by Diane Carey
Bonifay, a little nervous and a little bold, said, “Give it a toss.”
“No, I don’t need to. It’s been sitting in my pocket, mumbling at me and biting my leg.”
Vellyngaith peered down at the coin, seeming to expect it to actually speak. Perhaps it was some kind of supertech from the mysterious laboratories of Federation.
Keller knew what the coin had to say. He wanted more time to think, but he also knew he’d already made up his mind. There they were, representatives of the enemy planet, and here was Shucorion representing the whole Blood world, and over there was Zoa, here to see if she wanted to recommend to the Rassua people to join up with the UFP, and up yonder was Mr. Scott, all of Starfleet in one suit, watching him to see what he would do next. Not to mention Savannah and Zane. Why should they follow him after today? Would they have a reason?
He turned to face the rest of them. “Reckon we should go see what it is.”
Vellyngaith went down on one knee before him, once again clasping Keller’s ankles.
“Simmer down, please,” Keller pleaded, and wriggled out of the grip. “Stand back up, will you?”
“If it’s anything kin to those probes,” Scott pointed out, “your phasers won’t affect it. You’ve only got four photons, and there’s doubt they’ll scratch it either.”
“I know, sir,” Keller said. “But I can’t let it go eat these people’s planet. At least we can fly our brand-new jalopy in and have a look. Maybe we can figure out what how to deflect it.”
Zoa nodded her braids once, sharply, and Bonifay winced at the idea. The baby wailed his single protest, then settled down to the business of fingering Bonifay’s black hair.
Now that the decision had been made, Keller thought of a hundred things to do.
“Savannah, evacuate the crew personnel to the shuttlebay. Tell them to put everything on automatic or manual. I’ll handle as much as I can. You load them up and go with them.”
“Not me!” she protested. “I’m here now! You’re not making me go back there and live with all those surface dwellers. Forget it.”
She planted herself in her seat, clasped her pulpit firmly, then shot him a defiant glare. An impudent strand of her hair flopped over one eye.
Her devotion pulled a half grin from him. He looked at Zoa, but never even got the question out. The Rassua crossed her arms over her chest, each hand holding a phaser. She took a calculated step backward and stood like a carved statue guarding a pharaoh’s tomb. Immovable.
He shifted his question to Zane Bonifay. “What about you, gypsy?”
Bonifay jiggled the alien baby. “It’s my nomadic nature.”
“You’re all bats.”
“But we’re your bats.”
Could the worst day of a man’s life also be the best?
Strung out, he put one hand on Zane’s shoulder and the other hand on the arm of the command chair to steady himself as he turned yet again and faced the port side stations. “Mr. Scott, I’d like you to take our shuttlecraft and our evacuated crewmen, and escort these people back to Belle Terre and explain things to Governor Pardonnet, please. If we fail, you’ll have to gear up to fight this thing. Can’t exactly move the Quake Moon away from Belle Terre. Maybe we can at least buy you some time.”
“I’d rather stay with you,” Scott offered, but he spoke in a tone that made clear his offer, not his order.
“I appreciate that, sir, but you’re the only one who can lead these people in and not be fired upon by the planetary defense network. They just wouldn’t believe anybody else, I mean, I wouldn’t.” He paused, accepting the passage of a torch from one generation to another. “Besides, I can order my own crew to go out and die with me. I can’t order Captain Kirk’s crew. You’ve done your part. It’s our turn.”
Scott didn’t like the order, but there were a lot of things about the sentiment that he did seem to respect. He simply nodded and gave Keller one final gift.
“Aye aye, sir.”
Warmed, Keller turned to Shucorion. “I can’t order you either. You’ve got crewmen of your own to take care of. And not only that, but you have to explain to the Blood people what’s going on. If we succeed, they’ll have to learn how to make nice with these guys. With such a wild proclamation, they’ll need somebody they can believe.”
“My men will explain on my behalf,” Shucorion told him. “I shall stay with you and pilot your jalopy.”
The clear display of trust almost bowled Keller onto his backside just like the mule engines had. When had he earned anyone’s devotion, never mind a man like Shucorion? A captain, a leader? An alien crossing over every line of contact his people had ever established?
“Thanks,” he uttered. His voice rasped a little.
Shucorion smiled, as if Keller were somehow entertaining.
Turning now to Vellyngaith and the gaggle of Kauld, Keller said, “You people go with Commander Scott here. If we fail and your planet’s destroyed, at least the handful of you will be alive to tell about it. Just raise that baby right, will you?”
“I will name him ‘Keller’!” Vellyngaith vowed.
“No!” Erupting in an anguished laugh, Keller shook his head and pleaded, “Let’s not get syrupy here! Just leave his name where it is.”
“You are willing to die for our world!”
“And don’t you forget it. Welcome to Humanity.”
Cold now even inside the nice commando sweater, Keller paced away to put some distance between himself and the overwhelming changes of the past few minutes.
Behind him, Vellyngaith addressed Shucorion. “And you, Avedon? You will go with this man and die for All Kauld? If our planet is destroyed, this is the best thing that could happen to you. You have dreamed of it all your life.”
Not denying a bit of it, Shucorion could’ve been rude. Instead he simply said, “Another change for us all.”
Moved, Vellyngaith squared his slumped shoulders. “Then I will go with you also, and represent All Kauld.” He turned to the other Kauld people and addressed one of the men. “Fremigoth, go with them and carry my final order. Listen to these humans. They are better than we are.”
He shifted a step, to one of the women, and took her by both wrists.
“Raise our child human,” he charged.
Must be his wife. The Kauld woman simply nodded, her eyes full of promise and adoration for him.
This was the weirdest day. . . .
But Keller was already thinking beyond all this. His fear was being overtaken by something else. How tantalizing, how infectious, to be rushing out to meet the unknown! If he could keep his breakfast down, he’d be right up there with the charioteers on that coin.
And just as a bonus, no matter what happened after this, Shucorion and Vellyngaith were standing shoulder to shoulder instead of face-to-face. How many planets, how many people were represented here on the frigate’s bridge?
“Zane,” Keller began, “what’s the biggest supply of olivium that hasn’t been crammed back into the Quake Moon?”
“Far as I know, the hold of the mining ship. Pandora’s Box.”
“That’s where we’re going, then.”
“Why?” Savannah asked.
For the first time, Keller slid into his command chair. The dark green leather folded around his thighs and welcomed his aching back. Not a bad chair. He raised his eyes to the forward viewscreen, to the thirteen Kauld ships floating humbly before his one cumbersome parade balloon, and past them to the dusty expanse of the Sagittarius Cluster and whatever that mysterious place held in store for them.
“Can’t catch a shark without bait,” he said.
Chapter Twenty-four
Pandora’s Box
THE ROOM was now dimly lit by lights quickly fading. Frost rimed the edges of the console, the door, the bunk frame. The small quarters had become a strange Christmas card, etched with frozen crystals that muted every color. How pleasant it would be to wrap in a blanket.
But that wasn’t
the image Uhura wanted to convey when the inevitable happened. She wanted to look ready to go.
Oh, here he came. She heard the thunk and bump of heavy footsteps in the carpeted corridor of the former olivium chaser. What a strange life Pandora’s Box had lived so far.
The door banged and bumped. Someone outside was fumbling. Very good. He was shaken up.
When Billy Maidenshore finally thundered in, he was red-faced with both cold and anger. Outside were the angry voices of other criminals, those he had conned into working with him by promising them the wind and stars. Like most people of his kind, Billy could no more deliver paradise than he could tell the truth two days in a row.
“What’ve you done?” he demanded.
Uhura pressed her freezing hands between her knees and asked. “About what?”
“We can’t do anything! All the ship’s systems are locked up! If we try to engage the drive, it’ll blow up! We’re losing oxygen, there’s no heat, we’re getting carbon-dioxide poisoning—the crew’s panicking! Can’t you hear them?”
“They’re not a crew, Billy. They’re escaped convicts. I mean to make them convicts again. Without moving them a single inch. This time, you’re all in my prison instead of having me in yours.”
“You better explain that, lady.”
She defied him with silence this time. Whatever he wanted—answers or adoration—she would provide none.
He spun around to the bunk where McCoy lay under the finest blanket Billy had brought to Uhura. “McCoy, wake up! Wake up and die!”
“He won’t wake up,” Uhura said. “He’s almost dead. See his sunken eyes? The cheekbones showing? No color in his lips? A few more minutes . . . and I’ll be gone soon too. I just wanted to be alive long enough to tell you that you’re going to die a lot more slowly than the doctor or I will. We’ve arranged for that.”
A terrible shiver bolted through her, but she fought it, even pretended to enjoy it.
“You wanted us to talk about you,” Uhura added. “So we did. We decided to put a stop to you.”
Maidenshore stared at McCoy’s face, the colorless complexion, the half-open but unseeing eyes. For a man who had caused so much misery, even death, he seemed stunned by the presence of it.
Uhura watched him, carefully measuring her tenor and timing. “You’ve forgotten, Billy. We’re Starfleet officers. We’re ready to die. At some point, it becomes our duty. It’s my duty to make sure you don’t cause any more misery or mischief or harm anyone else. It’s going to get very cold out here. You may run out of air first, but I doubt it. You’ll all be alive until your core temperature simply goes down so far that your hearts can’t manage one more beat. Dr. McCoy explained hypothermia to me. There’s nothing you can do about it. You control the Pandora’s Box, but I’ve killed it.”
Outside, the raging prisoners pounded on the door and called, “Billy! Get out here!”
“Shut up!” Billy shouted. “I’m working on it!”
They pounded a few more times, then fell oddly silent.
Fear. They were terrified. Why not? Hanging out here in space? All they could do was sit here and die, slowly, watching it come moment by moment.
“We’ve surprised you, haven’t we?” she diagnosed. “That’s because we discovered your secret.”
“What secret?” he demanded.
She smiled. “That you won’t die for anything . . . but we will.”
Those words shook him to the bone. What a wonderful sight. His normally cocky eyes switched around as if to find answers on the walls, his hands clenched and unclenched, his guileless attitude fell to shreds.
“Call somebody,” he ordered. “You call somebody!”
She waved her hand disinterestedly. “You’ve inhibited the whole system, remember?”
He fished frantically through his pockets for the code release device he’d been using on her system when he wanted messages sent. He plugged it into its socket, punched the code numbers in, fumbled the code, and had to start over. By the time he succeeded in opening up the communications system, he was thoroughly flustered and manic.
“Call somebody!” he screamed. “I’m cold!”
She gazed up at him, her own eyes sallow, her complexion patted down to a pasty tan. “What’re you going to do? Kill me? What’s fifteen minutes this way or that? I don’t want to call anybody for you. You’ll just try your shenanigans again.”
Desperate, he swung to the board and began to punch out a distress call.
“Won’t work,” Uhura informed. “No one’s going to answer another distress call from Pandora’s Box after what happened the last time. Besides, I doubt the Peleliu’s in any condition to come out here and help us. Interesting, isn’t it, that you arranged the ambush of the only ship capable of saving you?”
He turned to her, amazed, shaken, breathless with sheer cold and the truth she spoke. His mouth moved, but nothing came out.
“Did you think I was just a damsel in distress?” she crooned. She leaned back in her chair and put her feet up on the end of the bunk. “You’re going to die in the dark, Billy.”
Because of the relationship she had set up with him, he knew better than to take her words as posturing or bravado.
“Nobody kills me,” he proclaimed, but he was frightened, biting his lip now, fitfully. “Nobody kills me . . . here—take it! Fix this!” He threw his hands up in the air and moved away from the console. “Whatever you did, stop it from happening. Stop it and I’ll get you anything you want. I got connections, you know. Nobody kills me. Nobody kills me. . . .”
“Come here and tell me all about it.” Uhura rubbed her leg on the side of his knee. “Maybe you can improve my opinion.”
Apparently he picked up just the slightest perfume of second chance and grabbed for it. He moved closer, his lurid eyes fixed on her with either desire or despise. She couldn’t tell which.
Didn’t matter, either.
Once he was away from the bunk, he was theirs. She coiled her leg around him, slid all the way down in the chair, and yanked him off balance.
“Hey!” he wailed as his knees knocked into the edge of her chair.
McCoy appeared behind Maidenshore, who was concentrating too hard on Uhura to hear the doctor roll out of the bed. “Have a drink, Billy,” he said, and pressed a hypo to Maidenshore’s throat.
“Put him here.” Uhura stood up and offered her chair.
McCoy steered the suddenly groggy racketeer into the chair, where he collapsed in a daze, muttering, “It’s not fair . . . nobody’s ever fair to me . . . what happened to simple fairness?”
Uhura looked down at him and shook her head. “He should never have left me with my makeup kit.”
“Lock yourself in, just in case there’s something I haven’t thought of.”
The doctor straightened abruptly, his teeth chattering some. “Where are you going?”
“To explain things to my prisoners. They’re in a panic. I’ve shown them I can take them down. Now I’m going to explain it to them personally . . . what Uhura says she can do, she can do. Without Maidenshore, they’ll do anything to survive, including recognize that I’m in charge of this ship and not Billy. They’ll be very happy when I tell them to lock themselves into their cells and I’ll take them to a nice warm penitentiary. They won’t have to die with the ship failing around them, which is what they’re looking at presently. After I have them convinced and confined, I’ll come back and get the heat back on.”
“You aren’t even armed!”
“I don’t need to be. I have a very big, cold knife pressing on all their throats.”
“Lady,” McCoy complimented, “you fight dirty.”
Chapter Twenty-five
“GRAVITY!”
“Compensate! Full thrusters!”
“Thrusters are on full, sir!”
“Use the engines! Compensate! Keep compensating! Sulu, pull us back! Full power astern!”
Everyone, except Spock, was swimming in sweat. Ev
en Spock had an unexpected sheen of amazement on his face.
Sulu fought with the protesting helm to draw the starship back, away from the enormous body that had suddenly appeared in space. Kirk was used to succeeding in his efforts, even if he had to pay a price or field a struggle—but this!
They had figured out how to attract the ’bot probe using the features of antimatter that were in similar flux to the olivium—not a good match, but close enough, apparently, to reach out and pull the tiny string that kept the probe in this universe, on this plane of existence.
Quite abruptly he found out he had pulled the string that would unravel the whole sweater. A dangerous flicker, a wobble of space around them, and here they were, sitting next to a body, a vessel, a civilization big enough to have its own gravitational force!
Made sense. If you’re going to pull something the size of a planet into your universe, you’d better expect mass and all its implications.
“Stabilizing, sir,” Sulu finally gasped, exhausted and drenched in sweat.
Before them in space hung not a ship, but a mechanism or vehicle the size and mass of a very large planet. Or was it a planet in some unknown form?
A moving vessel so big that it possessed so much gravity? A planet that didn’t need a sun for energy? Incredible!
The enormous body wasn’t exactly round, but might once have been. Now it was more oblong, but uneven, with jagged parts and appendages that looked like huge skyscrapers, banded together at their tips with metallic filaments that flickered and glowed. Inside the filaments flowed a watery substance, some kind of energy generation or natural waterfall that changed colors every few moments. Kirk couldn’t even begin to imagine what that stuff was, but he sensed the power.
And not to far from where the ship now hovered, pushing constantly against the gravitational pull of this big thing, was mounted one of the ’bots, sitting up on its table legs, fixed into a fitting that suited it perfectly.
“As you suspected, Jim,” Spock said, “we were only seeing the very tip of the structure.”