D'Qla

Sun rings painted glaring, yellow-white rainbows across the barren landscape.  Stephen April sat on a spur of brown rock, in the shadow between two shafts of the moving luminescence.  The rock beneath him was hard, and warm.  He lifted his face to the sky, a sky devoid of stars, full of a diffuse molten light, split by metal bands curving across the horizon.

It was a unique structure, left over by some extinct alien race on a planet in the Romulan Neutral Zone – former neutral zone, he reminded himself – yet only one among many, in the galaxy's diverse wonders of architectural monuments.  Their purpose was mundane – probably the only reason the old Romulan militants hadn't targeted this planet.  But the sight, dominating the sky, left an impression not easily forgotten.  The engineering was nothing short of astronomical.  Quantum-dating indicated centuries went into their construction – an alien equivalent of the Egyptian pyramids.  Scholars once thought they had been of Iconian origin, but that had been disproved.

In seconds, the light-strip moving towards him would touch his body.  Were this Horuulk, the real planet, he would be exposed to a lethal dose of ultraviolet radiation – the planet lacked an ozone – and die in seconds.

After being promoted to admiral, he used to watch ships passing in space, from starbase viewports, or via holofeed in his office on Earth.  The ships represented something in him.  He made himself represent something, in them, in turn.  He wrapped himself up in them, all of his feelings and emotions, until they became those things – those feelings, those emotions.  Hopes, dreams, angst, nightmares.

He watched the approaching column of sun-glare, waited, felt the heat and squinted.  Brilliant light assailed his optical nerves.  Instinctively, he looked away.

From one holodeck to another.  Once, he could have deactivated the holodeck's fail-safes – before the forced, lateral redesign of all ships' internal systems, preventing such reckless behavior – and experienced a true-to-life simulation.  But it still would not be the real thing.  Real death, fake killer.  Death by unreality.

Reality... unreality... That line blurred more and more, lately.  Every day.  And lately, he could handle neither.  Stumble... fall... get back up again... stumble... fall.  Why did this happen to him?  Why was he so weak?  He couldn't even enjoy this simple pleasure.

Brenda was swimming in the pool on deck 15.  Tabatha probably would not have restricted him from joining her, but he needed to be alone.  He had always been a loner.  Being Stephen April constituted a solo act.  An everlasting walk on a very thin tightrope.

With holographic interfacing, he thought he would enjoy some quiet time on the holodeck, like he used to, and simultaneously monitor the away team's progress.  They had left the lander, and were traveling by hoverdisc towards a valley, where the Memiklon representative he was supposed to have met would intercept them, and guide them the rest of the way.  His com-link extended to the rest of the team – those who had complants – whether or not they realized it.  Complants were becoming increasingly popular due to their obvious advantages over previous, traditional communicators, but some feared the devices as too Borg-like – as if they would allow a form of mind-control, or an intimacy beyond personal comfort levels, depending on the individual.  So far, he had only heard from Rampart.  April knew Hendriksson and Davalos had them; he wasn't sure about Science or Nyerko.

Nyerko.  Seeing her was seeing into a window on the past.  A younger Eve Ordalani.  That manifested forgotten memories and feelings, of distant times, distant places, reminding him of another Bartokian security officer, newly arrived... which served only to further demount him from his bearings.  Finding her on his ship, of all places, of all places, should not have surprised him.  In a way, it didn't, now.  He wondered how much of Eve resided in her.  Maybe too much.  Maybe not enough.

He thought of his analogy to Brenda, of being a character in a story, and discerned how preposterous it was.  A story had direction, a plot, a purpose.  Beginning, middle, and end, with clear character motivations along the way.  But this was not a story.  This was real life.  Things didn't always make sense in real life.

He climbed to his feet.

He looked at the wolf, having forgotten, momentarily, that it was there – wishing it would leave him alone.  The wolf sat down, not taking it personally.

"What are you supposed to be?"

"You're supposed to be my spiritual guide.  Look at me.  Look at the state of my spirit.  You're doing a bang-up job."  He waved the creature off, winding across the rocky, uneven ground.

When he glanced over his shoulder, the wolf was still there.  It had gotten up, and was following him.  "Go away.  Leave me alone.  You aren't real.  I'm not in the mood for figments of imagination or talking animals."

The nanites.  They did something to his brain... opened new connections....  Where was it coming from?  He didn't even have to think; it just came to him.  "Are you the... form, or the messenger, of the nanites, trying to communicate?"

The wolf panted, watching him.

No, somehow that was too simple.  Too rational.  It defied his scientific perceptions, and in that lay the heart of the mystery, the key to the puzzle.  It didn't make sense.  That was why it made sense.  If only he could put it together....

"Not just the nanites."  He walked in a circle, gesturing with his hands, trying to mentally assemble the pieces and fragments.  "Hon Jurmol... that... holo-language I saw, on deck seven..."  It was starting to make sense – almost.  Almost.  It was keyed to M'Dli, and that alien city, and this galactic restructuring, across the universe... and the Shapers, in a far, far distant future....  "And before that," April continued, nodding to himself, "in Stellar Cartography... Somehow it all ties together.  But how?  Why?"  He whirled on the wolf.  "Why?  What does it mean?"

It was a mystery.

Once, space excited him.  It was so dark.  So wide open.  So warm, and vast.  So... not empty, but the space between the stars, and planets, that mind-numbing gulf starships leaped daily... Empty wasn't the word.  Scary.  Lonely.  It was a scary, dark, lonely, emptiness.

It was the space inside of him.  It terrified him.  Strange, how such things never terrified a younger man.  But he wasn't a younger man.  Nothing felt right anymore.

Space.  The universe.  The final frontier.  He wandered through the stars.  The stars whispered, reciting chants and prayers and dreams.  They waited.  They echoed unfulfilled promises and ambitions, the peace of satisfaction at the end of a long and weary road.  They wanted him.  They wanted to be known, and for him to know them.

And still he wandered.

It was difficult to see which was the diversion, or more diversive – the fake planet, or the fake counselor.  Two ships circling in an ocean of personal chaos.

He thought his head would explode.  There was so much there, within, bubbling, seething, hungry to get out.  The universe sat, complete and self-contained, inside of him, and he was out of touch... out of contact.  How could life be so unfair?  Why did it deny him?  Always teasing, hinting, of something... something out there, at the end, beyond everything, calling to him, and he could not find it.  He could not go there.  Life trapped him in this tiny little corner of the universe, his life, his brief window of time... tortured and tormented, looking through the glass.  But looking for what?  He did not know what he was seeing.  Life.  The stars.  Broken promises.  Empty dreams.  The stars shined for him.  But they lied.

Trapped between this latest personal crisis, and not knowing what to do, was driving him mad.  What was happening to him?  He was being remade.  How exciting and terrifying at once.  And yet he felt neutral, cold, dead already, unfascinated.  No hope of resuscitation.

Being remade.  It might as well have been the same thing as saying, he was dying.  Being reborn.

What did that mean for him, for Brenda, for Starfleet, for... anyone?  For everyone, and everything...?  What did it mean for his future, if he had no future?  It nestled like a bug inside of his brain, squirming and restless, an itch he could not scratch... a thorn in his soul.  At times like this, he wished he could call on Milla, that woman who had been made a part of the Q-Continuum.  With one snap of her fingers... or in Milla's case, a pucker of her lips... she could rid him of this.  Of course, that would be too easy.  He had heard that she had been returned to being human.  If that was true, then she would be of no help anyway.

He was an aberration.  A deviant.  This preoccupation with death and depression, this negative outlook, was not healthy.  Yet it wasn't what it seemed, on the surface.  It represented lack of fulfillment.  The mysterious unknown, always calling to him, never to be revealed.  It was maddening, absolutely maddening.

A mystery.  He needed that, at a time like this.  If anything could take his mind off of.... No, nothing could take his mind off it, not completely, never, no.  But at least it gave him something to do, while he fluttered, a loose leaf on the winds of fate.

B'Eryn had visited Chromus.  It didn't exactly go well.  While the away team launched to Memiklon's surface, B'Eryn was making her report to April.  She then inquired when he, April, wanted to see her.  Turned out Brisk had ordered counseling for April also, on Rampart's recommendation.

He didn't look forward to it.  He had come to the holodeck to sort out his thoughts in a little experiment – first conjuring Horuulk, to take his mind off of it, gain some objectivity before he started.  He wanted to go in with a clean perspective.

That wasn't working out well, either.  The computer knew how B'Eryn would act... or, at least, believed it knew.

The Klingon woman sat in a large chair, as she did in the counseling office – her office, since she was now, again, the only counselor on board, after Nacin's reassignment.  Yet it was not her office.  Horuulk was gone; the black-and-silver hologrid lines remained.

"I've never seen you so distraught," she said, fixing him with her Klingon stare.  "Why are you so full of anger?"

April knew counselors – recognized their tactics.  He could sense their prying claws, psychological sharp, trying to cleanly get inside and lay bare one's brain, and analyze, analyze, analyze.  He knew they were meant to help, but in his mood, he didn't want to be 'helped'.  It was just more questions, and he was fed up with questions.  Enough questions.  He wanted what he didn't have.  He wanted answers.

He didn't know if it was her fierce calm, or his own inner turmoil and irritation wavering all over the board, but her responses irritated him.  Was this how the real B'Eryn did things?  Maybe the computer didn't know her accurately.  Otherwise, he really didn't look forward to seeing her.

He didn't want to hear any more psychobabble.  This wasn't real.  None of this was real.  It was just a waste of time.  Repulsed at the silliness of this, and at his own weakness, he got up.  "End program."

He experienced this same ordeal almost every year, at nearly regular intervals.  A cycle of questioning, self-doubt, worry, caught on the scales of esteem versus low esteem, and the scales tipped back and forth constantly, this way, then back that way, then the other....  Quite frankly, he was sick of it.  He was sick of being who he was.  He wanted to be someone else, somewhere else... How many times had he said that?  Thought it?  But then, as now, there was just no escaping one's self.  "No matter where you go, there you are", as the saying went.  Next year, if he survived until then (and somehow he always did), he would be going through this again, he was sure.  And the year after that, and the year after that.  It just never ended.  Why couldn't he simply be happy with who he was, with his limitations?

He used to watch holo-recordings of Neria.  After a while, he stopped.  They still resided in the Federation datagrid, privy to his personal access code, but he had not watched them since he had returned to Earth, after accepting promotion.  He couldn't.  It was too painful.  Twice he tried to erase them, and remove all evidence of his daughter from permanent records, as if she never was.  He couldn't bring himself to do that either.  How many people knew Neria April had existed?  She was there, in the memory banks, for those who stumbled onto her.  But no one looked for her.  No one knew, or would likely care.  They didn't know her.  They didn't, wouldn't, couldn't know her, like he did.  She lived on only in his memory – the memory of her own father... he who had tried to deny her, to deny her life, and he couldn't stand it, either way.

The future was so uncertain.  No... That was wrong.  There was nothing certain about it at all.  The future had never been certain.  He just didn't know that, until now.  He didn't know what the future held.  At all.  Once he thought he did – thought he had an inkling; it felt sure enough to make sense, it had to be real... But it was a convenient lie.  He had bought into it, wanting to believe it.  For most of his life, he did believe – in a hopeful future, a haven of light and promise and optimism, a Federation that would endure for centuries, maybe millennia.

All of the "nobility" in concept, governing the Federation, was a sham, a slew of policies wrapped up in hopes and treaties and desires and wishful thinking – he saw that now – statesmen trying to set an example to the masses, and show them the way, the way things could be, should be, and, they believed, that if they crammed it down enough people's throats, would be... if only they could make everyone believe.  But it was all just window dressing.  A mask, for how those who ran the Federation wanted the Federation to be.  A lie made up to convince people like him, who wanted to believe it.

What was Hon Jurmol's holo-language?  It was hypnosis.  An eye opener.  The universe was information.  Code.  A language.  It could be written, it could be communicated, it could be spoken and shared.  His holo-derivative keyed the hidden message in their genetic codes, and the nanites in his body were acting on it.  Yet it was more.  So much, much more.

He was dying.  Evolving.  What he would be, whatever he would become, he did not know, but the man known as Stephen April would die.  As Neria lived on, a mere memory, he would become a latent part of the background information of the universe.  He tried to look on the bright side: At least he wouldn't be a mass of decaying, rotting cells in a hole in the ground, somewhere, or discorporated molecules, stripped down to subatomic particles inside a solar furnace.

As the wolf said: When he was ready to understand... he would.

B'Eryn vanished, along with her chair and the chair in which April sat.  He stood staring at the floor, collecting himself.  It was about time for the 'real' deal.

He was dismayed, when he turned and saw the Klingon woman standing there.

"Sorry, Admiral – I didn't mean to startle you."  B'Eryn took a few steps across the black-and-silver grid, eyeing the spot where her holo-duplicate had sat.  She had on a variant of the standard uniform, with a sleeveless jacket, allowing her teal-wrapped arms to show.  "You might be surprised at how common it is, for some people, to 'rehearse' counseling sessions on the holodeck, before seeing a real counselor.  As if it's a test, and they need to have all the right answers ahead of time."  She looked at him, noting his curious gaze.  "I have a program set up to flag me whenever someone utilizes my form on the holodeck.  I never thought you'd be one to use it."

"I've... rarely needed counseling," April tried to explain.

B'Eryn nodded knowingly.  "No one likes to admit that they need a counselor.  Which, when you think about it, is why Starfleet created the position aboard starships."  She checked her wrist-chronometer.  "Your appointment starts in five minutes."  She offered a friendly grin, showing jagged Klingon teeth.  "You can still make it."

"I... don't know what to say."

"I see.  But you had no problem opening up to a holodeck character?"

"That was different."

"Because it was a simulacrum?  If I may ask, Admiral, respectfully... What are you afraid of?  No one is going to judge you.  I'm only here to help."

April studied her Klingon features then looked at the far wall.  "I just don't see the point, really.  Nothing's going to change."

"Then it won't hurt to try."  B'Eryn licked her lips and said, "You're not allowed to refuse a counseling appointment, Admiral... as you well know.  I don't think it would be a good idea, if you could.  Obviously something is bothering you.  I can help you to bring it out and to face it, if you'll let me.  Would you care to sit down and discuss it here?  We don't have to go back to my office."

"Uh... no, that's okay.  Let's... conserve holodeck use."  He gestured to the door.  "After you."

"As you wish."

It hurt to see pain on someone's face.  You have to know pain, to see it.  You have to be able to feel it yourself.  Was it an anachronism of the enlightened 24th century age? – when no one wanted for anything, where everyone could have all, and there was no hunger, no starvation, very little crime except when it was fashionable, much less disease, and war only when primitive foreign savages attacked... – that in this place, where no one was supposed to hurt or suffer, some still did?  Or was Stephen April a freak, a physiological anomaly whose aberrant genes dredged up feelings supposed to be long forgotten?

Sometimes he thought that had to be it.  He battled with his pain every single day, and never truly understood why he felt it.

But he felt it.  He had seen it, reflected in Cadie's lovely, tanned face, when she confronted him in a corridor, showing him a recorded conversation she thought should interest him.

"...I love you, Stephen," she had told him.  "The way I thought you loved me.  You've betrayed that," she said on a bitter note, "but I haven't forgotten."

April debated taking a step around her.  He really didn't have time for this.

Sensing his intent, she blurted, "You are the sun, the moon and the stars to me."

April blinked.  "What?"

"That's what you said to me.  Tell me you remember."

It kept coming back to that.  "Cadie..."

"Why did you marry her?  How can you do that to me?"

April sighed.  "Cadie... I'm human.  I'm organic.  You... Despite how far you've come, you're still just a machine."

"'Just a machine'?" she repeated, incredulous.

"Don't take it the wrong way.  I don't mean that to belittle you.  But we're just... We're different."

"Why do you have to think that?  Organics are machines of another variety.  So what if I'm made of steel and circuits, and I have superconducting energy for blood.  I'm still aware.  I still feel.  Why can't an organic and a machine love each other?"

"Did you expect us to be husband and wife, someday?"

"Husband, wife... Those are just words, Stephen.  Labels."

"They're more than that, actually.  They're symbolic.  It's their symbolism, what they represent, that matters."

"Okay.  Fine.  I have another word for you.  How about commitment.  I thought we were committed to one another."

"Cadie... I am committed to you, in what I do.  I'm an explorer."

"So I'm just a ride, is that it?  A means of getting around?"

He reached up with a gentle touch to her face.  "You're the only one I can share this with."

"So why did you marry her?"

"Because there's another part of me that needs something else – and she's the only one who can share that with me."

"That?" she said suspiciously.

"No, not that that.  But—"  April's hand fell.  He let it fall.  "Look, Cadie.  You're machine... I'm human.  We're different.  That's just the way it is, and that's the way it's always going to be.  Exploration is what we have in common.  That's our unifying factor."

She was better than the hologram.  And that made it much worse.  Somehow, she had gotten to him, quickly, cleanly and efficiently.

"I wish I wasn't Stephen April.  I wish that I could... be not who I think I am.  I wish I was someone else – something else, some other kind of man.  I wish..."

It was no use.  He slumped forward in the chair, leaning his elbows on his thighs.

He was glad B'Eryn wasn't a member of the warrior caste.  She had gotten him to spill his guts without even thinking about it.  Come to think of it, Hon Jurmol and the other Klingons on board proved, equally well, why Klingons were so formidable, no matter what their occupation.

"I don't know what to do," he said.  "I feel like I am somebody else, I've changed so much.  Like I snatched up the personality from one of those alternates and brought it back with me.  Like it supplanted me, and my true self has been lost."

B'Eryn's head tilted at mention of 'alternates'.  April's tales of having traveled the multiverse were known to a few.  Most did not believe it possible; it would have required him to live eons, to encounter so many different timelines... as he claimed.  He also claimed to have forgotten most of them, that it was simply too much information for a human brain to hold – which made it merely incidental to his discourse.  She let him continue, holding her silence.

"But..."  April shrugged, shaking his head.  "That isn't the case.  I am who I am."  He held up his hands.  Desperate, futile emotions overwhelmed him.  "This... is what I've become.  What do I do?  I feel lost."  All of it became too much.  He broke down.  "Please... please, help me.  Help me to find my way."  Tears streamed from his eyes; he slid off the chair, the final traces of strength running out of him, squatting on his knees, staring into nothing.

"Your subconscious is telling you what's wrong," B'Eryn said, gently.  "Listen to it."

He stared at her, incredulous.  He was again glad, that she was who she was – a counselor, over being a Klingon...a Klingon with compassion.  Any other Klingon might have pulled a knife and gutted him out of sheer disgust.  "You're not going to call sickbay?  Or security?  Have them lock me up as unstable?"

B'Eryn touched him, felt the tension in him and drew back.  "That is one recommended reaction.  But I've always thought it... an arrogant attitude – Federation idealism, meaning the best, but at its worst.  No, I won't.  I'm a counselor.  I am supposed to help.  You just need to be honest with me, and with yourself.  But let me tell you, sir... Stephen, if I may call you that... honestly... I believe everyone should listen to the subconscious voices inside of them.  They tell us what is right, and wrong, and what we need.  They guide us.  As I said, perhaps you should listen to yours."

April wondered if she knew more than he realized.  He shook his head.  "What mine is telling me is... is not good."

"What is it telling you?"

"That I need to escape.  This world... this life."

"And go where?"

"I've asked myself that question, a hundred thousand times... Where could I possibly go that would be any different from where I've been?  Every universe... for all of their differences, every universe is the same.  Just more of the same.  Every universe, every life..."  He made clutching motions at his head.  "I am trapped in a vicious, never-ending, revolving circle... Trapped with myself.  I can't step out of myself.  I can't stop being me!  What do you do about something like that?  How do you stop being yourself?  I am just so... frustrated."  He threw up his hands, feeling the urge to apologize again.  He was doing that a lot lately.  "I'm... I'm sorry.  I'm just so... I feel so much pressure.  I'd like to think I can handle anything... and I can, in certain circumstances—"  Although that wasn't anything.  "—except the pressure I put on myself, apparently."

"I understand," B'Eryn said.

"Sure you do."  A counselor would say that.

"I do," she insisted.  "Klingons have a word for it.  d'Qla.  It means short day."

April's frowned.  "I don't understand the context."

"It refers to weight... personal weight.  The pressure of responsibility, the overload when it becomes too much.  Klingons don't languish with doubt or personal guilt.  I'm lucky in that sense, for neither do I.  We don't carry emotional baggage for long.  So for us, it's d'Qla.  A short day."

"I thought you grew up on a Federation planet."

"I did.  But doesn't everyone know some Klingon?"  She grinned.  "Still, we aren't here to discuss Klingon etymology."  She eyed the padd in her hand, where she had been making notes.  "Let's go back to what you were telling me about the nanites.  Based on what you've said, and other reports, I have a theory... that the nanites may be fulfilling your subconscious desire."

"My desire?"  Of course, it wasn't bizarre.  Nothing was bizarre anymore, after all he'd been through.  Nothing new, or different, or, truthfully, unexpected.

"As I said, everyone has a subconscious voice which steers us.  It tells us what we need, and what we truly want."

"But..."  April tried to shake off the feeling deep inside, trying to tell him something... something he didn't want to hear, or refused to see.  Both.  "I don't want this...."

"Don't you?  If I may be bold, you've said it yourself, Admiral.  You wish to be someone else.  While some believe that the basic programming of our nanites can't be altered by any force of will, they do respond to our desires on a subconscious level.  That is in their programming.  This language you've described, the phenomenon affecting others around the ship, obviously alters perceptions.  The effects are... well, inexplicable.  In your case, I would guess that it's given you the ability to influence, consciously or subconsciously, the nanites' performance upon your system.  You are remaking yourself."

"Yes."  He agreed; he could not help but agree.  He suspected, knew so, already.  "But there's one problem.  This isn't what I want to be... I don't want to be like this," he repeated.  "Full of angst, and torment, and confusion..."

"Knowing you as I do, I would suggest that it's your ambivalence which is truly causing you pain.  You don't know what to make of it."

"My ambivalence?"

Why was he repeating everything she said?

B'Eryn nodded.  "You're scared.  You're having difficulty letting go of what's comfortable and familiar.  And that's perfectly understandable, after having devoted so much of your life to what you've known."

"So I should let go of my fear, and embrace it?"

"Possibly... but that has to be your decision.  We're obviously in need of more information on this phenomenon before we can make any final conclusions.  In the meantime, Admiral, you should try to relax.  Take a break."

"A break?  In the middle of a mission?"

"As soon as you can.  Do something with your wife... go on a date.  Seek some social interaction with the crew.  All of your worrying won't change anything, and it's only worsening your condition."