Vulcan's Forge

by Josepha Sherman

  "But wait a minute," she continued. "We can track the Romuian by the flaw in its cloaking device. But they're no fools, never were. And since they're no fools, I am assuming they mean for us to track them. They're counting on it. So, as far as I'm concerned, they've already chalked us up as a casualty."

  Uhura hit the communications panel on her chair's arm. "Uhura to Engineering. Mr. Atherton, how're you coming with that diversion of impulse power?"

  "We can boost phaser fire about fifty percent for maybe two broadsides, Commander," Atherton said, as if he was making a vast concession.

  " 'Maybe' two broadsides?" Uhura asked. "Not enough for a whole battle? See what else you can do by . . . eight hundred hours. And while you're at it, have you got the specs for a cloaking device?"

  Long, long ago, Captain Kirk himself had stolen those specs. Even now, tense and frightened as she was, Uhura had to stifle a grin at her memory of Kirk in the command chair wearing tilted eyebrows and pointed ears—and Spock's insistence that on Kirk, they were not aesthetically appealing.

  "Aye, Captain," said Atherton. He sounded really apprehensive now.

  Getting to know me, are you, Atherton? Good. "Excellent," Uhura said. "How long do you think it'll take for you to build one up from scratch?"

  Grinning, she prudently turned down the volume right before an anguished Oxonian howl from Atherton would have split her eardrums.

  "Good. Cut that time in half, mister, and get back to me. Bridge out.

  "We may want to pull our own disappearing act," Uhura explained to the bridge crew. "Can't hurt."

  Well, it couldn't hurt anyone but Atherton and his crew. And maybe a Romulan or two.

  The crew dropped into wait-and-see mode. Uhura negotiated appeals from Engineering. From time to time, she reduced Duchamps to apologetic admissions that he'd received no transmissions from any of the ships he had hailed. Some of those ships are imaginary, mister, remember? Still, one message from Excelsior, say . . .

  Uhura stared out into space, as if willing the Warbird to become visible, to finally break the suspense.

  Why not wish for a knight in shining armor while you're at it, lady? Jim Kirk's dead, Spock's missing, and you're going to fight this with every weapon you can.

  "Commander . . . something's coming in," Duchamps cut into Uhura's thoughts. "Warbird, Commander. It's dropping its cloaking device."

  "Shields on full," Uhura snapped. "Battle stations, alert! Mr. Atherton, how about those phasers?"

  "The message is coming from the Romulan vessel." If Duchamps sounded any more surprised, his jaw would probably have thumped onto his workstation.

  "Well," Uhura drawled, "will wonders never cease? Put her captain on screen, mister."

  She drew herself up into what she privately called her Queen of Sheba pose. Romulans responded to magnificence, and she knew that Romulan women often held high positions on board their starships and in government. Respect for women was built into their culture. She had that working for her—and the fact that she was a veteran of the Enterprise. One of Jim Kirk's own.

  The figure who appeared on-screen wore no helm. His uniform was finer than most Romulan uniforms she had seen, and she'd seen fewer stars in some nebulae than glittered on his tunic. Dark hair, meticulously cut, pale skin, high cheekbones, a commanding arch of nose, and eyebrows almost ridiculously well arched made this Romulan look more patrician than most. Hmmm, must be seeing one of the real aristocrats, Uhura thought. He was definitely worth looking at, and I'll just bet he knows it, too.

  Keeping her hands out of sight, she brought up Intelligence files, ready to search on whatever name her adversary supplied.

  "You are Lieutenant Commander Uhura of the Intrepid?" the Romulan commander asked.

  "Commander Uhura of the science vessel Intrepid II," Uhura corrected sweetly. "Captain Spock, of Vulcan, is our commander of record."

  The Romulan officer nodded. No name? Either he was very rude or very confident. Or he was playing a game.

  Uhura wasn't Communications for nothing. She was good at games. "You have the advantage of me, sir," she said, arching her own eyebrows and putting a great lady's disdain into her voice.

  "That I have, Commander."

  "I was not speaking of firepower, sir, but of courtesy," Uhura countered. "You are an intruder in this space. You use our names, but have not supplied your own."

  What the Romulans used for registration numbers appeared on her workstation, and remind me to log a commendation for Duchamps, Uhura thought. She ran a fast search.

  "Avrak," she said, and saw the slightest tightening of his mouth. "Commander Avrak of the Adamant. And what," she added with a second quick glance at the display, "is Senator Pardek's own sister-son doing in this quadrant of the galaxy? A trifle indiscreet of you, isn't it, Commander?"

  She had been right. Pardek had been one of the most prominent figures at Camp Khitomer after Nanclus of Romulus had been arrested, and Avrak was his nephew and heir.

  "Your intelligence is good, Commander," Avrak said smoothly. Did he seem somewhat peeved at having to share a title with a signals officer jumped up to command? All the better if he did. "But so is ours. I know what your weapons specifications are on the science vessels. Spy vessels, I should say. You are in violation of Romulan space, a clear declaration of war. I call upon you to surrender."

  Uhura smiled thinly as her crew whispered objections. "Commander," she said in her best imitation of James Kirk, "I'm surprised at you. Don't you know that we have already transmitted our position back to Starfleet, and in cipher? You're the one who's violated the Neutral Zone, as you know perfectly well. Your cloaking device has been leaking radiation thanks to the solar flares in this system. I'd have that checked, if I were you," she added with false solicitousness. "And put your engineering officer on report while you're at it."

  Avrak smiled ever so slightly. "Now you are the one who is overconfident, Commander. Does your crew know that you're planning to fly them straight into the mouth of Erebus?"

  Oh, he was a cultivated one, wasn't he, with his references to ancient Romulan battle epics?

  "We await reinforcements," Uhura purred. "You may believe you have us outgunned: I would not trouble to dispel your illusions. Nevertheless, when our convoy arrives, you might as well be commanding . . ." Inspiration hit her; Romulans hated ridicule. "A rubber ducky."

  Did he get the reference? Possibly; at least he knew from her tone of voice that he'd just been insulted.

  Atherton, you'd damn well better have those phasers online by now. And a cloaking device of our very own would be really useful.

  "Commander," came Atherton's voice, right on cue, "I've got the firepower you want, but please, for the ship's sake, don't go fighting any fleet actions."

  Hadn't planned to, mister. She tapped out assent on her console, continuing to keep her hand below Commander Avrak's line of vision.

  "Come, come, Commander," Avrak said in the most urbane of tones. "We do not have to charge you with spying. Call it . . . engine failure. A most convenient fiction. You were forced to divert course, and we chanced to find you."

  "When someone dies, his heart stops," Uhura retorted. "That doesn't mean that a man shot by phasers dies of a heart attack. Or that a Romulan who's overextended himself can't bluff."

  "As can a Starfleet officer who knows she is outgunned."

  "Oh no, my dear Commander Avrak, you're the one who's bluffing." Uhura kept her face carefully blank. "Excelsior's on her way. Commanded by Hikaru Sulu. Do you know him? One of James Kirk's best."

  "Ah, what a pity. We broke your cipher, Commander. We know that Excelsior has not yet responded to your distress signal."

  "You broke one of our ciphers, sir," Uhura riposted, "as you were meant to do. We have others. Do you really want to wait around to see if Excelsior shows up? Captain Sulu takes a dim view of trespass. As you know. Right about now, he's really not very happy with treacherous Warbirds."

  Uhura took a deep
breath, thankful that her bridge crew knew to confine their reactions to glances and whispers. It was one thing to bluff with hardware and starships. Now for the real bluff, which was, of course, political.

  "Commander." She leaned forward in her best "let's talk equal-to-equal" pose. "It seems to me that you are of no use to your senator and patron dead. Unless, of course, you are of an age and standing sufficient to create an . . . inconvenience. Enough of an inconvenience that he might see an advantage in favoring your heir over yourself."

  She flashed a smile that men in several quadrants of the galaxy had assured her was dazzling. Avrak's face flushed darkly, but not as dark as hers, which gave away nothing at all, thank you very much.

  "Perhaps," Uhura added, "you came to investigate a few spies whom you might have downworld, hmm? May I remind the commander that Obsidian is a Federation protectorate, secured by a Starfleet outpost? Unless your people are planning to bob their ears and bleed red for a change, it's going to be easy enough to spot them, you know. Or," she asked with sweet malevolence, "have you beamed a plastic surgeon downworld, too?"

  No answer.

  "Do you know," Uhura went on, "I cannot believe that a senior Romulan officer, a patrician of your Empire, would create an act of war merely because you were too indiscreet to not threaten or bluff. It seems most . . . illogical, especially for a race of Vulcan stock. Perhaps your kinsman is right to focus on your heir, not on yourself."

  Leave him some dignity, she warned herself. After all, he's a Romulan. If he loses too much face, he'll fight to the death to regain it.

  "Lady," Avrak forced out between clenched teeth, "you forget yourself."

  "Commander," Uhura gave him back as good as she got, "I cannot believe you would declare war—beyond the fact of your illegal presence here—because you were worsted in an argument with a lady. I would suggest you withdraw. Now. I grow weary of this debate."

  That tactic had worked for Captain Kirk. Would it work for Uhura? She crossed her fingers, well out of line of sight, and prayed silently.

  Avrak allowed himself to laugh. "Commander . . . Lady, how I wish we had met somewhere, almost anywhere other than upon the bridges of enemy ships." That, Uhura thought, was probably the only truthful thing he'd said so far. "I am minded to indulge your bluff for some hours longer," Avrak continued. "And then . . ." His smile broadened in a way that made Uhura want to slap him; he was too confident by half. "We shall see what we shall see." He paused. If they had been in the same room, Uhura suspected, he would have looked her up and down. "Until then, Adamant will . . . hold fast."

  Intrepid's screen blanked as Avrak ended transmission. An instant later, the Warbird disappeared as its cloaking device engaged.

  "Well," Uhura said brightly. "That was interesting, wasn't it? Or, as Captain Spock would say, fascinating.

  "Duchamps, are you still picking up those radiation anomalies from the Warbird?"

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "Good. Well, at least we've got a few new weapons for ourselves." Two, anyhow: the augmented phasers and the cloaking device, assuming Atherton got it online (and she'd bet a month's pay on his success). And maybe, just maybe, they'd get Captain Spock back.

  "Commander?" Lieutenant Richards asked warily. "I . . . uh . . ."

  "Spit it out, mister."

  "Begging the commander's pardon, but it sounded as if that Avrak were . . . uh . . . attracted to you and letting you know it. And during red alert, too." He sounded shocked.

  "Did it, Lieutenant?" Uhura gave him another of her dazzling smiles and saw him actually flinch from the impact. Did you think I didn't know it, mister? "Now that, too, is fascinating. Reminds me of a little something Captain Kirk taught me long ago. Remember? I've said it before: Anything can be a weapon. Anything at all."

  Red alert continued to sweep across the bridge, concealing her science officer's blush.

  And, darker skin or no, her own.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  Obsidian, Deep Desert

  Day 5, First Week, Month of the Shining Chara,

  Year 2296

  I am Faisal ibn Saud ibn Turki, Ensign Prince repeated defiantly to himself. I am a prince of the ancient ruling house. I will not die in such an ignoble fashion!

  The archaic words weren't much comfort. Faisal looked at the rest of the group, huddled into the deepest recess of the cave against the fury of the solar flare outside. (Dramatic, that flare; too bad that they couldn't exactly enjoy the view.) Not one of the troop looked happy, or bold, or anything other than . . . resigned.

  Yes, yes, I know, if it is written we shall die, then we shall die—but no one can know in advance what is written, so damned if I'm just going to curl up and—and wait. "Trust in Allah but tie your camel," and all that.

  But neither Islamic theology nor Arabic proverbs were going to comfort these people. Instead, Faisal said as briskly as he could, "If I am not mistaken, solar flares of this intensity don't last too long."

  "They don't have to," Ozmani muttered. "We'll be out of food soon enough."

  "What nonsense is this? We still have plenty of supplies, enough of these . . ." But even Faisal couldn't bring himself to call ration bars food. "These nutrients," he finished resolutely, "to see us through three days. Four, if we're careful."

  "Water."

  Faisal just barely kept from snapping something hot in Arabic. "We have enough water, too," he contented himself with saying, "as long as we don't get too energetic." No, that was only reinforcing the "curl up and die" idea. I'm a pilot, curse it all, not a —a psychiatrist! What am I supposed to say?

  Ha, yes, he had it. Faisal continued as brightly as he could, "We did get off that one burst of a message before the flare. The base personnel couldn't have missed it, and brief though it was, they're good enough back there to have gotten a fix on us. Hey, you know those folks! By now they'll be searching for us. As soon as the flare dies down, they'll be coming to get us."

  No response from any of them, save a wan smile from Lieutenant Diver. Humoring him, Faisal thought. These were a group of well-trained specialists suddenly stuck in the middle of danger with nothing constructive to do, that was at the heart of it. Of course they were all used to the good old military "hurry up and wait" that hadn't changed since the days when his great-great-however-many-great-grandfathers were out fighting the Turks. But usually the "hurry up and wait" happened when one was amid familiar surroundings. It was asking a lot of these people to combine passive waiting with the hardships of desert survival.

  "All right," Faisal said suddenly. "Enough brooding. When my ancestors were stuck in the middle of the Rub al-Khali, the Empty Quarter of our homeland, with nothing around them but . . . well. . . nothing, they could very easily have let all that desert emptiness get to them. Instead, they kept up morale by telling each other stories."

  Kavousi sighed, just a touch too loudly. Faisal glared at him, in no mood for sarcasm. "Captain Rabin left me in charge, mister. And if I say we're going to start a storytelling circle, then by Allah, that's exactly what we're going to do. Besides," he added with a quick grin, "haven't any of you ever heard of Scheherazade?"

  A few wry chuckles answered him, and Faisal continued, cheerleading, "We're Starfleet, aren't we? If one woman alone could hold off Death for a thousand and one nights, we can damn well hold it off for three or four little days!"

  A moment ago, Centurion Ruanek had been surrounded by natives shoving against him, trying to overwhelm him even as he fired and fired again. A moment ago, he had been struggling to keep his footing against the combined weight of their wiry, half-starved bodies, realizing that if he fell, he'd be crushed, realizing that he was actually in danger, he and his warriors both—

  And now the battle had stopped so suddenly it was as though he'd been plunged into some fantastic old tale in which living folk were turned to stone. He gaped along with the others, Romulans and natives both, at this sudden bold intruder. The robed figure was actually daring to move right through th
e lot of them, proud and straight-backed as though knowing no one would attack him. And Ruanek gasped along with the others as the stranger tossed back the hood of his cloak. Another Vulcan—

  More than that! Ruanek realized suddenly. Light and Darkness, this is none other than the famous Spock himself. The half-human Starfleet legend—yes, and he is clearly acquainted with our noisy madman.

  No, no, more than "acquainted." These two were definitely foes, as rigid with hatred as those emotion-blocked Vuleans could get.

  Amazing, Ruanek thought, and again, amazing, which didn't begin to relieve his feelings. And how can I use this? He glanced sideways at cousin Kharik, thinking, Maybe all isn't lost after all, maybe we can get out of this mess without killing more children or ourselves, and raised his hand to his warriors in the Romulan signal that meant "hold your fire."

  No danger of disobedience; the others, Romulans and natives both, were all still as intrigued as he.

  There will be a battle. Ruanek hardly needed to wonder at that; the icy tension between Spock and Sered was almost a tangible thing. But this time it will be a battle of one-to-one, Vulcan against Vulcan.

  Akhh, and let this be the end of it! If Sered fell, surely Avrak would accept that as a sign that this mission was doomed to fail. There could be no other possible course of action but to leave, not unless those over Avrak really did want outright war with the Federation.

  Unlikely. Yet it might not be a bad thing; there can at least be glory won in warfare. But there can be none at all in serving a madman!

  Yes, yes, let him and his warriors at last be free of the madman and let them leave this cursed planet not as servants but as true Romulans! Let them escape while something of honor was still left to them!

  I never thought to say this, not of a Vulcan, not of Spock, no less, but: Win! Slay the madman and free us all!

  Spock and Sered stood staring at each other, both too stunned to move, each waiting for the other to take the initiative. A familiar, albeit hoarse, voice cut suddenly through the tense silence: