CHAPTER 13

Hamunaptra Resort

Earth, Sol Sector

Ardeth Bay VII was transported directly to the meeting room. Many pairs of eyes watched as he materialized slowly in the corner of the room. Sparkle of light surrounding the shape of his body, slowly becoming clearer and clearer until his whole body were fully materialized.

He looked around and was shocked to find the room was filled with Starfleet and Dnunians high ranked people. He had been briefed about what had happened by the two Dnunians and two Starfleet officers who had picked him up at Rigel IV.

Eryk came to him and gave him a big hug, "Greetings, my dear friend. You’re in a big trouble." He whispered in his ear. He didn’t need him to tell him, as soon as he saw Janoj and Sharc he knew that he was in a deep hole.

Sharc shook his head when he saw the show of emotions between Eryk and Ardeth. He had heard about this human, yet he had never seen him in person. He knew and he was sure that Janoj also knew that he worked closely with Eryk and Salvia in the Soul Foundation helping war victims and refugees. He had even heard high praises regarding Ardeth who acted as a peacemaker. Dnunians were mostly very discipline in regards of holding and keeping their emotions. They did not show their feelings in public, especially those from the royal house. Seeing Eryk hugging Ardeth and then watching Ardeth returned his hug with a pat on Eryk’s back was repulsive.

Ardeth walked behind Eryk and quickly sat down. He had seen the recording on the flight back home. He couldn’t believe that the Key could open to a portal.

"Mr. Bay? I am Janoj of Dnunia." Janoj gave out his hand to him. The Admiral was shocked to see the gesture. The Prince didn’t even bother to shake his hand when he arrived in Starfleet HQ. He too had heard about this young man’s activities. His reputation preceded him. The Admiral was sure that the Prince, despite of his anger, had managed to keep his respect towards Ardeth Bay.

Ardeth shook his hand firmly, "It’s an honor, Your Highness." When the Prince let go of his hand, Ardeth brought the tips of his fingers to his mouth, then to his forehead, a way Dnunian regarded their Prince in respect. Janoj seemed to be pleased by his gestures. Ardeth sure knew the way to melt the cold atmosphere in this room, thought the Admiral.

As Ardeth sat down, Janoj firm yet cold voice regarded him. Here we go, thought the Admiral. The future of the whole Federation space was on this man’s hand.

"It’s a key, Your Highness, not a puzzle box." He replied, holding his palm out as a signal to hold on the conversation. He was acting cool and composed. Janoj and Sharc noticed this and they began to see why Eryk liked this man so much. He was unlike any other human they had encountered. He tapped the comm. channel in front of him and spoke, "Monica, get the replica of the key and bring it here." He ordered the director with a deep, firm voice full of authority. Janoj liked the way he gave orders.

"A key to the portal, Mr. Bay?" Sharc was impatient.

"Obviously, Your Highness, but that remained unknown up until after the incident." He received the replica from Monica and signaled her to stay. "Monica Bleeth is the Director of this place, Gentlemen. She knows this place better than I do, so I ask if she could remain in this room."

Janoj waved his hand, "As you wish, Mr. Bay. Now tell me about this key. Can you open it?"

Ardeth handed the replica to Janoj for him to analyze. "Your Highness, the key was not from ancient Egyptian time. The relief, the symbols that it bears are not Egyptian Hieroglyphs, although some of them are quite similar, therefore I cannot read them. We believe that this one was made far before the civilization even begun. Centuries ago, The Med-Jai tribes reached conclusions that this is some kind of key. To what we do not know. From the recording that I saw, it opens up to a portal. A very small wormhole indeed, as Lt. Data had concluded. Somehow, Salv… The Princess had accidentally activated it. I have no further knowledge as to how to re-open the portal, especially when The Princess took the key with her."

Janoj noticed that Ardeth almost slipped his tongue calling Salvia without her title. He suspected that the relationship among Ardeth, Eryk and Salvia was more than meets the eye.

"Excuse me, Your Highness." General Gunn who had been carefully inspected the replica of the key called out to Janoj.

"Yes?" He turned his head to face the General.

"These symbols and markings. I have seen them somewhere back home, Your Highness."

"Explain, General." He ordered.

"Well, I didn’t know for sure, Your Higness, but I think I saw them in the Museum. If I may take this replica, I would have some of our historians to work on it."

"Carry out." He dismissed him and turned back to Ardeth.

"As you can see, Mr. Bay, our scientists are working hard on how to re-open the portal. I strongly suggest you to help in anyway you could."

"Your Highness, I know that non of this would happen if I didn’t gave her the password to the vault. I do not wish you to understand the reason why I did, but please believe me that of all people in this room, I will be the only one who will be responsible should anything bad happened to her. I will take the responsibility alone."

Janoj winced, clenching his jaw. "You have no idea what kind of responsibility you will take, human. You have no idea what kind of punishment awaits you should all attempts to bring her back failed." He hissed the words through his fangs and stood up to leave the room.

Janoj did not wish to stay longer. He was afraid that all the emotions he had been holding would burst and ended up killing someone. His younger brothers followed him close behind. Eryk turned his head to look at Ardeth. He gave a smile to encourage him. He knew how much he loved his sister. He knew that among all the people in this room, Ardeth was the first one who wished for Salvia to be brought home safely.

Ardeth watched them go. He closed his eyes and saw Salvia’s face in his mind. He had to bring her back. He had no time to regret what he had done, he had to act quickly. Ardeth once read about some artifact that could bring people from the dead. He was sure that if he looked carefully in the archives he would find some other key to open the portal. But he would need somebody who can access through the hundreds of files and thousands of data entries fast. He would need Lt. Commander Data to help him…. And Monica too.

CHAPTER 14

Med-Jai Village

Egypt, 1933

Salvia sat on the corner of the tent, holding a bottle of water. The villagers had moved back to the village after the storm and the quakes subsided. She was watching the Captain and the Med-Jai Chief talking. However she didn’t pay attention to the conversation, instead she fixed her gaze on Ardeth Bay. She was amazed at the similarity between her Ardeth and this man. He looked younger than her Ardeth but from the way he was talking to Picard, she could see that he was more mature.

He didn’t believe in the cover story that Captain Picard had told him. She had almost choked holding the laugh that had been about to burst. The Captain had insisted that Salvia remained quiet and that they should not reveal the truth to the chief, in fear of altering the course of history. Her physical appearance was enough to scare the whole village, so she agreed to keep quiet. She was exhausted anyway. But now, the Captain was forced to tell the truth about them coming from the future.

"24^th century?" He asked once again. Salvia liked the way he asked and asked and asked the same question over and over again.

Picard merely nodded. "And we want to go back there. As I said, we both are lost travelers."

"And how are you going to do that?" He asked bluntly.

"That, Chief Bay, is what I’m hoping to find out from you. You see the key that we have seems to be malfunctioned. We cannot re-open the portal. We are hoping that we could use your key, I mean the same key in this century, to open it. We desperately need your help."

Ardeth Bay turned his attention to Salvia. "I do not understand why you always refer yourself as plural, Mr. Picard. Surely you don’t refer the pet as a traveler too."

"Pet?" The Captain was surprised.

Salvia raised an eyebrow, but she knew better to keep her mouth shut. If these barbarians thought she was a pet, they could kill her anytime they want. Her life was in Picard’s hand.

"No, Chief Bay. She is not a pet. She is…. comes from different planet, different star. She is an intelligent being, like human. Only her appearance is difference from us, Chief. Her name is Salvia."

Salvia stood up and walked towards Ardeth Bay. She offered him her hand like humans did when they were introduced to other people. Ardeth took her hand and shook it firmly.

"Salvia, that’s my name." She said in her lovely, hypnotic voice.

Ardeth looked at her more carefully, still holding her hand in his. "You fought like a warrior. You have wounded 46 of my men." He shook his head in amazement.

"I’m sorry, it was self defense. I thought you were going to kill us."

"No. We thought you were going to kill us." Ardeth sat back down.

"Now that everything is clear, we want to see the key. Your key." She said again, with her usual arrogant tone of voice. The Captain rolled his eyes.

"Chief Bay, I’m sorry. We do not mean to push you, but we really need to get back to our time. The longer we remain in this place, the greater risk we face that the history path could be altered somehow."

Ardeth Bay looked at the key on the table. He shook his head.

"Know this, Mr. Picard, Ms. Salvia, this thing doesn’t belong to our culture. It was found 25 years ago in the island of Philae. But, it was gone only 5 years after it was found. Most likely the tomb raiders took it with some other artifacts originated from ancient Egyptian time. I would like to help you go back to your time, but I’m sorry to tell you that no Med-Jai knows the whereabouts of that thing."

Salvia covered her face with her hand for a few seconds, letting the words sunk in her mind.

"You said the key doesn’t belong to your culture. Which culture do you mean. Moslem Med-Jai or…" The Captain asked.

"Egyptian, Mr. Picard. We didn’t even know that it is a key to open a time portal. We cannot even read the symbols here. They are not Egyptian Hieroglyphs, although they look similar. That thing has been forgotten for 20 years, Mr. Picard. If you have this thing in the 24^th century then it was somehow found somewhere in the gap of the 400 years, before your time, but after my time."

"No! There has to be another way to open the portal! I can believe that you don’t know about that thing, you don’t look that smart. But someone must know about it. Artifact like this cannot just disappear, you fool!" The Princess argued in a high tone of voice. Picard knew she was beginning to see the grim situation they were in and started panicking.

"Princess, please sit down. I’m sure we can open the portal again. Just sit down and let me do the talking. Your Highness, please." Picard assured her. He put his palm on her shoulder and led her to sit back down.

Ardeth noticed the way he addressed the ghostly woman. She was a noble. That explained her arrogance. He didn’t like being called ‘a fool’ but he could picture in his mind if one of the girls in the village had been facing the same situation, they would not be as brave as this woman, with an exception for only one woman, Hazanah. The village women would probably crawl under a cave and cry themselves to die. So he remained silent and waited for Picard to speak.

Picard turned back to Ardeth. "Chief Bay, is there anything, any artifact that you know of regarding the time portal?"

Ardeth shook his head, "I’m sorry, Mr. Picard. I do not know of any Egyptian artifacts that could create such portal."

Ardeth raised from his seat and rest his hand on Picard’s shoulder. "You better get some rest. My men will show you to your tent. The women will deliver some food and water for you too."

He looked towards Salvia and smiled, "And you, Princess Salvia, please pardon the villagers. I’m sure they will stare at you when my men escort you to your tent. They have not seen anyone like you before."

Salvia merely looked at him, saying nothing. She was too shocked to say anything.

"Oh, Mr. Picard, you can clean up and wash at the oasis. One of my men will gladly show you the way. I will order somebody to bring some water for Princess Salvia to wash her face."

"Oh? Why does he get to have a great bath in the oasis and I only get some water to wash my face?" She asked cynically

Ardeth smiled, he knew this woman used to get all the things she wanted. Well, if she had to stay here she would have had to do a lot of adaptation. "It’s not customary for women to wash at the oasis. Men will be watching you. But of course I can order all men not to watch you while you are bathing. But, I only have two eyes. I will not know if some of them peeking from up the hills around the oasis. It is up to you,… Your Highness. I will order my men to get as far away from oasis as possible if you wish."

Salvia waved her hand in disgust, cursing a word under her breath that Ardeth could still hear. "Barbarians!"

Ardeth turned his back and walked out of the tent, wearing a smile on his face. This woman was somehow annoying, yet amusing.