The Enterprise War

by John Jackson Miller

  “Patience, Quadeo.” Kormagan walked in front of Pike. “What, did you think to lure us here and decapitate our command? The Boundless are eternal, Captain. One rises to replace another. Succession is what we’re best at!”

  “You’ve got me wrong. That’s not what I had in mind at all.” Pike interlaced his fingers. “I wanted to meet the people who thought they could steal my crew.”

  “Just grab him,” Quadeo said. “We’ll put him in a suit for real and throw him at his Rengru friends!”

  “Maybe later,” Kormagan said. “Don’t forget why we’re here.” She looked to Connolly. “Are you going to help us, or must we do this the hard way?”

  Pike drew a blank. “What’s she talking about, Lieutenant?”

  Immobilized, Connolly quickly explained that the Boundless had come in search of transporter technology—and that they intended to scuttle the ship afterward. “I didn’t think you were still alive, Captain.”

  “We all are—barely. We thought the same about you. I’m glad to see you all.” He nodded to Connolly. “Nice beard, by the way.”

  Kormagan looked to the space battle raging outside. “I can’t believe the Rengru left you here alone—or will spare us much more time. Give us what we need, Captain Pike. The transporters!”

  “Well, I can tell you they work. That’s how we got everyone off the ship so I could have this little conversation in private.” He smiled, adding, “But they haven’t gone far.”

  “That’s enough,” Quadeo snarled, pushing past Kormagan and pointing a weapon in Pike’s unprotected face. “Stop with the games!”

  “No games,” Pike said, gaze not on the barrel, but the main viewscreen beyond. “In fact, here comes the rest of our crew now.”

  The Boundless turned toward the screen and saw the other half of Enterprise racing toward them. Rather than attack it, the Rengru mother ships opened a lane for it to pass through—an event that clearly alarmed Pike’s guests. For a moment, it looked as if the engineering hull was going to collide with the saucer section—until at the last second, it swooped overhead.

  “Where’d it go?” Quadeo asked, pulling the weapon away.

  “Just passed behind us. You’ll see it return in a second. Keep watching.”

  The stardrive section soared back into view just ahead of the saucer, traveling more slowly and in the same direction. A blue light flashed beneath the hull—

  —and the whole saucer section shook. “Is that a weapon?” Kormagan asked.

  “Everything we do that moves things, the Boundless thinks is a weapon,” Connolly said. He’d been agog, marveling at the whole sequence. “They don’t know what a tractor beam is, Captain.”

  “That’s a shame,” Pike said, “because it’s pretty useful. You see, we’re on impulse only, and our maneuverability is shot. But while our engine section may not be able to push us, it can definitely pull us.”

  The acceleration, mild at first, was fully noticeable. To the alarm of the Boundless, the engineering hull surged forward, the saucer in tow.

  “We’ve got to get out of this thing,” one of the other Boundless said. “Now!”

  “No,” Pike said, “I don’t think so. You’ve had months to get to know my people, but we’ve just met. I don’t want you to leave just yet.”

  “We are leaving,” an infuriated Quadeo said. “I don’t care about any stupid transporter.”

  “I think you’ll stay.”

  Quadeo’s disruptor was in his face again. “And how will you stop us?”

  “Oh, I won’t. But someone else will.” Pike spoke into the air. “Mister Spock, are you with us?”

  Everyone on the bridge heard the response over the intercom: “I am, Captain.”

  “It turns out I’m not the only one aboard,” Pike said to the others. “I have a gaggle of engineers down in sickbay, huddled with an old acquaintance of yours. Lieutenant, if you’re feeling up to it, I’d like you to have the honors.”

  “Thank you,” Spock said over the intercom. “Boundless units: Freeze.”

  Pike continued looking at the barrel of the disruptor—and realized that its owner had no way to operate it. He stood carefully, dislodging himself from his seat and edging around Quadeo. All the Boundless on the bridge were statues now.

  “Way to go, Captain Pike!” Ghalka said.

  “Credit where it’s due,” Pike said, pacing about his new museum of metallic art and ignoring the howls of complaint from the Boundless. “Back when he was stranded, Spock told me all about you. He said that even your leaders—your wavemasters—had these governors on their battlesuits.” He rapped at the sphere over Kormagan’s shoulder.

  “That got me thinking,” he continued. “You stole our scientists, but not our engineers. I didn’t have access to them myself for months. But once we were reunited, I brought them a little gift: Spock’s battlesuit.” He regarded his armored arm. “Your manufacturing is really something. Even though Spock took a laser torch to his governor, our people were still able to figure out how it worked. And what channel it operated on—and how to issue a signal of their own to your units on the bridge.”

  Connolly looked at him. “Can we move, sir?”

  “Spock, can the team down there figure out who’s who?”

  There was a pause. “This is Galadjian. We are working on that now.”

  Pike wasn’t surprised to hear the engineer’s voice. Spock wasn’t even back at ten percent—but in his lucid moments he’d insisted on helping. The captain hoped this was part of the way back for him.

  “When our carrier sees we’ve been out of contact, they’ll fight your signal,” Kormagan said. “Whatever reprogramming you’ve done, they’ll reverse!”

  “We’re not some tour group that wandered in,” Pike said. “I have some of the best computer operators in the cosmos. You characters just steal stuff.”

  He turned to face the viewscreen, where the nebular clouds were flying by as the convoy picked up ever more speed. “You also seem to like to steal people. Well, now I’m stealing all of you!”

  67

  * * *

  U.S.S. Enterprise

  Saucer Section

  Approaching the Nest

  Leaders of the Boundless loved to posture, claiming that they had never known fear. Kormagan thought that was nonsense. Across her decades of service, fear had saved her more than once, driving her away from situations where there was no hope for survival for her troops, much less victory.

  Nothing she had ever felt compared to what she was going through now. From her stationary position, she had watched the screen as the Rengru convoy—now a pair of flying chevrons, forward and aft—protected both halves of Enterprise as they soared ever faster. Boundless carriers had kept up for an hour, only to fall behind as the formation reached depths of the Shennau Corridor no Boundless member alive had seen.

  The saucer’s bridge, already crowded, had grown busier still, as more of the Enterprise crew entered via the shaft to something Pike called a “turbolift.” Pike and his vile engineers had sadistically manipulated the battlesuits of the Boundless, forcing the wavemasters plus Baladon to all stand to either side of the command well, heads facing the screen—and the doom that certainly awaited them all.

  But she could still see Pike—and that gave her a chance. “Captain, can you order my headgear to be stowed? I wish you to see my face.”

  Pike called someone on his communicator and made the request—and seconds later, was staring into her eyes. “You have something to say?”

  “Captain, I have underestimated you and your people. This I regret. But you are making a grave mistake.” She looked to the screen. “Clearly you have made some kind of—alliance with the Rengru.” The words curdled in her mouth. “It is misguided. You’re taking us to the Nest, where the Rengru will tear us apart!”

  “Is that so?”

  “You don’t know, Captain. We don’t even tell our own people, because it’s too horrible. The Rengru inject fee
ding tubes into the backs of their victims’ necks—and devour their brains. Then they implant their young in the empty skulls!”

  “Wouldn’t it make more sense if they implanted the young first and let them devour the brains?” Pike looked around to his crew. “I mean, I’ve heard some scary monster stories in my day, and what really sells them is logic.” He pointed to the air. “Now, Vulcans—you’d think they’d be great at writing horror.”

  “Stop being foolish,” she implored him. “You are in immediate danger!”

  “Eh,” he said, turning to look at a data device a human held before him. “Sorry if I seem a bit distracted. We didn’t want you to see a ship full of people and Rengru when you got here, so I had to move most everyone to the stardrive section.” He shook his head. “This whole thing has played hell with the duty rosters.”

  Kormagan’s eyes goggled. “Did you say the Rengru were aboard?”

  “Yes. They left. I asked them to.”

  “You did what?”

  Pike shook his head. “You’ve been fighting forever—and yet both of you know jack squat about the other. It’s time that changed.” He spoke to the air. “Commander, whenever you’re ready.”

  Forward, beneath the large screen, the air itself began to glow. It was like the effect she’d seen on Connolly’s video, but the being that materialized was not. It was a human female, partially enshrouded by the limbs of a Rengru clinging to her back.

  Words of disgust streamed from Kormagan’s stilled companions. “What is that?” Quadeo said.

  Pike approached her. “I’d like to have you meet my Number One, Commander Una.” A human dressed as Boundless greeted a human wrapped within a Rengru. “I’m sure you’re glad to be back on the bridge.”

  “It has been a while,” the black-haired woman said. She faced the Boundless—and several of the Rengru appendages writhed, recoiling. “There is nothing to fear.”

  “Do you say that to us, or to that?” Kormagan asked.

  “To you both.” Una glanced at the limbs, which settled at her side. “This meeting is long in coming.” She looked to Pike. “Captain, the Rengru have given me an updated navigation report.”

  “I’d tell you to take your station, but neither of us are really designed for the furniture right now. Lieutenant Amin, take the commander’s information.”

  The Rengru-human hybrid walked right past Kormagan. It was a horrible, mesmerizing spectacle—but what was on the screen was worse. The nebular corridor had ended, with the Rengru mother ships peeling away to reveal a vast floating complex of space factories and shipyards.

  “The Nest,” she whispered. It was the black fortress, the innermost seat of Rengru defenses. No Boundless force had threatened it since the waves were in the double digits. Her worst fears were realized. “Pike, I implore you. There is still time to stop!”

  “Why would we want to stop?” Pike asked, his back to the screen. Then he looked back. “Oh, that? That’s not where we’re going.”

  Kormagan and her colleagues watched, forcibly transfixed, as Enterprise’s stardrive section towed it closer to—and through—the elements of the floating Rengru megalopolis. Soaring beyond, into another bank of nebular clouds, completely black.

  And then: stars. Young and bright, within a pocket in the heart of the vast nebula complex. The Starship Enterprise veered toward the nearest, traveling as fast on impulse as the tow would allow.

  “Increase magnification,” Pike ordered.

  “Magnification, aye.”

  A single globe orbiting the star appeared first as a tiny dot—growing, eventually, into something all the wavemasters immediately recognized, even though none of them had ever laid eyes on it directly.

  “K’davu,” Kormagan whispered.

  She said no more. But her thoughts were alive with the words of one long dead—and the words she had always longed to say: We are coming home, Greatmother Eudah.

  68

  * * *

  U.S.S. Enterprise

  Saucer Section

  Approaching K’davu

  Still armored, Pike clanked off the pad in the main transporter room. “Thanks for bringing me down here,” he said to Pitcairn. “We have got to get those turbolifts fixed. Connolly tells me I can just jetpack up and down the shaft, but I’m afraid of becoming a human torpedo.”

  “We don’t mind the work,” Yamata said, standing next to his boss. “We’re just glad to be back on station.”

  “And doing what we can without full power,” Pitcairn added. “We’ll have rewritten the book this mission on how to operate with half a ship.”

  “Save room for a few chapters,” Pike said. “We’re taking the whole tour group down to K’davu, so you’ll be beaming them down here first before sending them on their way.”

  “Yeah, I guess all our shuttles are in the wrong section,” Yamata said. “And I’m not sure our guests would even fit through the doors.”

  Pitcairn smiled. “Sure you don’t want to try another saucer landing?”

  “I see the ordeal hasn’t hurt your sense of humor,” Pike said. The Enterprise had barely gotten aloft. The saucer would never make it out of a real gravity well.

  He’d been even more curt with the Boundless, who were still imprisoned on the bridge; Federation first-contact specialists probably would not approve of his handling of them. He didn’t care. “First contact” in this case had meant the Boundless kidnapping nearly a sixth of his crew for the better portion of a year, and the second contact hadn’t been any better.

  Yamata pressed a control—and Una and a still-armored Connolly materialized. They stepped down to meet Pike. “Our guests are . . . resigned,” she said. “They don’t like me very much, but K’davu has them spellbound.”

  “They’re not too happy with me, either,” Connolly said. “I think Baladon’s about to rupture something.”

  “The Lurian, right?” The frozen Baladon had also asked for his headgear to be stowed. “Tell him it’s payback for his torpedo way back when.”

  Connolly looked pensive. “I’ve told Number One what I know about K’davu, Captain. The others and I would like to go along.”

  “Still asking for the away missions. That didn’t work out so well the last time.” Pike shook his head. “Boyce and Carlotti want to check all of you out, to see if you’re suffering any of the same effects that Spock did.”

  “I get it—but we’d like to see how this plays out. It’s kind of personal.”

  That, Pike understood. But he had a condition. “If we’re going to visit another world, I want my scientists to do some science. Bring your equipment.”

  “Yes, sir!” Connolly said, cracking a smile. “Now I just need a change of clothes. You wouldn’t believe how much I’ve been looking forward to that.”

  “You’ll have to wait a little longer,” Una said. “You’ll need an environment suit on K’davu. It will make sense when you get there.”

  Connolly’s face fell. “Then I guess I keep this damn thing on.”

  “Sorry,” Pike said. “But come to think of it, I’ll need to get out of this thing for a few minutes. I’ll be right back.”

  Exiting the suit was easy, thanks to his engineers’ instructions. He walked quickly down the hall to sickbay, where Boyce, newly restored to his domain, gestured to his lone patient in the ward. “He won’t sleep—and he won’t let me medicate him. Maybe you can talk sense into him.”

  Pike found Spock sitting up in bed, rubbing his hands together. He started with the good news. “It worked perfectly, Spock. I wish you’d been up there to see it—the Boundless leaders are powerless.”

  Spock looked at Pike. His beard had been trimmed, the captain saw.

  “Do you understand me?” Pike asked. “It’s done. And you gave the command.”

  “I . . . just said a word.”

  That was true: the engineers had done all the rest. It didn’t matter. “You earned a share of this. And I’m willing to take you down to K’dav
u with us, if you want. In an environment suit, of course.” Pike had changed out of the battlesuit intentionally so as not to confront Spock with his prison for the past year.

  Spock’s eyes focused on something Pike could not see. He began mouthing words again—only this time, soundlessly. After a few seconds, he looked at Pike and spoke. “Captain . . . I cannot.”

  “Okay. I don’t want to push you. How are you feeling, Spock?”

  “I have . . . bad dreams.”

  “I didn’t know Vulcans had them. I guess everybody does.”

  “My mother said that.” He shook his head. “I cannot tell . . . when I am awake.”

  “From what the doctor says, you nearly always are.” Pike looked to Boyce out in the examination room. The doctor shrugged. “You weren’t even in charge of your own body most of the year—and stuck on that snowball for a lot of it. Anyone’s sleep patterns would be wrecked.”

  Spock started to say something—and stopped, gripping his hands together more tightly. “I will control this—and return to duty. But not yet.”

  “All anyone could ask.”

  “You have obligations,” Spock said. “Meditate—I mean, mediate. Find the peace between them.”

  “If it’s there to be found. Una thinks so.” Pike rose. “Stay strong, my friend.”

  Boyce followed Pike out into the hall. “It’s like he never came back from where he went, Chris.”

  “What did you expect, Phil?”

  “I expect Spock.” Boyce pointed a thumb back at sickbay. “I read Gabrielle’s notes about him from when he was on Skon’s World—and took a look at the medical reports Galadjian’s people were able to coax out of the battlesuit. He was under physical and emotional duress, yes, and we could tell. But he was coping—right until he got out of that armor. What we beamed off that ice sheet was someone else.”

  Pike growled in aggravation. “Are you talking alien possession on top of everything else we’ve had to deal with? Because I have about reached my limits on this mission.”

  “I don’t mean that. It’s Spock’s body, Spock’s mind. But his predicament and ours was one level of problems. He’s worried about a lot more than that.” Boyce stared at him. “Come on. You started having your own moments, two years ago. You know what it’s like to be here—and not here.”