Gemini (30 page)

“Fire!” said Kirk. The landing party aimed phasers at the vessel and let loose. Energy splashed across the ship, turning its gray hull crimson.

The little craft suddenly seemed to leap off the floor of the warehouse, like a fat toad after a fly. Mounted blasters crumbled the roof, its door still not fully open, and hunks of the ceiling rained around the landing party.

The ship wobbled in the night air for a moment, righted itself, and flew off.

Kirk watched the ship—and with it, Peter—flee into the sky even as he waved McCoy forward to Counselor Hanor.

She was still alive, incredibly. “Don't try to talk,” said McCoy, uselessly. She seemed to want to, despite the fact that with each word she bled more freely, a filigree of red bubbles foaming out to mingle with the rusty orange of her robe.

“We formed an alliance,” she gasped, then managed a ghastly semblance of a chuckle at her own stupidity. “Docos and I wished to restore power to the old tribes after your starship left … the smuggled statuary was a way of attaining funding for we three … ”

“‘We
three,'”
said Kirk, jumping on the admission. “Who, Counselor? You, Docos—and who else?”

But she could say nothing else.

“She's dead, Jim.” Her face was as ugly in death as it had been in life, but was now just another gargoyle that had joined a crowd of equally lifeless statuary.

Kirk was already speaking urgently into his communicator, most of his being concentrating on the task at hand, a small part praying, unknown to the rest of him, that it wasn't too late. “Kirk to
Enterprise!
Emergency!”

For a long moment, nothing but static. Then, wending its way through the noise of space:

“Captain, this is Uhura.”

“Uhura, reverse course, beam us up as soon as possible! Understood?”

“Yes, sir. We've only just left orbit, I think we have you—”

The next thing Kirk knew was materializing in the transporter room aboard the
Enterprise.
“Spock, Sulu, you're with me,” he called, leaping off the pad. “Bones, take care of Giotto.”

“I'm not hurt, Captain,” said Giotto.

“I'll be the judge of that,” said McCoy, firmly.

“Scotty,” called Kirk, as he headed out the hatch, “get to engineering, I have a feeling it's going to get rough.”

“No surprises
there,”
grumbled the Scotsman, dashing out of the transporter room.

“Full sensor spread,” ordered Kirk minutes later, as he took the conn. “Maximum dispersion. Screen on.”

As Sulu returned to his helm position, he saw that Lieutenant Sherwood was filling in for him. He caught her eye and jerked his head to one side with a little grin. She vacated the chair rapidly, winking at him.

Spock was at his station, hands flying over his console while he peered into his viewer.

“Any sign of them, Spock?”

“Negative, Captain. This ship seems as elusive as their earlier vessel, and they will doubtless have learned to compensate for the strategy that proved successful then.”

“There's at least one difference between this ship and the old one,” said Kirk. “We put a pretty good crease in the hull of this one. That may give us their scent.”

“Indeed.” Spock was back at his console, as naturally as if it had been an extension of himself, adjusting for this new variable. “Such relative ease in detection was one of the prime factors in Starfleet's abandonment of refractive hulls to attain stealth technique. The index of refraction must be so precisely calculated that damage from battle or even meteors can disable the system. If the refractive dissonance is sufficient, we may be able to … ” A pause. “I have them, Captain. Putting them on screen now.”

A small, glowing speck flashed into existence above Nador, and heading away fast. “Intercept course,” said Kirk. “Battle stations. Go to red alert. Spock, have they seen us?”

“I do not believe so, Captain. Though they are beginning to pick up speed, their course is continuous along a straight line, indicating that hurry rather than stealth is their main objective.”

“Neither will be enough,” murmured Kirk, grimly. “Raise shields.”

“Captain, I'm receiving a hail from them.”

“On screen,” said Kirk, though he had a sinking feeling he knew the upshot of any communiqué they would wish to send.

“Captain Kirk,”
came the voice of Counselor Docos, a moment before his face appeared on the viewscreen.
“How good of you to supply us with an escort. Not that we'll need one once we leave our solar system. Privacy, you know.”

“Escort?” Kirk laughed, contemptuously. “Back to the planet, certainly. To either a Federation jail or a Nadorian prison—that's a jurisdictional dispute I don't care to get involved in.”

“I said ‘escort,'”
repeated Docos, with a confidence that told Kirk he was not only aware of the ace up his sleeve, but willing to exploit it.
“We have your nephew.”

“So you do,” said Kirk, in what he hoped was a sufficiently casual tone. “And I'm giving you a chance to surrender and turn him over. Such an action on your part will be noted on our records, and may work in your favor at your trial—”

“And if you don't let us go, he will die,”
said Docos, coldly.

At least it's out in the open now,
thought Kirk.
No more dancing around it.
Despite the stakes, there was always something to be said for knowing exactly where you stood.

“I wouldn't recommend that,” said Kirk, smiling grimly.

To his surprise, Docos laughed.
“I'm sure you wouldn't, Captain, but you'll forgive me if, as captain of this ship, I choose my own strategies.”

“Choose any strategy you like,” replied Kirk. He rose from the conn and walked to the viewscreen, hands crossed behind him. “But know that I will not allow anyone—including my own flesh and blood—to be used as a hostage.”

“But … ”
Docos seemed taken aback by this, as if talking to an obstinate child who refused to understand.
“But I'll kill him.”

“At which point,” said Spock, “you will no longer have any hold over the captain.”

Bless you Spock,
thought Kirk. “And at which point,” said Kirk, emphasizing each word carefully, “I will no longer be inclined to negotiate. That's my counsel … Counselor.”

Docos turned to look at someone beside him on the small bridge, and shouted something. Before his syllables could fade, his image vanished.

“They're fleeing, sir,” said Sulu. “Doubling their speed.”

“Right after them,” said Kirk, returning to the conn.

“I hope Counselor Docos is a logical man,” said Spock.

“That makes two of us,” said Kirk, taking a deep breath.

* * *

In sickbay, Prince Abon moved the pawn into position. “Check and mate,” he said. “Another game?”

“No,” said Prince Delor. He rose and stretched, a moment passing before he realized he had very nearly gotten used to the ability to rise and stretch on his own. “I'm bored,” he said, with the conviction of one who had always been surrounded by persons whose job it was to relieve that ennui.

“So am I,” said Abon, “but it won't do any good to dwell on it.”

“And the back of my neck itches worse than ever,” said Delor. “It even burns a little—” He stopped in midsentence, realizing the import of his words, and looked at his twin, whose expression, commingling shock and horror, mirrored his exactly.

They reached for the button to summon Dr. McCoy at the same time, but Delor got there first.

* * *

“Closing, sir,” said Sulu.

“Their status?”

“Raising shields, but not arming weapons,” said Spock, after a moment.

“Prepare tractor beam,” said Kirk.
By God, it worked, it—

At that moment, the
Enterprise
was shaken by a blow whose percussive force rang throughout the entire ship.

“What was that?” asked Kirk, quickly. “Have they fired?”

“No, sir,” said Spock. “I have the source of the assault on screen.”

The image on the screen shifted and Kirk saw, to his horror, another of the roiling psionic storms hovering before them, its mass underneath its surface shot through with power, as it loosed another bolt at them.

“M
C
C
OY
!”
SHOUTED
K
IRK
, stabbing a button on his console. “What the devil's going on down there?”

“I warned you!”
crackled back McCoy's voice.
“The twins can't control it, Jim, and—”

“What about that neural link of yours?” A new tremor shook the ship, stronger than before. Kirk could see damage-report lights winking to life on Uhura's board.

“Will you let me finish? The neural link burned out as soon as the storm appeared again, and just replacing it won't do any damn good.”

“Then try drugs, or—”

“I'm already running some tests on some simulations. McCoy out.”

“All power to shields,” said Kirk. “Try to keep the Nadorian ship in range.”

“That won't be difficult, sir,” said Sulu, as the ship shivered again.
That wasn't a blast from the storm,
thought Kirk.

“Photon torpedoes, Captain,” supplied Spock, as Kirk turned to him. “From Counselor Docos's ship.”

“Bastard,” said Kirk, his tone half-admiring. Most petty thugs would have taken advantage of such an interruption by just running, and hoping the
Enterprise
couldn't catch them. Beneath Counselor Docos's robes, however, seemed to beat a gambler's heart.

A fact,
Kirk thought grimly,
I hope to be able to confirm personally.

“Ready a fusillade of photon torpedoes,” said Kirk.

“Photon torpedoes ready, Captain,” said Chekov, a moment later. “Shall I—?”

“Fire on my orders only,” said Kirk, sharply. “Fire them one at a time, and while doing so, maneuver the
Enterprise
so
their
ship is between us and the storm. We'll see if we can get one of our enemies to do our work for us. Clear?”

“Yes, sir,” said Sulu, admiringly. Kirk saw him exchanging an expectant glance with Chekov.

“Use maneuvering thrusters if you have to,” said Kirk, feeling the ship rumble again through the arms of his chair. “Nice and slow—but not too slow. Begin maneuvering,” beneath him he felt the
Enterprise
move again, this time a steady, controlled motion, “and fire.”

Photon torpedoes lanced at the enemy ship several times over the next couple of minutes, doing little damage, but apparently keeping Docos from realizing that the
Enterprise
was slowly but surely changing its position, forcing the Nadorian ship to do so also.

“Another attack from the storm, Captain,” reported Spock, unnecessarily, as the ship shuddered.

“Maneuvering complete, Captain,” announced Sulu. On the screen, Kirk nodded tightly; he could see Docos's ship some distance away, and beyond it the storm cloud, boiling like the surface of a new sun.

“I am reading increased energy emissions from the storm,” said Spock.

“Hold on to something,” said Kirk, “and hope.”

The storm erupted suddenly, discharging another burst of psionic energy. Faster than it would take to describe it, Kirk saw the tendrils leap out toward Docos's ship.

Then they gracefully curved
around
Docos's ship, to collide head-on with the
Enterprise.

Over the collision, Scotty's voice came from the intercom.
“We can't take much more of this, sir.”

“Understood, Scotty, I'll try to get you some relief.” Clicking off, Kirk turned to Spock. “Get to sickbay. Do
something.
If the princes are generating those storms, stop them any way you can, short of killing them.”

“Moving one to a sufficiently distant venue might prove effective,” said Spock, as the deck shook beneath him anew. “The distance within which their psionic powers function cannot be infinite.”

“Too much distance, not enough time,” said Kirk, shaking his head. “We need another option.”

“Understood,” said Spock, as the turbolift door closed behind him.

“Why?” Kirk muttered to himself, as he paced the bridge. “Why did Docos turn to fight?”

“Even a Cossack would turn to fight if something he loved was endangered,” said Chekov.

“Mr. Chekov,” said Kirk, after a few seconds, “remind me to put you in for a raise.” He hammered one of the console buttons on his chair. “Kirk to cargo hold.”

“Lieutenant Sinclair here, sir,” came a clear, cool voice from the intercom.

“Lieutenant,” said Kirk, slowly and clearly, “listen carefully, I'm only going to have time to say this once … .”

* * *

“What the devil do you think you're doing?”

Their Serene Highnesses Princes Abon and Delor looked up, guiltily. “Nothing,” said Delor, unconvincingly.

“This is ‘nothing'?” asked McCoy. He charged between the twins, seizing the hypospray that lay on the counter before them, and examining its contents. “I thought so. This is tetralubisol.” He turned to face the twins angrily. “I don't know how this got here, but if you had used the hypospray, it would have—Oh.” He shook his head, even more angry, and barely trusting himself to speak. “No. There's got to be another way. I don't believe in martyrs.”

“It's your fault,” said Abon, to Delor. “If we had only been able to decide—”