Seekers: Second Nature

by David Mack

  Ponderous cracks of breaking wood, from trees striking one another and crashing together to the ground, turned Theriault’s head. She looked over her shoulder and saw the jungle’s canopy collapsing in a straight line, heading directly toward them. She waved Tan Bao and Hesh ahead of her, then fell in behind them.

  They hit the sand running and rushed to catch up to Dastin, who was a dozen meters down the beach, tearing away the camouflage he had draped in front of Vixen. As soon as the curtain of leaves was cast aside, he clambered over the rover’s hood and slipped through its barely open driver’s-side door. By the time Theriault and the others reached the rover’s hiding spot, Dastin had pulled it forward and opened all its doors. “In! We gotta go!”

  Rather than waste time circling the vehicle to get in from the passenger’s side, Hesh grabbed the edge of the roof and swung himself feet-first through the rear hatch. He landed in the rear passenger-side seat just in time for Tan Bao to jump into the seat behind Dastin.

  At the same time, Theriault vaulted across the rover’s hood, sliding on her hip and landing on the far side in one graceful leap, and then she held on to the rover’s chassis with one hand as she pivoted into the front passenger’s seat. “Punch it!”

  Sand spit from the rover’s wide spinning tires as its hatches fell shut.

  Nimur and the Changed emerged from the smoky jungle clearing Dastin had created. Looking past Dastin, Theriault saw Nimur point at the rover. “Faster!”

  Dastin swerved away from the Changed. “This is as fast as it—”

  Telekinetic force hammered the rover from behind and sent it tumbling through the air. Everything outside the windows was a blur of beige and green—and then they slammed nose-first into the water. Violent deceleration threw all of them forward, pushing Hesh and Tan Bao against the backs of the front seats, pinning Theriault against the forward console, and trapping Dastin against the steering controls. Half a second later the inertial dampeners kicked in, and they were able to sit back and steal a breath.

  Dastin accelerated the rover and set it on a shallow dive toward open water. Theriault reached for her safety harness and locked it shut around her torso. “Strap in. That’s an order.” Hesh and Tan Bao complied immediately, but Dastin kept his hands on the rover’s controls. Theriault was about to chastise him when she saw the tactical display on the forward console. There were multiple signals in the water, pursuing them. She looked back at Tan Bao. “Help me get Dastin strapped in.” Together, the two of them secured Dastin into his safety harness without interrupting his control of the rover.

  Meanwhile, Hesh took his own look at the tactical screen, and then he powered up his tricorder. “Commander? This is most intriguing. Nimur and the other Changed appear to be pursuing us even though we have submerged more than twenty meters beneath the surface.”

  “Thanks, Hesh, but we already know that.”

  “Do you also know that they’ve experienced a reversion mutation, to an amphibious life-form? One that has been dormant in their genome since early in their species’ evolution?”

  “No. I didn’t know that.”

  Dastin scowled at the Arkenite. “Is that information supposed to be useful?”

  “Not in the general sense. But it might interest you to—”

  “Hang on.” Ahead of the rover loomed an opaque wall of vegetation. Dastin yawed the rover several degrees to starboard and patched in the vehicle’s auxiliary power supply. Seconds later, the kelp forest swallowed the craft, which bladed its way through the aquatic jungle. Keeping his eyes on the path ahead, Dastin prompted Hesh, “You were saying?”

  Hesh held up his tricorder. “I was about to say, my scans of their altered physiology suggest that they will be far more maneuverable inside the kelp forests than we will, so I would advise keeping to open water in the hope that we can outrun them at greater depths.”

  The rover jerked to a sudden stop and listed hard to port. Dastin opened the throttle, and the purring of the MHD grew loud enough to hear and high-pitched enough to hurt.

  On the tactical display, the eleven blips were closing in faster by the moment. Theriault knew what the next words out of Dastin’s mouth would be. She glared at him. “Don’t say it.”

  “I think we’re snagged on the kelp.”

  “I told you not to say it.”

  Tan Bao covered his eyes with one hand and massaged his temples. “I hate irony.”

  Dastin struggled with the controls. “Let me try putting it in reverse, see if we break free.”

  Hesh adjusted his tricorder. “Perhaps I can use this to create a subsonic pulse that, when propagated through the aquatic medium, will disorientate them long enough for us to escape.”

  Theriault couldn’t take her eyes off the tactical display. “Five seconds to intercept! If someone’s gonna do something, now would be the time.”

  They all looked up and around at one another. No one had anything to say.

  Everything was quiet for several seconds. And then for several more.

  Tan Bao looked up and around. “Oh-kay . . .”

  Dastin glanced left, then right, perplexed. “What happened?”

  Hesh stared numbly at his tricorder. “I think someone beamed up Nimur and the Wardens.” He adjusted the device. “Based on the specific residual ionization in the water, I think it was the Klingons.”

  His news drew a cynical laugh from Dastin. “That’s twice today they’ve saved us by mistake.” The scout nudged Theriault. “Maybe we ought to thank them.”

  “If we get off this rock alive, I’ll send them a basket of tribbles. Now break us free and get us moving, before something else down here decides to eat us.”

  20

  “Transporter room! Answer! What is your status?” Durak wanted results, but all he was getting from the Homghor’s transporter room was intermittent static punctuated by deep thuds. No one had answered his first two demands for information, and now the third was being ignored, as well. He skewered Magron with a look. “Find out what’s going on down there.”

  His first officer snapped to attention. “I’ve confirmed the transport sequence was completed. Because of interference with the signal lock, multiple subjects were beamed aboard.”

  “Don’t just repeat what the computer tells you! I could have a trained puQat do that. Take that petaQ Tegras and go secure the prisoners. Move!” He chased Magron off the bridge with his hateful glare, then turned his eyes back toward the enemy ship on the viewscreen. “Zuras! Hard about. Set attack pattern jav’negh, full speed. Volcha! Target the Starfleet vessel’s engineering deck. Disruptors at half power—Captain Kang wants them alive.”

  Grunts of acknowledgment came back to Durak, and that was enough to satisfy him that his orders had been understood. Digits on his command screen counted down the dwindling qelIqams that separated the Homghor from the Starfleet scout ship. Victory was within reach, Durak was sure of it. He would strike the decisive blow against the interlopers, and then even Captain Kang would have to recognize him as a warrior worthy of honor and advancement.

  “Twenty seconds to firing range,” Volcha said. ­“Locking—” He did a double take at his console. “Target has changed course and speed. Attempting to reacquire weapons lock.”

  Durak watched the nimble little Starfleet ship twist and dart through the planet’s rings. Behind it, Kang’s cruiser pursued like a lumbering brute, blasting the rings with torpedoes.

  “Helm, break to starboard! Keep us out of the Voh’tahk’s firing solution!”

  Low curses fell from Durak’s lips. He had underestimated the Federation ship and its crew. Even though he had heard of how fast and maneuverable the Archer-class scout ships were, until now he had never faced one in action. The tiny ship exceeded its lofty reputation.

  We’re never going to catch it if all we do is trace its movements. We need to get a step ahead of
it and let it come to us. “Helm, hard climb. Take us through the rings and put us into a reverse orbit. I want to go nose-to-nose with the Starfleeters on the other side of the planet.”

  “Executing hard climb,” Zuras confirmed. The planet’s rings dominated the viewscreen for several seconds as the Homghor shot through them. Once clear on the other side, instead of orbiting in the direction of the planet’s rotation, which was standard operating procedure, the bird-of-prey banked in the opposite direction and orbited against the planet’s movement.

  It was a tactic whose chief advantage was also its greatest risk: surprise. It was unlikely the Starfleet ship would expect to see the Homghor rushing into a head-to-head confrontation; however, putting the entire planet between himself and his prey meant that Durak was flying blind into battle. He wouldn’t know his opponent’s position, attitude, or speed until the moment of engagement. This gambit could be either his triumph or his undoing.

  Anticipating glory, he grinned. War holds no honor for the timid.

  Volcha’s eyes were wedded to his display. “Estimate target intercept in ninety seconds.”

  “Look sharp, my friend. We’ll have the advantage, but only for a moment. You’ll need to take a snap shot as soon as we have sensor contact. Make it one worthy of a song.”

  The weapons officer nodded. His finger hovered over the firing switch. “I will.”

  Durak thumbed open a channel to the transporter room. “Magron! Report!” His demand was once again met by silence. He opened an intraship PA channel. “Bridge to Magron!”

  There was no response. What in the name of Fek’lhr is going on down there?

  Behind him, the hatch to the port-side corridor slid open. Magron—bloody and battered almost beyond ­recognition—staggered through it and fell face-first to the deck. Somewhere far aft, hidden in the ruddy shadows, Klingon warriors screamed in agony. Everyone on the bridge turned to face this new threat from within. Durak leaped from his command chair to Magron’s side and pulled the first officer over the threshold onto the bridge. “Report!”

  Magenta spittle dribbled from Magron’s split lips. “They’re coming.”

  “Who? The novpu’?”

  Magron shuddered and coughed up a mouthful of blood. “The mIgh’Qugh.” As soon as he’d forced out the words, Magron expired with a long, rasping rattle of weak breath.

  Durak dropped the empty husk of what had once been a warrior. “Secure the bridge and seal all interior hatches. Zuras, Volcha, continue with the attack.” He pointed at the communications officer. “Kazron, get over here and help me guard the entrances.”

  “Shouldn’t we hail Captain Kang?”

  “We’ll hail Kang when I say so, not before. Our first duty is to defend this ship. Now draw your disruptor and defend the starboard hatch.”

  “Yes, sir.” Kazron stood and moved aft to stand on Durak’s left. The two Klingons drew their disruptor sidearms and stood facing the sealed hatches, waiting to open fire on anything that dared to breach them that wasn’t a ­Klingon.

  Echoes of pandemonium resounded through the hull from beyond the locked duranium barriers. Durak had heard such blood-curdling clamor only once before, as a junior officer on a cruiser whose hull had been breached in combat. It was the sound of bulkheads rupturing under strain, hatches being torn from their frames, a starship’s guts being torn out by a force of nature.

  By the time Durak began to suspect that Doctor Tormog’s warning had not been an exaggeration, the hatches to the bridge were buckling inward, one ear-splitting impact at a time, as if the long-dead gods of Klingon antiquity had risen with a vengeance. Sparks flew from both doors’ magnetic control systems, and then with a final booming roar the hatches flew inward. The starboard hatch slammed into Kazron and pinned him to the deck. Durak dodged the port-side hatch by a whisker and fired a wild barrage of disruptor blasts down the corridor.

  He watched, horrified and enthralled, as a female novpu’ walked with preternatural calm onto the Homghor’s bridge. Long silvery tresses framed her aqua face, whose sides were marked by golden spots that continued down her neck and underneath her primitive garments. She seemed oblivious of the fusillade of disruptor pulses Durak fired at her. They all seemed to be absorbed into her without inflicting any damage to her or her clothing. By the time she confronted Durak, he had ceased firing. All he could do was stare at her, awed and agape.

  Her voice was rich and melodious. “I am Nimur. What is this place?”

  Durak stammered, “It’s—it’s the I.K.S. Homghor.”

  “I do not understand. Explain.”

  “It’s a ship.”

  Several other novpu’ from the planet followed Nimur onto the bridge as she stepped past Durak. She stared, bewildered, at the main viewscreen, which showed the darkened side of her planet. Then she turned back to face Durak. “What is that?”

  “That’s your world.” Her reaction revealed she didn’t understand. “As seen from space.”

  “From what?”

  “From very high above.”

  She looked around the bridge. “How can a ship travel where there’s no water?”

  He remembered she was a primitive. “It travels in the darkness between the stars.”

  Comprehension dawned quickly in Nimur’s eyes. “Incredible.” She looked around at the remaining bridge crew. “You will make this vessel obey my commands now.”

  Volcha rested his hand on the grip of his disruptor. “We don’t take orders from you. We are sworn to obey Captain Durak—and no one else.”

  Nimur was skeptical. “Are you all so loyal as this one?” She studied the rest of the crew’s reactions. Slow nods were accompanied by more hands moving toward sidearms. “Very well.”

  A grotesque wet cracking noise filled the bridge. Durak winced for only a fraction of second—and when he opened his eyes, he saw that every one of his officers’ heads had been twisted around until their necks had snapped like brittle twigs. Only he remained standing.

  Then an invisible hand gripped his throat and lifted him off the deck.

  Nimur stepped in front of him, as calm as she was malevolent. “They would not obey me, Durak. You will—or else you’ll experience agonies more horrible than any you’ve ever imagined. Now . . . tell me how to use this ship. Tell me everything.”

  • • •

  It was all but impossible for Kang to see the Sagittarius through the storm of broken rocks and ice blurring past on the Voh’tahk’s main viewscreen. He was losing patience with his crew’s fumbling hunt of the Starfleet scout ship. “Mahzh, anticipate your target, don’t follow it. You’re just wasting torpedoes.” He keyed in a new dispersal pattern on his command screen and relayed it to the weapons console. “Box them in! Then finish them with disruptors!”

  “Yes, Captain.” Mahzh set to work entering the new firing solution.

  Their tiny prey darted through Arethusa’s rings like a prize fish that refused to be reeled in. In open space, it would be no match for the Voh’tahk, but in an environment rich with natural obstacles, it was proving more than elusive. If not for the impending arrival of a more pressing threat, he might have been content to pass the hours matching wits with the scout ship’s commander. To his regret, that was for the moment a luxury he could not afford. Keeping his eyes on the Sagittarius, he called out to his wife. “Mara, how long until the Endeavour arrives?”

  Her own attention was steady on the sensor display. “Twelve minutes.”

  There were too many variables in play for Kang’s liking. He needed to know if the Homghor had recovered the novpu’ targets from the planet’s surface. If Captain ­Durak—a consummate striver, if ever Kang had met one—had followed orders, both the Voh’tahk and its bird-of-prey escort could declare this mission completed and break orbit without risking an unnecessary confrontation with Starfleet. Kang knew some might question his honor
for seeking to avoid a potential combat situation, but bitter experience had taught him the high price of war. He was in no mood to court its wrath without good reason.

  He swiveled toward the communications officer. “Kyris. Any word from the Homghor?”

  She shook her head. “Not yet, Captain.”

  “Hail them. Tell Captain Durak I want an update right now.”

  “The Homghor is currently out of contact, sir.” She noted Kang’s pointed stare of inquiry and elaborated. “They’re on the far side of Arethusa. We can restore contact in fifteen seconds.”

  Kang was about to curse Durak, but then he reasoned out the younger warrior’s tactics. He’s trying to head off our prey and catch them in his own snare. The captain nodded to himself. He’s not as clumsy as I’d feared. Kang could only hope that Durak had been able to keep his infamous ambition in check long enough to obey orders and beam up the novpu’ before he’d committed his crew to his daring maneuver against the Sagittarius.

  “Helm, move us above the rings and accelerate to full impulse.”

  Mahzh looked up from the weapons console. “If we stay above the rings, the Sagittarius will just stay beneath them.”

  “That’s what I want them to do,” Kang said. “And I suspect it’s what Captain Durak wants them to do, as well. Maintain harassing fire. Keep the scout ship’s attention on us.”

  “Understood, Captain.”

  Kyris turned from the communications panel. “Captain? I’ve hailed the Homghor, but it’s not answering.”

  “Are you sure they’re receiving?”

  “Positive. But they do not acknowledge.”

  An intuition of danger stirred in Kang’s gut. “Mahzh, scan the Homghor.”

  “For what?”

  “Life-forms. Anomalies. Anything.”

  Mahzh trained the Voh’tahk’s sensors on the bird-of-prey with a few simple commands. Then he shook his head. “Their shields are raised.”