Star Trek: The Lost Era - 08 - 2319 - One Constant Star

by David R. George III

  “No,” Sulu said. “You’re certainly right about that. But my decision isn’t about courage or timidity. It’s about my unwillingness to knowingly place my crew in danger, and after the terrible injury to Commander Linojj, we know that there definitely is a danger.”

  Accepting that he could not change Sulu’s mind about undertaking the rescue mission herself, Tenger decided to do what he could to ensure her security. “You’re taking Ensign Kostas with you,” he said. “Why not choose me instead?”

  “I selected Ensign Kostas because she is an engineer cross-trained as a field medic,” Sulu said. “She can investigate the structure to learn how it’s isolated Ensign Young from us, but if we can figure out a way to recover him, she can treat his injuries at once.”

  “I understand,” Tenger said. “But at least allow me to accompany you.”

  “I’m taking as few of the crew as I can,” Sulu said. “You are also right to argue that the Enterprise should not be without both its commanding officer and exec. With Commander Linojj incapacitated, that means that you’re the ship’s first officer. In my absence, you therefore need to be here.”

  Tenger surrendered the argument. Knowing the captain as well as he did, he’d never expected any other outcome. Sulu always listened to the judgments and recommendations of her senior staff, and compelling reasons and new perspectives could persuade her to different decisions—but not when it would mean sending members of her crew into known dangers. If she could avoid doing so, she would.

  “What are your orders then, Captain?” Tenger asked.

  “I’ve spoken with Crewman Permenter, who told me all he could about what happened on the planet,” Sulu said. “I want you to speak with him as well. I’ll contact the ship regularly to keep you informed of what we learn, and whether or not we can recover Ensign Young. Under no circumstances is any member of the Enterprise crew to go down to Rejarris Two without my explicit order.”

  “Aye, sir,” Tenger said.

  The captain offered him a curt nod, then headed for the shuttlecraft. Tenger watched her board Amundsen before he withdrew into the airlock. He sealed the entrance to the hangar bay, but he didn’t leave. Instead, he stared through the port in the door as the turntable slowly rotated to point the shuttlecraft’s bow toward the main hatches, which he saw had already begun to reopen. Moments later, Amundsen rose from the deck and started forward. It passed through the force field—blue pinpoints of light flaring around it as it did so—and out into space.

  As the shuttlecraft dropped out of sight, carrying the captain down to the structure on the surface of Rejarris II, Tenger wondered if he would ever see Demora Sulu alive again.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  The shuttlecraft leveled off fifty meters above the snow-covered plain and approached the coordinates to which the second landing party had transported. Through the forward viewport, Sulu spotted the mysterious structure where Ensign Young had been hurt and contact with him lost, and where Commander Linojj had suffered her grisly injury. The portion of the structure closest to Amundsen did not impress the captain—nothing really distinguished it—but as she followed it with her gaze, first in one direction and then the other, she apprehended its great size. Enterprise’s sensors had measured it as a ring more than half a kilometer in diameter and two kilometers in circumference, but the gray weather, along with the snow and ash, concealed its farthest reaches as it curled into the distance.

  “Initiating sensor scans,” said Ensign Kostas, seated beside Sulu at the shuttlecraft’s main console. The captain had tasked the engineer with examining the structure and determining its capabilities, particularly with regard to whatever weapons and defenses it might possess. While Kostas analyzed the readings she gathered, Sulu would transmit the collected data to Enterprise for further study. She intended to employ what they ascertained to formulate a plan to recover Ensign Young.

  Operating the helm, the captain slowed Amundsen as they drew nearer the structure. A beam of some kind had fired at Linojj when she’d stood atop it, and the first officer had hypothesized that the same beam might have toppled Young from there to the ground. Sulu would therefore refrain from flying above the structure, unwilling to risk either an attack on the shuttlecraft, or its capture.

  “This close to the surface, biosensors appear to be functioning,” Kostas said, “but I’m not finding any life signs in the area.”

  The captain didn’t expect any life-form readings. She reasoned that whatever had prevented the signal enhancers from enabling a transport lock on Young likely interfered with sensors as well. They would have to search for the ensign visually. Sulu hadn’t yet resolved whether she would attempt that from the shuttlecraft or on the planet surface, on top of the structure. She would base her decision on what she and Kostas learned.

  “No life signs, but I am reading power,” the ensign said. “It’s flowing throughout the structure.” Kostas ran her hands across her console, obviously trying to coax additional detail from her instruments. “The power levels are inconsistent, though . . . they’re fluctuating.”

  “According to Crewman Permenter, the structure’s been damaged,” Sulu said. “Maybe that’s why its power is unstable.” She brought Amundsen to a stop a hundred meters away, where it hovered above the beam-down location of the second landing party. She studied the structure through the forward port, picking out a section that appeared free of snow and ash. “There,” she said, pointing. Even at that distance, she could make out a wide cavity in the inner side of the metal.

  “I see it,” Kostas said. “Targeting sensors.”

  Sulu locked in Amundsen’s position and secured the helm, then stood and paced through the rows of chairs to the rear of the cabin. At the aft bulkhead, she slid open an equipment drawer and pulled out a set of field glasses. She carried it back to her seat and trained it on the damaged section of the structure. “The metal there has been bent and twisted inward,” she said. “It’s also been scorched black, suggesting a fire or an explosion or possibly an attack with an energy weapon. If it’s—”

  Sulu abruptly stopped speaking when she saw something beyond the structure, something visible through the rent in the metal. She rose and stepped to the side, seeking a better vantage. When she narrowed the scale of her view from the structure to the patch of ground past it, the field glasses adjusted automatically, bringing that spot into sharp focus. “I see something carved into the ground,” she said. “A letter written in Federation Standard.”

  Beside the captain, Kostas operated her controls. “Sensors don’t detect anything like that in the area.”

  “Sensors don’t, but my eyes do,” Sulu said. Though she felt certain of what she saw, she set down the field glasses and worked the helm to move the shuttlecraft closer to the structure. When Amundsen had covered half the distance, she brought it to a stop again and peered through the field glasses. Having drawn nearer, she looked down at the letter etched into the ground from a steeper angle, seeing it not through the gap where the structure had been torn apart, but out in the open. She saw not just one letter, but many. “It’s a message,” she said, shifting the field glasses to find the first letter. She read aloud what she saw.

  CAUGHT IN GOLD BEAM, PULLED INTO RING, CAN’T—

  Past the last word, a man on his hands and knees used the point of a wedge-shaped stone to inscribe another letter into the ground. “It’s Ensign Young,” Sulu said. She handed the field glasses to Kostas, who raised them to her eyes.

  “I see him,” she said.

  The captain worked the helm controls to push Amundsen closer, halving the distance to the structure once again. She remained vigilant for any beams. “Is there any indication that he sees us?”

  “No, sir, not that I can tell.”

  Sulu reached to the communications panel and opened a channel. “Amundsen to Ensign Young,” she said. “Captain Sulu to Ensign Young.”

  She waited, but received no response. She considered simply setting the shuttl
ecraft down beside him, but she did not want to fly over the structure or into the ring it formed without more information. Given the level of technological sophistication the landing parties had observed on the planet, Sulu suspected that Amundsen could withstand any attack waged on it from the surface of Rejarris II, but the loss of contact with Young troubled her.

  “Is there a way we can visually signal him?” she asked Kostas.

  “I take it you mean other than by flying the shuttlecraft right past him.”

  “Yes.”

  “We could dump some of our fuel and ignite it,” Kostas said, her tentative tone reflecting the brainstorming nature of her idea.

  “I’d prefer not to do that,” Sulu said. “We might be alone on this planet, but I’d still prefer not to do anything that could seem antagonistic. What about doing something with the shields?”

  Kostas appeared to consider that. Finally, she said, “We could overload the power inputs. That would cause the shields to disburse the extra energy as thermal radiation, which would be accompanied by a bright glow.”

  “Would that damage the shields or the shuttlecraft?” Sulu wanted to know.

  “No, sir, I don’t think so,” Kostas said. She operated the controls on her console, and the captain saw numbers and equations tripping down the ensign’s display. “If we increase the power to the shields in a microburst, they’ll dissipate it as a rapid flash of heat and light.”

  “Do it,” the captain ordered.

  Kostas made the necessary preparations at her console, then moved to the starboard bulkhead. “In order for the microburst to reach the shields, I’ll need to temporarily remove the primary and secondary surge protectors from the generators,” she said. She detached an access panel, revealing a maze of duotronic circuitry. Kostas reached in and pulled out a pair of translucent, prism-shaped components and set them on the deck.

  When the ensign returned to her seat, she said, “I’m not sure how bright the flash will be, but we should avert our eyes.” Sulu turned and faced the aft end of the compartment. “I’m ready on your command, Captain.”

  “Go.”

  “It will take a few seconds for the power to build up,” Kostas said. “Initiating now.” Sulu heard her tap a control surface, and then the ensign turned away from the forward port.

  Seconds passed, and Sulu began to think that nothing would happen, but then the cabin began to brighten. She saw her shadow projected onto the deck beside that of Kostas, and then the light flared brilliantly. A loud bang shook the cabin before the lighting returned to normal.

  “I’m sorry, Captain,” Kostas said. “I should’ve anticipated that. The heating of the air around the shields caused a rapid expansion of the neighboring atmosphere, which led to a sonic boom.”

  “It’s all right, Ensign,” Sulu said, turning back to her console and picking up the field glasses. “As long as the shuttlecraft stayed in one piece.” The captain looked out again at Ensign Young. He remained on his hands and knees, chipping away at the ground. Neither the flash of light nor the thunderclap caused by the shields had attracted his attention. “He can’t see or hear us,” Sulu concluded. “The question we have to answer is: why?”

  Kostas moved back over to the open bulkhead, replaced the shield surge protectors, and set the access panel back in place. “What if we tried to land near him?” she asked.

  Sulu wondered the same thing, the appeal of such an action strong. But the power coursing through the structure, the beam it had fired toward Linojj, and the resistance of its interior to transporter locks and sensors concerned her. “For now, continue your scans and try to determine the purpose of that thing out there,” she said. “If we wait for Ensign Young to complete his message, maybe he’ll provide us with some useful information.”

  As Kostas worked the sensors, the captain observed Young through the field glasses. He had completed another word—SEE—and begun engraving another. She hoped that once he told them what he couldn’t see, it would shed some light on his predicament.

  Movement suddenly caught Sulu’s eye, a dark shape that had darted behind Young. Only then did she note that the ensign threw a long shadow on the ground, as did the rocks and boulders around him. Outside the structure, the unbroken cloud cover scattered the sunlight, washing everything in a dull cast devoid of shade, but somehow, around Young, Rejarris shined. She noticed then that he had removed his jacket, though she didn’t see it anywhere about him.

  Sulu slid a fingertip across a control on her field glasses, widening their view. She saw, behind the ensign, an area of rock projecting from the soil, surrounded by boulders and smaller stones. As Sulu inspected the area, one of the boulders moved, shifting upward as though pushed from below, but then falling back into place. Its shadow jumped up and down along with it, which must have been what she’d seen.

  The boulder did not remain still, but jerked upward more violently. It teetered and seemed to balance precariously for an instant, then toppled onto its side. Beneath where it had stood yawned a dark pit. As Sulu watched, a long, tubular black shape rose from within, its tip barbed. What followed looked like something out of a nightmare. Ten multiply articulated legs emerged spiderlike from the hole and lifted the rest of the beast out into the daylight. At the end of a long, twisted neck, a triangular head tapered to a blunt snout. Two large elliptical eyes glistened as though with sinister intent. A pocked, cylindrical body rose up next, spines protruding from it and curving backward, and a flat, spade-shaped tail trailed behind it. Its wrinkled black flesh looked like old leather. It stood almost as tall as Young, but its many limbs made it appear twice his size.

  The ensign whirled around when the boulder crashed to the dirt, and when he saw the creature, he reached around to the back of his waist. Sulu could not see the object he took in his hand, but the pose he assumed told her that he had drawn his phaser. The threat made no discernible impact on the creature, which moved toward him with lightning speed. Young fired once, but too late. A red-tinged yellow beam blazed into the creature, but did not appear to even slow it down. With its spiked front appendage, it swatted the weapon from the ensign’s hand. The creature struck Young, its head impacting with his chest, sending him flying backward from his feet.

  Sulu flung the field glasses to the deck and punched new commands into the helm. “Something’s attacking Ensign Young,” she told Kostas as the shuttlecraft shot forward. The captain sent Amundsen into a dive. Through the port, she could see the creature climbing atop Ensign Young. “Get our phasers,” she said, and Kostas immediately raced from her seat.

  Sulu brought the shuttlecraft in low over the structure, hoping to startle the creature and scare it away. From somewhere up ahead and somewhere to starboard, two expanding gold beams streaked into Amundsen. The shuttlecraft juddered, and Sulu read on her panel the drag placed on its forward momentum. Two more beams appeared and slammed into Amundsen, but one quickly sputtered and died.

  Kostas returned and leaned in over her console, gripping it in order to keep her balance in the shaking cabin. “They’re tractor beams,” she said, obviously consulting the sensor display. Sulu ignored the beams, keeping the shuttlecraft at speed. “They seem to be trying to direct us downward,” Kostas said.

  “That’s where we’re going anyway,” Sulu said, even as the cabin suddenly stilled.

  “The tractor beams have stopped,” Kostas said.

  As Amundsen swooped in low over the creature, Sulu saw it turn its oddly shaped head skyward. It stood over Young. The ensign struggled beneath it, fighting against some of its many limbs holding him down.

  “Brace yourself,” Sulu said. She put the shuttlecraft down hard, and she heard Kostas grunt beside her. The captain reached toward the ensign, steadied her, then held out an open hand. “Phaser,” she said, and Kostas slapped a weapon into her palm—not the smaller, concealable type-1, but the type-2 pistol model. Then Sulu raced for the hatch, where she jabbed at the controls set into the bulkhead. The hatch glided
open.

  Ten meters away, Young scrabbled backward along the ground, away from the creature. It pursued him, the motion of its many limbs like some sort of awkward, frenetic dance. It clapped two of its ten legs down on the ensign’s feet, then clambered forward and secured his hands. The creature’s front appendage rose and hovered high in the air, its spiked tip aimed downward, as though about to strike and impale the supine form of Ensign Young.

  Sulu fired. She didn’t even wait to jump to the ground, but raised her phaser and pressed its trigger from inside Amundsen. The beam streaked from her weapon and caught the creature square in its cylindrical body. It lurched to one side, several of its legs coming off the ground, but it did not let go of Young.

  The captain leaped from the shuttlecraft, past the port engine nacelle, and onto the ground. As she aimed her phaser again, Kostas alighted beside her. The creature struck at Young, bringing the point of its front appendage straight down at him.

  “Fire,” Sulu told Kostas, and together they loosed the might of their energy weapons. The creature reeled under the combined firepower and issued a feral cry—whether of pain or confusion, of fear or anger, Sulu couldn’t tell.

  But then the creature pivoted swiftly and fixed Sulu and Kostas with the gaze of its massive oval eyes. It reared up, its front four legs lifting high into the air, and it roared, the sound from its snout guttural and primitive. On the ground beside the creature, Ensign Young didn’t move.

  Sulu held up her phaser for Kostas to see, then adjusted it to its highest stun setting. The ensign followed her lead and reset her own weapon. When the creature brought its front legs back down and charged at them, they fired in tandem.

  The beams both landed, but the creature dodged to one side. The phaser blasts slowed it, but still it moved with surprising speed for a beast its size and that looked so ungainly. Its long multi-jointed legs ate up the distance to the shuttlecraft in large tracts. The captain judged that she and Kostas had one chance to save themselves.