by Dayton Ward
He held up his left hand, making a fist and indicating for Sortino and Ensign Minecci to maintain their positions. “We’re here,” he said, keeping his voice low and confirming to the others that they had reached their destination. “There’s a turret. Active.” He gestured toward the tricorder Minecci held in his hand. “Anything?”
The security officer shook his head. “Muddled readings, sir. Whatever’s interfering with the scans, I think it’s getting worse.”
Kirk grunted in irritation, even though Minecci’s report was something he had anticipated as they drew closer to the operations chamber, which was their goal. From the moment the Kalandan outpost’s internal security systems had come on line, they had caused problems for him and the landing party. Communicating with the Enterprise was for all intents and purposes out of the question, given Spock’s report that the rift within the energy barrier surrounding Gralafi had closed. Even with the extra boost provided by routing signals through the communications systems of the two shuttlecraft on the surface, the barrier itself prevented any connection. It was a reality the Dolysians had faced for decades since the establishment of their mining colony here, but one for which Kirk had little patience at the moment. Tricorder scans, already compromised to a degree thanks to the scattering and other damping fields working to conceal the outpost’s presence, were further hampered by the security measures now in play. Spock, Uhura, and Boma were at this moment attempting to fashion some sort of workaround to that issue, but they had their hands full just trying to find some way to override the complex’s impending self-destruct protocol.
It’s always something.
Even without the benefit of a tricorder, Kirk’s gut told him one thing: if the turret at the end of the passage was active, it had detected something it considered a threat. Did that mean the Romulans were close by? Given that the operations chamber the weapon guarded was the closest such facility within easy walking distance, it did not make sense for the Romulans to be anywhere else if they were looking for a fast way to gain access to the outpost’s technology. They doubtless were suffering the same sorts of setbacks thanks to the security system, and were without question looking for their own tactical edge in what was fast becoming a game of subterranean cat and mouse.
“What are you doing?” Sortino asked, watching as Kirk adjusted the power setting on his phaser.
“I don’t feel like waiting for the Romulans to pin us down,” the captain said. Peering around the corner again, he noted that the turret was swiveling away from him. He figured he had perhaps five seconds before the weapon began to swing back in his direction. That would be enough, he decided as he stepped into the tunnel and took aim at the turret. He sighted along the top of his phaser, focusing on the base of the weapon just as the unit’s motion sensor glowed brighter and its inner mechanism hummed louder. Its speed accelerated as it swept back toward him, and he knew that the thing had detected his presence. The turret locked on him just as he pressed his phaser’s firing stud and a blue beam spat forth, the whine of the weapon’s discharge all but deafening in the narrow tunnel. There was a brief flash of light as the beam struck the turret, a shower of sparks erupting from its base. Kirk kept his phaser trained on the unit until he saw the motion sensor fade to black, and the hum of its internal motor died.
“That thing could’ve cut you in half, you know,” Sortino said.
Kirk sighed as he reset his phaser to stun force. “I try not to think about it like that.” Now free from the scrutiny of the defense system, at least in this section of the complex, he moved forward into the tunnel. With his phaser held out before him, his eyes focused on the metal door set into the stone on the left side of the corridor near the junction. “According to Spock, this door leads to the second control chamber.”
Behind him, Minecci said, “That tracks with the readings I’m getting, sir. Whatever’s behind that door, it’s pulling a lot of power.”
“Let’s just hope whatever instrumentation we find in there is compatible with the other room’s,” Kirk replied. “Otherwise, this little field trip will have been for nothing.” Based on what Spock had told him, each of the five operations chambers located at different points within the underground complex seemed to have been designed to operate independent of the others. Despite this, and as far as the science officer had been able to determine, each of the rooms was subject to override by any of its counterparts. In theory, if the Romulans were able to seize control of just one of the remaining operations centers, they might well lock out Spock and his team, and perhaps even turn the outpost’s defenses against the Enterprise party.
So, Kirk mused with no small amount of apprehension, let’s try to avoid that, shall we? As things currently stood, the Romulans could cause enough trouble, and that was without considering the ticking clock that was the outpost’s containment protocol. In order to protect whatever chance Spock and the others might have of aborting the outpost’s destruct sequence, Kirk saw no alternative but to do everything possible to deny the Romulans access to any of the Kalandan technology.
“Come on,” he said, motioning for Sortino and Minecci to follow him. As he moved closer to the door, he was able to see the openings leading to the other two passages meeting at this junction. The door was positioned between the corridors, and each of the tunnels curved away in different directions. Kirk recalled what Spock had told him about this area of the complex, remembering that the closer of the two corridors charted a path deeper into the bowels of the underground facility and the massive generators supplying power. The other passage cut a lateral swath through this part of the installation, intersecting with other tunnels and rooms, including what looked to be an environmental control plant as well as yet another of the operations chambers.
Separating him from that area of the facility, Kirk knew, were yet more of the weapons deployed as part of the internal security system. So far as Spock had been able to determine, the mounted turrets were the extent of such weapons, but even the ever-reliable first officer had expressed doubts when considering the incomplete information available to him. Despite the lack of concrete knowledge regarding the full extent of the outpost’s defenses, Kirk had no choice but to risk venturing deeper into the complex in a bid to stop their Romulan adversaries from gaining access to any of the ancient yet still quite dangerous Kalandan technology.
Kirk paused before crossing the threshold of the other tunnel and looked over his shoulder at Minecci. “Readings?” he asked, his question little more than a whisper.
The security guard frowned as he studied his tricorder. “The interference is getting stronger the closer we get to the ops room, sir.” Returning his phaser to his hip, he reached up to manipulate the tricorder’s control panel. “I don’t understand it, Captain. Whatever this is, it wasn’t there before.”
“Something new from our Kalandan friends?” Sortino asked, leaning closer to look over Minecci’s shoulder at his tricorder.
“I don’t know,” Kirk replied, “but whatever it is, we have to find a way around it. Until we can reopen the rift and warn the Enterprise about the Romulans down here, we’re on our own.” Poking his head around the threshold leading to the other tunnel, he saw nothing but more rock walls, floor, and ceiling. Except for one darkened area perhaps three-quarters of the way down the tunnel, overhead lighting fixtures were spaced at regular intervals down the length of the passage until it came to a bend, perhaps fifty meters from where he stood, that curved to the right.
Wait.
No sooner had he pulled back from the junction than Kirk realized something about the corridor was . . . wrong. What had vied for his attention, if only for a fleeting moment?
“Jim?” Sortino asked. “What’s the matter?”
Shaking his head, Kirk replied, “I don’t know. I just—” He stopped as his eyes fell on the tricorder in Minecci’s hand. The device had proven all but useless during their move from the operations chamber, a difficulty explained by interference cre
ated as one part of the facility’s security protocols, but what was it Minecci had said? Something new had taken to disrupting his tricorder?
Son of a—
Without warning, Kirk stepped back into the intersection, aiming his phaser at the patch of darkness created by the pair of extinguished lighting fixtures near the far end of the corridor. He fired, the beam striking a point along the rock wall, and the reaction was immediate as shadows broke away from the sides of the tunnel and lunged into the illumination cast by other lights farther down the hallway. Kirk caught sight of silver and red and even a reflection of something gold and rounded—a Romulan centurion’s helmet.
“Kirk!” Sortino snapped. “What the hell are—?”
A hailstorm of disruptor fire exploded from the mouth of the tunnel as Kirk jumped across the threshold, seeking cover on the other side of the passageway. Energy bolts slammed into the wall behind him, sending a cloud of stone shrapnel into the tunnel. Kirk stepped farther from the tunnel mouth, his back to the doorway leading—he believed—to the operations chamber. The assault from the corridor faded, and Kirk was sure he heard the sounds of footsteps running toward him. At least two assailants, he figured, possibly more. He would not have time to try his hand at opening the door the way Spock had instructed him, and he and his team might find themselves outnumbered in short order. What to do?
Dana Sortino provided the answer.
“Ambassador!” was all Kirk could shout at Sortino, who was once more brandishing a phaser pistol in each hand as she stepped into the tunnel and fired both weapons. Twin streams of blue energy lanced down the passageway as Ensign Minecci took a position next to her, dropping to one knee and firing his own phaser. Kirk leapt forward, unwilling to let his charges take on that kind of risk without him, and added his own weapon to the fray. The darkness at the halfway point of the tunnel was illuminated by the flashes of phaser fire, and Kirk saw at least two figures lying unmoving on the tunnel floor. Another figure had already retreated to the far end of the corridor, taking refuge around the passage’s bend.
“Come on!” Kirk shouted, gesturing with his free hand for Sortino and Minecci to head for the operations chamber’s doorway. Pausing before the panel set into the wall that controlled access to the room beyond the door, he already could hear more sounds of running in the corridor, but he was certain they were coming from more than one direction. Within seconds, by his estimate, he and his team would be outflanked, so long as they remained in this corridor. The only options were running for safety or getting through the doorway, and overriding the door’s control panel even with Spock’s detailed instructions would take far too much time.
Kirk aimed his phaser at the door panel and fired.
Dashing up the corridor, Vathrael paused to kneel beside Betria and Sipal, her two fallen centurions. In the near darkness, she had to feel her way to each soldier’s neck in order to check his pulse, and was relieved to discover that neither of her subordinates was dead. Whatever she might think of humans, she knew that it was not their normal habit to kill unless they felt no other option was available. The human who had first fired on her and her subordinates, the one with the gold uniform tunic and the insignia of a Starfleet captain, obviously felt that the current situation had not yet deteriorated to the point where killing was necessary. Though Vathrael could admire that restraint, her next thought—born of training, experience, and instinct—turned to how she might fashion this insight into some form of tactical advantage.
“Come,” she said to Subcommander Atrelis and Centurion Drixus, both of whom had managed to avoid falling victim to the humans’ abrupt attack. “We have to keep moving.” She had no desire to be pinned down here in the tunnels and at the mercy of her human counterparts, even if they were refraining from the use of lethal force. The hurried plan she had put into action in order to attempt to ambush the Starfleet group had almost ended in utter failure. Despite Atrelis’s success at effecting a low-level disruption of the humans’ portable scanning devices, the Starfleet captain had somehow figured out the ploy. Vathrael cursed herself for the decision to extinguish some of the lights in the tunnel as a hasty means of providing momentary concealment. She had been counting on the humans being so involved with accessing the sealed compartment—the same chamber to which she sought entry—that they might fail to notice the irregularity. Once again, the human captain had seen through the ruse, which Vathrael conceded had been poorly considered.
Another enemy might well have made you pay for your ineptitude with your life. Think, fool.
Vathrael reached the mouth of the tunnel just as another, single burst of Starfleet phaser fire erupted somewhere ahead of her. It was followed by the sound of something exploding, but no sooner had that noise echoed down the corridor than she heard a new, low hum.
“Captain!” shouted a male voice. An instant later there was another burst of energy, followed by shouts of warning.
Lunging into the passageway, her disruptor held before her, Vathrael was in time to see the Starfleet captain running up the corridor and lunging for cover. His companions, one female in civilian clothing and a male in black trousers and a red Starfleet tunic, also were running away from her. As the captain caught sight of her crouching at an intersection at the far end of the corridor, his eyes grew wide with alarm even as she raised her disruptor and took aim at him.
Another burst of energy howled in the corridor, and instinct screamed for Vathrael to drop to the ground just before something hot and bright passed over her. Then she felt something grip her shoulder and looked up to see Centurion Drixus pulling her along with him.
“Wait!” she shouted, but there was no time for anything else as the human woman and the other Starfleet officer were turning toward her, weapons raised.
“Take cover!” the human captain shouted, just as more energy whined in the tunnel, and for the first time Vathrael saw a new weapon turret, this one mounted above the still-sealed doorway leading to the alien control chamber. It swiveled in its mount and spat forth twin beams of yellow energy that struck the tunnel walls near where the humans had been standing. Additional blasts tore into the tunnel’s rock floor, sending stone shrapnel hurtling in all directions.
“Fall back!” Vathrael heard the human captain shout even as Atrelis and Drixus were pulling her out of harm’s way and back toward the other tunnel. She saw the automated turret continuing to fire, loosing salvos in the direction of both parties, until she was ushered out of its line of sight by Drixus. Now under cover, she listened to the weapon’s ongoing assault for an additional moment before it ceased firing. Her ears still ringing from the maelstrom that had just been unleashed, she finally held up a hand and signaled for Drixus to halt their retreat.
“Are you all right, Commander?” The centurion’s concern, Vathrael saw, was genuine, yet another demonstration of his unwavering loyalty to her.
Reaching up to pat him on the shoulder, Vathrael nodded. “I’m uninjured. Thank you, Drixus.” She paused, wiping perspiration from her brow, before looking to Atrelis. “What was that?”
“The intruder control system,” the science officer replied. “It seems designed, at least as a first measure, to disable weapons it perceives as a threat. I did not comprehend that feature during our initial encounters with the automated turrets, Commander.”
Vathrael frowned. “Are you saying that so long as we don’t use our weapons, the turrets won’t harm us?”
“I would not proceed from that assumption,” Atrelis said. “As I said, it may only be a preliminary countermeasure. I cannot help but think that the system will employ more robust methods if we attempt to infiltrate an area it deems worthy of protection.”
Drixus asked, “So, what are we to do?” He held up his disruptor for emphasis.
“The humans face the same dilemma we do,” the science officer replied, from where he now knelt next to the still unconscious form of Centurion Sipal. “We would seem to be on equal footing, at least in that reg
ard.” Rising to his feet, he gestured to the fallen soldier. “They should be reviving soon, Commander.”
Nodding as she absorbed the report, she asked, “This security system. Is it something you could countermand, assuming you’re able to gain access to the control room and decipher the components?”
Atrelis replied, “Perhaps, but the humans destroyed the panel controlling the door, Commander. I may be able to bypass the damage they inflicted, but it likely will take considerable time and effort.”
That was unacceptable, Vathrael decided. There still were other comparable chambers scattered throughout the complex, not counting the one to which the humans had already gained access, but they were much too far away to be of any immediate use. She harbored no doubts that the Starfleet captain and his group meant to deny her entry to any of the other chambers, using whatever means were at their disposal and even as they too dealt with this new complication presented by this installation’s security protocols. The only true advantage she possessed, thanks to overhearing the Starfleet captain moments earlier, was the knowledge that he and his people were alone here, without the support of their ship, which hovered somewhere beyond the energy field, which for some unknown reason had become impassible.
If that ship cannot come in, then you cannot leave. It was a simple statement, but one carrying a great deal of weight. Unless and until a way could be found to traverse the energy barrier, there would be no way to alert Fleet Command of her findings here. There was nothing to be done about that at the moment, Vathrael reasoned. For now, she faced more immediate problems.
“Where are the humans now?” she asked.
Scrutinizing his scanner, Atrelis nodded back toward the mouth of the tunnel. “They appear to be retreating down the other passage. It may be an attempt to circle back to the other members of their party.”
“Then that is where we must go, as well,” Vathrael said.