Star Trek 07

by James Blish

  "If we're to divert the asteroid, Captain, we must warp out of orbit within thirty hours. Every second we delay in reaching the deflection point will compound the problem, perhaps past solution."

  McCoy halted. "What in blazes is that?" he exclaimed.

  Ahead of them, topping a shallow hill stood a tall tower, obelisk-shaped, composed of some gleaming metal. Wild flowers were heaped around its base. Nearing it, they could see that its surface was inscribed with curious, unreadable symbols.

  "Analysis, Mr. Spock."

  Spock was readjusting a dial on his tricorder. He frowned. "Incomplete, sir. It's an alien metal of some kind—an alloy resistant to probe. Readings can't even measure its age accurately."

  "Any theories about what it could be?"

  "Negative, Captain. But alloys of this complexity are found only in cultures that parallel our own—or surpass it."

  "Buttercups in a meteor area but no meteor craters," McCoy said. "The whole place is an enigma, biologically and culturally."

  "Thirty hours," Kirk said. "Let's not waste them. This Paradise may support some life-forms."

  It did. Below the obelisk's hill lay a clearing. Copper-skinned people were moving about in it with an ease which declared it to be their home. In its center a large, circular lodge lifted to a roof that seemed thatched with reeds. Animal hides had been sewn together and stretched to compose its walls. A woman, children around her, was mixing meal with water she dipped from a crude pottery bowl with a gourd. Near her an old man, a heap of what looked like flint arrow heads beside him, was bent over his work. To his right, younger men, magnificently muscled, bows slung over their shoulders, were gathered around a painted skin target, engaged in some amiable argument. Perhaps it was the way the russet tone of their bodies blended with the hue of their beaded leather clothing that explained the sense of peace that lay like a blessing over the whole settlement. Here was man at one with his environment.

  "Why, they look—I'd swear they are American Indians!" cried McCoy.

  "They are," Spock said. "A mixture of advanced tribes—Navajo, Mohican, Delaware."

  "It's like coming on Shangri-La," Kirk said. "Could there be a more evolved civilization on this planet, Spock? One capable of building that obelisk—or developing an asteroid-deflector system?"

  "The sensors indicate only one form of life type here, Captain."

  "Shouldn't we tell them, Jim?"

  "What, Bones? That an asteroid is going to smash their world to atoms?"

  Spock said, "Our appearance would only serve to frighten and confuse them, Doctor."

  "All right," Kirk said abruptly. "We've got a job to do. Let's get back to the Enterprise." But as he turned away, he looked back at the Indian village, his face wistful, a little envious.

  "Something wrong, Jim?"

  "What?" Kirk said absently. "Oh, nothing. It just looks so peaceful and uncomplicated. No problems, no command decisions. Just living."

  McCoy smiled. "Back in the twentieth century it was called the 'Tahiti syndrome,' Jim—a typical reaction to idyllic, unspoiled nature. It's especially common to overpressured leader types like Star Fleet captains."

  "All right, Bones. So I need a vacation. First let's take care of that asteroid."

  Kirk moved on toward the obelisk. Stepping on to its pediment, he flipped open his communicator. "Kirk to Enterprise!"

  "Aye, Captain." It was Scott's voice.

  The order for beam-up was on Kirk's lips when the metal under his feet gave way. What appeared to be a panel in the pediment slid open and tumbled him down a steep flight of stairs. In the narrow shaft of daylight that shone through the gap, he had barely time to note that the panel's underside was dotted with vari-colored control buttons. Then the panel closed silently. Groggy, he raised his head—and his shoulder hit one of the buttons. A shrill buzz sounded. A blue-green beam flashed out. It widened and spread until he was completely bathed in blue-green luminescence. It held him, struggling. Then he fell down the rest of the steep stairs—and lay still.

  Spock was the first to notice his disappearance. Appalled, McCoy joined him. They circled the obelisk, their anxiety mounting in them. When Spock had raked the empty meadow with his eyes to no effect, he opened his communicator, reported the news to Scott and ordered beam-down of a Security Guard search party. But neither the Guards nor their sensor probes succeeded where the Vulcan's sharp eyes had failed. The panel gave no hint of its existence. Stern-faced, Spock gave the meadow another rake with his eyes before he made his decision. He jerked open his communicator to say curtly, "Prepare to beam us all back up, Mr. Scott. We're warping out of orbit immediately."

  "Leaving? You can't be serious, Spock!" McCoy said.

  "That asteroid is almost as large as your Earth's moon, Doctor—"

  "The devil with the asteroid!" McCoy shouted. "It won't get here for two months!"

  "If we reach that deflection point in time, it may not get here at all." Spock's face was impassive.

  "In the meantime, what about Jim?"

  "As soon as the asteroid is diverted, we will return and resume the search."

  "That'll be hours from now! He may be hurt! Dying!"

  Spock faced him. "If we fail to reach that deflection point at the exact moment, we will not be able to divert it. In such case, Doctor, everyone on this planet, including the Captain, will die."

  "Can a few minutes more matter?"

  "In the time it has taken for this explanation, the asteroid has sped thousands of miles closer to this planet—and to the Captain." Imperturbable, he spoke into his communicator. "Beam us up, Mr. Scott."

  Scott's voice was heavy with disapproval. "Beaming up, Mr. Spock."

  The object of their concern wasn't dying; but he was breathing painfully, slowly. He seemed to be in a large, vaultlike chamber; but the dizziness in his head made it as hard for his eyes to focus as it made it to remember where he'd come from or how he'd got here. He was sure of nothing but the vertigo that swayed him in sickly waves when he tried to stand up. In his fall, he'd dropped his phaser and communicator. Now he stumbled over them. He picked them up, staring at them without recognizing them. After a moment, he stopped puzzling over them to start groping his way up the metal stairs. As he stepped on the first one, a sharp musical note sounded. He accepted it with the same dazedness that had accepted the unfamiliarity of his phaser and communicator. Then his reaching hand brushed against some button in the panel above him. It slid open as silently as it had closed; and he hauled himself up through it into the daylight.

  The three girls, flower baskets in their arms, startled him. So did their bronze skins. They were staring at him, more astonished than he was. One was beautiful, he thought. Under the long, black hair that glittered in the sunshine, she bore herself with the dignity of a young queen, despite the amazement on her face.

  In their mutually dumbfounded silence, he decided he liked her high cheekbones. They emphasized the lovely, smooth planes of her brow, cheeks and chin. The other two girls seemed frightened of him. So was she, he suspected; but she didn't turn to run away. Instead, she made a commanding gesture to her companions—and dropped to her knees at Kirk's feet. Then the others knelt, too. All three placed their palms on their foreheads.

  Kirk found his voice. It was hoarse. "Who—are you?" he said.

  "I am Miramanee," the queenlike girl said. "We are your people. We have been waiting for you to come."

  But her ready welcome of him wasn't repeated so quickly from the elderly chief of the Indian village. Kirk's greeting into the communal lodge was courteous but reserved. It was primitively but comfortably furnished with mats and divans of deerhide. Tomahawks, spears, skin shields and flint knives decorated its walls. There was a fire pit in its center, embers in it still glowing red. The chief sat beside it. Flanking him, three young braves kept their black eyes fixed on Kirk's face. One wore a gleaming silver headband, embossed with a emblem into which a likeness of the obelisk had been etched. Miramanee
made her obeisance to the chief; and turning to Kirk, said, "This is Goro."

  The old man gestured to a pile of skins across from him.

  "Our priestess has said you appeared to her and her handmaidens from the walls of the temple. So it is that our legend foretells. Though we do not doubt the words of Miramanee, these are troubled times. We must be sure."

  "I'll answer any questions I can," Kirk said, "but as I told your priestess, many things are strange to me."

  The warrior who wore the emblemed headband cried out, "He doesn't even know our danger! How can he save us?"

  "Silence, Salish! It is against custom to interrupt the tribal Elder in council! Even for the Medicine chief!"

  But Salish persisted. "Words will not save us when the skies darken! I say he must prove he is a god!"

  "I will have silence!" Goro addressed Kirk. "Three times the skies have darkened since the harvest. Our legend predicts much danger. It promises that the Wise Ones who placed us here will send a god to save us—one who can awake the temple spirit and make the skies grow quiet. Can you do this?"

  Kirk hesitated, searching frantically through his emptied memory for some recollection that would make sense of the question. He saw the suspicion in Salish's eyes hardening into open scorn. "I came from the temple," he said finally. "Just as Miramanee has told . . . but I came from the sky, too. I can't remember this clearly, but—"

  His stumbling words were interrupted by a stir at the lodge entrance. A man entered, the limp body of a boy in his arms. Both were dripping wet. Miramanee, her hand on the boy's soaked hair, cried, "A bad thing has happened! Salish, the child does not breathe! The fish nets pulled him to the bottom of the river. Lino has brought him quickly but he does not move!"

  Rising, the Medicine chief went to the boy, and bending his ear to the chest, listened intently. Then he pried open an eyelid to peer into the pupil. After a moment, he straightened. "There is no sound in the body," he announced, "and no light in the eyes. The child will move no more."

  Lino had laid the small body on a heap of skins. Kirk glanced around at the shocked, stricken faces. He got up, moved quickly to the child and raised the head. "He is still breathing," he said. Then he stooped to place his mouth on the cold lips. Breathing regularly and deeply, he exhaled air into them. After a moment, he seized the ankles; and began to flex them back and forward against the chest. Salish made a threatening move toward him. He held up a restraining hand and Goro called, "Wait!"

  The keen old ears had heard the slight moan. The child stirred feebly—and began to retch. Kirk massaged him briskly. There was a gasping breath. The eyes opened. Kirk stood up, relief flooding through him. "He will be all right now," he said.

  Goro placed his palm on his forehead. "The people are grateful."

  "It's a simple technique. It goes away back . . . away back to—"

  His voice trailed off. Away back to where? He couldn't remember. This "simple technique"—where had he learned it? Now that the emergency's tension had passed, it was replaced by an anguish of frustration. How had he been marooned in a present that denied him any past? Who was he? He felt as though he were dissolving, his very being slipping through his fingers like so much water.

  In a dream he heard Goro say, "Only a god can breathe life into the dead." In a dream he saw him turn to the three young braves. "Do you still question that the legend is fulfilled?"

  Two shook their heads. Salish alone refused to touch palm to forehead. Goro turned to Miramanee. "Give the Medicine lodge to the god."

  Still in his nightmare of non-being, Kirk felt the silver band of the Medicine chief placed on his head.

  It was Scott's angry opinion that too much was being asked of his engines.

  "I can't give you Warp Nine much longer, Spock." Calculated disrespect went into the engineer's intercom. "My engines are showing signs of stress."

  "Stress or not, we cannot reduce speed, Mr. Scott."

  "If these circuits of mine get much hotter—" The nervous systems of the Enterprise bridge personnel were also showing signs of stress. Their circuits were getting hot under pressure of the race against time being made by the asteroid. Spock alone preserved his equanimity. But even his quiet eyes were riveted to the mam viewing screen where a small luminous blip was becoming increasingly visible. The irregular mass of the thing grew larger and larger, its dull though multiple colors revealing themselves more distinctly with every moment.

  "Deflection point minus seven," Chekov said. "Full power, Mr. Scott," Spock said into his intercom.

  "The relays will reject the overload!"

  "Then bypass the relays. Go to manual control."

  "If I do that, we'll burn out the engines!"

  "I want full power," Spock said tonelessly.

  "Aye, sir."

  The First Officer swung the command chair around to Sulu. "Magnification, factor 12, Mr. Sulu."

  Sulu moved a control switch—and the image on the screen jumped into enormous contour. For the first time the asteroid's ominous details could be seen, malignantly jagged—a sharp-fanged mass of rock speeding toward them through the trackless vacuum of space. "Deflection point minus four," Chekov said. Spock looked away from the frightful immensity on the screen and Chekov said, "Minus three now, sir."

  The Vulcan hit his intercom button. "All engines stop. Hold position here, Mr. Scott."

  "All engines stopped, sir."

  "Prepare to activate deflectors."

  "Aye, sir."

  There was an irregular cracking sound, acutely heard in the sudden silence usually filled by the engines' smooth humming. The ship vibrated.

  "Power dropping, sir!" cried Sulu.

  "Engineering section! Maintain full power. Full power!"

  Scott's voice was hard. "Dilythium circuits failing, sir. We'll have to replace them."

  "Not now," Spock said.

  "Zero! Deflection point—we've reached it, sir!"

  "Activate!" Spock said sharply.

  On the screen the monstrous mass glowed redly. Then the glow flickered and faded.

  "Degree of deflection, Mr. Sulu?"

  "Insufficient, sir."

  It was defeat. Horrified silence held the bridge in thrall.

  The composure of Spock's voice came like a benediction. "Recircuit power to engines, Mr. Scott. Maximum speed. The heading is 37 mark 010."

  "That heading will put us right in the asteroid's path, sir."

  "I am aware of that, Mr. Chekov. My intention is to retreat before it until we can employ all our power on our phaser beams."

  "What for?" McCoy demanded.

  "To destroy it." Spock turned his chair around as though he were addressing the entire personnel in the bridge. "A narrow phaser beam," he said, "that is concentrated on a single spot of that rock will split it."

  "It's also likely to cripple the ship," McCoy said. "Then we'll be crushed by the thing."

  "Incorrect, Doctor. We could still evade its path by using our impulse power."

  "Jim won't be able to get out of its path!"

  "That is another calculated risk we must take," Spock said.

  Miramanee, her arms full of new buckskin garments, was approaching Kirk's Medicine lodge when Salish stepped out from behind a pine tree.

  "Where are you going?" he said.

  "It is my duty to see to the needs of the god," she said quietly.

  Salish tore the clothing from her. "You should be working on our ritual cloak!"

  She retrieved the clothing. "There will be no ritual between us now, Salish." She spoke gently.

  "You cannot go against tradition!"

  "It is because of tradition that we cannot now be joined," she said.

  "You are promised to me!"

  "That was before he came."

  "Tribal priestess and Medicine chief are always joined!"

  "He is the Medicine chief." She paused. "Choose another, Salish. Any maiden will be honored to join with you."

  "I do not wish
another."

  Genuine compassion came into her face. "You have no choice," she said.

  "And if you had a choice, Miramanee, would you choose me?"

  She didn't answer. His face darkened. He wheeled and strode off into a grove of sycamore trees. She shook her head sadly as she watched him disappear. Then her black eyes lit. She walked quickly toward the Medicine lodge; and Kirk, roused from his brooding by her entrance, looked up at her and smiled.

  "Perhaps you would like to bathe before you clothe yourself in these." She placed the Indian garments at his feet.

  "Miramanee, tell me about the Wise Ones."

  "Tell? But a god knows everything."

  "Not this god," Kirk said wryly. "Tell me."

  She knelt beside him, fingering his uniform wonderingly. "The Wise Ones? They brought us here from far away. They chose a Medicine chief to keep the secret of the temple and to use it when the sky darkens." She reached to touch the back of his uniform. "There are no lacings here," she said, puzzled. "How is it removed?"

  He knew he was flushing and felt like a fool. Gently he removed her hand. "And the secret was passed from father to son? Then why doesn't Salish use the secret? Why are the people in danger?"

  Still puzzled, she was seeking a way to loosen his belt. "The father of Salish died before he could tell him the secret."

  Kirk had taken her hands in his when two girls, accompanied by Goro, came into the lodge. They placed their baskets of fruit at his feet; and Goro, touching his forehead respectfully, said, "The people honor your name. But they do not know what you wish to be called."

  Kirk felt the anguish of frustration again. "What do I want to be called?" equaled "Who am I?"—that "I" of his without a Past, without identity. He was sweating as he fought to dredge up one small clue to the Past that was hidden from him—and suddenly one word advanced from its blackness. He said, "Kir . . . Kirk. I wish to be called Kirk."

  "Kirok?" Goro said.

  Kirk nodded. He was exhausted. Something in his face frightened the fruit bearers. They had hoped for the god's approval, not this look of lostness. They withdrew; and Goro, anxious, asked, "Have the gifts displeased you?"