Chapter One

THE ENEMY SHIP cut across our port bow, forcing
to heel off to starboard, but our captain gripped
forward rail and refused to give more than a meter.
    "Keep her to," he said, the quiet of his vo
somehow reaching us over the roar of the ship str~
ing.
  "Jim, this is crazy."
    "Don't swing off, no matter what your stoma
says."
    Space overhead was bristol blue, the crashing ,~
even deeper azure and marbled by green swells a
white foam. The older officers called it cadet blue.
    "Stand by to come about. Piper, stand by the bm
stay. Bones, you take the foresheet. And watch yc
head."
"Don't worry. My head's not going anywhere."
Below and around us white hull and green de
tilted to a sickening forty-five degrees that buried I
boom tips in brine and put us straight alongside a s~
gust of wind. The bowsprit bobbed in thirteen-f~
arches. We crashed against the waves, skating alo]
side our enemy's beam for a moment of reasonle
risk.
    I freed the backstay on the port side so it would]
be in the way when the big main boom swung abol
then slid down the inclined deck to the starboa
backstay and got ready to pull it up tight once the s
swung by. There, shivering, I awaited the order

come about. With the ship at this hideous angle, my
thigh cut into the rail. I was almost lying on my side.
Just over the rail, an arm's-length away, the tree-trunk
boom dug furrows into the seawater with every long
dip of the schooner. Arching out and rising away from
the water, the mainsali's bright white canvas tightened
with air and became stiff as cast rhodinium. This was
drama of the highest order, and my heart thudded
testimony to the pure insanity I'd gotten myself into.
Of course, I couldn't exactly decline the honor.
    This old ship had been bending to the winds for
something like a century and a quarter on this planet,
revived to splendor by the very fading of her own
kind. Originally built as a nostalgic replica of a nine-
teenth-century pilot schooner, she was a working ves-
sel, not a yacht. That "y" word wasn't allowed on
board. And there wasn't a winch to be found. Every
line had to be hand drawn, no matter how heavy the
load. The acres of canvas, caught to the masts by big
wooden hoops and lashed with rope to the gaffs and
booms, made a puzzle of stitched white overlapping
rectangles and triangles overhead and together formed
a great seagoing pyramid of sailcloth and rigging.
Pretty. But sitting here in excitement's grip, with
abused timber groaning under me and the booms biting
the tops off eight-footers, it was hard to see the pretti-
ness. Not even in the echo of ourselves as the other
ship, a bluff-bowed ancient ketch two meters longer
than our schooner, carved away from our starboard
stern and came about for another match.
    "Here he bloody well comes again," uttered Mr.
Scott at wheel watch, his Scots rumble getting thicker
as tension grew. He was standing at the helm rather
than sitting, gripping the spokes of the wooden wheel
tightly, and narrowing his gaze forward. His eyes
narrowed to dark wedges. His dark hair, matted
against his forehead by spray, was laced with the first
hints of silver. He wasn't watching the sails, though.
2

He was watching the captain. And the captain was
watching the enemy ship.
    Amidships, Dr. McCoy squinted accusingly at the
captain and held on tight to the foresheet. Wind tore at
his hair and spray battered his face.
    Our bow [ifled high out of the water, coming into the
air like some flying fish, until half her keel was clear of
the sea. Almost immediately she crashed back into the
chop like a descending guillotine, burying the fo'c'sle,
burying thirteen feet of bowsprit and the whole bottom
of the Genoa jib. I winced and drew my shoulders in.
    Heeled to starboard, the other ship was a mirror
image of ours, except that her mast heights were
reversed, her fore-tops'l wasn't flying, and her bow
was bluff- instead of clipper-curved. When our captain
first started talking about the enemy, I'd thought he
was saying "catch"; one of many visits to his aft cabin
library had set me right. She was the ketch Gavelan.
We were out to get her, and she us.
    My hands cramped as I gripped the backstay line.
Awaiting orders, i looked at the captain and wondered
what he was waiting for. Fu[t sail in this kind of chop
was crazy enough without waiting until the last second
to execute a tack.
    He stood on the forward deck, his eyes hard and
pinched at the corners. In a heavy brown sea jacket
with the collar up he looked like a hoio on a tour spool
from some planet-pushing travel agency~ His hair,
sandy and shimmering on top, darkening at the sides,
shone nicely but couldn't upstage that glare of his. I
could see him trying to put his mind into the head of
the other captain before making a decision. He wanted
more than anything to be inside Gavetan's hold, se-
cretly listening to what the other skipper was saying--
more, though, he wanted to know what the other was
feeling, thinking, breathing. He thought he could get
there if he stared hard enough.
 "Come about," the captain said. "Now."

    Dr. McCoy let go of the foresheet a moment too
soon, forcing Mr. Scott to haul hard on the wheel to
keep from losing the fores'l into the waves. I held on
as long as I could, but the ship wheeled and bucked,
reversing herself in the water and cutting a pie wedge
in the chop as she tacked. The rigging whistled over-
head, the timber groaned, and the hoops grated so
loudly I thought they were going to shear right
through the mast.
    Barn--the fore boom elunked to port. The sail
luffed, then filled and tightened. An instant later--and
Mr. Scott ducked just in time to avoid a ringing head-
ache--the main. The schooner twisted back in the
water with the grace of a shorebird's glinting wing.
    "Haul in tight," the captain called. "I mean you,
Piper. Put support on that main, then bring the sheet in
close."
    I shook myself, skidded across the tilted deck and
drew in the main until we were so close upon the wind
that we threw up a sickle of spray with every dive of
our prow. He was watching me. I could feel it. Oh, he
was looking at the other ship, but he was watching
me.
  "Closer," he said.
    I drew down harder, sacrificing three more finger-
nails and one knuckle's skin.
    Plunging toward each other like two Gloucester
packets of a different age, our two schooners glided
through walls of spray. The tapered lines of the sails
and weaving mastheads conjured images of wave
troughs deep enough to hide entire ships. I leaned
harder against the teak rail, plain scared. From two
sides of an angle, we speared for each other.
    "Jim, I didn't come out here with you to become a
damned South Sea walrus!" Dr. McCoy informed the
captain, clinging desperately to the fore hatch and
glancing wide-eyed at the oncoming schooner.
 The captain didn't respond. Even now, there was a

distant tranquility on his face. '['his was his blood and
beef--another man's peace was this man's boredom.
When he wasn't wrestling the irabalances of interstel-
lar space and intersystem politics, he was here, tasting
death in the same seas our mutual ancestors called
their own interstellar void.
    The captain of the other ship was no Rigellian slugfin
either. Silver spume spilled over Gavelan's rail as she
held tight into the wind and rocketed through jumping
seas toward us. We were both pointed at the same
square foot of ocean, and we both wanted to own it.
Overhead, rigging whined. Tension buzzed through the
halyards.
    l drew in a breath, held it, and closed my eyes. The
captain said I should learn to hear the ship, so I could
hear what was wrong when it happened. Sometimes he
made me close my eyes and covet' my ears too.
Feeling what's wrong, he called it. Even times like
this--especially times like this---could teach.
    Sails moaned. Waves smacked the keel. Gaffs and
booms creaked. The wind rushed inward, filling the
main tight. On collision course, our two schooners
sliced through the seas toward each other. When our
ship's prow dug deep into the waves, met a trough that
matched its shape, and phmged six feet deeper, the
deck dropped out from under my feet. Only catching
my elbow around the backstay kept me aboard. t
heard Dr. McCoy yell something as my feet left the
deck, wobbled on the rail for three hideous seconds,
then skated off. Down I went for a ride across twenty
slippery feet of green deck, on one knee, until the
fisherman's sail-bag stopped me.
    "All right, lass'?" Mr. Scott bothered to call from the
wheel.
    I took a moment to nod at him while I rubbed my
knee. It was the wrong moment.
    "Get your feet under you, Piper," the captain
snapped. "Prepare to come about."

"Again?" McCoy complained. "What are you? A
blasted porpoise?"
    "Lay alongside, Scotty," everybody's devil called
firmly. 'Tm not going to let him work our windward.
Piper, bring in the jib sheet two pulls. You left it too
free."
    Always the cut. Always the barb. Why? Didn't he
have enough laurels to sit on? Not ten people in a
million had his status. Why pick on me?
    But as I glared at the captain, ire mixed with a stab
of sympathy for him. Most humans could afford to
cloak their flaws. A starship captain--the captain of
any vessel, I was learning---constantly had his flaws
thrown up in his face, with nowhere to deflect them.
Not only could he see them, but he must see them
displayed before all who wish to Iook--a galaxy ready
to criticize. That would beat anyone into humility.
Anyone but the strongest.
    If he could be strong, if he could bear his flaws and
mine too, then I could at least haul my end of the
halyard.
    Gripping the ship's rail, I got to my feet and moved
carefully along the high side toward the bow. Battered
by salt spray, the rail had gone from a burnished
ribbon to a chipped ridge. It spelled work for deck
hands. Like guess who.
    I loosened the jib sheet, cranked it in, feeling the
pressure of the wind as we heeled deeply, and belayed
it without another screwup. Just when 1 was breathing
my sigh of relief, I made the mistake of looking at the
oncoming Gavelan.
    "What--!" l choked. The other ship was so close
I could almost count the planks in her hull. Wreathed
in spray, she was crashing toward us out of a night-
mare. I couldn't breathe anymore.
    The captain cupped his hand around his mouth.
"Now, Scotty!"

    Mr. Scott closed his eyes and cranked the big wheel
hard, then took a dive for the backstay to free it. The
main boom began to swing. The sails, towering above
us like wings, luffed for only an instant.
    The schooner hung in midair, shuddered as shock
waves thrummed through her wooden hull, then dived
like a seal. Her bowsprit carved across our enemy's
bow and forced the other ship to fall off the wind.
No one but the possessed would try such a move.
The booms swung around and slammed home.
Climbing the wave, the ship shook off a wash of green
seawater, filled her sails tight, and heeled in.
    The captain leaned back. If he'd had a pipe, he'd
have smoked it. "Fall off," he said. Mr. Scott stiffly
complied.
    Dr. McCoy slumped down on the fore hatch. "Shore
leave, my eye."
    I panted silently and got my footing on the deck. A
few breaths later my thoughts came out in a mutter.
"All we need is an aft phaser..."
    Gavelan was upright in the choppy water, fallen off
the wind. Her sails luffed uselessly, flapping and shud-
dering, in search of air.
    Turning to me, the captain raised both straight
brows and queried, "Did I hear you say something,
Commander?"
    Still out of breath, I blinked at him and tried to look
steady. "Not me."
    His lips pressed flat. Kind of a grin, and kind of not.
"Good."
    I watched, numb, as he walked casually down the
long green deck, unaffected by the angle, and took
charge of the wheel. Slowly now, he brought the ship
about in a stylish tack that hardly let the sails flutter:
the last turn of the blade before coming abeam with
Gavelan.
 Aboard the other ship, the skipper's familiar Mid-

6                                                                                  7

 Eastern features glowed in the sun behind a dark
 cropped beard. "Brilliantly executed, Captain!" he
 called. "I concede the match."
     "Accepted, Ambassador," the captain returned.
 "I'm looking forward to my lobster."
    "And you shall have it," our former enemy re-
turned. Behind him, his crew, an unlikely collection of
individuals, watched us coast by. "The best available
in the next port of call. And my liquor cabinet is yours
to raid.~'
  "Faster than you can moor a dinghy."
    The ambassador roared with laughter. Gavelan
caught the wind and fell in behind us. Finally, finally,
we were back on course.
    I watched our captain as he steered the ship with
damnable leisure. San Francisco was long behind us
and I still tended to stay on the other end of the ship
from where he was. A respectful distance, it might be
called. A little chicken was another way to put it. He
always saw the imperfection, that halyard belayed one
turn tess than the others, the backstay not hauled up
tightly enough, the rope tied in a granny knot instead
of a square knot . ~ . and there was nothing in this
.galaxy more soul-galling than coming up out of a hatch
in time to see James Kirk correct your little error.
    James Kirk. An enigma in his midthirties. And here
he was, commanding seventy-two feet of timber and
sailcloth with every ounce the commitment he used to
head up the multidepartmental city-in-space we call a
starship. The whole scope of that became scarier to me
with every minute I spent in his company. He wasn't
an easy man to get to know. He guarded himself. Oh,
he talked often enough, but he spoke little. Curiosity
boiled up in me, enough to turn a Star Fleet command
candidate into a petty snoop. Despite the integrity I
was trying to imitate, I often found myself haunting
the open aft hatch, hoping to---accidentally--catch a
line or two of the conversation between him and

McCoy and Scott during one of those quiet personal
sessions. I seldom got more than a sniff of kahlua and
coffee. In fact, the silence said plenty. My curiosity
remained intact. So did the sting of knowing 1 wasn't
yet welcome in that inner sanctum. I hungered more
for it with every passing wind.
    And the mysteries about Captain Kirk seemed to
grow deeper as I knew him longer. I looked away from
him and leaned over the ship's rail for the dozenth time
to see black letters outlined in hunter-green scrolls:
Edith Keeler.
    Letters no one would explain. I knew "Edith" was a
feminine name on Earth, not very popular anymore.
Since sailing ships had always been named after both
men and women, knowing the name's gender nar-
rowed my curiosity by 50 percent. The rest remained a
darkness.

    It was nearly three o'clock, Earth time. I seldom
knew what time it was, but as I came below, through
the aft cabin, I happened to glance at the old-style
ship's clock that lay half-buried in navigational charts
on the captain's desk. The clock I could read. The
charts--well, I could read the clock.
    The aft ladder was easier to climb with a tray of
coffee mugs than the forecabin ladder, so that's the
way I went. I came up on deck just in front of the
ship's wooden wheel. Behind it, the captain was grin-
ning at himself and steering Keeler through waves that
seemed to grow calmer at his behest. What had been
eight-footers had smoothed to a light chop as we
stopped fighting them and continued sailing into the
middle of the Caribbean,
    I relayed coffee to Mr. Scott and Dr. McCoy as they
relaxed amidships, then returned with one for the
captain. He took it with a silent nod, settled back in
the helm chair, and eyed me with those hazel-browns.
"Something on your mind, Commander?"

9

"That sounds like something Spock would say."
"Oh, no, Jim. Spock would comment on the waste.
You know, exertion and risk with no true gain. Can't
you just hear him say it, with a 'most illogical' pinned
on the end of it?"
    Bidden as though by drug, I indeed heard Com-
mander Spock's rough baritone cadence knitting those
words into his own kind of commentary on races and
contests.
    "Now, Captain, there's a proposal I'd like to see
worked on," Mr. Scott said, as he cocked one leg on
the cooler and gripped the loops of rope that held the
mains'l to the big boom. "Mr. Spock on board this
kind of starship. I wonder ha' he'd look in a slicker."
    "Earth's a water planet, Scotty," Kirk said, be-
mused. "One of very few. Sailing ships grew with our
culture. Besides... wouldn't you hate to see Spock
even greener than usual?"
    The three men laughed, enjoying their moment of
teasing bigotry at the expense of their absent friend,
forgetting that although I was human, Earth was not
my home either. I had no reason to feel envious, yet I
couldn't laugh along with them.
  "Where are we headed, sir?" I asked.
    "We're supposed to rendezvous with the other flo-
tilla participants at New Providence."
    I waited for him to finish the sentence. Perhaps it
was his tone, perhaps the flicker in his eye, or the fact
that I'd learned to expect more from him than what-
ever was obvious. After a moment, I assisted.
"But..."
    McCoy's rooster-tail brows arched up. "Tell her,
Jim. What are you saving it for? She's been looking at
you like a suspicious cat for a week now, even if she
doesn't know it."
    I flushed again, but McCoy's hilarious glare made
me duck my head and smile in embarrassment. One

thing was for sure: we weren't going to New Provi-
dence.
    That half-grin stretched one side of Kirk's mouth.
He gazed at me from the corners of his eyes. "We're
sailing toward your future, Piper."

    "A banana republic," Kirk explained, putting one
foot up on the rail, still fingering the ship's wheel
lightly. "A quaint local epithet used to describe island
settlements in semitropical areas here on Earth. The
Virgin Islands .... Greater and Lesser Antilles ....
Jamaica, the Caymans, the West Indies in general."
  "Because of the banana trees?"
    "Banana trees, banana vendors, a generally banana
life-style is what you'll find there."
    He gazed at the sea between McCoy and Scott. "I
guess we taught Ben Shamirian a good lesson today,"
he said, enjoying the sight of Gavelan plowing along
several ship-lengths behind Keeler.
    "That you did, sir," Scott said. "And bonnily too.
'Course, Doc and I'll ne'r be the same for wear..."
    "What, Scotty? Thinning out already, at your age?
I'm dismayed."
 "And I'm ocean-sick," McCoy drawled.
    Meanwhile, I was itching to find out what he meant
about sailing toward my future.
    When I spoke, my voice seemed not to fit in among
theirs. "Are you tampering with my future, sir?"
    He nodded, dawdling through a sip of coffee. "Your
first command."
    He was teasing me again. Bad enough when I did
know what he was talking about, much less when 1
didn't. I sat down on the rail and leaned back against
the lifeline. "A lobster scow, right?"
    Kirk shook his head, saying, "A space vessel."
Through my astonished stare he continued, "With
atmospheric and stellar capabilities."

12                                                                13

    The stare started to hurt. My eyes watered in the
wind. Mr. Scott was chuckling.
    "Are you . . ." I stammered. "Are you kidding
me?"
    "Commander, it's a Star Fleet-commissioned space-
going passenger vessel, and it's waiting at Man-o-War
Cay for you to take command." When Kirk saw my
expression--'ff by any reach of terminology I still
appeared human at all--he buried a flicker of amuse-
ment in a blink.
    McCoy leaned forward on the rail, supported by
both hands on either side of his legs. Those demonstra-
tive eyes widened at me. "How hard did you think it
would be to wangle a light command for the youngest
person to receive the Federation Medal of Valor?"
  "But... but... but... but why?"
    My question started in McCoy's direction, shifted to
Scott, and ultimately landed on Captain Kirk. After a
moment, he said, "Oh, I've got a little mission for you.
Call it a... mail run."
  "Space... a space... a mission out in space?"
  "That's right."
    I took a deep breath, and shook the seaweed out of
my head.
  "Think you're up to it?" he asked.
  "No!"
    Captain Kirk chuckled openly. "That alone tells me
you are," he said. "We'll be there by tomorrow after-
noon. Start getting used to the idea, Commander. As
of tomorrow, you've got a ship of your own."

14

Chapter Two

"Anything you might say has already been taken down in
evidence against you."
                 --The Squire of Gothos

MY OWN COMMAND.
    Gladiator. Excalibur. Odyssey. Mountaineer. Trou-
badour.
    Since she would be acquired during my stay here on
Earth, shouldn't my ship have a Terran name? This
planet might be just a little squeak that started a big
rumble, but Earth's history had plenty to offer. More
so in plain gallantry and intrepidness than in many
more, dare I say, civilized cultures. I was just begin-
ning to appreciate that. Earth, planet of my ancestry,
had been the subject of my fascination, my study, even
my curiosity, but never my respect.
    As Star Fleet hung in political suspension a few
thousand kilometers behind us, subject to tense
purges, and courts-martial, I contemplated the name
of my ship. Had I earned this? I had fallen into a bad
situation and forded it. That was Star Fleet's hope
when they created the Academy to mine the crude ore
of future command, wasn't it? The cost had been long
and wide--the lives of a Star Fleet destroyer's entire
crew; no, not my fault, but inevitable because I
refused to give in. I felt victorious about the failure of
Vice Admiral Rittenhouse's clandestine attempt to
trigger the collapse of Star Fleet and set up his own
intersystem'republic, but I still didn't feel good about

15

it. Victorious... good... too different for peace of
mind. And now Star Fleet trembled in the wake.
    I stood in Keeler's galley, heating coffee on what
seemed an archaic gas stove. Though I'd grown used
to it, I still marveled at Kirk's purity of cause. Dr.
McCoy had told me that when Kirk had purchased this
ship, she'd been half-restored and in bankruptcy. He'd
completed the restoration, rope for rope, halyard for
halyard, binnacle for binnacle, keeping true to the old
style. Hence, gas stove.
    Maybe a feminine name, so everyone would know
the captain was female. Edna St. Vincent Millay. Too
long. Summer Rain. Myth. Siren. Or a famous name:
Zuriak. Boone. Philip of Macedon. James T. . . .
    He didn't seem worried about the tumult at Star
Fleet Command. After all, here he was, one of only a
handful of starship commanders, cruising his home
planet in the slowest possible fashion. Shouldn't he be
back there... helping? Weren't there decisions to be
made? I'd bet that somebody, somewhere, was turning
to his second and grumbling, "Damn, I wish Jim Kirk
was here."
  Thunderbird. Chimera. Cumulus. Egyptian.
    The coffee wasn't even hot enough to send up an
aroma when an unexpected whine shook me from my
plans. The whine turned to a hum, then caused a faint
but recognizable oscillation of air particles around my
face and arms, where the skin was bare. My ivory
cotton flight suit shielded the rest of my skin from the
particle jump, but the cause remained perfectly identi-
fiable, even if it was totally out of place. I must be
delirious, imagining things.  A transporter beam?
    The hum grew deeper. I dashed to the forecabin
ladder and climbed up enough to get my elbows onto
the deck, and froze in place, astonished. Three forms
were indeed materializing onto the aft deck. The syn-

16

thesis of old and new hit me like the smell of bad
weather. Invasion.
    "How rude!" I exclaimed. My breath was stolen by
the wind flushing into the fores'l. Beaming down!
What raw nerve!
    Still hardly more than bands of shimmering light, the
forms were steps away from where I'd left Captain
Kirk and the others on the aft deck when I escaped to
collect my thoughts. Kirk obviously wasn't going to
divulge any more information about this so-called mail
run he'd slotted me for and I'd seen no reason to gawk
at him. So I came down to the galley, to gawk into the
coffee.
    But with people beaming onto the ship without the
slightest announcement, I had another direction to
gawk in. The affrontery of it held me to my place half
out of the hatch, peering around the main mast.
    Three Star Fleet Security Division uniforms distilled
into being and stopped shimmering. Two men, large.
And a woman, compactly built but still somehow
imposing in her own subdued way.
    Kirk got up from the helm chair, moving to them like
a prowling ghar-tiger. Sharply he demanded, "Just
what is the meaning of this intrusion?"
    "Captain James Kirk?" a big goon of a lieutenant
began. It was a formality only, the beginning of a
recitation.  "Yes."
    "Lieutenant Alexander, sir. Sir, I am instructed to
escort you to Star Fleet headquarters regarding an
inquiry issued by Star Fleet Command and the Federa-
tion Military, Advisory Committee---"
 "Why?" Kirk asked with typical bluntness.
    "For questioning regarding the theft of special tech-
nology by a member of your crew."
 Kirk's voice changed. "Which member?"
 "Lieutenant Sarda."

17

    I bumped my head on the hatchway in a bolt of
shock. Sarda... only weeks ago my biggest concern
about Sarda was helping him find a channel back into
the Vulcan disciplines he'd been denied by his race's
pacifist prejudices. Only weeks ago we were fighting
side by side. How did he get himself embroiled in
espionage while on shore leave? I gripped the hatch
rim and dug my fingernails in, seized with a sudden
need to talk to him, to find out why--
  "What in the devil!" McCoy blurted.
    Scott moved to stand beside Kirk, a united front. He
glared at Lieutenant Alexander. "You'd better have
your chevrons on straight for this one, lad," he
warned. "Lieutenant Sarda is a recipient of the Silver
Palm."
  The lieutenant shrugged. "Anyway."
    Mr. Scott bristled. "You don't just go about tossing
accusations at Federation honorees."
    Alexander took a breath, ignored him, and ad-
dressed the captain again. "I am authorized to escort
you to Star Fleet Command Headquarters for ques-
tioning regarding this theft. If you do not choose to
cooperate, I am authorized to place you under special
arrest---"
    "In other words, I go with you either way," Kirk
finished, his eyes narrowing.
    "Correct, sir." Alexander pivoted on one foot and
faced Mr. Scott. "Chief Engineer Montgomery
Scott?"
  "Aye..."
    "Sir, I am instructed to escort you to Star Fleet
headquarters regarding an inquiry issued by Star Fleet
Command and the Federation Military--"  "A' right, mister, I've heard it."
    "I'm authorized to escort you to Star Fleet Com-
mand Headquarters for questioning. If you choose not
to cooperate, I am authorized to place you under
special arrest."

lg

    I ducked back into the forecabin. Even beyond the
complete surprise and unlikelihood of this turnabout, I
sensed a deeper wrongness. Slipping aft through the
cabins, I hid at the bottom of the aft hatch and lis-
tened. Half expecting Alexander to have turned to
McCoy with his recitation, I had to recalibrate when
he turned instead to Kirk and said, "Sir, I must
request that you inform me as to the whereabouts of
Commander Spock, who has also been named in the
inquiry."
  There was a pause.
    Kirk's voice was low-toned. "Mr. Spock is not
aboard."
  "Where is he, sir?"
    '"On leave. I don't know specifically where." His'
vocal timbre stiflened then. "Lieutenant, this is a
gross breach of protocol as well as a serious accusa-
tion. I demand to know who's responsible for levying
these charges."
    "Sir, there are no charges. This is only an emer-
gency inquiry. I must also request that you inform me
as to the whereabouts of the following Fleet personnel,
who have also been called in for questioning: Lieuten-
ant Commander Hikaru Sulu, Lieutenant Nyota
Uhura, Lieutenant Commander Piper."
    While I crouched in the forward hatch, my heart
shriveled up and ran into the fo'c'sle. I couldn't swal-
low anymore.
    "I'm not in the habit," Kirk went on, very steadily
measuring his hidden message, "of monitoring my
crew's shore leaves. None of those people are here."
    "Then if you and Mr. Scott will please gather your
things, I'!1 signal the cruiser to beam us up."
    The lack of immediate alternatives showed in Kirk's
voice; though I couldn't see his face, I knew exactly
what his eyes were doing. "Dr. McCoy isn't able to
pilot this schooner alone, Lieutenant. You'll have to
wait until we make port."

19

    I ducked back another step into the aft cabin. His
message was gaining poignant clarity, if not explana-
tion.
    "Yes, sir," Alexander said. "A Star Fleet low-
atmosphere tug is on the way to take control of this
vessel. The sailing plan you filed with the San Fran-
cisco Maritime Authority specified New Providence as
your next port of call. The boat will be taken there,
unless you specify somewhere else. We could have the
boat beamed somewhere, if necessary, but it's offi-
cially impounded until further notice." I caught a
glimpse of Alexander's gesture toward the sober fe-
male guard. "Yeoman Philotoff will remain on board
until the tug arrives. She knows how to steer it."
  Beam the whole ship? Wow...
    "Now just a minute," McCoy interfered, blustering~
"How can we be expected to supply any useful infor-
mation, considering we've been sitting on this ocean,
out of touch with everybody and everything? How do
you explain that?"
  "I don't, sir."
    The sound of shuffling feet replaced the voices for a
moment, then relented again.
    "Captain," Alexander said. "I have here a warrant
of permission to search this boat, the North American
Maritime Registry vessel Edith Keebler, as issued by
Supreme Congressional Judge Michael Riley, stardate
4720.2."
    Kirk bristled. "It's Keeler," he said, taking a nip at
what little flaws he could find in Lieutenant Alexan-
der's efficiency. Alexander had been handpicked, no
doubt. Most security people would have been more
intimidated by the monumental assignment of con-
fronting the captain of the Enterprise.
    "If you don't mind," Alexander continued. "Lieu-
tenant Harsch and I will take a look underneath."
  "Below," Kirk corrected. "And I do indeed mind,

20

Lieutenant. My privacy has been ruptured. No matter
how stringent your orders., I doubt they included
beaming without notice onto private property. Be
assured I'll have a discussion with your superiors
when we return to Command."
    "Nevertheless, sir, I'm going to have to search the
boat."
    Rushing back into the forecabin, I spun around
frantically. No, not the head--they'd look there. The
galley cabinets were too small . . . the berths were
military-neat, without any convenient piles of blankets
or clothing to hide under. I might have been able to
hide in or under a sail bag, but I couldn't get on deck
without being seen... unless the fo'c'sle hatch was
open...
    Alexander and Harsch finally picked their way
through Kirk's stubbornness and started their search
of Keeler. In my mind, supplemented by careful listen-
ing and imagining how I would do it, I saw the Security
men investigate the ship's tight little hold, the engine
room where the now-quiet engine---of course, an old
restored dieseltsometimes throbbed, the supply
shelves in the aft hatchway, both heads, the forecabin
closet, and every other nook they could find. I wished
desperately for Vulcan ears as their slow footsteps
scraped on the upper decks. Poking the sail bags,
peering around the sea sides of the fores'l and jib, then
finally the walking and poking and opening and closing
stopped. There were voices, but I could barely hear
them. My hands were cold, sweating. I bunched them
up under my chin and tried to make sense of this. Was
Kirk being framed? Had someone pinned these
charges on Sarda in order to entrap Kirk? Or to
distract from other crimes surfacing during the purge?
A half-dozen members of the Admiralty had come
under suspicion--two had been court-martialed, one
actually jailed. Captains of other starships had been

21

dismissed--four of them! I'd made myself ready to
accept almost any change at Star Fleet Command--
but not this.
    My skin tingled. The air around me vibrated ever
so faintly: My ears buzzed for a long instant, then
everything settled again. Only the sea wind hummed
now.
    I burst out of the larder, shoving upward against the
wooden board that made a lower berth and a seat
behind the madiera table in the forecabin. The seat
cushion bounced off as I climbed out. I unfolded my
legs and winced at the creases left in my thighs and
sides by cartons and tins of stored food. I'd been on
board Keeler weeks before I even knew that compart-
ment was there.
    I quietly gained the top of the forecabin ladder and
peeked out, past the mainmast, rigging, and sails, to
the helm. Yeoman Philotoff was at the wheel, scanning
the blue sky. Looking for the low-at tug, no doubt.
McCoy stood near the aft hatch, hanging onto a block-
and-tackle, scanning the deck. He spied me. His head
craned forward and his brows shot together; but he
clamped his lips tight. With a roll of his eyes he told me
to stay hidden. He, too, evidently understood Kirk's
efforts to stall the search. Hide Piper, give her a
chance to act. But act how? What did Kirk want me to
do? Sarda was no thief, certainly no traitor, and if
anyone knew it, I did. Kirk was giving me some kind
of advantage. The captain knew what he would do if
Mr. Spock were in this position. Now I had to figure
out what that was, so I could do it too. That was all.
    The low-atmosphere tug appeared on the distant
horizon, approaching rapidly. I ducked deeper into the
hatchway. The tug was a flattish aidspace vehicle with
bumpers all around its turtle-shaped hull just below
Star Fleet insignia and call letters. Typical of Security,
the vessel had no aesthetic catalog name.
 ArthurJan . . . Culloden . . . Pioneer... Corinthian

22

ú . . Versailles, America, Proxima---could I name a
ship before I'd even seen it? I wouldn't want anyone to
impound my ship; I wasn't going to stand by while
Keeler was trussed up under Fleet red tape. She was
going to the port her captain wanted her in.
    My hands shook now as I heard the low throb of the
tug's engines whine down tø idle beside the schooner.
I scoured my brain for some memory of the crew
complement of a low-at--two or three, no more. Plus
Yeoman Philotoff, above decks. I'd wait. I'd let them
take us in tow. Then . . . phasers. There had to be
phasers on board somewhere. Jim Kirk was a cautious
man. Any sailor learned to anticipate pirates. I
wouldn't leave my ship or crew without some kind of
tangible protection; I guessed he wouldn't either. They
had to be aboardrebut where?
    "This is Gavelan calling Keeler. Jim, is there some
problem aboard?"
    My heart took a dive. "Damn it!" I hissed. The com
unit in the aft cabin! Ambassador Shamirian had no
idea what he was doing if Philotoff decided to come
below.
    I was trying to crawl back into the compartment
under the bench when I froze, hearing voices.
    "Do you mind," McCoy was saying, "if I go down
there and answer that? Our sister ship over there
wants to know what's going on."
    "Go ahead, sir," Philotoff replied. Her voice had a
rough texture, but her tone was almost conciliatoryú
    The vision appeared before me of McCoy's brow
rising in indignation. He grimly uttered, "Thank you."
Caustic bitterness was uncloaked in the doctor's tone.
    I met him in the aft cabin, but waved him to silence
and motioned to the corn unit. He picked up the
transceiver and responded, "Ambassador Shamirian,
this is Leonard McCoy."
    "Yes, Doctor. What's happening? What has the tug
come for?"

23

     "We're... well, we're being impounded, Ambassa-
 dor. Captain Kirk's been called back to Star Fleet
 Command for, uh, administrative reasons."
  "Ah. I'm not surprised. Do you need help?"
     McCoy shifted the question to me with a look. I
 shook my head, wide-eyed.
      He swallowed, then spoke into the transceiver.
 "Not right now, Ambassador. We'll let you know."
   "We'll be here, Doctor."
   "Apparently so will we. McCoy out."
    He replaced the transie and started to say something
to me, but I pressed a finger against my lips. I opened
my palms in an encompassing gesture and whispered,
"Phasers?"
    The sharp blue eyes grew huge. He stared at me as
though I'd grown cauliflower ears. With a paranoid
glance up the hatchway, he exaggerated a shrug and
his eyes got even wider. Evidently it hadn't occurred
to him to rupture the flow of events planned for us by
Star Fleet security.
  Above decks, we heard voices:
    Someone hailing from the low-at: "You know how
to steer this fossil, Yeoman?"
    Philotoff answering: "I can keep it on course, but I
don't know how to change course. It's a museum-
quality relic, but it sure is slow."
  "Can you fold up those membranes?"
    "They're called sails, Vallo. And... we could try it.
I'll need help. I've never seen anything like this be-
fore. I'm used to automatic sail furlings."  "Stand by."
    Keeler rumbled as the low-at pulled up alongside,
hovering at a pace so slow as to strain the heavy-duty
tug engines. We heard a "thunk" as the tug officer
dropped onto the aft deck. "All right," he began,
"how do we do this?"
    "Doctor!" I hissed from the bottom of my throat.
"Phasers!"

24

    McCoy touched his mouth in thought, paused
through a few long moments, then whispered, "If I
know Jim, they'll be near his own bunk." He pointed
broadly to the captain's berth.
    We went through every drawer and cubbyhole, ex-
panding our search away from that focal point, until
McCoy stifled a little yelp of victory; sure enough
there were phasers--hidden nicely in a dull wooden
box in the aft cabin head. In the head, of all places.
Knowing Kirk, he probably asked himself where any-
body who knew him would guess he might keep phas-
ers, and he went immediately in the opposite direction.
    I crossed the cabin in one step. Mceoy watched,
wordless, as I separated the gun-handle unit from the
power pack of one phaser and stuffed it into the pocket
Of my flight suit. Good thing it had been a little chilly
during my wheel watch this morning, or I might have
been wearing a water suit or shorts and not been
prepared for this at all. As it was, I could barely
assimilate what had happened and what to do about it
in the time I had.
 "What do you--"
 "Shhh!"
    He lowered his voice considerably. "What are you
going to do with that?"
    "I'm taking this ship, sir," I told him. "The captain
had something like that in mind... do you have any
idea?"
    "Me? I'm a doctor, not a spy. Nobody tells me
anything. It does look like he left the ball in your
court, though."
 At that, I stared at him and gushed, "What ball?"
    "Are you going to take over the tug?" the doctor
asked.
  "And leave it behind, yes."
 "Wouldn't it be faster than Keeler?"
    I nodded, struggling with shaky fingers to set the
phasers on heavy stun, and explained, "But they can

25

track the tug. Once we're in crowded Bahamian wa-
ters, the schooner becomes just another ship in the
flotilla. Stay here," I told him. With a second phaser,
the complete gun, wrapped in my clammy fist, 1
slipped through the ship's innards to the fo'c'sle, a
dark and cramped quarter in the pointed bow. Above
me was an open hatch, with no ladder. Beyond that,
bobbing high aloft, was the foremast. I would have to
climb out just right if the sail was tø hide me. The
dangerous moment would come just as I surfaced, for I
would have to balance myself and had little option of
ducking to one side or the other. Turbulence . . .
Counterattack... Identity Crisis . . . the S.S. Nerve
Pinch...
    I straddled the fo'c'sle, one foot on each bunk, and
hoisted myself up and out in a single motion, my head
low, coming out straight up so the mast itself would
hide me for a moment.
    I crawled forward, squirming along the green deck,
keeping the big sail between myself and the invaders.
    The ship shuddered and faltered. A loud scraping
noise filtered forward through the wind. I couldn't see,
but I felt the mains'i drop, felt the slackening of
control over the wind. I winced, thinking of those two
security clods trying to furl the main. Getting it to drop
was easy enough once the ropes were tracked back to
their sources, but folding up all that yardage of sail-
cloth was something I hadn't come close to mastering
even under Captain Kirk's tutelage. Not unex-
pectedly, Philotoff started yelling obscenities, both at
the sail and at the tug crewman.
    The phaser pistol was warm in my hand. Within its
power pack, restrained compressed energy kept the
whole weapon warm even when not in use. It doubled
the sweatiness of my palms as I arranged it in police
position, one hand holding the phaser, the other
steadying that wrist. I backed as far to the schooner's
bow as I could get--right up against the jib--braced

26

my buttocks on the rail, and aimed at the position
where one of the men would have to stand in order to
drop the fores'l.
    "It's good enough," Philotoff was calling. "We can
fix it later."
    "I dunno... you really want to leave Captain James
T. Kirk's float looking like that?"
     "I'm not so sure it isn't supposed to look like that.
And it's a boat, not a float." "Okay, okay."
    It's a ship, my tense mind corrected. Typical secur-
ity inertia for brains.
    Several more seconds I went on like that, brewing
up animosity for them, for their churlish intrusion, and
their offhanded treatment of Keeler. I gathered every
last annoyance into a lump and sat on it until my teeth
gritted and my finger itched on the phaser trigger. By
the time the fores'l began to drop, I hated security
people from the bottom of my... bottom.
    The sail dropped. Wooden hoops scraped the mast.
Sailcloth luffed and piled up on the boom. The ship fell
out of the wind altogether. Soon the gaff was at my
eye-level. I tightened my grip on the phaser.
    The gaff settled as two sets of hands pulled it down
from the other side. Thenmtwo faces.
    They gaped at me for an instant. Then Vallo went for
his phaser.
  I hunched my shoulders, and fired.

27

Chapter Three

"Sailor's luck, Mr. Spock."
          --Amok Time

A PHASER IN full fire is a hot thing. All that energy so
tightly contained causes flushback into the phaser
casing, making it warm to the touch. The weapon
reminds the user of the power in hand. A weapon with
a conscience. My hands sweated as the beam pro-
pelled Vailo backward down the deck. He collapsed
against the rail, then tumbled to the deck. I didn't mind
using the phaser, but using it without a clear reason
took me down with my prey.
    Perhaps it was guilt that made me hesitate. Caught
in the complexity, I held my breath as Vallo crumpled,
and gave Philotoff the time she needed to react. I saw
her phaser come up in my periphery, even saw the
infinitesimal glow as the beam gathered inside the tiny
muzzle perforation, and I would have loved to take
credit for the response of my nerves. Maybe Star Fleet
trained me better than I remembered or maybe prime-
val responses took over, but I found myself shoulder
down on the deck as the blue beam lanced over me.
    Footsteps vibrated through the deck wood and I
knew she was coming around to find me. Scrambling
like a puppy on ice, I somehow made it to the foredeck
and hid behind the jib, the only sail still flying. The
schooner's forward movement had slackened to al-
most nothing when the fores'l luffed and went down,

               28

and the jib was doing little more than providing some
stabilization as we bobbed in the choppy lapis seas.
    "You're just making things harder on yourself,
Commander," Philotoff called as she circled the fore-
mast and carefully came toward the bow. "Come on. I
know who You are. Kirk cooperated, so why don't you
do the same?"
    I didn't answer. I held my phaser close to my chin
and stepped carefully in the tight deck area on the
pointed bow. There was no place to go but overboard.
On a ship this size, even that wouldn't hide me. The
rope netting under the bowsprit provided no solutions
either. I would have to stay on board.
    On the canvas sail I saw the ominously clear etching
of Philotoff's silhouette kindly provided by Earth's
vulgar yellow sun. She wasn't built so much differ-
ently from me, except that she was a little shorter and
her hips were rounder. She looked well trained and
strong in that silhouette, a uniform-bound power pack
just like the phaser she carded. She was about to come
around the sail. Her phaser was preceding her. Her
hand caught the edge of the canvas. The sail started to
luff.
    Philotoff snapped the sail out of her way. The boom
waggled. I moved--fast. I caught a glimpse of the
phaser bolt as it struck out and sizzled into the sea
beyond the starboard rail, and I was pinched with a
sniggering little regret that I didn't hang around to see
the look on Philotoff's face. I heard her scrambling
around on the deck as she searched frantically for me,
heard her drop into the fo'c'sle through the open
hatch, and heard her shuffle through the galley, the
forecabin, the main cabin, and finally up the aft hatch-
way, but by then I had the advantage. When she
popped up through the aft hatch and the sun turned her
dun hair to umber, I was there and so was my phaser.
A second later, Yeoman Philotoff was heaped over the
hatch stairway, twitching and numb.

29

    She wasn't alone; I was numb too. My arms ached
from the stiffness as I held them locked before me,
joined at the phaser in a tangle of fingers. I stared at
Philotoff's !imp form, and at Vallo still crumbled be-
yond her. If only I could know this was right...
  "Freeze right there, lady."
    By the time the new voice cut through me, I'd
already lowered my phaser, and my guard. I'd forgot-
ten the tug. I looked over my shoulder, toward mid-
ships. The tug hovered just above the chop off our port
side, casting a jade shadow on the water. A burly
guard hung his arms over the bumper rail, his shoul-
ders hunched, and a phaser trained square at my heart.
  "Don't turn," he said. "Drop the phaser."
    Defeat swarmed over me. Evidently being at sea for
so long had dulled my thinking processes more than I
realized. I would have to remember this---for future
shore leaves. My phaser thunked to the polished
wooden hatch-top at my feet. Only then did the guard
climb carefully onto the tug bumper and hop from
there to Keeler's rail, and finally onto the deck just
port of the foremast. I stood on the aft hatch, helpless,
my back still to him. I didn't turn, but I was watching
the guard as he kept the phaser firmly raised. He knew
better than to trust me. Kirk's face passed by in the
shadows cast by the guard's bulk as he slowly crossed
the green deck. What was I supposed to do? What did
the captain want of me? Should I take these people
down--that was out of the question now; the guard
had a solid drop on me.
    High above me, the mainmast groaned in a stern
gust of wind over the ship, echoing my feelings. The
guard was big; I'd have a hard time taking him physi-
cally, if he ever gave me the chance. Not likely. He
was very cautious, approaching me with suspicious
slowness. A few more steps and he would have my
phaser.
 All at o{~ce, the fores'i boom, with the sail sloppily

30

bracketed between it and the lowered gaff like a rum-
pled bedspread, swung hard over from the starboard
side where Vallo and Philotoff had left it. The guard
threw his hands up when he saw the heavy tangle of
wood, rope, and canvas swinging toward him, but he
was no match for the sheer weight. The boom and gaff
thudded into his chest and knocked him hard into the
blocks and tackles of the rigging that supported the
mainmast. He howled his pain and anger, and the
expression on his face told me he wanted nothing more
than to have my right arm in his gritted teeth. His big
body shuddered and recovered in spite of the deadly
blow. Somehow he stayed on his feet and shook the
boom off with a mighty heave. Swinging freely, the
boom wobbled back over the forehatch.
    But I hadn't waited. The phaser was back in my
hand. I leaped from the hatch onto the deck for a clear
shot, and took it. The stun beam caught the guard in
the shoulder and raced through his body, its energy
force knocking him onto the rail. He pivoted over it,
his eyes wide with shock, and tumbled into a mild
white froth.
    My shoulders shook with tension as I straightened. I
broke my stare from the floating guard as his body
bobbed under the blue surface. I looked to starboard.
Dr. McCoy was just getting to his feet, leaning on the
raised deck amidships.
"I forgot all about you!" I blurted on a gust of relief.
He crawled under the lobbing boom and reached
over the rail to catch the stunned guard's left arm as
the body bobbed to the surface. I tucked the phaser
into a pocket and rushed to help him. Using the loose
jib halyard, I tied the guard to the side of the ship,
ensuring that he wouldn't go under anymore.  "What are you doing?" McCoy asked.
    I looped the rope under the guard's armpits two
more times for good measure and said, "I'll be right
back." I stepped up onto the polished rail and made a

31

 crazy leap for the tug--it was farther away than it
 looked. The bumper squeaked under my deck shoes
 and keeping my balance was a fight to be remembered.
 I wasn't going to be surprised again. In moments, the
 tug had been thoroughly searched and I could stop
 worrying about having another face pop up behind me
 when I wasn't looking. I climbed back onto the tug's
 turtle-backed deck and called, "All clear. Help me get
 those three on board the tug."
    McCoy glanced at the waterlogged form of the
guard, then back at Philotoffand Vallo, both still safely
under stun on the aft deck. "Pull closer, then," he
called in a frustrated tone, waving his hands in surren-
der.
    By the time the doctor and I had wrestled the three
security people onto the tug and dismantled the navi-
gational beacon so the tug couldn't be tracked too
soon, yet another forgotten presence had pulled along
our starboard rail.
    "What's happening?" Ambassador Shamirian
called as three of his crew held the two ships together.
Gavelan's bumpers were over the side, squeaking with
effort between the vessels. The ketch's sails were
being dropped and her movement soon stopped alto-
gether. We were adrift.
  "Oh ...."I buried the phaser deep in my flight-suit
pocket as I followed McCoy back onto Keeler's boa-
green deck. Quickly I crossed to the port rail and
stepped up onto it, holding the rigging. "Ambassador,
I need your help."
Shamirian was a barrel-shaped man with a scruffy
black beard and ink-spot eyes, his swarthy complex-
ion softened by the gentle way in which his features
came together. A collarless yellow shirt flapped
against salt-and-pepper hairs on his massive chest as
he inhaled thoughtfully. He was an adventurous sort,
as he had aptly proven in the constant tournaments

32

with Captain Kirk over the past few weeks, but the
adventurer was always hidden behind an innate father-
liness. Lacking Kirk's presence, I needed someone
like that right now.
    He squinted his eyes in expectation, even a touch of
amusement.
 "You name it," he said.

    We sailed for days and I counted every hour. My
only respite came in the dream-dogged sleep Dr. Mc-
Coy forced me to catch while I could get it, and there
was little more to do while sailing a straight course.
Ambassador Shamirian led the way in Gavelan, while
two members of his crew and I shared constant wheel
watch in his wake. Four hours on, four hours off.
Frustration nagged at me, as well as the dreams that
jarred my sleep, dreams of James Kirk nodding at me
to follow him into a very black void. I keenly missed
his easy gestalt with the ocean, that gourmet blend of
sea and eye. For a while 1 thought I might be losing my
high sense of trust for him, and that frightened me. If 1
couldn't trust Kirk, then who?
    Frustration .... If we had the facilities and the
cooperation, we could have beamed to our destination
in a matter of seconds. Instead we plodded tediously
up one swell and down the other, creeping along the
Earth's wet surface like insects and there seemed no
end to it. I plied Dr. McCoy with questions, suspecting
that Kirk would have told him what was going on if he
told anyone, but all I got was various versions of "I'm
a surgeon, not a secret agent." After a while I began to
believe him. Perhaps even Leonard McCoy was kept
from certain information. That made me more ner-
vous; what could be so touchy that Kirk wouldn't tell
McCoy about it?
    Shamirian's crew members aboard Keeler set my
mind at ease more than anything. I hadn't wanted to

33

admit to him that Earth's wind patterns sometimes
deceived me, and the ambassador's offer to lend expe-
rienced crew had taken at least one of the rocks out of
my stomach. Captain Kirk had told me I should be
able to feel the wind's direction on my face. I never
could. I wanted to.
    By the time we swung into the quiet Caribbean cove
at Man-o-War Cay in the Abaco Islands of the Baha-
mas, I felt like an old woman. I took no time to breathe
in the pure air or enjoy the mixed scents of the
settlement, or even to marvel that the tiny semitropical
island had managed to avoid the touch of the dilithium
age. This was Keeler's home port, the place where she
had been rebuilt and rerigged, a place where small
sailing vessels had been built for centuries, as far back
as the American Revolutionary War, Ambassador
Shamirian told me. Blond settlement natives, still car-
rying the fair coloring of ancestors centuries removed
who had been shipwrecked here, and a strain of Hai-
tians still made up the population. Since space travel
had become common and the discovery of marvelous
off-world resorts whetted Earth folks' appetites, the
tourist trade had fallen off to a trickle in the Caribbean
side-islands. Now, Man-o-War Cay shuffled along her
own peaceful way, serving passing travelers and re-
pairing water vessels as she had for generations. So
what was I doing here?
    "What now?" Dr. McCoy asked as he straightened
from helping me take the main halyards down.
    My spine clicked as I straightened. "The captain
said there would be a ship here for me. A space-going
ship. There can't be that many of those on a dot of land
this small."
 He shrugged. "Let's find it."
    I was glad he suggested that. I didn't want to seem
like I was giving orders to Leonard McCoy. Though he
was technically my superior, he was not an officer of
the line---and he liked it that way. Captain Kirk had

               34

left me holding the bag, and evidently McCoy was
happy to let me keep it. The doctor seemed to under-
stand how much I needed to get that bag by the throat
and shake it.
    We left the schooner in Ambassador Shamirian's
care, took his good wishes, and went ship hunting.
    Indeed it was a banana republic. There was even a
doddering Haitian native bent over a wheelbarrow
filled with bananas, hawking his island fruit. So there
were we, Star Fleet officers both, meandering along
the sand-crusted dock area, each carrying a bunch of
bananas. We questioned our way across the island to
another cove, where we were told there was a hangar
used for space hoppers and air transport vehicles.
Indeed Man-o-War Cay did have its area of modern
contamination, despite first impressions. The hangar
was large enough for several space-going shuttles.
When we first walked into the square blue building we
saw four Federation shuttles being worked on. Beyond
them were two private hover-cars, and beyond those a
huge, ugly, patched-up wreck probably being salvaged
for parts. It took up most of the hangar area and
prevented us from seeing beyond it.
 "Maybe it's behind that wreck," I mentioned.
    "We could just be in the wrong place," McCoy said.
"I'm not sure the fellow who directed us here was
actually speaking English. Or maybe Jim's connec-
tions didn't hook up."
  "Let's at least look."
    My heart sank as we stopped to get under the
wreck's twisted nose, taking care not to be cut by
jutting pieces of metal and fibercoil hull. From here on,
the hangar was empty. I strode a few paces into the
area, and sighed. Would the pieces of this puzzle keep
backing out of my reach?
    "Nothing," McCoy commented as he came to my
side. "Maybe we should just contact Star Fleet and
see if we can reach Jim."

35

    My lips pressed tight. "Not yet. I assaulted Fleet
Patrol officers to get here. I'm not leaving until I'm
sure there's no ship here meant for me." I continued
glaring, unseeing, into the empty space of the hangar
as though to clear my head and let revelations pour in,
but none came. The only interruption was a drawling
voice of someone singing, and the corresponding clank
of tools from inside the wreck behind us. At least
somebody was enjoying himself.
  "Hello rha baby, hello ma honey, hello ma ragtime
gaaaaaaaal. Send me a kiss by wiiiire ....Baby ma
heart's on fiiiiiiire. Hello ma baby, hello ma
honey..."
I closed my eyes and moaned. "Oh, no. No."
McCoy moved beside me. "What?"
My head drooped. "I know that voice." Collecting
every bit of self-control I owned, I turned around and
soaked in the panorama of dented, mangled, patched,
time-battered hullscape. With a deep breath and grit-
ted teeth, I bellowed, "Scanner!"
There was a bump from within the coilplate under-
belly and an illustrative "Ow! Goddang it." A face
bloomed from a hatch in a place where no sane life
form would put a hatch. The familiar boyish features,
brown eyes, and sloppy brown hair at once relieved
and enraged me. "Piper!" rolled the Tennessee pro-
nunciation of my name. "Ya'll're late!" He crawled
out of the hatch head first, and I was there to catch him
by the--orange and blue floral?--collar. Ignoring the
tropical shirt where a Fleet uniform usually lived, I
rammed him up against the scored hull.
"Why are you here?"
Scanner's smile dropped and he pressed back in my
grip. Though I didn't have a man's strength, I had
three things that worked on Scanner Sandage: five feet
nine inches, a full clip of impatience, and his respect.
"Now, whoa, Piper," he began carefully. "Don't cold

36

start your warp engines. I know what you're think-
ing."
 "Then tell me."
     "Mr. Spock said you might be surprised to have
your own command all of a sudden, but I figured--"
  "Spock was here?"
    "Well, sure, for a while... when we installed the
warp engines and the computer bank."
    I let go of him to step back and stare in sinking
disbelief at the ship. It was a piled design, but the
original hull shape was lost in additions and modifica-
tions, each with its own shape and color. Only the
original blunt nose and some of the starboard hull
remained unfettered by extra equipment. It looked like
a displaced prehistoric lizard, and the observation slits
engineered into the sides looked like gills left over
from a bad stint of evolution. I held my breath. "This
lumbering, obsolete junkyard has warp speed?"
    He touched his heart, flexed his knees, and uttered,
"Oh, yeah! She'll go warp four!" He glanced help-
lessly at Dr. McCoy, then back at me. "Aw, Piper,
have a heart. A ship hasn't even got any personality
till it's at least twenty years old."
    "Oh?" I shot back. "And what part of this ship is
only twenty years old?"
    Dr. McCoy followed, wordless, as Scanner took my
elbow and escorted me slowly along the rutted hull.
Names of people and projects were illegibly etched
into dents and over patches, cut or burned in by
whatever tool was being used at the time. "You got the
wrong attitude," Scanner insisted. "When Captain
Kirk asked me ff I knew where there was a ship for a
covert mission, I jus' naturally suggested this one. I
got my pocket money when I was at the Academy by
doing Federation construction jobs on this rig."
    "You're responsible for this being my first command
ship?"

37

    "Yeah! It's got cutting lasers, it's got tractor beams
tied fight into the warp engines, it's got pinpoint
disruptors for demolition, it's got a presser beam, it's
got a containment field, it's got grapples, it's got a hull-
tool bank, it's got passenger quarters, and it's got
state-of-the-art computer capabilities that yours truly
helped put in. It's got a full architectonics library and
. . . and it's got Star Fleet registry." He poked his
finger into the hollow of my shoulder with each of the
last three words. "Federation-wide clearance."
  "With Kirk's name all over it," I muttered.
    He squared off in front of me, staging himself
against the construction rig, and struck a dramatic
pose, his brown eyes expressive and intent. "Remem-
ber the First Federation's giant tug? Doc, you remem-
ber!"
    "Oh, yes," McCoy droned, rolling his eyes as the
memory flooded back in. "The commander of that
ship took a real fisk. He bluffed us down and we fell
for it. We could've bypassed his shutdown of our
systems and blown that ship to bits with a few phaser
shots. It didn't even have any shields or weapons. Just
an incredibly powerful tractor beam." He shook his
head and clasped his hands behind his back thought-
fully. "Jim was impressed by the theatrics."
    "Right," Scanner said. "It was a supervessel de-
signed to yank asteroids out of orbit and haul 'em in
for mining purposes. All that power, and it turned out
to be a giant space-faring truck. But think what we
learned from it! Think of the mining boom after we set
up relations with the First Federation! That's what this
is!" He swung both hands endeafingly toward the
ship. "It's a Fesarius!"  "It's a barge!"
 My head started to throb.
    I backed off a few steps to see if the rig looked any
better, and was greeted with yet another---as though I
needed one--surprise. From the main air lock ap-

               38

peared a second familiar face, one which confirmed
my guess that I'd been set up. I watched in silent
astonishment as the slim young woman caught sight of
me, narrowed her slightly tilted almond-shaped eyes,
the only suggestion that she might be other than hu-
man, and strode down the long ramp toward us. Her
short beige-blond hair was a shade or two lighter than
the last time I'd seen it, a gift from Earth's relentless
sun. My hair, too, bore a few streaks of extra gold
after so long at the schooner's helm, but it would never
reach the pearl shade of hers.
    "Merete," I breathed, almost a groan, confirming
what I saw as she came down the long ramp and
approached us.
    "Hello, Piper," she said. Her tone of voice told me
that she knew exactly what was going through my
mind. She reached for McCoy's hand. "Dr. McCoy,
how are you?"
    He took her narrow palm in subdued greeting.
"Well, I'm just fine, Dr. AndrusTaurus. What are you
doing here?"
    She shrugged. "Medical duty. Or so I was told. I
only recently started to doubt it."
    That was enough formality for me. I rounded on her.
"Do you know what's going on? All I've got so far is
Scanner, this bizarre excuse for a space vessel, and a
pile of unanswered questions. And I hope this thing
really can fly, because I'm guilty of assaulting Star
Fleet officers to get to it."
    Merete pressed her delicately colored lips into a line
and gave me a look of intense sympathy, but she
plainly had no answers for me and, knowing that,
declined to complicate my mood. As she had in the
past, Merete AndrusTaurus gave me her best prescrip-
tion: a steadying presence.
    Scanner shook off my words and recalibrated.
"Piper, it's a good ship. It's got heart. Here... look
over here. See that dent? That happened when they

39

built the very first outersystem communications relay
station. And this patch over here? That's from the
superstructure for the Martian Colonies' Orbital Medi-
cal Center. And up yonder, that's what happened when
they built the new docking bay for Star Fleet Com-
mand itself. I was there." He poked his own chest.
"There's my name. See? Judd Sandage, light-etched
right in. And there--see that name? Liex Muller? He
died on that job. Piper, this ship... this is a memorial
to construction projects all over the Sol system. It's an
archive of local history! And it's all yours!"
    His enthusiasm was almost pathetic. I backed away
a few steps and leaned toward Dr. McCoy while
Scanner waited anxiously near his prize.
    "He loves the ship," I whispered to the years of
experience beside me. "What do I do?"
    Dr. McCoy folded his arms and rocked in contem-
plation. ,Give him the benefit of the doubt. The ship is
innocent until proven obsolete."
    With a surrendering little nod, I tried to change the
look on my face to give the impression I might be
having second thoughts. "I... I see what you mean,
Scanner," I said. "It does have a certain... unique-
ness."
He nodded so hard his hair flopped over his eyes.
The massive blue hull, patched with vari6us colors
of coiiplate, scored with Scanner's precious chroni-
cles, stretched out across the hangar, begging for
approval. Even the silly carnivorous teeth somebody
had painted onto the bridge hull seemed to be trying to
smile. I licked my lips, gazing across the veteran
fibercoil. I had to clear my throat before I could speak.
"Does it have a name?"
    Scanner puffed up and squared his shoulders. With a
nod he announced, "Tyrannosaurus Rex."
    My nerves jarred against each other. I felt Dr.
McCoy shift beside me, moving away. Must have been
the steam coming out of my ears.

40

    In a feeble attempt to shield my disappointment, or
perhaps to shield Scanner from it, 1 ignored his hopeful
expression and stepped past him, tersely stating, "Not
anymore."

    "This is U.F.P. Construction Transport S.S. Ba-
nana Republic requesting clearance for space access."
    "This is Star Fleet Planetary Patrol, Banana Repub-
lic. Specify your registry code."
  "MTK 4247, Patrol. It's a new code."
    "We copy. That's not a new code, Banana Republic,
it's a reissue. Please confirm and specify the old
code."
"All right, confirmed. Scanner, take over."
Scanner leaned forward in the mate's seat beside
mine as we sat in front of a slapdash control cockpit
which bore the scars of having been overhauled and
added to with each new phase of engineering science
over its disturbingly long life. He tied his console into
the communications link and said, "Patrol, this vessel
was formerly registered as Construction Tug 87, S.S.
Tyrannosaurus Rex, registry number MKT 1187." He
leaned back as far as the newly installed command
lounge would pivot. "You sacka wet socks."
    I shushed him with a glance. "I don't want any more
delays!" I hissed at him. "If we can get atmospheric
clearance we can be at Star Fleet headquarters in
fifteen minutes." Leaning closer to the corn system, I
asked, "Patrol, are we clear for space access?"
    There was an annoying silence. They had no reason
to hold us back but their own petty show of power
over civilian vehicles. After a moment the same voice
returned: "Affirmative, 4247. Take a heading of point
five seven seven by two six two. Have a good trip."
    "No thanks to them," Dr. McCoy commented from
the passenger couch behind us. The foreman's cabin
had been refurbished, storage compartments removed
and altered for passenger seating. The renovations

41

were considerably more pleasant to look at than the
conglomerated hull, with its damage repairs and its
added chunks of hardware that had been tacked on
with each new technical innovation. The construction
transport looked less like any kind of ship than a
collection of odd-shaped containers somehow welded
together. Dr. McCoy had wasted no time in settling
back into the cushions of the new pivot chairs and
acquiring a professional slouch. Beside him, Merete
AndrusTaurus gazed thoughtfully out the observatory
gaps in the coilplate casing of the ship. Beside us,
coasting through the clouds, flew a Star Fleet Plane-
tary Patrol Cruiser. Merete waved at them, her slim
eyes narrowing as she smiled in an attempt to smooth
out anything they might have overheard. Merete
wanted nothing more than peace of mind--my peace of
mind.
    "Well, Commander Piper," McCoy said. "Once we
clear the atmosphere, you're officially the captain of a
space-faring vessel. Quite an accomplishment, consid-
ering you've hardly been aboard a space-faring vessel
long enough to change uniforms. If you don't watch
out, Jim Kirk'11 think you're upstaging his dazzling
career." He was smiling, both arched brows raised in
amusement.
    I blushed, but not from pride. "Doctor, this wasn't
my idea," I reminded him, burying my humiliation in
adjusting a navigational mapping beam.
    "Ah, but that's usually how it happens, Com-
mander," he pointed out in his wise drawl.
    Scanner nodded. "Sir's right, Piper. You know, in
all the years ol' Rex has been alive, all the uncounted
projects this ship hauled on, she's never had a captain
before. She's had crew chiefs and construction bosses
and foremen, but never ever a captain. You're the first
one!" He slumped back in his chair, raised one foot
high on the other knee, and stared at the mangled

42

ceiling circuitry. "Captain Piper. Has a kind of a nice
ring to it."
    Perhaps the designers put too much pivot into the
pivot chairs. I stood up, shoulders bunched beneath
the cotton flight suit, and placed my hand on Scanner's
chair. It gave a satisfying groan when I pushed it, and
it reeled backward. Scanner yelped, hit the floor on his
side, and rolled over, his face plastered with astonish-
ment.
    "What'd I do?" he bellowed. "What'd you do that
for?"
    I stood over him, one foot on either side of his
sprawled left leg. For long moments I glared down at
him, so intently that he dared not get up. McCoy and
Merete were frozen to their chairs.
    "Don't call me that," I said. I stepped over him.
"Notify me when we're over San Francisco."

 "Is it gone yet?"
    The soft voice was consummately feminine. Noth-
ing about it suggested its source might be other than
human. There wasn't much about Merete that couldn't
be human if she wanted to give up her Palkeo citizen-
ship or heritage. The Palkeo Est people of Altair Four
were one of the independently evolved cultures closest
to humans so far discovered, at least in their habits and
attitudes. Only physiological exceptions set them
apart, such as genetic code differences, blood com-
pounds, and certain nucleoplasms or some other bio-
technical terminology that I could throw around.
Merete's similarity to a human, spiced with that ves-
tigial hint of aiienness, comforted me somewhat, but
unfortunately also reminded me of Sarda.
    Sarda--a cultural foundling. A Vulcan, displaced by
his own people, trying to dig a trench that would lead
him back to the main river of Vulcan tradition from the
separate pool fate had eddied him into. Had he broken

43

under the pressure, the sorrow?.Could a Vulcan deal
with that kind of humiliation in the midst of personal
honor and pride? Or would he reach a snapping point?
    "Is your headache gone?" Merete asked again with
her customary patience.
    An added pressure on the heat cloth over my eyes
let me know I was being touched.
    I thought about giving her an answer and waited to
decide ff the pounding in my skull had receded.
"Nope," was my conclusion.
    Merete's weight tipped the edge of my bunk mat-
tress. "I don't want to medicare you ff I can avoid it."
    "It's only a headache, Merete," 'I said. "I'll live." I
puffed the heat cloth from my eyes and blinked into the
dim light of the foreman's cabin. My cabin, now. It
was a cramped and inglorious place. Constructags
simply weren't bu'flt for comfort, and room remained
at a premium even when renovations were attempted.
"It'll go away as soon as I get to talk to the captain. As
soon as he tells me what's going on."
    "You don't have any idea?" she asked, diminishing
the seriousness by casually arranging the heat cloth in
her medikit.
    "I know sarda's in trouble." I sat up, scooting back
against the cold metal wall. "It's got to have some-
thing to do with that. Kirk deliberately made sure
those security officers didn't find out I was on board
the schooner. And I think he knew how I'd react once
I found out Sarda had gotten caught up in espionage."
I pulled at her wrist, forcing her attention away from
the medildt. When she looked up, I asked, "Are you
sure, absolutely sure, Mr. Spock didn't say anything
about this so-called mail run?"
    In deference to me, she took the time to think about
it for a moment. Finally she shook her pale head and
shrugged. "Not a word. He provided instructions for
the ship, and for a while there were several Star Fleet
technicians and engineers down here working on it.
                4

Scanner and I didn't even know the ship was intended
for you until a week ago, when the last of the Fleet
crew left. I thought I was here to tend to injuries in the
tech crew. I certainly didn't understand orders to stay
behind. Then Mr. Spock told Scanner that you'd be
coming. We assumed you'd beam in any minute after
that. What were you doing on that sailing boat?"
    I dropped back. Good question, Doctor. "It's Kirk's
private ship. He offered to authorize shore leave for
me aboard the schooner if I was willing to crew the
ship during the Annual International Battle at Sea
Flotilla for Masted Ships. War games. A collection of
sailing buffs get together and try to outmaneuver each
other. I thought it was a little primitive and silly until a
couple of ships actually went over in the fervor for
victory points. Smaller ships than Keeler, of course,
but even we carne close to being rammed a few times.
They're pretty serious about it." I stared at my knees,
suddenly unblinking, aware of little more than my own
heartbeat. "Few more serious than Jim Kirk. I never
saw such intent to win. He's a bedeviling man,
Merete. He leaves me in awe . . . confused .... He
tries to force me to figure out what he's thinking. He
pushes the odds. This time, he miscalculated. Some-
thing went wrong. He meant to tell me what was going
on, but he got pulled off the schooner before he could
do it. I've got to find him, Merete," I told her, lost in
conviction. "I've got to know what to do."
    If she was unsettled by my intensity, she did a prime
bedside job of concealing it. She nodded slowly, mak-
ing sure I knew she had been listening. "You will," she
assured. "We'll be there soon. It may all turn out to be
much simpler than you expect. Just a mix-up of some
kind. It may even be fixed by the time we arrive at Star
Fleet."
    "I hope so," I said. "I don't mind a struggle, but I
can't stand not knowing."
An unfamiliar whine interrupted our conversation,

4S

followed then by several clicks, and I knew somehow
that Scanner was trying to shake the bugs out of the
new intercom system. I was about to punch the trans-
ceiver button beside my berth when his voice franti-
cally crackled through the hastily installed circuits.
    "Piper! You better get up here! This danged ship is
warping out of orbit all by itself!"

46

Chapter Four

"Make the most of an uncertain future."
            --The Squire of Gothos

"STATUS !"
    The command seat sighed as I angled into it and
squared off before a band of flickering instrument
lights.
    Scanner was trembling slightly, but trying to conceal
it as he frantically interpreted the readout screen.
"She pulled out of orbit as soon as we reached the
descent plane for the West Coast."
                       ~

    "Malfunction?" I asked as we reeled past the daz-
zling display of Jupiter and her moons.
    "Naw, Idon't think so. She's got a mind of her own.
She's powering up to warp. Betcha the computer's
behind it. Looks like this trip is going to take a lot
longer than you thought. We might have to tote
lunch."
    The control panel was like the rest of the ship: a
sloppy amalgam of new instruments shoved in wher-
ever the old instruments could be moved or rear-
ranged. I felt like a piebe as I tried to familiarize myself
with the controls. "Get into the system. Countermand
what it's doing."
  "I tried."
  "Well?"
 He gave me a desolate look. "It's locked up."
    A chill ran through me. I glanced over my shoulder
to the passenger seats, where the two doctors sat in

47

expectant silence. Merete was noticeably stiff. McCoy
appeared relaxed but wide-eyed. I felt uncomfortable
under the sudden weight of responsibility for their
lives, not to mention the self-consciousness of know-
ing how often McCoy had watched James Kirk per-
form under pressure.
    No--I couldn't think about that now. I couldn't
waste time and mental energy comparing myself to the
captain. As I turned once again to the blinking control
panel, I noticed with a shuddering apprehension that
Jupiter was already far behind.
    Scanner's face was patterned in blues and grays as
he peered into the visual readout screen. "We're about
to warp, Piper."
  "Dr. McCoy, Merete, strap yourselves in, please."
    "What's going on?" McCoy asked. "Why's it doing
this?"
    "You've been here all along, sir. You know as much
as we do. Scanner, confirm that the computer has
navigational control, or the warp could tear us up."
    "Computer has full control," he responded. "Rex
knows what she's doing, even if we don't."
    "Stupid machine," I grumbled. "Project course and
tell me where we're going."
    "How?" he blustered. "He could go flyin' forever at
warp speed. The computer's the only thing that knows
where it'll stop us. How you gonna get it to tell you?"
    We glared at each other for a long moment as I
reviewed the fact that I didn't have any real answers.
Something in Scanner's words had awakened the rebel
in me. I shrugged. 'TI! ask it." My hands lingered
over the Controls until I figured out which ones to push
to revive the computer, or at least distract it. "Compu-
ter tie-in, command authorization."
    The board began whirring and clicking as though it
didn't have the slightest idea what I was talking about.
Then the firm, resonant imitation of a female voice

48

requested, "Specify identification code for authorized
command, please."
    I looked at Scanner. He blinked at me,'then back at
the computer console. "O1' Rex has delusions of being
a starship," he said, obviously taken aback.
    "But it gives me some power," I surmised, "if it
knows it was to answer to a particular person."
    Dr. McCoy leaned as far forward as his safety straps
allowed. "Let's hope it knows that person is you,
Commander."
    "Going to warp speed on automatic," Scanner said.
To the instant, the stars before us blended into a segue
of spectral color and we were at warp. A flush of
helplessness caused silence on the cramped b~~dge.
We waited to see if the ship could stand the strain.
    "Warp two," Scanner advised. "Two-point-five...
warp three. Entering cruise mode." He shook his head
and sighed. "Well, here we are."
    When my skin stopped crawling, I renewed my
computer access and fed in my personal identification
code. The gratifying result came almost instantly.
"Accepted. Lieutenant Commander Piper, Star Fleet
clearance, Star Date 3988.1, command status ac-
knowledged. Thank you."
    I took a deep breath and glanced at Dr. McCoy.
"I'm alive," I told him. He looked a bit dazed, but said
nothing. I tried to think clearly, readjusting my mind to
talk to a computer. "Computer."
     "Working," the gentle voice answered with just the
perfect touch of question that invited me to continue.
  "Release navigational control to the helm."
  "Not possible."
  "Why not?"
    "Current navigational programming includes a pre-
empt encoding which prevents change of program
until destinational code is satisfied."
 "Damn."

49

    "At least we know it's not a malfunction," Merete
pointed out. "There is a destination."
    I cleared my throat. "Computer, specify destina-
tion."
    More clicking. "Tau Ceti Quadrant, Ciatella Star
System, planet Argelius."
 "What?" McCoy blustered.
  "The plot thins," Scanner drawled.
    I sat back. "Argelius? Why Argelius? It's the sleep-
iest planet in the Federation! There's no place in the
known galaxy where less goes on. Why would he send
us there?"
    All three of my hijacked "crew" blinked at me like a
gaggle of curious birds. Then Merete and Scanner
chimed, "Who?"
    My brows lowered over my eyes in a scurrilous
frown. "Who else?"
    They backed off. Space was black, velvety, deco-
rated, and ominous as we streaked through it, the old
ship reveling in a mission that included no anchoring
or pulling. For the first time in her existence, an ugly
old tug had a chance to fly. Aside from a few shaking-
down tremors, Rex took to the new warp capability
with unexpected grace, maintaining her cabin warmth
and keeping us all in quiet comfort despite the unaes-
thetic surroundings. I felt that, somehow, this old dog
loved her new trick.
  "What's our ETA?" I asked.
    "Ninety-two hours," Scanner said. He watched the
control board, his expression sunken, as though his
old friend had betrayed his trust. In that moment of
helplessness, when I could do absolutely nothing to
change the situation, my senses finally opened up to
someone's feelings other than my own.
    "It's not a mistake, Scanner," I said mildly. "It isn't
your fault."
 He shook his head, brows knitted in perplexity. "I

50

wish I knew what was going on. I dunno what to say. I
helped put in all this equipment. It wasn't pro-
grammed, I swear it wasn't."
    I slouched in the command chair. "You feel bad
about being outwitted by Mr. Spock, and I feel bad
about allowing myself to get dropped into this by
Captain Kirk. I knew he had something on his mind,
but I never had the nerve to ask until it was too late. If
this is anybody's fault, it's mine." "Yours?"
    My lips pressed into a mockery of a grin. "Privilege
of command."
 "Aw, that stinks."
    I shrugged. "But it's one thing they kept grilling into
us at command school. Command is more than getting
all the credit. It also means getting all the blame."
    Scanner sighed and got to his feet, casting one
pathetic look back at the computer console and instru-
ment panel before saying, "I'm gonna get some sleep.
Nothing else to do. Poor Rex... first space mission
and all we can do is sit here like a buncha Dunsels."
    My first command. I'd dreamed about it since enter-
ing my senior year at Star Fleet Academy, when I was
offered the privilege of choosing whether or not I
wished to go on to command candidacy. A singular
honor, given to only a handful of graduates each year.
Not just a chance for high rank, but a chance to
command a Star Fleet space vessel. Then along came
the mangle of events that had led me into the Rit-
tenhouse conspiracy and finally to the Federation
Medal of Valor, and I knew the meaning of being
plunged into the unexpected. How long ago? How long
had I served aboard Enterprise--a matter of weeks? It
seemed like years. And I wasn't ready to have that
feeling of years.
    I glanced surreptitiously around the dull little com-
mand area of Banana Republic. I was alone now.

51

Merete had retreated to her cabin, McCoy to the one
he and Scanner must share. The computer and instru-
ment panels had settled down into a humming elec-
tronic euphoria of knowing exactly what they were
supposed to be doing and quite simply doing it.
Ninety-two hours. Almost four days before I would
hax, e any answers. Four days of being Dunsel.  Not exactly a command dream.
    The hours crept by, each one ridiculing me, until I'd
finally had enough and something snapped.
    Scanner jumped about twice his height when 1
whacked him out of a sound sleep. "What--what? Red
Alert? Whassa matter? he babbled.
  "Scanner, get up," 1 said. "We've got work to do."
    He raked a hand through his hair and mumbled,
"Are we there already?"
    "Hardly," I said, trying to cut through his disorien-
tation.
    On one of the other berths in the crowded cabin,
once part of a storage compartment, Dr. McCoy rolled
to his feet. "Is something up?"
  "Yes, sir," I answered. "My patience."
    Scanner shook himself out and got up, wobbling
slightly as he asked, "l hope you got a good reason for
wakin' me up from that nice shore leave I was taking."
    "I do. We're going to break into that navigational
program. I want control of this ship."
    If he hadn't managed to wake up completely, the
shock of that statement brought him fully around.
"You're gonna what? Are you fishin' in the right
crick? The computer's been programmed by Com-
mander Spock on Captain Kirk's orders !"
    I straightened my shoulders, despite the low ceiling.
"Well, you just get ready to unprogram it. He might be
Captain Kirk," I said solidly, "but this is my ship."
    I turned, strode out of the cabin, and stepped onto
the interdeck ladder, not staying to examine the look
of abject amazement the two men exchanged. It really

52

wasn't meant to be a dramatic exit; I just wanted to get
out of there in case they started laughing.

    Scanner and Dr. McCoy followed me back to the
bridge. As we passed Merete's cabin, she too realized
something was up and hurried into the corridor. In a
way, I was glad they followed. Their presence forced
me to stay in the mode of defiance I'd reached, and
gave me no opportunity to reconsider. I had to be in
control of the ship. Suppose there was trouble? What
ff we were attacked or damaged? How would I live
with myself ff all I could do was shrug and say it was
Kirk's problem?
    I kept thinking about Captain Kirk, my mind divid-
ing between trust and rebellion, obedience and insur-
gence. I respected him, certainly, but could I ever
respect myself as much if I settled back and accepted
whatever he or anyone dished out to me without so
much as an explanation? Possibly I could have done so
this time, if another element, deeper and harsher,
hadn't been eating at me. Sarda.
    Lieutenant Sarda, recipient of the Silver Palm and
Star for Conspicuous Bravery. Young Vulcan techni-
cal scientist, a weapons specialist. In fact, a weaponry
pioneer, much to his own embarrassment. My fellow-
classman at Star Fleet Academy. The only person
who'd stayed relentlessly at my side during the dread-
nought affair just weeks ago---I kept saying that to
myself: just weeks ago, only weeks.
    What was happening to him? Was this computer
setting carrying me farther away from helping him? I
had to know the entire truth. I couldn't get it here, on a
space ship streaking toward passivity. My Vulcan
friend had somehow strayed from the route back to the
Vulcan teachings to one lined with suspicion. Theft of
Federation-owned technology, the security lieutenant
had said. Which technology? Sarda hadn't been work-
              53

ing on any particular project that I knew of, not after
the destruction of the dreadnought that carried the
image projector he'd invented. That episode had been
enough to drain the inventive urge out of anybody, at
least for a while. Especially poor Sarda. He kept
trying to turn his talent for weaponry to devices for
defense, and Star Fleet Command, in its unending
military wisdom, kept interpreting Sarda's inventions
to be used aggressively if necessary. They kept giving
him awards and commendations that did nothing more
than shame him before his Vulcan culture. So far none
of his inventions had been used punitively, except by
Vice Admiral Rittenhouse. But Rittenhouse was dead
now, and his dream to force galactic war was dead
with him.
    So what had happened? What had changed since I'd
gone to sea with the intrepid James T. Kirk?
    I forced myself back to the immediate present,
jabbing a finger at the computer console. "I want to
know how that thing's tied into the navigational sys-
tem. I want every circuit examined until we find a way
to interrupt the programming. You're the electrical
specialist," I said to Scanner. "Start tracing. I'm going
to get into the mechanics. I want control of this ship
and I don't care how we get it."
    Scanner gaped at me, hands on hips. "It must be
autumn in Piperland, 'cause the leaves are dropping
off your tree !"
    I struck him with a cold glare. "I'm not joking,
Scanner. I'm not going to be anyone's pawn. Not even
Kirk's."
    Dr. McCoy caught my arm as I stepped past him, on
my way to the engine area. "Do you know what you're
doing? The computer program may be tied into other
things. Life support, engine control..."
  "We'll have to find out," I said.
  "But if Jim did this on purpose---"
 "I'm not letting anyone dictate my command with-

54

out an explanation. I'm going to get control of this
ship's helm."
    Scanner grasped the back of the command chair and
shook it. "Piper," he whined, "don't you get it? This
is Captain James T. Kirk you're dinkin' around with!"
    If I ever doubted my decision, the last lingering
regrets now dissolved away as I gazed into Scanner's
desperate annoyance and realized that I had neither
control of the ship nor control over those who were
supposed to be my crew. To him and Merete, I was
merely a fellow Academy graduate. To Dr. McCoy, I
was a talented upstart. The obstacles before me grew
as I began to perceive them. Control of the ship;
respect of my crew. The weight kept my shoulders stiff
as I squared them. "That's exactly right," I said
coolly. "And he wouldn't let anybody do this to him."
    By the look in Dr. McCoy's face, I could tell that I
had hit upon an unmoving truth. I took my note of
victory and escaped to the engine room.
    For the next forty hours I drove them and myself to
every physical and mental limit, making demands
upon them that strained both their patience and my
own. McCoy set himself up as Mess Officer, and, true
to his word, that's what he made of the galley. We
didn't eat well, but we did eat. At least we wouldn't
faint from hungermthat is, if the broccoli with peanut
butter sauce didn't kill us first. As the hours passed,
we found out how the computer system worked, found
out how the warp engines were tied into it, found out
which circuits, foils, trip-joints, and conduits were
responsible for the navigational lockup. I allowed
them time for sleep, but only barely enough, and only
on Dr. McCoy's insistence as senior medical officer. I
catnapped, but only when he exercised his medical
authority, and even then I did nothing but dream about
which circuitry panel I was going to try next. I refused
to believe the obvious: that we were trying to break an
unbreakable program. The more obvious it became,

55

the more determined I was to find that one flaw, that
one backdoor that would give me access to control
over the ship I supposedly commanded.
    By the third day of this, we were all showing effects
of the strain. Scanner, especially, since most of the
pressure--and my wrath--landed on him. I wasn't a
technical specialist, but I did have a way with ma-
chines, only because I didn't compl~tely understand
them and they didn't completely understand me. Deep
down, I knew they were stupid, no matter how brainy
they pretended to be. There was a way to wheedle
into, out of, past, or through just about any system,
any program, and if I had to force unprecedented
performances, I would do it. There was a way to hack
into that navigational programming and I would find it.
    "If it kills me, you'll find it!" Scanner finally ex-
ploded when I muttered my intents as we both lay on
our back under the dismantled bridge panel. He
crawled out, unfolded himself, and got to his feet,
primed for a tirade. His face was drawn and pale, his
eyes ringed with exhaustion. Behind him, Merete had
been trying to piece back together one of the circuit
boards I'd picked apart. She paused to listen, but did
not interrupt as the volcano bubbled up in Scanner's
face. "We've tried everything we know. Logic over-
ride, process of elimination, systems confusion, drop-
snag, memory-circuit jumping--I don't know what
y'ali want anymore! It's Mr. Spock's program! Where
d'you come off thinking there's a flaw?"
    I stood up and brushed several years' worth of
construction dust from the legs of my flight suit.
"Even Spock knows better than to design a com-
pletely impenetrable system, Scanner. You know he
could get into it if he had to."  "He can. We ain't him!"
  "I don't care. There's a way. I'm going to find it."
    I stepped past him. My own momentum swung me
around when Scanner clasped my arm and pulled me

56

back to face him. I hadn't realized until then the extent
of the frustration he felt. Nor, I think, had he realized
the extent of my determination. We squared off, sepa-
rated only by a circuit-drenched expanse of bridge
space.
    "Look," he said hoarsely, "I know you got Lieuten-
ant Commander slashes on your sleeve. I know you're
the youngest hoo-hah ever to get the Medal of Valor,
and if you pulled my socks off and tickled my feet I'd
have to admit you deserved it. But one big bang don't
add up to eight or ten years of experience and if you
scratch the surface you're gonna find out you're just
like me and Sarda and everybody else, just fresh outa
the plum tree, and we need help to do this! You can't
just 1olly in here and pop off orders to break program-
ming by somebody like Spock, you just can't! You
can't!"
    His words grated on my bones. The truth of them,
the spark within them, lit the burning need to establish
myself beyond the boundaries that had been set for
me, the cavernous desire to be worthy of Kirk's
expectations, even beyond my own. And even beyond
the deep humiliation of being told off by someone who
was supposed to be under my command, there rose a
special indignation. Closer and closer it came to the
surface, until finally, in a rumbling, chilling tone of its
own, it broke free.
    "You hear me, mister." I narrowed the distance
between myself and Scanner, hardly recognizing my
own voice. "You can report status to me. You can tell
me what's happening, and what might happen, and
what happened in the past. You can tell me I'm suck-
ing antimatter. You can tell me anything you want to
tell me. But don't ever tell me what I can't... do."
    The words sizzled in the air between us. They had
been hardly more than a whisper, the hissing voice of
some command demon that had been dormant within
me.

57

     Scanner stared at me. Evidently he expected my
 reaction even less than I did. I'd never seriously
 exercised those commander slashes before.
     He blinked slowly, and his eyes went down. For the
 first time both he and I understood the separation we
 must work within, and I genuinely felt--for the first
 time in my life----the intense desolation of command.
     Rather than waiting for the situation to thicken, I
 turned and walked off the bridge. Merete was waiting
 in the narrow corridor as I stepped through. Our eyes
 met. Her tolerant expression manifested itself in a
 gentle tone of voice. "He's right, you know."
     And the demon flushed back into power. My chin
 snapped upward. Wrong time, wrong mood.
     "I'm in charge, Doctor," I snapped. "I'll tell you
 when he's right."
    The desolation followed me as I made my way deep
into the ship, trying to find a moment of peace in the
midst of my obsession. I didn't like the sounds that
had come out of me. I wondered if Captain Kirk had
ever found himself in a situation like this, standing
alone against the people he was trying to protect.
What was it like for him? He had close friends too--
Spook, McCoy, Scott--how did he manage to com-
mand them, order them around when he had to?
Where did he draw the line? Where was the distinction
between _fi??nd and commanding officer? Perhaps
    ere wasn t any distinction at all. Perhaps the friend-
ship had to be sacrificed altogether. Did I dare believe
that? It seemed the easiest way right now, for me, ira
lonely way.
    The engineering circuit-boards to the steering mech-
amsms on the transport were spread around me as I
lay on my side before an open access-chamber, drown-
ing my insecurities in snapping voltage, when I be-
came aware of a second presence. I didn't feel guilty,
so it couldn't have been Scanner. I didn't feel any
waves of sympathy, so it wasn't Merete either.

58

 "Feel better now?" the tolerant voice began.
 "I'm not sure," I admitted.
    There was a shuffle beside me, and Dr. McCoy
slipped into view as he sat down near me. I continued
working. The beleaguered circuits crackled their fa-
tigue.
    "Are you going to tell me I'm behaving irratio-
nally?" I asked him.
     He shrugged, one brow raising into an arch. "Irra-
tionally? Not yet. Obsessively... maybe." "And obsession isn't irrational, sir?"
    "Depends on who's displaying the tendency," he
said casually. "Question is, do you think you're acting
irrationally."
    It might have been in question form, but something
about it wasn't a question at all. I paused in my circuit
junctioning and looked at him. "Defiance is a perfectly
rational process," I said, hoping it sounded reason-
able.
    Now both brows went up. "New one on me," he
muttered. Then he looked directly at me and asked,
"Are you sure, really sure, that you want to break the
captain's programming?"
    I settled back to work, rather as a buffet around my
answer. "Yes, I do."
    "We'll be at Argelius in twenty-eight hours," he
pointed out. "Maybe your answer will be there."
    "And maybe it won't." I tried not to sound flippant.
"Sir, you know Captain Kirk. You know he'd never
allow this to happen to him. I can't help but think he
expects the same from me."
    He tipped his head calmly. "You'll tear yourself
apart if you keep comparing yourself to him."
    My hands, now scored with a dozen tiny electrical
burns, felt hot and clammy inside the access chamber.
I pulled them out, knowing I was fooling myself about
gaining entry into the system by any mechanical route.
I scooted out and leaned up against the bulkhead.

59

  "I'm comparing myseff to me," I told him.
    McCoy pursed his lips and said nothing more about
it, though I could see and sense him thinking deeply,
possibly analyzing my mental state with his years of
experience with deep-space psychology. Actually, I'd
have relished the chance to talk to him, to sift out my
conflicting feelings, perhaps even to ask his advice,
but there wasn't time.
    "Sir, you know Commander Spock. How would he
program a system ff he wanted it to be impermeable by
anyone but himself?"
    McCoy spread his hands out. "You're asking me? I
don't even know how he makes the computer play
chess with him. He'd do it logically, of course... one
by one eliminating every possible flaw. He'd probably
get the computer to help him set up the system in the
first place. Double indemnity."
    "But there's a way into any system," I persisted.
"It's just a matter of--" I scouted for a better word,
but there wasn't one. "Odds," I said.
    He puzzled for a moment, then held up a finger.
"Oh. You mean like ff you fire an infinite number of
shots at an infinite number of monkeys..."
    "You'll eventually kill Shakespeare." A grin broke
my frown and some of the tension flowed away.
    "But you're overtaxing ~our resources, Piper," the
doctor suggested. "There isn't the technical knowl-
edge on board this ship to outguess a computer expert
of Spock's level. From what I can see, you've already
tried every possible way of getting into that system.
You've exhausted your options."
    As we sat on the floor, leaning up against opposite
bulkheads, Dr. McCoy's untechnical presence and his
obvious emotional empathy for my situation gave me a
portal to slip through. In that quiet, sequestered place
I found a clarity of purpose that had eluded me, no
matter how directed my goals seemed, and a simplicity
that just might be my salvation.

6O

"All the options," I murmured on a sigh. A sigh of
surrender, perhaps.
    He too had been lost in thought, and now looked up.
"What? Oh. Yes. At least, looks that way to me."
    I stared into the access chamber. The circuits snick-
ered back at me.
    Scanner appeared, or shall I say peeked, through the
narrow doorway, his fatigue-drawn face wearing its
most puppyish expression. "Permission to come aft?"
    I peered at him for a moment, then felt myself relax.
"Granted."
    He crouched near Dr. McCoy in the cramped area
and sighed, hanging his head and not looking at me
until he absolutely had to. "I thought about trying to
cross-connect the spiral circuits into the computer
bank, but I thought I'd better get your okay before I
blow up the ship."
    I dropped my gaze for a moment of private amuse-
ment, realizing the lengths I'd pushed poor Scanner to
in his attempt to satisfy me. He seemed completely
serious. He was that desperate. A faint shudder passed
through me. Cross-fed spiral circuits. Br,:,,.
    "Sit down, Scanner," I said. "Take a break. Believe
it or not, I'm not out to wear you down."
    He slumped onto his haunches against the bulkhead
and waved a weary hand. "Nah, s'okay. I'm just the
comedy relief."
    McCoy shifted his legs on the cool metal floor and
said, "I think we should all get some rest." Then he
paused and regarded me soberly. "Assuming we've
admitted we're going to Argelius."
    My next words tasted bad coming up, but I let my
pride slide away long enough to say them, for the
sakes of the people I was responsible for. It wasn't
desperation that was driving me, after all; I didn't have
the excuse of trying to save lives or the success of my
mission. It was, as Scanner had muttered at me a day
ago, "plain cussed mulishness." Lacking any honor-

61

able excuse for my behavior, somewhat deflated by
Dr. McCoy's accuracies about trying to imitate Kirk, I
sank into remission and said, "We've done our best.
Even Kirk couldn't ask more of us. We've tried every
normal way of breaking the programming."
    Scanner rubbed his eyes. "Everything but voodoo
conjurin'."
    My neck ached as I wearily nodded. I stared with
unfocused eyes past my arms as they ,ested on my
knees, past the circuit cleaver still hanging from my
fingers. Aware of everything, I saw nothing. Voodoo,
he'd said.
    "Every normal way," I mumbled. I continued to
stare.
    Vague movements in my field of vision, McCoy and
Scanner shared a glance, then looked at me again.
    "Uh-oh," Scanner moaned. "Lookit that. I'm
scared of that smile."
    Maybe I was smiling. I wasn't sure. My fatigue-
stiflened cheeks did feel tighter, but I wasn't paying
attention. Inside my head a tiny schooner suddenly
came hard about in the face of its enemy and slashed a
new course across lmpossible's bow. My fingers be-
gan to tingle.
  "We've been going about this all wrong," I said.
    Scanher's head drooped between his knees. "I knew
it, I knew she was gonna say that... I knew it..."
    "Come on!" I got up and led the way back to the
bridge, hardly aware of my own movements and the
aches of strain and fatigue. They followed me, proba-
bly as much out of curiosity as to follow my order, and
even Merete, who could sleep through a supernova,
was awakened by the electric anticipation in the air.
She came out of her cubicle and followed, groggy but
aware that something was happening. We emerged
onto the bridge amid the scattered mechanical debris
of Scanner's second attempt to reroute the computer

62

 program through the main guidance system. I settled
 into the command chair.
  "We've been sailing the wrong tack," I said.
    Scanner shook his head, and his bangs fell over tired
eyes. "What's a tack?"
    McCoy and Merete crowded near us as I continued.
"Instead of thinking about the programming, we
should have been thinking about who programmed it."
    Scanner grimaced in perplexity. "Spock pro-
grammed it."
    "Of course. A perfectly rational program, impos-
sible to break by rational means."
  "What are you getting at?" McCoy asked.
  "I'm going to force the machine to be irrational."
    "You can't do that," Scanner argued. "This is a
computer. You can't fool a computer."
    "It's a machine, Scanner. Machines are idiots.
They're marvelous tools, but they're stupid. You
know why they don't put legs on computers? Because
they'd walk off a cliff if you told them to."
    Drained and now confused, Scanner dropped into
the nearest seat and slumped. "Okay," he resigned,
"but the only one who knows what's going on inside
that machine is the machine itself."
    "My thoughts exactly." I settled into the command
chair and punched into the computer link. "Computer,
identify my voice pattern."
    "Working. Lieutenant Commander Piper, Star Fleet
identificationre"
  "Now identify the commander of this vessel."
    The instruments quietly hummed. "Lieutenant
Commander Piper, command status authorized Star
Date 3374.4."
    "Verify my personal authority to engage Class A-1
priority command under master's voice pattern."
    The humming took a little longer this time. "Veri-
fied."

63

     "Good," I murmured. "Computer, establish Cla~s
 A-1 priority command as specified."
  "Working. Priority established. Please go ahead."
      "Question: is there a way to countermand current
 navigational program?"  "Negative."
     No surprises there. I pressed on. "Is there a way to
 bypass current programming and engage a new pro-
 gram in its place?"
    "One moment, please." Click, buzz, whirr. "Af-
firmative."
  "How?"
     "Under Star Fleet Regulations for Emergency
 Command, Section Z-12, subparagraph B, current
 authorized command must declare critical emergency
 computer activation."
    "Ah. Computer, this is Lieutenant Commander
Piper. As commander of this vessel, I now declare
ú critical emergency computer activation according to
 specified Star Fleet regulation."  "Acknowledged."
     "Compute method for overriding current navigation
 programming and engaging a new program in its
 place," I said nervously, taking great care with my
 words. "Specify how to free helm to manual control."
     "Immediate answer is not available. Will advise
 upon completion of circuit analysis." With that, the
 computer board settled into a happy whirr.
  Scanner's lips fell open. "I'11 be danged!"

    It took the computer only four minutes to figure out
a way around its own programming. Before any of us
dared break the expectant silence, the pleasant female
voice returned, rife with directions which Scanner and
I carefully followed.
    "Reroute navigational circuitry through CKC-
Bank, sections 72R through 197X, via Dexter-Nelson
noncontiguous file cluster. Arrange file allocation
64

along following index pattern." A long list of number
bunches appeared on the readout screen. Scanner
wordlessly, even numbly, fed them into the appropri-
ate systems, one by one. It was clear by the way he did
it, slowly and with nervous care, that he didn't really
understand what he was doing.
    "What's happening?" Merete asked quietly, as
though she might disturb the computer's concentration
if she spoke too loudly.
    "It's telling us how to get helm control," I said
simply.
    McCoy shifted forward eagerly, with a strange en-
thusiasm that I didn't quite know how to interpret.
"You're actually breaking Spock's programming?"
    "No, not breaking it," I answered. "It can't be
broken or stopped. He knew that's what we'd try to
do, if we tried anything." "Then what--?"
 "It can't be stopped. But it can be replaced."
    He gave me an amusing frown. "Sounds like rheto-
ric to me."
    "Ah, yes, but Rex has never been taught the art of
rhetoric. It can't tell the difference, so it just does what
it's told. The computer has no reason not to help us
override the programming, so that's what it's doing.
Didn't I tell you? Stupid!" My delight actually
squeezed a giggle out of me, but I was too pleased to
be embarrassed.
    "That's it." Scanner sat back. Fine beads of sweat
glistened on his upper lip. "Now we wait."
    We settled down. The computer console did every-
thing but spit bubbles. Lights glowed, then flickered,
then changed intensity. Numbers on the readout
screens flashed by faster than human eyes could as-
similate them, backgrounded by jangles, grinds, and
general electronic braying.
    Soft lights played across our faces. Faces of human-
ity itself, reestablishing the true wonder of our own

65

power. Think of a machine... design a machine...
build a machine... be carried into the farthest reaches
of space by a machine... yet still rule over it. Still
outthink it. Quite a partnership, quite a symbiosis. Our
lives were in the hands of the machine, and its in ours.
    The patterns of lights grew pale. The clicking fell
away, leaving only a whirr and hum. The whirr
stopped. The hum faded. The readout screen went
blank.
    Then, three simple words, flashing calmly, outlined
in red:

HELM IS MANUAL

    The computer's firm voice echoed the words, once,
in simple punctuation, then fell silent.
    My eyes drifted closed. My head drooped on 'aching
shoulders.
    Behind me, Dr. McCoy and Merete shifted, sharing
looks of disbelief that confirmed our success.
    Even Scanner, in his silence, radiated bone-deep
amazement. One hand reached for the readout screen
and tenderly touched it, in a silly human gesture. After
a moment, his face, bathed in the gently flashing light,
turned to me. "Well... you got control, Commander.
I never woulda bet on it." He clapped his knees to
renew the moment. "So, it's all yours. Where do you
want us to go?"
    I forced my eyes to focus and stood up slowly,
gazing out over the beautiful elegance of space as we
cruised along at warp three.
  "To Argelius," I said. "But on my order."

66

Chapter Five

"Didn't think I had it in me, did you?"
              --The Changeling

I THINK SCANNER was plotting to have me assassi-
nated. Merete was contemplating my mental condi-
tion, and Dr. McCoy was shaking his head a lot. So,
after another smooth escape disguised as a dramatic
exit, I spent much of the next day's travel tucked
safely in my quarters, gazing into the computer access
screen.
    I'd been in there alone for three hours before any-
body missed me during the next day-cycle. No sur-
prise it was Merete who finally opted to peek in.
  "Disturbing?" she asked.
    My eyes flipped up from the computer screen--my
only movement.. My preoccupation held for a long
moment as I gazed at her, then I moved my hand from
its parking place against my lips and said, "No. Come
on in."
    She invited herself into the chair beside the bunk
and looked at the screen. "Tech manuals?"
    "Look at this," I said flatly, punching the controls
on the side of the access screen. The screen went
blank for a moment, then flickered with new data.
"I've been through this a dozen times already and I
st~~l can't fathom it."
 "What is it?"

67

  "Vulcan training."
      She inhaled, held it, and sighed. "Oh. Sarda's still
on your mind. Any particular aspect this time?"
  "Sarda's clan."
    Her delicate eyes narrowed. "Sarda's clan specifi-
cally? How did you ever find data that obscure?"
    I made a guttural sound to double the impact of her
question. "Obscure is right. The Vulcans are noto-
riously secretive. However, Doctor dear, the Federa-
tion's liaison committee to the Confederation of 40
Eridani isn't without its muscle. They convinced the
Vulcans to loosen their grip on cultural secrets at least
enough that off-worlders could understand enough
about them to respect them at a little less distance. I'll
bet that day saw logic fly."
    "Even so," Merete countered as she sat at the end
of my bunk, "Sarda's clan isn't exactly the visible elite
of ShiKahr City, like Mr. Spock's. Isn't Sarda from
somewhere below the Vulcan equatorial zone?"
    "He wouldn't tell me. I've been hunting through the
library systems for weeks. Before 1 put out to sea on
the Keeler, I left a search worm in the mainframe
library computer at Starbase One. It's been picking
through its indices, looking for information on Sarda
and his tribe, or whatever they call themselves. All 1
had to do was key into that system from here to get the
results of the search."
      "So Mr. Spock's new computer for this ship is
coming in handy."  "Sure is."
  "What have you found?"
  "I found," came the answer, "the Lyr Zor."
My revelation was lost on her. "Clan or region?"
Self-consciously, I clarified. "Clan. The region is
called Lyr T'aya, as closely as the computer can put it
into English alphabet. It's way south, in the Vuldi
Gorge. The nearest city is Jia'anKahr. Does that mean
anything to you?"

68

    She nodded, eyes widening. "It means remote. I
knew Sarda wasn't from the city clans who usually
gravitate to Star Fleet, but I had no idea..."
    I leaned forward. "Can you imagine the pressure it
would take to force a Vulcan from a clan that remote to
venture away from the planet? Do you realize how
alone he must have been? And he knew he'd stand out
at Star Fleet too. We don't exactly see fair-haired
Vulcans every day."
    "And all this is teaching you something," Merete
prodded gently, probably thinking my state of mind
was as delicate as Sarda's.
    I took a deep breath. "I've found that Vulcan clans
pretty much keep the teaching of their respective
children as a private matter. Only when a Vulcan child
reaches what they call Norn-La-Hal do they take on
the blanket training of all Vulcans. So there's a plane-
tary unity, but only after a certain point, if you get
what I mean."
    "I do," she assured me. "And you're angry at the
Lyr Zor for their particular method."
    This earned her a good long stare. How did she
know? Was it etched so clearly in my expression? A
passing flush of denial swept over me, a self-defense
mode of pretending to keep an open mind--oh, what
the hell. She saw through it anyway.
    I waved her closer to the computer screen. "Well,
look at that. Just look."
    Together we read the rare data from Vuldi Gorge,
the air around us heavy with implication.

TRAINING FILE UI-77. LYR ZOR CLAN, LYR T'AYA REGION,
VULDI GORGE CRESCENT, VULCAN. CONTACT: SUNVAR,
MAGISTRATE OF INTERPLANETARY RELATIONS, JIA'ANKAHR,
VULCAN.

NEWBORN-4 YEARS. VISUAL MATHEMATICS, BASIC CALCU-
LATION, BEGIN NEUROLOGICAL ORGANIZING. LYR ZOR
IDENTITY MELD.

69

 FOUR YEARS. MATHEMATICS AND SPECIES IDENTIFICATION,
 PHYSICAL COORDINATION, ALGEBRA, GEOMETRY, PHYS-
 ICS.

 EIGHT YEARS. PRELIMINARY TELEPATHIC COMMUNICATION
 AND ETIQUETTE. LYR ZOR CLAN HISTORY. VULCAN AN-
 THROPOLOGY. CALCULUS. QUANTUM PHYSICS.

 TEN YEARS. SUPPRESSION OF CORTICAL STIMULAE IN
 DOMINANT HEMISPHERE. VULCAN CULTURAL HISTORY.
 STUDY OF VULCAN RITES OF PASSAGE.

 ELEVEN YEARS. PRESSURE POINTS OF MIND MELDING.
 MEMORY ACCURACY. INTERNAL-TIME COUNTING. INTRO-
 DUCTION TO LOGIC AND DEFINITION. PRINCIPLES OF
  ANALYSIS. CONCRETEHESS OF THOUGHT. PHYSICAL                 DE-
  PORTMENT.

  THIRTEEN-FIFTEEN. FORMAL TRAINING BEGINS.

    "Have you ever seen anything like that?" I blus-
tered, deep in useless empathy. "That's what a Lyr
Zor child goes through."
    "Have you got that in VulCan years or Earth Stan-
dards?"
    "Earth Standards. But, my God, Merete, look at the
pressure. Think about the incredible mental discipline
involved. Not only that," I said, turning to her, "but
notice how much of it involves social approval. Look
ú.. cultural history, physical deportment, no less...
and that's supposedly before formal training. It's prac-
tically child abuse."
    Merete leaned back in her chair, her medical train-
ing showing as she gave me both the benefit of the
doubt and a moment to cool off. "You're right," she
said patronizingly. "But don't forget they're born to it.
Chances are a Vulcan child would be mentally unbal-
anced if those tremendous brains of theirs weren't
given something to grasp, even early on."
  I held out my hand to argue, then shook it and said,

70

"All right. Just keep watching and see what you think.
Computer, continue rundown of Lyr Zor training."
    The screen unit buzzed, then moved ahead with
colored letters on the screen.

FORMAL TRAINING. TAL T'LEE. FIRST MEDITATION ASSISTED
BY AN ADEPT OF LYR ZOR COUNCIL. CONTROL OF SUB-
DOMINANT CORTICES. DWEMISH HI-AN. IDENTITY ISOLA-
TION. BRAIN CONTROL WITH NUMBERS SYSTEMS AND
EQUATIONS. MULTIPLICATION LEFT TO RIGHT. ENOK-KAL FI
LAR. PROCESSES OF DEFINITION. CONCEPTS OF GIVENS.

SIXTEEN-NINETEEN. AN-PRELE. PAIN CONTROL MEDITA-
TION WITH COUNCIL ADEPT. READINGS INCLUDE ESSAYS
OF DISCIPLINE BY SURAK AND ANALYSIS OF PSEUDODOXY
BY T'VEEN OF JlA'ANKAHR. LOBE SEGREGATION OF BRAIN.

    "Piper," Merete interrupted patiently, "why are
you doing this to yourself?. Your becoming an expert
on Vulcan training won't help Sarda."
    "Won't it?" I countered. "As I understand it, Sarda
should have already gone through the stage called
Venlinahr. That's the stage a Vulcan should have fin-
ished by Sarda's age in Earth years. It's the stage of
most Vulcan adults, and it's two stages ahead of--
well, let me show you. Look. Here's the part about the
Katra. Now just watch."
    With reluctant tension, Merete looked into the
screen. Its faint blue lights played across her skin.

TWENTY-TWENTY-FOUR. THE RUNES OF T'VISH, LOGIC
PARADIGMS. BEHAVIORAL MODIFICATION. MULTiPLICA-
TION RIGHT TO LEFT, DIAGONAL, AND CROSS-MULTIPLI-
CATION. ISOLATION OF THE KATRA.

TWENTY-FIVE-TWENTY-NINE. SELE-AN-T'LEE: COMPRISED
OF LESSONS IN SUBDOMINANT BRAIN ORGANIZATION,
ADVANCED PHILOSOPHY AND LOGIC, MUSCLE COORDI-
NATION, AND CONTROL OF WILL. FIVE STEPS. BELIEF DISCI-

71

PLINE, REALITY AWARENESS, SENSORY ACUTENESS, VISUAL
CALCULATION, FACT ANALYSIS. READINGS INCLUDE LOGIC
AND DEFINITION BY LYRAS, THE INTERIOR BY TAL LUXUR
OF ROMULUS, EQUATIONS BY SCORUS, SYSTEMS OF LOGIC
BY SURAK, PURPOSE AS PRIME MOTIVATOR BY SURAK.
ALSO INCLUDES ADVANCED MIND MELD TECHNIQUES.

    "Now, that's where Sarda was when he was trying
to teach himself the Vulcan controls," I told her.
"Sele-an-t'lee, he told me. Can you imagine trying to
do all that by himself? It was probably tearing him
apart. How was he supposed to learn the techniques
for advanced mind melding if there was no one to meld
with? And he was still two stages behind. No, don't
talk. Read."

THIRTY-THIRTY-FIVE. NORN-LA-HAL. SUPERIOR CONTROL
MEDITATION AND NEUROLOGICAL ORGANIZING. IMPOR-
TANCE OF DIGNITY AND TRADITION IN VULCAN IDENTITY.
CONTEMPLATIONS OF INFINITY. VENLINAHR. STATE OF
MOST VULCAN ADULTS. MEDITATION BY INDIVIDUAL DIS-
CRETION. FURTHER STUDY OF VULCAN DHARMA. AD-
VANCED READINGS OF THE MYSTAGOGUES SURAK,
SCORUS, T'ENNE, T'VISH, PRISU, AND SELTAR.

    "See?" I said, tapping the place on the screen with
one cracked fingernail. "That's when they can relax.
Venlinahr. That's when they're true Vulcans by their
own standards. Sarda should have reached that by
now. Then there's the next one, the real killer."
    "I see it." Merete's voice was funereal. Just as the
words on the screen were.

KOLINAHR. FINAL DIVORCE OF THE BRAIN, BODY, AND
KATRA FROM ALL EMOTIONAL RESPONSES. IF NECESSARY,
KOLINAHR WILL BE ACCOMPLISHED BY MEMORY ABERRA-
TION.

LIST COMPLETE.

72

 I leaned back. "Computer off."
    The screen went blank. The blue glow was gone,
fallen off Merete's delicate features like shimmering
leaves from a scale tree on Proxima. The fleeting
thought of home gave me no comfort today.
    Neither of us cared to rupture the dangerous silence
we'd fallen into. Only Merete's calm courage allowed
her to finally bridge the deepening gap. "Rigorous,"
she commented, curbing her tone of empathy.
    "Killing," I corrected. "There's no excuse for that.
And even worse, what's the excuse for denying that
training to someone who was born to need it? Why
would they do that to him? A half-trained Vulcan could
go mad just trying to fill in the gaps."
    She looked at me, and I could see her mind working
as she tried to slowly reassess the information that had
flashed by us in truncated form. Years and years of
relentless mind training encapsulized on a computer
screen, yet every bit as burdensome as those big
words and wide concepts implied. Merete tipped her
head, feathery brows lowering. "Is that what you
think might have happened to Sarda?"
 Silence this time was a noisy answer.
    "Piper, you saved him from it," she said. "You set
him up with Mr. Spock, and Spock arranged for a
Vulcan teacher for him. It's only a matter of time
BOW."
    "No, not now," I snapped. "Now is the whole
issue. Now, he's in some kind of trouble, and it
doesn't make sense. Espionage? That's not Sarda. Not
a healthy Sarda, anyway. Maybe . . ." I paused,
hunting for the hurt, "maybe I was too late. Maybe,
when he went back into training with another Vulcan,
it was too much. Maybe he snapped."
    Instantly Merete got up and stepped out into the
skinny corridor to the food dispenser and came back
with two cups of steaming coffee, sweet, with cream.
She pressed my fingers around one of the cups, then

73

sat down very slowly, taking every last possible sec-
ond to let time slide between me and my paranoia.
"Piper, listen to me," she said. "You could be right."
 I looked up. "What?"
    "You could be right." Her tone was tolerant, not
patronizing. "But don't rule out another possibility.
There are still many things about this that we simply
don't know yet. And one run through the computer
library about Vulcan training doesn't make either of us
experts on Vulcans. We're not Vulcans. It may be as
normal for them as learning to fly a skimmer is to us."
    "Then why was it tearing him apart?" My palm
connected with the bulkhead. In my other hand, the
coffee sloshed. "What's he doing in the middle of this,
Marete? Did he snap?"
    She shrugged one shoulder and sipped her coffee.
She swallowed deliberately, stalling for more time.
Her rotten tactic was working too. I was starting to
realize the truth in her words, and the damning fact
that I would just have to wait.
    "What do you think?" Merete asked after several
long moments. "What do you really believe?"
    More moments. They were beginning to sap me dry.
Kill me, but don't make me wait anymore.
    "I don't know," I murmured, staring. Coffee steam
wreathed my face.
    I was rescued from myself by the intercom whistle,
and Scanner's voice coming on before I could re-
spond.
    "Piper, we've got a ship on scope. Approaching
rapidly, no identification, no signals, won't answer a
hail, and the design is unfamiliar. You want me to slow
down?"
    I dived for the intercom button and mashed it. "No!
Don't touch anything. Does Rex have shields?"
    "Kinda. Enough to put off maybe one phaser shot.
We just didn't figure--"

74

    "Put them up. Don't alter course or speed. I'll be
right there !"

    Whoever it was, they had a fast ship. In the few
seconds it took Merete and me to skim through the
Rex's walkways, the triangular gold and red shuttle
had pulled alongside and was matching our speed.
 "Anything?" I asked.
    Dr. McCoy, who had been lounging in the captain's
chair, wheeled out of it and out of my way in the same
movement. "Not a peep. Yet."
 "No classification on that design, Scanner?"
    He looked nervous. "Nope." The communications
receiver hung in his ear as he stared, shoulders
hunched, out the portal at the large shuttle. "Beats me
what it is."
    "What they are," I corrected. Anticipation hung on
me like sweat. No... that really was sweat. Sticky. A
captain shouldn't be sticky. Damn. "Ship to ship."
 "Channel open. Fire away."
    I cleared my throat. "This is the S.S. Banana Re-
public requesting your identification and purpose.
Translator is tied in. Please respond."
    The board crackled on my echo. The massive gold
wing dwarfed our main viewing portal, making us all
strain upward to see it. It was imposing, and we felt
adequately imposed upon.
 Scanner stiffened. "Something .yeah. . .
static..."
    "Pull it in." I knew he was trying, but I still had to
say it.
    Merete and Dr. McCoy huddled together near the
port viewing slots, peering out at the unidentified
vessel, their silence an ominous reminder of the un-
avoidable dangers humankind had given to ourselves
when we first ventured out into space. We could live in
space, we could keep ourselves alive with the most

75

basic of methods, but we could never be completely
safe.
    Scanner listened, lightly touching the audio receiver
in his ear. "They're requesting visual contact."
    I thought about it for a moment, then shrugged.
"Visual on."
    The screen flickered, an ominous instant of seeing
the screen superimposed against the unidentified ship
that hung half-visible beside our bridge portal. Then it
settled down to a somber, elegant face, familiar in its
saturnine reserve.
    "Spock!" McCoy blurted. Yet I could tell he wasn't
altogether surprised.
    While Kirk's face was built on curves and McCoy's
on squares, Spock's features were a montage of trian-
gularities framed by trim black hair and those orna-
mental Vulcan ears. The flush of comfort I felt at the
sight of him was banked by fresh thoughts of Sarda.
    "Permission to come aboard, Commander," he re-
quested.
  "By all means, come aboard," I said.
      "Thank you. I shall arrange hookup and be there
momentarily. Spock out." The screen went blank.
    Merete reached over for a generous squeeze on my
forearm. "Time for answers," she said quietly.
    Scanner grunted. "Good, 'cuz we sure got the ques-
tions."
    We waited with false patience as Spock organized
his shuttle to dock with Banana Republic. His ship
moved out of our main view, now visible only through
the ribbed portals on the side of the ship. Rex moaned
and bumped hollowly as the ships joined and the
breezeway was sealed off and pressurized. By the time
the starboard loading-dock door slid open, we were
already there, waiting.
 The doors parted. Commander Spock stepped in.
 We gaped at him. He no longer wore his usual Star

               76

Fleet colors. This was an altogether different Spock. A
dun-colored cowl framed his jawline, his shoulders
broadened by a burgundy thigh-length cape. His lean
form was even further elongated by dark azure vel-
vet--a belted tunic. Those, simple leggings, and calf-
wrap boots made him look like a planet-traipsing ven-
dor or someone out of a medieval story, depending on
who was doing the imagining. Only his fluid dignity
reminded us that he was who he was. That and the fact
that he carried a handful of computer cartridges--
cookies to feed Rex's new main frame library.
  "Sir," I began, "you're..."
 "Out of uniform," McCoy supplied boldly.
    Spock looked at him with an almost quizzical twin-
kle in his eyes. "Astute reckoning, Dr. McCoy," he
drawled. He strode onto my bridge, the cape swinging.
"A gift from the Organians some time ago."
    "Thought that getup looked familiar," McCoy re-
plied.
    "It proved convenient," Spock said. He obviously
didn't care for his current apparel in lieu of Star Fleet
issue. "Once on Argelius, we must not divulge our
military attachments. Our mission there requires that
we travel incognito."
    McCoy frowned. "You mean I'm going to have to
dress like that?"
    Spock had been scanning the bridge controls as
though to refamiliarize himself with them, but now he
straightened and natled the doctor with his gaze again.
"Doctor, I am actually anticipating the spectacle."
    I felt my eyes widen, and ridiculously squinted in an
attempt to curb it. McCoy folded his arms and cocked
his head, but said nothing more about Spock's unlikely
raiment.
    Spock deposited his computer spools on Rex's main
navigational board and turned to me, markedly casual
in spite of the circumstances. His presence, entirely
unforeseen as it was, had a pronounced effect on mo--
               77

 a rush of apprehension, curiosity, the sense of teeter-
 ing on some tightly stretched wire just about to fall into
 a pile of very spiny answers. I might know soon what
 was going on, but I was ready to bet I'd come out with
 bruises.
  "Sir," I began, "can you tell me what's going on?"
     He frustrated me and entertained McCoy with a
 thoroughly Vulcan response: "Yes."
     My palms started to get moist. I rubbed them
 against the ivory fabric of my flight suit and licked my
 lips. McCoy surveyed me, rolled his eyes, and mur-
 mured, "You'll get used to it."
    "Thank you, Doctor," Spock said tersely. "I shall
explain fully once I've released the navigational pro-
gramming to Commander Piper's control. It will be
necessary to have manual control to maneuver into
orbit."
  Scanner coughed and hid behind Merete.
    I didn't have anybody to hide behind. Although I do
confess to a quick glance around the bridge for any
handy camouflage.
    McCoy came once again to life, approaching Spock
with a noticeable swagger. "Don't bother, Mr.
Spock."
    Spock rewarded him with a perplexed gaze and
waited patiently for the explanation McCoy was bub-
bling to give. I think my feet were sweating by then,
too, but they were too numb to tell.
    "The controls are all freed up," McCoy said. A grin
tugged at his lips.
  Spock's brows lowered. "I... beg your pardon?"
  "Free. Unlocked. Piper did it."
    Any previous beliefs that a Vulcan couldn't be
stricken speechless were quickly flushed. Spock held
his gaze on McCoy for a moment of incredulity, then
turned to the controls, spidering one square-fingered
hand over them, and ran headlong into one of the
snags of being Vulcan. Surprise flared, tempted him,

               78

pushed up one Panish eyebrow, then fied. "Remark-
able," he uttered. When he turned to face me, he was
in control again.
    However, that didn't stop his expression from freez-
ing my blood.
    "I'm impressed, Commander, though mystified," he
admitted. "How did you manage it?"
    "She outhumaned you, Spock," McCoy crowed,
delighted.
    Spock appeared annoyed--and I use the word ten-
derly. He looked one more time at the navigation
board, as one looks at a pet who suddenly turned wild.
After a steadying moment, he breathed deeply and
said, "Obviously there was some element I failed to
consider. I shall anticipate your giving me a full
description, Commander, once our mission is com-
pleted."
    Whew! Lifted off the hook by the Vulcan sense of
priority. I started to feel my feet again. "Yes, sir.
Won't you sit down?"
    It was clearly an invitation to do more than relax.
Spock knew that, and swiveled his chair to face us all.
I settled into the helm chair beside him, while the three
others took passenger seats, and we became---pardon
the punwall ears.
    "Captain Kirk was apprised of the current situation
by Dr. Boma," Spock said, typically direct, "who,
you'll recall, was involved in the science behind the
dreadnought project."
    "Believe me," I said with guttural inflection, "I
remember."
    "Doubtless." Spock nodded, and not without empa-
thy. He spoke to me with an easy clemency he could
only have learned from humans, and only have
learned to express without Vulcan shame after years of
hard experiences among humans. As he spoke, I was
the one to be impressed. "Those involved with the
dreadnought project were a select few," he went on.

"The late Vice Admiral Rittenhouse used only people
he trusted or people whose expertise he could not do
without. He tried to keep his choices to a minimum."
  "And the minimum included Sarda?" I guessed.
  "Yes," his voice rumbled, giving away his inner-
  most regrets. "Lieutenant Sarda's innovative skill
  with weapons technology made him indispensable to a
  man who was trying to trigger a galactic conflict.
  Rittenhouse wanted Sarda's image projector. Along
  with Sarda, there were three others in the dread-
  nought's special science team who were not killed
  aboard Rittenhouse's ship when it exploded." He
  slipped one of the library cookies into the slot and
  touched the controls lightly. A picture blinked
  onscreen, a dignified black man with a iongish face and
  cutting eyes, his age shown only by a frost of silver at
  his temples. "Dr. Samuel Boma, of course, who devel-
  oped the dreadnought's actual hull material and struc-
  tural design. Charges of conspiracy against him have
  been greatly reduced due to his cooperation with Star
  Fleet of late." Spock tapped the controls again and the
  face changed. A woman this time, human, midfifties.
  Her hair was pitch-black, short but shaggy, framing a
  translucent complexion and small blue eyes. She
  looked like she could be many things, none of them
  scientific.
    "Professor Ursula Mornay of the University of Tar-
rigor, Altair Six," Spock introduced. "She perfected
the theory for transwarp, and is one of the top theo-
rists in the Federation. Professor Mornay is known for
her unscrupulous behavior. We believe she is the key
agent. The determinant."  "Of what sir?"
    He swiveled his chair to face me again, shifting our
attention from the viewscreen to his words. Every-
thing he did, every movement, smacked of poignance
for us who had been waiting. "The transwarp technol-
ogy has been stolen."

80

    He said it so simply that its full implication didn't hit
any of us at first. Seeing that, he went on. "Mornay
contacted Boma with an ultimatum. She said she and
the 'others' were appropriating all information about
transwarp and evacuating their lab."
  McCoy leaned forward. "But why?"
    Spock had anticipated the simple question and was
right there with an answer. "Mornay is a subversive.
She has never displayed loyalty to any system or
person, and has accepted funding from dubious
sources, intent only on her own personal advance-
ment. She is known for her contempt of governmental
systems."
  "The Federation government?" McCoy asked.
    "Any government, Doctor. She is not particu-
lar."
    "Then why was she working on a top project like
this?"
  "Because, Doctor, she developed the theories."
  "And nobody watched her more closely?"
    With a Vulcan version of a sigh, Spock carefully
outlined the reason. "Until now, she has done nothing
overtly threatening. Therefore, she has enjoyed safe
haven as a Federation citizen and scientist. She was,
however, openly committed to Rittenhouse and his
plan to aggregate the galaxy into one ideology. She
fears for her life and status now that Rittenhouse is
dead. This is her attempt to preserve that status."
    I leaned forward, barely able to keep from clawing
the arms of my chair. "She means to ransom the
transwarp technology?"
    "Virtually. And more. The scientists intend to
throw it open for purchase by any bidder, knowing the
galactic powers will welcome such opportunity and
that the Federation dares not allow itself to be outbid.
Unfortunately, Professor Mornay's understanding of
politics is simplistic. If she succeeds in throwing the
technology up for grabs, as it were, she will likely

               81

instigate something too forbidding for her to conceptu-
alize. A cosmic scramble."
    The phrase was unfamiliar to me, yet it hit me like
the smell of bad weather. Sensitive to the glances of
Scanner and Merete, who were taking all their cues
from me, I squinted and forced myself to add up the
sketchy evidence and paste it into something familiar.
Galactic powers plus hot technology plus trigger-
brained scientists equals .... "A feeding frenzy."
    Spock pursed his lips and nodded thoughtfully. "An
apt comparison. Cosmic scramble is a colloquial term,
of course, but an accurate one. Mornay underesti-
mates the severity of her actions. When cosmic scram-
ble begins, individual lives and galactic peace are
forfeit. Mornay is virtually sentencing herself and the
other scientists to violent deaths."
    "And Boma wants to head it off, but the other
scientists wouldn't listen to him."~
    "In a word, yes. Boma approached Captain Kirk
because--"
    "For the same reason Paul Burch did when he
wanted to foil Rittenhouse's plan," I guessed. "He
knew Captain Kirk would be dependable and discreet.
Right?"
    "Correct. He also knows the consequences of cos-
mic scramble. A dozen petty wars could erupt that
could pull down the structure of the galactic order as it
now stands. If a hostile government gains the
transwarp technology, the balance of power could
shift drastically. Whoever has it could become a super-
power, both economically and militarily."
    "It's that special?" McCoy interrupted. "Isn't it
just another form of propulsion?"
    Spock frowned. "In simplistic terms, it is. How-
ever, the added complexity is this: Mornay and her
team were spearheading special research for a process
for the extreme refinement of dilithium into tri-
lithium."

82

    He stopped talking, his black eyes landing on Dr.
McCoy. I watched the exchange in silence, as did
Scanner and Merete, and recognized a sort of repartee
going on. Spock remained silent, obviously waiting,
punishing McCoy for his earlier jibes and forcing him
to betray his own ignorance.
    McCoy shifted uncomfortably, pursed his lips, and
glanced around. He soon broke under the you-igno-
rant-boor treatment. "Well, all right," he blurted. "Go
ahead."
    "Trilithium," Spock said, hiding his victory and
thus doubling it, "existed only theoretically until four
years ago. It is the compound that allows the advanced
flow of energy to be compacted into transwarp drive.
Dr. Mornay managed to synthesize it in solid form, but
it exists only in a matter/antimatter-fiux environment.
In other words, once the power source is turned off,
the trilithium instantly degenerates. Last year, Mor-
nay, Perren, Boma, and Sarda combined their abilities
and devised the mechanism that would allow trilithium
to retain its integrity for a workable period even when
the system was not in flux. And that, Doctor, is far
more than just another form of propulsion."
    Spock spoke his words carefully, knowing the situa-
tion had become tangled. It was imperative that we
understand; he knew that too. And because of the way
he spoke, with concise eloquence, we accepted the
cruciaiity. Slowly I began to understand. ff the
Klingons, the Romulans, the Orions, the Tholians, the
K'zinti, or any of a handful of hungry governments
thought they could get this new high science... truly a
feeding frenzy. And the Federation would participate
just to keep the science out of hostile hands. It would
have no choice. Just as Rittenhouse had believed the
Federation could win any war he induced, Mornay
was probably making the same bet.
    I licked my lips. "Her deal includes unconditional
amnesty for herself and the others?"

83

Spock's chin went up a little. "How did you know?"
I shrugged. "It makes sense." I declined to tell him
it was what a desperate human would do. I didn't need
any more embarrassment.
    Nodding slowly, Spock once again touched the con-
trol, and once again the face dissolved into a new face.
The consummately human features of Ursula Mornay
fizzled and reformed into the angularity of Vulcan
features. Resisting those plaguing thoughts of Sarda, I
forced myself to get familiar with the new person. He
was a young Vulcan, though not as young as Sarda,
and his hair was the same black as Spock's, but
untrimmed. It hung almost to his shoulders, caught
back only by Vulcan ears that were slightly more
backswept than Spock's. His silver-gray eyes bore a
glimmer of defiance--or was I imagining it?
    "The third team member," Spock continued. "His
name is Perren. He is a specialist in interspace phys-
ics. He and Mornay have worked closely for eight
years on the science of transwarp. While Mornay is
the theorist, Perren is the applied scientist. She refined
the concept, and he developed the actual hardware for
transwarp, the engineering itself."
    "Another Vulcan working on an instrument of vio-
lence?" Merete asked.
    Spock acknowledged her with a tip of his head.
"The transwarp is not an instrument of violence in and
of itself. However, you're correct in implying that
Perten has deviated from approved Vulcan lines of
morality."
    "You mean he's like Sarda," I bridged. "Ostra-
cized. He doesn't fit in on Vulcan because of his
propensities."
    "He is like Sarda," Spock agreed, "but only to a
point. Sarda regrets his . . . divergence from Vulcan
practices and is trying to mend it. Perren," he said,
"makes no apologies."

84

    I was only half listening as Spock explained our
reasons for being at Argelius. That Mornay and her
team had escaped to this distant planet, near the edge
of disputed space, to use the passionless culture and
neutral standing of Argelius as a fortress against
everybody. Odd. The threat of cosmic scramble on the
most sedate planet in the known galaxy. It was posi-
tively poetic.
    "Even the Federation is not formally aware of the
theft as yet," Spock was saying. "So far, Mornay has
made no announcement, but time is of the essence.
Boma wanted Captain Kirk to get here first. He wants
the captain to convince the science team of the danger
they're causing and find some other means of negotia-
tion before the major powers go into scramble."
    I straightened my back and it cracked. But I had to
ask. "And me?"
    "You, Commander Piper, are the captain's ace in
the hole, as you say. Sending Enterprise to Argelius
would be rather conspicuous--"
    "Yeah," Scanner grunted, only then pointing out
how quiet he'd been. "Like a battleship in a bath-
tub."
    Spock paused, trying to visualize that, and finally
opted to ignore it. "I will return to my shuttle and we
will approach the city in question from two directions.
Your assignment is to locate Lieutenant Sarda and
separate him from Morhay and Perren. I will then
attempt to isolate Perren, leaving Professor Mornay
for Captain Kirk to handle."
  "Divide and conquer," McCoy said.
    "Essentially. Also, if the scientists are separated,
they will be unable to give over the complete technol-
ogy. The threat will be effectively cleaved."
    The edge of my chair creased into my thighs. "But
Captain Kirk is back on Earth," I protested. "He was
yanked right off the schooner and taken under guard
for questioning--"

85

     "Captain Kirk," Spock said, "will be here when the
time is right, Commander."  "Butre"
    His confidence in Kirk, even lacking the explanation
I craved, squeezed away every last suspicion that I
might be part of a plan that hadn't been thought out
and carefully executed, with me playing the part of
some cog in the middle of the mechanism. Spock's
glare bored through me, and when it was disrupted by
a slow blink, we both understood our concepts of
Captain James Kirk.
    I let it go. Part of command was learning to live with
half the answers.
    "Sir," I began slowly. "I know things look bad for
him, but I can't--I don't believe Sarda is a willing part
of all this. He's a victim of circumstance. I'm sure of
it."
  "Based on what, Commander?"
    Now I froze. Had it been Kirk asking me that
question, I'd have given him an unqualified "intui-
tion." But this was Spock. Spock, who required all
parts to all equations. Whose manner demanded preci-
sion from me. Why did I feel Sarda was innocent?
    Finally I said, "He'd have no reason to run, sir.
He's a Federation honoree. He's been on the 'right'
side all along."
    "And?" The steady eyes probed me, Unfiltered and
discerning, cutting straight through to the most human
part of me.
  So I said it.
  "And I trust him."
    Spock nodded, evidently satisfied by something a
Vulcan shouldn't really understand at all. He slowly
said, "I agree with you."
    In my periphery, I saw Scanner's jaw slacken as he
stared at Spock. Whether his awe came at my sudden
credibility or Spock's almost human display of faith in

Sarda, I couldn't tell. Guilt stabbed me. Doubt came
rushing back upon me from my conversation with
Merete. Now that I'd spoken my piece, could I back it
up? Or, more crucially, would Sarda back it up?
    "However," Mr. Spock went on, "we must main-
tain our caution. You know of Sarda's struggle to
become fully Vulcan, and of the intense strain he was
under until you brought the problem to me. I must take
partial responsibility for his welfare, since it was I who
recommended a Vulcan tutor for him and bridged the
relationship."
    My skin bristled as I added up the infinitesimal clues
in his tone. My teeth sank into my lower lip, and I
tasted the dryness of complication. Quietly I said, "Perren."
    A deep silence fell behind my voice. Suddenly the
situation took a dive for the intricate. Its entangle-
ments shone in Spock's expression as he watched us
all add it up in our minds, for he more than any of us
knew the labyrinths of being Vulcan.
    He shifted his long legs and started talking again.
"Sarda and Perten knew each other already. Perren
had the advantage of not possessing typical Vulcan
prejudices against Sarda's talents. Yet, while he is a
renegade in his own way, Perren is older than Sarda
and had already advanced through Vulcan training. He
was the logical selection." Spock fixed his eyes on
nothing for a fleet moment. Was he apologizing, in his
way? He knew we had both interfered with Sarda's life
and, no matter the noble purpose, may have placed
him in a compromising position. Or a position whose
temptations were too much, even for a Vulcan.
    Spock jarred me out of those gray thoughts when he
asked, "May I speak with you privately, Com-
mander?"
  "Oh.. 2' I glanced sheepishly at the others.
  "Right.". Scanner slapped his knees and stood up.

86                                                                87

 Merete and McCoy tried to disguise their curiosity in a
 casual stroll aft, and I longed for their presence once
 we were alone.
    "Commander, this is rare information I must give
you now," Spock began, steeping me in the elegance
of his control. "There are certain things you must
know before you can effectively deal with Lieutenant
Sarda."
  I nodded. "I understand."
    This wasn't easy for him. I could see that. He
evidently had put much thought into whether or not to
tell me whatever it was. Finally he made his commit-
ment. "Vulcan training methods are matters of great
privacy. They are more than simple passings-on of
information. They provide my only cause to question
Lieutenant Sarda's part in this incident."
    He was stalling. He might even be hoping I would
come to those unspeakable conclusions on my own, to
spare him the trouble of speaking them. In deference
to him, I tried.
    "You're saying," I began, "Sarda might be loyal to
Perren in some way?"
    My question made him uneasy. He gazed downward
at nothing, saddled with a decision no Vulcan wants to
make: whether or not to let a non-Vulcan in on the
privacies they guard so dearly. Yet there was another
perception pressing him, beyond just the rupture of
Vulcan privacy; we both felt it. A human who could be
friends with a Vulcan is an instant complication. The
weight sat on me now.
    Slowly he said, "The mental training of young Vul-
cans cannot be simplified, Piper. It cannot be reduced
to a matter of mere words."
    "But, sir, it's a matter of computer record," I told
him. "I was just reading the library tapes--"
    "The computer record," he interrupted, "is not
Vulcan." Troubled by what he was trying to say, or not
to say, Spock indulged in a sigh and sought for words

               88

to explain what could not be explained. Something too
deeply personal for words. "On the screen, there are
words in print," he said. "There is no clinical way to
convey the depth behind the words. It is the difference
between a dictionary definition and the intimacy of
personal interaction." He looked at me now to see if I
understood, and his eyes no longer wavered.
    I nodded for his sake. "You mean a kind of symbi-
otic relationship, beyond the learning of facts and
controls? Something social?"
    The eyebrows, their change of position on his
stately face, gave me my answer.
    "Vulcan training involves a mental endowment, tu-
tor to pupil and vice versa. A... spiritual bond, if you
will. And it is accomplished by meld. Under normal
circumstances, I consider it illogical that Sarda would
willingly take part in espionage. However, his liaison
with Perten, at so crucial a time in his disciplines, does
change the facts."
    For the first time my doubts, my questions, about
Sarda took body. To my shame, I had to fight through
an ugly twinge of jealousy in order to think with a clear
head. "A sympathetic relationship," I murmured.
    Spock nodded. "And potentially dangerous now.
Quite frankly, I am dubious of Perren's state of mind
also. Ordinarily, a Vulcan would never condone the
conditions Mornay has presented, would never so
offhandedly gamble with countless innocent lives. If
Perren's Vulcan attitudes have so completely con-
torted, there is cause for worry."
    With a deep breath I concluded, "Meaning we have
no idea what mental condition Sarda's in right now."
  His tone of voice sank low. "Yes."

89

Chapter Six

"May we together become greater than the sum of both
of US."
                  --The Savage Curtain

AROELIUS IS ONE of a handful of planets bordering
disputed space, relatively safe and unravaged on the
edge of the Federation envelope. Relatively, of
course, being the key word. These planets also tend to
draw occasional undesired attention because of their
proximity, and if there is some galactic incident it is
quite likely to involve one or more of them. Most of
those border planets handle their teetering rather well.
Argelius, however, is a planet of insipid passivity. Its
people, like the Vuicans, had once been warlike and
snappish, but evolved, unlike the Vulcans, into a re-
gresslve society that stresses extraordinary complais-
ance. Its people, even its children, rarely quarrel even
among themselves. They can't even work up a good
brood. As a result, along with anger, out are ambition,
growth, technology, a free-market mentality of any
kind, and just about everything else that allow a soci-
ety to depend upon itself. They are nice people, but
they are helpless. They bring administrators in from
other planets because they can't administer them-
selves, trade their location and benevolent hospitality
for foodstuffs, medical services, in fact most neces-
sary goods and services of any kind. They are a
professional shore leave planet. It's all they do well.
 The culture itself has its colors. The buildings are of

90

natural stone and wood, clothing reminiscent of
Earth's Middle East during the classical period. Veils,
slippers, turbans, belly dancing, mosaics, simple musi-
cal instruments, and so on. Several Federation anthro-
pological studies had been made on the hypothesis that
the Argelians are one of a handful of human-origin
races scattered around the galaxy by a superior culture
who'd sought to preserve them. The biggest fly in that
ointment was a faint but definite telepathic ability that
appeared hereditary in some of the women. But none
of that was my problem. Even though Argelius has
only three major population clusters that could be
called cities, the clusters are disorganized and very
old. Some streets--many, in fact--had never been
named even in the hundreds upon hundreds of Arge-
lien years they'd been in use. There are no class
structures; everybody is poor. As such, there is no
quartering of Yelgor City, no way to guess which end
of town might attract a group of fugitive scientists.
    So, here we were. Orbiting. We were waiting for Mr.
Spock to devise a plan for finding the scientists. I
suppose each of us assumed Spock would be the only
one of us who would be able to solve the problem, a
problem without many clues. As we watched him scan
bits of new and old data about the scientists, trying to
pick out some little propensity that would give a hint of
where they might be hiding, we slowly digested the
idea that even Spock, unfortunately, wasn't made of
magic.
    He knew that too. It showed in the taut lines of his
jaw as he calmly, even hypnotically, pored over screen
after screen of drab information about Mornay and
Perten. When that store was exhausted, he unceremo-
niously began the whole process again with reams of
data about Yelgor City and the huddled villages that
surrounded it like a litter. Dr. McCoy and Merete
confiscated Spock's information about the scientists
and went to another terminal to go over it again, to

91

 apply their knowledge of human psychology. Maybe
 they could find something Spock missed. Meanwhile,
 Spock and I slowly analyzed the city itself. We looked
 for architectural styles that might be conducive to a
 band of renegade scientists, places that had multiple
 escape routes, natural shielding, seclusion within a
 populated area, that kind of thing. But it wasn't easy to
 try to think like a renegade scientist, mostly because I
 wasn't a scientist and Spock wasn't a renegade.
     Scanner, meanwhile, bided his time watching the
 readouts of the planet while we quietly orbited. Nor-
 mal fluxes of magnetic and heat energy that heave and
 sigh as a planet turns were enough to keep him satis-
 fied. Come to think of it (which until then I hadn't) I'd
 never known Scanner to ask for more to do. So he had
 a hobby, and thus took his place as the least of my
 worries.
    Only when Scanner suddenly stopped humming one
of his obscure collection of folk songs and leaned
forward did I realize how long we'd gone without
uttering a word. His abrupt motion drew both Spock's
attention and mine. Scanner's nose was almost touch-
ing his readout monitor. "What the blue peepin' hell is
that?"
Spock turned in his chair. "Mr. Sandage?"
Scanner blinked, shook his head, grimaced, then
shrugged. "Sir... I've never seen a wave like this
before."
    Spock keyed in his own viewscreen, giving us both a
split-second glance at the computer's simulation of
jagged waves streaking upward from a small portion of
the planet's surface. The glance lasted only an instant
thanks to Spock. He vaulted sideways, diving for
Scanner's navigational controls, long fingers dancing
over the board. His shoulder struck the chair, sending
Scanner tumbling onto the deck. Just before Scanner
would have struck the port bulkhead, the ship around

92

us tilted violently away from the planet, yanking free
of our orbit.
    The engines groaned and wheezed. The artificial
gravity lost its center of balance, giving our individual
weights to the centrifugal force that sent us crashing
into the starboard bulkheads. Scanner was thrown the
whole width of the cabin space, and the side of his
head hit the emergency door handle as he slammed
hard into the bulkhead between McCoy and Merete.
    I clawed at one of the passenger chairs, but couldn't
hold on. I felt myself being sucked starboard. My
shoulder hit the rim of the viewing portal and my own
weight crushed me against Merete, who was trapped
between my legs and the bulkhead. Dr. McCoy strug-
gled against the crushing pressure to slip his hand
under Scanner's bleeding head, but that was the best
he could do.
    Banana Republic's engines sounded like one of
those old freight-train locomotives trying to drag an
overload. Spock was still somehow holding himself to
the control board, his cape flying across his shoulders,
flapping toward the starboard side. Pure determination
kept him clinging there as the ship wrenched herself
and the attached shuttle out of orbit in a whine of
strain.
    My eyes watered. I forced them to stay open, trying
to understand why Spock had inflicted such danger
upon us. Just as the pressure began to slacken and the
ship's gravity to regain control, a shock wave hit us.
    It came from outside, down there. I felt its alienness
with an almost psychic intensity and knew that it
hadn't come from my ship. Nausea fluttered through
me as wave upon wave rocked us--but these weren't
just waves of energy. With them came distortion.
Detachment from reality. Before my eyes the walls of
the ship stretched and yawned, even faded to show
stars of the wrong colors and placement. My arms

93

 changed length, shape... then reality settled again,
 for an instant. Then another wave.
     A hull seam somewhere on Rex's outer skin sud-
 denly ruptured. Loud hissing filled the cabin as the air
 spat out into space, then a sucking sound replaced it as
 the automatic sealants went to work. The ship, at
 least, was trying to take care of itself. But for us, the
 fabric of consciousness was fraying.
     Between each wave was a moment of unsettling
 reality, as though the reality was the dream between
 waking times. Power waves, maybe. Dimensional tam-
 pering. Whatever it was, I hated it.
    My nervous system buzzed. Everything in my body
felt out of sync---heartbeat, breathing, everything--I
lost count of the energy waves wracking us as we
drifted just out of orbital distance. Even this far out,
the waves shuddered through us, horridly potent.
Through my sluggish mind came the realization that
Spock had just saved our lives by getting us out of
direct contact with the power waves.
    Finally the last wave grumbled through Rex's shell,
passed through our vibrating bodies, and passed out
into space. We held our breaths, waiting for another
wave, but no more came. I pushed myself off the
bulkhead to Spock's side.
  "What happened? What did they do?"
    Spock straightened, then immediately bent over the
readout screen. He was ominously silent.
    , McCoy knelt beside Scanner, helping him to sit up.
"What did who do?"
    "Mornay and the others," I said. "Nobody else on
Argelius could create that kind of power emanation."
    "Quite right," Spock confirmed. In a move particu-
larly human, he looked over the computer readout
screen and gazed through the big main portal at the
serene planet, almost as though he only partially
trusted the computer. He tapped the controls to test

them, then asked, "Commander, I suggest we veer
back into orbit."
I paused. "Sir, you're senior officer on board."
"Yes," he said, "but you misunderstand the nature
of the conditions under which this ship was commis-
sioned for you. Captain Kirk arranged a special prior-
ity command for this transport. No one, regardless of
rank, can supersede your authority on this vessel."
    My expression carried an unmistakable "you're kid-
ding," but I forced myself not to say it. After a
moment, I collected myself and asked, "What if I was
killed?"
    He tilted his head. "Obviously, the senior officer
would have no choice but to take over. That officer
would be authorized to command the ship, but not the
mission. The ship itself is considered expendable.
Your presence on this mission, however, is not. Shall I
attain orbit?"
    Dulled by his words and by his sense of courtesy, I
simply nodded. I was about to ask again what had
happened to us, when Scanner moaned and drew my
attention. McCoy was probing the head wound while
Merete ran a Feinberger over Scanner for vital signs.
    I crossed the deck and knelt beside them. "Got
bonked, huh?" I uttered sympathetically.
    Scanner leaned his head back against the bulkhead
as McCoy tended the swollen spot on his temple and
dabbed at the blood. Though pale and disoriented,
Scanner gave me a best-effort shrug. "I guess I'!1 just
sit on the floor from now on. I keep endin' up down
here anyhow. What kinda high-intensity flush was
that? I never saw nothin' like that."
    "It disrupted our autonomic nervous systems," Mc-
Coy said. "And if I'm not mistaken, attacked the brain
thalamus too."
    "It didn't seem real," Merete commented, still
tensely running the Feinberger over Scanner. "No

94                                                                95

 concussion," she said to McCoy. "Dural contusion,
 and very slight subdural bleeding."
     "I hope all that means 'headache,'" Scanner
 grumbled.
     "Orbital status," Spock reported. He continued
 contemplating the planet below us, one hand still
 resting on the controls.
   "Mr. Spock?"
   "Commander?"
  "Was it... unreality?"
    "Perhaps," he said. "A crude description, but appli-
cable." He leaned forward, puzzling over the readouts
as they flashed before him. The ship's new computers
were still waffling on what to tell him. Tensely then,
Spock straightened. "It was the transwarp antimatter
flux," he said.
    Evidently that announcement, coupled with the dis-
tortions we'd felt during the attack, meant more to
McCoy than to the rest of us. Or maybe he simply read
something in Spock's tone that we hadn't yet learned
to hear. "You mean they're down there tampering with
the fabric of reality?" he said.
    Scanner moved his legs gingerly and commented.
"Reality's gonna have stretch marks."
    Spock nodded thoughtfully. "I know comparatively
little about the transwarp flux pattern," he said.
"However, I do know that the energy requires sophis-
ticated housing in order to be safe. I believe we have
just experienced the result of an accident."
    Stiff and cold, I murmured. "They must be trying to
build it!"
    Spock looked at me. The eyebrow went up in stern
punctuation. "Undoubtedly."
    "But they can't possibly have the right facilities on
Argelius," McCoy said. "Not for something like
that?'
    "Why would they want to actually build a transwarp
device?" Merete asked.

96

    I clenched my fists and answered, "To raise their
advantage. Now they not only have the technology,
but they have the threat." I turned to Spock. "Unless
the accident..."
    Spock returned my stare, only to finally break it
with a deep sigh. "Such contained antimatter power,
engaged in a flux of that magnitude, could theoretically
have obliterated the entire planet had it not somehow
been focused out into space."
    "Including whatever Mornay is using as a labora-
tory," I said. I didn't mean to sound accusative, as
though I might be blaming him in my rush of irrational
human concerns, but I couldn't help it. "It could've
taken the whole lab with it, couldn't it? They could all
be dead. Couldn't they?"
    He saw the intensity of that thought tighten my face
and knew what it meant to me that Sarda might already
be dead, that all hopes to rescue him from a tangled
situation might be nothing more than useless risks.
Declining to give me the silly Vulcan statement that,
yes, they could be, he pressed his lips together and
lowered his eyes, assessing his long experience with
humans and the honesty it had shown him how to use.
He gave me the answer no other Vulcan might even
have had the courage to:
 "I don't know."

    It was a long time ago. Maybe it wasn't really so
long ago, when the shadows of memory start to fold
with time. Like warp drive--a thought, and you're
there.
    The planetoid was hairy with jungle and brush.
Inside that foliage lurked unspeakable danger. Ene-
mies. Enemies who knew us, knew what we had and
what we were capable of. We needed an advantage.
Something they didn't know about.
    I felt Sarda beside me, looking over my shoulder
through a hole in the heavy ferns. We watched as a
97

 pair of our enemies passed through the ravine below,
 too far away for our weapons to be of any use. These
 mock phasers were only good at a distance of ten
 meters. We needed that extra advantage if we were
 going to survive.
  "Any ideas?" I asked, crouching low.
    Sarda crouched also, keeping his head down. His
light, brassy hair stood out too clearly amid the green-
ery, and he was careful not to let it give away our
position. "We are all equally armed and provisioned.
If you and I are to gain some advantage, it will not be
through our possessions. We must find some way to
pool our knowledge. Our particular talents are the
only things we have that they do not also have."  I sighed. "All right. What have we got?"
    His amber eyes lost their focus for a moment as he
analyzed us. Sarda and I had known each other all the
way through Academy, but not particularly well. A
greeting-in-the-corridor sort of association, along with
a couple of terms as lab partners. And now we had
been chosen as a team, pitted against the best of Star
Fleet Academy. Even knowing each other better
would have been an advantage, but we didn't have it to
call upon. We had no idea then that the future would
weld us together with a bond of ordeals.
    And this would be the first. Contrary to belief, truly
enduring friendships are founded not on time, but on
trial. Lasting relationships have to be forged, not
simply discovered. We had no idea that this would be
our first trial, this random pairing off for the Senior
Field Endurance Maneuvers.
    It was an exclusive privilege to be recommended for
these maneuvers. With only reserved amusement and
even a little contempt, upperclassmen referred to
these as "Outlast" games, and intimately as "the
Outlast." That was the purpose, after all, to outlast the
other teams. Not easy. These opponents of ours were
the cream of Star Fieet's crop. Each participant had to

               98

be not only recommended, but actually sponsored by a
ranking member of the Academy faculty. We not only
carried our own reputations, but the reputations of the
officers who'd stuck their necks out to put us here.
The odds were by no means equal. Though each team
consisted of one command candidate and one science
specialist, that's where the equity ended. The com-
mand candidates could be anything from tactical ge-
niuses to wizards of offensive improvisation. And each
knew how to apply that specialty to incapacitate an
enemy.
    The science specialists filled an even wider spec-
trum: life science specialists in Earth or alien medi-
cine, chemists, biologists and every other kind of
-oiogist, including neurophysiologists who could
short-circuit a whole nervous system given the right
circumstances, electrical experts, sound wave theo-
fists, astrophysicists, speed/time people--anything be-
yond knitting, and sometimes they could even do that.
And Star Fleet twisted itself into curls to keep any two
teams from being alike during any one Outlast. There
was no help, no planning ahead, no cramming for this
test. Survive or don't. We would endure solely on our
talent for guerrilla improvisation. How well we could
use and merge our respective talents would tell the
test.
    The Outlast was not exactly the kind of honor
anyone really wished to get. One thing, however, was
sure: if you got it, you'd better not turn it down. You
might go in scared, sick, or alone, but you go.
    "I am a specialist in energy-wave direction and
mechanics. You are versed in the history and applica-
tion of strategy and tactics," Sarda began. "I am a
Vulcan, therefore I have audio, visual, and muscular
capabilities superior to those of our opponents. I can
sense life form presence within roughly twenty me-
ters. I have typical Vulcan sensory capabilities for
estimating distance, volume, and speed. Since I am the
99

 only Vulcan participating in this particular Outlast, we
 may consider those to be advantages."  "Okay," I agreed. "What else?"
    "You are human. All of our other opponents are also
human, with the exception of the Skorr entomologist
in team six. We may assume that they expect you to
behave in a human fashion. You are not an Earth
native. Three of the other team commanders are also
not of Earth. Of the three, we are aware of only
Vesco's home planet, Altair Nine, which is primarily
an ice planet. He will have no natural advantage in the
jungles of this planetoid." Sarda tipped his head, then,
and looked directly at me in the midst of his :analysis.
"You, however, come from Proxima Beta, which is a
swamp and jungle planet. This environment is more
natural to you. How well can you reconnoiter in this
kind of terrain?"
    "Well enough," I agreed. "I know how to move
through thick growth without making noise. I know
how to test the ground before putting my weight down.
I know how to use plant organisms to make ropes,
nets, camouflage, shelter, and a few other tricks." I
shrugged, hoping it would all mean something to him.
Immediately, though, I was dissatisfied. "It's not
enough. We've got to have advantages, not tricks."
    Sarda sat down heavily in a way that, for a human,
could have been interpreted as surrender. "We cannot
gain advantage against the unknown."
    Then the rustling began... a sound both distant and
near, as piercing as the Red Alert klaxon. Enemies!
    Stunned, almost as though we'd forgotten, we
stared at the gently waving ferns, then at each other,
then scrambled for cover. It was early in the Outlast, a
wise time to let someone else be the aggressor. Let
them take each other out for a while and leave fewer
teams for us to deal with. Of course, that also meant
we would have to deal with the best teams.
 But that was for later. For now--hide!

lOO

    We squirmed backward, kneeling low, finally crawl-
ing on hands and knees. I caught a glimpse of one of
our opponents, Gruegen, a honey-mouthed Norwegian
who was much more clever than his demeanor sig-
naled.
 "Down," I whispered.
    "We can ambush them," Sarda suggested, almost
inaudibly.
  "Not ready."
    We flattened ourselves to the moss and let the ferns
and cycads close over us. The rustling sounds grew
closer, then began to fade. Soon we were alone again.
    Sarda stood up cautiously to check the surround-
ings. "They've gone," he said. He turned to me
sharply. "Why did you not attack them? They were
perfect targets."
    "I told you I'm not ready. I'm not going on the
offensive without a plan of action. Gruegen's not the
type to let himself be trapped that easily. The last thing
I'm going to do is underestimate my enemies. Lesson
number one in basic tactics at the Academy."
    His response was caustic. "And lesson number two
is not to allow opportunities to slip by."
    "That doesn't make sense. We've got all the time it
takes. There's no reason to rush into a confrontation
that would give away our position before we have any
advantage. When we do confront them, we don't want
the odds to be equal, do we?"
    Sarda's arms stiflened at his sides. "I would be
satisfied simply to make a good showing during these
games. Winning is an outlandish goal considering the
odds. I find myself... wishing for early defeat," he
murmured. The tone was quiet, weary.
    I looked at him and frowned. "Don't you care
whether we win or not?"
    His amber eyes caught the deep greens of the ferns
again as he met my glare. "I am a scientist, not a
strategist. These games are of no use to me. I find them
               101

 an unnecessary strain and can see no way for us to
 emerge as the superior team. Had I not been recom-
 mended--"
     "But you were recommended," I snapped, slicing
 off his self-pity. "This is an assignment, Lieutenant, a
 mission. You might not care whether we win or not,
 but I do. You're not going to drag me down. I don't
 know how Vulcans feel about mission purpose, but if
 they're all like you, why do they bother to join Star
 Fleet?"
     He bristled at my attack on his race, having no
 defense against my caustic, almost mocking tone,
 though he nearly shook with the effort to contain his
 feelings. The coldness returned to his face; the eyes
 dropped, shaded by drab russet lashes. Neat brassy
 hair flashed in a ray of sunlight filtering through the
 twisted trees overhead.
    I stood up, fists clenched. "We're not under any
time constraints other than the need for food and
water. Eventually hunger and thirst will force us all to
forage. I'm not going to wait. I'm going to build up a
food store now, and we're going to hole up here and let
the other teams take each other out. When only three
or four teams are left, that'll be the time for us to take
the offensive." I paced the mossy clearing, scanning
the foliage and cultivating my analysis as I moved.
This was my little bridge, the think tank of my ship.
Here I would make my decisions and our "lives"
would depend on them. This was the core of the
Outlast. From here I would decide how we could take
out the minimum two teams we would need to claim
our superiority in the games, provided, of course, we
were the last to survive. The two-team kill was re-
quired for good reason; to prevent the teams from
simply hiding until all the others were down. It was a
participation event, and I would indeed participate--
later.
 "Our strongest weapon," I thought aloud, "is infor-

               102

mation about the other teams. Rule number one: know
the enemy. This high'~round is a vantage point. We
can see pretty well down into the ravines on both
sides. Maybe we can get an idea of the tactics the
others are using." I pushed down a puff of ferns and
looked between them, scanning the lush, dark ravine
below. All around us, insects and seedpods fluttered
on the hot thermals. Eerie fingers of sunlight glowed
with dust particles and tiny life forms. Behind me, I
could feel Sarda's unenthused glare. "We'll wait here
for a while. We'll hide."
    "Hiding is not a very honorable tactic," he pointed
out, sharply reproving me.
    I twisted around. Revenge? From a Vulcan? I was
right; I didn't know him very well at all. "I've got my
reasons," I said. "I'm going after food. While I'm
gone, you survey our supplies and see if there's any
way to use them offensively."
    His brow crinkled. "Offensively? Our supplies are
not--"
    "Just do it, all right? You can argue its logic with me
later." Resentment rode my tone. Or perhaps it was
nerves. Deep in my mind's basement I knew I was
attacking him as part of a defense against my own
apprehension. I really did want to win, and I also did
understand the odds against it. I was blaming him for
my own insecurities and disguising it in that I'm-in-
command tone of voice. That tone... it could be quite
a tool. For a moment there it almost convinced me. I
hoped it convinced Sarda, at least that I was serious.
    As I cautiously gathered nut clusters and wild fruit
for our store, my disgruntlement with him slowly
dissipated. Maybe it was my fault. As the command
element, wasn't I supposed to be able to generate
enthusiasm, or at least loyalty, in my crew? His atti-
tude would be a reflection of my own success as a
commander. Ouch--that was a chilly discovery. Could
I be that powerful? Powerful enough to fire a Vulcan's
103

sensibilities? Damn it all! It was tough enough to be on
the Outlast, much less to be teamed up with a Vulcan.
If only we were both Vulcan, or both human... our
differences were too much of a burden.
    I wondered what his problem was, why he resented
his selection to attend the Outlast.
    No. I wouldn't think about it. It didn't matter. Only
winning mattered. One way or another, I would entice
him to cooperate, even if I had to find some "logical"
reason to dangle before him. Somewhere out there in
theoryland, there had to be logic in the shape of a
carrot.
    Thus, we waited. We watched. The first three teams
went down quickly, within the initial five hours of the
Outlast. We actually saw two of the teams ambushed
by others, saw their frustration when the dye darts hit
them, and we knew the third had gone down when we
heard the subtle hum of the transporter beaming them
back up to the monitoring ship orbiting somewhere
above us. Two more teams were eliminated just before
sunset.
    Sarda and I hid on our shaded escarpment, deep in
the ferns and palmettos, trying to get a feeling for what
we were up against. This planetoid had no moons, so
after dark there was nothing but starlight to see by.
Anyone with any common sense would settle down
and not attempt to move about. Movement or light
could only draw attention, and none of the remaining
teams wanted that, including us. Night came, and was
accepted. Even for command candidates, there is a
time when rest is part of the strategy.
    Morning dawned hazily over the five remaining Out-
last teams. It was time for us to move out. At least two
of the four other teams had to be ours.
    For two hours we hunted our opponents, doing little
more than homing in on their locations and move-
ments. My classmate Vesco and his Skorr scientist

104

were the most aggressive, setting some very creative
snares while Sarda and I watched enviously. Why
hadn't we thought of those? Vesco was a devious
young man and he worried me. As we'd watched over
the past hours, he had been the victor in three
matches----one more than he needed to claim superior-
ity in the Outlast for himself and his teammate. Now
all he had to do was arrange for his team to be the last
alive. But from what we could see, that wasn't enough
for Vesco.
    Nor was it enough for the Norwegian command
candidate and his sultry science specialist. Those two
had looked like a guy-and-girl advertisement for Al-
pine skiwear--tight skiwear--when we'd all met for
the initial briefing before the Outlast. They hadn't
seemed like they could discuss anything more compli-
cated than theft latest romp at the lodge, and I was
taken down a notch when I realized they had devel-
oped a crude kind of communication system using the
lights on their medical sensors. As I huddled behind a
palmetto, the rough texture of the trunk scratching my
arm, their code flashes deflated my creative ego as
they arranged an ambush. I wasn't usually concerned
with my own levels of femininity, certainly not at
times like this, but I got a funny twinge of jealousy
when I realized a woman that luscious could also be
inventive.
    Sarda evidently saw my shoulders sink. "Is some-
thing wrong, Lieutenant?" he asked.
    "They're communicating," I groaned. "It's only
Jacob's Elementary Light Code, but it's giving them
an advantage."
  "Why should that disturb you?"
    "Why? Because I should've thought of it, that's
why."
    He paused, probably trying to assimilate my dis-
gruntlement, but finally gave up on that and said,

105

"Communication is decidedly an advantage. However,
theirs is limited to the distance from which the Fein-
berger light can be seen during daylight hours."
  "Right," I admitted. "It also has another flaw."
  "And that is?"
  I held out a flat palm. "1 just read it."
    Sarda contemplated that revelation, then flattened
his lips and nodded.
    "It also gives away their position," I added. "We
need something better. We need some way to pool our
abilities and still put distance between us. We need a
communicator that can't be visually read."
  "We aren't allowed communicators," he said.
    "Wrong," I told him. "We weren't given communi-
cators. Nobody said we weren't allowed."
    He shifted to one knee and balanced himself in the
more comfortable position. "You're playing with
words, Lieutenant. We have no private auditory means
to communicate if we are separated. We shall have
none."
    "And you're being pessimistic," I accused. "Try
opening your mind."
    "Neither an open mind nor blatant optimism can
change the facts," he countered irritably.
    The irritation was catching. "For a Vulcan, you
don't know how to think very well," I snapped.
"There are alternatives. We just have to find them, or
invent them, or something. I mean to win."
    Sarda's expression hardened at the thrust of my
words, and he icily pointed out, "The others do also.
Determination is not in short supply during Outlast
games, Lieutenant Piper. Your human obstinacy will
gain you no ground here."
    There were times when I hated the truth, and this
was one of them. I hated him for telling me what I
already knew. Yet something inside me refused to
believe that I didn't have just that fraction more grit
than anybody else in the Outlast, just that extra bit of

106

tenacity that would help me win if I used it right. He
was a Vulcan. He'd never understand. I dropped the issue.
    "Let's add up our supplies," I said. "Maybe we'll
get an idea."
 "We have already done that."
 "Let's do it again."
    Frustrated, he glared at me before unrolling his
landing-party kit. Before us lay the usual sparse pro-
visions, things any ordinary landing party might have.
There was a Feinberger mediscanner, an electronic
match, Sarda's mock phaser, a hook and line for
fishing or snaring, a standard emergency beacon, and
a simple steel knife. No compass, no tricorder, no
communicator. We each had one of those kits, but two
times sparse is only double sparse.
    "Nothing there," I muttered. I rolled the Feinberger
in one hand, then plucked the electronic match. "Un-
less these mechanical components could be altered
somehow. Could you build a communicator?"
    "Without tools?" he answered. "Without a transta-
tor/capacitor? Withouta"
    "Think in terms of 'withs,' not 'withouts,'" I de-
manded. "What's here that could be used to build any
kind of communications device, anything that could
allow us to separate and still keep in touch? Maybe
the Feinberger sensors could be readjusted or some-
thing. Use your imagination."
    Sarda glared rather corrosively at the useless collec-
tion of gadgets, fingered them, contemplated them,
then continued staring them down. One by one he
raised them for an individual 1ookwthe mediscanner,
the match, the beacon--and put them down again.
Eventually he shook his head and pressed his lips
together. "I can see no provision here that would lend
itself to the creation of any kind of sophisticated
communications circuit."
  I slumped down, shaking my head. "It doesn't have

107

 to be sophisticated. All it has to do is relay and
 receive. Or even just relay. It doesn't have to be able
 to signal a starship, for crying out loud."
     He frowned at my unfamiliar phrase, glowered se-
 verely, and tried once again to envision the impossible
 thing I demanded. After watching his battle, I plugged
 myself into the same circuits and tried to help. "This
 planetold has the same basic geological makeup and
 energy fields as Earth, say, before the Industrial Age.
 What was on Earth then that we could use now?"
    I really hoped he wouldn't start explaining it to me,
but just apply whatever came up. Maybe if I tossed
enough questions his way, one of the answers would
strike a chord, preferably before we tore each other to
bits. I'd never worked closely with a Vulcan before,
yet I still got the idea that Sarda wasn't displaying the
usual Vulcan level of patience. Instead of that elegant
control, his was more of an induced frigidity. I kept
sensing movement under the icy surface, a movement
that frustrated him even more than my wild aspirations
did. Sitting only inches from him, I now watched the
internal fight tug at his stern expression and realized
suddenly that, no matter what he said, victory in this
Outlast meant as much to him as it did to me. I
couldn't have substantiated that in a thousand years,
but I felt it as surely as if he had engraved it on the skin
of my hand. His lips tightened again, his amber eyes
tinted green with the reflection of ferns, and his hand
tightened on the Feinberger again.
    Then the ferns flickered. No... the flicker was in
his eyes. He gazed tensely at nothing, his lips parting
in perception. He stared, no longer at the kit, but now
into the ferns, yet not seeing them. He was listening.
  I tensed. "What?"
    Still longer he stared, now tilting his head slightly,
raising his eyes until the amber in them was corrupted
by the cloud-strung sky. "An approach," he said.
"Very faint."

108

 "Sure?"
 "Yes."
    The kits rolled into our hands as if by some strange
kinetic force, and we sank into the dewy ferns. I drew
my mock phaser and set it for close range. My shoul-
der shook, a giveaway of rookie tension as my fist
closed around the weapon. If I was this nervous during
Academy games, what would it be like some day on a
real mission, when the phaser was set to kill?
    Ignoring the nagging signal of my own inadequacies,
I pushed Sarda behind me and listened. Now I too
could hear the rustle of approach. One of the teams
was near, growing nearer.
 "Any hints?" I whispered. "Who is it?"
    "No way to tell yet," Sarda responded quietly.
"Could be any of them."
    "I'm not ready to move on Vesco, but if it's the
Norwegian or--"
 The jungle parted.
    Two people crept into view, weapons drawn. My
heart sunk when I saw that they were wrapped in vines
and leaves for camouflage. Should've thought of that,
too. Everyone was getting the drop on me, and I was
letting it go on. Something had to break, something...
there had to be a way.
    I aimed my mock phaser, carefully. The enemy team
was moving toward us. They sensed our eyes and
paused, then moved forward again, ready for us,
somehow knowing we were here. Both were human,
both male, one tall and wiry, the other stocky but light
on his feet. The vines covering them made it difficult
for me to take aim in the jungle's dimness, but I tried
anyway. Somewhere between those heavy leaves
were human forms to hit. I tried to estimate down from
the filtered blobs of faces in the overgrowth, and fired.
    A dye dart lanced away from me, swishing through
the ferns. One of the faces dodged fast, and bright blue
dye sprayed all over a palmetto.
               109

    We scrambled. Sarda went one way, and I the other,
while the enemy team raced through the ferns trying to
get to us before we got another clear shot at them. The
jungle burst into pandemonium. Vines tangled around
our legs as we plunged behind thick bushes and
avoided stinger plants while trying to keep our heads
down.
    "Circle!" I hissed at Sarda. Just then, a dye dart
whizzed by, just over my ear. I turned in time to see
yellow dye smatter across a lichen-covered stump, and
lost precious seconds staring at it and absorbing the
horrible fact that I had almost been disqualified from
the Outlast. In the same thought as my vow that they
wouldn't come that close again came the awareness
that I was entirely vulnerable to those dye darts. I took
a broad dive for a wall of ferns just as another dart
sang by.
    I'd lost track of Sarda. Frantic, I risked standing up
straight and trying to get a bearing on him. If he went
down, that was it. Half the purpose of the Outlast was
teamwork. We had to work together, protect each
other, and jointly survive. Separating might not have
been the best idea. Where was he?
    The ground took a sharp dip without warning, and I
slid down a bristly bank, just managing to keep control
of my descent and land on my feet at the bottom.
There, I paused and listened, crouching warily. Every
muscle in my body quivered with anticipation, and I
began to wonder if I could handle an actual survival
episode, where lives really were at stake. After all, this
was only a game. What would reality be like?
    I shook off that thought and put my mind back in the
present, where it belonged, remembering what one of
my Academy professors had said about distraction
being deadly. Sarda . . . I had to find him. If we
couldn't communicate, separation could also be
deadly. What if he'd already been hit? We could
already be disqualified and I wouldn't even know it.
110

What if that happened? What if I'd been eliminated
from the Outlast before I'd even made a single kill?
What if--
 Sounds... rustling... over there.
    I crouched deeper into the ferns and crawled in the
direction of the sounds. My legs ached as I moved
forward, keeping my hand tightly around the mock
phaser. Thorns caught my hair and pulled it, but I kept
moving forward, letting them tear at me rather than
adjust my position and give myself away. Only when I
heard the voices, hissing at each other from deep
within the steamy overgrowth, did I pause and realign
my approach. They seemed to be moving away from
me, but that could easily be an illusion of the jungle. I
didn't trust it.
    Good thing, too, because in seconds I was almost
beside the rustling. With a howl I hoped was ferocious,
I plunged from the protection of the rough cycads,
aimed at the noise, and fired.
    Instantly, a dye dart buzzed toward me and I
plunged to one side. The ground came up to meet me,
but the dye dart missed, splattering instead over the
twisted roots and vines behind me. Blue paint flecked
the shoulder of my uniform--blue? Blue!
  "Sarda!" I burst out of the cycads again.
    He was wide-eyed and waist-deep in some kind of
brown and yellow cane growth, his mock phaser aimed
squarely at me.
  "What about the others?" I gasped.
    "I thought--evidently I was mistaken," he said,
brows drawn.
    "They've got to be here somewhere! Get behind
me!"
    We joined forces and hunted. We found our prey, all
right, and they found us. Dye darts flew, but none
scored hits before one of us ran afoul of a trip wire
strung across an open space, and down came a string
of giant leaves brimming with stagnant water.
               111

    "Yuuuuuuuuck !" blurted one of our enemies. Gasp-
ing and sputtering, we split off in different directions,
drenched in the most ghastly rank stuff a jungle could
offer.                               ~
    Sarda and I staggered back up our escarpment and
rolled onto the moss, choking and definitely reeking.
  "What the--what the--what is this stuff?" I gasped.
    "A trap, obviously," he murmured, shaking drop-
lets of stagnancy from his sleeves.
    "Oh, gaaack," I choked, my nose shriveling. "This
is... underhanded!"
  "And obviously not set by that team."
  "Somebody's playing practical jokes!"
    As the echo of my words looped down through the
ravine, Sarda cautiously advised, "Keep control of
yourself, Lieutenant."
    "But this isn't the time or place for practical jokes!
The Outlast just isn't the time for jokes !"
    Sarda grasped my arm to calm me down, only to let
go when the sleeve squished and let loose a new waft
of stink.
    I gritted my teeth and clenched my fists tight, glaring
off down the escarpment with an acid scowl. 'Wesco!
That slug. It could only be him. He used to do the
same things to his dormmates at the Academy!"
    Sarda sighed and looked at his drenched uniform. "I
believe he has turned that particular epithet back upon
us," he commented.
  "Come on. We're going to take him out."
 I struck off down the ravine.
    "Piper! Wait!" Sarda chased me down the incline,
catching desperately at my uniform parka. "Piper,
stop before you give our position away."
    Somewhere down very deep, I realized that I was
losing control, letting anger get the better of me. Vesco
and his tricks had prevented me from conquering the
other team, and for no apparent reason. Why would he
rig such a booby trap? Only when I started wondering

               112

how he'd known where we were clustered did I re-
member that his teammate was a Skorr and could fly.
All this time, Vesco had had aerial reconnaissance at
his disposal and we'd forgotten all about it. Anger hit
me again. In my rage, I plowed right down the clearest
areas of the jungle, just ahead of Sarda as he tried to
force me to stop. Only when my feet sank into an
unseen hole and I stumbled forward was he able to
catch me.
    I clawed at the ferns and pulled myself up. Honey.
My boots were dripping with honey. I looked around,
down. Yes, there it was... a neatly dug hole brimming
with raw honey, covered with dead bugs. Now the
honey, and the bugs, were all over my legs.
    "That's it," I growled. "He's mine." The contami-
nated honey sucked at my boots as I pushed myself up
and turned once again down the incline, but Sarda
caught me and, this time, held fast.
    He yanked me around. "Lieutenant," he began
firmly, his pale eyes boring deep, "you must control
yourself!"
    "Vesco's not playing fair," I insisted, then accused,
"You're not human. You don't understand."
    Sarda grasped my shoulders and forced me to face
him. "And ff he were playing fair, you wouldn't be
walking into his trap. We can beat him as you desire,
but not if you let him conquer you even before there is
a confrontation. If I can try to think like a human for a
few hours," he said with quiet punctuation, "I ask you
to think like a Vulcan."
    Until he saw the fury fade from my face, he refused
to let go of my arms. Determination narrowed his
eyes. And in those moments of fire and ice, the trial
that forged our relationship found its power of crea-
tion.
    The moment drew itself out. How much real time
passed, I've no idea. We read each other, communi-
cated more deeply than words can manage, and made
113

 not a move until we both knew I had completely
 absorbed and accepted his pact. Think like a human;
 think like a Vulcan. The ultimate empathy--trade
 minds.
  I nodded.
  "You're right," I said. "You're right."
     Sarda took a deep breath. Relief layered the deter-
 mination in his eyes. For a few uncomfortable seconds
 he struggled to regain the stiff composure of his race.
 "I would estimate that Vesco has littered this area with
 such traps."
     "I should've remembered. Vesco's specialties are
 reactology and reflexology," I told him. "He's out to
 rattle us."
     "And very nearly succeeding," he said, his scowl
 putting me in my place.
    I held my foot up so the insect-laden honey could
drip off, then moved aside as carnivorous plants
slinked out to lick at the vibrations of drops they
hoped were blood. "Yeah . . . sorry. Well, Vesco's a
psychologist. I should have expected he'd use it. Let's
start using our own specialties."
    Immediately, Sarda unrolled the kit and began prov-
ing that he hadn't been entirely unaffected by my
earlier insults either. Evidently he had found his way
through my bitterness to that faint ring of truth at its
core. He'd opened his mind as I'd dared him to and
discovered that he could readjust the receiving mecha-
nisms on the mediscanners to read old-style carrier
waves. A couple of hours work and pop, communica-
tion. Of course, it wasn't as easy as it sounded, but we
did manage to arrange a rough kind of transceiver.
    "It's called a radio," Sarda explained. "Very low
gain vibrations, not very efficient."
    "Efficient enough," I said, fondling the mangled
Feinberger, now removed from its shell and hooked up
with about a dozen spidery additions from pieces of

114

uniform, parts of the electric match, and anything else
we could jury-rig to our purpose. It wouldn't work
very well, but it would work.
    We put it to use almost immediately. Sarda took a
place in a tree high on the escarpment, and I made my
way down into the ravine, hoping against hope that the
three other teams still remained for me to beat. If there
was only one team left, I had already forfeited the
Outlast.
    From his high vantage point, Sarda was able to
pinpoint the positions of the two-man team we'd just
missed, and with his superior ability to judge distance
he helped me zero in on them. In minutes, their
uniforms were stained a satisfying bright blue. Defeat
rose in their faces---I empathized, believe me--but
they weren't allowed to utter a sound, They were
"dead." According to the rules, they sat down right
where they were and the leader engaged his locator
beam. I watched, probably out of paranoia, as they
were unceremoniously beamed up to the monitor ship.
 Now... the Norwegian. And Vesco.
    I had to wait, straining my patience, not to mention
my courage, while Sarda tried to locate the two most
dangerous teams. While on the bottom of the ravine, I
ran into two more of Vesco's unfriendly little traps--
one involving a sizable spider and the other layering
my right arm with needleplants--but my promise to
Sarda held true. I buried my anger and remembered:
Think Vulcan.
    "Piper!" the faint crackle of the receiver buzzed in
my ear.
     I twisted the two metallic fibers that would engage
 my transmitter. "Here."
  "Piper, do you copy?"
     I twisted the fibers tighter and brought the mangled
 unit to my lips. "Affirmative. I copy. Where are
 they?"

115

     "I have spotted Gruegen and his teammate. Take a
 course bearing point-five degrees south. They are
 roughly 200 yards from you. Be on guard."
   "Moving."
     He kept me apprised of their shifts in position as I
 made my way through thorny, steamy jungle toward
 my prey. Finally, in spite of torn clothing and leftover
 needleplant spines, I spied the two blond heads, gath-
 ered my legs under me on a small moss mound, and
 drew my mock phaser.
     In my ear came the faint sizzle of warning. "Piper,
 they're turning toward you."
    I nodded to myself, not taking time to engage the
transmitter. The fronds in front of me started rustling.
They were coming.
  I raised my weapon.
  "Piper! Vesco and his Skorr are behind you!"
  My skin prickled. Behind me! Damn.
    "They're closing on you from both directions,"
Sarda warned, his concern coming through strained
circuits. "You must retreat---quickly! Piper--"
    I could feel them now. That unmistakable, indefin-
able sensation of warning ran up my arms as I tucked
the mock phaser to my chest and hunkered down on
the moss hill, glancing behind me at the bobbing heads
of Vesco and the Skorr. Close enough to see. Not
good.
    "Piper!" Sarda hissed, his desperation breaking
through that fragile Vulcan shell.
    I tore the receiver from my ear and stuffed it into a
pocket, then lay the mock phaser down on the moss
beside me. Folding my legs, I sat down and arranged
my hands in the most unthreatening position possi-
ble-hanging over my knees.
    Vesco and his teammate broke through the ferns
first. They stopped short when they saw me, frozen in
astonishment for an instant. I made good use of that

116

instant; I shrugged despondently at them, then put one
elbow on my knee and rested my chin in my hand.
    Vesco's brow knitted. He glanced at the bird face of
his companion, then grinned in a sort of deflected
victory. As I hoped, he didn't bother to check me for
dye-dart stains.
    The jungle rustled like stiff taffeta. Vesco dropped
his grin and stared. He drew his weapon. The Skorr
took his cue and sank into a shadow, careful of huge
golden wings.
    Dark green jungle p~tterns gave birth to the muscle-
man shape of Gruegen, soon followed by his shapely
scientist. The Norwegian spied Vesco and drew his
weapon with a shout just as a dye dart flashed between
him and the woman. Everyone ducked for cover,
except me. I sat quietly on my moss hill, head in hand,
as dye darts whined in from four directions. It took
every ounce of control I had in me to keep from
reacting. I sat still, tense as drawn string, ignoring the
whistles of darts ringing around me and splattering on
the foliage and rocks. In my pocket, the muffled buzz
of Sarda's frantic calls vibrated faintly.
    A howl from my left accompanied the thud of a dye
dart against a human form. Gruegen rose from the
ferns, his shoulder and the right side of his face bathed
in purple dye. His teammate came out from her own
hiding place, staring at him. In a silent chorus, their
expressions sank.
    Misery crumpling his face, Gruegen wordlessly
drew his locator and signaled to be beamed up. Vesco
emerged from the bushes near me, followed soon by
his scientist, and beamed his unabashed victory as
Gruegen and the woman dissolved into bands of light
and disappeared.
     In his rush of triumph, Vesco never bothered to
 wonder why I too hadn't been beamed up yet. His
 shoulders straightened and he puffed up, believing

117

himself the ultimate winner of the Outlast. He rubbed
his hands around his mock phaser, rather lovingly, I
thought, and grinned at his teammate. Striding fully
into the clearing, he looked at me and opened his
mouth to say something.
That's how he got ultramarine dye all over his teeth.
He blinked, and his eyes widened. Then widened
some more. Arms spread, he dropped his gaze to the
splotch of blue on his uniform. He stared at it. The
Skorr stared at it. They both stared at my mock
phaser, now firmly back in my hand.
    I continued to sit rather sheepishly on my moss hill,
my lips pressed tight. Ali's fair in the Outlast, after all.
    Vesco started to shake. Pure rage rumbled up
through his body. His fists balled up tight. Only the
stern rules of the Outlast kept him from tearing into
me.
    Great golden wings drooped in despair as the Skorr
scientist drew its locator and went to stand beside the
rosy and rabid Vesco. Their last sight of the Outlast as
they were beamed up was little old me sitting on my
moss lump, quietly being the commander of the cham-
pion team.

    I don't know. Three words a Vulcan hates. And I
hated them too when they referred to Sarda's life. That
friendship had been won on the Outlast, lost when I
found out about Sarda's talent for weaponry and un-
knowingly humiliated him by making it known to Star
Fleet, then finally won back when we had stood to-
gether against Admiral Rittenhouse's power-seeking
campaign. I fought to absorb the idea that our relation-
ship might have been cut off before its chance to grow.
I fought not to be jealous of Spock as I stood near him
on Rex's bridge. Spock had had years with Kirk to
cultivate their unique mutual understanding. It seemed
unfair that Sarda and I might be denied the same
chance.

118

    For all the pain it brought me when I recalled the
Outlast, the privileges and honors and parties and
advantages it gave Sarda and me at Star Fleet Aca-
demy, the vividness of that episode brought with it a
glimmer of hope, a faint star of chance to brighten
Rex's dim bridge and sweeten my determination. If
Sarda was dead, I would make sure he hadn't died for
nothing.
If he was alive, I now knew how we could find him.
I moved a few steps forward, to where Mr. Spock
was tensely scanning the energy readouts of the fast-
fading transwarp flux. "Sir," I began.
He turned his head. "Commander?"
"About locating Mornay and the others..."
Sensing something even I, in my numbness, didn't
feel yet, Spock stood up and faced me. When he
spoke, I knew he understood.
  "You have a plan?"

119

Chapter Seven'

"How fallible of me."
          --The Squire of Gothos

 "RAmo? You MEAN like... radio?"
     "That's right, Scanner. Old CalTier waves. Go
 ahead. Do it."
    He gawked at me a moment longer, waiting for the
punch line no doubt, then faced his sensor equipment,
altogether dubious. He touched the console plain-
tively, and gave up before even beginning. Twisting
around, he accused, "You say 'do it' as though all it
takes is spittin' on a twig. I'm not even sure this kind
of equipment can be tuned down that far. You're
talking about a frequency that's lower than a hog in a
waller, you know that?"
    I pointed at the console's transmitting panel and
said, "Try to aim them in the general vicinity of the
transwarp flux, and when we beam down, we can
continue to track them with tricorders."  "But I'm tryin' to tell yawl--"
    "Lieutenant Sandage," Spock interrupted fluidly,
"if you set your frequency balance at submedian, then
gradually adjust the energy level according to the
correct bands, you may find carrier waves accessi-
ble."
    "It'll all have to be manual, sir." Scanner sounded
apologetic. "Otherwise the computer'11 tell us it can't
be done."
 "That's all right," I told him. "Just don't listen to it.
               120

It's like flying an atmosphere craft and keeping altitude
with throttle instead of wing angle."
    Spock nodded. "Correct. If those frequencies are
accessible with these sensors, it will be through energy
power rather than actual adjustment of the wave
bands."
    Scanner threw up his hands. "Okay, okay. S'worth
a shot." He settled down to the tricky adjustments,
which had to be recalibrated every few seconds. "Do I
have any idea what I'm waiting for?"
    "Response," I told him. "If Sarda's alive and in a
laboratory of some kind and picks up those waves,
he'll know who's sending them."
    "That's a 1otta if's." Scanner sighed and wiggled his
fingers before hunching over the sensor console and
searching for the delicate balance of energy and wave
output. So low they were affected even by our move-
ments in the ship's orbit, those waves had to be chased
by hand and eye. A starship's sophisticated computer
sensors could have kept up with them, but Rex's
ragtag system could not do anything so refined. Scan-
ner sat there for an exhausting two hours, painstak-
ingly sending low-gain waves toward the location of
the transwarp flux. As the time passed, I grew more
respectful of Scanner's talents with the sensor equip-
ment as he made adjustments with his fingers that were
even too tiny to show up on the screen. I soon gave up
trying to follow what he was doing and simply sat back
in amazement.
     Below us turned the outskirts of Yelgor City. I was
 dying to get there, to get things going, to find Sarda
 and rescue him, or, if he was dead, to begin dealing
 with his death. Kirk would be along soon, ready to
 deal with Dr. Mornay, yet Spock and I hadn't even
 been able to begin our mission of separating her from
 Perren and Sarda. Time began to sit on me, smothering
 and prickly with responsibility. I'd expected the ap-
 pearance of Spock to siphon the weight of that respon-
 121

 sibility, but it hadn't. Less and less was I able to shift
 away the pacts I made with myself when I accepted
 the stone of command.
    Frustration of this caliber, this feeling of sitting at
the core of a storm yet being completely impotent to
take action, drove me to confront Spock when other-
wise I never would have. He was still trying to pin-
point the transwarp flux origin, even though the waves
had long since dissipated, leaving only the faintest
traces of disruption in the fabric of space. Speaking in
a low voice so as not to bother Scanner, I began, "Mr.
Spock?"
  "Yes, Commander?"
    "Where is Captain Kirk, sir? Is he on his way? Do
we have any clues?"
    Spock's honesty, both of word and expression, was
easy to appreciate. "He may be," he said, swiveling to
face me. "Even he was unsure of his moment-to-
moment plans. I know he was reticent to bring Enter-
prise to Argelius at the outset. He did obviously intend
to join us at some point, but he himself didn't know the
point. Beyond that, I cannot say."
    I nodded, staring at the floor, contemplating.
"Thank you," I said slowly then. "That leaves me free
to move."
    At this, McCoy elbowed his way between us. "How
does it do that?"
    "It gives us two choices," I explained. "Either we
sit and wait for the captain to show up, or we take
action according to what we already know. The cap-
tain wanted us to do one of those, and it can't be the
first choice because he apparently didn't know when
he'd be able to get here. I don't think he'd expect us to
make a decision based on an unknown, so we'H act
based on what we do know." McCoy's brows went up.
 Spock pursed his lips. "Logical."
 From the passenger seat on the port side, Merete
               122

said, "Then it's our move. But what move do we
make?"
    She had to ask, didn't she? I licked my lips, hoping
some revelation would slide out. "Well . . . make
ourselves indigenous to the planet, I guess. Get down
there and start looking. We're not getting very far
sitting around in orbit. Sir, you said you have Argelian
costumes for us?"
    "Yes, aboard my shuttle," Spock said. "Mr. San-
dage and I will remain aboard and continue broadcast-
ing the signal. In the meantime, I shall use connections
in the government of Argelius to arrange for a base
from which you'll be able to prowl the area. The
prefect is already advised of the situation. You should
have no trouble."

    The Argelian prefect's idea of a base was a squalid
little alley cantina deep in Yelgor City's north quarter.
Spock had also arranged jobs for us, so no one would
wonder what three strangers were doing there. At least
we would have a central core to start from.
    I led the way, feeling conspicuous, as Merete and
McCoy followed me through the streets according to
Spock's directions once we'd beamed down in an
unpopulated dock area. Through the narrow, foggy
streets we walked, flanked closely by scowling Gothic
buildings of wood and stone, passing natives and their
guests, the latter consisting of Star Fleet personnel on
shore leave, Klingons and Romulans likewise, and
even the occasional nonhumanoid, though those were
rare. Argelius simply wasn't conditioned to make itself
comfortable to a wide range of life forms. Of course,
even the serene atmosphere couldn't dissolve military
prejudices, much less racial ones. The Fleet people
watched the Klingons and the Romulans, the Klingons
watched the Fleet people, and the Romulans watched
everybody. I felt everyone watching us. It might have
been my imagination. It might have been the veils and
123

the beaded curly-toed slippers. Or the plume pants. Or
the feathers. Purple and chartreuse just weren't my
colors. Somehow I got the feeling the clothing didn't
completely hide our foreignhess.
    "I'll get Spock for this," McCoy vowed, glancing
over his shoulder at a passing group of Argelians who
had just given him the curious eye. Self-consciously he
tugged at the tight brocaded vest and cummerbund.-
Purple wasn't his color either, especially under the
bright orange fez. He looked like an animated piece of
tapestry as he adjusted the shoulder bag that carried
our tricorders.
    "I hope we're not far from this cantina we're sup-
posed to go to," Merete said. "It's damp in the
streets."
    "Don't complain," I told her, briefly scanning her
ankle-length blue robe. "You're the only one of us
who's not dressed up like a tropical bird." I clutched
the wad of flight suit and boots under my arm. Spock
had suggested I leave them behind, but I couldn't
reconcile the idea of staging a phaser raid on extortion-
ists while wearing feathers and veils.
    "This is it," I said, turning down a loud alley and
into a low-slung doorway. Acrid and dim, the cantina
was crowded with laughing patrons. Sagging curtains
decorated each of five walls, then' colors and fringes
faded by smoke and time. The patrons squatted on
cushions or lay on long, low couches, munching con-
fections I wouldn't have touched with a field prod.
Squeaky music twanged from one corner, where a
clutch of musicians wavered to their own questionable
melody, and on a velvet podlure a young girl twisted
and spun in some kind of dance.
    We were barely inside the door when a fat, surly-
looking man approached us, babbling in Argelian, and
grabbed my elbow to drag me farther into the cantina.
  "What?" I blurted. "What do you want?"
 He shook his head in disgruntlement and switched

124

easily to English, practically on the attack for an
Argelian. "You're late! I do a favor for Chamberman
Yiri and what do I get? I'm expected to operate
shorthanded on the first night of the Archtide. You...
take this tray." He shoved a wide metal tray heavy
with confections into Merete's arms and ordered,
"Serve those Klingons over there. Keep them happy.
And you," he said, gesturing to McCoy, "pour more
drinks. Over there."
    Within seconds, I was alone with this charming
round curmudgeon and he was walking me through a
sea of legs and pillows. "It'll be your turn soon. Do
you know the litika ?"
    "I... might," I stammered, stepping over a sleep-
ing Argelian. "Have you seen any Vuicans around
lately?"
    His hands waggled in the air. "Who can tell? Vul-
cans, Romulans, they're all the same." He led me to a
shimmering curtain and told me to stand there until he
came back, which was fine with me. I took the moment
to slip behind the curtain and retrieve my communica-
tor from the folds of the veils, which had sounded a lot
easier when I'd told Spock and Scanner I could hide it
there. The communicator chirped when the antenna
screen flipped up. "Piper to Rex," I said quietly.
  "Spock here."
  "Any change, sir?"
    "None as yet. I am continuing to send the carrier
waves. Since only one of us is needed here, Mr.
Sandage requested to join you on the planet, and I
agreed. He has changed clothing and should be meet-
ing you there within a few minutes. What is Your
situation?"
     "I think we've just been hired on for the season. We
 won't be too conspicuous here. I'll be able to ask a few
 questions, maybe get some answers or a lead to fol-
 low. Sarda's alive and he's in the area--I can practi-
 cally feel him."
                125

    There was a stern, reproving silence after my exu-
berant claim, a kind of logic-to-nonsense wrist slap-
ping, but he didn't make any direct commentsú "Yes.
ú.. Advise me if there is any change of plans. I shall
hail you in thirty minutes for a check-in."
  "Affirmative. Piper out."
    I tucked the communicator into the pocket of my
folded flight suit, dumped the whole wad behind the
shimmery curtain, then slipped back out into the can-
tina, only to get a faceful of chubby proprietor.
    "There you are! I told you to stay here and where
did you go? Behind a curtain. Those cubicles aren't
meant for you. You stay out in the open and do your
job. Well? Go ahead!"
      The music had stopped. The patrons were all look-
ing at me. I blinked back at them.  "Well?" the proprietor urged.
    "Yes .... Well .... "I straightened my veils. The
patrons started banging their hands on squat tablesú
Finally I asked him, "What am I supposed to be
doing?"
    "Doing? Dancing, of course! What do you think
you're dressed for?"
  "Ah. Of course. Sorry."
  "Don't 'sorry.' Dance!"
    From across the cantina, McCoy's eyes became
very wide when I stepped hesitantly onto that velvet
podium. The podium, fringed with silver, looked fairly
nice from a distance, but up close I saw that the
threads were separated and rotting from years of being
trod upon. It felt mushy. I could barely stand on it,
much less dance.
  Dance? Me, dance?
    The pounding grew louder. A gaggle of faces leered
up at me in brutal expectation. Klingons, humans,
Argelians, two Mengenites in the back... not a very
promising group as audiences go.
  The proprietor got impatient and clapped his hands
               126

sharply. The band groaned to life. Their music once
again whined. The audience kept pounding the tables.
    I raised one veiled arm and lowered it, letting the
veil softly fly. Then the other. Two steps left, two right
ú.. dance, huh? Now I could see Merete also frozen in
place, staring at me with the same saucer eyes I was
getting from McCoy. And now there was Scanner at
the doorway dressed in a waiter's ecru shirt and red
vest and holding a tricorder. Wasn't this nice? What a
privilege to have my Star Fleet colleagues on hand to
watch my un-Fleetlike gyrations.
    Whatever I was doing, I was doing it wrong. The
audience howled their complaints, and I tried to im-
prove my twisting to imitate what I'd seen the other
girl doing earlier. Not to much avail. I simply wasn't
trained to move in those combinations. After a few
minutes of this, I managed to find the beat of the tune
they were assaulting us with and was able to improve
my act by making the veils and feathers fly. Eventu-
ally, the audience started to treat me better. It was
probably just sympathy.
    The Klingons at the table to my left began showing
their appreciation by snatching at my veils, and suc-
ceeded in yanking some free before I got possessive
and yanked back. They hooted at my un-Argelian
defiance and raised their mugs of a favorite Klingon
wine involving distilled butterflies. The smell identified
it quite well. They took my reaction for encourage-
ment-as I should have guessed Klingons would.
Their sooty complexions shined in the torchlight, cut
by bright teeth and sharp black beardsú One of them
grasped my ankle.
     "For an Argelian woman, you're a supernova," he
snarled upat me. "Come down here." "Can't," I said. "I'm working."
    "You'll still be working." He stripped off my slip-
per, brought it to his face and started sniffing it while
he leered at me. "tlhlngan Hol Dajatlh'a' ?"
               127

    I didnlt know what he was asking me and wasn't
about to get into a discussion with him anyway. I
twisted my foot, hoping to break his grasp, but he held
fast to my ankle.
"You're not much of a dancer," the Klingon Said.
The only female member of the group threw her
head back and laughed." 'elaS-ngan ghaH." What-
ever she said, they got a roar out of it at my expense.
    The first gorilla pulled harder on my foot. "Kyrtu
calls you a woman of Elas. Is that why you fight? You
don't look like an E!asian!"  More laughter.
    Another male downed the last gulp from a dented
goblet. "There are other things Argelian women can
do, Gelt. She's not working in this place without
qualifications."
    I stopped dancing. I glared down at him, gritting my
teeth to keep in what I was thinking.
    Gelt laughed along with his companions, then
turned that gray face up to me again and gave my ankle
a rough tug. "Enough dancing," he said.
    My eyes grew narrow. My voice rumbled across the
cantina. "Let go of the foot," I suggested, "or you'll
be wearing it."
 The laughter faded. A moment later, the music.
    "I will teach things to you," Gelt said. "Things of
Klingon. Strong things. A salute to things of Klingon !"
He raised his mug and addressed the others, still
holding my foot. "May you die angry !"
 After a group swig, they watched for my reaction.
    My lips grew flat. "Not bad for somebody who just
learned to walk upright."
    He had no misconceptions of my meaning. The grip
on my ankle tightened. In my periphery, the
tavernkeeper had his fists clamped to his mouth in
frozen panic. McCoy was poised for trouble. Scanner
and Merete were out of my line of vision. This wasn't

the time to worry about them. This was the time to
kick the lard out of a Klingon.
    There was no sense in trying to talk my way out of
this; that was clear in the Klingon's eyes. So I closed
them with my other foot--a good, clean, Star Fleet
kick to the bridge of his nose. His hand fell away from
my leg, but the blow that would've floored any human
merely echoed briefly within the misshapen Klingon
skull. Gelt collapsed backward, his face crumpled in
astonishment, but he was soon clawing his way back
to me through a forest of his companions, who were
also grabbing for me. I felt myself going down in a sea
of Klingons, and caught a glimpse of Scanner's. body
flying head-on into the clutch like a giant brown-haired
torpedo.
    Star Fleet self-defense tactics did their best to keep
our heads above those slimy waters, but there were
five of them and only two of us. McCoy was trying to
reach us, but the flood of Argelians who were trying to
escape kept him from making much headway. Merete,
too, was lost somewhere in the rush for the door. A
party of three human vacationers hesitated for a mo-
ment, then cast their lot with Scanner and me, smooth-
ing out the odds a bit, but we still had that awful
Klingon ruthlessness to deal with, as well as their
superior strength. I heard a bone crack somewhere in
the forest of arms and legs before I fully compre-
hended the Klingon bar-fight mode. After that, I quit
playing Star-Fleet fair.
    I pulled ears and gouged eyes and even took a bite
out of a fuzzy forearm. Scanner flew by me at least
twice, neither time in control of his course, and by
now McCoy had discovered the art of smashing bot-
tles over Klingon heads. But Klingon heads are hard,
and the Klingon temper short-fused. Gelt was still
furious and he kept me occupied. I could barely keep
him from getting a grip on me much less worry about

128                                                        129

helping my friends. I landed a few good blows, still
kicking at that tender spot on his forehead where I'd
kicked him before, and this dazed him. He was slow-
ing down, though his copper-gray face was still
screwed up with rage. Where moments ago this had
been only a saloon free-for-all, something had
changed. The Klingon sense of pride had taken charge.
If Gelt got a good hold on me, he would kill me.
    It was a lucky thing that Argelian edicts prevented
the possession of any weapons while on the planet, or
I'd have been dead already. As the Argelians
scrambled into the alley, the cantina slowly emptied
out, leaving only a tangle of humans and Klingons, and
one petrified tavernkeeper who was frantically ringing
an alarm bell. The sound of an alarm on Argelius
usually translated into, "Run in the other direction,"
so if help was to arrive, it wouldn't be soon enough.
    Gelt was circling me. I had managed to get the
podium between us. Roaring, he dived over it, fingers
waggling at my throat. I slithered clumsily to one side,
feeling his scratch rake across my upper arm, and I
tore one of the veils from the waistband of my plume
pants. I jumped up onto the podium and for a frantic
moment lost my balance. Gelt rolled over, but a solid
slam on the ear rocked him back onto his stomach. I
looped the veil around his neck, dropped onto his
back, and twisted.
    He clawed at me, scoring my wrists. I kept pulling.
His throat grew taut against the veil, and he drew
blood on his own neck in an attempt to free himself.
He gagged and spat, then twisted around to grasp the
veil near my hands. Neck muscles stiffening, he made
me believe he wasn't going to let himself black out. So
I snatched up the nearest stone jug and introduced it to
the side of his head. He wavered under me, and at the
first sign of recovery, I clubbed him again. This went
on three, count 'em, three more times. Finally his eyes
rolled UP and he drooped back. As soon as I felt his
130

struggle slacken, I let go of the veil and leaned over
him long enough to be sure he was breathing. It was a
ragged, throaty kind of breathing, but the job was
done.
    I rolled off the podium only to realize that I was
wrong; the job was far from done. Scanner was being
pummeled by a large Klingon, two of the human
vacationers were trying to rescue him while holding off
their own problems, and Dr. McCoy was grappling
with the spitting Klingon woman--and losing. With a
deep breath, I steeled myself for more.
    Hardly had I drawn the breath when the ogling
crowd at the alley door parted and the cavalry sailed
in. Meret~ followed by Mr. Spock, cape flying, and to
my astonishment, Captain Cavalry himselfmKirk.
    Though I was stunned with relief, McCoy knew
exactly what to do. He grimaced with effort and
shoved the Klingon woman straight at Spock, who was
able to down her with a slightly modified version of the
Vulcan nerve pinch. Evidently he'd bothered to learn
how to numb a Klingon nervous system in his years of
dealing with them. Handy data.
    Kirk was not so subtle. He ran headlong into the
fight, took a leap, and bodyslammed two Klingons
right into the tavern wall. He was on his feet before
they had a chance to shake off the surprise. He picked
one, hauled him to his feet, and let fly a classic right
cross that rearranged the Klingon's jawline. In spite of
the victory, I saw the captain wince and shake his
aching hand before turning to deal with the second
Klingon. Number two was quickly dispatched, but it
took an extra punch.
    The cantina was littered with bodies. At every door
and window, Argelian faces goggled at us, amazed at
our willingness to defend ourselves and each other
with physical force. This would keep their gossip lines
buzzing for years.
 Kirk rubbed his knuckles, surveying his happy hunt-
                      131

ing ground. A quick glance around the room gave him
a head count, and he seemed satisfied when he turned
to me. "Ah, Piper. On the job as usual. And looking
dapper."
    I turned red, quite aware of the torn veils, the one
bare foot (which was almost as bad as the foot still
wearing the absurd slipper), the filmy harem pants,
and the scanty top. I would've told him it wasn't my
idea, but that meant having to tell him it was Spock's
idea, and I decided not to do that. Of course, Kirk
wasn't in uniform either. He also wore some version of
Argelian clothing: a simple toast-brown tunic, beige
trousers, and Federation boots. Well, riobody's per-
fect.
 Limply I said, "I think I blew my cover."=
    Captain Kirk raised his brows and blinked. "Yes,
you do seem rather uncovered." He surveyed the
clumps of Klingon. "Well, it was worth it."
    Scanner stumbled to my side, holding his elbow.
"Bet you're a fun date,"

  "Klingons !"
    We all turned abruptly at Merete's warning call as
she stood near the dockside window.
 Kirk took a step toward her. "Where?"
    "Heading this way," she told him. "They must've
heard the noise."
    McCoy joined her and leaned out the window for a
better look.
 The captain asked, "How many, Bones?"
     McCoy pushed himself off the windowsill and
blurted, "Too many!"  "Let's go. Move."
    The captain led us out of the tavern and down the
alley, stepping aside to herd us through a narrow
doorway into the next building, then out again into the
open Argelian night. He'd barely given me time to

132

retrieve my gear, but we got away before the Klingons
discovered us standing over their fallen comrades.
Panting, we slipped behind a huge stone cistern and
knelt there for horrible moments while a barrage of
Klingons thundered past, looking for us and frothing
for revenge. 'We held our breath as their hard-soled
boots clattered down the docks.
    Scanner slid to his knees between Merete and Spock
and pressed his shoulders back against the cool stone.
"Gawd-a-mighty. Klingons really give me the colly-
wobbles. Ugly with a capital ug!"
    "Predictable human reaction," Spock commented. I
watched his expression and McCoy's double take and
decided it was another of those odd Spock-McCoy
barbs that I was only beginning to pick up on.
    I stanched the scratches on my arm with a veil and
turned to Captain Kirk. "Sir, we didn't expect you so
soon."
    He shrugged. "Professor Mornay won't expect me
so soon either. That's our extra playing card. Besides
you, of course."
    "Weirdest game I ever seen," Scanner complained,
wincing as he stretched his arm.
    I pressed on. "What happened when they took you
in for questioning?"
    Kirk shrugged. "I answered them." His casual air
deflated the bureaucratic web he'd probably had to
untangle before making good his promise to meet
Spock here. He hadn't said, of course, that the an-
swers had been truthful--only effective.
    "You could're told me what was going on," I said,
facing the captain, surprised at my boldness and some-
how urged on by it. In that moment of bald honesty, I
was talking to the captain of my starship, the captain
of my schooner, and the captain of my destiny. He
knew what I was feeling. I might as well have the
satisfaction of speaking the words. "It wasn't neces-

133

 sary to leave me holding an empty bag out in the
 middle of an ocean on a ship I didn't know how to pilot
 ... sir."
     He nodded, one shoulder cocked and his brow
 furrowed. "I see. Anything else?"
' I dropped the crumpled flight suit and started peel-
 ing off excess veils. "Well, I could mention something
 about getting stuck in a smelly tavern and being pawed
 by some K!ingon with no neck and a face like a
 macaque...
  "But," he prodded.
     "But... I think I'd rather know what you want us
 to do next."
     "I want us all to fulfill our respective missions. Go
 ahead, Spock."
     Spock shifted as he crouched beside McCoy. In his
 tunic and cape, he seemed forbiddingly natural to this
 guerrilla life-style, as though he only half fit in any kind
 of world. He addressed me directly with his serene
 Vulcan approach, and any other identity but that of
 science officer dropped softly away. ~'I was attempting
 to hail you when the captain beamed aboard unex-
 pectedly from the ship that transported him from
 Earth. You were correct about Lieutenant Sarda and
 your carrier waves."
     Scanner inhaled sharply and grinned. "Did we tree
 him?"
     Spock hesitated, lost for a moment in the colloquial
 assault, then recovered and said, "Yes, we... treed
 him. Shortly before the captain arrived, I began re-
 ceiving low-gain impulses from what is apparently an
 abandoned dairy farm on the northern outskirts of the
 city, just over that rise." He gestured to a shadowy
 ridge just behind a densely populated slum area. In the
 twilight, we could see it clearly. "The pulses were
 regular and definitely geared to be picked up by sen-
 sors attuned to radio waves. Logically, the sender
 could only be Lieutenant Sarda, since those waves are

134

tricky to broadcast. Congratulations on your guess.
We now have a location."
    I slumped back and closed my eyes for a moment.
He was alive. Alive and answering me. Cold and still
since the first transwarp waves had hit Rex, my heart
started beating again. Merete reached over and
squeezed my arm in much-needed reassurance. She
was grinning that silent fairylike grin. He was alive.
    "The Enterprise isn't here?" I blurted, turning to
Kirk.
    "Not yet," he said. "Too conspicuous. Scotty's in
command and the ship is on its way... slowly."
    "A decoy? Mornay thinks you'll be on board the
starship?"
    "Yes. And Dr. Boma is on board. He may be of
some help when it comes down to the wire. He's
worked more closely with these scientists than any of
US."
    I crouched between the cistern and a wooden build-
;ng long enough to squirm out of the harem pants and
back into my flight suit and boots. Ahhh, that felt right.
"So we'll go ahead with our plan to split up into three
teams and separate the scientists, sir?"
    "They'll be easier to handle that way," Captain Kirk
added. "But I'm also counting on your relationship
with Sarda to shed light on Mornay's mental state
before we try to deal with her. We don't want her
pushing the wrong buttons in a panic. With any luck,"
he said, peering over his shoulder at his closest col-
league, "Mr. Spock will be able to pull out his bag of
Vulcan logic tricks with Perren and weaken Mornay's
stand by taking away her support. Her possession of
transwarp loses its potency if she doesn't also possess
Sarda and Perren."
    Fully dressed and loving it, I stepped Out to put on
my boots. "What if you can't reason with her? We
have reason to suspect they're actually building a
transwarp device---"
               135

    "Which makes them a thousand times more danger-
ous." He paused, driving home the seriousness of that
one change. "Spock told me. We can't afford to wait
too long," he said, his voice taking on an abrupt
strength. "Every minute that goes by heightens the
risk that other governments, hostile ones, might get
word of Mornay's plans and descend on Argelius.
We've got to shut her down before that happens. It's
up to you to give that process a strong beginning." The
captain's finger pointed at me in illustration, pinning
the responsibility right back on my shoulders. "Mot-
nay doesn't know you. That's an advantage," he said.
"Use it."
    "Aye, sir, I'll do my best." Of course, I was really
saying that I would fake it to the best of my abilities. I
hoped he took it as that kind of promise. Nothing was
guaranteed.
    "We'll go in teams," he said, calculatedly making
eye contact with each of us as he spoke. "Piper, you
and Sandage go first. Isolate Lieutenant Sarda and get
him out of the red zone. That'll leave Spock and me
free to move in on the others."
    Charming .... I get to go first. "How are we going
to pinpoint the location without the ship's sensors?"
    Spock retrieved a tricorder from Merete, who had
kept her presence of mind during our foray with the
Klingons and made sure our equipment got out of
there safely. Checking the tuning, Spock then handed
the tricorder to Scanner. "These tricorders have been
adjusted down to the carrier wavelength. There's in-
sufficient power to send the waves, but the tricorders
can now receive them adequately to home in on the
source. The signal will be faint. You'll have to con-
stantly tune in. It may be tedious."
    Scanner shrugged. "They don't call me Scanner for
riothin'." His eyes made a self-conscious flick and he
added, "sir."
  "We'll give you forty-five minutes to get into posi-
                       136

tion outside their compound," Captain Kirk said. "At
that point, Mr. Spock and I will create a diversion,
giving you the opportunity to get inside unnoticed."
His tone, abrupt and poignant, insisted on successú
"It's critical that each of you understand. Don't under-
estimate the gravity of this situation. Those scientists
ú . . each of us . . . even this entire planet are
expendable. Mornay has to be stopped, even if the
cost is all of our lives. Understood?" He paused, a
long, measured pause until he received the depth of
awareness from us that he demanded. With a nod, he
said, "Good luck."
 The clock started ticking again.

137

Chapter Fight

"There are some things that transcend even the discipline
of the Service."
                      --Amok Time

 IT TOOK US almost thirty minutes to wind our way
 through the Argelian slums and up that rise to the
 dairy farm. A motley collection of old wooden shacks
 and stone-processing buildings, the farm also now
 possessed an incongruous sophistication: guards.
    "How many?" I asked as Scanner crouched beside
ú me in the nearby overgrowth.
     He turned his tricorder and squinted at the screenú
 "Twelve or more. These buildings are armed with
 screens. Sensors can't penetrate, but I read twelve
 guards on this side. You think they're Argelian?"
     I smirked at him. "Not if Mornay's worth her salt.
 Look at those phaser rifles."
     "Yeah, so much for Argelian law. Those guys don't
 look very affectionate, do they?"
     "They look like hired guns to me," I said. "Mornay
 must've scraped the bottoms of some seedy bar-
 rels."
     "Tell you what . . . they got a sensor wall around
 this place that's steady as a docked ship. A butterfly
 couldn't get in without them findin' out."
   "But it isn't a force field..."
   "Negative, just sensors."
   "We only have twelve minutes before the captain

and Spock make their diversion. Let's find a door to
target."
    "What kind of a diversion you think the Captain'll
come up with?" Scanner asked as he followed me in a
wide arch through the surrounding trees and reddish
Argelian scrub growth.
    "Who knows?" I answered. "He'll use whatever's
at his disposal. The ship he came in, the ship Spock
came in... maybe even Rex. Whatever it is, it'll be
fast and sudden. We'll have to be ready."
    "We're ready for anything," he said with a little
snarl of confidence.
    "This is a good place," I said, hunching down and
scanning the farm area below. "On the far side from
the city... only one door, and only three guards. See
any others?"
 "Yup, right behind that wall. Two of 'era."
 "Where?"
 "Next to that lopsided shed."
    "Oh... I see them," I said, peering down the grade
at the guards as they lazily paced. "Look at their
clothes. All different. And they're all humanoid, too.
Quick and good with hand-held weapons."
"Those scientists ain't takin' chances, are they?"
"No," I said, feeling the weight again. "They're
not." I gazed over the buildings, plugging myself into
the faint lights that shone from tiny windows. Those
were probably set up as labs, probably set up quickly
and without safety measures. Sarda would be in one of
them, confined somehow. Each of those thoughts
made me stiff with worry. If the scientists, in their rush
to produce a transwarp device and up their ante, could
have one "accident," then certainly they could have
more. Sarda wouldn't be safe as long as he was forced
to cooperate with them.
    The three stone buildings were attached to one
another with lath-ribbed breezeways covered with

138                                                          139

some kind of tarp. The only opening on this side of the
compound was a heavy wooden double door, warped
by time and the elements, and guarded by two sentries
with phaser rifles.
    "Any time now," I breathed. Captain, make it a
good show for me.
    Soon phasers would lance from the sky, or perhaps
he would use photon torps for a brighter effect. A
distraction, he said. If I was in Kirk's position, I'd
have drawn the guards away by hitting a target down
the glen, near enough to see very well and far enough
to get the guards out of my way. Nervously, I glanced
at the sky.
    "Are you ready?" I asked Scanner, more out of
need for the sound of a voice, even my own.
    ú The night was dead quiet. The two nearest planets in
the Argelian system wheeled blue and pink overhead,
conflicting with the two moons for attention. "Yeah,
I'm ready," he whispered, also watching the sky.
    "Any time," I said again. I licked my lips and
pushed my mind right through that door. All I had to
do now was join it. "Any minute."
  "I'm still ready."
  "Good... good..."
  "Wish we had phasers."
    "Use your imagination," I scoffed. "What did they
do before phasers were invented?"
 He shrugged. "They used photons."
    A smirk was the best I could manage for his com-
ment. I watched the sky. It was time. Where was the
captain?
    Fleeting and horrible, the idea struck that Scanner
and I might be in the wrong place, about to break into
the wrong compound. Could that be it? Was I screwing
up already? Frantically I started scanning the country-
side, looking for the right compound or some signal of
Kirk's diversion, but... nothing.
 Besides, why would they have phaser rifles if this
               140

wasn't the right place? Right, right, that made sense.
  "Hey, Piper?"
  "What?"
 "You see what I see?"
 I swung around to him. "Where?"
    "Yonder." He pointed down at the compound and
the slope behind it.
    I squinted through the purple Argelian night, trying
to home in on a strange snorting noise that was groan-
ing its way up the slope. A moment later a score of fat
animal faces popped up over the hill, followed by
!umbering gray bodies, then more faces and more
bodies. Resembling, more than anything, a cross be-
tween Earth rhinoceroses and those clodheaded mud-
pigs discovered lurebering around Rigel Four about a
century ago, they were Argelian currbucks. Big, genr
tie, and clumsy, they shook their horns in confusion
and gallumphed toward the farm. Nobody would ever
have bothered to keep them around except that their
milk made up about 90 percent of Argelius's export
trade, considered a delicacy for its alcoholic effects
without the usual hangover. The animals themselves
were born with a case of industrial strength stupidity.
    "Warthogs!" Scanner blustered. He watched in as-
tonishment as three chubby Argelian shepherds franti-
cally waved prods at the animals, evidently trying to
get them under control, but to no avail. The currbucks,
wide-eyed and snorting in panic, thundered over the
crest of the hill and headed straight for the guarded
farm area.
    We watched, tense and unsure, as the currbucks
lumbered right through the compound's sensor
screens and set off the alarms. The night filled with
flashing lights and whooping klaxons. One by one, the
guards around the compound ran to help herd the
curtbucks away from the farm. Eventually, when it
was clear the herd was out of control, when currbucks
were running snout-first into the compound walls in
               141

blind panic, even the guards at the rear door drifted
away toward the scampering herd.
  Scanner stared downward. "Was that it?"
    "I don't know," I said quickly, tensed on bent knees
and ready either to go or stay, or go... or... "What
do you think?"
  "I don't know. What do you think?"
  "What do you think?"
      "You're the one who's always tryin' to think like the
captain. You tell me! Would he send hogs after us?"
  "Maybe that's it."
  "We can go if you wanna go..."
  "Maybe we should go."
  "But what if that wasn't it?"
  "But what if it was?"
  "You think it was?"
  "Yeah. Yeah. Let's go."
    We went. A diversion is a diversion. And 100 Arge-
lian currbucks can be plenty diverting.
    The mercenaries were shouting at each other, be-
cause with mercenaries there's usually too much ego
to elect any one leader, and they made a silly spectacle
trying to direct an impossible roundup. By the time
Scanner and I reached the door, the klaxons and
flashing lights had thoroughly terrorized the currbucks
and the guards were sufficiently distracted with what
they thought was just an accident from a neighboring
farm. With a last glance over our shoulders, we slipped
inside the wooden doors and closed them tightly be-
hind us, locking out the flashes and most of the
sounds.
     The silence of danger closed in around us. My skin
quivered with anticipation.  "Lock it," 1 said.
 Scanner pulled the bolt with a shaking hand.
    The hallway was simple, made of stone blocks,
unadorned except for small filament lights that cast a
cold glow.

142

     "I can't believe that worked!" Scanner gasped.
 Until then, I hadn't noticed how nervous he really
 was. He gawked at me.  "What?"
  "The bit with the hogs!"
     "Well, it wouldn't have except that they didn't
 know we were coming," I said.
    Only then did we sense the presence at the end of
the hallway. We paused, looked at each other, then
turned and stared into the muzzle of a phaser.
  From the end of the hall, a soft voice emerged.
    "Greetings, Commander Piper. Your presence is
most gratifying."

    There was no mistaking him. Even among his own
kind, lost among the people who bred him and taught
him so thoroughly to fish the ice patterns of the mind,
he would have stood out. Only for an instant was he a
stranger to me. Unfamiliarity lasted no more than a
second. Suddenly, I knew himmpersonally, intensely.
    He carried the gravity of the situation with polished
Vulcan composure. His hair, a mass of soft ebony
waves, was longer now than it had been in the photo-
graph Spock had shown us. It fell over his shoulders,
drawing attention down to a splendidly sculptured
tunic of sage-green quilt, and up, to graceful back-
swept ears and canted eyes. The eyes--they were pale ú
gray, almost silver, striking in raven hedges of lashes
and upswept brows, and they held an undefined wild-
ness. The deeper I looked into them, the more surely I
saw that touch of self-indulgence, even turbulence.
Vulcan ways could bridle him, but only to a certain
point. He wore his attire, his long hair, his Vulcanness,
and his independence like a crown.
    Perten raised an arm in a beckoning gesture. Dol-
man sleeves on the surcoat, slashed with crescents of
silver hiding between quilted green panels, immedi-
ately created the illusion of a cape. His beautiful

               143

clothes might have seemed pretentious--he had obvi-
ously been well paid for his talents--had it not been for
a bawdrick of platinum clasps sloped across his hips,
enameled with the cool azures and greens Vulcans
dream of as they mediate on their hot red planet. There
were chips of semiprecious metals in the belt that
caused a faint glitter, but all were very small and
tasteful, providing subtle reminders of Vulcan heri-
tage. Only the phaser in his left hand, held casually
downward, but ready, jarred the image we saw before
US.
    Embarrassment made me resist Scanner's glance. A
dozen questions flashed into my mind, all beginning
with "how."
    I swallowed hard, straightened my spine, and
walked forward. Scanner stayed behind, his hand on
the door bolt.
    "I greet you, Commander," Perren said. "I presume
you wish to speak to Sarda. I shall escort you to him.
There are automatic defenses that will injure you if
you go unaccompanied."
    He raised his arm again and stepped backward,
gesturing down a dim corridor. The phaser also came
up just enough to maintain the subtle intimidation.
Only his eyes spoke now~
    In my defeat, so sudden and quick, I couldn't think
of anything to say to him. What does prey say to its
conqueror? My throat was tight with anguish. I
pressed my lips and moved forward.
    Perren herded us both into a small laboratory annex.
High stone walls were lined with computer crates,
discarded equipment, and storage boxes. Two sturdy
folding tables held more equipment and stacks of
computer spools.
    "You will remain here," Perren said. "I advise you
strongly against attempting to escape. This farm has
been impregnated with rather sophisticated defense
devices that will be unmerciful should you encounter
               144

them. You must be confined, of course, but I have no
desire to see you injured."
    Scanner turned his back on Perren and leaned to-
ward me. "This is the bad guy?"
    I cleared my throat. "We're only here because of
Sarda," I said, hoping the lie couldn't be discerned in
my tone of voice. With a little luck, I could deflect
their attention from whatever Captain Kirk and Mr.
Spock would be doing next. "I don't care about any-
thing else. Where is he?"
    Perren bowed his elegant head, tipped one shoulder,
and punched a button on a portable communications
unit. "Sarda."
    Breath froze in my lungs. Beside me, Scanner
tensed.
  "Yes," came a voice that was chillingly familiar.
 I stared at the corn unit as though it had bitten me.
    Perren spoke quietly, but with poignance. "Have
you completed repairing the circuit usher?"
    "Very nearly. 1 will need your assistance to recali-
brate."
    My chest tightened as I heard his voice. Mornay and
Perren might have brought Sarda here against his will,
but I knew very well there was no physical threat that
could make a Vulcan work against his will. Perten
knew that too. His eyes touched me as he spoke into
the eom unit. "Your visitors are here now."~
    There was a pause. My mind screamed in an effort
to define that long moment. The communications unit
beneath Perren's hand zoomed up and swelled to fill
my field of vision. My eyes blurred.
    "Very well," Sarda responded distantly. "I shall be
right there."
    It ended with a heartsickening click. Perren straight-
ened and observed us coolly. I wondered if he could
see my turmoil, the pain I felt as the idea rammed
home that Sarda might actually be here voluntarily. He
wasn't a prisoner... he was free to move around. My

               145

mouth clamped tight and my whole body went torpid. I
was forced to stand there and add up the obvious. A
trap.
 A trap... a trap.
    In my periphery I saw Scanner looking at me with
concern, but I couldn't respond. I couldn't move. The
deep wound burned.
There was a noise in the hallway. A faint shuffle.
He appeared. Amber eyes struck me like a hard
wind. He wore only his standard Fleet uniform, the
tenne gold fabric catching lights from his brassy hair,
as though nothing had happened to spoil his right to
wear it. His brow was slightly furrowed even before
we spoke. He strode past Perren with familiarity that
hurt me and stopped before reaching us. His lips
parted.
    Scanner burst out from behind me, clutched Sarda's
collar, and rammed him backward into a wall. Sarda's
arms flared outward, but he did nothing to resist the
attack as Scanner growled, "You mule-eared son of a
Romulan, I oughta pin you up like a fish !"
  Perten took one step, then wisely stopped.
    Sarda accepted Scanner's acid glare and hot breath
with a calmness that said he had expected it. "Things
are not as they seem, Judd," he said quietly.
    "They seem dang plain to me, you rock-hearted
rat," Scanner seethed.
    Sarda shifted his eyes to me. With his Vulcan
strength he could have thrown Scanner off like a
snowflake, but he waited under that malicious grasp
and did nothing.
    I moved up beside them, making no effort to get
Scanner under control. He was acting out my most
frightening feelings, giving vent to a piece of myself I
was just as glad not to see right now. Even with
Scanher's fists jarred up against his throat, Sarda
merely gazed at me, and I at him.
  "We thought you needed us," I said. Obviously, I

146

was struggling. The quiver gave it away. I wished I
could be Vulcan too, so I wouldn't have to feel this.
But capped inside this human casing, the anguish
bubbled to the top.
  "There are things I must tell you," he said.
     Scanner bumped him harder against the wall again.
 "You mean explain, right?"
  Perren came closer. The phaser was raised now.
    "No," Sarda said to him, bringing a hand up to his
colleague, his mentor. "No need. Please leave us."
    The phaser went down, but cautiously. The other
Vulcan nodded once in acknowledgment of Sarda's
right to privacy even above his right to safety. "As you
wish."
    When Perten left, closing the door behind him, the
tension remained.
  "Okay, Points," Scanner growled, "start tawkin'."
    In a rare tactile moment, almost in relief, Sarda hung
his hand on Scanner's arm. He was still looking at me.
    Moments ticked by. The silent communication con-
tinued.
      When it had done all it could, words had to come. I
took a deep breath and swallowed. "Scanner."
  "You gotta be kiddin'."
  "Back off, please."
  "Not till I get what I want."
  "You'll get it. Back off."
    He hated what I asked. Perhaps he even hated the
fact that I wasn't really ordering him off, but just
asking him, friend to friend. Somehow that made it
different, more potent. With one more threatening
bump against the wall, he let go and backed away.
Suddenly it was almost as though Sarda and I were
alone on a rock somewhere in the middle of nothing.
    Sarda lowered his hands slowly to straighten his
tunic. Still we gazed at each other in that uncomfort-
able knowing silence. The answer was there: he was
no prisoner. If he started out that way, it hadn't lasted.
               147

On top of the pain of having been betrayed by my
friend came the hurt of being overshadowed in our
friendship, being displaced by Perten. I'd been con-
gratulating myself for a bond that might have already
become secondary.
    I dug deep, and found my voice. "Why did you
answer our carrier signal if you knew we were walking
into a trap?"
    The complexity of the situation shone in his eyes.
"It was not I who answered your signal," he said. "It
was Perren."
  "Because you told him."
    Even through the Vulcan shields, he flinched. The
misery now showed itself in his eyes, too, but for
different reasons. With effort, he went on. "I would
never have told him. I hoped you would know me
better."
     Guilt swarmed in. We both felt it, both felt victim-
 ized by the situation.
     "There's no other explanation," I said. If I was
 wrong, at least the truth would have to come out now.
 Insult was a strong medicine.
     He didn't respond immediately. He seemed embar-
 rassed. With a momentary glance at the floor, he
 steeled himself to tell us things no Vulcan would
 ordinarily volunteer--unlesS the reasons were gravely
 important to him.
     "Perren knew about you because he knows me," he
 struggled. "Through our training meids, he has come
 to know you... what to expect from you. When the
 stampede diverted our sensor system and the guards,
 he knew there was a 98 percent probability it was
 you."
     The effort of saying that in front of Scanner, much
 less to me if we had been alone, drained him. For a
 moment his breathing was ragged. He quickly recov-
 ered, though, and contained his discomfort.

148

    With a tremble of relief, I continued, "And the
signal we sent?"
    Fortified somewhat, he answered, "Perten also un-
derstands about the Outlast. He had no trouble inter-
preting the appearance of the carrier waves."
    Behind me, Scanner slumped back to sit on one of
the tables and hung his head, disgusted. He crossed his
arms and heaved a rumbling sigh.
    "We were worried about you," I said to Sarda. "I
thought you'd been kidnapped. Are you all right?"
    "I'm fine," he admitted, even though I got the feel-
ing he would much rather have given me the answer
I'd hoped for: that he'd been shanghaied at phaserpoint
after a grueling ambush and beaten into cooperating.
  "You weren't kidnapped," I concluded.
    "Not precisely, no. I . . . elected to come. I am
needed here."
    "You're helping Mornay and Perren hold the galaxy
hostage?"
    He bristled. "I am not helping them, per se," he
insisted. "I designed the correct containment equip-
ment for transwarp energies. I alone know how to use
the safety and backup systems properly. Mornay is
attempting to build a transwarp device. Had I allowed
them to build the device without my help, I would
have been endangering countless lives on this planet. I
could not... do that." The weight of responsibility
was plainly still pullinghim in two different directions.
He was exhausted. "The experiment is too delicate for
me to ignore. There has already been one slippage, but
I managed to deflect the waves into space at the last
moment."
    "You bet you did!" Scanner exploded. "And we
were right in the middle of 'em when they came
through!"
    Sarda stared at him. His face went ashen. He even
stopped breathing. I hadn't quite realized the depth of

149

the transwarp danger until he supported himself on the
edge of the table and physically fought for control. He
won, but he had to close his eyes to do it.
    Even Scanner was affected by the sight. With a
shake of his tousled head, he sighed, "Damn it,
Points."
    Sarda's brassy head dropped slightly. He gazed at
the table, ashamed, yet committed.
    "In other words," I continued, "you didn't elect to
come at all. They blackmailed you. Your inaction
would have cost lives, so you came with them."
  "Yes," he said softly. He didn't look up.
    Silence settled around us like fog. Without taking a
step, we waded through it.
    I was the first to move. I strode to the table, beside
Sarda, turned and leaned against the edge. Now only
inches separated us. When I looked up, so did he.
My words were careful, sincere. "I understand."
If there was anything more, any lingering regret or
guilt, we beamed it out. If Sarda had betrayed us, I
didn't want to know about it. There was no profit in
repaying a mistake with another mistake.
    He gathered himself with a solemn nod. "You're
wise," he said. His gratitude was there, but sheltered.
Neither of us made any attempt to uncover it further.
    "Tell me about Perren," I asked. "What makes him
tick?"
    Sarda blinked, confused by the slang, then remem-
bered what it meant and tried to find the best words to
explain a complex individual. "You saw him," he said,
as though that explained something. "He is supremely
in charge of himself. He believes in the rationality of
Vulcan philosophy, but he cannot abide the Vulcan
tenet of not making moral judgments, even rational
ones. Like Vice Admiral Rittenhouse, Perren believes
there is an overwhelming moral difference between
Federation philosophy and those of the Klingons,
Romulans, and the handful of minor hostile powers.
               150

He believes the illogic lies in ignoring the differences."
    "Are you telling me he doesn't believe in the Vulcan
philosophy of pacifism?"
    Sarda's eyes flared in a wave of frustration. Maybe I
didn't completely understand Vulcan ways, but now
wasn't the time to chastise me for it. He realized that
and continued, "Even on Vulcan, logic continues to
evolve. Minor points in logic can extrapolate into vast
differences in philosophy. Contrary to common belief,
there are those among my people who do not accept
the Vulcan system of pacifism. Things do change,
Piper," he said, raising a hand to emphasize his point.
"Even Spock was a renegade at one time. He dis-
agreed with cloistered Vulcan ways. Since then, the
Vulcan patterns of logic have grown outward to in-
clude our place as a major Federation contingent.
Someday, Perren's ideas may be accepted, as Spock's
have."
    Scanner crossed his arms over One knee and argued,
"That don't excuse putting the whole galaxy on the
edge of a cosmic scramble, bud."
    Sarda struck him with a deadly look. "No," he
snapped, "it does not. But even pacifism has violent
results when those who embrace it refuse to defend
others' rights to peace." His tone was sharp, carrying
echoes that defended himself as well as Perren. The
flare faded then, quite abruptly, and humility returned.
He was troubled; it was easy to see.
    "You're saying he believes Rittenhouse was basi-
cally right," I said. "That moral unity has to be
established, even by force. Right?"
    "All Vuicans have the same basic beliefs," he went
on, making it suffice as his answer. "But the right to
individualism includes the right to disagree. Unfortu-
nately, that also means there is disagreement on how
to achieve the goals of peace. Perren's talents as an
applied scientist have given him comfort all his life,
and he feels an acute awareness of those who have no

151

such opportunities because of their governmental sys-
tems. He feels a responsibility for the oppressed peo-
ples of the galaxy and wants to bring down the govern-
ments that oppress them. He . . . thinks it will be
simple."
    I saw Sarda's embarrassment for Perren as he
spoke, once again staring into the tabletop, unable to
meet my eyes. This, however, was no time for delica-
cies. If Sarda had come here and was staying here out
of loyalty to Perren, I would have to rupture that bond
enough to get Sarda back. Our friendship, and the
success of our missionwthat peace he spoke of so
reverently--depended on it. Time would come later
for kindness.
    "He's wrong, Sarda," I said, slicing across the lines
of tolerance. "His mistake is assuming the Klingons
and others will automatically give in when they're told
the Federation will use the power of transwarp against
them. He doesn't think they'll fight back against im-
possible odds. He doesn't understand irrationality.
Am I right?"
 Reluctantly, he admitted, "You... are correct."
      "And Mornay. She wants power as much as Perren
wants peace."  "Yes."
    "And he doesn't see through Mornay any better
than he sees through irrationality. He doesn't under-
stand why anyone would simply want power, because
it's an emotional goal."  "Yes..."
  "And where do you stand?"
    He stiffened. His shame deepened. I had succeeded
in putting him on the spot. My appearance here, and
my dedication to my own mission, nailed him down.
Would he come with me, or stay with Perren?
    "Where he stands doesn't matter anymore," came a
harsh voice from a corner behind Scanner.

152

    Sarda and I turned abruptly. Scanner slid off the
table and whirled around. Several guards stood there,
sighting down their phaser rifles at us. They flanked a
stout woman with sharp, flashing eyes framed by a
bowl of dark gray hair. Her mouth was curled into a
forbidding grin, a sign of victory, as she took a few
steps toward us. Comfortably flanked by her guards,
Ursula Mornay had us at a stunning disadvantage.
    She had aged considerably since the photo we'd
seen aboard Rex. Now her hair was peppery with the
years, her features harder, her small blue eyes creased
with lines and time. Her shoulders were slightly
stooped, but her youth had not been entirely sacri-
ficed. She still appeared strong and steady as she held
a phaser on us, evidently not satisfied to put her trust
completely in her hired guards.
    "You've done good work, Sarda," she said, still
grinning. "Plenty well enough that we can t/~ke over.
Now it's only a matter of time before I have all I
need."
  "What is it you need?" I asked.
    Her quick eyes flashed at me. "You'd love to know,
certainly. So you're Sarda's bold rescuers. Well
enough. I don't need him anymore."
    Sarda's brow creased and he stepped forward, put-
ting himself between Mornay and us. "You dare not
activate the flux device without my safety systems,"
he said with a startling emphasis.
  "I have your systems, don't I? I don't need you."
  "Professor, you cannot--"
      "I'm putting you away for safekeeping. If I need
you again, I'll have you. But under control."  "And my friends?"
    "Your friends' lives will guarantee your coopera-
tion. The logic of it is simple enough even for a Vulcan,
isn't it?"
  I thought of what Spock had told us about her, about

153

her tunnelbound view of politics and her hunger for
power. Spock had postulated that Professor Mornay
didn't understand the true consequences of her
actions. With a little luck, I could manipulate that.
Deep breath... and dive.
    "Professor," I began, "you're in great danger here.
You're too far out and too close to contested space for
the Federation to protect you. If you throw the
transwarp technology up for bid way out here, there's
going to be--"
    "I know what there's going to be," she said. The
grin widened.
  "And you don't care?"
    "I have everything under control, don't I?" she
said. Quite plainly, she agreed with herself, and that
was the only person she cared to consult.
    I took a step. "And where does Perren fit in? Does
he understand the repercussions of your plan?"
    She shrugged, her little mouth twisting. "Perren's
ideas are quaint. He has no real perception of the
scope of possibilities within my grasp, now does he?
Why should he? He only cares about his work, and I
let him do his work. I'm the only one who lets him. I
do the thinking and he does the building. He doesn't
argue with me. It's a good working relationship."
  "For you," I said.
    "Where else can he go?" She paced to our right,
keeping the phaser leveled. "He wanted to force the
Federation to look at our device, to realize the poten-
tial. I want the same thing. Except that I want the
whole galaxy to realize the potential. Scope, you see. I
said that before. Scope." Her tiny eyes narrowed with
excitement at the idea and for a few moments she was
seeing her vision of the future instead of us.
    In a bold gamble, I decided to test the vision. I
moved toward her.
 And stopped shortmher phaser twitched and her

154

eyes cleared. Behind her, the guards' phaser rifles
snapped up. My reflection wavered in a half-dozen
cross-hair sights.
 So much for that theory.
    "Oh, Piper, you're not that silly, are you?" Mornay
taunted. "You're too military, aren't you? You think
dreamers can't be sensible, can't see the whole pic-
ture. Well, you're wrong!" Her tone became a bark,
her eyes sharp as fangs. "Scope! Once my device is
tested, I'll be a major bargaining force in the new
Federation."
 "You sound like Rittenhouse," I accused.
    "He had his plans. He failed. Now the turn is mine.
The starship will be here soon, and I willdemand that
Captain Kirk act as the Federation's emissary. When
we meet, it will be on equal ground." Her tone was
casual, but her manner had a cruciality about it. Not
the kind that could be argued with. Even Rittenhouse
appreciated the capabilities of his enemies. It seemed
Mornay didn't. That trait made her wilder, more dan-
gerous. I closed my mouth and stiflened my jaw,
determined not to argue with her. It was plainly a
waste of time. Kirk was right to save her for himself to
deal with. She didn't take me seriously. Not yet.
    She turned slightly when Perren walked in behind
her, threading his way through as the guards parted for
him, but her attention stayed with us.
    Immediately I changed my course and raised a hand
to him. My own impotence struck me when I saw my
hand trembling. I had to force myself to speak. "Per-
ren, are you sure you understand what you've gotten
yourself into? Do you know that Professor Mornay
intends to ransom transwarp to the highest bidder?
Have you thought about the lives that would be lost in
a cosmic scramble?"
 Mornay laughed out loud at my prattle of questions.

155

Perren merely inclined his head. "I have thought it
out," he said simply. "The resulting advantages are
worth the risks."
    "But there is a moral imperative even more impor-
tant," I told him. "Would you have transwarp and the
trilithium technology fall into Tholian hands? Or Ro-
mulan hands? Or Klingon hands?"
    His angular eyes swept toward Mornay, though he
didn't turn.
    "Give it up," I implored, "before it gets too big to
control. Transwarp can do great good under the right
control. Don't make it a volleyball. She can't do
anything without you and she knows it. Don't cooper-
ate with her."
    For an instant, a fleeting and definite doubt crossed
Perren's emotionless face. His brows came together
just that fraction of an inch, enough to tell me my
words struck a disharmonic chord he recognized and
feared. His chin lowered a fraction, cementing the
flicker of uncertainty in our minds. Even Mornay saw
it.
    "I have... had to wrestle with my motivations,"
Perren admitted. "There is not always a right and
wrong to choose between. Some circumstances re-
quire a choice between a wrong and a wrong. I have
struggled with myself, but a commitment requires
decision, which I made long ago."
    "Then decide again," I prodded. "Isn't there honor
in altering logic when the patterns of facts change?"
    Mornay laughed at me again, a sound that could
have been pleasant in other circumstances. She nod-
ded at Perren.
    "You'll cooperate," she told him. "You've put fif-
teen years of your life into this project. The risks
aren't so great that you'll abandon it and give up the
chance to bring total peace to the galaxy, are they?"
She turned to us again and deflated Perren's impor-
tance by talking about him as though he wasn't here.
156

"How would he go back to Vulcan and explain to his
family and his sponsors that he sacrificed galactic
unity to a theoretical risk? The humiliation would be
too great3'
    Affected by the stalled logic and the danger of losing
Perren to Mornay's cooing, Sarda stepped forward to
address his mentor directly. "You must reconsider,
Perren," he said. "There are acceptable moral rea-
sons_?,
    Mornay opened fire on him. Phaser-stun hit him full
in the chest, catapulting him backward over a table.
His arms and legs convulsed as he struck a wall.
Scanner plunged in to catch him, barely keeping him
from slamming to the floor. When I flinched toward
them Mornay moved between into my path. I could do
nothing but look on, quaking in the realization that the
Vulcan friend I'd come here to rescue was now a
tangled, tingling, !imp symbol of Mornay's violent
nature.
    For a horrid instant as the phaser bolt struck Sarda,
I thought the weapon was set to kill. I hadn't come
here to get Sarda killed. The stun setting at least
proved that Mornay was sincere about using Sarda's
abilities again if she needed them. She wasn't ready to
kill him. Or perhaps that was for Perren's benefit. If he
hadn't been here, might she indeed have killed?
Her zeal to use that phaser kept the threat alive.
"You see?" she said. "I do not play." She warned
me off with a wave of the phaser. She must have seen
something, some active fury, in my eyes that even I
wasn't aware of. When she once again had control, she
eyed Perren. "Our goals will be realized. Things will
settle our way3'
    Sensing the end of this dubious conversation, I
opened my mouth to say something, anything, that
would keep Mornay here and bfiy time for Captain
Kirk to act. My lips parted, and imagine my surprise
when I chirped like a communicator.
               157

  Every muscle in my body locked up.
     Mornay blinked. "Of course!" she said. "Help from
 outside! I should have expected that, shouldn't I?"
 She turned to bark at one of the guards. "Find the
 communicator and bring it to me."
     Easily done. A moment later, Mornay possessed
 both my communicator and Scanher's tricorder. She
 held the communicator and waited, and sure enough it
 chirped again. Kirk's signal! The check-in!
     Scanner, still holding Sarda against his shoulder,
 tried to contain the bugging of his eyes and delib-
 erately bit his lip.
 I pressed my knuckles into my thighs. Now what?
 Mornay came to me and held up the communicator.
 "Answer them. I'm sure you know what not to say."
 There was hunger and victory in her tone. She was
 about to find out who we were working with, how
 powerful we were.
     Sweat trickled down my neck. The captain would
 give himseft away when I answered that signal. I
 pressed my lips tight. My eyes stung.
    Mornay caught the whiff of defiance. Without a
pause, she made dramatic affair of switching her
phaser to the "disrupt/kill" setting and turned it on
 Scanner and Sarda. Her expression said the rest.  I took the communicator from her.
  Scanner tightened his grip on Sarda. "Piper..."
     His message was clear enough. Find another way,
 and fast.
     There was no other way. Think fast--that's what
 heroes do in these kinds of situations. So why was I
 still clicking along at sublight? With a shallow breath, I
 put my trust in the captain and flipped the antenna
 shield up. "Piper here. Is that you, Merete?"
     The name shot from my lips a little too sharply. I
 could only hope Mornay would attribute it to my
 nerves.

158

    A faint shuffle from the receiving end accentuated
the tension as we waited for response. Then--
 "Yes, this is Merete. Where are you, Piper?"
    I took a deeper breath, all primed for a sigh of relief,
then remembered the sigh would tell Mornay someø
thing. I stood there like a balloon, letting my breath
out so slowly that I started turning red. "We're in one
of the lab buildings," I said, stalling.
    There was a pause. In my mind, a softly etched face
stood beside her and told her what to say.
 "Have you isolated Sarda?" she asked carefully.
 "He's... with us."
    Mornay's phaser jerked toward my friends in warn-
ing. The hints would have to stop, or Scanner and
Sarda were finished. I'd never learned to lie, to bluff.
Why didn't the Academy have a class in bluffing?
    "Can you get out?" Merete asked, her tone telling
me things.
    "Not right away," I said. "The compound is booby-
trapped." I watched Mornay to see if I'd said too
much, but she didn't move. "It'll take time."
Another pause. Kirk's image nodded in my head.
"I'll contact you again in thirty minutes," Merete
said. "ff you've found a way out, we'll beam up and
vacate the system before Enterprise arrives. It's time
to haul in tight."
    She had difficulty with the nautical phrase. She
didn't know where the emphasis should go. The words
were too even, too careful. But the message was real:
he knows.
    My shoulders trembled. I squeezed them tight and
brought the communicator closer to my lips. "I agree.
They've already worked our windward."
    Mornay was practically under my chin in an instant.
Her phaser now hovered between my eyes, conveying
a message entirely different from Merete's. Sign off or
die.

159

    Why bother talking out loud at all? These subliminal
messages, coming at me from a dozen different direc-
tions, were grating enough.
    "Piper out," I said quickly, and closed the commu-
nicator.
    Mornay snatched the instrument from my grip, her
fingernails raking the side of my hand. She backed
away. "Code words," she said bitterly. "And not even
subtle." Without a single consideration for the privacy
between the two Vulcans among us, she turned to
Perten and demanded, "Who is Merete?"
    Perren, however, very much realized the unethical
uglies behind her question. His face went verdant with
bottled emotions as, with effort, he answered, "An
associate. Merete AndrusTaurus. A Star Fleet physi-
cian. She was loosely involved with Piper and Sarda
when they interfered with the dreadnought affair."
    His humiliation was obvious, even through the Vul-
can shields. He knew damned well he was betraying
something sacred when he defiled the privacy of the
training melds he had shared with Sarda. Was it habit?
Had Mornay exerted subliminal control over him for
so long that he had forgotten his responsibilities to
anyone else?
    Ursula Mornay thought about what he had told her,
then nodded and put her needly glare on me again.
"Your friends out there can be traced. You've kindly
supplied me with the means to attract their attention."
She awkwardly gathered the tileorder into the same
hand that held the communicator and said, "They'll be
sure to answer a distress call from one of their own
signals." She handed the two instruments to a guard
and reset her phaser, then looked up at Perren. "See
that they are locked up in the storage room. I promise
you they won't be hurt unless they themselves force
me to act. Such things are sometimes necessary, aren't
they? For the ultimate kindness, we must fortify our-

160

selves. Take them immediately. The guards will go
with yore Then meet me in the main lab."
    Mornay knew Perren's weaknesses very well after
all their years together. My heart sank to see it work-
ing.
    Once again I locked my lips, redirecting my frustra-
tion long enough to help Scanner lift Sarda. Con-
sciousness was seeping back as the phaser stun dissi-
pated, but he needed help to walk. A short, cold walk
to a small, cold room.
    When we got inside, I let Scanner take Sarda to a
crate where he could sit down. I turned instead to
Perren. The mercenaries remained outside, and with
my voice low, only Perten could hear me.
    "Can you really think of selling transwarp to hostile
powers?" I asked, my tone one of unexpected inti-
macy.
    He tossed his head in a motion of frustration and
said, "I assure you, Commander, I will destroy
transwarp and myself if necessary, before I allow the
flux technology to leave Federation hands."
    That took me by surprise. For a moment I just
gawked at him in confusion, then blurted, "So it's all a
bluff."
    "No," he said. "Not a bluff. Ursula will do what she
threatens to do. She has her purposes and I have mine.
For the moment, they are parallel. When the time of
divergence comes, I will be able to control her."
  "How can you be sure?"
    "Question me no more, Commander!" he snapped.
"You begin to irritate." That was obvious enough,
judging from the way his lips curled in when he said it.
With a fan of dark hair, he spun and left. The door
clanged shut. We heard the grinding of a mechanical
lock.
    "Huh," Scanner grunted. "Vulcan is skin-deep."
He glared at the door for a count, then turned back to

161

Sarda. The contempt he felt earlier for Sarda had
apparently found new targets. There was none left
here. He began busily rubbing sensation back into
Sarda's arms and knees, ignoring those tiresome pro-
tocols about not touching Vulcans. Scanner never did
pay much attention to them, and this wasn't the occa-
sion to change him. "Come on, Points, you're okay.
Here, lean on this. Atta boy. Got any feet down there
yet?" He paused, then asked, "How are you?"
    Sarda blinked to focus his vision and slowly said,
"Unwell."
    I flinched at the weakness of his voice and the effort
he put behind it. I lowered myself onto the next crate,
facing him. "Do you feel horrible?"
    Only then did the whole impact of his regret surface
and only for an instant. A sadness touched his down-
turned face. "I feel foolish," he murmured. The in-
tense honesty startled us.
    Scanner stared in amazed empathy and started to
say something. I cut him off with a quick shake of my
head.
    Carefully rephrasing, I asked, "Do you think you're
hurt?"
    Sarda made a laudable effort to straighten himself,
though his arms and thighs shook. Without thinking,
Scanner and I each caught an elbow. "Nothing perma-
nent," Sarda uttered weakly. "She has always . . .
resented my association with Perren."
    The effort drained him and he fought a bone-deep
shudder, but the gloss was returning to his eyes now
and his complexion was regaining its luster.
    "We've got to talk," I said. "Come up with a plan of
action."
    "What action?" Scanner howled. "She's got us
hemstitched?
    "Never stopped us before," I muttered back. "The
captain's out there somewhere, expecting us to be
ready for him."

162

    Sarda blinked hard and straightened a little more.
"Captain Kirk? Here?"
 "Yes, with Spock, McCoy, and Merete."
    Scanner added, "Yeah, and now they know we're in
trouble."
    I nodded, my nose wrinkling at the reminder. "And
thanks to my bad acting, Mornay's ready for them.
They'll walk into a trap."
    "Maybe," Scanner agreed, "but she still doesn't
know it's the captain, and that's goana make her
underestimate."
    Nervous now, I slid off the crate and paced to the
room's only opening, a newly mounted metal door
with a wide, tinted duraglass window. I pressed my
shoulder against the glass and peered into the stone
corridor, where four mercenaries were eerily lit by
those inexpensive little diogen torches. Those guards
looked too casual about their job, casual in a danger-
ous way. Casual as though they did this for a living.
Casual as though the phaser dries were extensions of
their own arms. My nervousness doubled. "We've got
to buy Captain Kirk time. Mornay thinks he's on
board Enterprise. The starship should be here soon."
  "When?" Sarda asked.
    I threw my hands up, only to have them clap down
onto my thighs. "How do I know? Kirk never tells me
anything! All I know is that Mr. Scott and Dr. Boma
are bringing the ship in while Kirk lurks around here.
We were supposed to break you out, and here we are
locked up like penned ducks! We've got to get out of
here and get on with our mission."
    "Uh-uh," Scanner complained. He took that as a
cue to lean back against the wall next to Sarda and put
his hands behind his head. "Our mission was to sepa-
rate Sarda from the witch and the warlock. We done
that. He's separated."
    I ignored him. It was that or whack him one, and I
figured I'd save my strength. A few strands of thick
               163

hair fell around my face as I stared at the floor,
cloaking me from their eyes. I'd have liked to think of
my hair as golden, but somehow it never got past
pyrite. The worse the situation got, the browner my
hair felt. Even after all those weeks under Earth's
gaudy sun ....
    How did my hair get into this? I widened my eyes
and shook my head to clear it. A deep breath helped
me cope. "There's something weird about this," I
grumbled, my brow knitting until it gave me a head-
ache. "Something about Mornay isn't fitting with what
we were told. I don't think she's as unenlightened as
Spock thought. She was careful not to say things to us,
as though she..."
  I faltered, staring into a convenient wall.
  "As though she what?" Scanner prodded.
    My eyes narrowed as I thought harder, forcing
myself to add up things that were abstract at best.
"Perten doesn't know much about humans, does he?"
  Sarda frowned. "Why do you ask?"
    "He can't see through her. She's stringing him
along. Saying the things he wants to hear. Like I said,
she's not so ignorant. I don't think we should underes-
timate her. She knows better than to try to ransom the
technology by itself. She knew enough to build the
device. Is that going to be enough for her? You heard
her talk about testing transwarp. It's the next logical
step. She intends to take her leverage as far as it'll
go!"
    "Piper," Sarda said calmly, "your logic is accept-
able, but Mornay has no support for such a project.
Beyond ransoming the technology, she has no lever-
age. The dreadnought was supposed to be the test for
transwarp, but it's not an option any longer." He
paused then, fatigued by the long talk, and closed his
eyes. Soon they opened again, slightly dulled from the
strain. He was recovering, but I knew what full phaser
stun felt like, and I frowned sympathetically.

               164

    "She might have more support than we realize," I
went on, pacing now. "Rittenhouse had plenty of
support. Star Fleet is only scratching the surface of the
corruption. Who knows how deep it runs? Mornay
probably knows exactly who to contact when she
needs something."
    "Even so," Sarda argued, "she will need special-
ized scientific help to mount transwarp on a ship, and
that is assuming she can call upon people who know
how to select an appropriate vessel. That takes spe-
cialized knowledge. She cannot simply call upon new
scientists. Herself, Perren, and I are all who remain of
Rittenhouse's science team."
    I stopped pacing. Scanner and Sarda both gazed up
at me, and I down at them, and I think we all stopped
breathing. "No," I said. "You're not. You're not at
all!"
 The little stone room echoed.
 "Boma," Scanner murmured.
 "And he's already on board Enterprise," I finished.
    Sarda's eyes widened as he stared at me. We had the
same thought at the same time. We said it together.
 "The test ship!"

165

Chapter Nine

"1 suppose most of us overlook the fact that even Vulcans
aren't indestructible."
                      --Amok Time

 "IN HIGHER PHYSICS, concepts are not expressed as
laws and certainties, but as probabilities. There is only
a 62 percent chance that transwarp will work. The
danger is not that it will fail, but that the test ship
would fail to return from interdimensional warp travel.
Professor Mornay and Vice Admiral Rittenhouse were
willing to take that chance. Perren does not realize that
Mornay still intends to."
    Sarda struggled to hide the vestigial weakness left
by Mornay's phaser attack. He knew we didn't quite
understand the science he was talking about, but it
didn't matter. We understood the danger. ff from
nothing other than the careful lack of inflection, Sarda
made us understand the nightmare of being forever
caught between dimensions.
    "Seems there's a lot about Mornay that Perten
doesn't realize," Scanner commented. "She said she's
got no more use for you," he told Sarda. "How long
before she doesn't need Perten anymore?"
    By this time I had been standing silent for many
minutes. All the parts of this puzzle were wild. A
deviant professor whose theories, when twisted into
reality, became a galactic threat; a renegade Vulcan,
no less, whose thought patterns could barely be pre-

166

dicted by another Vulcan, much less a 1oopy pack of
humans who'd come into this wholly unprepared; a
starship about to become a sitting duck, no doubt
sabotaged from inside by Boma--but how? Could one
man shut down a whole starship crew? Even ff he was
a leading astrophysicist, even if he had built some of
the finest war machines of the past decade, even if he
did resent Enterprise officers for a court-martial that
ruined his military career--then again, maybe he
could do it.
    More than anything I hated being trapped. If I had to
fail, why did it have to be this way? If determination
was a factor for Boma, then it would have to become
one for me. I was on the inside, the captain was on the
outside. I should be the one getting him in, not him
getting me out.
    I began to stalk the doorway, The guards knew they
were being watched. They glared at me and shifted,
lips twisting. Sometimes they rearranged the phaser
rifles in their arms. They looked dirty. They looked
ready. Exactly the kind of people Mornay would hire.
Not an ethic to share between them.
    I stared at them. Moved to the opposite wall. Stared
some more.
    One of the guards kicked the bottom of the door and
swore at me, his lips curled back in silent rage.
    My eyes narrowed. I kept staring. This was a deli-
cate art. I had to hate them.
    "Piper," Scanner warned quietly, "those blizzard
brains are gonna come in here and gently reprimand
you if you don't cut that out."
    The wall was gritty against my shoulder, its stone
cold and forbidding. It fortified my burgeoning resent-
ment. I continued to irritate the guards with my eyes.
"You can feel it," I murmured. Then, more strongly, I
said, "There's a rift between Mornay and Perren. I
mean to widen it."

167

    "Yes. We must," Sarda agreed. "If Perren supports
Ursula now, he will be immoral. He is in a dangerous
dilemma for a Vulcan to face."
    I spun around. "And we can use that. Perren's
already vacillating. I saw it in his eyes."
His doubt surfaced immediately. "Piper..."
"Don't tell me I didn't," I snapped immediately.
Under the sharp wave of my hand he fell silent. "The
lives of the test ship crew--that's the angle to take
with him. Either Mornay hasn't told him about using
Enterprise as a test ship, or she's somehow convinced
him it's safe enough to risk. But what are they going to
do with over 400 crewpeople? It doesn't seem r~ossible
that two scientists could take over a whole stafshj'p full
of military personnel."
    "The logical assumption is that they will incapaci-
tate the crew in some way," Sarda said.
    "Or trick them into beaming down," Scanner
added.
    "Or blackmail them into beaming down." Once
again the stone floor rolled beneath my feet. Back and
forth, back and forth, pause for a heavy stare at the
guards, back and forth again. "This is getting us
nowhere. We could guess all night and still be wrong.
We've got to get out of here and deactivate that sensor
screen or tie up the guards or something, anything to
help Captain Kirk get in here and do what he wanted to
do in the first place. He's got to be informed about
Boma and Enterprise."
    Scanner stretched and arched his back. "I've heard
of pipe dreams before, but not Piper dreams."
    I returned to the window. My reflection was caught
in the blue caste of the duraglass. Did I really look so
tired? I felt old, but not experienced. Years had passed
in minutes, all laden with this terrible impotence.
Outside somewhere--my mind went out to the Arge-
!ian hills with their red and blue foliage, bathed in the
light of the banded moonsmthere, somewhere, Kirk
               168

was waiting for me to take action. Had he understood
my message? Did he know he was on his own?
    The mercenaries in the hall started moving around,
casting rude glances at me. The more I stared, the
more they twitched. I couldn't get out, but they could
get in. Their anger would bring them in. It was only a
matter of degrees.
    A fierce man with missing teeth and a long grassy
moustache was the first to lash out. He struck the
duraglass window with the butt of his phaser rifle. It
bounced off. The glass hummed.
    I refused even to flinch. My stare became a leer. I
mocked him with my steadiness. Never mind being
frozen with fear, of course. This seamy type of planet-
trotter would have no trouble killing all of us with
nothing but a shrug as explanation. In the reflection I
saw Scanner tensely reach for the lid of a crate. Not
much of a weapon, but ff I had him scared, imagine
what I was doing for the guards.
    I didn't have to imagine. Vexation colored the faces
outside the blue duraglass.
    "Piper," Scanner began, a tremor giving him away,
"people are morons until proven otherwise. You're
courtin' live examples."
    Several responses popped into my mind, but to
answer him would be also to destroy the string of rage
building outside the door. By now I had pressed up to
the blue window tight enough to see both ends of the
short corridor and keep all four guards itchy. They
mumbled at each other, but they couldn't speak out
loud. They didn't like my intense interest. Grass
Moustache could barely stand to blink his eyes any-
more, because he knew I would still be there when
they opened. His three compatriots had better control,
but were slowly losing it.
 But I had singled out my target.
    I focused on the pair of large coffee-brown eyes
above that moustache. Eyes that loathed me. Ah, but
               169

 there is no peace in the land of pensionaries. You hire
 yourself out for a questionable living, you take what
 you get. Sometimes you get stared at.
     This was more than being stared at. As the moments
 ticked by, I owned him.
     His lips peeled back again as the rage boiled up-
 ward. His shoulder blades hammered against the op-
 posite wall as he pushed himself off and brought the
 phaser rifle up. One coal-hard eye snapped shut, the
 other lining me up instantly in his sights. ff only it had
 been courage holding me there, I would have had a
 better story to take home.
     My legs turned to jelly. I was held in place only by
 sheer astonishment that my ploy had worked--too
 well.
     "Piper, get down!" Sarda shouted. He slid off the
 crate, but not soon enough.
     Grass Moustache fired his phaser rifle. A single
 lance of bright orange light decorated the gray corridor
 and made the diogen touches glow. I dropped to a
 crouch, covering my head. Above me came the sicken-
    ing sizzle of cooked metal and melting duraglass. As
ú the window disintegrated, I also heard Grass Mous-
 tache's fierce growl. Then shuffling, and another
 voice.
     "Idiot! Cease firing. We haven't got any place else
 to keep them!"
  "We'll keep them in an old shoe!"
     "Get hold of yourself! Don't lose your pay over
 nothing."
     Cautiously I looked up when the sizzling began to
 fade. The upper corner of the door was dissolved,
 along with a ragged portion of duraglass. Along the
 edge of the glass, a phosphorescent red glow was
 darkening as it cooled. Not enough. Not big enough.
 My hope sank.
  I pressed my hands on the floor, wondering if I

dared stand up and show myself again through what
remained of that window.
    The chance never came. An explosion rocked the
lab, a great boom that threw us all to the floor and
vibrated in our bones. It was very close--maybe even
this building. The ceiling crumbled and dropped
chunks of plaster and stone in dusty clouds.
    "Take cover!" I shouted across the room. I was
gratified to see the two of them huddled beside a huge
cooling cabinet as part of the side wall expanded into a
barrier of loosened bricks. Unfortunately, it didn't
collapse. On the other hand, if it did, would it take the
whole ceiling--and us--with it?
    From across the compound came another explosion,
much more distant this time, but much more powerful.
It set off a string of popping noises, as though pressur-
ized containers were being exposed to too much heat.
    Commotion broke out in the corridor. From the
floor, I listened.
 "What's happening?"
 "Hellfire, that's what! Come on!"
 "We're assigned here, not out there."
 "Move, I said!"
 Then, new voices from down the corridor:
 "Where's Lugrode?"
    "I don't know. I can't find anybody from the city
side."
 "What do you mean, you can't find 'em?"
 "They're gone, that's what I slavin' mean!"
 "Two of you come with me 2'
 "Ain't movin' 2'
    There was a distinct thud and a groan as authority
was rudely reestablished.
 "You! Stay on that door."
    I got warily to my feet, still hunched down, but now
able to peek through the bottom of the duraglass at the
scampering mercenaries. The voices were a cacoph-

170                                                        171

 ony now, impossible to separate. Only when a man
 skidded in from the south side with a startling an-
 nouncement did I begin to feel the revitalization of
 hope.
    "The security signal on the weapons locker is
jammed !" the man howled, as though somehow it was
pinching him to be cut off from his weapons supply.
    I spun toward Scanner and Sarda, fanning my way
through settling stone dust. "They're cut off! And
people are missing! He's in!"
"Huh?" Scanner blustered. "Who's in?"
"Captain Kirk! I don't know how, but-he's inside!"
He slumped and rolled his eyes. "Aw, Piper, I wish
yawI'd get off that nag and ride a real horse for a
change." He sat down wearily.
    I dragged him to his feet. "Get up," I growled.
"We're getting out of here."
  He stiflened, but the doubt lingered. "How?"
    I had been gazing at the mutilated bricks of the wall,
but now I spun on him. "Stop asking that and start
thinking it! You heard. They're down to two guards on
us and they're stuck with the weapons they have in
hand."
    "Sure," he complained. "Those puny little phaser
rifles you could shoot a moon down with !"
  "Get used to it, mister, we're getting out. Now."
    Scanner raked both hands through his hair. "Dang!
You're even starting to sound like him!"
    His statement caught me by surprise. And an even
bigger surprise--I didn't like it. My own silence sat on
me like a rock. My lips clamped shut, my face aching.
The smoke hurt my eyes.
    Sounds of demolition continued to filter through the
outside walls, punctuated by electrical crackling.
Sarda was already palming the damaged wall. If he
carried any of Scanner's doubts, he never let me see
them. He may or may not have believed we could

172

break through that wall somehow, but he knew none-
theless that I would never be satisfied unless we tried.
What he didn't realize yet was that I would never be
satisfied until we succeeded. I'd die in this place
before I would force Captain Kirk to have to rescue
me. Somehow he had already managed to get inside,
confound the guards, put several of them out of com-
mission, cut off their weapons supply, and set off a
chain of explosions to cripple Mornay and Perren. He
was a tough act to follow. I would never be satisfied to
merely applaud. If I went down on Argelius, this stage
would have the marks of my fingernails in it.
    Scanner's words, fraught with annoyance and the
truth of fatigue, haunted me. I began to question my
driving force even as .we picked at the bucking stone
wall and tried to wedge leftover computer parts be-
tween the large bricks. No more bursts of courage
came to mask my fear; now I had to deal with it all.
With the silence came an overwhelming need to get
back into space, into space vehicles, to systems I
knew and weapons I understood, to the place where I
had experienced one great triumph before. I began to
focus on that. If only I could get back into space...
     Before you can outguess an enemy in three dimen-
sions, you've got to be able to maneuver in two.
  "Fine," I spat under my breath.
    This drew unwanted attention. Sarda hesitated. "I
beg your pardon?"
    "Both of you get back." I moved in on the wall, not
really knowing what I would do when I felt the cool,
broad bricks beneath my palms. The bricks had shifted
against each other, leaving uneven gaps where mo-
ments ago there had been only creases. There had to
be a weak spot somewhere. "All right," I said through,
gritted teeth, agreeing with yet another unheard urge
from you-know-who in my memory, "when in doubt,
do it the hard way."

173

  "I'm afraid t'ask," Scanner muttered.
     "Where's something we can throw at it? What's in
 those crates?"
     I moved toward the heavy metallic storage crates,
 ignoring the shuffle behind me and the errant conver-
 sation.
     Sarda's voice was lowered. "... useless to attempt
 to talk her out of it."
     Then Scanner, more like a hiss. "Talk her out of it?
 Hell, I'm not even going near her!"
     "Keep an eye on those guards at the door. Make
 sure they're not watching," I said as I shoved one of
 the crates toward the weakened wall, then doubled
 back for a second crate. "Help me lift this."
     Insanity must be contagious, because I didn't get
 any arguments. Scanner heaved a doubtful sigh but
 made no comments as the three of us wrestled the
 second crate onto the top of the first. Sarda's Vulcan
 strength allowed him to serve as anchorman while
 Scanner and I lifted and steered the crate into place,
 wincing at the screech of metal against metal.
   "Okay," I said. "One more."
     "One more?" Scanner howled. "We jus' barely got
 that one up there!"
  "That one in the corner should do."
  "But that one's empty!"
    "I know it's empty. How else could we lift it that
high?"
  "Piper, I think yawl need shore leave."
    "No thanks. I just had all I need of Captain Kirk's
idea of shore leave. Come on. We haven't got all day."
    The empty crate was soon in place easily enough,
high atop the other two crates, looming just under the
plaster ceiling.
    "Now what?" Scanner asked. The same question,
silent now, hovered in Sarda's expression.
    I wiped my palms on my thighs. "Help me get up
there."

174

 "What?"
    "We'll never find enough junk in here to add up to
the weight of a person, so I'll provide the weight to
break the wall. It's simple."
 "It's nuts! You'll kill yourself."
 "Beats staying in here. Come on, help me."
    I didn't want to have to make it an order, yet they
both sensed the nearness of that extreme. I wasn't yet
comfortable with command status, but if I had a
phaser I would use it, and rank was a kind of weapon.
Beside me, Sarda stood silent, hardly blinking. I
looked at him.
    Softly, perhaps seeking approval, I told him, "It has
to be done. There isn't time for alternatives."
    His hands disappeared behind his back. Slowly he
nodded. "I would prefer to take the risk myself," he
said.
    "I know." My voice hovered between us. "But it's
my responsibility."
    Chivalry wasn't dead; they helped me climb into the
highest crate. The metal was cold against my thighs
and shoulders as I huddled inside and shut the crate,
then braced myself as well as possible. A shiver
wracked my arms and legs. Seconds passed as I fought
to control it. I had to be ready, body and mind. My
weight had to be used correctly.
"Ready," I said. Lying, of course. "On three."
Three came a lot sooner than I expected. I rocked
the top of the tower while Scanner ticked off, "One
ú.. two... three!"
    Into my small, dark world came the sickening sensa-
tion of the ground dropping out from under me. The
planet tipped. My head struck the crate's metal wall.
My own weight crushed down onto the back of my
neck, forcing me into a ball. Then came an abrupt jolt
as the crate struck stone. Within the crate, no~se
doubled on itself and pummeled my eardrums. I was
falling again, turning again.
               175

Another jolt. This one bent the crate into a weird
geometric form, and me with it.
    The crate struck the floor and continued to tumble at
least one whole turn. The door was ajar now, bathing
my confused eyes with raw yellow light. Diogen! The
corridor!
    Twisting painfully around, I kicked the door out-
ward and rolled out of the crate onto a pile of de-
stroyed bricks in time to see Scannerand Sarda stum-
ble through a ragged opening in the wall. At the same
moment, the two remaining guards, eyes bugged with
astonishment, skidded around the corner to gawk at
us, too stunned even to raise their phaser rifles.
    It was Scanner who bolted to action first. He swept
up a chunk of brick and pitched it hard. It flew down
the corridor and struck one guard where his hand was
gripping the phaser rifle. He choked and dropped the
weapon between his knees.
    Sarda was ready. He moved in quickly, wrestling
the guard down, bracing the phaser rifle between them.
Without thinking, I grasped a brick and gave it a two-
handed heave at the second guard. He saw it coming,
but never had a chance to dodge. The square of gray
brick slammed into his chest and drove him against a
door. He collapsed, gasping. Only then did Sarda
succeed in pinching his own opponent unconscious.
    He swirled around, his eyes afire, his arms flexed
and ready.
    For a head-clearing moment I remained on one knee
among the rocks, gathering eye contact with my crew
before plunging onward into the storm. We needed
it.
 I shoved myself to my feet, quaking with conviction.
 "Let's get out of this squirrel cage."

    The outside of the lab building was even in more
disarray than the inside. Once we escaped into the
dark openness, my sense of immediacy was prickled
               176

with a sense of vulnerability. Caution returned where
moments ago it would only have been a burden. Sarda
and Scanner followed me as we twined our way across
a compound, hiding from running mercenaries who
were scattered about, desperately looking for some-
thing to shoot at. Us.
    I pressed my shoulders back against a wall as I
peeked around its corner, motioning for Scanner and
Sarda to close up tight behind me. My fingers made the
shape of a phaser.
    Keeping his voice low, Sarda asked, "What are you
planning?"
    "Find the captain," I said. My skin tightened as
three mercenaries trotted past our hiding place, head-
ing for the main lab. Surely by now they knew we were
free. Well, we were out; free was something else.
    "How we gonna find them without communica-
tions?" Scanner asked. "They could be anywhere in a
kilometer radius."
    "They're inside this compound, Scanner," I in-
sisted. "The explosions we've been hearing have got
to be Mornay's booby traps. Somehow Kirk and
Spock are setting them off. It's just a fabulous tactic,
that's all, letting the enemy provide the firepower
behind the confusion. I should've thought of it the
minute Perren mentioned the security system. Kirk
should've been an urban guerrilla."
    "With his track record," Scanner pointed out, "he
prob'ly was. I dunno if we should try horning in on his
business."
    I relaxed for a moment and peered at him. "You
never want to try anything. You're always afraid to
take a risk. Why'd you ever join Star Fleet? Why
didn't you stay in Tennessee and raise pigs?" "I'm 'fraida pigs."
    Simple question, simple answer. He ducked a swat
from me, and I shook my head, unable to hide the grin
that pushed its way up.
               1 77

 "If Mornay's going up to Enterprise," I thought
 aloud, "we've got to get back to Rex."
     "Like I said," Scanner pointed out, "we need a
 communicator to key into the automatic transporter
 link."
     "Ursula may not reach the starship," Sarda said
 then. His voice was a sudden, steadying buffet against
 the frantic compound noise and Scanner's Tennessee
 twang. "Captain Kirk may be able to prevent her from
 doing so 2'
     "I can't make that assumption," I said, more
 sharply than I intended. "I won't let him down again."
     The determination in my voice caused silence be-
 hind me. It swelled up like a cloak and covered my
 shoulders. Whatever happened, I had to make it true.
 He was counting on me.
     As I stood there against the cold stone, every mus-
 cle in my body knotted, knowing that lives depended
 on my next decision, I realized the essence of the
 schooner Edith Keeler. Whoever the woman was,
_ whatever she had been to James Kirk, she was now
 personified in square yardage of sailcloth, gleaming
 brightwork, brass, and bowspritmshe was what saved
 him from the horror of these hard moments in the life
 of a starship officer. It didn't get easier, as I had once
 hoped. I understood that now. I would never get used
 to these moments. I could only save myself from them,
 find some ship to sail away on, to become sane again
 and gather up what I needed to go back to space, just
 as he had learned to do. Even with cold ground
 beneath my feet, I felt once again the surging of the
 deck under me, with the deadly and beautiful ocean an
 arm's length away, nicely mastered. I heard once
 again the wind whistle inside the main, and I almost
 looked upward. If I could learn to pull those halyards
 and sheets at the right moments, maybe... just maybe
 ú . . I could pull the fight ropes here and get us out of
 this alive.

178

 Key word: maybe.
    No---I didn't want to hear thatú Shut up, Piper, and
get to work.
    "Come on," I said before I'd even planned where to
go from here.
    We made it safely across to the next building, a shed
of some sort with a maze of wooden fences in pathetic
disrepair, but terrific material to hide behind. Unless
they spotted our actual movements, they'd never be
able to pick out our forms in this mess.
    "Sarda," I began, "they must have some kind of
communications board around here."
    He moved close, keeping himself balanced in an
awkward position by holding onto the cross beam of a
crooked fence. "Indeed. In Ursula's main lab. She had
to be able to contact supply ships, and her guards, of
course."
 "Just point in the right direction, will you?"
    He ignored my irascibility and quite simply pointed.
We skulked across the paddock area, skirting fences
upon fences, halfway around the farm until only a
short expanse of open area lay between us and the
main lab.
  "I'11 go alone," I said.
    Both arms. Not even a chance to get up. I looked to
one side--a stern Vulcan truth. And the other side--
Tennessee smoke.
    I let my head drop for a moment and took a deep
breath. "Listen, both of you. ff I fall, then you'll still
be free to try again. You heard what Captain Kirk said.
This mission is more important than any one of us.
Maybe more than all of us."
    Sarda's expression never flickered. He had no inten-
tion of arguing, any more than he intended to let me go
in there alone.
    It was Scanner who spoke. "ff we let you go,
how're we gonna know what crazy thing to try next?
Face it, Piper. Nobody thinks like you."
               179

    "Oh, thanks, Scanner, thanks a lot. And here I was,
waiting for an oath of loyalty."
  "Oughta know better by now."
    I stole a glance at Sarda and was relieved to see that
his mouth was drawn upward on one side and he was
deliberately not looking at Scanner.
    "All right," I conceded. "I've got enough to fight. I
don't need to be fighting you too. But stay in close
formation. Sarda, you know the way in."
  "Roughly. I was not permitted to roam freely."
  "You lead then. Scanner, right behind him."
    Scanner moved into position. "Bet you wish you
had a phaser," he teased as he shifted past me."
    "Hell, I wish I had a slingshot," I admitted. Only
then did it occur to me that I probably could have
made one out of available materials if I'd had my
training screwed on straight. Luckily, neither of them
thought of that, and I got away with it. "Go," I said
quickly, taking advantage.
    My nerves electrified as we hurried across the open
area, dodging searchlights as the beams swabbed the
ground in search of us. Mornay must have been plan-
ning the theft of transwarp for some time--at least
since the failure of Vice Admiral Rittenhouse's scheme
with the dreadnought. She must have had this com-
pound set up immediately afterward, and had the
security system already activated when she, Perren,
and Sarda arrived, though I now believed Mornay and
Perren had planned this from the moment Vice Admi-
ral Rittenhouse died. Even now, sporadic explosions
and crackling voltage told us the chain reaction of
sabotage was still running. Kirk must have found some
way to trigger those booby traps. It was the only
explanation that made sense--and I really needed
things to make sense right now.
    Except the part about Dr. Boma. My heart withered
as I remembered that element. I deeply wished it
hadn't made such sense. I had a sudden, absurd,
               180

overwhelming desire to stand up straight and yell at
the top of my lungs, "CAPTAIN KIRK, YOUR SHIP
IS IN DEEP TROUBLE! WHERE ARE
YOOOOOOOOO?" Luckily, I managed to keep it to
myseff for the moment. Somehow, I'd find him. To-
gether we'd make our way back to that distant
schooner with the mysterious name.
    Even as the reassuring thought filled me with
strength, we slipped into an alcove and were met with
a sight that siphoned the strength out again.
    A few meters away, between the main lab and a
carefully arranged pile of file crates, stood Ursula
Mornay and four mercenary guards. They held their
phaser rifles sighted coldly upon Captain Kirk and Mr.
Spock.
    I crouched, almost by reflex alone, and pulled Sarda
down beside me. Scanner saw our movements and
dropped instantly. Our blood cooled as we watched
and listened.
    The captain and Spock stood side by side, unflinch-
ing before the phaser rifles, but definitely sobered. She
had them. Somehow she had caught them. But what
about McCoy and Merete?
  "How'd she get them?" Scanner whispered.
  "Shh. Listen."
    "... really think you can pilot a starship with a
handful of hired guns?" Kirk was putting to Mornay.
    "I have crewpeople, Captain," Mornay said as she
opened and tuned a hand communicator. "All I have
to do is pick them up. And you'll help me do that, or
your crew will remain in their semicoma until they die.
I have a knife at your throat, Capta'm Kirk. I promise,
I will cut you."
    Scanner's voice buzzed faintly at my ear. "What's
she tawkin' about? She got 'em strapped down in front
of old movies, or what?"
    "Obviously she has the crew hostage somehow,"
Sarda whispered back, even more faintly.
               181

  "A whole starship?"
    I shushed them with a swipe of my hand, and myself
was stilled by the expressive glance Kirk exchanged
with Spock. I ached to read his mind the way Spock
could. I saw a thousand thoughts in that one glance,
truly a trade of minds, perhaps of plans. So close...
    I pressed my hands on the jut of wood that partially
hid us in our alcove shadow, pressed until the wood
cut hard into my palms and forced me to accept the
damning reality that Captain Kirk was out of reach, at
least for the moment. My drumming message would
have to stay inside my head even longer.
    Mornay brought the communicator to her lips.
"Samuel? Have the guards beamed aboard?"
    From the instrument in her hand came a dull buzzing
voice. "All who checked in are aboard now. Some are
still missing and we can't seem to find them."
    Mornay paced a few steps and eyed Captain Kirk,
who remained carefully impassive. "I'm not sur-
prised," she said. "As soon as you're ready, beam up
the captain and Commander Spock. I'm sure they'll be
cooperative, but have the guards ready just in case."
    "They're ready, believe me. We've dealt with those
gentlemen before."
    The voice was distorted by the distance between us
and the communicator itself, but there was no mistak-
ing that arrogant cadence. Boma.
    My message to Kirk fizzled within me. He already
knew. And Boma had already won. The Enterprise
was in orbit, and Boma was in control. It seemed
unfathomable that one man could incapacitate 400-
plus people who were supposedly Star ~!eet's best,
but then again, I was supposedly Star Fleet's best too.
    I drew my shoulders inward, fighting a terrible
shiver. Luck does run out, even for Star F!eet's best.
Perhaps my luck had been spent on the dreadnought
affair. Maybe that was the best I'd ever do. Maybe I
couldn't beat that act. It was hard enough trying to get

               182

used to being called Lieutenant Commander when I
hadn't even completely gotten used to being called
Lieutenant. Everything I did seemed to be running
about ten minutes tardy.
    Incapacitate a whole starship crew? Damn her, that
wasn't fair! I gritted my teeth and forced my insecurity
to become anger. Anger was workable stuff, and she
could only kill me once.
    I dug what was left of my fingernails into the slat of
wood and listened harder.
    Mornay was fiddling with the communicator. "Per-
ren, are you there?"
    Static from the damaged electrical system caused
the frequencies to jump, but soon the cool voice came
through. "I am making final installments in the porta-
ble memory."
  "Hurry up. We're ready to go."
  "What about the guards?"
    "They're already aboard the starship. We'll prepare
to leave the solar system as soon as you beam up.
We're going now."
  "I shall be there momentarily."
     Without the courteous, if mechanical, sign-offs usu-
 ally used over communications channels, Mornay
 flatly readjusted her instrument and hailed the ship
 again. I kept my eyes on Kirk. He was absolutely
 unmoved, as relaxed as he had been during those long,
 quiet hours of ocean crossing when there was nothing
 to do but watch the sea roll. He wasn't tensed, ready
 to attack, waiting for that minute flinch that would give
 him his cue. Spock also stood calmly. Only when the
 eerie whine of a transporter beam caused my skin to
 tingle did I realize why the two officers made no effort
 to free themselves; they wanted to get back on board
 the starship. If there were fights to be fought, at least
 Enterprise would know its guardians were where they
 belonged, doing what she needed them to do.
  As we watched, the clutch of oddly matched person-
                183

 alities dissolved into elongated prisms, and dissap-
 peared.
      Without a pause, I redirected my thoughts. "Let's
 go. The main lab, Sarda."  "This way."
     We got about three steps before Scanner grabbed
 my arm and said, "Hold it. Yawl aren't gonna believe
 this. Look what I see."
     What he saw was two familiar figures clumsily
 skulking their way across the compound, heading in
 the opposite direction from where we were going.
 Before I could stop him, Scanner had stuck his fingers
 in his mouth and let fly a. shrill whistle. Seconds later,
 McCoy and Merete were gathered into our little nest.
   "Where've you been?" McCoy hissed, eyes wide.
   "Where're you been?" Scanner retorted.
   "Looking for you."
    "I can top that," Scanner crowed. "We bin lookin'
for everybody."
    I squirmed between them. "Scanner, shut up or I'll
cork your face. Doctor, what do you know?"
      "Didn't you hear that conversation?" Dr. McCoy
flipped a hand back at the now-empty compound.
  "Only the end of it."
    "Oh." His eyebrows worked as he steadied himself
to tell us what he had hoped we already knew. In one
way he hated having to repeat it. In another, he was
quaking to get it out. The conflict within him showed
on his face, at once anguished and enraged. "Boma
waited until the ship was in Orbital status, then he
gassed the whole ship with a hypnogenetic com-
pound."
  "A who?" Scanner blurted.
    "A narcotic. Sleep-inducing gas. Deep and danger-
ous sleep. It causes severe reduction of metabolic
rate." He inched closer, as though to intensify his
words and used one hand to illustrate the terrible,
intangible truth. "Anyone who ingests it can literally

               ~84

sleep himself to death unless an antidote is provided
soon enough."
 "The knife at Kirk's throat," I murmured.
    "It's more than that," Merete said, glancing at Dr.
McCoy as though she knew what he was thinking,
what he was feeling. "It's a progressive coma. The
time element makes a difference. Mornay didn't tell
the captain that. Maybe she doesn't even know it."
    "That class of drug is an idiot's playground," Mc-
Coy insisted, his fist now clenched. Suddenly I saw
something in him that I hadn't before. He'd always
seemed amusing to me in his moments of exaspera-
tion, but now he moved beyond exasperation to down-
fight bitterness. He seemed to feel about the Enter-
prise crew the way Mr. Scott felt about the ship itself.
The crew was his. His children. His expression grew
stony with violence as he thought of what Mornay had
done to them. "Many drugs in that category don't
have antidotes at all," he said, nearly growling. "She
might not know that or even care. She might just as
easily be lying to Jim by telling him that she can undo
what Boma's done. The crew might already be dead."
     His fatherly wrath, and the accompanying sense of
 helplessness, spurred me to convictions even beyond
 my own. I leaned toward him and promised, "You'll
 get your chance to turn the tables, sir. We'll get there
 somehow."
     "Yes, we must," Sarda interrupted. "Perren cannot
 possibly know about this aspect. He would never
 participate. I'll take you to the lab." He started away.
 The quickness, the suddenness of his movements trig-
 gered a foreboding deep inside me. He was hurrying
 now, but his motivations had shifted. Some hidden
 imperative in his movements told me that, and the
 echo on his heels was Perren, Perren, Perren. Was
 there enough logic in the galaxy to turn Perren now?
 Sarda disappeared into a narrow doorway, leaving
 only the question behind.
                185

     I motioned Dr. McCoy and Merete after him, mean-
 ing to bring up the rear guard.
     Scanner stepped past me. "Don't worry. It's just
 hero worship."
 Sharply I answered, "I can't count on that."
 Unease set in on top of the fear. I set my determina-
 tion on kill and pushed my motley group onward into
 the lab building after Sarda. My memory kept scouring
 the vision of Kirk's face, his glance at Spock, Spock's
 silent response, for some hint of their plans, or at least
 their opinions. No answers yet, though. I was still on
 my own. Rats! Things were really getting bad when I
 couldn't even pretend that Captain Kirk had all the
 solutions in his pocket.
    Sarda paused at the end of one hallway, confused by
the dimness and trying to remember which corridor
held the main lab. The passages were narrow and
moist, the stone walls considerably older than those of
the building we'd been held in. We had no idea how
long the farm had been abandoned, but a faint animal
scent still clung to the mossy walls. The corridor was a
dead end, with only one doorway at the left.
    "Sarda," I called quietly before he reached the
door.
    He stopped, halting the whole line of us, and I
squirmed past the others into the lead.
    "Stay behindme," I told him. Leading with my
shoulder and a good dose of nerve, I peeked into the
lab. Nearly stripped bare, the lab held only a few
engineering consoles, a computer outlet, and a few
empty metal crates. There weren't even any chairs
left, if there had ever been any in the first place. I
motioned the others inside. Scanner nudged the door
shut.
    There was only a little more lighting in here than in
the corridor, though these lights were electrical rather
than the diogen filament torches that ran through the
hallways for function rather than for close work. Evi-

               l86

denfly Captain Kirk's handiwork with the electrical
system had depleted the power leading to the labs. But
that didn't matter any more. There wasn't anyone left
but ourselves. The work done in these labs was omi-
nously complete.
    Sarda appeared beside me. "The communications
board should be near the mainframe outlet. They
would have no reason to take it with them." As he
spoke, he hunted through the piles of discarded equip-
ment and storage crates. "Yes, here it is. Partially
dismantled."
    The two of us lifted the portable console up onto a
nearby cabinet. It looked like a computer board with a
hangover.
    "Can you fix it?" I asked, grimacing in empathy
with the mangled board.
    "They likely did not intentionally dismantle it,"
Sarda said, "but merely cannibalized some parts. We
may be able to bypass those and create enough signal
to trigger your ship's transporter."  "Scanner, what do you think?"
    He moved in between us and thoughtfully twisted
his mouth. "Doesn't look too bad. You want me to
try?"
  My shoulders drooped. I gave him a deadly glare.
     "Okay, I'll try," he said, and put his hands on the
 console.
     The doctors and I spent several minutes gathering
 the bits and pieces that fit Scanner and Sarda's
 descriptions of what they needed, and the communica-
 tions console quickly began looking more like its own
 kind. Scanner pulled up a crate and sat down before
 the tilted mechanism, and began attempting to contact
 the automatic pilot aboard Rex. "He's up there, I
 know he is," he muttered self-consciously.
   "Can you boost your gain?" I asked.
   "Rex'11 answer, don't worry."
  I couldn't help it. I still had trouble trusting a ship
                187

 that looked like the remains of a brewery explosion. I
 leaned over his shoulder, trying to make sense of the
 red blips on the tiny screen as they ran through white
 cross hairs, seeking matched waves. "Maybe you
 need more power. There's got to be a--"
    Nonregulation bulldozers hit us from behind. We
never even heard them coming. Only their vicious
warning growls preceded the impact, and only by a
fraction of a second. I was struck hard in the middle of
my back with just enough balance of force and re-
straint that I was momentarily stunned but still quite
conscious. The room spun, a whirl of pain and faces.
My legs withered under me as the pain in my back took
hold and my nervous system responded. Something
gripped my arms and pulled me up and around, then
crushed me back against a pile of crates, and a gnarly
hand cupped my throat. For an instant I almost tried to
strike back. Mercenaries were only human, after
all--
    But these weren't Mornay's hired guards. These
faces hated us well beyond the value of a credit
payment.
    A Klingon disruptor brushed my cheek. Stale breath
wreathed my face.
    His head at a menacing tilt, Gelt snarled his satisfac-
tion. "Dance with me."

    With great effort I pulled my eyes from his and
confirmed the nightmare: four Klingons at attack
stance held disruptors cleanly on Sarda and the others.
    "Where is it?" Gelt demanded. "The science you're
making here."
    "We're not the scientists," I choked past his grip. I
tried to keep the pain out of my voice for the sakes of
my friends. "As you can see, they took their equip-
ment and left. We're not even sure what they were
doing."
 Nary a flicker of belief damaged his anathema.

               188

"Transwarp," he whispered. Well, so much for that
bluff. "Where is it?"
    All right, if he wanted answers; I'd give him an-
swers. "About 35,000 kilometers away from here by
now, I'd say."
    His grip at my throat tightened, clawing inward
under my ear. My carotid artery pounded, and I had to
drag in what little breath he let me have. Starved for
oxygen, my lungs began to ache and the pain in my
back throbbed enough to make me dizzy.  "Straight up, I'll wager," Gelt said.
    His smugness enraged me, as it had once before. I
bumped my arms against his hard chestplate just to
show him how I felt, and forced my voice to rasp past
his grip. "That's right, fossil face, and there's nothing
you can do against a starship."
    There was something intensely satisfying about be-
ing despised by a Klingon. Not particularly pleasant,
but satisfying anyway. If my mouth hadn't been rock
dry, I'd have spat at him. Past his ugly face, McCoy
and Scanner were refining the art of astonishment.
     Gelt's lips peeled back in hatred as he fanned his gun
 arm outward and barked at his nearest fellow taran-
 tula, "Hlch Qorch.t Toogh!"
     As soon as his hand was free, Gelt ripped open his
 belt guard and pulled out the kind of dagger that's so
 mean looking it draws blood with appearance alone.
 And it was still in a sheath! Gelt wanted to see the
 blade, though. With a snapping motion, the sheath
 struck the floor and bright silver glinted between his
 face and mine. "Your friends are corpses," he said.
 "But you... you are what we call bortas choQ. Do
 you know the words?" His hand pressed tighter on my
 throat. His teeth were gritted, his whisper one of
 hunger. Only his lips moved. "Revenge meat."
     The blade rasped wide. Now there were claws on it.
 Never let it be said that Klingons had no sense of
 drama.
               189

     I tensed, waiting for the impact. Die with a Klingon
 blade between my fibs?
     The room erupted into flaming lances. From a hid-
 den alcove came a burst of phaser fire. First one
 Klingon, then another were blasted across the room
 into heaps. Not really understanding, I reacted first
 and thought about it later. I jammed my knuckles hard
 into Gelt's right eye as he turned to look. He howled,
 and lost his grip on my throat.
     Two more Klingons were sighting down at that
 alcove, exchanging disruptor fire for phaser bolts
 while trying to take cover behind a table and a lighting
 stand. Sarda dropped back onto a counter and brought
 his legs up, and nailed one of the Klingons in the side
 of the head with both heels. The Klingon went down,
 but roBBed over and staggered up again, to be caught by
 a phaser shot. He skidded into Gelt's legs, and both
 went down.
    Free now, I fought to stay up on thready legs. Gelt
was trying to get up from an awkward position, tan-
gled with his unconscious cohort, and I knew I had
only seconds. I reached upward, grasped a heavy air-
conditioning unit from a newly carved wall outlet,
braced my feet on the wall, and heaved. It stuck. With
an inelegant shift of my weight, the unit jolted loose
and I pulled it down on Geit's head, adding what
strength I had left to the already weighty object. Gelt
convulsed once, and went limp.
    I slumped against the waft, gasping. My vision dis-
solved into a black tunnel before I could assimilate
what was happening with the last Klingon. My ears
roared, then whined, then began to accept the gift of
blood and air again. I hung a hand on the open collar of
my flight suit, glad it wasn't a turtleneck.
    I hadn't realized I was slipping down the wall until
Dr. McCoy's voice beside me was accompanied by
firm support from both sides. "Are you all right?"
 Scanner was there too. "Did he cut you, Piper?"
               790

    I shook my head and blinked down at the fuzzy
shape of a Klingon disruptor, still clenched in its
owner's hand. "How come," I rasped, "we're the
only ones obeying... Argelian law?"
    A sigh of relief fell from Scanner. He looked first at
the inert form of Gelt, then at me. He shook his head,
struck by my raw invertebrate-level hatred of
Klingons. "You know, I think you must have some
tribble in you," he observed.
    My vision was starting to return now that I could
breathe. I coughed once, mostly to make sure I
wouldn't make a fool of myself when I answered them.
With an indelicate shove, I straightened up. "Scanner,
get back to work."
  "You all fight, though?"
    "Sure . . . go on." I pushed him back toward the
communications console. Not very convincing; I was
still leaning on Dr. McCoy, surprised at the strength in
his slender form.
    What had happened? Had I been imagining it when I
saw Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock being beamed away?
Were they here? Had the cavalry come in again?
    I blinked and took deep breaths, willing my vision to
clear.
    But the form in the alcove was neither Kirk nor
Speck.
    Perren moved somberly from the archway. The
phaser was still held upward, but he was looking down
at the last of the Klingons, now a quivering lump at his
feet. He was carrying a nondescript metal case by the
handle, which left his right hand free for the phaser.
Now he looked up and made a fleeting eye contact first
with Sarda, then me. Clutching the metal case tightly,
he moved out of the alcove, keeping his back to the
wall and the phaser firmly raised.
     I moved away from McCoy. Walking was an effort.
 My back throbbed where Gelt had bludgeoned it. I
 didn't stop until my own crew were all behind me.
               797

Sarda came up at my side, though, and I knew there
was nothing that would wave him back.  "Thank you," I said.
    Perren nodded a single, simple nod. "You're quite
welcome."
    Disturbing moments shuttled past as we wondered
if we were captive again. Five of us against one Vulcan
and a phaser... incalculable odds indeed.
    Perren, perhaps sensing that, provided the answer.
"I have no intent of challenging you," he said, not
quite able to mitigate the edge of warning in his tone.
He moved sideways, toward the door, the rich green
quilt of his tunic making a shock of color against the
gray stone. "I am sorry our goals cannot harmonize.';
    "Neither do yours and Professor Mornay's," I told
him, also moving slowly toward the door, hoping he
wouldn't feel threatened yet. "Mornay intends to use
Enterprise as a test ship for transwarp. She doesn't
care about the safety systems or the lives of the crew."
    "The crew will be beamed down when we reach our
destination," Perren said. "They will live."
    "They may already be dead," Dr. McCoy spoke up
forcefully, a distinct blade of professional experience
giving credence to his statement. "Mornay's either
lying or fooling herself about how easy it is to provide
an antidote. Narcotic gases shouldn't be played with,
and to her it's all a game." He nailed the words to
Perren's chest with a hammering truthfulness.
    "She's finished with safety, Perren," I carried on.
"If transwarp fails, she'll take over 500 people with
her into interdimensional hell, and if it doesn't fail, the
crew of Enterprise is already forfeited. She's fooling
you. Don't let her."
    Doubt flickered on his fine Vulcan features, but only
a flicker, and soon controlled. He swallowed stiffly.
"Ursula has planned carefully. The narcotic is not
lethal."

192

    "She's a theorist," Merete interrupted in the tough-
est tone I'd ever heard from her. "She's not a medical
specialist. No one can learn how to handle hypnoge-
neticides overnight. It takes months just to isolate
correct dosages. Are you going to believe her or Dr.
McCoy?"
    Perren wrapped his arm around the metal case, and
I was stricken with the undeniable image of a child
clutching a stuffed toy. For many seconds he never
moved, nor even blinked. The inner battle slimmed his
eyes and drew his blade-sharp brows together. Beside
me, Sarda tensed with a kind of empathy only Vuicans
could understand, a remote kind of blending in which
the integrity of personal privacy was constantly at
risk.
    The wild, impossible victory against a sister ship
recurred in my mind, and Captain Kirk fed me one of
his favorite tactics from the reaches of my memory.
Push, push, push till it explodes in your face.
    "You're being used," I insisted. "She'll turn on
you. Hundreds of lives will be the cost."
    "Piper is right, Perren," Sarda said. "I entreat you,
believe her."
    He hadn't used the word "correct." He had said
"right." A subtle difference; a moral difference.
    Perren stepped.over one of the unconscious Kling-
ons and reached the doorway, then hesitated. He
seemed unwilling to leave us until he had made his
conclusions and then explained them to us. That alone
showed me his unsureness. His need to explain proved
to me that we were breaking through.
    'I must tread a center course," he said finally, and
not without some diffidence. "I must stand by my
calculations and my hardware. I am willing to do so
for the sake of my goals. This---" He waved his phaser
once over the fallen Klingons. "--is the sort of event
I am trying to stop." The twitching bodies of our ene-
193

mies, still caressing their weapons, illustrated his point
neatly. "Ursula underestimates Vulcans. It is a perfect
cloak for me to wear."
    Sarda stepped toward him, now standing slightly to
one side between me and Perten. "It is illogical to
sacrifice the lives of an entire starship crew," he said,
reverting to simple didactics.
    "It is illogical to sacrifice all I have worked toward
on the basis of a danger that is only theoretical."
Perren's voice jumped a shade toward that irritation
I'd heard before. "If the starship crew is already dead,
then they are no longer a factor. You are free now. I
shall neither help nor hinder you. There is nothing
your ship can do against a starship." He looked from
me to Sarda, the change evidenced by only the barest
tightening of his mouth. "I regret that we must
part."
    Sarda remained absolutely still. Only I, standing so
near to him, perceived the advance of his tension and
his efforts to hold himself back. "We need not part,"
he said.
    Older and fully trained in his Vulcan controls, Per-
ren had less trouble subjugating his regret. Having
been caught up in the rare experience of human-
Vulcan friendship, I'd wondered for a long time now
what friendship would be like between two Vulcans, if
indeed this was friendship and not merely that strange
training bond necessary between mentor and pupil. As
Spock had pointed out to me, Perren and Sarda had
much in common from the beginning--mostly the fact
that each had had trouble fitting in to current Vulcan
conformity. It must have been comforting for Sarda to
find another Vulcan who understood his awkward
place, someone of his own race that he wasn't obli-
gated to explain himself to. I wished I had thought of
these things earlier. I'd have been more prepared for
what was coming.
 Perren nodded, but not in agreement. It was some-

194

thing different entirely. "Then I regret that we part
before our objectives can be shared. It remains only
for me to wish that you live long and prosper." He
spoke slowly now, without the edgy tone of underlying
rebellion that had always been there before. Backing
out into the corridor, maintaining his expression, he
vanished.
    My hand reached out for Sarda, who was already
moving.
 "Sarda, wait!" I gasped.
    He paused at the door, cast a glance back at me, and
fitfully gripped the stone for an instant as though
hoping to find something to say that would explain. He
was torn in half. Even a Vulcan couldn't hide that
much torment.
     He pushed himself off the door frame. We heard his
boots on the hard floor of the passageway.
  "Sarda!" I started for the door.
    Scanner's voice caught me back for an instant.
"Piper, I got it!"
    I drew an invisible circle around him and the doctors
with my finger as I skidded to a stop at the doorway.
"Beam up! I'll contact youl"
    Deep Argelian night had thoroughly penetrated the
stone building now that most of the electricity had
been strangled. I was tired of feeling cold. I'd only felt
warm once since leaving Earth, and that was because
of a Klingon growling at my throat. Even running
through the building failed to heat my blood. The
injured muscles in my back screamed with each stride,
and my head pounded now whenever I took a breath.
At every turn I caught a glimpse of Sarda. He was
healthy and fast; keeping up with him was terrible
work. At the turn of the last corridor, I gave in to a
useless urge and called once again, "Sarda, wait--"
    To my utter amazement, he whirled around and
stopped. Was he surprised that I followed? Had he
forgotten so much?
               195

    He turned again, in time to see Perren's distant form
retreat into a smaller building.
    I jogged to a halt a few feet from Sarda and steadied
myself with a hand on the wall. He turned once again
to me, hesitantly at best.
    "He's probably getting the last of his equipment," I
said, drawing a deep breath, "before he signals Mor-
nay to beam him up."
    Sarda gazed once again through the night at the
other building, now still and darkened. When he
turned back to me, the quandary in his eyes was
frightening. His fists balled up. I doubt he was even
aware of it.
  "I cannot leave Perren in this situation," he said.
    I closed the space between us by another step.
"You're not leaving him. He's leaving you."
    With a step of his own, he widened the gap. "Piper,
you do not comprehend Vulcan complexities. I have
no time to explain them to you."
    With a nod I showed him that he was right. Slowly I
asked, "Do you really think Perten doesn't under-
stand what he's involved in?"
    Inner struggle tightened his mouth. "That is no
excuse to abandon him."
    My shoulders sagged as I tried to think of logical
arguments. But even a partially trained Vulcan knows
his own thoughts. If he had made up his mind to forfeit
the past for the future, even a hazy future, I knew no
power in the universe could pull him back.
    When arguments were not enough, when logic could
only fail, it was time to go beyond them. My shoulders
squared as I backed away a pace, showing him that I
was ready to accept his decision.
  "Then you'll have to choose."

    Sarda no longer glanced indecisively at the building
that had swallowed Perten only moments ago. His
eyes lost their focus as he gazed at me, and I felt

               196

utterly unseen. Perhaps he was searching for a way to
explain the inexplicable. With my silence I hoped to
show him that no explanation was necessary. As for
my own message, my presence on this planet would
have to speak for itself.
    Sarda privately navigated his sea of uncharted emo-
tions without help from me, for I could no longer help
him, no matter how much I wanted to.
    He raised his chin a fraction. "There is only one
choice," he said, his voice solemn and low.
    I willed myself not to nod, to flinch, or even to
breathe. I wouldn't show the tiniest hint of feeling
betrayed. I hadn't been betrayed, after all; he had
simply made the best decision for himself. That was all
I had any right to ask of him.
    Searching for the final words, the words that would
get me smoothly out of this terrible last encounter,
gave Sarda an extra few moments.
 His arms relaxed at his sides. "I go with you."

197

Chapter Ten

"The trigger has been pulled. We've got to get there
before the hammer falls."
                    --Errand of Mercy

WHEN WE GOT back to the ship, it was unfortunately
in the same shape as when we left. I finally had to
admit Rex wasn't just an industrial nightmare but the
ship I was stuck with. It felt pathetic and small as we
gazed out the viewing portals at the pure beauty of
Enterprise, her design still striking me as elemental. I
would probably always get this shock of awe at a
glimpse of a starship, and I would probably never get
used to it or take it for granted. Engineers and space
technologists may have designed her, but they shared
the heart of an artist.
    "Are we in one piece, Scanner?" I asked, leaning
over his shoulder, still peering at the starship in orbit
several degrees farther out.
    "Functional," he answered with a shrug. Even so,
he tapped several linkages just to check.
"How long will it take them to install transwarp?"
From behind me came a mellow voice finally free of
its stress. "Perren has become most efficient in his
engineering," Sarda said. "He and Boma can install
the complex into a starship's warp system in roughly
eighteen hours. Likely they will not do it right away,
but retreat to a safe haven where 'they have access to
other people who are also followers of Rittenhouse."
 I nodded my thanks to him. His presence still sur-

198

prised me, but I was finally warm. In our crisis aboard
the dreadnought those few weeks ago, he had been
forced to stay at my side because of circumstances.
Today the decision was his own. For the first time in a
long time, I stopped worrying about what Captain
Kirk thought of me. Sarda's testimonial was all I
needed. Even now I felt the warm buzz of telepathic
support from him, a subtle echo behind my thoughts
that gave me that extra supporting nudge. I still
couldn't interpret that buzz--whether it was inten-
tional or not, whether it was normal for Vulcans or
not--but it was welcome, deeply so.
    "We have to act immediately," I said, sliding into
the command chair. The new leather breathed under
me and cradled my legs and back as though it knew 1
was still fiercely aching from Geit's assault. As ff to
remind me, the Klingon disruptor I'd taken from one
of the unconscious swine dug into my rib. I pulled it
from my belt and handed it to Merete; Sarda did the
same with his. Scanner wisely vacated the seat beside
me and moved to the navigation/sensor station farther
to the right, allowing Sarda to take the place beside
me.
    "What do you have in mind?" Dr. McCoy asked
with a controlled touch of incredulity. He was leaning
forward in one of the passenger chairs, watching his
home ship and no doubt wishing he was there to do his
part.
    I empathized with his frustration, and it kindled my
sense of purpose. "We've got to keep them from
warping out of orbit."
    Every eye in the ship struck me. Scanner straight-
ened up like a long skinny balloon and yelped, "Oh,
yeah? While we're at it, let's rearrange the solar
system so the planets all line up in a row."
    McCoy leaned even farther forward. "This ship
against a starship?"
"Sure," Scanner mocked. "If you can get me within

199

 fifty meters, I can cut 'em up with my little laser torch.
 If you can get me within ten, we got a claw. S'pose
 they'd notice?"
     The doctor ignored him. "Wouldn't it make more
 sense just to get away and notify Star Fleet?"
     "By the time Star Fleet could get out here," I said,
 "Mornay could have taken Enterprise anywhere in the
 known galaxy. They're not leaving this system if I can
 help it."
    "Piper, we don't even have phasers big enough to
carve a moustache on that ship's face," Scanner said,
pointing descriptively.
    An unexpected voice interrupted us. "Leave her
alone."
    Gazes shifted again, this time aft. Merete stood
alone in the obscurity of the hatchway, one hand
braced upon the ship's gnarly bulkhead as though to
say she trusted it. Her face was eclipsed by a band of
shadow. The hem of her robe made a purple wedge in a
walklight, and at the shadow's top a crescent of pearl-
blond hair shone in the glow of a tiny bulb near an
electrical access. Beyond that, there was nothing of
her to focus on but her intense presence of purpose.
    "Piper is our commanding officer," she said. "We're
going to do what she says and we're not going to argue
anymore. ff we die," she added softly, "then we die
well."
    Merete was so quiet and unobtrusive that I often
forgot how much I told her, how much of my past and
my present thoughts she kept diligently stored for me,
things I'd said both intentionally and unintentionally.
Only when one of those things surfaced at exactly the
right moment, thanks to her sensitive timing, did I
remember to appreciate her. I wouldn't forget again
for a long, long time.
    True to the drama of the moment, she never moved.
She let her words sink deep into the fabric of what was
to come, and drew no more attention to herself. She

200

wanted me to have the attention, we all knew. Even
Dr. McCoy settled back as though he too somehow felt
better about all this.
    Sarda moved slightly, switching from helm tracking
to the computer readout screen before him. It cast a
fine blue glow on his pale alien features. "The Enter-
prise is moving out of orbit on impulse power. Taking a
heading of point three-seven."
    "Heading out of the solar system," I uttered.
"When they get clear of the planets, they'!! go to
warp. Follow them. Just don't get so close that they'll
want to fire on us. They'll know we're coming."
  "I can already hear 'em laughing," Scanner said.
    "Let's hope they are, Scanner," I countered imme-
diately. "It's an advantage not to be taken as a threat
tOO soon."
    "They won't fire on you," Dr. McCoy pointed out.
"It's a waste of energy. They know they can outrun us
at warp."
    I looked at Sarda, and he silently confirmed the
logic. Obviously Leonard McCoy hadn't spent all
those years aboard a starship without learning a thing
or two about military logistics.
    "Thank you, sir," I said to him, then hunched
forward on my command console as we eased out of
orbit and slipped into the path of the distant star-
ship.
    Rex's old impulse engines grumbled, but soon
pushed us up to the speed of Enterprise and even a
little beyond. We gained on her slowly, while three of
the system's planets rolled by. Four other planets were
well out of our trajectory and only one remained for us
to pass before we cleared the solar system.
    "Scanner, how do these terrific tractor beams of
yours work?" I asked.
  His boyish face screwed up. "Huh?"
    "How do you haul something that's heavier than
your engine thrust capacity?"

201

     "For short range, you anchor on the nearest planet
 or moon and use it for traction."
  "Can we brace on a planet and hold Enterprise?"
      "Hold Enterprise? Well, I guess so, long as she's in
 orbit or somethin', but--"  "No buts."
     "You gotta have some buts, Piper." He spun his
 chair around to face me. "We can't hold a ship the size
 of Enterprise against her own thrust, not even if we
 hang onto a whole sun. We could tow her, but only if
 she was adrift." The acrid tone was gone from his
 voice, likely driven out by Merete's blanketing prom-
 ise. I particularly noticed it.
  "How closely can you pinpoint the tractor beams?"
    "Hell, I could pull the yoke out of an egg at 20,000
kilometers."
  "Good," I murmured. "That's good."
  "I give. Why's it good?"
    My right shoulder went up and down once. "You
said this ship is a Fesarius. Let's see what it can really
do."
    Scanner puffed up at that comment. He had no idea
what I had in mind, but he was suddenly anxious to
prove the truth of his own promise. Even if it killed us.
ff it didn't work, none of us would be around to flay
him with an 1-told-you-so.
    "Sarda," I began, "pinpoint the joist where the port
warp nacelle is attached to its strut and feed the
coordinates into Scanner's tractor beam. That's what I
want, Scanner. Put a lariat of traction right around that
joist."
    It was so wild he couldn't even think of anything to
say. He blinked hard and took a deep breath, then
glared accusingly at his equipment as though to get a
mental running start on it.
    "Make the beam as tight as possible," I instructed. I
punched the nearest computer access switch. "Com-
puter."

202

  "Working," the pleasant voice answered.
     "Release all safety monitors, overload capacitors,
 and limiters for the tractor system to manual control at
 the helm station."
  "Acknowledged."
     Good. No arguments from underneath either. I
 needed that.
     Scanner shook his head, unable to resist a 50 per-
 cent grin. "That's the first time I ever heard anybody
 ask a ship's permission to rip its guts out." He
 squinted and peered at me over his shoulder. "You
 sure you got enough authority to do this?"
     I gripped the arms of my chair. "Power up the warp
 engines. Zero thrust. Power only. Sarda, feed the
 energy through to that tractor beam. We've got a lot of
 starship to pull on."
     "Powering up. Maximum in twenty-point-seven
 seconds." Even as he spoke, Banana Republic began
 humming with bottled warp power.
     "Hold at maximum," I said. "Go to two-thirds
 sublight, heading sixty degrees subport."
     "At that rate," Sarda read out slowly, "we will be
 within tractor range of Enterprise in... one minute,
 eighteen seconds."
     "When will we be in tractor range of that last
 planet?"
  "We are nearly there now."
     "Scanner, get ready to grab onto the planet. I think
 you know what I want to do."
      Perhaps it was fortuitous that he only nodded. He
    bent close to his sensor console, coordinating the
impossible.
     I put my glare unfiinchingly upon the ivory essence
 of Enterprise. In my mind the starship had sails. She
 surged now through an ocean of splash and stars, but
 there were no steady hazel eyes gazing over her bow.
 She knew he wasn't on her bridge and she felt help-
 less, like a warship with no rudder, rampaging franti-

203

caUy through a blockade. She was calling out to me.
    I had finally reached the point at which sacrifice is
more than bravery's flag. Finally, my life meant less
than my mission. Never before had I truly believed 1
would die, much less take these four fine lives with
me. Fail, yes. Die... no.
  But now, this time, I was ready.
    "Piper, they're outrunning us," Sarda said, urgency
spiking his words.
    I clutched the command console. "Don't let them. If
they warp out before we can engagemMerete!" I
snapped. "Get to Scanner's station and keep your
eyes on the matteffantimatter flux monitor for Enter-
prise. Tell me exactly when she's about to go to
warp."
    Her footsteps announced that she was crossing the
limited deck space, and I resisted the glance that
would have confirmed it.
      "They're at point five . . ." she read out. "Point
five-five... six..."
  "Scanner--"
  "I'm ready."
  "Just the nacelle."
  "Ready."
  Tension crackled in the cabin.
    Around us the sound of our engines drummed their
effort.
    My hands left sticky prints on the command board.
"Sarda, get us up there..."
  "Closing. One-hundred-fourteen kilometers now."
  "Warp point-eight," came Merete's soft voice.
  "Seventy-thousand kilometers."
  "Point eight-five ~. 2'
  "Forty thousand kilometers."
  "Point nine..."
  "Twenty-five-thousand kilometers."
    The old ship thrummed. Its voice made a solemn
backdrop for the voices of my crew as they ticked off

204

the elements of chance. In range, in range, in range
... we've got to get in range...
    "Point nine-two, Piper," Merete read out, unable to
control a quiver of warning. "Point nine-five... nine-
eight... nine-nine... warp sp--" "Now, Scanner!"
    A massive jolt sent us all rolling. Neither human
strength nor Vulcan could hold against the sudden
force. Banana Republic used the planet for an anchor
and set itself up as a pulley between natural stationary
force and the science of propulsion. Every casing,
baffle, strut, crosspiece, and joist on the old tug was
abruptly put to the test of its lifetime. I was plastered
to the port bulkhead, crushed between the emergency
exit and the forward claw control, unable to turn or
even move at all. Banana Republic went up on an
invisible axis like a bead on a taut string, tilting in
space between the planet and the starship, finding its
own best angle against the killing forces that were
tearing it inside out. Never before had it been asked to
hold a piece of a starship against warp thrust.
    The cabin lights dimmed and sagged out as their
power was sapped, leaving us with only the off-angle
light of the Argelian sun to see by. Even the tiny
emergency bulbs flickered along the walkways. Staticy
crackles splintered through the electronics. Around us
the roar of our engines expanded to a deafening whine.
The engines were coming forward for a visit, or at least
a last meal. The grating noise of coilplate being
stretched like muscle tissue was as sickening as it was
terrifying.
    Artificial gravity lost its grip. As it struggled to
regain control, it pulled our bodies in a dozen direc-
tions at once, as though it meant to tear us apart limb
from limb. I heard someone yell, but the words were
indiscernible under the din of mechanical torsion. I
ached to help, but all I could do was cling to the base
of a nearby chair and wait for the hull to rupture and all
 our precious atmosphere to hiss out into space before
 we exploded into a billion bits.
     As suddenly as it had begun, it ended. The great
 yank was over. The tractor beams automatically com-
 pensated for the lack of thrust, luckily, or we'd have
 found ourselves buried in that planer's surface.
     Moans filled the cabin. Behind them, the engines
 sputtered and groaned, slower and slower, grinding
 like old batteries. The power was gone, no matter how
 the backup circuits combed the system for more.
     McCoy was pulling Sarda to his feet as we gathered
 ourselves on a pitched deck. The artificial gravity was
 off kilter, and not likely to improve.
    I dragged myself back to the helm after doing a
quick head count. They weren't in good shape, but
they were all alive, which relegated them to my second
concern. Scanner and I made it to the viewport at the
same time. Sarda, limping noticeably now, was soon
to follow.
The Enterprise was still there... sort of.
"Goddang!" Scanner gasped. "You twisted it!"
Sure enough, the starship's port nacelle was off
kilter on its strut. Not broken off, but wrenched
enough that the delicate balance needed for warp
speed was quite impossible.
  "Remarkable.. 2' Sarda breathed.
    Dr. McCoy peered between Sarda and me. His
expression was easy enough to read. Very low, witha
strange and solemn intimacy, he murmured, "The
angel falls.. 2'
    I stared at him. The grimness of his message, sent
across space to our captain, caught me by the
heart.
    Merete broke the sweaty silence with a prophetic
truth. "So much for the test ship."
    McCoy straightened his thin form and poked a
thumb outward. "If I were you, I'd fix that before the
captain sees it."

    Several seconds lolled by while Rex--and l--panted
for life. Beside me, Sarda was stiff and silent, his
breathing also ragged as we shared an unbelieving
glance.
 "Status," I choked.
He pulled himself to his station. "Checking."
Scanner still gawked at the starship as Enterprise
rotated slowly in space on a bizarre angle. The
wrenched nacelle made her look like a chiid's broken
toy. "How you gonna explain to Kirk that you twisted
his ship?"
    "They can't go to warp," I thought aloud. "When
help arrives from the Federation, we'll all still be
here."
    "I dunno about you," he rasped, "but I left back
when you started tawkin' about tractor lariats. I may
never come back."
    "Sarda, where's that status report?" I must have
really wanted to know, since I asked twice.
    Sarda bent tightly over the readout hood. "Warp
power depleted... tractor capacity down 86 percent
ú.. impulse drive out... major structural damage to
central bracings and all main couplings . . . stress
damage in major underpinnings and the matter/anti-
matter containment baffle . . . emergency leakage
control is still in operation, but all other electrical
maintenance systems are at tolerance." He fell silent
for a moment, not to speak again until he straightened
and directed his quiet words to me. "Piper... life
support is completely down."
    Beside me, McCoy stifled himself from repeating
what he had just heard. Hearing it twice wouldn't
make it less true or provide a solution. Merete,
though, couldn't keep from struggling upward to Sar-
da's station and peeking into his readout hood.
 I had to push my voice out. "How long, Sarda?"
    "On remaining battery power, no more than eight
minutes."

206                                                               207

    I pressed a hand to my pulsing forehead, took a deep
breath, and shook myself. "Uh-huh... well... this is
a good time to go see how the captain's doing."

  "Are we within transporter range?"
  "Barely," Sarda answered tonelessly.
  I struck him with a look. "That's a yes."
  "Yes."
    Merete asked, "They'll pick up our transporter
beams, won't they?"
  "Undoubtedly," Sarda said.
    McCoy pushed close. "I'm no engineer, but it's my
business to know how the ventilation system on that
ship works. They can flood any compartment with
narcotic gas at the touch of a button. We won't last
two minutes."
    "No choice, sir," I told him. "We'll just have to
hope they're in disarray right now and can't move that
fast."
    "You know better than that," he warned, and he
was right.
    I turned to Scanner. "Are there oxygen masks on
board Rex?"
    "You mean portable ones? Nope. Just the kind
that have to stay tied into the wall units. Quit lookin'
at me like that, Piper, I didn't design the damn
things."
    "We'll have to use the emergency masks aboard
Enterprise."
    "Beaming in one at a time? We'll never get the
chance."
  "We'll have to make the chance. Sarda--"
    Without a pause Sarda answered, "Six minutes,
twelve seconds left."
    "There's our alternative." I led the way aft toward
our tiny transporter alcove. "Sarda, how long to beam
five people from one pad?"
  Calculating on the run, he called, "A total of one
               208

minute, thirty-three seconds if we beam consecu-
tively, including recalibration time for, each beaming,
plus preset time for the operator."
     "I'll operate it," Scanner volunteered. "I know this
unit like the inside of my mouth."  "Get it ready. Merete--"
    She was beside me in an instant, and we were both
looking down at the Klingon disruptor she held. "It's
basically the same as a phaser," she said. "This word
indicates the force ray, the kill/disrupt setting. That
doesn't leave a body. This is kill/intact/heat. It does
leave a body. These are stun settings one, two, and
three, one being the lightest strike. Three is the worst;
it causes instant viral rotting of living tissue. It's
technically a stun setting, but the victim isn't meant to
live long. And this toggle gives you narrow beam, wide
field, or microbeam."
    "Got it." I slipped the disruptor into my belt again
and handed Sarda his own, repressing a shudder of
disgust at having to use weapons of such calculated
cruelty. "Merete, Dr. McCoy," I addressed, turning in
the narrow passage as Scanner set the coordinates,
"you go first. Don't wait for us. As soon as you
materialize, put on the nearest emergency masks.
Then head for sickbay and get that antidote process
going."
    "You bet we will," McCoy said with a thorny nod.
"Good luck."
    "Good luck, Piper," Merete echoed solemnly as
McCoy maneuvered her onto the pad first.
    I scowled and nodded my best response, which
wasn't much considering the circumstances. It was
definitely a yeah-right-get-going acknowledgment, but
I just had to hope she understood. Certainly she
deserved better from me.
    "Energize," I said, and Merete dissolved into a pale
spectrum. "Hurry, sir," I told McCoy instantly,
"you're next."
               209

    The transporter hummed once again, flushing us all
with the faint nausea common to nearby dissolution,
and McCoy was gone.
 "Sarda," I said with a terse motion.
 "I prefer--"
 "No arguments. Go."
    Logic, thankfully, told him i was fight. He pressed
his lips flat and moved into the cavity, where, a second
later, he buzzed into nonexistence.
    Scanner busily reset the mechanism, working with
calm assurance.
    "You go next," I said. "Captain's last off the ship
and all."
     His hair flopped over one eye as he shook his head.
"Not this time."  "Scanner--"
    "Nope." He nodded toward the chamber. Then he
grinned. "No arguments."
 I was relieved that I could still smile.
    A touch of regret surged through me with the first
sensations of dissolution, to be leaving my first com-
mand vessel behind and derelict. Rex's rumpled inner
hull blurred around me, disintegrated, and reassem-
bled into the clean white bulkheads of Enterprise's
hangar deck.
    "Good choice, Scanner," I mumbled as the last
quivers of dissolution faded and reality became whole
again. The hangar deck was the emptiest place on the
ship, and the biggest single space, thus the hardest to
fill with any kind of gas. Sarda stood a few feet away,
plainly relieved to see me materialize. Per orders, the
doctors were already gone.
    I stepped immediately away from the beaming area;
Banana Republic's transporter was just about old
enough not to have the safety devices that modern
equipment had, and I had no particular desire to merge
molecules with Scanner. Sure enough, he hummed
into being only three seconds later, exactly where I'd
               210

been standing. True to his word, he was fast with that
geriatric transporter.
 "Masks?" I blurted.
    "Yonder." Scanner led the run across the hangar
deck to what he knew was the nearest emergency-
provisions locker. Of the three of us, he had served
longest on' Enterprise in a true crewing capacity. For
Sarda, the starship had been a science assignment,
drawn only shortly before I too had found myself
unexpectedly Enterprise-ing.
    Scanner pulled himself to a halt on the Iocker's
handle and yanked it open. There were small fire
extinguishers, but the hooks for four oxygen masks
were empty. "Dang! Mornay musta had her people go
round and collect 'em in case the captain got away
from her."
    Sarda shifted as though he was about to explain the
illogic of that, then changed his mind when he remem-
bered that Ursula Mornay had plenty of illogic to go
around.
 "There've got to be others, Scanner!"
    He glanced around the hangar bay, then made a
decision. "Right. And I know where. Come on."
    Since we were already on the starboard side, we
dashed with him to the small hangars where the Arco
attack-sleds were stored. Had we been closer to the
port side of the hangar deck, the big Galileo and
Columbus shuttlecraft would have provided perfect
protection and plenty of masks, but this was much
faster at a moment when time was crucial. Mornay
undoubtedly knew we were on board by now, and
would soon take action against us. We had to be ready.
    Sarda got the hangar door open and Scanner
squeezed through immediately, scrambling to the top
of the nearest sled and forcing its hatch open. That was
when a telltale hiss in the vents told us that Dr. McCoy
had been completely right. Gas!
 "Scanner, the gas!" I shouted.
               211

    His arm disappeared up to the shoulder and he
grimaced with effort, but soon pulled out a mask. He
straightened and tossed it to me, then buried himself
deeper in the Arco's hatch, searching for another
mask. Above him, ghostly pink fog shot from the
ceiling vents.
  "Scanner, put your own on!"
    In a moment he resurfaced and glanced up at the
pink gas, then called, "Sarda! Here!" A second mask
flew.
  "Scanner, hurry!" I called.
    He was still digging deep into the attack sled when
the gas started to spread around the sled. He finally
came up with a third mask securely in hand, and
struggled to balance himself on the slippery hatch
bracings. Had he been at floor level, he might have had
a chance. But there were ventilators directly over his
head, spewing gas. It spread ungodly fast.
"Judd!" Sarda's voice was muffled by his mask.
Scanner wavered. He made a final effort to bring the
mask to his face, but his muscles flagged and he
collapsed onto the lid of the hatch as it drifted shut
beside him. He slid onto the solar wing with a hollow
bump and sagged into our arms. Though he was al-
ready unconscious as we eased him down, his hands
clutched at our clothing. He was still fighting. His
sheer determination affected us both, perhaps Sarda
even more than me. He supported Scanner's head and
gripped one limp hand, but there was nothing we could
do.
    Sarda's brows knitted in anguish as he put his hand
on Scanner's chest, then looked at me. "He took a full
dose. His heartbeat is too slow."
    My fist struck the Arco's photon sling to vent a burst
of rage. "We can't help him. I just hope the doctors
made it to sickbay. It's up to them." In the next
seconds, I made one of the hardest decisions of my
life and for someone who was only twenty-five years

               212

old, I'd had too many of those. I stood up and said,
"We have to leave him. Mornay'11 be sending her
guards down here. Let's be gone by then."
    Sarda forced himself to agree, and we crossed the
hangar deck at a run.
    The corridor shocked us with the sight of a dozen
crewpeople collapsed in midstride. They were pale
and pasty, as though phasered down. Sarda quickly
knelt among them, checking pulses. "These people are
barely breathing," he said, unable to keep the heavi-
ness of disgust out of his voice. "This midshipman's
already dead."
    One, and counting. I thought of Scanner. Dead.
What a word.
    The hiss of a turbolift door down the next corridor
drove us quickly up the nearest deck-to-deck spiral
crawlway. We barely made it, and I had to draw my
feet up, out of sight, while several of Mornay's hired
lizards ran past the opening toward the hangar deck.
    I listened until there was nothing left to hear of their
footsteps. Above me, Sarda climbed a few rungs, then
stopped. I felt his concern.
    "It's not likely that they will move him, Piper," he
said, keeping his voice down.
    Until he said it, I hadn't been sure of what I was
thinking. I squinted upward into the brightness of the
tube. "I guess you're right."
    He pulled off the uncomfortable mask and attached
it to the communicator belt under his uniform shirt.
"Where are we going?"
    Nice handy ladders... empty tube... big ship... I
stripped off my own mask, hooked it to a belt loop,
and shrugged. "Up."
    And yet, a more specific destination kept turning in
my mind, no matter how I tried to apply logic to the
situation. Sarda had surmised that Mornay, Perren,
and Boma wouldn't try to install the transwarp device
until they reached a comfortable location where they

213

were totally in charge. They wouldn't be in Engineer-
ing, then. No point in going there. The doctors didn't
need my incompetence in medicine to help them find
the antidote for the narcotic gas, so no point in going
that way. Besides, Merete and McCoy weren't the
people I needed to see right now. I had prevented any
hope Mornay might have of taking the starship out of
the solar system on warp power, and surely they knew
by now that nothing but several weeks in spacedock
would realign Enterprise's delicate nacelle balance.
They wouldn't bother trying to repair such wild dam-
age. All that sounded perfectly logical, and I was ready
in case Sarda asked, but my real motivation was
nothing more than a subliminal echo deep in the least
logical corners of my thoughts. It was an irresistible
call. Rotating and growing ever stronger in my mind
was a single word: bridge.
    The Enterprise was as quiet as a floating coffin.
Each entry into a new deck, a new corridor, chilled us
with the sight of co!lapsed crewpeople dropped in their
tracks by Mornay's ruthlessness, then mashed to-
gether on the starboard side because of our little trick
with Rex. The starship was worse than empty. It was
cataleptic.
    And traveling through it, thanks to me, was like a
maze of dead ends. Everywhere we turned, doors
refused to work or were jammed partially shut, turbo-
lifts scraped and rasped in their tubes, or refused to
open for us at all because they were simply too dam-
aged to allow passengers to trap themselves between
decks. The ship's automated maintenance system was
fully enabled, cutting off many access routes through
the ship that were now dangerous.
    Even worse---I couldn't feel the presence of Captain
Kirk. Common sense told me he was here. I'd seen
him and Speck beamed on board. But I couldn't feel
him. Where was he? Had Mornay, in some fit of
unpredictability, beamed him somewhere else to corn-

214

plicate any bid he might have for freedom and the
welfare of his ship and crew? Might she have gassed
him and Spock along with their crew, in case she
needed to impress Star Fleet with the caliber of her
hostages?
    As we wended our way through the innards of the
great ship, I kept trying to find Captain Kirk with my
intuitions. I clamped my mouth shut when the inclina-
tion arose to tell Sarda my feelings. Vulcans already
thought humans were a little short of a harvest, and 1
didn't need to throw more fodder on that field.
    Finally we were spared any more sights of the
crippled crew when we reached a direct turbolift to the
bridge. We stood side by side and looked at it as
though there was no lift inside and we'd just fall away
into eternity if we stepped in.
    "Disruptors," I uttered, clueing us simultaneously
in to the missing element. As with a single motion, we
drew the weapons from our belts.
 "Set for light stun?" Sarda asked.
 "Heavy stun."
 He looked up. "Not the third setting."
 "No. Second."
    I looked at my weapon after setting it, unable to pull
my eyes or thoughts away from the dial. I knew Sarda
wondered why I was hesitating, but I had no clear
answer yet. My fingers moved like separate beings on
the disruptor dial. An extra three clicks. And a lock.
Kill/disrupt.
    "Kill?" he asked. Whether he was surprised or
disappointed, I couldn't yet tell. He hadn't been with
us when Captain Kirk made me believe in the urgency
of the situation--that any single life was expendable,
even my own. The time had come to act on that sour
truth.
    Sarda left his own weapon on stun; I was glad he
did. It fit into my plan.
  Even through the conviction, his question made me

215

think twice, forced me to make the awful decision a
second time. "I have to be taken seriously," I told
him. "It's imperative."
    Neither of us liked it very much. Only that, the
evenness of our regret for what we had to do, kept
Sarda from controverting my decision. That, and other
things between us that still defied definition.
    With a sigh of commitment, I stood up. Fortified
against my own decision, I led the way back to the
bridge turbolift.
    There were no words between Sarda and me as we
rode to the bridge, flattened against the sides of the lift.
Words had lost their value. And my mind was already
on the bridge.
    The doors hissed open. With a shout of warning, I
burst out, followed by Sarda, led by my disruptor.
Several faces snapped around in shock. Weapons
came up.
    I picked a target and fired. A scream filled the bridge
as one of Mornay's mercenaries withered into gory
lights and smoke. I turned my disruptor on Mornay,
my readiness to kill confirmed by the leftover scent of
incinerated flesh and bone.
    The first voice was a distantly familiar one. I hadn't
heard it in a long time, and then only briefly, but it
hadn't been soon forgotten.
    "You again!" Samuel Boma's face flushed beneath
its deep brown complexion.
    Professor Mornay, gripping the handrail on the up-
per walkway, glared at him. "I told you someone had
invaded the compound to get Sarda out," she said
roughly.
     Boma drew in his brows and pointed. "You didn't
tell me it was her! I could've warned you!"  "Why? Who's she in particular?"
    Boma shook his head. "You don't want to know." It
was hard to believe this was the man who had designed
the dangerous dreadnought that was meant to put the

               216

galaxy on the edge of war, who had kept his cool
enough to fool Star Fleet into accepting his help, and
who had somehow managed to take a prime com-
mander like Montgomery Scott by surprise and gas
down the entire crew. I forced myself to remember
those things and not slacken my guard.
    By now I'd assured myself there was no one on the
bridge but who I saw: Mornay, Boma, and three
remaining mercenaries who were manning helm, navi-
gations, and command intelligence stations. There was
no sign whatsoever of the bridge crew--Mr. Scott, Mr.
S ulu, Uhura... the bridge looked raw without them.
  "Sarda," I said, the order silently following.
    He took careful aim, holding the disruptor in both
hands, and one by one struck each guard with a stun
bolt. Mornay and Boma had no choice but to watch
and wait until the four of us squared off across the
bridge from each other.
    "Where's PerrenT' I asked. "Did you leave Arge-
lius without him after all, Professor?"
    She gave me a smug nod. "Keep guessing, hot
spur."
    I battled against the quiver of my voice and de-
manded, "Where's the captain?"
  "Held tightly hostage, that's where."
  "Those aren't answers, Professor."
    "I don't owe you answers. My guards are on their
way up here. Do you think I'm foolish enough to let
myself go unprotected? The instant you entered the
bridge, my security forces were alerted. When the
turbolift doors open, you're dead."
    That word again. I ignored Sarda's glance. !
wouldn't have known what to tell him anyway. I
waggled the phaser at Mornay and Boma, who were
standing near each other near the Engineering subsys-
tems monitor. "Down there, please, both of you."
    Boma hesitated, but Mornay merely widened her
weird little grin. Now what? What could I do if she

217

 wasn't even intimidated by a Klingon disruptor set on
 kill?
     "Gladly," she said then. "Out of the line of fire."
 She led the way down to the command module, step-
 ping over the crumpled body of one of the guards.
 Boma followed.
     I hated the fact that she was right; putting them
 down there made it easier for her marauders to fire
 freely at us when they appeared. "Sarda, can you jam
 that turbolift?"
    He moved immediately to the communications sta-
tion and placed his disruptor down on the console to
free both hands. What I asked of him was no easy task.
The turbolifts were especially designed to counter-
mand any artificial jamming, to avoid trapping passen-
gers anywhere on the ship. Sarda would have to
reroute its programming both through the computers
and through the engineering of the ship. If he had time.
If, if, if. Another word, like dead.
    When he had done what he could at Engineering, he
crossed by me to Communications and started tamper-
ing.
    I snaked sideways along the handrail past Sarda and
down the gangway, trying to put myseff in a position
where my single disruptor could protect Sarda from
whatever came out of the turbolift while still keeping a
wedge of threat over Mornay and Boma.
  "Hurry, Sarda," I urged.
  "Trying."
    The communications station clicked and whirred
under his hands, but I could see in the tension of his
jawline that he wasn't succeeding against the auto-
matic resistors of the turbolift system. That was con-
firmed when the turbolift doors puffed open.
    Sarda rolled away from the station to give me clear
aim. His disruptor, left on the Engineering console,
was out of commission for us.
  My finger flinched on the trigger, ready to kill again.
               218

The phaser that came out of the lift to aim at me was
also quite ready to commit murder.
    "Nobody move!" a strong voice shouted. A single
phaser. Human eyes behind it. A hero's eyes. A
captain's eyes. They reflected his ship.
    "Captain!" Like an idiot, I was still holding the
disruptor on him.
    He recovered sooner and redirected his weapon at
Mornay, quickly assessing the situation, lumped-up
guards and all. He was still wearing the brown tunic
and beige trousers from Argelius, which told me he'd
been too busy to slip back into a uniform. Either that,
or the uniform had nothing to do with who he really
was deep down.
  I forgot to breathe. "You're here !"
    He nodded. "Commander, would you mind?" He
pointed at me, then down at Mornay and Boma.
    The disruptor. Oh, damn. My hair bounced as I
looked from him to Mornay, back to him, and back to
Mornay. Finally comprehension sank in and the dis-
ruptor in my hands moved itseft to the people it was
supposed to be guarding. "Right .... "I murmured.
"Sir, there are guards on the way up here," I said
breathlessly.
    "Yes, I know. They had a little trouble getting by
Mr. Spock and me."
    I readjusted my feet. "Oh." So much for the guards.
"Where were you, sir?"
  "Before or after we broke out of our cells?"
  "Uh... after."
    "We've notified Star Fleet Command," he said,
"given Bones the specific name of the drug the crew is
under, incapacitated most of the professor's guards,
and put an isolation field around the transwarp mecha-
nisms," he now looked at Mornay in prime connec-
tion, "so even the Professor and Dr. Boma won't be
able to engage it."
  The bridge fell silent.
               219

  I lowered the disruptor slightly. "Is that all?"
    Numb, dreaming, drunk . . . I could're taken my
pick.
    "By the way, Piper," the captain began, circling the
upper deck with his phaser still steady on Mornay and
Boma.
  "Sir?"
    He raised a brow at me. "You wrinkled my star-
ship."
    A ball of compunction blocked my throat. "Aye, sir,
I know that, sir. You should see what it did to my ship.
I'm sorry. I didn't know what else to do."
      "No apologies," he said. "I was considering the
self-destruct sequence myself."  I blinked. "You're joking."
    "It wouldn't be the first time." His strong words
were directed every bit as much to the two on the
lower deck as to me. He meant to have his message
clearly given. "A starship commander must always be
ready to use the last resort. You'd be surprised."
    Darn right I would be. "Aye, sir," was all I said.
Behind us somewhere, my first command ship drifted,
derelict. I heard its noble moans in my mind.
Mornay and Boma exchanged an unreadable look.
I should're blown the doors off that damnable tur-
bolift when I had the chance. The contemptible thing
opened again behind Captain Kirk. Presuming it would
be Mr. Spock, the captain didn't turn soon enough.
    "Phasers down! Don't move, Captain." The form
was Vulcan, but not Spock. Perren held his own
phaser square at the captain's spine. He reached
around and pulled Kirk's phaser away from him, put it
on the floor, and kicked it down the gangway where
nobody could reach it. "Now yours, Commander."
    My glance connected briefly with the captain, but
there was nothing I could do. Perten was unpredict-
able, I'd seen that for certain. The captain's face grew

rosy with anger. He didn't like being caught off
guard--another thing we had in common. I lowered my weapon.
 "Down here," Perren instructed.
    Until I could think of something better, I did as he
instructed. Soon, both weapons were lying down the
gangway, out of reach.
  "Now move over there, Captain Kirk."
    The captain stiffly obeyed, but ! noticed his true
nature remained unsmudged he made sure he was
standing between that phaser and me.
    "That's right," Mornay spoke now. Her voice
seemed strange after all the fluxes of victory and
defeat that had passed the bridge in the last few
minutes. The weird grin was gone, though. Her
transwarp mechanism was out of commission for quite
a while. Isolation fields couldn't just be pulled down
overnight. "My turn again, isn't it? I'm not giving up.
I'll get away." She tapped her graying temple. "It's all
up here. And you'll never interfere again, any of you.
Perren," she said, her tone rising, "for the good of the
galaxy... kill them."

    Vulcan or not, he was quite liable to do it. He'd let
us go once before, and we'd returned to haunt him.
The horrifying thought arose that Mornay might in-
deed know him much better than Sarda did, and might
have more control over him than we guessed. No time for analyses.
    Perren hesitated, but it wasn't the kind of hesitancy
that gave me any confidence. He leveled the phaser on
Captain Kirk.
    Suddenly I said, "No." I stepped past the captain,
and, in the boldest bet of my lifetime, walked straight
into the line of fire. Perren's stare flickered at me.
"You know I understand you," I said to him. "Maybe
better than she does. And I think you know her

220                                                                 221

opinion of you. You can't keep retreating under her
banner. You're going to have to make a new decision
for yourself, right now. Because I'm going to take that
phaser away from you."
    If I died doing it, I would be the only one to die.
Perten knew the captain and Sarda would be on him in
an instant. He'd never have time to recover with me
standing so close to him. And everything would grate
to a halt once again, and for good.
    Forced into confrontation with himself, Perren
parted his lips as though silently trying to explain--to
himself, probably.
  I lifted a hand. Put it out. Touched the phaser.
    He raised his chin, eyelids drifting down as he
looked now at our hands, cupped on the same weapon.
His fingers tightened, then relaxed.  With a tug, the phaser was mine.
    Perren, his head lowered in deep contemplation,
dazedly joined Mornay and Boma on the lower deck.
    But the hatred was not over. It boiled now in the
pitch black of Boma's eyes. Perhaps I had ruined his
plans one time too many, and with too much finality.
Even as Perren stepped down, Boma's rage stripped
him of caution and propelled him across the bridge; his
target: my throat. Not entirely a tactic of momentary
insanity, his sudden action took me by surprise. Fro-
zen, I never had a chance even to raise the phaser.
    Taking advantage, Ursula Mornay hunched her
shoulders and grabbed for the discarded weapons lying
on the upper deck. The bridge burst into wild motion.
    This time, though, I wasn't alone on the summit of
Mount Danger. A flash of beige and boot--the captain
braced on the bridge handrail and vaulted into Boma
without so much as a pause for breath. He caught
Boma cleanly in the chest just before the astrophysi-
cist's hands would have torn me bodily from the upper
deck. Boma went down hard against the helm, the
wind gushing from his body, and he fell limp.

222

    Mornay's eyes widened in astonishment, but she
had the phaser by now and backed against the weap-
ons console, trying to get a better grip on the handle.
Before her, Captain Kirk appeared over the handra'd
and straightened, his eyes full of warning. He had no
weapon, he had no advantage. Only his eyes. The
blades of truth.
     He lowered his chin slightly, almost as though scold-
ing her. "It... is... over." The bridge fell to silence.
    Challenge rumbled between them. Then, like thun-
der in the distance, it ended. Ursula Mornay narrowed
her small eyes, her face shriveling into a sneer, and she
lowered her phaser. The captain relieved her of it.
    With a sigh, he reached down and hauled Boma,
staggering, to his feet and gave him a heave toward the
upper deck. "Mr. Sarda."
    The voice beside me was almost a whisper. "Aye,
sir."
    "Escort the professor and Dr. Boma to the brig. If
they so much as flinch," he added with a stern look at
both prisoners just for effect, "paralyze them."
    "Aye, sir." Sarda glanced at me, and whether or not
he meant to be asking me for it, I handed him Perren's
phaser. He gestured Mornay to the turbolift, careful to
keep the weapon keenly trained on the little woman we
had learned not to trust. He glanced at Perren, who
remained near the viewscreen, awaiting his own fate.
Clearly Perren was no longer part of the threat. The
captain said nothing, but silently waved Sarda on with
his assignment, confirming that he intended to have
Perren handled in some other way. Soon Sarda was
gone with Mornay and Boma.
    Captain Kirk came to my side of the bridge, still on
the lower deck below me, instantly at ease. He leaned
one hand on the deck rail and said, "I like your style."
    A deep breath came out of me a bit more gustily than
I would've liked. "You should," I said. "It's yours."
               223

Chapter Eleven

- "It should be hauled away AS garbage?
           ---The Trouble With Tribbles

I wns TRYING to absorb the end of the nightmare when
Captain Kirk extended his hand to me. Why did he
want to help me down from the gangway? Almost on
the thought, the answer wrapped itself around my
heart. The captain's handshake suffused me with
honor, a thousand times more than any promotion
ever had, or ever could.
    As if sensing my need for a moment of not being the
center of attention, Kirk moved to his command chair
and thumbed a button. "Kirk to Engineering." When
there was no response, he punched again. "Kirk to
auxiliary control."  "Spock here."
 Ahhh, that sonorous voice! How welcome it was!
    "Mr. Spock, the bridge is secure," the captain in-
formed him.
    "That is satisfying news, sir. Congratulations. May
I ask the condition of the prisoners?"
    He wanted to know about Perren, I guessed. From
opposite sides of the bridge, the renegade Vulcan and I
exchanged a meaningful regard, but nothing more.
This was the captain's moment.
    "Professor Mornay and Dr. Boma are on their way
to the brig. Perten is still here with us."
    A brief pause gave weight to Spock's next question.
"And Mr. Sarda?"

224

     The captain peered at me from the corner of his eye.
 "He's in charge of the prisoners."
    Relief went through me like a knife. I closed my
eyes and breathed deep, then let myself stare at the
floor as Kirk's support for us soaked in. Had he been
 in my place before? Did he know what it felt like?
   "Ship's status, Spock?" he was asking.
    "Very poor, Captain, as you might guess. However,
we do have maneuvering capabilities on impulse
power. We should be able to ambulate back to Arge-
lius, 0e we take care not to strain the systems. I am
presently attempting to re-engage electrical support
for the guidance systems."
     "Keep me posted. Bridge out." Again the command
 chair clicked. "Kirk to sickbay. What's the antidote
 situation?"
     McCoy's voice shot through the com system with a
 reassuring confidence. "We've isolated the antidote,
 synthesized it, and introduced it into the circulation
 system, Captain. The crew should start waking up
 within about fifteen minutes, depending on the individ-
 ual."
  "Will they be functional, Doctor?"
     "The intoxicant was wicked stuff. They'll wake up,
 but for the next six hours or so we're going to have a
 mighty sick crew on our hands, Jim."
     Kirk lowered his voice noticeably. "Any count on
 fatalities yet, Bones?"
  "No way to tell yet." McCoy sounded edgy.
  "Guess."
    "We hope to hold it under a dozen. Doing our best,
ú Jim. Ipromise."
     I felt the presence of Merete when Dr. McCoy said
 "our best," and knew she had found her own way to
 contribute to the situation. She could easily have
 stayed behind on Earth and gotten safe transit back to
 Star Fleet Command to await her next orders. Her
 presence had seemed so natural that, until now, I
               225

hadn't remembered to appreciate it. I sent her a tele-
pathic good luck and, remembering how she always
managed to get to the core of my tensions, flexed my
shoulders in an attempt to relax the muscles in my
neck. With that I also took a deep breath and caught
traces of a sweet odor, heavy and lingering descending
from the upper vents. Merete's silent response---the
antidote.
  The captain addressed me quietly. "Piper?"
  I shook myself into focus. "Aye, sir?"
  "Where did you moor Keeler?"
    "She's docked, sir. At Man-o-War. I took the liberty
of arranging to have her brightwork sanded and refin-
ished as long as she's just sitting there. I left Ambassa-
dor Shamirian in charge of her."
    "I thought you would." Leaning that way, with one
elbow on the command arm, clasping one wrist as
casually as a tiger rolling onto its back in the sun,
Captain Kirk became everything a human could be.
His soft hazel eyes brushed me and hovered beneath
feathery brows that minutes ago had defined his sense
of purpose. The purpose relieved, his face returned to
the portrait of wisdom I'd known on board that lovely
schooner so far away. For that instant, he and I were
everything and everyone in the universe, mentor and
pupil, captain and mate, captain and captain.
    The communication was real. It drew his lips out-
ward into a restrained grin. "Good job," he added.
    I smiled. "Thanks." Funny that I felt as gratified by
his trusting me with his schooner as I was by his
trusting me with this mission. Of course, after many
weeks at sea with James Kirk, I knew what the
schooner meant to him. The mission only meant risk-
ing death. The schooner meant life itself. The
schooner, the starship... a strange and provocative
mirror image.
  "That was quite a wrenching you gave us," he said

then, reinstating the paranoia. "I had no idea a con-
struction tug could do that."
    Several possible responses flooded my brain. "Nei-
ther did I."
    His brows went up and down in a dismissing motion.
"Well," he said, "I won't want to be around when you
explain it to Mr. Scott."
    The moment's elation sank out of me. I muttered,
"Me neither." Maybe there was something to be said
for narcotic gases after all.
    The captain moved around the back of his command
chair, caressing the leather. All the while he was
looking at Perren, who stood on the far bridge, swal-
lowed by his own thoughts, or perhaps by the empti-
ness of them. Abandoned by his scruples, Perren was
caught between the gears of bad and good, for the
moment quite content to surrender himself to the
wisdom of others. A sudden and completely unex-
pecteA sorrow rose inside me, touched with pity for
him. Was he so wrong to wish to free the countless
conquered worlds in the neighboring hostile empires?
He felt guilty for the privilege of having been born
Vulcan, of being born into the Federation, .where his
abilities were able to flourish without leash. I had once
thought of the Klingons' right to be what they were,
had once armed weapons to defend that clause in the
Articles of Federation that guaranteed the privilege of
serf-rule to any government that didn't wish to join the
Federation as much as to those who did. Never before
had I thought so sympathetically of those billions of
beings who might never get the choice at all. Perren
made me think. The sacrifices were his, and I had
mined them. I would do that again, of course, but
would things always have to be this way? Was freedom
of choice only a matter of proximity in the galaxy?
Where your borders lay?
  As I gazed at Perren now, these thoughts folded in

226                                                                 227

on me and I became confused. I tried to isolate my
regret, but after all we'd been through I couldn't clear
my head enough for simple rationalities, much less a
complex moral question. When all this was over and
there was time to read, time to ask, time to listen, I
promised myself I would keep learning. Perren's face,
all angles and soft shadows under the bridge lights,
evoked from me a warrant of teevaluation.
    Kirk shook me out of these half-thoughts. "Piper,
take the communications station and put out a dis-
patch to Star Fleet. Advise that we need an interstellar
tow to the nearest starbase, and that we'll meet them
at Argelius."
    Striding across the bridge, I spontaneously asked,
"What about the Banana Republic, sir?" It was out
before I had a chance to bite it back.
    His straight brows went flat on his eyes as he turned
slowly. "What about the what?"
    I whirled around and froze again. Well, tunnel-
mouth, how do you get out of this one? "Um... by
the way, Captain, I never had a chance to thank you
for arranging a command for me. So... thank you."
  "You're welcome. Banana Republic?"
    Hang him, he was going to annoy me into explain-
ing. Strapped, I fabricated a graceful, diplomatic lie
and served it on a silver shrug. "First thing that came
to mind, sir..."
    Okay, so it wasn't graceful or diplomatic. It got me
off the hook.
    His brows did a little dance again, but he let the
subject die young and waved me onward to communi-
cations.
    It felt good to sit down. The bridge chair groaned
lazily as I relaxed into it, confirming the illusive idea
that things were settling down. Only a fleeting glance
at Perten, and his at me, kept us clinging to past
actions. Captain Kirk probably intended to have me
escort Perren to the brig, as Sarda had escorted Mor-

228

nay and Boma. Perren was unpredictable and the idea
of ushering him below brought on a clutter of possibili-
ties. I would still have to be careful. I swiveled around,
putting my back to him. He wasn't my problem any
more. Feeling taken care of for the first time in too
long, I quietly tapped out the dispatch to Star Fleet
Command and put it on a priority band. After all, it
wouldn't do to have a starship hanging around in the
middle of nowhere any longer than absolutely neces-
sary. When the message was intact, I committed it to
the system and pressed the Subspace Send-Code.
Then I leaned back, my wrist still resting on the rim of
the console. The board hummed merrily, doing what it
did best. Machines were easy to please. A small grin
tugged at my lips. Poor old Rex. Quite a show.
 Buzz buzz buzz buzz buzz buzz.
    I sat bolt upright. The tamper alert light was going
wild. Somewhere in the system, the dispatch was
jammed. Raking a hand through my hair, I chided
myself for still being on edge, flexed my shoulders, and
bent over the board. I didn't know much about com-
munications cross plays, but I hadn't given up without
a fight yet.
    "Clanky plumbing," I accused, realizing that, of
course, I had done this to the starship myself. If things
wouldn't work, it was because I had made damn sure
they wouldn't.
    I pecked away at the toggles and inputs, trying to
clear the system before Kirk got the idea that I needed
help. All the electrical routes seemed to be working,
butmthere was an intrusion of impulses. From out-
side !
  "Captain, we're being jammed!" I shouted.
  He was beside me in an instant. "From where?"
    "Port astern. Transmitters are being impeded. I
can't get the message out!"
    In a single motion he flew from the upper deck to the
helm control and rattled orders into the board. As we

229

watched in growing awareness, Perten moved away
from the main view screen and gave us clear sight of
our port astern space. The screen solidified quickly,
with only a waver of sensor shift before focusing on
two hawk-shaped warships just coming out of cloak.
    I vaulted from my chair and grasped the deck rail,
staring. "They must've moved in while we were play-
ing musical phasers !"
    Kirk reached back and nailed the corn link on his
command chair. For all the good it would do to an
unconscious crew, the captain's urgent words echoed
through the corridors of the crippled starship. "Bat-
tiestations! All available hands to battlestations. Mr.
Spock, to the bridge."

  "Piper, take the helm."
    The Red Alert klaxon howled. Bridge lights dark-
ened and became the warning scarlet that told us we
were in trouble. The helm was sluggish under my
hands.
    "Raise all shields," the captain said. Calmness had
returned to his voice. Somehow he had gotten it back.
    Even emptied of its human elements, the bridge
came alive. The computer systems fought the damage
and sucked energy into themselves to do their jobs.
Diagnostic readouts of the ship in tiny skeletal duplica-
tion, all done in computer blues, greens, and reds,
were constantly shifting across the upper display
boards, giving visual reality to the damage I'd done.
And on at least two dynoscanners loomed the configu-
ration, distance, and approach data on a pair of
Klingon warships. Bigger than birds of prey, these
were of the older, sturdier design, engineered for
firepower and engine thrust. My throat closed as I
watched the actual ships growing nearer in the main
viewer. Because of me, Enterprise was helpless.
 I wiped a trickle of sweat from my chin and pecked

at the helm control board, trying to think my way
through unfamiliarity with these controls. "Only half-
screens available, sir," I told him.
    "They certainly didn't waste any time finding us,"
Kirk said to no one in particular. That was me, that no
one.
    In a fit of self-deprecation, I grumbled, "Klingons
are stupid, but they're not that stupid."
    Still dressed in cape and tunic, Mr. Spock shot out
of the turbolift, cast one glance at the main viewer, and
rounded on his library computer station. It started
spewing data at him the instant he touched it, like a
child jumping up and down to tell a parent about its
troubles. "Captain, we're being scanned," he said
immediately.
    "Jam their frequencies," Kirk ordered. His scowl
told how much he resented the invasion. "Let them
guess."
    Able to tie into many divisions of the bridge from his
board, Spock fed the order through and prevented the
Klingons from knowing the details of our damage.
Anything more complicated would have to be done
from the home consoles in each division. "Their weap-
ons are armed, Captain, but they're not coming within
firing range. They are separating... coming about to
flank us on either side."
    As he spoke, the scenario took place on our viewer.
The two ships peeled away from each other and disap-
peared out opposite corners of the screen. The captain
circled his command chair, his eyes narrowed like a
fox in a hunt. Prey or predator? Which role would he
take, and why?
 "Do we have phasers, Spock?"
    "Nonoperational, sir." Spock was quiet and termi-
nal about it. He knew perfectly well what he was
saying and, Vulcan or not, made no attempt to hide the
heaviness he felt. A basic hopelessness was evidenced

230                                                               231

by his lack of explanation. Phasers weren't working,
and they weren't going to be working any time soon.
Not soon enough.
    Was there anything on this starship that we hadn't
destroyed?
    The captain prowled the bridge. He was trying to
think like the Klingons, and I was trying to think like
him. I caressed the helm's edge, feeling very, very
small. This was my fault. If I hadn't jumped to conclu-
sions, assumed Kirk couldn't handle Mornay--if I
hadn't crippled the ship-
    Spock turned to us, a communications hook in his
ear. "Sir, the Klingon commander is hailing us."
    Kirk acknowledged it with a wry look. I felt a snide
comment coming, but he repressed it and said, "Vis-
ual, Mr. Spock."
    Velvet space dissolved, replaced by craggy Klingon
features. It wasn't Gelt, I noted with some relief,
though there was little doubt about how Klingon Cen-
tral had found out about us. Once again I cursed
myself for my common altruism. I'd left Gelt and his
crew alive when I had the chance to put them out of
my misery. As I watched, aching inside, the Klingon
captain spoke. "Commander, Enterprise, this is your
captor. Your ship is disabled. We will take her in tow
and return to the Klingon annex on the opposite side
of the Federation Neutral Zone. As soon as we touch
Klingon space, you will be classified as salvage."
    Kirk grew rock still. "Captain, you draw this ship
into Empire territory and it'll be the last thing you do.
I'll detonate her the second we leave Federation
space, and you with her."
    His words chilled me to the marrow. I believed
those words, that tone. He would. And I would help
him. I no longer felt death lurking at my door. I'd kick
the door open and go in style, along with the finest ship
in the universe and her captain.
  The screen wobbled and turned to space again. Kirk

232

looked over his shoulder; Spock frowned and shook
his head. "They've cut us off," he said.
    Kirk bent over his command console. "Kirk to
sickbay."
  "McCoy here."
  "Bones, what condition is Scotty in?"
    McCoy took his time answering. "Still unconscious.
But his metabolic rate is increasing and he's respon-
sive. Why? Are we the only ship in the quadrant
again?"
    Captain Kirk sliced through what sounded like a
private joke. "I've got to have him on the job. You've
got to bring him around."
    McCoy's tone changed. "Jim, I don't know if that's
possible," he insisted. "A direct dose of this stuff
could kill him."
  "Can't you try--"
  A crunch of energy shuddered through the ship.
    Spock squinted into his graphic readout. "Tractors,
Captain, from both sides."
  "Can you feed back their energy?"
    "Not without overloading our impulse field flux. In
our present condition, the firing chambers would over-
flow into the magnatomic tubes."  "Heading?"
    Spock straightened so abruptly that it hurt my back
to see him do it. "The Neutral Zone. They're taking us
home." His statement rang of the cryptic.
    Behind Spock, framing his caped form, the string of
graphic schematics and bar charts across the rim of the
bridge was nothing less than beautiful, in spite of their
data. The Red Alert glow made them shine brightly
against crisp geometrical insets. Who ever had the
chance to contemplate the beauty of a ship's bridge
while in Alert condition? The klaxon had stopped,
having done its job of waking the dead, leaving only
the red glow and wildly flashing CONDITION: AL-
ERT signs. I suddenly wondered about Sarda. Had

               233

Mornay snatched the opportunity of the call to battle-
stations and somehow overtaken him? Taken him by
surprise? Sarda knew humans better than Perren did,
but Mornay was clever and abrupt in her methods. l
pushed my thoughts through the deck platings and
deep into the ship. Don't trust her.
    "Spock," the captain asked, "how long till they can
take us into warp?"
    The first officer tilted his head, piercing me once
again with a contagious confidence. "It will take them
approximately seven minutes to adjust their tractors,
compensate for our bulk, and balance their combined
engines for warp speed."
    Behind me, the captain spoke urgently. "Bones,
I've got to have Scotty on the job. I don't care how
you do it."
    McCoy sounded strung out. "Jim, what do you want
me to say? It'd take me half a day to calculate the
right dosage of this antisomnial for a man Scotty's
age, weight, and physical makeup. Now, I'd love to
put him on the bridge, but it's not going to happen
because nothing, nothing is going to make me pump
this explosive into his system."
    "I'll be right there. Kirk out. Spock, take the con.
Keep me posted on those ships." He said all this on
the fly to the turbolift, and I got the distinct impression
that nothing was bloody well going to get in his way.
Not all crucial starship decisions, it seemed, are made
from the bridge.
    "Mode of resistance, Captain?" Spock asked at the
last minute.
      "None till I get back. Get on those repairs. I want
full shields and photon torpedoes." The lift panel whispered shut.
 Spook turned to me. "Switch to forward visual."
    I punched buttons. The screen melted and solidified
again to show us the fantails of both Klingon cruisers,
coordinating their energy to tow us along. Spock nod-
               234

ded thoughtfully, but said nothing about it. Instead he
moved around the gangway toward the weapons con-
sole.
    "Commander, if you will assist me, please," he said.
He swung onto his back under the defense subsystems
monitor and peeled off the panel.
    To get to him I had to step past Perten. The young
Vulcan's face was sallow as he stared at those Klingon
ships. He wasn't even aware of me as I passed him. As
much as Enterprise was disabled because of me, those
Klingons were out there because of him. Come to
think of it, everything was because of him. He knew it,
too. It shone in his eyes and the set of his lips. Not
exactly regret, though. Perren wasn't the kind to re-
gret too much. Had his plans gone as he intended,
transwarp would not have been at such risk. The
Klingons knew we had it, no doubt. Gelt would have
told them. And even if he hadn't, information like that
spreads faster than Troyan bullet-bacteria. NOW
wasn't the time to be searching for blame.
    Take your own advice, girl, my inner guardian
warned.
    "As I feed these synchrotron pulsors through the
system," Spock was saying, "confirm connectivity
with the graphics on the scanner above."
    "Aye, sir. Go ahead." One by one, we fed and
confirmed each patch in, trying to cram a week's
repairs into a few minutes. The end result would be
power for just a few photon shots, but those were
better than nothing. Small talk kept trying to squeeze
out of me, and I kept mashing it down. All I needed
now was to be asking Spock a gaggle of stupid ques-
tions. My nerves were whining like the Keeler's rig-
ging. My hands were cold, and I had to use the head
oh no! Not now. Please, not now. Heroes never go to
the bathroom! Horatio Hornblower didn't, Superman
didn't, Cyrus Centauri didn't--but I did. Which
proved who was a hero and who wasn't. As Spock

235

worked under the console, I finally asked, "Uh, sir?
Permission to step updeck?"
 He paused, then resumed working. "Certainly."
    I dashed into the bridge head, and by the time I
dashed out again, the Romulans had arrived.
    Yep, there they were. I knew I should never have
gone to the head.
    Red Alert was whooping again, signaling intrusion
into our immediate space, and Spock was clawing for
the intercom. "Spock to Captain."  "Kirk here."
    "Romulans in the area, Captain, three ships. Light
fighters 2'
    "Maintain Alert status.. Enable the Engineering
control board. We've got partial staff back in engi-
neering, Mr. Spock. Put them to work impulse-drive
integrity. I'm on my way."
    He would never know how much his last four words
meant to us, or at least to me. Spock rose to his full
height, eyeing the viewscreen with Vulcan fierceness.
We watched, unable to take action, as three Romulan
ships looped in front of the Kiingon cruisers and fired
on them. Lancets of red energy cut hard into the
Klingon screens. Without a pause the Klingons re-
turned fire, cross-secting space with blue beams. Sev-
eral of those missed entirely, but a few hit the Romu-
lan birds and scored damage. Smaller ships had
smaller shields, and the Romulans were vulnerable
that way, in spite of superior maneuverability at sub-
light. They veered off and circled for another attack.
    "Why are they firing on each other?" I wondered.
"They're allied, aren't they?"
    Spook raised a brow. "Transwarp is bigger than
their alliance," he said.
    Like animals protecting their kill, the Klingon ships
turned in space to keep between the Romulans and us.
Even as they did, I caught a glimpse of color in the

236

high left side of the viewscreen and pointed ridicu-
lously at it. "Mr. Spock, look!"
    He stared for an extra moment, then moved to his
scanner and shook his head. "Unidentifiable. We have
no cataloguing of that configuration." He straightened
and watched the new ship reel in to fire on the Romu-
lans, then attempt to cut the Klingons off from us. "I
daresay," Spock murmured, "we are in scramble."

    Cosmic scramble. An intragalactic, military feeding
frenzy. The phrase had come a long way since, in
Rex's quiet cockpit, I'd first heard it glide out on
Spock's resonant voice. Once, it had meant little to
me. Now it spelled gruesome danger. This kind of
battle would be far from neat, far from a simple two-
sided dispute. And we were sitting in the middle of it,
stark helpless. We were the nested egg about to be
fought over by every form of alligator.
    The feeling was devastating--to be put on hold like
this, to be an ignored piece of torn meat, while others
fought around us. Shots of light energy in bright colors
splintered around us. Enterprise rocked in the ebb of
energy bolts that passed too near us. The Klingon
ships continued to tug us along, distracted now by the
other ships, bolts of enemy fire keeping them from
launching into warp speed. For the moment, at least. It
bought us time.
    The unidentified ship cut across our bow, giving us a
sharp, shocking view of its forked hull and fierce
colors. We hardly had time to blink before two Romu-
lan birds sliced by us so close that I stumbled back into
the command module, and Perren swayed backward
into the bridge rail.
    "Take your helm, Commander," Spock said, his
tone rising and lowering as though he was reading a
fairly interesting caf6 menu. His eyes strayed reso-
lutely on the screen action.

237

    I maneuvered in that general direction, letting my
hands lead me along the command module, unable to
pull my stare from the battle. I winced as the Romu-
lans sliced through the screens of one Klingon vessel
and disabled it, only to dodge into green plasma blasts
from the unidentified ship. The Klingons then took
their own revenge, firing hard on the nearest Romulan
wing.
    The turbolift opened behind me, stealing my atten-
tion. The captain appeared, then Sarda, on either side
of a gray-faced apparition of Mr. Scott. I held my
breath in empathy. Scott looked iH and in pain, proba-
bly the effect of whatever the doctors had to do to
wake him up and get him on his feet. The captain and
Sarda supported him heavily, brought him across the
bridge, and eased him into the chair at Engineering.
Mr. Scott pressed his hands hard on the console. I
could almost feel the effort going into his concentra-
tion as he assessed the ship's available energy.
    Sarda moved across the upper deck until we were
side by side, but on different levels. A brief glance told
me he was all right. It felt good to have him here. Until
now, I hadn't let the emptiness take hold.
    Kirk pressed ScoWs shoulder in mute reassurance
and looked at tl.te viewscreen. "Situation, Mr.
Spock?"
    "Unchanged. Three Romulans, two Klingon cruis-
ers, and one unidentified vessel, all counterattacking.
One Klingon cruiser is damaged but functional. They
have not as yet fired on us."
  Kirk nodded. "Piper, have you got an opinion?"
  I blinked. Piper who?
    His asking constrained me to find an opinion even if
I didn't have one. So I invented one. "I'd say . . .
concentrate on the Romulans and the unknown ship."
  "Based on what?"
 ú "Based... on Klingon tendencies."
  "Explain."
               238

    Deep breathe, let out slowly, start talking.
"Klingons are like grizzly bears. They attack straight
on, with sheer brute force. Even though they're a
threat in firepower and ruthlessness, they're predict-
able. If we just watch them, we should be able to tell
what they'll do next." I stopped to lick my lips, which
had dried up when I realized that Mr. Spock had
stopped his scanning and was also listening to me, and
Perten had turned my way too. Another deep breath.
"Even though the Romulans have lesser weapons,
they understand the concept of subtle attack. Things
like sneaking and bluffing. They're cunning. It makes
them dangerous. I'd watch out for them. I'd even
disable them if I got the chance."  "Spock?"
  I tensed, waiting.
  "I concur," Spock said.
  "So do I," was the captain's response.
    Before I had a chance to exhale, Kirk demanded,
"Disable them how?"
    It's not as if he didn't have ideas of his own. He was
testing me and using my reactions to test himself.
Evidently he was as curious about what made me tick
as I was about finding out what drove him. But
couldn't it wait for a better time? Sir?
    Trying to push ideas through the whiskerbugs infest-
ing my brain, I shrugged and said, "Maybe... use
their distraction with each other... launch someone
in a shuttlecraft or one of the attack sleds and make for
open space to get a distress call out to Star Fleet..."
    "They'd be caught in traction by one of those ships
and taken prisoner."
    "Yes... of course... sorry." And on top of being a
bad suggestion, it wasn't even the answer to what he'd
asked.
    Luckily, James Kirk wasn't James Kirk for nothing.
He took his good question and my bad answer and
combined them into a wild card. "Shuttlecraft," he

239

murmured, watching the interplay of ships before us.
"Spock..."
    They exchanged a long look--not a word, just a
look.
    Spock nodded. "Excellent," he uttered. Had I
missed something?
    Stepping down to the navigations console beside
me, he tapped through to the automation of the hangar
deck and computer-moved one of the shuttles into
launch position. As he worked, the only sounds were
the whirr-beeps of electrical cooperation and the muf-
fled, strained voice of Mr. Scott as he fed orders
through to the few engineers back on duty below
decks.
      "Shuttlecraft Columbus ready for launch, sir,"
Spock said then. "Automation system locked in."
  The captam nodded his acknowledgment.
    Why was he taking me up on a stupid suggestion?
And an empty shuttlecraft at that . . . of course! A
decoy. Make the enemy waste their time following an
apparent escape. Like I said, he wasn't James Kirk for
nothing.
    "Go ahead, Mr. Spock," he said, calmly watching
the enemy ships wheel and fire on each other like
dancers in some erotic alien ritual. As if to give my
analysis life, the small Romulan ships were using
supreme strategy, working together against more po-
tent enemy vessels, coordinating their attacks then
retreating to the rim of the solar system to regroup and
attack again, from different angles. The Klingons were
unable to tell where the Romulans would dive in upon
them next. The only surplus danger was that unidenti-
fied ship. The Klingons had their hands full trying to
maintain their pull on Enterprise and the unnamed ship
knew how to use that. Its forked hull lanced past us
several times, that green plasma ray cutting deeply
into the Klingon shields, only then to swing around
and potshot the Romulans into falling out of forma-

240

tion. All the while we continued slowly moving toward
the outside of the solar system, where, once clear, the
Klingons might be able to take us into warp speed.
Another clutch of guilt caught me by the heart. Tan-
gled motivations looked for excuses in my head. Si-
lent, I watched the battle tighten before me.
    A small white speck appeared at the corner of the
screen. It drew my attention. The shuttlecraft--veer-
ing away for open space. As Kirk had anticipated, the
unnamed ship and two Romulan wings turned on their
tips and angled after it in a strange race. Because they
were closer in the first place, the Romulans overtook
the shuttlecraft first. Pulling it against its own thrust,
they drew it up alongside and tucked it under one
wing, then warned off the unnamed ship with a volley
of particle-beam fire.
    The unidentified vessel peeled away, barely dodging
the milky white gauze of particle beam, leaving the
Romulans to their catch. They drew the shuttlecraft in
tight to their hull. Not large enough to bring the
shuttlecraft on board, they made good their possession
with magnetic couplings on their ship's underbelly.
When the shuttle was firmly attached, Captain Kirk
said, "Now, Mr. Spock."
    Sarda and I both looked at Spock at the same
moment, after a questioning glance proved that neither
of us knew what was happening. As Spock's long
finger leaned on a toggle. It flipped.
    The entire left side of the viewscreen lit up. Blue-
white particles spun through space, then redoubled as
a matter/antimatter explosion bubbled inside the first.
The Romulan ship was memory, nothing more than
scattering bits of fibercoil melting and dissolving in a
pyrotechnic bloom.
 I came halfway out of my chair. "Wow!"
    Sarda's cool gaze washed over me, and I got the
feeling that only my yip of delight kept him from an
embarrassing smile. He probably saw how ridiculous I
looked and decided to interiorize that grin pulling at
his upper lip.
    Spock bent over his readout screen at the library
computer. "One Romulan ship obliterated... another
slightly disabled from impact fallout."
"Good, Spock, good," the captain murmured.
Victory earned us a slap on the wrist. The third
Romulan ship flashed by us at attack angle and lay
open the skin of Enterprise's forward half-shields with
a shot full of revenge. The bolt crumpled our shields
and burst through with just enough remaining energy
to send us staggering. I was thrown out of my chair
altogether, and Sarda careened backward, barely
missing Mr. Scott, who was clinging to his board with
whatever strength he had. When the bolt faded and the
ship stopped shuddering, Sarda was picking me up and
Perren was picking himself up. Kirk and Spock, darn
them, were already up.
    Kirk was holding tight to the bridge rail, his eyes
ablaze with satisfaction. I felt it too---that rare sense of
triumph that came from outthinking an enemy when
the enemy already had an upper hand. It was worth
that spanking they'd given us. Suddenly I understood
the captain's advantage. He knew what I had forgot-
ten. None of these ships dared destroy Enterprise. We
had what they wanted.
    "I think they're annoyed, Mr. Spock," the captain
crowed.
    "Yes," Spock agreed. "They do seem... vexed,
Captain." With that, he returned to his readout screen.
    That comforting thought left only the possibility of
being dragged into Klingon space, or being acciden-
tally blown to bits by wild shots, or being boarded by
the enemy, or--
    Spock straightened abruptly and glared at the
viewscreen. "More ships, Captain! Veering in from
various directions in open space," he said, his tone
edged with surprise.

242

    Kirk raised his voice. "Scotty, where's that shield
power?"
    Mr. Scott turned slightly, even that an effort since
he was standing up--leaning, really--and running a
protosensor rod over the board. "Nearly there, sir...
up to 83 percent." His eyes narrowed in discomfort,
and he was breathing heavily. "Working on impulse
thrust--" He slipped and collapsed forward over his
console. By the time Captain Kirk reached him, he
was wiping his face with a blanched hand and pushing
himself up.
    The captain took him by the arms and steered him
back into his chair. "Scotty? Can you make it?"
    Scott fought for his part in the play, forcing his eyes
to meet Kirk's without a flinch, in spite of the pain
showing in his face. "Aye, sir... those spine-headed
pirates'11 not have this ship if I can help it." The
promise drained him, but he pulled on an inner sturdi-
ness and straightened under the captain's grasp.
    Even in the midst of trouble, Kirk found a personal
moment to pat Scott's arm. "Good, Scotty. We need
you."
    "Captain, forward deflector power is impaired,"
Spock reported. "Unlikely to regain."
  "Identify those ships," Captain Kirk ordered.
  "Attempting to do so."
    I leaned toward Sarda, who still had a grip on my
arm, and said, "We're trying to get photon capacity."
    "All right," he said simply, and moved to the weap-
ons control console on the upper deck. Mirroring that,
I dashed back to the helm and drifted into my chair. At
least it looked like we were helping.
    "Come on, Spock," the captain urged. "I want to
know who I'm up against."
    Spock nodded, very slightly, then gave voice to
what he was seeing on his monitor. "Tholians, sir. At
least four. Sensors are unsure. And at least three more
v. essels... checking design catalog to identify." He

243

moved across his computer, arms sweeping the board
as he tapped into the fabulous memory system. Even
in that short time, the cuneiform shape of the Tholian
ships had become clear on our screen. Behind them,
other vessels appeared, all different--claviform, tur-
nip-shaped, biform, full-orbed, all different colors.
When Spock returned to the monitor and the blue light
once again washed his features, the answers were
there. His brows went up. "Captain, they are
Klingons. However, not Empire-sanctioned vessels.
One is of a configuration currently being used by the
Rumaiym, a racial tier of the Empire."
    Captain Kirk moved to the deck below Spock, draw-
ing the two of them together into that intangible bubble
they shared when I looked closely. "Analysis,
Spock," Kirk softly invited.
    Spock tilted his head, observing the action in space,
then turned his gaze downward to his captain, as if
they were alone. "It's not surprising that sections of
the Empire might attempt to gain a bargaining weight
within the power structure. In fact, if current intelli-
gence is accurate, we are seeing agents of at least four
Klingon strains: Klinzhai, Rumaiym, Wijngan, and ff I
am correct about that triformed vessel, the race calling
themselves Daqawlu--the Remembered."
    With a dry nod, Kirk commented, "Oh, they'll be
remembered, all right."
    "Obviously the Klingon Empire is not so unified as
they would have us believe."
    "Obviously. Well, we can't keep feeding them shut-
tlecraft. We'll have to come up with something else."
Kirk circled the command module, giving me a clear
view of the harsh determination that brought his brows
together and tightened his lips. His words hummed
with bottled ferocity. "I don't like being the pawn."
    I cast a brief glare at him, but broke it off before he
saw it. Neither did I.
Kirk spun suddenly, and I braced for a reprimand.
244

But it was Spock he caught in his net. "You told me
about a transwarp accident while you were aboard
Piper's ship."
  "Yes," Spock acknowledged. "Quite unsettling."
  "Unsettling enough to disable those ships?"
    Spock hadn't thought of that, judging from his ex-
pression. As he added up the elements, Sarda, Perren,
and I turned to watch, and wait.
    With a nod of contemplation, Spock said, "Possi-
bly."
  Kirk inhaled deeply. "Describe it."
    "I believe improper imbalance in the matter/anti-
matter flow through the holding chamber caused the
trilithium to degenerate. The result is not thrust, but
dimensional warp. Am I correct, Mr. Sarda?"
  Sarda shifted his feet and nodded. "You are, sir."
    The captain gripped the raft harder. "Can it be
repeated?"
  "Repeated in what form?" Spock asked.
    "If the transwarp mechanisms were patched into the
Enterprise's defense system, could those conditions
be duplicated?"
    Spock held the hot potato for a few seconds, then
tossed it across the bridge. "Mr. Sarda?"
    Sarda dropped his gaze as he contemplated his
safety equipment and, knowing him, about a thousand
other alternatives. He hated having his inventions
used for military offense, but it was that or imprison-
ment behind Klingon lines. His innermost struggles
shone faintly behind his eyes. I tensed, wishing there
was some way I could help him. For a long self-
conscious moment, our eyes met. Perhaps he drew
strength from me, for he straightened and faced the
captain. "It could be done," he said. "We could not, in
fact, prevent it from happening, considering the condi-
tion of the Enterprise. Rather than the defense system,
the mechanisms would have to be connected into the
propulsion system, the warp drive itself, then expelled
               245

through the sensory in order to do what you require
with any control. However... I do not trust myself to
a task so complicated. At least, not alone. The dangers
to ourselves, with an untested system--"
    "I'll help." I was on my feet already. Kirk and
Spock looked at me. Ridiculous! What I knew about
transwarp would fit under a fingernail. Then, in an
instant, I knew what I could do. I rounded on Perren.
My words were potent as sharp wind. "You'll help
tOO."
    Perren's narrow features paled, but his eyes grew
intense.
    "You know what I'm talking about," I pressed. In
my periphery, Kirk and Spock waited, knowing when
silence was the key to winning.
    "Yes," Perren murmured. "Yes, I must." He ap-
proached Captain Kirk. "You must let me. I can cut
installation time by two-thirds. I beg you, allow it."
    Kirk glared at him, partially in threat, partially in
disbelief, partially in that special way he had of cutting
through the thoughts of others. Put his ship in the
hands of a traitor? Even now, Perren's face was
backed by a tangle of enemy ships firing on each other,
haloed by the fluorescent sparkles of direct hits.
    I couldn't stand it. I couldn't let the doubt dangle. I
rushed around the command module in a move I hoped
was dramatic and arresting, until I was nearly at
Perren's side, and faced the captain. "Sir, you've got
to let him. He means it."
    Kirk's glare carried a definite how-do-you-know as
it snapped to me, yet he said nothing. I knew I'd better
be right.
  "How long?" he demanded.
    Perten tensed. "Roughly . . . seventy minutes. An
estimate only, of course."
    A commanding hand swept from Perren to Sarda.
"Both of you, get to it." The hand folded into a point,

246

and swung straight at me. "Piper, I want you down
there too."
    I swallowed a lump of liability. "Aye, sir. I under-
stand."
    A brief glance from me sent Sarda toward the turbo-
lift, Perren close behind, and I brought up the rear
guard, deliberately not picking up one of the discarded
phasers in a vote of faith for Perten. Kirk noticed, and
raised a brow at me as though he knew what I was
thinking. No real surprises there, though. Gambling
was part of the game--sometimes the wiser part. We
both knew it.
    I reached the back of the bridge and was about to
join the Vulcans in the turbolift when a crack of energy
struck the port side of Enterprise, and rocked us hard.
My shoulder, with the rest of me behind it, rammed
into the frame of the turbolift, and I managed to catch
myself and hang there until the ship stabilized. In the
wide viewscreen, the unidentified ship streaked out
from the underside of our primary hull and vectored
out into space toward the Klingon cruisers.
    The captain moved toward the helm console and
turned briefly to me. With deliberate poise, he said,
"Hurry."

    The Engineering deck was disturbingly quiet, jarred
only by rumbles of energy from outside that told us the
enemy ships had opened fire on us and the K!ingons
who possessed us. Perren, Sarda, and I were reso-
lutely silent as we gathered Perren's equipment and
carefully--so carefully--followed the directions
Spock fed through to us on how to dismantle his
elaborate isolation field around the transwarp mecha-
nism itself. The mechanism made little engineering
sense to me; it looked like something out of a child's
coloring book, a quincunx contraption with several
arms and a central core of funnels and circuitry.

247

 Evidently that was the reaction chamber for the tri-
 lithium. I didn't even try to understand it.
    Perren and Sarda worked feverishly to wrestle the
various attachments into the central feeder unit for the
ship's energy/matter matrix restoration cowl. Okay, so
I didn't understand that either. It didn't matter, as long
as they understood. Even with their combined Vulcan
strength and a few good shoves from me, the installa-
tion of transwarp into a damaged warp propulsion
system was the work of more than three people. I
didn't bother asking what this or that was, especially
if, by some miracle, it happened to fit. I followed their
directions through the most muscle twisting sixty-two
minutes of my life. It seemed more like six minutes.
    Finally the work dwindled down to minute delicate
adjustments and all I could do was watch. It was as
though Perren and Sarda had fallen into a different
language; though I was watching, their science was so
specialized that I might as well have been a thousand
solar systems away. My thoughts began to drift, jarred
each time the ship shook under us from enemy fire. I
held on to a nearby pylon and tried to keep hold of my
self-control. The frustration was building again. I
hated having to just watch.
    I started thinking about the enemies out there. Tho-
hans, Romulans, Klingons of every breed, and that
persistent forked ship whose configuration we couldn't
pin down. Living beings, tangled in a web of power
grabbing. Each had a history and a goal of his or her
own. And so did I.
    Without pausing between thoughts, I suddenly
blurted, "What's going to happen? When we imple-
ment this, what's the effect?"
    Only when both Vulcans paused at the same time
did I realize I'd forced them to face something they
had been trying not to think about. Not only face it,
but put words to it.
 They exchanged a disturbing glance. Perten gripped
                      248

the micropincer he was using. "We . . . have never
postulated the effect of an accidental imbalance. Our
efforts, of course, have always been directed toward
canceling out or circumventing any such occurence,
with the hopes of eventually preventing them alto-
gether. We take great care to stabilize the integrity of
the trilithium before funneling matter/antimatter
through the field core."
    Spock's face filled my mind, completely unbidden.
Perren, so unlike him, was turning logic inside out to
avoid simply saying that he didn't know. Suddenly I
longed to hear those words; there was something
reassuring about the honesty in the phrase I don't
ktlow.
    Anger boiled up in me and I snatched Perren's arm.
"I've got to understand! You've got to give me some
idea of what it's going to do to those ships out there."
    Perten jerked away. His eyes flashed with the on-
slaught of my emotions coursing through him. Long
black hair waved when he pulled his arm free. I went
after it again, but Sarda caught my wrist.
    A swell of perception washed through me, cooling
my nerves, running up my arm, and spreading through
my body. The anger didn't go away, but like the
distortion of transwarp flux, Sarda had turned it out-
ward and away from Perren. For a moment he took it
upon himself, seeing perfectly well that I was reaching
the limit of my patience with Vulcan ways. He slowly
absorbed my need to understand, and with his grip
forced me to comprehend what could be foretold and
what couldn't be.
    Seconds passed, long ones. Sarda broke his gaze
from mine only once.
    He nodded briefly to Perten, who collected himself
with difficulty and went back to work on the microcir-
cuits. When the triad of conflict faded to the two of us,
Sarda turned back to me.
  "Piper," he began, "even we do not fully compre-
                       249

 hend why transwarp works as it does. It is not meant
 to be a weapon."
     Though I knew how deeply he believed that, I
 pressed, "I'm in the command line. I've got to have
 some concept of what that thing's going to do to other
 life forms. The captain has to know."
     "We would tell you, if that information could be
 gained without actually using the imbalance." Glints
 of blue and yellow light from Perren's snapping panel
 flickered in Sarda's bronze hair and in his troubled
 eyes. Guilt gnawed at him. Would he ever have peace
 from it? "The wave effect," he tried again, "is a reality
 solvent. We may liken it to pouring water on a sand
 castle. The sand remains, but.. 2'
    The transwarp contraption trilled to life, singing an
electrical song, and saved him from having to find the
words for the terrible vision he saw. For a moment we
simply watched the equipment whirr and glow and
hum.
    Sarda's expression filled with omen. "We cannot
allow hostile hands to possess this."
    "And we shall not," Perren agreed, that rebellious
thorn surfacing again.
    My opinion stuck its neck out again. I couldn't stop
it. I glared at Perren. "You should're thought of that a
long time ago."
  Sarda watched me, silent.
    Perren retreated to his work. The instrumentation
whistled and chirred happily under his hands. Even
poorly hooked up, fed into a damaged system, the
transwarp mechanisms showed the effort of years of
work.
    "I can complete the calibrations," Perren said.
"Correlating the flux ratios of transwarp drive with the
sensors must be done from the sensor control room."
    Sarda gathered the necessary computer disks and
said, "Contact me there when you're ready to begin."

250

    "Very well," Perren said. "It may take several more
minutes to make the correct calculations."
    Sarda only nodded. He knew all that, apparently. As
he stood up, his amber gaze caught fast to my own and
I felt that wash of telepathy again. Was I really feeling
it, or had I learned to imagine it as I came to know him
better? He'd never confided in me about whether or
not these mental waves were normal for Vulcans--if
he even knew. I hadn't asked, and a good thing too.
He might be supremely embarrassed if my feelings
were induced by his inability to control that inherited
telepathy. He seemed so different from Spock, as
different from Spock as Spock was from Perrenm
Sarda, even more different from most Vulcans who
came to Star Fleet. Very few of Sarda's fair-haired
clan ever roamed from their home planet, yet he was
here, rare, and of great value to me. As we stood
together over a mechanism that might either save or
destroy us, I found myself hoping he never would
learn to control the soft inner communication.
  "Where will you be?" he asked.
    My answer was deceptively simple. "Where I'm
needed."
  "I know you will do well."
  "Thank you. For everything."
    His expression remained stoic, but he dropped his
eyes, then raised them again. "And I thank you," he
said, almost whispering.
  "Good luck," I responded.
    Before we got into a chain reaction of thank-yous,
he wisely dipped away and left the area. I lingered
there long after he was gone.
    Below me, Perren drew my attention when he
paused and put a hand to his lips. I knelt down.
"Something?"
    His brows came together in contemplation. "This
arrangement must be coordinated from the bridge, at

251

 the engineering subsystems monitor. If you can do
 that, I can monitor and adjust the intermix according
 to your readouts from pulse to pulse."
    "I can do that," I told him. I could do it, if only I
knew what he was talking about. Let's hear it for blind
optimism.
    Perren's face went blank for a moment, then twisted
in confusion.
  "What's the matter?" I asked.
    He shook his head. "I'm unsure about the sensor
output system. I can correlate the thrust ratios for
warp drive, but I do not know how to adjust them to
run through the sensory."
    It sounded like a bigger problem than I could
solve--surprise, surprise---and I bit my lip before
making a wild assumption. My feet were tingling when
I stood up. "I know who does. I'll contact you when I
get to the bridge."
    I started toward the exit. Before reaching the door,
though, I remembered my charge from a higher au-
thority--a trust I wouldn't betray.
    Perren saw me turn, saw the tangle of emotions in
my face, the sensation of being torn between two
distinct duties. Even though I said nothing at all, the
problem was obvious.
    He read my hesitation--even I couldn't say ff he
read it correctly--and paused fine-tuning the
transwarp to seal his credibility with a promise. "I
give you my word."
    The throb and hum of Enterprise's sensor system
trying to accept the new energy of transwarp became
the pulsing of some great heart. I absorbed Perren's
promise. Think like a Vulcan.
    With my tone, I charged both of us to fulfill the vow.
"I accept your word."

    The hangar deck was cool with freshly circulated
air, sweet with the lingering odor of the antisomnial. I
               252

 swung around the corner of the alcove where the Arco
 sleds were anchored down, and was only superficially
 surprised to see Sarda there, kneeling beside Scanner.
 He'd evidently decided to make good use of those
 extra few minutes Perren said he had. He was holding
 Scanner in a sitting position against the attack-sled's
 folded solar wing.
     I knelt beside Scanner, but my question was for
 Sarda. "What are you doing here?"
     His gaze was penetrating. He didn't want to explain.
 "Deviating."
  That was all I was going to get, too.
     Scanner's face was clammy as I touched it and
 turned him to me. "Scanner? Look at me. Are you
 okay?"
     He blinked past the pain left over from artificial
 sleep and unnatural awakening and moaned. "If this is
 life after death . . . I'll take death." He folded over,
 and only Sarda's grasp kept him upright. When he
 raised his head, his face was pale and his eyes glazed.
 "You got... trouble upstairs."
     Good. Sarda had been filling him in, probably trying
 to distract him from his own discomfort.
     I took him by the shoulders. "Scanner, listen to me.
 We've tied the transwarp into the warp drive and
 we've got to correlate the thrust ratios with sensor
 issue. Can you tell me how to do tl~,at?"
   "Aim it... you mean?"
   "Yes, aim it."
     "Yeah... oh, worm guts... they killed me, Piper."
 He let his head sag back against the solar wing. Pinch-
 faced, he fought the gaspy breath of nausea and
 cramps. Sarda and I shared a glance of penetrating
 empathy and waited.
  "We'll get you to sickbay," I promised.
      "Can't y'just... bring sickbay down here?" Scan-
    ner closed his eyes tight. When they opened again,
, some of the color was returning to his face, as well as

253

his wits. "Yeah... that transmitter on the bridge... a
dead jellyfish could work it. Y'all can do it easy."
  "Gee, thanks. How?"
    "Same way you aim sensors, except . . . push the
impulses through weapons override . . . even if the
safety system says you can't."  I frowned. "It'll burn out."
    He took a choppy breath. His cheeks flushed with
heat. "You can't stop that. It's all there is. That crazy
transwarp hookup won't last long anyway. You
might's well force a human heart to breathe air."
Cramps took hold of him again, piercing all three of us
and making me realize what Mr. Scott, with his hands
full of starship, was going through. Scanner pressed
his arm under his ribs. His free hand made a loop
toward Sarda. "Tell her, Points."
    Sarda's lips flattened, a strange reflection of his
hand on Scanher's arm as it gripped tighter. He felt
responsible; I sensed it simmering. "Probably true,"
he admitted.
    Obviously, none of us had possessed the courage to
say it before this. The captain's plans suffered as I
waded through the truth. Enterprise's systems were
sturdy, but not meant to funnel the shared energy we
would soon demand of them, the hazardous intermix
with its deliberate irabalances. In perfect condition,
possibly--but not with the damage I'd inflicted. The
K!ingons were towing us closer by the minute to the
system's edge where, at warp speed, they could easily
rush us into their home territory. Time now worked
against us. All we had was this one chance. Mutual
disablement.
    'TI! tell the captain," I said. "We'll make it work
somehow."
    Scanner managed a weak smile. "I was hopin'
yaw!'d say that."
    "Sarda, can you manage with him? I've got to get
back to the bridge."

254

Sarda nodded. "I'11 contact you from the sensory."
I started to get up, but faltered when Scanner caught
my sleeve. When I looked down, he said, "Don't let
the bastards beat us, Piper."
    My hand caught his and squeezed. "You count on
it."
Comforted, he slumped back against the solar wing.
I didn't stay to help Sarda get him on his feet. The
bridge of Enterprise was waiting--and all the clocks
were ticking.
 Make it work, make it work, make it work...

255

Chapter Twelve

"Risk is our business."
           --Return to Tomorrow

THE BRIDGE WAS organized chaos. Captain Kirk was
leaning over the helm, his medieval costume incongru-
ent with the geometric surroundings, doing the jobs of
ten. The scarlet lights of Alert status were distorted by
blasts of color energy from enemy ships as they swung
by, lashing out at each other, and catching us in the
crossfire. Iridescent damage on the nearby Klingon
cruisers lit up our faces. To my right, Mr. Spock was
bending over his readout hood, its blue light on his
face clashing with the scintillas from the main viewer.
He had to hold on to the edge of the console to keep on
his feet as enemy fire cut at our battered deflectors. He
and the captain were alone on the bridge.
    As I came out of the turbolift, a strange thought
flushed over me. Getting to the bridge hadn't been
easy, and I'd been thrown down at least twice as the
ship was rocked by battle turbulence. I'd had to ignore
the groggy, nauseous crewpeople just coming around
after having had their lives risked for them. When the
turbolift doors opened, ;,t occurred to me that precious
few of those people were authorized to come to the
bridge. Yet here I was, privileged to be at the hub of
decision, alone with Captain Kirk and Commander
Spock.
  Kirk spoke into the intercom, correlating something

256

I couldn't hear clearly, and Mr. Scott's voice came
back up at him through the corn system. I looked
toward the engineering panel, confirming to my jarred
senses that he wasn't there anymore.
    "Nominal but coming back slowly," Kirk was say-
ing. "Good work, Scotty, keep it up." Fighting from
inside a cage, he adjusted the navigational controls and
Enterprise pivoted against the Klingon tractor beams
until we had a clear view of a Romulan ship veering
toward us, with one of the cuneiformed Tholians close
behind. Instantly Kirk struck a firing launch. Space
filled with bright red-orange lancets. Phasers! They'd
gotten phasers working! And the captain was using
them to keep the enemies busy out there, protect our
weakened deflectors, and complicate the Klingons'
effort to protect their prizemusmwhile they also tried
to beat off attackers who were determined that if they
themselves couldn't have us, nobody could. Including
the Klingon Empire.
    The pastel Tholian vessel swerved to miss our pri-
mary hull, one of her wedges blazing with melted hull
material. The Romulans cut upward on short notice
and fired their particle beam at us, but the Klingons
fired and detonated the particle beam before it reached
our screens. Enterprise rocked and whined in the
dispersing waves. I caught myself on the bridge rail
and managed to stay upright.
    From one side, Spock's voice overlapped the snap-
ping of tangled voltage as Enterprise trembled back to
life. "Port side Klingon cruiser is keeping in contact
with the other cruiser, Captain," he was saying, his
hand to the com receiver in his ear. "Distorted . . .
they are attempting to contact their Empire or other
Empire ships... I believe to request help that... may
be on stand-by already, if I decipher these transmis-
sions correctly."
 "Cut off their broadcast. Make sure those transmis-

257

sions get scrambled. They can tow us," the captain
said to the screen, "but they'll have to do it alone.
Scotty, ready secondary phaser banks."
    "Secondary banks are dry, Captain. I'm trying to
funnel in some power. It's only a matter' a time before
the hull in D-section ruptures and that'll be the end of
our reserve. We've taken too many hits there, sir."
Scott's voice held the timber of a man possessed.
    But I was staring at Spock. Just last year I'd finished
a top-of-the-line course in computer cryptography and
I blasted well knew that with the new wave-maze
technology the Klingon Empire had developed, we
couldn't possibly tie in to their transmissions. Profes-
sor Eufinger had made that indelibly clear. But there
was Spock, blithely doing the impossible.
  Well, Eufinger had always been a cretin anyway.
    The captain's voice shook me awake. "What's the
status on the transwarp appliance?"
    I had to clear my throat. "It's tied in, but... a little
shaky. We have to correlate from here to the engine
room and over to the sensory. Perren's standing by,
and Sarda should be in the sensory any minute."
    Kirk left his station and approached me swiftly on
the lower deck, shooting me full of the moment's
urgency. Even though I was standing over him, the
sense of eminence he radiated was staggering. I felt
drawn to his presence, even comforted, in spite of the
battle blazing on the screen behind me. "Do you know-
what to do?" he asked.
    "It's been explained to me, sir," I said, obviously
avoiding the real answer.
    He seemed to like that response even better than if
I'd told him I knew all about it and understood it
perfectly and could pull it off without a hitch.
    "Go," he said. We crossed by each other as he went
to join Spock.
    The engineering subsystems monitor was sluggish
under my hands. The functions override and critical
               258

regime indicators took too long to respond. Oh, well
... I didn't know for certain what they meant anyway,
so let them take their time. I tapped the com through to
engineering. "Bridge to Perren."  "This is Perren."
  "I'm at station. Hold while I tie us to Sarda."
  "Acknowledged."
 Another tap. "Bridge to sensor broadcast."
    A few seconds passed. I was about to call again
when the breathless response came. "Sensory. Sarda
here." He'd been running.
    "I'm feeding the coordinates through to both of you.
Keying weapons cross feed now."
  "Acknowledged. Drawing power to transwarp."
  "Broadcast ratios are confirmed, Piper. Standing
by, J'
My eyes drifted closed. I inhaled and turned. "Cap-
tain? We're ready when you are."
    Kirk's expression pasted me to my controls. "Target
the Klingons who have us under tow. I'm going to
move us up into their tractor to tighten the range. We'll
go for a short incursion first." He skipped the steps
altogether, going from Spock's side back down to the
helm, and introduced the controls to their heading.
Beneath us, Enterprise whined against the strain of
impulse power fighting the tractor beams to push
forward into them. Not as impossible as trying to pull
away, but not easy.
    "Aye, sir. Targeting." I had to force my fingers to
move. Green lights on the board blinked, confirming
that Sarda was receiving the coordinates.
    "Romulan ships moving in for another rush on the
Empire cruisers," Spock reported.
    "Just as well," the captain muttered. "All right,
Piper. Ready transwarp flux..."
    "Range is uncertain," Sarda warned. "There may
be an echo effect. Brace yourselves."
I held my breath, waiting for the captain's next

259

word, as the two Romulans vessels wheeled into near
space. Echo effect? Did he mean-  "Execute !"
    I leaned on the emissions toggle. The controls went
wild.
    Enterprise's electrical noises drooped out to long
howls. My arms became elastic. I felt my knees fold in
the wrong direction.
    The edge of flux--we still felt it, even though the
waves were deflected outward at the attacking ships.
The flushback twisted reality around us. I heard Kirk's
voice as he shouted something to Spock, but the words
made no sense. Still, I clung to the sound.
    While Sarda's safety systems directed the actual
flux at our enemies, the dimensional distortion
couldn't be controlled. It fed back on Enterprise,
engulfing us in the same peripheral effect we'd felt
aboard Rex. If this was the fallout, what was it like out
there, in the main stream?
    The ship lurched and bolted to starboard, then
righted.
    My arms came back. The queer feeling subsided
abruptly, leaving us all breathless.
  "Status, Spock!" Kirk demanded.
    The answer took too long. "Tractor beams have
released us." Spock's report carried a ring of triumph.
"We are free to maneuver."
 He turned to the main viewer. We all did.
    The scan of immediate space was horrifying. Parti-
ally dissolved ships floated by us, dismembered, or
spliced together wrong, completely rearranged--when
a Tholian ship drifted past with a Romulan wing pro-
truding from the side of its hull, I had to look away.
    Spock, still staring at the screen, stepped down to
the captain's side. Together, with expressions frighten-
ingly alike, they watched what we had done. The area
looked like an interstellar junk yard. The only vessels

260

left maneuverable in immediate space were one Rum-
aiym ship, the unidentified ship, and... Enterprise.
    Far off at the edge of the viewer, there was move-
ment. The remaining Tholians, their hatred of disorder
apparently stronger than their desire for transwarp,
cashed in their chips and retreated at high speed. So
did the ships Spock had identified as Wijngan.
    The first ship left to move on us was the Daqawlu
vessel, a streamlined yellow and black ship made
mostly of curves. It gathered speed gradually, then
faster, and fired full disruptors.
    Enterprise rocked under us. I felt myself hitting the
floor, my hip smashing the edge of the engineering
console as I went down. In the corner of my eye I saw
Kirk dive for the helm control. Impulse power
hummed up from the lower decks, and the starship
tipped away from the Rumaiym beams.
    "Shields four and seven down completely, Cap-
tain," Spock shouted over the combined din of disrup-
tor fire and impulse rumble.
    Kirk struck an intercom button. "Kirk to Engineer-
ing. Scotty, divert all available power to photon torpe-
does."
    "They're too weak, sir," Scott's voice filtered up
from distant decks. "I'll need four minutes to re-
charge. Buy me that time and I'll give you disruption
potential." He sounded better than he had when he'd
been on the bridge. Typical, for Scott, health was
directly related to proximity to the engines.
    The arcuate Daqawlu ship had vectored out into
deep space and was diving on us again at attack speed.
    "All right," Kirk growled. "We'll do it the hard
way. Piper, enable the flux. Execute on my mark."
     The yellow and black ship swooped toward us. Her
phaser port glowed faintly with gathering energy.
  "Now, Piper."
 Had someone said something?

261

  "Piper!"
      I flinched, drawn abruptly back to my role in this
awful drama. "Oh... aye, sir... enabled."
  "Execute!"
    I bit my lip, and fed the impulses through as Scanner
had instructed.
    This time the dimensional flux wasn't as distorting.
Had it lost its power? Were we drained already? A
wash of nausea, loss of vision, dizziness... and it was
over. I blinked, and worked to focus on the
viewscreen.
    Before us, the Daqawlu ship shimmered briefly as
reality short-circuited. They fell out of attack pattern,
turned belly-up, and swept to one side of us. The ship
left our viewscreen, then veered back in and came to a
stop at a respectable distance. There seemed to be no
other effect.
    Kirk moved around the helm module, his eyes fixed
on the drifting enemy vessel. "Spock? No effect on the
ship?"
    I'd never seen Spock hesitate. This time, though, he
did. When he moved to his scanners, it was with a
distinct force of will. Slowly, he said, "Confirmed...
the ship is intact." He straightened then, his saturnine
features limned with empathy, gaze rooted to the
Daqawlu ship. "But there are no life forms aboard."
  The captain turned sharply. "You mean..."
    "Whatever happened during that flux," Spock con-
firmed, "it took them all with it."
    Astonishment filled the captain's face. He stared at
the screen. My nausea returned, and I was surer than
I'd ever been that he and I were nursing the same
thought. It was easier to kill an enemy than condemn
him to eternity between dimensions.
     Involuntarily, we moved toward the viewer. Only a
step or two. Enough to seal the horror. Water on a sand castle.
 We were shaken from our stupor by the Red Alert
               262

klaxon as it whooped to life again. My heart hit my
boots. It couldn't be. It couldn't.
    The captain looked at Spock. Feeling it, his first
officer lifted his head from the scanner hood and
somberly confirmed, "More ships, Jim." His nitaglase
eyes shined in the Alert's red glow as he uttered words
more awful than plain information could be. "Battle
cruisers of the Empire."
  Go through it all again? We couldn't. I couldn't.
  Kirk struck the comlink. "Scott, weapons?"
    "Best I can offer is 70 percent range on photons,
sir," the engineer reported stiffly.
    From another side of the engineering deck, Perren's
voice interrupted through my monitor's intercom.
    "We do have remaining power for another transwarp
flush. Shall I enable?"
    Damn him. That meant I had to report to the cap-
tain. I hated myself. "Captain... transwarp is stand-
ing by."
    "Man your post," Kirk snapped. "Ready photon
torpedoes."
    With a burst of energy, I smacked the comlink and
said, "Stand by, Perren. Do not enable. Repeat, do not
enable." I swung around the chair to the weapons
station and went after the photon controls, steeped in
resurging faith for the man on the lower deck. My
fingers tingled on the triggers, stiff with both relief and
anticipation. We were back on familiar territory--my
kind of ground, and his.
    "Captain," Scott hailed. "I canna guarantee that
photon capacity. Energy was drained severely by
those flux beams. I'm rerouting power through im-
pulse reserve."
    "Speed it up, mister," Kirk demanded, suddenly
fierce as he dragged his senior officers together and
made them stand in the fire with him. "We're at
battlestations. I want fighting capacity."
  The intercom crackled. "Aye, aye, sir."
               263

    "Piper, man the exterior scanners," the captain
ordered, sending me dashing around the bridge to the
dynoscanners at the opposite side. While I was mov-
ing, Kirk spoke into the intercom. "Mr. Sarda, report
to the bridge immediately."
    I almost passed out when I heard that. We were
going to be together--right when we needed to be. I
was glad for that--and for the fact that Captain Kirk
refused to use the transwarp flux again.
  "Piper, report the range of those ships."
    The scanner light flickered with numbers. I squinted
into it. "Point six-zero light years and closing."
    A few moments of silence gave us no comfort.
During that time, the captain took the helm himseft.
"Spock, divert more power to impulse drive for the
best speed out of the area."
    "Very well," Spock said. He crossed to engineering
and played with the controls as fluidly as if he'd
accepted a challenge to play chess. Yet this time, I
knew he was deliberately hiding a deeper concern. It
showed, if subtly, in the way he moved.
    I peered into the space scanners. The three Empire
cruisers moved in on one monitor. Hope sank as I
watched them grow nearer, the schematics of their
configuration flashing on two other monitors. And on
the scanner at my right a distant flicker showed me we
were finished. More ships on the way.
    I watched the monitor, hypnotized. Four equidistant
points of starlight bloomed against black space. Only
my training kept me from sinking into a chair and
waiting for the end.
  "Captain," I murmured, "four more."
 Our eyes connected.
    Anything he would have said to me was drowned in
the hiss of the turbolift. Sarda glanced at me, a fulfill-
ing glance, ff fleeting, and took in the conditions we
faced.

    "Sarda, take weapons control," the captain or-
dered.
    Sarda nodded, but said nothing as he hurried to his
station.
    Though the captain surely knew there was nothing
left to try against the odds coming at us through open
space, we both knew we would try anything to keep
surviving. Beyond our own survival was the scientific
integrity of the Federation. We would destroy our-
selves to preserve that.
    I watched the scanner. Behind the K!ingon battle
cruisers, four new points of light became ivory pearls,
closing at warp speed.
    "Scotty, I want those photons, now!" Kirk made no
attempt to hide the urgency.
    "Working, sir. I can give you 78 percent range, and
two-thirds power."
 "It'll have to do. Sarda, target those new vessels."
 "Targeting."
    "Range," I rasped. "Two-hundred-eighty-thousand
kilometers and closing." Damn it, did we have to keep
doing this?
 "Stay sharp." Kirk's voice was bracing.
    In my scanner the four ivory jewels separated like
exploding fireworks, preparing to surround us. They
were closing fast, all teeth bared. As they peeled away
from one another in classic formation, their shapes
flattened into graceful disks and grew limbs. Sound
caught in my throat. I choked it out.
 "Captain, hold your fire! Starships!"
 All eyes struck the viewer.
 "Spock, confirm!" Kirk snapped.
    Spock hung a receiver in his ear and fingered his
controls. He met the captain's disbelieving gaze.
"Confirmed, sir. Commodore of the Fleet Lyle Craig
aboard U.S.S. Hood--"
 The captain burst to his feet.

264                                                          265

    Spock went on, his voice strong now. "Captain
Jarboe on the U.S.S. Yorktown... Captain Andreoni
on board Exeter, and Captain Long with the destroyer
Majestic. Commodore Craig suggests we sit back and
ú.. watch the nickelodeon." His brow rose over the
unfamiliar word.
    But it wasn't unfamiliar to the captain. His face was
alight with triumph as we watched the starships move
in around us, and saw the sudden action of the sur-
prised Klingon cruisers. Kirk slapped the command
console with both hands and roared, "Advise they are
welcome, Mr. Spock!"
    "With a capital 'well,'" I whispered. We made it
work, Scanner. Rest easy.
    The United Federation of Planets dumped politics
on the floor and moved in as ff to a trumpet carillon.
    Three Klingon battleships wheeled to meet four
Federation starships, and we could nearly taste the
surprise. From our Alert-darkened bridge, we
watched as the starships took on the battle cruisers
and the destroyer Majestic peeled off after the uniden-
tified ship that was still haunting us. Two of the
Klingon vessels suddenly moved in on Enterprise.
They were going to use us as a backdrop--a safety net.
    Kirk saw it. His sharp words cut through my fasci-
nation with the screen. "Piper, take the helm! Plot a
course astern, z-minus thirty degrees. Lock and exe-
cute. Give them a clear field to open fire. Sarda, arm
photon torpedoes. Wide dispersal. Fire!"
    I should have known he wouldn't just sit back and
watch the nickelodeon, whatever that was. Jim Kirk
would fire a bologna sandwich out the photon tubes if
he had to, but he'd do something.
    Photons burst through inner space, blasting a
Klingon ship out of our way as Enterprise descended
gracefully out of the center of battle. The Klingon ship
pivoted away, its hull dazzling with crackles of energy,
and nearly collided with the nameless forked ship as

               266

the latter reared away from our fire. We could nearly
taste their rage.
    Cut free from us and roaring like teased animals, the
Klingon ship recovered and whirled around on an
imaginary axis, bringing its full disruptor banks to bear
on us. A bright glow opened on their firing ports, and
the bolt streaked toward our bare port hull. Instinc-
tively, we braced for an impact that would tear the
skin right off the ship.
    But the cavalry was still here. From the top of our
viewer came a gleaming ivory disk, immense and
instantly blanking out the whole screen. Massive call
letters flashed by, black against the creamy plated hull,
and we heard the thunder of disruptor fire striking full
shields. Hood!
    The other starship flooded past our viewer and was
gone almost as suddenly as she had appeared. She'd
taken the bolt on her own shields, leaving us intact to
move downward and out of the way. Now she was
turning on the Klingon who had attacked us, slicing
hard into the damage we'd done, redoubling it.
    We descended into a clear spaceway. Hood and
Yorktown moved in over us, taking our place among
the clutter of ships. They opened fire. The Empire
cruisers cut away suddenly, swinging after each other
in retreat, and disappeared into light speed.
    Exeter was chewing Romulan bones. By now, there
was nothing left of the Praetor's ships to return to his
distant Neutral Zone. Even the dangerous forked ship,
after firing three final shots on Yorktown and learning
what it was like to have a starship turn on it, turned on
a pointed hullfoil and streaked into open space. Majes-
tic wheeled after them, nipping at their heels.
    "They did it!" I shouted. At least one foot left the
deck. From opposite sides of the bridge, Sarda and I
shared a penetrating gaze. His relief was plain. He
slumped back on the weapons control console, sur-
veyed the screen, and looked at me again. Against my

267

flight suit, I raised a thumb in silent tribute. Perhaps it
was the space between us, or the red dimness of the
bridge, but I thought he almost smiled.
    Kirk rested a hand on his command chair, but said
nothing. That was all right; he didn't need to say
anything.
    Spock was standing near communications, receiving
a message. "Sir, Hood is hailing us." His voice was
soft now with that charismatic smoothness that said
the danger was over and we had survived in high style.
"Commodore Craig reports this sector is clear. He and
Ambassador Shamirian are awaiting your reply."
    Kirk's cheeks grew round with a repressed grin. He
pounced on the intercom. "Ben! You old sea gypsy.
You're late."
    "Now, Jim, you know as well as I do what it takes to
round up four starships. Pardon my saying so, but
Enterprise looks a little ill around the mainmast."
      "Don't worry about my ship," Jim Kirk countered,
pleased with himself. "We're still in one piece."  "I never worry about you, Jim."
    Another voice interrupted now. "Jim, this is Craig.
Don't ask me how you stayed in that one piece in the
middle of a scramble. I'm impressed right down to my
birthday suit."
  "That's one I owe you, Lyle."
    "Deduct it from the three I owe you. What else can
we do for you while we arrange to tow you to star-
base?"
    "We have a medical emergency here," Kirk told
him. "We need as many medical personnel as you can
spare, a damage control team, and a skeleton crew
while my crew recuperates."
    "You've got it. Patch me through to Leonard. I can
tie in my ship's surgeon and let them share details. No
sense in us captains horning in."  "Thanks again, Lyle."
  "Glad to help, Jim. Craig out."

268

    The captain settled into his command chair and
surveyed the bridge before turning to Spock. "Mr.
Spock," he said, a definite lilt in his voice, "secure
from Red Alert. Patch our sickbay through to Hood."
"My pleasure, Captain." Another lilt, clear as bells.
The bridge lights came back on.

    Within an hour we were under tow, this time toward
home territory. Yorktown and Hood were towing En-
terprise, and behind us, Majestic was towing Rex.
Exeter had stayed behind in the Ciatella Star System to
make sure the area was secure. Starbase Four had
been alerted and was preparing its space dock to
accommodate a heavy cruiser. Breathing time.
    And that's just about all I was doing: breathing. And
gazing in disbelief at the beautiful starships ahead of us
as we rolled through open space. When Captain Kirk
appeared in my periphery, I hardly noticed.
  "Everything all right, Commander?"
    "Hm? Oh . . . yes, sir, of course. Everything's
fine," I said, trying to convince myself. I wasn't used
to this. I kept waiting for things to start going wrong
again. "Captain.. 2'
His eyes narrowed. "I thought so. What is it?"
"Sir... what's going to happen to Perren? I mean,
what do we do with a Vulcan? Lock him up and throw
away all that brilliance? He did help us..."
    "Yes, and I'm sure the Judicial Committee at Star
Fleet Command will take that into consideration. I'm
going to submit a recommendation that he be re-
manded to the custody of his home planet. We'll let the
Vulcans decide. That's equitable, I think. Don't
you?"
    This time I couldn't stop the nonregulation sigh of
relief. "Yes, sir, I sure do."
    He stayed by me for a few minutes. Together we
watched the elegant starships as they towed us along.
Finally, he urged, "What else?"

               269

    I looked at him. He was watching me carefully, his
head at a slight angle. How did he always know?
    But he did know. I made no more attempts to hide it.
I looked once again out into space. "That unidentified
ship..."
    The captain nodded, and clasped his hands behind
his back. He thought about it for a moment before
answering. "A blemish on the art of war, Piper," he
told me. "You don't always get the comfort of know-
ing."
    At least he understood. It made me feel better. The
sniggering doubt would always remain, but at least it
was a shared doubt. Now only one question remained.
    "Sir, how did you get out of trouble at Starfleet
Command?"
    He resisted a grin and tipped his hat. "Trouble is
only a minor annoyance when you've engineered it
yourself. And don't worry. The assault charges against
you were dropped due to extenuating circumstances."
    "Before I ever laid a hand on those security people,
I'll bet."
  Now he did smile. Then he said, "You'd win."
    I shook my head and sighed. The captain watched
me passively.
    "We've got a lot of cleaning up to do," he said. "Go
to your quarters and get some rest."
  "My quarters, sir? But I thought--"
    "You're still officially assigned to my command."
He paused then. "Banana Republic or not, Enterprise
is still your home ship."
    Swelling in the compliment, I hardly knew what to
say anymore. I let my hips rest against the bridge rail
and, finally, I relaxed in his company. "I seem to be
thanking you a lot lately, sir."
    A little shrug softened the soldier in him. "And we
don't thank you enough. It evens out. Go on. Get
some rest."
 I flexed my shoulders. "Aye, sir. I will."

270

  "Oh, and Piper--"
 "Sir?"
    "The Annual Atlantic Wind Ships Race is coming
up. I need crew. Interested?"
    The deck of Enterprise felt as if it was surging on a
wave. "Just try setting sail without me," I said.
 "Wouldn't think of it. Good night, Commander."
 "Fair weather, Captain."

271

Chapter Thirteen

"A little suffering is good for the soul."
         --The Corbomite Maneuver

SICKBAY WAS A ZOO. Several doctors, nurses, and
orderlies had beamed over from the three ships escort-
ing us and were preparing to beam back to their own
ships with groups of our ill crewpeople. All four sick-
bays were hard at work trying to ease the aftereffects
of the heavy drugging. Some people were on their feet.
Others were still unconscious. Many still hovered in
between. Sarda was here already, apparently for the
same reason that brought me here before following the
captain's suggestion to rest.
    Scanner was one of those in-betweens: still in bed,
but the light had returned to his eyes and the whip to
his tongue.
  "Piper! You daughter of a snake. How are yawl?"
    I tweeked the forefinger that waggled at me and said,
"You don't want to know. Are you all fight?"
    "Naw, I died. I'm just here as an example of what
not to do."
    Sarda offered a straighter answer. "Merete esti-
mates he will be duty-fit in a day." The sentence
sounded awkward until I realized I'd never heard him
call Merete anything but "Doctor." Sarda had
changed. Not for the human, but for the better.
    Scanner tugged at the lapel of my flight suit. "So
how's it gonna feel carryin' a rank of full Com-
mander?"

272

     I backed off a step. "Oh, no, not again! Not a
 chance, not a prayer! Maybe they'll promote you, but
 they're not going to do that to me again, not for a long,
 long, long time! I'll resign first!"
  "Okay, okay... forget I mentioned it."
    "You'd better forget you mentioned it, because ff
Star Fleet gets any bright ideas I'll know where they
came from."
    "Hey, this is me forgettin'." He held his hands up in
surrender.
    Luckily for him, a roll of laughter from a group of
recovering crewpeople distracted me from my reaction
to that unsavory idea. "What's going on over there?"
  "Oh, nothin'," Scanner said. "Really nothin'."
    I looked at Sarda. A Vulcan version of a shrug
tightened his shoulders. "Judd has evidently rigged
some holographs into the patients' lounge, to entertain
the crew as they recuperate. I have not as yet seen
them, but they seem to be efficacious."
    "Are you telling me," I began, "that we actually
have a visual record of Scanner's idea of entertain-
ment? What is it, Scanner? Old Laurel and Hardy
tapes? Films of test flight crashes? What?"
    "Ain't teHin' 2' Whether he wanted to tell or not, his
cheeks grew rosy.
  "This I've got to see."
  "Piper, it's dull, I'm telling you!"
    "Sure. I know a setup when I see one. Come on,
Sarda."
    We elbowed our way through the lump of crewpeo-
ple--easy, because most of them were still weak.
Laughter is the best medicine, Confucius or somebody
once said, and it showed in the blanched faces around
us as health slowly returned. When we got through to
the specially rigged holo platform, I saw why. I also
remembered that a certain Tyrannosaurus Rex lover
had been armed with a tricorder during a particularly
opportune moment.

273

    The group rippled with laughter again, in time for me
to see a small holographic version of myself, engaged
in a vigorous dance. Veils whipped in and out of the
image periphery, as did a grasping Klingon hand from
below. Veils!
    Sarda's voice was fuel on the fire. "Piper, I had no
idea you were so... athletic."
  "Scanner!"

    It took three strong orderlies, but eventually peace
reigned again and I was forced to accept my share of it.
In a ship still empty of most of its crew, I discovered
what quiet really meant. It was nice, for a change;
soothing. My quarters were the same as I had left
them: Merete's bunk pleated and pin straight, mine a
little rumpled. I never could make a bed.
    That didn't matter now anyway. I planned to add to
the rumples. I ordered all the lights off except the one
tiny courtesy bulb in the head. Darkness folded
around me, welcome as a warm cloak, and my head
felt like an iron ball when it hit the pillow.
    One deep breath to usher me into sleep---and the
door buzzer sounded.
 Ease off, guys, I'm under orders to sleep.
 My voice triggered the door. "Come."
    The doorway was dark, and as the panel opened,
bland corridor light molded around a stock authority.
"Commander Piper..."
    I struggled into a sitting position. "Oh---Mr. Scott.
Come in, please."
    Still silhouetted, he moved into my lightless quar-
ters. "Lassie... I'd like a worrrd wi' you."