by Kem Antilles
“Incoming,” Tandon snapped in a tight voice. “Above you and to the left.”
Drawing in a deep breath, she took a firmer hold of the control stick. “I’m on them.” She veered to intercept the needle-nosed fighters. The picture rippled and changed, still showing crude and flat crystals, but now they were lumpier and more purplish. Like trees.
The enemy flyers she was tracking were still fighters, but now they had iridescent gossamer wings. Dobb’s heart raced. She hardly noticed the shouts and confusion of the others around her.
Focus, she told herself. She made a dive toward the enemy fighters, but they banked and swooped down in an evasive maneuver. She followed, readying her weapons as the fighters dipped close to a stream, skimming low. One of the fighters dropped a tiny bomb into the water in front of her. The explosion sent up a blinding cloud of steam, enveloping her craft.
Dobb pulled up sharply, rolled, and narrowly missed the top of a large crystal as she emerged from the vapor.
That was a close one, she thought, her pulse pounding in her ears. She hadn’t expected something like that from the game—from Jake maybe, but…
Dobb’s head reeled. She pushed back from the simulator console, trying to think. Something was very wrong here.
Rainbow-colored lightning bolts sizzled through the darkened sky, striking the hilltop and sending the Citranese natives scurrying downslope for safety.
Gazing at one of the mammoth machines fighting for purchase on the muddy hill, Jake envisioned its inside parts: conveyors and an ore smelter, containers to store refined metals, reactors to power the processes. But, most important, somewhere in the heart of all the hydraulics, gears, and circuit boards sat a computer that directed everything, taking commands transmitted from the mothership and converting them into actions—a computer, no doubt well shielded but without which the excavators could not operate.
And sensitive electronics, Jake knew, could be blown out and ruined by power surges—such as a discharge from an electrical storm.
“I’ve got an idea!” he shouted to nearby Tani, startling her. He ran around, gathering the natives, and called out his scheme, trying to make himself heard above the wind and thunder and the roar of struggling excavators.
The Citranese leader listened carefully, then whirled and began giving orders, waving his slender arms. All nearby Citranese, including Tani, ran into the forest. Some scurried up trees and slashed at the metallic vines that hung from the branches. Others waited below to catch and knot the vines together into long cables. Teams carried the cables and raced upslope to the top of the bluff.
Jake did everything he could to help, but he panted with exhaustion. He marveled at the strength and stamina of these spindly-looking people as they charged up the steep incline, never slowing until they gained its summit.
As the rain came down and lightning streaked above them, pairs of Citranese took the downslope ends of the knotted cables and hurried toward the excavator machines. Jake rushed after Tani to pick up one of the ends.
The muddy slopes were so steep and slippery that Jake slid more than he ran. Jake struggled to hold up his part of the vine cable and keep pace with the seemingly tireless Tani as she sloshed through ankle-deep mud toward the excavator. Its treads fought for traction, spewing gouts of slop behind it.
Automated flyers soared across the skies, continuing to shoot into the slashing downpour, targeting the natives with phaser blasts that sent geysers of hot mud flying into the air.
“Where do we tie this vine?” Tani yelled when they reached the side of the machine, staying low. In front of Jake, the machine’s massive rear treads spun. He didn’t dare risk coming too close to those. And the stream of mud hurled by the machine made approach from behind impossible. He had to come in from the front, where the wide-open mouth of the excavator waited.
From the bottom of the enormous maw, two hydraulic arms protruded, ending in scoops with jagged sides designed to rip into the ground and shovel great loads of ore back into the excavator. The mechanical arms flailed about, trying to find purchase on the muddy slope.
“If I can tie this cable around the base of one of those hydraulic arms, we’ll be set,” Jake shouted to Tani. “It’s got to be attached securely.”
Tani nodded. Trying to keep his balance in the muck and ready to duck if a metal scoop flailed in his direction, Jake inched toward the arm’s base.
Then he slipped on a patch of mud slicker than bearing grease. Out of control, Jake slid down the remaining meters to the metal arm—just as the arm swept toward him. The scoop caught Jake in the stomach and knocked the wind out of him.
He doubled over and fell forward onto the long, segmented arm. His head and chest dangled over it. As if sensing his presence, the arm lurched, carrying Jake up toward the grinding maw. Inside the opening, he glimpsed a throat of conveyor belts waiting for him—and at its other end, a red-hot glow.
The ore-smelting furnace!
Nog hunched over the master data pad in Kwiltek’s quarters, grunting and nodding as he disabled one video-enhancement filter after another. He was just reprogramming the final one when Kwiltek overrode the door lock and marched into his quarters.
Nog jumped to his feet and dived for the door, ducking around the startled alien. He pelted up the dim hallway. Kwiltek’s footsteps thundered behind him, and he whistled for guards with a shrill, fluting sound.
Nog sped up, running in blind panic. His short legs pumped to keep him ahead. The sound of loud thudding from behind told him that more guards had joined the pursuit. Almost slipping as he rounded the final corner, Nog burst into the gaming control room.
Startled faces looked up from the simulator consoles. He saw Dobb from across the room pushing back in confusion from her control panels. Nog dashed to the center of the room and leaped onto one of the consoles.
“Listen to me!” he cried, pointing at the real pictures that now filled the video screens. “That is not a dead world. There are animals and people down there. My partner, Jake, is down there on the planet—”
Mutters and shouts of disbelief threatened to drown out his speech.
“It’s true,” Dobb’s voice broke in. “No one but Jake could have pulled that steam maneuver I just saw on our simulator screens. That was no game we just played.”
“No, it’s not a game,” Nog said. “It’s business—very big business. The planet below us is rich in latinum, and Kwiltek’s company doesn’t care if he has to wipe out a whole living world to get it.” He paused as a ripple of surprised murmurs spread through the room.
“Kwiltek is using this planet. And all of you!” Nog said, pointing around the room at the other garners. “Kwiltek brought us here with lies. He is using us to destroy this world.” As he spoke, Nog couldn’t believe he was putting lives ahead of profit. But Jake was down there…
He pointed to Kwiltek, who, along with the guards, angrily shoved his way toward the center of the room where Nog stood. “Do you want to be responsible for killing an entire world?” Nog shouted quickly, knowing the guards were about to grab him. “Do you want to let the mining company use you?”
The angry cries of the betrayed gamers drowned out all further speech.
The excavator’s mechanical arm tossed Jake toward the hot furnace, and he crashed onto the conveyor belt in the middle of a pile of squishy mud. He fought his way, sputtering and gasping, out of the ooze.
The moment he lifted his head, Jake felt a searing blast of heat on one side of his face. Turning, he saw the ore smelter approaching as the conveyor drew him forward. He also realized that he still held the end of the metallic vine cable.
Desperately, Jake scrambled back toward the outside, pulling himself along the cable. His feet pumped furiously in the slick mud. He fell, banging his elbow painfully on the conveyor, then struggled to his feet again, vividly imagining what would happen to him if he was swept into the furnace.
Reaching the mouth of the excavator, he got a welcome blast of
cool wind and rain on his face. Tani held the metallic vine, keeping tension on it so he could climb. Silently, Jake thanked her for her quick thinking and leaped free of the excavator mouth. This time, he managed to knot the cable end around the base of the metal arm and stumble away to safety.
Tani jerked sharply on the cable two times, signaling her fellow Citranese on the top of the bluff to tie it to the tallest tree. Then she and Jake ran from the excavator as fast as they could.
A massive thunderhead towered over the bluff. As Jake watched, a brilliant, jagged bolt of green lightning arced from cloud to hilltop.
The lavender tree on the summit burst into flames, and lightning raced down the vine cable to the excavator machine. For several seconds, a halo of crackling, spitting electrical discharge surrounded it. The strong scent of ozone, tinged with burning electrical insulation, tickled Jake’s nostrils.
The excavator stopped short, its treads, metal arms, and turret now immobile and shivering with spasmodic convulsions. Black, noxious smoke poured out of its mouth as it sank into the mud, wheezing and deactivated.
Then Tani pointed in excitement. “Look at the other excavators!” Two of them had also been short-circuited by the lightning racing down other vine cables. The remaining machines had switched their engines into reverse and retreated from the scene of the battle. They slipped and slid down the muddy slopes, losing all the ground they had gained in the past hour.
The cheers of the Citranese rang out over the noise of the receding excavators. One after another, the slender humanoids rushed toward Jake to thank him. The bangas bounced up and down in apparent glee. Tani wrapped her thin, strong arms around him and hugged him. She squeezed so tightly that he thought his ribs would crack.
Then the rumble of the retreating excavators suddenly ceased. They had stopped in their tracks! Though seemingly undamaged, their engines, running lights, and all systems seemed to have switched off … as if the gamers above had shut them down. The attack flyers settled onto special platforms on the excavators, powering down their jets.
At that moment, Jake heard the familiar hum of a transporter beam about to whisk him away to another location. His skin tingled.
Finally! As the Citranese began fading out around him, Jake called, “As soon as I get back to Deep Space Nine, I’ll send the Federation to protect this planet. I promise!”
The last thing he saw before they all disappeared was Tani looking at him, her big blue eyes wide with astonishment and appreciation. He tried to smile at her, but the transporter took him away.
CHAPTER 11
Nog was waiting for Jake in the mothership’s transporter room, grinning from ear to enormous ear.
“Nog! I was beginning to think you’d never beam me back up,” Jake said, rubbing his hands down his muddy uniform. “What happened?” Every muscle in his body was still tensed and ready for action. After the dangers he had faced on the planet, he found his friend’s sharp-toothed grin a bit irritating. “I almost got killed down th—”
“Tell me later,” Nog said. “I’ve got something to show you. You’ll never believe it!” He rushed Jake down the corridors to the gaming room, where an amazing scene was unfolding.
The gamers from every shift, all two hundred of them had crowded into the simulation room, angry. Even so, Jake and Nog had never known the room to be as quiet as it was now. No phaser blasts issued from the simulation console speakers. No lights flashed. No chimes tinkled overhead as the computers tallied scores. All of the outraged players had switched off their terminals in protest.
A low-pitched, grumbling murmur rippled through the group as the young gamers converged on one corner of the large chamber. Kwiltek stood backed into the corner, head held high, an unreadable expression on his birdlike face. Only three of his guards, two Andorians and a Gorn, were anywhere in evidence. The outnumbered guards looked around with nervous uncertainty, afraid to start shooting.
Nog jumped onto a chair and addressed the group. “Now that my partner is safely back from the planet—” He pulled a dripping and muddy Jake up beside him, and the gamers cheered. “I think it’s time we made a few things clear to the management of this mining station.”
Jake cleared his throat and spoke in a loud voice. “What you’re doing here is wrong, Kwiltek. People live on that planet, and that’s their home you’re destroying.”
“We demand to be returned to our homes at once!” Dobb added.
“We won’t do any more of your dirty work,” another young humanoid said, crossing her arms over her chest. “You lied to us!”
“Yes, we are on strike!” Dobb’s partner, Tandon, said, hissing through the wisps of vapor curling up from his respirator.
“Let’s discuss this in a reasonable manner,” Kwiltek warbled in a soothing tone. “You are mining company employees, after all. But I’m afraid that unless you agree to sit down, stay calm, and renegotiate, I will have to suspend all payments of accrued wages until—”
Just then, the mothership’s computer drowned out any further conversation with an emergency announcement: “Federation ship approaching at high speed! A Starfleet runabout requesting immediate docking. Mr. Kwiltek, your presence is required at once in the command center.”
Grudgingly, the angry gamers let him out of his corner. “We want transport home, Kwiltek!” Dobb repeated, calling after him. Whistling in agitation, Kwiltek hurried toward a lift.
Nog stood on a chair so that everyone could see him despite his short stature. “Let’s go greet our visitors!” he shouted, and he led his companions out of the simulator room. Jake followed, asking Nog who was on the approaching ship. But the Ferengi said only, “You’ll see.”
Just outside the mothership’s main docking port, Nog and Jake squeezed into the reception area with as many other gamers as could fit. They heard the soft thunk of metal meeting metal; a slight shudder coursed through the floor under their feet. A moment after the hiss of equalizing pressures, a thick steel door rolled aside to reveal a fuming Commander Benjamin Sisko and an equally furious Rom and Quark.
“Dad!” Jake shouted, and he ran to his father. Nog was right behind him, hurrying over to his father and uncle, ducking low. Rom made a show of scolding his son, but both of the older Ferengi seemed secretly pleased.
Commander Sisko hugged his son hard, and Jake felt a tremendous relief that his father had arrived. “We got Nog’s emergency message pod and came right away,” Sisko said, “but it looks as if you’ve managed to wrap up most of the trouble yourselves.”
Just then, Kwiltek marched into the receiving area and confronted them. “Why have you come here? This is not Federation space. You have no jurisdiction over this planet.”
“My nephew sent for me,” Quark replied, stepping forward, “and rightly so. You have offended Ferengi honor. Perhaps you are not familiar with our Rules of Acquisition? My nephew has been trained in these principles since his youth. Nog, please familiarize Mr. Kwiltek with Rule Number 16.”
Nog snapped to attention and recited with confidence: “A deal is a deal.”
Quark shrugged eloquently. “It seems that you decided not to honor the business deal you made with my nephew and the human boy.” The Ferengi’s expression was almost apologetic, as if he had no choice in the matter.
“They’re only children. They’ve lost nothing but a few days of their time,” Kwiltek said. “Besides, why should your Ferengi customs matter to me?” he asked with an audible sneer.
Before Quark could answer, Sisko set Jake aside and glared over the heads of the other gamers at the birdlike alien. “Kwiltek!” he said in an icy, threatening tone.
Kwiltek flinched at the power of Sisko’s voice. The commander of Deep Space Nine stalked forward to stand beside Quark, the veins on his neck standing out like indium tensocables. The mass of kids in front of him parted; no one wanted to get in his way.
Kwiltek straightened to his full height to face Sisko. “I cannot allow you to disrupt my mining operations in thi
s manner. Please take your young and leave before I am forced to summon my station’s guards.”
“You mean the dozen guards we saw in there—with a couple of guys who looked like you?” Sisko asked, pointing toward the docking bay. “They climbed aboard a shuttle and left, towing a full ore hauler, just after we docked.”
Kwiltek’s face turned a strange shade of yellow-green.
Sisko nodded. “You have a lot of explaining to do, Mister,” he said. “We have Starfleet reinforcements on the way—but perhaps we should see if we can work out a resolution before they get here?”
“A resolution?” Kwiltek said. “But we have done nothing to—”
The uproar of the betrayed gamers drowned out the rest of his words. Commander Sisko motioned for silence.
“You know it is forbidden to steal the resources of an inhabited planet,” Sisko said. “The Federation takes its laws against strip-mining planets very seriously.”
“But this planet is in the Gamma Quadrant, and therefore not under the jurisdiction of—” Kwiltek began indignantly.
“You are licensed through the United Federation of Planets,” Sisko said, “and therefore bound by our laws. I have contacted the Federation Miners Guild and Trading Commission. If you refuse to comply with our laws, then your license will be revoked, and you will be unable to sell your ore anywhere in Federation space.”
Kwiltek’s face took on a shrewd look as Sisko began ticking his demands off on his fingers. “First, you must cease all operations on the planet below immediately.”
Jake tugged on his father’s elbow. “Uh, Dad, we already made a good start on that one.”
Sisko laughed. “I’ll bet you did.” He turned back to Kwiltek and scowled. “Second, when the Starfleet ships arrive, I want you to arrange and pay for safe passage home for all of these young employees.”
“And full wages! In latinum,” Quark added. “As guaranteed in their contracts. Your mining company must pay in full—”