Seekers

by Dayton Ward

  “Holy shit,” Leone said, bringing up his lance. “Run now, argue later, people!”

  “Go!” Klisiewicz shouted, backstepping toward the tunnel as Hewitt and his team evacuated the anteroom. The science officer allowed himself a brief sigh of relief, satisfied that—for the moment, at least—the security officers were out of immediate danger.

  Guiding Leone and Tormog toward the tunnel, Klisiewicz was the first to see the crack in the wall widen, then another resounding clap of thunder echoed in the chamber as the barrier was attacked yet again, and this time the wall came apart. Chunks of stone, breaking away from the wall itself, flew outward, and it was all Klisiewicz could do to avoid being struck by the airborne debris. Behind him, he heard Leone cry out, and a grunt of surprise made him turn to see Tormog’s legs giving out and his toppling to the floor. A piece of the demolished wall fell beside him, and the Klingon howled in obvious pain, dropping his lance and gripping his right thigh with both hands. From the knee down, his leg was bent at an unnatural angle.

  As Leone rushed to Tormog’s side, Klisiewicz backpedaled to the mouth of the narrow tunnel as the rest of the wall fell apart, revealing another passage and two Changed pushing their way through the widening gap. The first creature was tearing at the crumbling door, ripping free pieces of stone and enlarging the hole.

  Klisiewicz waited until one of the creatures showed its face in the newly formed aperture before firing his lance.

  The weapon again kicked in his grip as its energy beam spat forth, the full force of the salvo catching the Changed in its face. The creature’s tortured howl echoing in the anteroom was enough to make Klisiewicz flinch, but he pushed aside his fear and fired again, his beam this time striking the second Changed in the chest and pushing the renegade Tomol back and away from the hole.

  A second beam added to the chorus of energy permeating the anteroom. Leone had fired his own lance, though not at the Changed or the gap through which they were trying to force themselves. Instead, the doctor had taken aim on the upper edges of the wall and surrounding frame, blasting loose chunks of stone. Rubble began piling up, blocking the opening until a large slab of rock tumbled atop the growing heap, sealing it.

  “Cute toy,” Leone said. “Now, can we please go home?” Both men turned to the injured Tormog, still lying on the floor and gripping his broken leg and gritting his teeth against obvious pain.

  “Leave me,” the Klingon hissed, his eyes wide. “I cannot walk.”

  Mirroring Leone’s movements as both men slid a free hand under one of Tormog’s armpits, Klisiewicz said, “We’ll help you.”

  “Why?” Tormog asked, grunting his discomfort as the two men helped him to stand.

  Klisiewicz shifted his stance to accommodate their charge’s unexpected weight. “My captain promised your captain that we’d return you to him.”

  “Kang is not my captain,” Tormog countered.

  Leone said, “Fine. Want to stay here?”

  Pausing only a brief moment, the Klingon shook his head. “No.”

  “Good answer.” Klisiewicz cradled the lance in the crook of his right arm and tried to position the weapon so that he could fire it while assisting Tormog. “Let’s haul ass.”

  * * *

  Rounding yet another bend in the tunnel, Stano and Zane came to a larger chamber. Despite its rough walls, floor, and ceiling, Stano could tell that both the passages and this room had been cut from the rock by someone or something. The walls were too straight and the ground too flat, and there were grooves and ridges in the stone, which suggested some kind of drilling apparatus. It reminded Stano of the tunnels created by dilithium miners in the Rigel colonies, or when Starfleet’s Corps of Engineers assisted in the construction of planet-based starbases, or the outposts built on asteroids along the Neutral Zone. The tunnel leading to this modest-­sized cavern continued on through its far side, but there also were three more passages heading off in different directions, each like the one they had been traversing illuminated by lamps set into the walls and ­fueled by oil or some other flammable substance her tricorder could not identify. Checking the unit’s readings, Stano was able to confirm the intersection’s location using the map created by the unit’s scans of the mountain’s interior.

  “You should be meeting up with each other in a minute or two,” said the voice of Captain Clark Terrell over her open communicator. “But our sensors are also picking up Changed life-forms in the area, so stay frosty.”

  “I don’t suppose this is a good time to mention that I’m claustrophobic?” Zane asked, and when Stano looked to her, the ensign offered a sardonic grin.

  “That’s my joke,” said Doctor Leone over the open channel. “Write your own material, Ensign.”

  Ignoring the banter, Stano said into her communicator, “Thanks, Captain. Any report on our other people?”

  “Beaming up the last one now,” Terrell replied. “It was hairy there for a minute, but we’re good. That defensive beam or whatever the hell it is took a shot at us at first, but we managed to avoid being hit. After we beamed up the second man, it seemed to lose interest. We were able to grab Ensign Hewitt and the last man without ­incident.”

  “That’s good to hear,” said Lieutenant Stephen Klisiewicz. “One . . . no, make that four fewer things to worry about.”

  Stano agreed and released a small, relieved sigh, grateful that four more members of her landing party were safe, or at least safer aboard the Sagittarius than they were on the ground. Terrell and his crew had undertaken enormous risk by continuing to provide cover for her and the rest of her team, as well as using their sensors to penetrate the mountain and aggressively search for stragglers supposedly making their way to the surface. For whatever reason, the Preserver obelisk, which currently was taking shots at both the Endeavour and the Klingon battle cruiser in orbit above Arethusa and which also had attempted to engage the Sagittarius, had turned its attentions away from the small scout ship. Stano did not begin to understand what was motivating the ancient mechanism one way or the other, and at the moment she did not care. All that mattered now was for her and Zane to find Klisiewicz and Leone, and the four of them could call it a day.

  Amen to that.

  “Captain, anything new on those power readings you’re watching?”

  Terrell said, “Only that they’re continuing to increase. I don’t like it, Commander.”

  “We definitely don’t want to hang around here any longer than necessary,” added Klisiewicz. “We don’t know for sure, but we think it could be some kind of self-destruct protocol.”

  Before Stano could respond to that unsettling theory, her tricorder’s scan readings began to fluctuate. Rather than a crisp display of data, the unit’s small screen was filled with static. “We must be entering a larger concentration of mineral deposits or something. My tricorder’s gone screwy.”

  “According to our sensors, that area is almost a blind spot,” Terrell said. “We’re making adjustments to see if we can push through the interference, but it might take a minute. I’d keep moving, if I were you.” A moment later, he added, “Hold on. We’re getting indications of other life-forms in your vicinity, but we can’t lock them down.”

  Klisiewicz said, “Is it us? My tricorder’s acting up, too.”

  “I don’t think so,” Terrell replied. “We’re trying to pinpoint a location.”

  “I am here.”

  The voice came from behind her and Stano froze, feeling a chill course down her spine as she recognized the speaker: Kerlo. Closing her communicator, she gripped her phaser rifle, although she knew that she would never be able to turn and fire before the Changed killed her where she stood. With that in mind, she removed her left hand from the weapon’s barrel and held it up to show that it was empty. She then allowed the rifle’s muzzle to drop toward the ground before turning slowly. It was a struggle to maintain her bearing
as she beheld Kerlo for the first time since Nimur had triggered his Change, standing at the mouth of a tunnel that cut deeper into the mountain. Though he had retained his normal form, there was no mistaking the iridescent glow of his eyes as he regarded her. Had he tracked them, sensing their presence with whatever abilities he now possessed?

  “You would be wise to surrender to me,” Kerlo said, raising his arm and pointing at her. “Obey me, and I will spare your lives. Defy me, and die, here and now.”

  Stano, despite the knot of fear growing in her gut, held the Changed’s gaze and forced her voice to remain level. “You can’t kill us. You need us to get to our ship.” Though she expected some form of sharp rebuke, Kerlo smiled.

  “I don’t need all of you to get to your sky-ship. Some of you are more valuable than others.” He pointed at Zane, and in that horrible instant Stano understood that Kerlo meant to kill the ensign right in front of her.

  “No!” she said, raising her hands in protest, but Kerlo seemed to ignore her as his attention focused on Zane. It took Stano an extra second to realize that based on what he had seen Nimur do with her own telekinetic powers, the security officer should already be dead. Instead, Kerlo grimaced in abrupt shock, his other hand reaching for his head. The Changed emitted a low grunt, his discomfort obvious as he staggered backward and bumped into the unyielding tunnel wall.

  The psionic dampener. She recalled the odd inhibiting effect it had produced in Commander Sorak and Lieutenant Hesh back at the Sagittarius crash site. That ploy supposedly had been emitted by the Preserver drones, so it made sense that similar resources could be brought to bear here within that very same underground complex from which those weapons had been dispatched.

  As Kerlo dealt with the unexpected mental assault, Ensign Zane, reaching his own conclusion that he was still alive for reasons not yet explained, reacted in the only way he likely thought appropriate: he raised his phaser rifle and opened fire. The blue-white beam struck Kerlo in his left shoulder and sent him spinning back into the tunnel from which he had come, but he did not fall. Stano added her weapon to the attack, her strike slamming into the Changed’s back and causing him to stagger until he fell against the passage’s rock wall.

  Otherwise the phasers had no meaningful effect.

  “Damn,” Stano hissed, adjusting her rifle’s power output to its maximum setting. At that intensity, the phaser should be sufficient to disintegrate Kerlo along with a substantial portion of the surrounding mountain in the blink of an eye, and for a brief instant she worried that firing again might trigger a cave-in.

  We’re likely dead either way.

  As Kerlo regained his footing and turned to face her, Stano raised her rifle to her shoulder and took aim at his chest. Zane followed suit, and their actions seemed not to faze the Changed, as he once more stepped from the tunnel into the larger chamber.

  “Enough of this,” Kerlo said. “Your weapons are useless against us now. There is nothing and no one to save you from your fate.”

  “I will save them.”

  Stano was stunned to behold Seta standing at the ­entrance to another of the tunnels. For one so young, the Tomol priestess impressed Stano with her composure.

  “They do not understand our people, Kerlo,” she said, stepping farther into the small cavern, “but that is not a criminal offense.”

  Sneering, Kerlo replied, “They are outsiders. They care not for us but for what they can learn or take from us. We are better than that. After uncounted generations spent doing the Shepherds’ bidding and living the perpetual lie they foisted upon us, it is long past our time to assume total control of our own destiny.”

  “We can still do that, and without further bloodshed.” Seta held out her hands. “Please, Kerlo. You have always been one of the most gentle, caring people in the village. I know that part of you still exists. Do not let it be consumed by the Change.”

  Kerlo shook his head. “If you will not join us, Seta, then you are no better than the sky people, and you will share their fate, as will any Tomol who seeks to oppose us.”

  “I will not join you,” Seta said, her voice firm.

  “So be it.” Kerlo stepped toward her. “Let you be the first example to all who would stand in our way.”

  30

  Alert klaxons clamored for attention, inundating the bridge of the Voh’tahk with their incessant wailing like infants who yearned for feeding, but Kang ignored them. Gripping the arms of his chair, he held himself steady as the battle cruiser trembled around him, absorbing another salvo from the mysterious planet-based weapon.

  “Evasive!” Kang shouted over the din. “Turn our weakened shields away from our enemy! And silence that alarm!” Once more, he cursed the adversary he could not see. The strike was the third inflicted upon the Voh’tahk, which still had not been returned to full operational status following its encounter with the planetary defenses. “Where does it hide?” he asked. He had gleaned enough information from previous sensor scans to understand that whatever technology was being employed against his ship likely was automated, its builders either having long since died out or fled the planet. That it still operated with such efficiency even after a protracted period of neglect was a testament to its construction, and Kang wished he could convey his admiration to those who had created it . . . before carving out their hearts with his d’k tahg.

  “Captain!” called Mahzh, the Voh’tahk’s weapons officer. “I believe I’ve found the source of the attacks.”

  “Target that location and prepare a full barrage,” Kang ordered. “Where is the Endeavour?”

  Mahzh replied, “The Federation ship is continuing its own evasive maneuvers, but they also are locking weapons at the same point on the planet’s surface.”

  “Captain,” said Mara, in a low voice as she leaned in close to his left ear, “why do you continue this fight? Let the Earth ship deal with this. When they have departed or been destroyed, this planet will still be here.”

  Kang was forced to admit that while he had entertained that very thought, there was a simple reason he had not acted upon the notion. “I gave Khatami my word.”

  “What does Klingon honor mean to an Earther?” His hard glare caused her to glance about the bridge, and when she spoke again her voice was softer still. “How do you know you can trust her?”

  “Earthers have their own form of honor,” Kang said. “You have seen it with your own eyes. I believe this ship captain to be of similar character.”

  “What makes you so certain?”

  “My instincts.” Honed in battle, they rarely failed him, and he trusted them now. Kang waved her away. “Attend your station.”

  Nodding, Mara stepped back from his chair. “Yes, Captain.”

  As she returned to her science console, a new alarm sounded on the bridge, and Mahzh announced, “We have been targeted again. Incoming enemy fire!”

  There was no time to call for any maneuver that might guide the Voh’tahk out of danger before the deck heaved beneath Kang’s feet and he felt himself lifting from his seat. Only his grip on the chair’s arms kept him from being thrown to the deck, and he noted that his bridge officers were faring in varying degrees to the attack. Mahzh and Mara were holding on to their consoles, but his communications officer, Kyris, tumbled to the metal floor grates.

  “Move us away!” Kang bellowed over the sound of the new alarms. All around the bridge, alert indicators were flashing their different warnings from different consoles. This latest attack had caused even more damage, he surmised, perhaps more than even Konvraq, his loyal friend and engineer, might be able to repair.

  “Maneuvering thrusters are off-line!” shouted his helm officer, Ortok. “Impulse engines are slow to respond. Our shields are down to critical levels, Captain!”

  From her station, Mara said, “If they strike us again, we will be defenseless.”

  “W
e are defenseless now!” Kang barked. As though mocking his mounting frustration, the Voh’tahk’s primary power generators chose that moment to fail, their omnipresent drone fading as lights and displays across the bridge dimmed, their operations continuing only because of the battle cruiser’s backup power sources.

  “We have lost all propulsion!” Ortok reported.

  Mahzh added, “Weapons and shields are inactive.”

  “Life support is holding,” Mara said, “though our sensors are on reduced power.”

  Snorting, Kang pounded the arm of his chair. “Excellent. At least we will be alive, breathing and warm, when death deals its final blow upon us.” His gaze fixed on the main viewscreen and the lush world displayed upon it, and Kang all but jumped from his chair when he observed several beams of energy following what he recognized as a barrage of eight Starfleet photon torpedoes dropping toward the planet’s surface. “What is this? The Endeavour?”

  “Affirmative, Captain,” Mara answered. “They are firing on the source of the weapons attacking us.” A moment later, she said, “I am detecting explosions on the surface and at points belowground. Their counterattack appears to have been successful!”

  Behind him, Kyris said, “Captain, we are receiving a hail from the Starfleet ship.”

  “Open the frequency.” He pushed himself from his chair as the image on the viewscreen changed from Arethusa to the Earther captain, Khatami.

  “Captain,” she said, “we think we’ve neutralized the weapon. Our sensors aren’t picking up activity from that area anymore.”

  Kang moved toward the screen, nodding in admiration. “Well done, Captain. You have slain my enemy.”

  “We’re also reading the damage to your ship. Do you require assistance?” The question was presented without the slightest hint of arrogance or superiority, and Kang knew that she was reaching out, ship master to ship master, with a genuine desire to render aid.