The black holes were tar, concluded Leah, checking her readouts at the science station on the HoS. It was natural asphalt, like the sticky detritus in the La Brea Federation Park. Geysers of methane, ammonia, and other noxious gasses leaked from the putrid surface.
No one said anything as they assumed standard orbit. The mood aboard the HoS had been stark since the deaths of Kurton and Burka. With a small crew, the loss of two was devastating, even if they had picked up one young, raw recruit. But Herbert was human, like Leah, and that was suspicious in the light of the events at the Pink Slipper on Protus. Worse yet, they had lost two crewmen while gaining no information about Lomar, except that they had carnivorous plants. From this distance, it didn’t appear the place had any plants at all.
For the first time, she sensed some real hostility from the Klingons; even Maltz was a bit distant. None of this could be serious, she thought, because Klingons tended to exhibit their emotions openly. Then again, perhaps they were beginning to question their captain’s decisions and qualifications. She couldn’t blame them, because she was searching blindly for the enemy, making decisions by the seat of her pants. Coming here could be a huge waste of time, worse than going to Protus.
“Herbert,” she asked her newest crew member, “there are supposed to be carnivorous plants down there. Do you see anything that looks like vegetation? Plant life?”
The sixteen-year-old bolted to attention at his console, where he was tracking a chemical analysis sensor. He was looking specifically for chlorophyll, chloroplasts, magnesium, and other signs of plant life. “Yes,” he said, his voice squeaking. “A little vegetation in those bogs, if I read this right. Not much.”
Leah frowned in frustration. In the records, Lomar had looked like one of the planets created by the Genesis Wave. Close up, it seemed to be a dead version of that model—desiccated and all used up. She continued to search for energy sources, cities, anything that resembled civilization, but it seemed pointless.
“Maybe this was the enemy’s homeworld,” said Maltz. “A long time ago.”
Gradok, the weapons master who was now on tactical, called out, “There is a shuttlecraft on the surface!”
Maltz jumped down, and Leah hurried from her station to tactical. They peered over Gradok’s shoulder at what was unmistakably a vessel, nestled in a relatively level and dry crater. “Federation, civilian class,” said Gradok. “Speed-rated for warp two.”
“Colin Craycroft,” muttered Leah Brahms, shaking her head.
“What?” snarled Maltz. “From the Pink Slipper?”
“Yes, I remember now—he said he was going to beat us here. And he did.”
“What is he looking for?” asked Maltz.
“He thinks there’s treasure here, given our interest in the place.” Brahms shook her head with confusion. “I wish I could remember our conversation better.”
Maltz rubbed his hands together. “Good, we will kill him and be done with it before we go on. Ready away team.” The old Klingon glanced around at his sparse crew and lifted an unruly gray eyebrow. “Gradok and Herbert, you come with me.”
The lad looked startled, as if he hadn’t expected such an assignment. “Yes, sir!”
“I’ll go, too,” declared Brahms.
The old Klingon lowered his head. “As you wish, Captain, but we won’t be talked out of killing him.”
“I’m ordering you not to kill him,” responded Leah. “If we find him, we have to question him. Then I—and only I—will decide what to do with him.”
Maltz narrowed his eyes and scratched his stubbled chin, but he answered, “Yes, sir.”
Gradok lifted a beefy fist clad in leather and shook it at his board. “Give me the word, Captain, and I’ll destroy his shuttlecraft right now! A small torpedo will do it.”
“Is there anyone on board?” asked Brahms.
“No. No life-signs in the area,” the hulking Klingon answered with disappointment.
“For all we know, it’s a wreck, abandoned,” said Leah. “It may not belong to Craycroft at all. But it’s the only interesting thing we’ve found so far, so let’s inspect it.” She looked pointedly at Maltz, as if telling him to get his landing party moving.
“Kurok, you have the bridge. Keep shields up except when transporting. Use caution.”
“Yes, sir,” answered the second officer, a quiet sort who did as he was told.
“Away team, follow me!” growled the old Klingon. As they filed off the bridge onto the turbolift, Leah fell in beside the youth, Herbert.
“We’re going to have to wear environmental suits,” she said.
He nodded several times. “I’ve done that before—I can do it.”
“I don’t know what to tell you to expect,” Brahms said with sympathy. “Just follow orders, and you’ll be fine.”
The lad wrung his hands together nervously. “But I know Mr. Craycroft. He’s a family friend.”
“Good, then you can kill him,” Maltz said as the turbolift door slid shut.
Carol Marcus pretended to be sleeping on her laboratory cot. She had left the newest algorithms for the solar analyzer on her screen, without sending it to her captors, and she was fairly certain they would want to see the solutions immediately. It was an impressive piece of work, if she said so herself, and it would undoubtedly increase the number of custom-made planets and organisms they were able to spread across the galaxy. Try as she might, the old woman couldn’t do anything less than her best, and that was pretty damn good.
Unfortunately, Jim and David were closer than ever to discharging the Genesis Wave a second time—in a different direction—and she still had no idea how to stop them. They had done their best to stay away from her, except to compare notes and talk business. Neither side made an effort at tenderness anymore. She was still a part of the team, turning in good work, so they let her live while they concerned themselves with the biological portions of the matrix.
Still Carol sometimes had the sense that they considered her to be indispensable, like a good-luck charm. At times, their neediness was palpable and a bit chilling.
The scientist felt them in her mind before she heard the door to the lab open. As she had practiced in so many naps, she tried to become a receptor—putting out nothing, giving them nothing to suspect, taking in everything. She was an old woman; they were used to her naps. Thanking the fates for all those yoga classes she had taken some forty years ago, Marcus managed to clear her mind.
They stole into the room, anxious needs filling their thoughts. Sometimes she could hear them speaking words as plainly as day, like two people sitting at a table behind her in a restaurant. Other times, she felt only impressions and emotions. They weren’t cold and impassive, as she had thought, but hungry and desperate—it was like the center was missing from their lives.
Still dressed in their cleanroom suits, the two of them shuffled like old men to her computer station, which was about fifteen meters away. Eagerly they began poring over her results, and she felt their excitement.
“This will work,” said the phony Kirk. “We must incorporate it immediately.”
“Is she asleep?” asked the one she knew as David.
Carol willed herself into an empty-headed meditation. “Yes,” answered Kirk. “We are ready now.”
“But the test area is guarded by that ship,” said David. “We can go no closer.”
“Then we must discharge from here.”
“No, the preparations will attract their attention. Please do not worry—we have other means.” As if frightened by their argument, the verbal exchange degenerated into a lot of touchy-feely camaraderie between the two, and Carol almost felt a stirring of sympathy for them. But not quite.
They shuffled out of the room as laboriously as they had shuffled in, and Carol waited until the door closed—then a few heartbeats more—before she started thinking again. It was clear, a ship was stopping them from docking in the ideal position to discharge the second Genesis Wave. Perhaps
that would buy her some time, thought the scientist, but she had better do more than simply eavesdrop. She had to break out of this hologram and see the rest of the ship—where they really were.
Four figures shrouded in dark suits that resembled armor, and hoods that looked like horned helmets, appeared in a flash in a barren crater on Lomar. Wispy ammonia fog with ammonia sleet swirled around them, and it was hard to believe this had once been an almost breathable atmosphere. Leah Brahms stepped forward to inspect the shuttlecraft, which sat in a black scorch mark at the bottom of the crater. Half-covered in frozen sleet, it was hard to tell how old it was. The craft looked dark and lifeless, and her tricorder gave no indication of activity inside.
Maltz motioned them all back while he cautiously approached the shuttle, disruptor leveled for action. From the way he scrutinized the ground, Leah got the idea he was looking for tracks. When he found what he was looking for, he bent down and inspected a booted tread mark in the slush.
The old Klingon’s voice was amplified in her ear. “I say they saw us coming on their sensors and ran like the cowards they are.”
“I see only one track,” said Gradok, peering over the elder’s shoulder.
Maltz looked around, verifying for himself how many tracks there were. Without another word, he headed off in a northerly direction, bent over like a crab. Gradok fell in behind him. They were evidently hot on the scent.
Leah looked at Herbert and motioned him to follow. For some reason, she didn’t mind bringing up the rear. The lad, armed with no more than a tricorder and a knife, padded carefully after the Klingons, and Brahms moved fast enough to keep up with them.
She really wanted to take readings and spend some time analyzing them, but slow and deliberate wasn’t her crew’s method of doing things. She pitied Colin Craycroft if they caught him, but not much—as long as they didn’t lose sight of the mission. Of course, this excursion could be the second dead end in a row on which she had led them, and she might face a mutiny. On top of that, the shuttlecraft was probably a diversion they didn’t need.
She checked her readouts and said, “Maltz, I don’t see any life-signs on my tricorder.”
“It wasn’t a ghost who made these tracks,” barked the old Klingon. “Sensors found a lot of kelbonite in these ridges, so your readings may be masked. Trust nothing but your eyes.”
The party slowed down as they climbed a ridge with silty, ashen soil underfoot. It was a slippery ascent, especially in the sleet, and the Klingons forged ahead. Fortunately, Herbert was a good climber, as he had claimed, and he hung back to give Leah a hand. When they reached the top of the crusty ridge, everyone stopped to stare at the foreboding landscape beyond.
Spread before them was a vast black bog of natural asphalt, with seething bubbles shooting little puffs of smoke into the murky air. Around the edges of the bog were a few plants that looked like cattails, and in the center of the bog was a blackened tree trunk surrounded by brackish scum. At least, it looked like the remains of a tree, thought Leah, but one that had died eons ago.
Maltz and Gradok were stopped at the edge of the bubbling pitch. They would be scratching their heads if they could reach them, thought Leah. “The trail ends here,” said Maltz, his gravelly voice booming in Leah’s helmet.
She and Herbert reached the bank a moment later, and she glanced at her tricorder, even though Maltz had dismissed its readings. Signaling to each other, the two Klingons split up and went opposite ways along the bank, while Leah collected readings.
The lad stepped closer to her and asked, “What are we looking for?”
“Originally, it was the bastards who set loose the Genesis Wave,” answered Leah. “But now it seems to be Colin Craycroft and the owners of that shuttlecraft. They beat us here, so maybe they know something. You have a pack of photon flares, don’t you?”
“Yes,” he answered uncertainly. “I’m not sure how to use them.”
“Give me one,” she said, holding out her hand. Behind her faceplate, she granted him an encouraging smile, but Herbert still looked shell-shocked by his extraordinary change of fortune. Finally the lad reached into his pack and pulled out a squat pistol with a large barrel, which he gently placed into her gloved palm.
She studied the device for a moment, gripped its awkward stock, then fired a bright stream of photons over the tar-encrusted bog. The dismal scene lit up like an amusement park on the Fourth of July, then a stream of live photons sprinkled down over the bog, which shimmered with strange energy surges. The tree trunk lit up like a Christmas tree in the glowing fallout, and it appeared to be a spiral staircase, not a tree at all. Some kind of boat or craft floated at the base of the tree.
“Holy cow!” said Herbert.
Brahms saw the two Klingons standing stock still, staring at all she had uncovered, and she couldn’t resist broadcasting to all of them, “It’s a holographic cloak. Sometimes you need more than your eyes.”
“Is that a boat out there?” asked Maltz, jogging back to her.
“Hovercraft,” she said, checking her tricorder. “A small one, probably two-person.”
“How are we going to get there?” Gradok asked, dashing along the bank.
Leah pressed a button. “I just sent the coordinates to the ship. I think they can transport us there—one by one. Who goes first?”
“May I have the honor?” asked Gradok.
She contacted the ship and gave the order, and the weapons master was transported to the tree in the center of the tar bog, about seventy meters away. He had his knife drawn with a disruptor for backup, and as soon as he arrived on the tiny island, they saw his flailing silhouette fighting something invisible to them.
“Gradok, what is it?” demanded Maltz.
“A blasted net!” he grumbled. “Must be the holographic cloak!” There was a vivid burst of sparks, and they could make out Gradok kicking something on the ground. From the shore, they could see nothing but vague outlines and sparks, which finally died down to the normal gloom.
“Fine now,” he muttered. “I see the hovercraft. Want me to bring it over? There’s not much room to stand here.”
“Do you see the staircase?” asked Brahms.
“I see a hatch. I think we can blast it.”
“Belay that,” ordered Brahms. “Don’t destroy anything until we see what it is. We’ll keep transporting over. You climb into the craft to make room for us.”
“Yes, sir,” grumbled the weapons master.
In an orderly fashion, they transported to the tiny island around the old tree trunk in the asphalt bog. Gradok had indeed destroyed a holographic mesh that covered the boat and the hatch. The cloak didn’t do much but mirror the surrounding textures, but that had been enough in this gloomy place.
“I think visitors put this cloak up,” Brahms said, holding the shimmering fabric between her gloved fingers. “Because the hatch was hidden without it.”
“Craycroft!” said Maltz, seething. “How did he get in?”
The two Klingons scrutinized the small hatch at the base of the tree. Both of them tried their brawn on it, but there was nowhere to get a grip. The smooth, domed surface looked like it had to be opened from inside.
“Let me try,” said young Herbert.
Glowering doubtfully beneath their hoods, the two Klingons stepped into the sticky tar to make room for the lad to approach. He peered intently at the dull hatch for several seconds, then he peered upward at the burnt tree trunk. With a quick move that startled Leah, the lithe youth jumped up and caught the burnt stump of a branch. When the branch tipped downward, the hatch opened like a camera lens. In the dim light, Leah saw a spiral staircase winding downward into darkness.
“How did you know to do that?” Maltz asked suspiciously.
“It just made sense,” answered the lad. “If someone came over here in that hovercraft, he must have been able to let himself in.”
“What if it’s a trap?” asked Leah.
“Then it’s a good o
ne,” said Maltz. “They have captured my curiosity. The honor is still yours, Weapons Master.”
Gradok grunted and flicked on a light atop his helmet. Disruptor rifle leveled for action, the hulking Klingon tromped down the staircase, with Maltz on his tail. Leah nodded brusquely to Herbert, who took up the next position in the descent. She didn’t know why, but she had a feeling that this was too easy, too convenient. Craycroft hadn’t had that big of a lead on them. How had he found this place?
Before she could answer that or any other questions, Leah Brahms was clomping down a slippery metal staircase, plunging into the bowels of the dank planet. At this point, it seemed as if they had stumbled upon nothing but a pit under the tar bog, and she momentarily wondered if it was an excavation pit, maybe an archaeological dig. The walls of the stairwell seemed to be as hard and black as obsidian, and she figured some kind of process had been used to harden the asphalt.
Using the light on her helmet, Leah kept glancing at her tricorder as she descended. “There’s oxygen down here,” she told the others. “It’s not breathable air, but it’s getting close to it.”
“There is more than that,” said Gradok. Brahms leaned over the rail of the spiral staircase and looked down into the depths, where she saw the Klingons’ lights. They had stopped descending and were standing motionless outside an open doorway, illuminated in a flickering light. Their weapons were ready for action, but they weren’t firing.
When the two humans reached their position, Leah finally saw what had given them pause. Lying in the doorway, surrounded by his own dying light, was the old Tiburonian, Krussel. Gradok lowered his head to shine his beam at the frail Tiburonian, and Leah gasped out loud.
STAR TREK: TNG - The Genesis Wave, Book Two Page 21