"That's the man who showed me that you were going to be old and wrinkled and ugly," said Kerin. "And.
and it upset me, and I didn't know how to deal with it, because I didn't think I could even look at you when you're old..." "And he told me that all you cared about was other women! That you'd never stop wanting them..." "Q!" said Picard angrily. "So you have been meddling after all, despite all your protests to the contrary!" "Is pointing out the truth meddling?" demanded Q. "Is doing these young people a favor meddling?
I ask you." "Kerin," said Picard, ignoring Q's protests for a moment. "Yes, in years to come, Sehra will age. So will you. That is inevitable.
What you don't understand is that you will grow old together and cherish those years. And when you behold her, you will not simply see some old woman, but instead the woman you've shared many long and joyous years of married life with. You will look at her with love.
And Sehra, yes... Kerin will doubtlessly look at other women. Being married doesn't mean that you stop noticing beauty. But if he were to lose his ability to appreciate the more beautiful things in life, then how could he possibly continue to cherish you? Cherish the beauty in your face and form, and the beauty in your heart?" "Oh, bravo, Picard!" Q said sardonically, clapping his hands in slow, sarcastic applause. "Bravo! Try to justify this nonsense as best you can, and it will all boil down to the simple truth that the human concept of love is a total sham." Lwaxana came towards him, her dark eyes concerned. "Q, I don't understand what you're saying--" He shot a look at her. "Woman, you could attend me for a thousand lifetimes and still barely begin to grasp the subtleties of my greatness." Lwaxana gasped and stepped back, thunderstruck, her hand to her breast.
"Is this why you've come then, Q?" demanded Picard.
"Of course, Picard!" sneered Q. "The entire ship was filled with spirits of love, love, love. It was nauseating. You humans are so obsessed with love. You're always looking for it, or you're in it or out of it. Or you're singing about it, or writing poems about it. So I decided to examine it, to see just how durable this supposedly most enduring of emotions is." Picard came around the table to face Q.
All of his fury and energy was directed towards Q, towards this unknowable being who presumed to judge humanity in all its aspects. "In the cause of love, civilizations have risen. For lack of love, civilizations have crumbled. It's the most glorious and ennobling emotion of humanity." "Then humanity is in even worse trouble than I surmised," Q told him. "Your most glorious emotion? My dear Jean-Luc, it's your most positively ludicrous! It's selfish and self-directed. Possessive and spiteful. It encompasses everything that you humans are always claiming that you're above, and yet it's cloaked in this charming storybook idea that people loving each other is a good thing. You think that your race surviving war is your greatest achievement?
Nonsense! It's that your race has survived love, the most overblown, ridiculous excuse for a positive emotion that any race has ever encountered." Lwaxana was ghastly white, as if her soul had been ripped open. "I... I don't understand... you said..." Q rudely blew air from between his lips.
"Are you deaf and stupid, woman? How painfully clear do I have to make matters for you?" "Stop it!" said Deanna. "Leave her alone!" "Q, get out of here!" snapped Picard.
But Q ignored them. Instead he walked down the length of the conference room table, towards Lwaxana. Every step was swaggering arrogance.
"Oh, of course. I forgot to add self-deception to the list." He laughed once, that ugly, unholy sound. He hunkered down to bring himself on eye level with the ashen Lwaxana Troi. "Woman, you have been, and always shall be, merely another bit of data for my study.
Another rat to go running through the maze. I wanted to see how, in the name of love, you would interact with your precious daughter and vice-versa. I wanted to see if this wonderful emotion would blind you to everything that was dictated by common sense. And it did! How splendid." "You love me!" said Lwaxana, desperately, urgently.
"And still you continue! This is excellent. You're more self-involved than I thought. So much so that you ignored the advice of the daughter you love and the people you respect, just so you could fall in love with a being you just met and who every other person you encountered claimed had no capacity for love. They were right, dear Lwaxana. You are nothing to me. Humans are nothing to me, except when sometimes they can provide me with some amusement. And you, Lwaxana," Q's voice fell to a sarcastic, harsh whisper, "you have provided me with the most amusement of all. Thank you very, very much, you ignorant cow." Lwaxana sank to a chair.
"Q, I am telling you to leave," said Picard.
"A joke," Lwaxana murmured. "It's all been a joke. A scheme. An experiment." "I hardly think you're in a position to issue commands to me, Picard," Q said.
"He gave me the Q powers," Lwaxana said evenly.
"I am in a position, and my command is for you to leave. Now!" "He gave me the powers of the Q," Lwaxana said more loudly, and she looked up.
There was something in her face. Something unpleasant.
Something dangerous.
Deanna took her by the shoulders and said urgently, "Mother, let's go--" "A joke," and now when Lwaxana spoke, it was with a voice that sounded like thunder rumbling over the tops of mountains. "A plot to deliberately humiliate me. And you gave me the power of the Q..." "An interesting wrinkle, I'll admit," said Q. "I wanted to see if you'd choose power over the love of your daughter. For you would have lost that love, woman. In a shorter time than you can imagine, they would have come to hate and distrust you as much as they do me. So imagine my lack of surprise when you chose power." "Power in order to be near you!" she said.
"Power out of love for you, you ungrateful, no-good..." Sounding bored, Q said, "Your name calling is meaningless to me. I'm above such things. This little experiment is over. Love does not conquer all.
Only conquest conquers all. Only the kind of power that is generated by weapons and strength, not by the pointless display of a useless emotion." Lwaxana clenched her fists. "You used me!
You made me look like a fool!" "Nature did that," said Q. "I simply gave you an audience." Her entire body trembled in mortification and shock. And then came a scream, the sort of agonized scream of a fury to which hell had nothing remotely comparable. The fury of a woman scorned.
"Very impressive, Lwaxana," said Q.
"Now, if you don't mind, I'll retrieve my powers and be on my way." Her face darkened, her body stiffened. With a slow, measured tread she started towards him, her fists clenched.
And Q blinked in surprise. "Lwaxana, give me the powers back. You cannot keep them." Lwaxana was seething, the air crackling around her.
"Mother?" said Deanna nervously.
No less nervous, suddenly, was Q. He stretched out a hand as if yanking something away.
Instead there was a sound like energy building up.
"Lwaxana," said Q, looking decidedly less sure of himself. "I don't know what you're doing, or how you're doing it. But you can't have those powers anymore. You can't resist me.
Lwaxana! You're making me angry! And since I'm above human emotions that's not possible." He strode towards her, trying to look confident. "So before this goes on any further, give them back to me--now! This is my last word on the subject!" Lwaxana Troi blew him through a bulkhead.
Chapter Twenty-five
The bridge shuddered as Data suddenly called out, "Hull integrity breach! In the conference lounge." Burnside looked up from her station in surprise. "What? Are we under attack?!" "Apparently," said Data, "the impact was from the inside out." He rechecked his instruments. "The breach has just been repaired." "Look!" called out Wesley Crusher, pointing at the screen.
Q was floating in front of them, spinning around, looking confused and dazed.
"Someone outside?" said Chafin, utterly nonchalant by this time. "That old chestnut again."
"Mother!" said Deanna in shock.
Picard took a step forward. "Lwaxana," he began.
She spun and Picard saw the look in her eyes. He took a step back and began again, "Lwaxana..." She didn't hear him. She was beyond hearing, beyond caring. The only thing she was able to hear was Q's mocking tone. The only thing she could see was his sneering face. The only thing she could do was go after him. And she did.
In an eyeblink she was outside the ship, behind him. "Q!" she shouted, and naturally he heard her. He turned and Lwaxana's arms extended wide. Energy leaped from them and enveloped Q.
He shrieked, twisting and writhing in space, his body snapping about like a stringed puppet.
He flipped backwards and vanished.
"You can run, but you can't hide!" shouted Lwaxana Troi, and vanished as well.
Graziunas and Nistral looked at Picard in astonishment.
Picard shrugged gamefully. "Lover's quarrel," he said.
Q dashed down outside of the right nacelle like a sprinter. Lwaxana was right after him.
He spun, took a stand. "Lwaxana!" he bellowed. "I don't know how you're doing this! But I want those powers back!" "How am I doing it?" She advanced on him.
"You gave me powers equalling your own. But my mind was already superior to yours, and you heightened it that much further when you empowered me." "Your mind was never superior to mine! No human mind can be superior to mine!" "This is no human mind!" she screeched.
"This is the mind of a daughter of the Fifth House!" She reached out and she didn't even have to touch him as she brought her hands down. Q was smashed right through the warp nacelle.
There was pandemonium in the engine room. Q had just hurtled down into the matterstantimatter mix. Alarms were sounding and technicians were running every which way. Geordi was madly trying to shut down all power on the ship, because in ten seconds everything was going to blow.
Q staggered out of the containment area, miraculously leaving all the radiation behind him.
He looked dazed, punchy.
A hand clamped down on his shoulder, and from behind a deadly voice continued, "Holder of the Sacred Chalice of Riix!" He turned and Lwaxana swung a right cross that smashed him through the nearest wall. With a gesture she repaired it, and the damage to the mix. Just as quickly as the danger had arisen, it was past.
Q was running, tearing headlong down a corridor. He was desperately watching behind his shoulder, and so ran straight into a fierce kick to the crotch. He went down, gasping.
Lwaxana stood over him, boiling mad. She kicked him over and over for emphasis as he twisted on the floor, trying to get away, as she bellowed, "And keeper [kick] of the Holy [kick] Rings [kick] of Betazed!" and she booted him once more, sending him skidding down the corridor.
Picard, Riker, Worf and Data barreled down a corridor, following the trail of carnage. To their shock, Q came running from the other direction. He skidded to a halt and shouted, "Warn her, Picard! Warn her that she cannot treat me in this manner! She's unleashing forces she doesn't understand!" "She hasn't listened to me since this whole business started," said Picard calmly. "What makes you think she'll listen now?" Suddenly Q vanished.
They looked around, certain that he had dematerialized once more, and then abruptly they heard a high-pitched cry of alarm. They looked down.
Q was six inches tall. He was running around on the floor, shaking his teeny fists in impotent fury.
Lwaxana burst into existence above him.
"Hello, darling!" she snarled, and brought her foot down.
Q ran frantically, right and left, dodging the pounding feet. "Picard!" he howled in soprano. "Picard!" She suddenly reached down and grabbed him up.
"Got you!" she snarled, and vanished.
The Enterprise officers looked at each other.
"She's really beating the stuffing out of him," observed Riker. "What do you think we should do?" "Sell tickets," rumbled Worf.
Everyone else had left the conference lounge except for Kerin and Sehra. They sat there, holding each other's hands, and Sehra said, "I'm so proud of you." "If I'd injured you... gods, I can't even imagine it. I should never have doubted us.
Doubted anything. I'm sorry for everything. Will you give me another chance?" "If you will for me." "Of course I will." He grinned. "Isn't being in love wonderful?"
"Computer," said Picard, "locate Lwaxana Troi." "Lwaxana Troi is in the rocketball court." Riker blinked in surprise. "What's she doing there?"
Lwaxana swung the glowing paddle with confidence and smashed Q against the wall.
He ricocheted off it and spun backwards, out of control. Lwaxana was waiting for him andwitha brisk backhand, whacked the miniature god again. He screamed as he careened once more into the wall.
