Worlds in Collision (19 page)

“This ship has no medical officer,” Wolfe countered. “Dr. McCoy, you are relieved of duty for suspicion of aiding in a prisoner's escape. Next move's yours, Captain. Want to see how many more it takes before you're in here in place of your science officer?”

Kirk knew enough to back off if it meant keeping his freedom. That could be the key to another confrontation, one that he could orchestrate and win. But not here, and not now.

“All right, Commodore,” he said, holding his hands out as if to show he wasn't armed. “For the duration.” He watched as she looked around the room once more, making sure all of her people met her eyes to acknowledge that she had squared off against the fabled James T. Kirk and had won.

“Good boy,” she said icily. “Maybe Command will just accept a resignation and let you crawl off quietly.” Then she turned away and called to Farl. “Prepare to have the search parties fan out from the pad the Vulcan landed at,” she said. “You can have five troopers from my contingent to help with the operation.” Farl began whispering in an Andorian combat dialect into his battle helmet communicator.

Kirk started backing out of the cell. He had to organize his response for when Spock was returned to the ship and they could plan their next move together. But he stopped, blood freezing in his veins when he heard Farl's next question and the commodore's response.

“Disposition of the prisoner when he iss recaptured?” Farl asked.

“There will be no prisoner, Commander Farl,” Wolfe stated plainly. “With who we've got down on Memory Prime, we can't afford to take any more chances. At my order, when your troopers run the escaped prisoner to ground, I want your phasers set to force three.”

She turned to stare directly into Kirk's eyes.

“To kill,” she said.

The Klingons loved to tell the story of al Fred ber'nhard Nob'l, the
tera'ngan
inventor who, as had happened so many times on so many worlds, once felt he had gone too far and had created the ultimate weapon.

Faced with nightmares of a world ruined by the destructive forces he had called into being, Nob'l attempted to salve his conscience and bring forth the best in humans by using the profits from his inventions to award prizes in honor of the most outstanding achievements in science and peace. Of course, in typical
tera'ngan
fashion, as the Klingons were quick to point out, those profits were not set aside for that purpose until
after
the inventor's death.

As the long Terran years passed, Nob'l's inventions served the warlords of Earth well. Despite his fears, other ultimate weapons came and went with predictable regularity—mustard gas, fusion bombs, particle curtains, and smart bacteria—until his devices lay beside the rocks and sharpened sticks in museums. In fact, and this invariably had the Klingons brushing the tears of laughter from their eyes no matter how many times they heard the story, the only real casualty of the great Terran wars fueled by Nob'l's inventions over the century in which his prizes were awarded, were the prizes themselves.
Three
times they were suspended because of hostilities between nations. The third time, as Earth shuddered beneath the multiple onslaughts of its warriors Klingons admired most—k'Han and g'Reen—the suspended prizes were not resurrected, and lay buried amid the ashes of so much of the Earth that the Klingons considered foul and weak and better lost

For the events a few light-years removed from Earth, the Klingons had a bit more respect. Two centuries before Nob'l lay awake in foolish terror over destroying his world with a few tonnes of C
₃
H
₅
(NO
₃
)
₃
, the warlord Zalar Mag'nees, ruler of her planet's greatest city state, realized that the nature of combat in her world was changing and that ideas as well as strength and armaments must be brought to battle.

Mag'nees established an elaborate educational system designed to attract the greatest intellects among her citizens to the problems of war. Those who contributed the best new work achieved the highest honor: a commission in the warlord's personal corps of scientists.

Under her rule, with the brilliant work of her honored scientists and engineers, the whole of the planet was soon united, or conquered, as the Klingons told it, under one ruler. Though the warlord's commissions were discontinued after almost two centuries of global peace and their war-born heritage forgotten, the philosophy of subterfuge and protective concealment that had proved so useful in establishing the undisputed rule of Mag'nees, still pervaded all levels of her planet's society. Thus, when electromagnetic communication systems were discovered,, it went without question that the signals would travel by wire instead of by atmospheric transmissions open to any unsuspected enemy's receivers. Power plants were buried as a matter of course and fiberoptic transmission of all signals was enthusiastically adopted as soon as the technology became available. It was this in-born need for concealment that prevented
tera'ngan
scientists, in almost a century of scanning, from ever picking up the slightest datum that would indicate that a comparable, perhaps even related civilization was thriving in the Alpha Centauran system, fewer than five light-years distant.

The Klingons bitterly regretted that circumstance of history. For when at last the first slower-than-light Earth ship arrived in the Centauran system, the
tera'ngan
humans were too tired of war, the
centaur'ngan
humans long unschooled. To the Klingons' everlasting disappointment, in this one instance of first contact, unlike most others, peace was inevitable.

In the decades that followed, as the two planets discovered all the suspicious similarities between them, cultural and scientific exchange programs burgeoned. Zeyafram Co'akran's brilliant insights into warp theory were applied at the venerable Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Earth, and within seven years of the two planets' first contact, the light barrier had fallen before their mutual onslaught. Plays and literature were easily translated and meaningful to the two races and—hinting at interference from another spacefaring race thousands of years earlier—interbreeding was simple and pleasurable to all concerned, requiring none of the heroic efforts that would later be needed by humans and Vulcans.

More and more the two cultures grew together. Common goals were quickly decided and impressively established. The joint colonization of the second life-bearing world in the Centauran system was accomplished with goodwill and an almost unbelievable absence of territorial discord. Klingon psychologists who had studied that abnormal enterprise felt the experience was what had most influenced the incomprehensible optimism and peaceful nature of the Federation when it was first formed.

As the
tera'ngan
and
centaur'ngan
association grew, both looked to their pasts and dusted off the legacy of Nob'l and Mag'nees. Freed of their military legacy, joined in the best wishes of two worlds, and expanded to include sciences unimagined at the time the awards were first created, the Nob'l and Z. Mag'nees Prizes became the first human competition to celebrate the achievements, scientific and cultural, of two different worlds, and drive them forward in peace.

Upon its formation, the Federation Council eagerly accepted authority over the competition, opening it up to all members of all species. In an interplanetary association in which athletic competitions had ceased to have any meaning, except among those rare few who voluntarily chose to restrict themselves to absolutely identical advantages of gravity, genetics, and pharmaceutical enhancement, the Nob'l and Z. Mag'nees competition of the mind quickly came to stand for all the ideals for which the Federation strove. Calling on another ancient tradition, the prizes were awarded every four standard years. The winners, chosen through secret ballot by their peers who shared in the nomination for each prize, were among the most honored of Federation citizens. And true to the Federation's long-term goals, pressure was mounting to offer the Klingons a chance to participate.

The Klingons, not surprisingly, would have nothing to do with the Nob'l and Z. Mag'nees Prizes. The whole concept of the competition was alien and repugnant to them. The Klingons
did
have their own competitions for scientific achievement that, on first study, seemed somewhat similar to the Federation's awards; each decade on Klinzhai, a great celebration was held for those workers who had won the coveted Emperor's Decoration for Science in Aid of Destruction of the Enemy.

The Klingons could easily understand the concept of honoring the winners, but what they could never comprehend was why, in the human competition, the losers were allowed to
live.

Kirk smiled broadly as he walked down the corridor leading to the brig. McCoy accompanied him but certainly wasn't grinning; in fact he was having trouble keeping the scowl off his face.

“It'll be all right, Bones,” Kirk said, elbowing his friend in the side. “Trust me.”

McCoy rolled his eyes. “Remind me to do that when we're locked up on Tantalus playing poker with each other for twenty years.”

Kirk and McCoy rounded the corner to the corridor that ran to the holding cells. As Kirk had been able to determine by checking the ship's computer, only two of Wolfe's troopers remained stationed there. The others who had been milling around, investigating Spock's escape twenty minutes ago, were already down on Memory Prime, searching for Spock, their phasers set to kill.

“Sergeant Gilmartin,” Kirk said in a friendly tone. “We're back. General Regulation Document two hundred and twenty-seven again. Paragraphs B and C.”

Gilmartin turned to look at the other trooper standing at attention on the other side of the holding-cell door. Kirk glanced through the open doorway, its perimeter glowing with the security-field frame, and nodded slightly to Uhura, indicating that she should go along with whatever was to happen next.

Gilmartin turned back to Kirk. “Begging the captain's pardon, sir, but I believe Dr. McCoy has been relieved of duty.” The trooper looked nervous but he was bound to follow his orders.

“As chief medical officer,” Kirk agreed. “But he's still a doctor and able to act as such.” Kirk read the trooper's eyes for a moment, then continued. “I'm Lieutenant Uhura's counsel now and she is entitled to a medical examination while being held. Regulations require it.”

Gilmartin took a deep breath. “I'll have to check it out with the Commodore, Captain.”

“I wouldn't expect you not to, Sergeant,” Kirk said graciously, and gestured to the intercom panel.

As Gilmartin stepped over to the intercom, it was clear that talking to the commodore was the last thing he wanted to do. Kirk stepped in front of the holding-cell doorway and lifted his hand as if to wave in greeting to Uhura. Then he brought his arm down and around the neck of the second trooper by the side of the doorway and flipped him into the security field.

Gilmartin spun at the sound of the crackling repulser screen just as McCoy held a spray hypo to his neck. By the time Gilmartin could bring his hand up to try and knock the hypo away, it was too late. McCoy gently lowered the trooper to the ground and Kirk caught the second guard, now unconscious, as he bounced back from the field. Then the captain went back to the doorway to speak to Uhura.

“Listen very carefully,” he said quickly. “A contingent of troopers is hunting for Spock on Memory Prime. With orders to kill.” He paused a moment to let that sink in. “All
Enterprise
personnel are ordered restricted to the ship. McCoy, Scott, and I are disobeying those orders and going down to try and locate Spock before the troopers do. We'll have help down there, but no matter what happens, we will be disobeying a direct order from a superior officer. Do you understand?”

Uhura's expression was serious but displayed no fear. “Yes sir,” she said.

“The best that can happen to us is that we will save Spock's life and he will then be proven innocent of all charges. In that case, those of us who left the ship to find him will be given severe reprimands and probably lose rank. For what it's worth, I believe there's a good chance that the commodore has either misunderstood her orders or has received false ones. We can't use that as a defense, but it might make Starfleet more lenient.” Kirk paused to consider his next words. “Nyota, this is not an order. It can't be an order. But I could use your help.”

Uhura began to reply but Kirk shook his head and held up a silencing finger.

“As long as this field is on and you remain in the cell,” he told her, “you're safe and protected. As soon as the field goes off, you're on the run with us. Understand?”

“Understood, sir,” Uhura said evenly. “Request permission to accompany the captain.”

 

Scott was standing by in the starboard cargo transporter room when McCoy, Kirk, and Uhura rushed in.

“Ready, Scotty?” Kirk asked as he passed out the small hand phasers and communicators that Scott had brought.

“Aye, Captain,” Scott replied, checking the chronometer on the transporter console. “Fifteen more seconds. Coordinates are set for Mr. Nensi's office.”

Kirk, McCoy, and Uhura quickly took their places. Exactly fifteen seconds after Scott had given the chronometer's reading, the light strips flickered and the engineer's hands flew over the controls.

“What was that?” Uhura asked as the lights came back to normal intensity.

“Och,” Scott said as he ran to the oversized platform. “That was a clumsy ensign who just happened to drop a circuit plaser on a disassembled junction switch in a forward Jefferies tube.”

“What does that do?”

Scott smiled as the transporter effect sparkled around him.

“It shuts down the shields, lass,” he said, and they were gone.

 

Kirk and Scott materialized on a two-pad portable combat transporter in a small equipment storage bay. Two starbase troopers in full battle armor were waiting for them, phaser rifles at the ready, the impenetrable black visor of their helmets making each look like an impassive Cyclops.

Without having to be told, Kirk and Scott raised their hands above their heads.

“Sorry, Scotty,” Kirk said.

“My fault, Captain. I was sure I had gone to a beam path high enough to override this devil's capture mode. They must hae modified th—”

“Enough talking,” one of the troopers said over a suit communicator. The slightly distorted voice echoed against the metal walls of the storage bay.

“Step down.” The closer trooper gestured with the phaser barrel.

Kirk kept his hands in the air and hopped down the half meter from the small platform to the bay flooring. He turned his head to say, “Careful with your leg, Scotty. You know what happened last time.”

“Aye, Captain,” Scott said as he carefully moved to the edge of the transporter unit and gingerly stepped down from it. He lowered one hand and rubbed his right knee with a grimace. “It's still pretty bunged up, sir,” he said.

While the first trooper kept the prisoners covered, the second trooper harnessed his rifle and removed two sets of magnatomic adhesion manacles. “Hands back up,” he growled to Scott as he approached.

Scott complied, favoring his leg. The trooper stood to the side to give his companion a clear shot if the prisoners tried anything. He held out the first manacle, palmed the activate switch on the control surface of the bar, and said to Scott, “Turn around.”

Kirk's eyes met Scott's as the engineer slowly turned. Suddenly Scott's leg buckled and he collapsed to the floor with a moan of pain, reaching out for support and grabbing on to the first trooper's arm.

As the first trooper tried to pull back, Kirk leaned down as if to grab Scott's other arm and stepped into the second trooper's line of fire and of sight. He couldn't shoot now without risking a hit on his companion.

“Move away!” the second trooper ordered. “Back off, now!”

Scotty moaned in terrible agony and refused to relinquish his grip.

“Here, let me,” Kirk said as he went to pull up on Scott's arm. Instead he grabbed the activated manacle and slapped it against the first trooper's helmet. The impact immediately triggered the charge release in the device and the bar flowed around the trooper's helmet until the two ends met and joined. The bar quickly flattened and spread across the visor, rendering the trooper blind. He stumbled backward, clawing at the manacle. With a crash, he tripped over a low cargo crate and pitched to the flooring.

The second trooper backed away and held his rifle on Kirk. But by then, both Scott and Kirk held their phasers on the trooper.

“One or the other,” Kirk said bluntly, “but not both. Put down your rifle, soldier.”

The trooper hesitated, his intentions impossible to read through his visor.

“I don't want to say this twice,” Kirk said.

The trooper raised his rifle.

“You're not giving us any choice,” Kirk continued. “On the count of three, Mr. Scott. One.”

As Kirk said “Two,” he and his engineer both fired at the trooper's phaser rifle, blasting it from the unprepared trooper's hands.

“Keep going, full power!” Kirk called out to Scott over the whine of their phasers, then stopped firing his weapon and adjusted its setting wheel to “sweep.”

When Kirk fired again, a low-power standing wave of phased radiation engulfed the trooper front and back. Combined with the full-power output of Scott's weapon, the absorbed and redirected energy that coursed through the trooper's protective induction mesh had nowhere to go, resonating throughout the armor's circuitry until the regulator overloaded and the energy locked in phase with the trooper's nervous system.

The trooper crumpled and Kirk and Scott stopped firing. Other than a slight ringing in their ears from the phasers' whine, the storage room was silent. But only for a moment.

“Turn slowly,” a voice in the shadows commanded, “and drop your phasers.”

Kirk and Scott spun to see the first trooper step out from beside a tall stack of glittering alignment alloy shipping crates. He held a phaser II leveled at them and he had removed his helmet.

Kirk realized that another piece of the puzzle was about to fall into place. The trooper was a Vulcan.

 

“Where's the Captain?” Nensi asked.

“And Scotty?” Romaine added.

McCoy and Uhura looked around the chief administrator's office and saw at once that Kirk and Scott had not materialized with them.

“They were right beside us,” Uhura said. “I was just talking with Mr. Scott.”

“The
Enterprise'
s shields?” Nensi asked grimly, fearing the worst.

“Mr. Scott arranged to have them shut down,” McCoy said. “Besides, we were all in the same beam. If Uhura and I got through, then they must have, too.”

“Farl's combat pads?” Romaine asked Nensi.

“Possible,” Nensi said, “though I'm sure Mr. Scott would have been able to override them with the
Enterprise'
s system.”

There was a moment of confused silence, finally broken by McCoy.

“Look, wherever they are, they're going to be looking for Spock. We have no way of tracking them because we have no way of knowing where they came down and we can't raise them by communicator without giving the troopers a chance to trace our signals. But we do know where Spock came down thirty minutes ago. I say we start there.”

Nensi felt McCoy's call to action galvanize the group. For all his country-doctor ways, he was still a Starfleet officer and knew how to act like one.

Romaine held out her hand. “Who brought Spock's file?” she asked. Nensi could see she was hoping it wasn't with Kirk or Scott.

McCoy handed over a computer data wafer and Romaine went to Nensi's desk, inserted the wafer in the reader, and began to input on the keypad.

“Pardon,” a mechanically flat voice said as an associate trundled through the door to Nensi's office.

“What's that?” Uhura asked as the machine rolled over to Romaine and extended an eyestalk.

“An associate,” Nensi explained. “We have special dispensation from the Department of Labor to use robot workers, at least until the facilities are completed and we can bring in enough personnel without overtaxing the environmental systems.”

“How autonomous are they?” McCoy asked, watching Romaine talk with the device.

“Not very,” Nensi said. “Their onboard brain is a standard duotronic Sprite model, good for basic problem solving and conversation. A central control computer sets up their goals and schedules, based on researcher and staff requests, then dispatches them to carry out their work on their own. Just like all those repair drones at spacedock, but modified to operate under benign environmental conditions. It actually cost more to buy them that way, without all the extra armor and shielding. We have a couple hundred of them.”

“What's Mira doing with it?” Uhura asked.

“The associates are also a message relay system. The computer downloads dispatch requests to the associates, and if the associates happen to come across a person who has a dispatch waiting, then the machine can upload it and pass it along. It's not very cost effective, but they're rolling around anyway, so it makes sense.”

“Ah,” Uhura said as she made the connection. “That's why you wanted Mr. Spock's data file. It includes his identification holos and now all the associates are going to be looking for him as well.” She turned to Nensi. “But what kind of message can you pass on to him that will convince him it's not the commodore trying to locate him?”