Scene 9

            “Now that you have met all the teachers and doctors aboard who have been here three years or less, do you have any initial impressions?” Deanna asked Jarod.

            Jarod put his elbow on the arm of his chair and considered her. He had never yet explained to someone just how he put himself into the mind of another person. He had developed his gift with Sydney, the psychiatrist training him in it as much as he discovered himself. If he had ever felt like thanking Sydney for his work, it would have been for that. But he had never worked so closely with someone from the beginning of a Pretend as he was working with Deanna. There was very little he could keep from her. Bare facts that would put him in the brig if known, yes. But none of the emotions that he felt for himself and for others. He could not hide from her his ability to feel what his prey was feeling.

            He steepled his fingers in a way, though he did not know it, that made him look more like a Vulcan than ever. “You think I’m an empath. Well, I’m not. Not like you. Not like—” He’d almost said Angelo. “Not like a telepath. I must use my imagination. I imagine how it must have been, and from that I deduce how it was. My talent is in that I am nearly always right.”

            “Sherlock Holmes,” she murmured with a grin.

            “Sherlock—Holmes? An intriguing name.”

            “You know Austen, but you don’t know Sherlock Holmes?”

            “My reading has been…sporadic.”

            “Data is our Holmes expert, Jarod. If you find yourself with spare time, you must ask him to introduce you.”

            “Introduce me. To…Sherlock Holmes?”

            “On the holodeck.”

            “Oh, the holodeck. I look forward to that. But to answer your question, I have received some interesting impressions from certain of the teachers and doctors. I can see things in their interactions that give me reason to ponder why I would act in this or that way if I were they. Now tell me, Counselor: knowing what you now know, how do you interpret the emotions you feel from the people under my surveillance?”

            “It can be difficult,” she admitted. “Each emotion from each person is different, and I cannot always interpret their meanings. The same level of anger from two different people may mean two entirely different things. It may also mean two entirely different things within a single person at different moments or even at the same time.”

            “I know,” he said quietly and accepted the sudden glance she gave him.

            “I have to be careful not to let what I presume about a person influence how I interpret his feelings. I must not presume that just because a person is hiding something it must mean he is dangerous, a traitor, or a liar. We all hide things. I often learn things that have no bearing on the task at hand, and it is not at that time my task to uncover them. I am sure it must be the same with your work.”

            He felt a sudden rush of gratitude to her that he knew he could not hide from her. “It is.”

            “In addition, there are also a very few people I cannot feel, or cannot feel clearly.”

            Jarod slowly sat up straight. “There are?”

            “Certainly. Certain races, usually the telepathic ones, have some ability to mask their emotions, like Vulcans. Others, like the Qinar, simply have such incompatible brainwave patterns that I do not sense them at all, as if we are in two different dimensions.”

            “You mention Vulcans and Qinar specifically. There is a Vulcan teacher, Sirok, and a Qinar nurse, Onatah.”

            “There is also a teacher, Thato, a Spoun, another race I cannot feel. What is it, Jarod?”

            “If you were going to place a secret operative aboard a starship with a Betazoid empath, wouldn’t it be logical to choose an operative that Betazoid cannot read?”

            “Yes, it would,” she slowly answered.

            “In addition, those three are among the crewmembers I have decided to observe more closely.”

            Deanna made a grimace. “This means I can’t help you.”

            Jarod smiled. “You already have, Deanna. It is unusual for me to have such help. I usually work alone in the beginning.”

            “You do not need to work alone here, Jarod. You have support.”

            His smile had pain in it. “I appreciate it.”

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Scene 10

            Jarod opened up the silver case and slid a small, round disc into its slot. On the case’s screen in black and white was his young self, about ten years old, the young man Sydney, and the words JAROD. FOR CENTRE USE ONLY. He had recently finished a simulation dealing with Irish terrorists and was debriefing with his handler. As usual, he was posing as many questions as answers. Hadn’t it ever occurred to Sydney that it wasn’t right to make a child solve the problems of terrorists?

            “Is there a God, Sydney?”

            Sydney, as normal, managed to look unsurprised by the question. “Why do you ask, Jarod?”

            “Because of all those Irish people, Protestants and Catholics, killing each other, in part over their beliefs about God. But their beliefs are so similar. Is there a God?”

            “I don’t know, Jarod. What do you think?”

            “I don’t know either. So many people think there is. All those people killing each other in the simulation think there is. So many people have something inside them that needs to think there is. What does it mean?”

            “That is a question no psychiatrist or philosopher has ever been able to answer, Jarod.”

            “If people need a God, there should be a God. Isn’t that logical? And if there is a God, he shouldn’t let people kill each other. Or die in plane crashes like my parents.”

            Jarod snapped off the DSA recording. “Or be kidnapped from their parents and raised in captivity. Why do these things happen? Why? Isn’t there anything out there that cares?”

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Scene 11

            “Where’s Cousin It?” Miss Parker said instead of “Good morning.” The day she gave a commonplace, civilized greeting was the day Broots would have a heart attack.

            “Angelo seems to be in hiding today,” Sydney answered.

            “Yeah,” Broots chuckled. “Mr. Raines is in a fury that they can’t find him. He has some sort of special project.” He stopped with a gulp. Mr. Raines’ ‘special projects’ were never a laughing matter, as Angelo himself was a testimony.

            Miss Parker’s lips compressed. As much as she reserved her own right to push Angelo around and call him names like “Jello-Brains,” she, too, had felt all the horror of what Mr. Raines had done to him. Broots was still scared to death of her, but he had had enough peeks inside her carefully constructed shell to know that her bark and her bite were often mere show. Still, she did bite.

            “Anyway,” he said, “I don’t think there’s any more Angelo can tell us.”

            She put her face down close to his ear. “That means,” she answered in her soft, silky voice, the one that meant she was about to shout at him, “that we are only waiting for you. I am sick and tired of constantly being a step behind Jarod! I am beginning to suspect that you want Jarod to escape!”

            “No—no—” he stuttered, even while a tiny part of his brain considered that as a viable option. A very tiny part. “He’s a genius, Miss Parker. He’s outwitted us a hundred times. Hey, what’s the possibility that this machine is a red herring?”

            “It’s not,” Sydney said. “Jarod’s red herrings are never really red herrings. They always mean something. Even if they send us astray, they are always a means of reaching out to us. Jarod needs us.”

            “Needs us, Syd?” Miss Parker snapped. “We are chasing him. He knows full well that I am going to shoot him someday.”

            “Until he finds his family, we are the only family he has. You, me, Broots, Angelo. He has always reached out to us, even when we pushed him away—or threatened to kill him.”

            As it did at very unexpected times, Miss Parker’s face softened as she looked at him. She didn’t say what was there for her to say, that she knew Sydney regretted pushing Jarod away. Instead she said, “Then it’s a pity he hates us as much as he needs us. As long as he hates us, it will take me shooting him to bring him in.” Jerking out a cigarette, she stalked away.

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Scene 12

            “Captain! Intruder alert!” Worf called out. “Jeffries tube 42—no—wait. Captain, I seem to be having instrument malfunctions.”

            “Which is it, Mr. Worf?”

            He scowled at his instruments. “I am not sure, sir. I thought I read a transporter signal in the Jeffries tube, but it instantly faded, and there is no sign of any intruder.”

            “Dispatch a security team there and give your instruments a complete diagnostic.”

            “Yes, Captain.”

            “Captain,” Data said, “it is possible that our proximity to the new star system may affect our instruments.”

            “Thank you, Mr. Data. Do whatever you can to correct for it. Inform all sections as to any possible malfunctions.”

            “Yes, Captain. We will be within sensor range of the star system in five-point-two minutes, sir.”

            “Inform Commander Westmore and invite him to the bridge.”

            “Yes, sir.”

            Jarod seemed to have spent as much time playing as he did working. With the children he was a great favorite, and he spent time with them even when he was not teaching. He had taken part in a short Sherlock Holmes holodeck program with Data, where he had solved the mystery almost as quickly as Data did, and thereafter he was observed researching smoking pipes and taking up the violin. When he wasn’t researching the new star system with the science officers or teaching the children about it, he was in Engineering studying transport or holodeck technology with Geordi, learning Klingon sparring techniques from Worf, investigating various uses of the medical technology in Sickbay with Dr. Crusher, or having a Sumerian Sunset in Ten Forward with Guinan. It was as if, people thought, his whole life was about learning and absorbing everything about him.

            Now he bounded up to the bridge with a light of expectation in his eyes.

            “Commander Westmore, the stars you ordered,” Picard said with something of a quirk at the corners of his mouth.

            Jarod stood at the rail near Worf’s station and watched the distant glimmer of light in the viewscreen. When the star system was close enough to identify, he was smiling with wide eyes, his expression one of someone who has never seen such a thing before.

            “Commander Westmore?”

            “I’m sorry, Captain. It’s a beautiful sight, isn’t it?”

            “Yes, it is, Commander. You may take your position at Science Station 2. Technical information will come to you there, and then you may decide what you want to do with it. We do seem to be having some instrument malfunctions as a result of our proximity to the stars.”

            “Understood, Captain.”

            “Captain,” Worf broke in, “security reports no intruder detected.”

            “Intruder?” Jarod said sharply.

            “Most likely technical malfunctions, Commander,” the Klingon told him, “and not an actual intruder, but we’re checking it out anyway.”

            “Oh, I see.” He applied himself to his readouts. Data came to join him, and they conferred quietly.

            “Counselor, is anything the matter?” Picard asked. Jarod’s head came up, and he turned to gaze down over the edge of Worf’s console at them.

            “I am not certain, Captain,” Deanna answered. “I am sensing something odd—I can’t tell what it is. A presence, perhaps? Not quite; more like a disturbance in the landscape of emotion aboard the ship.”

            It did not occur to Data to wonder why Jarod’s hand clutched the edge of the console for a moment.

            Riker turned to look at Worf. “It seems a little coincidental that the internal sensors should pick up an intruder that isn’t there and that Counselor Troi should sense something that isn’t quite a presence.”

            “It does indeed,” the chief of security agreed. “I am running internal sweeps of the ship. Thus far it is not picking anything up. I am getting interference from the stars.”

            “Commander Data,” Picard said, “back the ship away until we get to the bottom of this. I’m sorry, Commander Westmore. Your project will have to be put on hold for a short time, just until we understand what is going on. As soon as we identify precisely what technical problems we may expect from our proximity to this system, we will know whether our peculiar readings have anything to do with it.”

            “I understand, Captain. I’ll take what information we have received and prepare an initial lesson for the children. Perhaps one of the teachers would like to help me.”

            “They have been ordered to give you every assistance you may need.”

            “Thank you, Captain.”

            As Jarod left the bridge, Picard began giving orders for special sensor sweeps for cloaked ships. They found nothing. Deanna examined herself and decided—perhaps—she had been imagining things.

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Scene 13

            Instead of going to the school area, Jarod went to his quarters. Turning on only one small light, he took out his jamming device, activated it, and set it on a table. He glanced around the darkened room. A shadow detached itself from a corner and moved toward him.

            Jarod wheeled around toward it. “Angelo?” He reached out and grabbed two shoulders, pulled them forward. “Angelo!” He gathered the faintly grinning empath up into a strong hug and felt himself being hugged back. It felt good. So good.

            “So you got here,” he smiled when he and his friend and ally released each other. “I thought you would figure out my machine, because you can figure out me. I’ve been expecting you for a long time. I wonder why I decided to leave it set for the Enterprise instead of San Francisco. It’s a little more dangerous. Well, at least this ship will be somewhat familiar. No lack of places to hide, just like at the Centre. Jeffries tubes, accessways… I can’t imagine you had much trouble finding me.”

            Angelo chuckled.

            “Now, listen to me, Angelo. You have to stay hidden. Don’t let anyone see you. I made a built-in sensor cloak in the machine that will keep you invisible to the ship’s sensors for some time, but you won’t be invisible to eyes. And there’s also Deanna.” He frowned. “I don’t want to deceive her. But if they find you before I’m done, they could find out everything, and that would be disaster. This captain and his first officer will not take kindly to someone masquerading as an officer on their ship and in their Starfleet. However, Deanna didn’t seem to understand what she was feeling when she felt you. Listen, Angelo. Stay near people, but hidden. Find out about them. Feel them; take on their persona. She might not detect you then.” He put out his hand to Angelo’s arm. “Angelo, find happy people. There are plenty of happy people on this ship. Learn what it’s like to feel true, unalloyed happiness. I have felt it once or twice. There is nothing like it in existence.”

            Angelo touched Jarod’s hand. “Jarod…happy here.”

            “Yes, yes, I am, Angelo. This is a good place. These people care for each other. They are interested in their work, and they are interested in what is good. We’ve known very little of that, haven’t we, Angelo? People who care for each other.”

            Angelo made an effort. “Angelo…care.”

            Jarod’s eyes went bright with spontaneous tears. “Oh, Angelo. I know you do. You give me such a gift.”

            “Sydney…care.”

            Something went flat. “Does he? Sometimes I feel that he does, Angelo, but when I look at my past, I see that he doesn’t. What kind of a man keeps a child locked up and studies him and runs him through simulations? Is he really discovering a conscience, now that I’m gone? I want to know why he didn’t help me and whether he cares now about what they did to me! Or am I still his subject? Does he care, or is he fascinated?” He jerked up, paced.

            “Jarod…sad here.”

            He slumped back into his seat. “You can feel the residue of my dreams, can’t you? Recently, Angelo, I rescued a little boy from his kidnapper. That was good, and it felt good, but I kept—I kept remembering. Things I have never remembered. My entire memory has been the Centre, but suddenly I was remembering…home. Lying in bed, safe. And then terror. Sheer terror. I was trying to help that little boy, and these floods of terror kept immobilizing me.” He was shaking. Angelo was shaking with him, feeling his terror, remembering his memories. “I remember my own kidnapping, Angelo! And now here I am again. Once again racing against time to give the children back the life I never had, and I can’t sleep at night. I dream about them, and they’re me.”

            “Me—me—” Angelo shuddered.

            “Yes, they’re you, too. Together, Angelo, we’ll keep this from happening again.” He put his arm around Angelo, and they huddled together.