by Diane Carey
“Humans,” McCoy said automatically. “Ooops—there’s one Klingon among them! Look at that! I’ve only seen two Klingons in my whole life, and there’s another one!”
“I’ve never seen any at all!” Cadet Kirk mentioned, peering through the leaves at the dangerous-looking men coming toward them, carrying hand-held weapons. “They don’t move freely in Federation space, do they?”
“No,” Spock said sharply.
The cadet smirked briefly, then scooted away behind them into the trees and bushes.
“Usually they keep to themselves,” McCoy added. “Unless they want to cause trouble, that is.” He turned to Spock. “You and I are scientists. I’d feel better if I were trying to argue a point with a dish of bacteria. He’s not a scientist.” He nodded in the direction Cadet Kirk had gone. “Maybe he’s got a better instinct about this kind of thing. Certainly better than you, right? After all, Vulcans and instinct don’t get along, do you?”
Clearly irritated, Spock squinted through the bushes. “Not lately.”
“What do you want to do?”
“The cadet is well-intentioned, but hotheaded. I prefer to contact these men. Find out their terms.”
The six men moved in their general direction, aiming their laser rifles, clearly looking for target. They seemed ready to shoot, and a shiver went down McCoy’s spine as he anticipated the graze of hot energy crossing his body. One of those lasers could cut a person right in half, or slice off a leg and seal the wound in one swipe.
“I’ll speak to them,” Spock said. “You stay down.”
“No argument here,” McCoy muttered.
Spock arranged his feet under him, preparing to stand up and face the men—
Zzzzztt—Craaacccck
McCoy ducked, and so did Spock. What had happened? Had the men shot at them? Had the lasers cut into the trees overhead?
Cadet Kirk crouched halfway up the trunk of the tree, holding on with one hand, and holding a laser torch in the other hand. He was cutting a branch. With a silly little laser torch!
Suddenly the huge branch shuddered, snapped at the base, thundered through the other branches, and came down on the heads of two of the kidnappers, driving them to the ground!
Chapter 8
“Cadet! Belay that action!”
Spock raised his voice enough for the cadet to hear, and McCoy was pretty sure the approaching kidnappers clearly heard him too. They would know, now, that the attack was broken off on purpose. Maybe that would even work in Spock’s favor if he intended to try talking to these rough-looking people.
The cadet lowered his laser torch and looked at Spock from the protection of the tree’s trunk.
Spock motioned him to stay where he was, but the cadet was already halfway back to them. The young man skittered through the bushes and crouched near McCoy.
“Sir?” he asked the Vulcan. “I thought we were going to defend ourselves.”
“I have decided to attempt negotiation,” Spock said.
“You mean we’re giving up? Just like that?”
“I have no intention of surrendering, Cadet. In fact, I will not order the two of you to associate with these people. But as a Vulcan I have an obligation to attempt to negotiate, to find a common ground. They will be forced to make a new plan when they discover Dr. Daystrom is not here. We may be able to come to some compromise.”
Cadet Kirk didn’t like what he was hearing. His mouth worked with things he was about to say, but which he held back. Finally he pressed his lips tight and kept quiet.
“Just in case they aren’t impressed with Vulcan philosophy,” McCoy asked, “what do we do then?”
“Escape,” the Vulcan said without inflection. “Follow the cadet’s original plan. Hide in the hills. Wait for rescue.”
Spock raised both hands high and turned toward the kidnappers. He counted off a few seconds during which just his raised hands showed over the bushes, then very slowly, making sure they could see him clearly, he stood up.
“Come on out here. All the way out. Hands up,” one of the kidnappers called.
“You Starfleet?” another asked.
The Klingon swatted his comrade across the chest. “Of course Starfleet, you idiot! What else is that uniform?”
Cadet Kirk hunched toward McCoy. Together they watched as Spock made his way through the bushes to the open ground, then walked evenly toward the kidnappers.
“You think he knows what he’s doing?” the cadet asked.
“I think he thinks so. He’s got a couple thousand years of Vulcan philosophy backing him up—”
“What if those men haven’t read Vulcan philosophy? Compromise usually means that somebody loses, and it’s not usually the guys with the guns.”
They watched for a few moments while Spock was questioned by two of the men and the Klingon, while the other man stood back and waited. The other two, whom Cadet Kirk had dropped the branch onto, were struggling to their feet and trying to collect their senses.
McCoy tried to evaluate what he was seeing. Was the Klingon in charge out there? Or the big red-haired man with the moustache? Perhaps it was the small-boned bald man with the space between his teeth. They were all talking to Spock, one by one. The only men not talking to him were the two who’d been injured, and the one other, a tall, skinny fellow with black hair cut very short and sticking straight up from his head like a currying brush.
“Ensign Spock’s not telling them much,” Cadet Kirk said suddenly. “He’s trying to get information out of them without giving them any.”
“How can you tell?”
“Because they’re still asking questions. If they’d found out what they wanted to know, they wouldn’t be asking so much. Every time one of them asks something, Spock gives a long answer. He’s making stuff up.”
Trying to pay attention, McCoy watched the way the men were speaking to Spock, and decided that the cadet might be right. Spock was doing a lot of talking, but McCoy guessed he wasn’t saying very much of any value.
“That’s the leader, over there,” the cadet said suddenly.
“Which? The Klingon?”
“No. The black-haired one.”
“The one over to the side? But he’s not saying anything. He’s just watching.”
“I know,” the cadet confirmed. “He’s watching, and the others are glancing at him every time they ask a question. Listen—if we have to run for the hills, I want you to go first.”
Over their shoulders, McCoy could see the hills, but had doubts about running to them without being cut down by those laser rifles.
“If I go first,” he asked, “what will you be doing?”
“This laser torch doesn’t have much range, but it’s enough to set fire to these bushes. I’ll make a firewall to cover our escape. I don’t want to have to worry about you while I do it.”
“Oh, you won’t have to worry about this country boy, believe me. I’ve got long, long legs. They get longer when there’s a rifle pointed at my back.”
“Don’t blame you.” The cadet paused. “You know what? I don’t even know your name.”
“Oh … it’s Leonard. Hi.”
“Hi.” The cadet chuckled. “I’m Jimmy. James T. Kirk.”
“I know. I read the I.D. on the—”
“Look! The black-haired one’s moving in!”
“Shh!” McCoy motioned him silent as they watched.
Looked like the cadet was right. As the thin man with the short black hair came closer, the others moved back. Even the Klingon.
That sight alone—a Klingon backing off from a human—was scary. What kind of man was this?
The skinny man fixed his eyes on Ensign Spock. He was a little taller than Spock and was able to tuck his chin just a bit as he moved closer. He stared without blinking, like a cat stalking a bird.
And Spock was certainly like a bird, like a raven—a smart, dark raven. He stood there elegantly, a slim pillar of Starfleet control. The bright sunlight flickered o
n his ink-black hair.
Suddenly the skinny man lashed out with the butt of his laser rifle and cracked Spock across the side of his head. Spock managed to tip his head away at the last second, easing the blow somewhat, but it was still a hard knock. Spock went sprawling on the crisp dirt and rocks.
“That’s it,” Cadet Kirk said. “Spock just told them that Dr. Daystrom isn’t with us. Now the head guy is mad.”
The skinny man shouted a single order—McCoy didn’t pick up the word as it echoed against the back hills—and the Klingon and the red-haired man moved in on Spock. They dragged him to his feet and shackled his arms behind him.
Then, with the butt of a laser rifle crammed into his back, they shoved him away, toward one of their little craft.
“They’re taking him prisoner!” McCoy gasped.
“Come on!” Cadet Kirk grabbed his arm and pulled. “Let’s get out of here!”
Chapter 9
“Keep running!”
“I am!”
McCoy already felt as if he’d run two miles. His lungs heaved and his heart hammered in his chest. His thighs ached and his mind sang with the sound of laser rifles whining behind him.
“This way!”
Cadet Kirk’s voice buzzed in his ear. He tilted toward it and kept running. Rocks rose under his feet, then cliffs rose around him, and he dodged for cover in the higher ground.
Behind them, the stand of dry bushes burned furiously, providing them with cover as they dodged through the trees.
“What about the shuttle?” McCoy called to the cadet as they climbed higher into the protective rocky hills.
“It has a fire prevention system. When the outer skin reaches a certain temperature, fire retardant will be sprayed all over the craft. It’ll be just fine, and waiting for us when we get back.”
“We’re going back?”
“Eventually. I’m not going to abandon my first command.”
“Your first ‘command’ … aren’t you getting a little full of yourself? You haven’t even been in Starfleet Academy for a whole year yet!”
“Doesn’t matter.” The cadet veered off to his left and disappeared behind a jutting boulder. “Here’s a place to hide.”
Panting, McCoy struggled to get up there, and found the cadet huddled in a natural fortress of rock and scrubby bushes. The ground beneath them was almost level. They could defend this place pretty well just by throwing stones, if they had to.
“You think they’ll come after us?” McCoy asked.
Cadet Kirk wiped his brow with a sleeve. “No way to know. Probably.”
“Probably,” the medic echoed sourly. “In a couple of hours, it’ll be dark. We’ll have to make some kind of plan. We can’t stay here in these rocks very long without food or water. So, Mr. Cadet, future commander, go ahead and give an order … what do we do now?”
“Keep your head down.”
“My head is down.”
“And don’t talk.”
“Who’s talking? You’re the one who’s talking!”
“Shh!”
Darkness had fallen swiftly, like an ax blade coming down. Half an hour later, this planet’s three bright moons had come drowsily up from behind the horizon, casting sharp, black shadows from the trees and rocks.
Crawling behind Jimmy Kirk’s compact body, Leonard McCoy wondered how he’d ended up here when all this started out as a perfectly simple, ordinary ride to a seminar. Now he was scooting on his belly through bushes and over stones, trying to reach the two parked runabouts, six desperate criminals, and one captured Vulcan.
From here, under the light of the three moons, two of them full moons and one a pinkish crescent, he could see the smoldering remains of the stand of trees where the Spitfire had crashed. In fact, he could even see the shuttle, its hull crusted white with fire retardant it had sprayed all over itself when the flames touched it. Now it was a dirty mess, but it wasn’t burned.
“I only see three of them.”
“The other three must be off looking for us,” Jimmy said. “I’d guess that, anyway. They’re not around here, that’s for sure. Why else would those three stick around?”
“Do you know what you’re doing?”
“Don’t worry. This is a textbook rescue attempt.”
“What if these men never read the textbook?”
“First,” Jimmy whispered, ignoring McCoy’s warning, “we have to get our hands on one of those laser rifles. Once we’re armed, they’ll have to take us seriously. Then we can rescue Ensign Spock, disable those two runabouts, haul the Spitfire out of the bushes, and get out of here and warn Starfleet about these creeps.”
“We’re going to do all that, are we? I’m getting tired just thinking about it.”
“I’ll get the weapon … you free Ensign Spock. All right, let’s move in.”
Well, the cadet was decisive, for sure. Whether the decisions were right or not—that remained to be seen. So far, the track record wasn’t too good.
But he was still trying. He wasn’t giving up. The more he failed, the more determined he got.
McCoy’s mind started to wander as he watched Jimmy Kirk sneak along in front of him. Maybe this would make a good research paper. The psychology of refusing to give up. He knew there were people like that in history, like General Ulysses S. Grant, who treated every defeat like a victory and kept on surging forward until the American Civil War was won for the Union. No matter what disasters befell him, he kept on coming. They called him “Unconditional Surrender” Grant.
This boy was like that. Would the results be as good?
McCoy had no way to know, and he was afraid to guess.
Abruptly, Cadet Kirk surged forward into the darkness toward one of the two little craft. McCoy strained to see, but could only hear the grunts and punches of a wrestling match. Jimmy had charged one of these men and attacked him!
Taking his cue, McCoy got his feet under him and also moved. He skirted around the nearest craft and headed for the second one, where Spock sat with his hands tied behind his back, and his feet tied at the ankles, leaning against the landing strut. His mouth was gagged with a wide piece of black nonconductive tape.
McCoy could see the other two men standing together several yards away, facing the hills and talking to each other. They hadn’t noticed what Jimmy Kirk was doing on the other side of the other runabout.
With his pulse throbbing in his ears, McCoy was aware of every tiny crunch of his toes on the rocky ground. Every scratch sounded like a foghorn to him. He kept glancing at the two men, sure that any second they would swing around and fire their laser rifles at him.
Spock saw him now … shook his head sharply as if he wanted them to abandon their attempt … but he didn’t move … didn’t attract any attention…
Stay still … don’t make any noise … almost there…
McCoy reached out. Another inch … he touched Spock’s knee, felt his way down to the shackles tying Spock’s ankles. The Vulcan remained motionless, but tense. McCoy could feel the tightened muscles as he tried to loosen the tied polymer strands.
These strips were simple, cheap, but effective too. The knots were locked tight, and the stuff wouldn’t stretch. Jimmy Kirk’s laser torch might do the trick, or it might melt the plastic to hot liquid and burn Spock’s legs and hands. How could he get it off?
If only he had that first-aid kit. There was a scalpel in there, sharp enough to cut the strips. But it was fifty feet away, inside the encrusted Spitfire.
“I can’t get you loose,” he whispered, barely loud enough even to hear himself. He knew Spock would hear him, because Vulcans’ hearing was more sensitive than humans’.
“Mmm!” Spock nodded toward the other runabout, but couldn’t speak past the tape.
“Quiet.” McCoy got to his own feet and slipped both hands under Spock’s arm and pulled.
With the faintest shuffle, Spock scratched to his feet, pressing one shoulder against the runabout for leverage. He ne
ver took his eyes off the two guards.
“Is that the Klingon?” McCoy murmured, nodding toward the person on the right, who was large and muscular in the hazy yellow moonslight.
Spock nodded, rather furiously, as if still trying to get a message across. He began taking impossibly small steps … a few inches at a time … McCoy kept a grip on his arm to keep him from toppling over. If they could get to the other side of the runabout…
Then what?
They would have to find something sharp and cut those plastic strands.
Hobbling pathetically, Spock made a valiant effort to shuffle out of the line of fire. McCoy’s mind reeled with crazy ideas about how to get the plastic strands off.
Bite them? Teeth were good, but not that good.
Stretch them?—no, that wouldn’t work, or the tied-up person could just pull his way out.
He thought again of that laser torch. There might be no other choice. Spock might have to deal with some burns in order to escape.
What could McCoy use to treat burns around here? Was there any plant like the aloe native to his planet? Some natural remedy he could use? He wasn’t comfortable with those things, even though his great-grandmother in Georgia had raised him on tales of home remedies. In fact, that was where he’d first gotten the idea of becoming a doctor.
Still, the thought of treating laser burns with leaves and sap didn’t make him very happy.
He almost jumped out of his skin as a third form appeared silently beside him—Jimmy Kirk!
“Move,” the cadet whispered, and nudged McCoy aside.
A short, stumpy blade flickered in the peaches-and-cream moonslight. A knife! He must’ve taken it off the man he attacked! And he had the man’s laser rifle under the other arm!
McCoy stifled a whoop of victory and slid to one side. Jimmy went to work on Spock’s bindings. Snap! Spaghettilike polymer fell from Spock’s ankles. Snap! His hands were free.
The Vulcan raised both hands and ripped the tape from his mouth and shouted, “Run! It’s a trap!”
Chapter 10