In a way, Kirk thought this ironic. The words were heated and the mood icy.
He looked up and down the table. The vice-regent of Ammdon had seated the Enterprise officers midway along the table. To Kirk’s right sat the vice-regent and his staff. To the left were Jurnamoria’s Constable of Peace and her half-dozen advisers. Kirk surreptitiously adjusted a throat microphone Spock had bollixed together out of one of the communicators. The others had come prepared for the primitive conditions in the chamber; he hadn’t known to come with an amplifier.
“Vice-Regent, Constable, we talk much and accomplish little. The issues dividing your two great worlds,” he said, [169] trying not to smile as McCoy muttered sotto voce, “Hog-wash,” and succeeding, “are not insurmountable.”
“Wrong.”
“He knows nothing!” came the comments, much louder than McCoy’s indignant snort.
Kirk held up his hand and got the silence he wanted. He knew instantly the silence wasn’t accompanied by open minds.
“We of the Federation have proposed a peace plan which benefits both Ammdon and Jurnamoria. We offer the technical expertise to aid your ailing food industries, and there will be further financial assistance to build new industries. With your planets’ drive and personnel and the Federation’s vast wealth and knowledge, we can forge a new tomorrow. We can go forward arm in arm toward a future filled with prosperity—and peace.”
“Pretty words,” snapped the Jurnamorian Constable of Peace. She sneered as she said, “What you offer Jurnamoria is nothing. Nothing! We do not need to be under the heel of alien aggressors. All we need is to have what is rightfully ours—and which they have stolen!” She stood and dramatically pointed at the vice-regent.
“There can be no off-planet ownership of Ammdon farmland,” said the vice-regent in a polar voice. “And there will be no kowtowing to off-planet dictators!”
“Sir, Lady, please!” pleaded Kirk. It availed him nothing. The two threw insults back and forth until Kirk simply sat down to let them get it out of their systems.
“It was a nice speech, sir,” said Uhura. “Even if they didn’t listen.”
“Thanks. I found it in Zarv’s quarters. I wonder how much better he could have delivered it.”
“Not much better, Captain,” said Spock in a low voice. “My tricorder readings show intense agitation. A motion to [170] adjourn until both sides reconsider and calm themselves would be in order.”
Kirk nodded, rose to demand the floor again. What he heard froze him stiff with fear.
“Jurnamorian bitch! Your warships are nothing compared to the might of the Federation vessel circling our planet.” The vice-regent’s smile turned into a sneer. “The pact with the Federation demands their full defense of Ammdon. Take your fleet and return to your miserable hellhole planet.”
Uhura’s computer gave a startled yelp as the Constable of Peace answered her Ammdon counterpart. The insult she gave had no direct translation.
“... we leave now. We shall see how this vaunted defense treaty stands. I think they are cowards. They will not fight. They will turn tail and run, leaving your rotten carcass in the sun for buzzards to pick over.”
“It would seem, Captain,” said Spock, “that a motion to adjourn is superfluous.”
“You have such a powerful grasp of the human condition that it amazes me, Spock,” answered McCoy. The group from the Enterprise watched as the Jurnamorian constable of peace and her entourage stormed out of the chamber. The angry clicking of their bootheels filled the long, stonewalled room for long minutes after the Jurnamorians had vanished from sight.
“You see how it is, Captain Kirk?” asked the vice-regent. “So bullheaded. Refuses to even consider our side.”
“Vice-Regent Falda, your approach needs polishing.”
“I think not,” the man said, his voice turning from silk to ice.
“Ambassador Zarv’s untimely death no doubt contributed to the problems here today, but we require more freedom to prepare. Our subspace radio message to Starbase One will bring another qualified team in a month or so.”
[171] “A month? Hardly, Captain Kirk. With Jurnamoria’s fleet about our planet, we would not survive a month.”
“A cease-fire can last indefinitely until a formal agreement is reached,” Kirk said, grasping at straws. “If they withdraw to twenty AUs, will that satisfy you? With the detection equipment supplied by the Federation, this is adequate distance for you to spot a preemptive strike.”
“No.”
“The Enterprise will not fight Ammdon’s battles, Vice-Regent Falda. We remain neutral if you initiate hostilities.”
Spock’s communicator bleeped loudly. He turned to Kirk as he closed the device, saying, “I don’t believe Ammdon will initiate battle, Captain.”
“Why not?”
“Mr. Sulu reports that the Jurnamorian fleet has fired upon the Enterprise.”
Kirk raced to the bridge, trailing his other officers behind like the contrail of a rocket plunging through atmosphere. Scotty had assumed command as soon as Sulu saw the Jurnamorian preparations to fire on the Enterprise.
“Report, Scotty.”
“ ’Tis nae so bad, sair,” he said. “The weapons they use canna penetrate our deflector shields, even at half power. But I kenna if we can fight and maintain deflectors. The fluctuations in the magnetic bottle are worsenin’.”
“Danger?”
“Aye, Captain, if it continues much longer.”
“Return to engineering and do what you can to keep things held together. I will not be using the phasers unless it is absolutely necessary, but I’ll require full deflector screen before we’re out of this.”
“It’ll be touch ’n’ go, sair.”
“I have every confidence in you, Scotty.”
[172] “Aye, sair.” The engineer returned to his precious engines to keep them running as smoothly as possible to power the Enterprise for the fight slowly building all around.
“Sir, the Ammdon ships have returned fire. See?” The forward viewscreen detailed the burgeoning battle. At first, only a few traces indicated rocket fire between vessels. Then all of space lit like an RR Lyrae star as more of the warcraft launched their barrages. It quickly became impossible for the eye to differentiate between Ammdon and Jurnamorian ships.
“Spock, deflectors up to seventy-five percent full power.”
“Powering up now, sir.”
Kirk sat, chin in cupped hand, as he thought furiously. If the Enterprise so much as fired a single round of photon torpedoes, the battle might be over. And Jurnamoria would be permanently in the Romulan camp. The few remaining crippled vessels would radio back to their home planet and report in full, if they hadn’t already indicated that the Enterprise took part in the battle.
“Sir, do you want me to prepare a course to warp free of the planet?” asked Sulu.
“We can’t run.”
“We can’t stay and fight, either,” spoke up McCoy. “This ship is too much for any of them—any thousand of them.”
“I know. Even if we use the phasers at low power, we can blow most of them out of the sky. Technologically, both planets are hundreds of years behind us.”
“Only if you measure technological development as the ability to kill,” argued McCoy. “What are you going to do, Jim? Lorelei was right, you know. Instead of us preventing a war, we set it off.”
“It would have been different if Zarv and Lorritson and Mek Jokkor had been conducting the negotiations.”
“I beg to differ, Captain,” said Spock. “I recorded the [173] entire proceedings and submitted them to detailed computer analysis. The situation had progressed too far for anyone to sway either party. The vice-regent’s motives are remarkably like those Lorelei outlined. Likewise, the Constable of Jurnamoria refused to listen because of her antipathy to the vice-regent.”
“Perhaps a conference with the individual parties,” mused Kirk. “Instead of together we ought to have met separately
, laid the foundations for a peaceful settlement, then met.”
“Such is moot. There are no fewer than six warcraft firing upon us. The deflector screens are holding; however, a notable magnetic flux is being established in the warp-engine MHD bottles.”
“Are the dilithium crystals holding? The instability isn’t going to crack them?” Without the dilithium crystals, the entire exciter stabilizer circuit failed and the precious magnetic bottles collapsed. The Enterprise would either be dead in space again or in peril of exploding in one cataclysmic eruption of matter and antimatter.
“At this point, they are in no danger. If other Jurnamoria ships join the attack against us, I cannot say what the effects will be.”
“Should I return fire, sir?” Chekov asked eagerly. His finger quivered over the firing button that would allow incomprehensibly potent phaser beams to leap forth.
“Keep the power at a minimum on the phasers. Ready photon torpedoes. Set proximity fuses to explode one thousand kilometers in front of each target.”
“Sir, that will do no damage!”
“Mr. Chekov, your bloodthirstiness in pursuit of defending this ship is admirable, but I don’t want to destroy that fleet. I want to show them what we can do—and haven’t done.”
“Sir,” the young ensign said, chastised.
[174] “That’s not gonna work, Jim,” said McCoy in exasperation. “They’ll think we’re not destroying them because we can’t. When a planet gets the warring bloodlust like they’ve got it, nothing but victory or death will sate it.”
“Mr. Chekov, are torpedo triggers set as ordered?”
“Aye, sir.”
“Fire tubes four through seven—now!”
Chekov’s finger plunged downward savagely. A deep shudder passed through the ship as the four photon torpedoes launched. On the viewscreen the torpedo traces showed vividly in comparison to the smaller, less effective rockets fired by the warring craft. The screen turned blinding white as the four torpedoes exploded a million meters in front of their targets.
“Sir, they’re renewing their attack. Three of the craft we fired on are disabled. They are forming on us and allowing the Ammdon vessels free rein.”
“Scotty, give me impulse power to get out of orbit. Let’s try to lead them away from Ammdon, if nothing else.”
The vessel quivered as power flooded the ignition chambers of the impulse engines. Kirk knew he risked much with this maneuver. Fuel for the impulse engines was at a premium; using the warp power would have been a more conservative approach, but he worried at the instabilities mounting in the stardrive engines. If he needed phaser power, it had to come from their gargantuan energy reserves available, even at an eighty percent functional level.
“They are following us, sir. Their communications officers are tracking and giving course data,” reported Uhura. “There isn’t too much else being passed between them.”
“They know what to do. This is a warlike culture. They’ve practiced enough to act without overt direction.” Kirk sat back and enjoyed the brief respite he’d won by turning tail and running.
[175] “Sir, the vice-regent wishes to speak to you. He sounds very angry.”
“I imagine he is, Lieutenant. Very well, put him on the screen.” Kirk watched as the viewscreen tore apart, then re-formed with the image of Vice-Regent Falda. The man’s chocolate complexion had turned even darker with anger. Kirk imagined he saw sparks actually flitting about in the jet irises as Falda tried in vain to control his wrath.
“Captain Kirk,” he said, turning the name into an insult. “You run like a whipped cur. You throw Ammdon to the wolves at our door. What value is this Federation of yours if it does not deliver the protection our treaty guarantees?”
“Vice-Regent, greetings.” Kirk waited for the man to respond. When he didn’t, Kirk smiled and said mildly, “We have no wish to be caught between warring factions. We do not wish to view this war at all. We bring offers of peace, of assistance.”
“Assistance means helping us destroy those interlopers! They bombard my planet even at this moment. We outnumber them, but their weapons are superior to ours. We require your firepower to stop them. Without it, we perish.”
“Jim,” whispered McCoy. “Should you contact Starfleet and get orders?”
“It wouldn’t do any good. I know as much about the situation as anyone there—more. If I can’t handle it, how can a bureaucrat four hundred parsecs away?”
Kirk held up his hand to silence McCoy. “I won’t pass along the responsibility, Bones. This is my command. I’ve been assigned to keep the peace, and I’ll do it. I will!”
“Captain Kirk, are you returning to defend Ammdon, or do we count this as a breaching of the Ammdon-Federation treaty?” The vice-regent glared from the viewscreen.
“We will return, Vice-Regent Falda. As long as your ships do not fire on us, as they were doing.”
[176] “The heat of battle,” the man apologized insincerely. “Our peace-loving commanders lack experience. Some fired at anything in their sights.”
“I’m sure that’s how it happened. However, there is a condition to our return. We will once more sit at the conference table and discuss mutually acceptable peaceful solutions to your problems with Jurnamoria.”
“Sit with Constable Ganessa? Impossible. She ordered this attack. I have no truck with murderers.”
“I’m sure she’d say the same, Captain,” said Spock. “Their bioprofiles indicate extreme hostility toward one another. If Ammdon or Jurnamoria had selected any other negotiators, this might have been avoided. The personality conflicts are too great.”
“They’re too much alike,” said Kirk, nodding in understanding and still at a loss how to defuse the interplanetary war and all its far-reaching consequences.
A flare of red lights caught Kirk’s attention. All over the bridge flashed emergency warnings. The deflector screens at full barely held off the attacks launched against them now.
“Phasers, sir? More torpedoes?” Chekov nervously licked his lips, eyes riveted to the readouts showing how near the point of failure for the screens was.
“More power to the deflectors.” He thought hard, if they turned and ran, they might reach starbase before everything aboard the Enterprise fell apart or blew up. But that accomplished nothing. The war would rage between Ammdon and Jurnamoria, and the Romulans would have what they wanted: a planetary civil war that they could exploit for their own expansionist motives. If the Enterprise fought, the Jurnamorian fleet might be destroyed and Jurnamoria must align with the Romulans as a self-defense measure. There seemed no way to defeat either fleet without massive [177] loss of life, since the leaders were totally opposed to further negotiations.
“Spock, identify the flagship with Constable of Peace Ganessa aboard.”
“Done, sir. Her vessel is at distance seventeen point zero light-seconds, heading—”
“Never mind all that. Sulu, maneuver us closer. Maintain deflectors at full power. Mr. Chekov, use photon torpedoes to keep them as far away as possible. Try to interdict incoming rockets with our phasers, set on lowest power.”
“What is it you’re planning, sir?” asked Spock.
“Prepare the transporter, Mr. Spock. I want to get close enough to the constable’s flagship to beam her out. And at the same time I want the Enterprise positioned in such a way that we can beam up the vice-regent.”
“But you can’t do that, Jim. Their deflector shields’d prevent it,” protested McCoy.
“You’re forgetting something, Bones. These are primitive ships. They don’t have deflectors.”
“They have to.”
“No, sir,” said Sulu. “None does. I never thought of it before the captain mentioned it. We’re too used to fighting ships at the same technological level.”
“So, all right, you beam the two leaders aboard. Then what? They still hate one another.”
“Dr. McCoy, your lack of faith in me is appalling. I think I see a way of res
olving many of our problems with one small meeting of the minds.”
McCoy shook his head. Scotty burst onto the bridge and cried, “The engines’ll take nae more, Captain. The deflector shields are wearin’ us down too much.”
“Cut power forty percent as you use the transporter.”
“Transporter?” he cried in surprise. “But, Captain, that’s nae possible. I kenna be sure we’ll hold together or not.”
[178] “Do it, on Spock’s command. Mr. Spock?”
“Nearing locus, sir. Approximately equidistant between Ammdon’s surface and the Jurnamorian flagship Bor. Transporter room, activate now!”
The lights dimmed on the bridge as power shifted from internal demands to the transporter. As soon as the enormous energy requirements of the transporter had been met, Kirk ordered full deflector screens and a course away from Ammdon.
“Put us out of reach of both fleets. I want this peace conference to be uninterrupted.”
He swung out of his seat and motioned for Spock and McCoy to accompany him. Dr. McCoy followed, grumbling. The expression on Spock’s face was unreadable.
Chapter Twelve
Captain’s Log, Stardate 5012.5
I find my ship to be in jeopardy. The intense assault by the Jurnamorian fleet has severely damaged certain portions of the Enterprise. Mr. Scott and his able staff are repairing those circuits most needed for warp-speed capability. I have ordered beamed aboard the Ammdon and Juramorian leaders for one final conference. There is one last tactic I have not tried to bring peace to the warring planets. If it fails, I must return to Starbase One and allow the Romulans their way with this section of space. I do not think I will fail this time. My argument for peace is one so potent the vice-regent of Ammdon and the Constable of Peace of Jurnamoria will not be able to resist.
[180] “I protest this cavalier behavior on your part, Captain Kirk,” Vice-Regent Falda said in his icy tones. “Your technology was to aid, not to kidnap. I demand to be returned to my planet immediately. The war raging requires my personal supervision.”
STAR TREK: TOS #12 - Mutiny on the Enterprise Page 15