Star Trek: The Next Generation #53 Double Helix: Red Sector Book three of six

 

 

Chapter One

 

 

"ATTENTION! THIS IS A STARFLEET SPECIAL SECURI- TY FORCES EVACUATION SQUAD! WE ARE ABOUT TO LAND A DIPLOMATIC COACH AND FIVE FIGHTER ESCORTS. ALL CIVILIANS MUST CLEAR THE COURT- YARD IMMEDIATELY! ANYONE REMAINING WILL BE STUNNED AND REMOVED TO A SECURITY BRIG! ALL PERSONS... ATFENTION!... THEY'RE NOT CLEAR- ING OUT. CAN THEY EVEN HEAR ME? PERRATON, IS THE TRANSLATOR ON? PECAN, GET YOUR WING BACK INTO FORMATION! WHERE'S THE BROADCAST GREENLIGHT? WHAT KIND OF DUNSELS INSTALLED THIS SYSTEM?" "AH, PERRATON HERE... STILES, BE AWARE THE BROADCAST SYSTEM IS GREEN AND TRANSLATING.

 

 

YOU JUST CALLED THE WHOLE PLANET A BUNCH OF DUNSELS." "SHUT IT DOWN!" "OAK ONE, THIS IS BRAZIL. FORMATION'S SHIFT- ING STARBOARD. THE EMBASSY'S GOT A BIG GAR- GOYLE ON IT AND I'M ABOUT TO CLEAN ITS TEETH." "LATERAL THRUST. ABORT LANDING PATTERN--

 

 

PERRATON, WOULD YOU RED THE P.A. BEFORE I COUGH UP A LUNG?"

 

 

"Copy that. Public address speakers are shut down. Fighter formarion's still too cramped for diamond grid, Stiles. Acorn just bumped a water tower." "All wings, pull up! We'll modify formation and try our approach again. Did the whole city hear us arguing?" "They heard you arguing." "Ahhh, I should've become a medic... Nuts, Oak One. Go to Ruby formation. Pecan, move two degrees port. Brazil, get off his tail. Acorn, keep your wings trim. Why can't you peo- ple hold a hover grid?" "Oak One, Acorn. It's not us. Stiles, it's you. You have to put the coach down and vertical your stabilizers to give us enough room to land in that courtyard." "Stabilizers... I hate stabilizers... I was supposed to go in for multi-vehicular flight school this week, but nooo, I had to grab a mission. Listen up! I'll land the coach first, then all wings settle around me five seconds later. Keep it sharp!" "What's the matter with you, Stiles?" Pilot Andrea Hipp's Geman accent seemed crisp over the comm. "This isn't syn- chronized swimming, you know." "I said no chatter! The ambassador's watching!" A prattle of aye-ayes settled the issue for the moment, but did nothing for Eric Stiles's stomach, or his icy fingers, or his tingling feet. This command stuff left a lot to be wished for.

 

 

And his hair was in his eyes... he was looking through a blond curtain. Didn't help.

 

 

On the screens of his fully carpeted cockpit, Stiles saw the platinum glitter of the Federation Embassy at PojjanPiraKot seem to rise up to meet him. Actually, he and the coach he piloted were descending into the brick city courtyard, but the illusion of a floating building disoriented him briefly. On the secondary side monitors, the five fighter escorts regrouped into Ruby formation and found the space to wiggle into the brick court, seffiing around the main coach vessel like baby ducks crowding a drake.

 

 

"Doesn't look like I expected ~t to," he commented. "What are those metal bands on all the buildings?" "The city's all reinforced." Ensign Travis Perraton's blue eyes peered with fresh curiosity at a smaller monitor as he adjusted the coach's shields to let them land, irritating Stiles with his eternal good mood. "They've got some kind of gravi- tational problem on this planet. All the buildings have had to be structurally rebuilt over the past few years since it started." "What kind of gravitational trouble?" "Something like high tides or earthquakes, I guess. That's what I've heard, anyway" Stiles wanted to comment, but was busy settling the coach onto its extender pads. The fantasy of brilliant artisanship in moving spaceborne vessels into an atmosphere and landing them in a surefooted, graceful manner had shriveled in his hands. At least that part was over. He trembled with irritation as the system's check barberpoled. Perraton had managed to clear the belly shields. Otherwise, the coach would've sat in the air like a beachball on the water--and probably rolled over.

 

 

"You're down" Perraton confirmed. "You can unclench now." "I'm fine!" "Yeah, sure you are. You worried about coming in shielded for the whole twenty hours it took us to get here from the starbase" Stiles bristled at the suggestion that he wasn't in control.

 

 

"Emergency diplomatic evacuations have certain regulations attached. Not getting a second chance is just one of the assumptions. Evac regs assume the situation is hostile and pre- cautions have to be--" "Don't quote the book." "Give me a view of the whole courtyard." Screens around the cockpit flashed views of all six lander pads with irritated civilians scooping dirt out of huge potted plants and dumping it on the ship's pads. So much for respect.

 

 

"Are they throwing rocks?" Stiles asked.

 

 

"It's garbage." Eying the same screen, Perraton stood up and pulled on his torso armor, buckling the padded vest over his chest. "Some of 'era are throwing balls of mud from those pots.

 

 

Stiles straightened. "Secure the coach and scramble the evac squad. Nuts, Oak One. Remain in your cockpits. Do not get out, understood? Sit tight and let Oak Squad flush the digni- taries. I'll escort Ambassador Spock personally." "They're pushing on my struts. Our light-stun phasers can--" "Negative!" Stiles broiled. "Let 'em crowd you. Keep finger shields activated in case they touch the wings. And all of you shut up! I don't want the ambassador to hear the slightest dis- respect." "Oh, we respect you. Don't you respect him, Cashew?" "1 drip respect." "As you were!" "As I was? Did I change? I like me this way. Did you change, Acorn ?" "Animals;' Stiles grumbled. "I'd like to get you disrespectful slugs on starship duty for five minutes, just five minutes...." He buffed himself in padded insulation as he pulled his flak vest over his head, then slipped into his gauntlets, adjusted his sidearm, and led Perraton out into the coach's main seating area.

 

 

Here, six other members of Oak Squad were already suited up and looking at him from inside their red-tinted helmet shields. Travis Perraton, Jeremy White, Bill Foster, Dan Moose, Brad Carter, Matt Girvan---the'Lr names and faces swam before his eyes like a manifest, and for a moment he thought the blood was rushing out of his head. Midshipmen and ensigns, all in training for what would eventually become specialties, for now they were assigned to Starbase 10 in the Security Division, under their senior ensign---Stiles. At twenty-one, Eric Stiles was the old man of the outfit. Perraton was next, at twenty years old and forty-two days junior to Stiles' ensign stripes.

 

 

Knowing that they had heard the ribbing he took from the wings, Stiles felt his face flush. He had to lead the mission.

 

 

He'd gotten himself into this on purpose. He had to address them as a commander. Nobody to hide behind. They'd seen the landing. His dream of a crisp textbook military approach and regulation landing had gone up in an ugly puff. Now the squad members were blushing and snickering, burying grins, trying not to look right at him--that was hard to take!

 

 

"Heads up." His voice cracked. "There's a riot going on out- side. Some kind of local political trouble. The embassy is beam-shielded, so we have to go in the security door. As we approach, the guard will drop the door shields. We'll have to go in and come out in single file. We're going to put the digni- taries between us, at two or three in a row. llqere are about twenty of these people, so the seven of us'11 be just about right.

 

 

I'll go last, with the ambassador right in front of me. He's the primary person to guard, and if he gets so much as a hangnail, somebody's gonna answer to me in a dark alley. After we get--shut up, Foster!" "I didn't say anything!" Bill Foster protested.

 

 

"Quit snickering! This is... this is-- "Serious," Perraton supplied.

 

 

"I know, Eric;' Foster muttered.

 

 

"You call me 'Ensign,' mister!" "Aye aye, Ensign Mister." "I want this mission to go like clockwork! I don't want a single twitch that isn't in the rule book! Don't snicker, don't slip, don't do anything that isn't regulation!" A hand was pressed to his shoulder and drew him backward a step on the plush carpet.

 

 

"Everything'11 go fine, Eric," Perraton mildly interrupted.

 

 

"We're ready when you are." His short dark hair was buffed under a white helmet with Starfleet's Delta Shield printed on the forehead, now obscured by the raised red visor. The shield glowed and sang at Stiles. Starfleet's symbol.

 

 

And Stiles had to make it look good. In the wake of Perra- ton's mental leashing, the symbol now lay heavily upon him. If he couldn't yell at his men, how would he keep them in shape?

 

 

He huffed a couple of steadying breaths, but didn't lower his voice. Now that he'd gotten up to a certain level of volume, it was hard to reel in from that. He took a moment to survey the squad--bright white helmets, black leggings, white boots, red chest pads against the black Starfleet jumpsuits, and the bright flicker of a combadge on every vest. Elbow pads, chin guards, red visors... looked fair. Good enough. Time to go.

 

 

"There are riots going on," he repeated, "but so far nobody's tried to breach the embassy itself. Our job is to clear a path between the coach and the embassy and get all Federation nationals out. These people don't have a space fleet, but their atmospheric capabilities are strong enough to cause a few problems. I won't consider the mission accomplished until we're clear of the stratosphere. When we get out of the coach, completely ignore the people swarming around unless they come within two meters or show a weapon. Clear?" "Clear, sir!" Carter, Girvan, Moose, and Foster shouted. Per- raton nodded, and White raised his nile. Had they accented the "sir" just a little too much?

 

 

Stiles stepped between them and the hatch. "Mobilize!" Perraton took that as a cue, and punched the autorelease on the big hatch. The coach's loading ramp peeled back and lay neatly across the brick before them. Instantly, the stench of burning fuel flooded the controlled atmosphere inside the coach. At Stiles's side, Perraton coughed a couple of times.

 

 

Other than that, nobody's big mouth cracked open. Stiles led the way down, his heavy boots thunking on the nonskid ramp.

 

 

They broke out onto a courtyard of grand proportions with colonnades flanking it on three sides and the diplomatic build- ings on the fourth side--a battery of fifteen embassies, halls, and consulates. Most of them were empty now. The Federation was the last to evacuate. Two of the colonnades were in ruins; part of one was shrouded in scaffolding while being rebuilt.

 

 

Most of the buildings showed signs of structural damage, but generally the Diplomatic Court of PojjanPirakot was a stately and bright place, providing a sad backdrop for the ugliness of these protests.

 

 

A quick glance behind showed him the positions of the five fighters landed around the coach. Their glistening bodies, streamlined for both aerodynamics and space travel, shined in the golden sunlight. There was Air Wing Leader Bernt Folmer, their best pilot, code "Brazil," parked like a big car in front of Greg "Pecan" Blake. Behind the coach the tail fin of Andrea Hipp's "Cashew" fighter caught a glint of sun. On the other side, hopefully parked nose to tail, were Acorn and Chestnut, brothers Jason and Zack Bolt--but Stiles didn't bother to check their position. He only hoped they were in sharp order.

 

 

All around were angry people waving signs, some in alan- gnage he didn't understand, others scrawled in English, Vul- can, Spanish, Orion Yrevish, and a few other languages famil- iar from courtesy placards all over Starfleet Command where multitudes wandered.

 

 

The ones in English jumped out instantly before Stiles's rac- ing mind. OUT ALIENS... LEAVE OUR PLANET... GET OUT STRANGERS... ALIENS UNWELCOME... CURSE ALIENS ALL.

 

 

Some of the people were calling out in English, too, though clumsily and without really understanding the arrangement of nouns and verbs. The anti-alien message, though, afrowed directly through to the team.

 

 

To the music of enraged shouts from the people raffling gates and creating a din by banging small silver knives on the iron posts, Oak Squad broke into a jog and flooded into a broad shield of sunlight glaring between the embassy and the consulate next door. The doorways and lintels were heavily reinforced with titanium T-girders, and titanium bands swept around every building, two on each story, like shiny ribcages.

 

 

Stiles glanced around at his squad, making sure nobody pulled ahead of the formation. This had to be crisp. The ambassador was watching from some window inside that embassy. Every- body was watching. Fifty meters.

 

 

Oak Squad thundered forward relentlessly, their phaser rifles tight against their chests. As Stiles led his men across the patterned brick, he saw that just the raw heat from the coach's VTOL thrusters had scorched some of the bricks nearly black and pitted them beyond repair, destroying the geometric design in the historic courtyard.

 

 

His boots felt secure and thick as he crunched over the litter of broken glass, smashed fruit, and rocks that had been thrown by the doters, who were now milling around the fighters and the coach. These Pojjan people were stocky and thick, with strong round cheekbones and bronze complexions tinged with an olive patina, reminding Stiles of Aztec paintings seen under a green filter. They wore various clothing, from the men's ordinary shirts and pants or the women's shiftlike dresses to the brightly beaded tribal tunics and leggings he'd seen on travel posters.

 

 

The travel agencies might as well rip those posters up.

 

 

Nobody was going to want to come to this dump anymore.

 

 

He cast the rioters a threatening glance or two, but although some were touching the ships' landing struts they weren't doing anything destructive. Not yet anyway. If anything hap- pened, the escort pilots would zap them. So he kept moving forward at a pace, letting the natives swerve out of his way. He led the squad manfully through a large puddle of fuel, some of which was still gulping out of a discarded and dented contain- er. Their boots splattered it and freshened the stench. Thirty meters.

 

 

Cries of anger, protest, and insult at Starfleet's intrusion into their courtyard grew louder, as the squad jogged across the brick plateau. Stiles didn't understand the Pojjan language, but some of these people were shouting in English or Vulcan and waving get-out-of-town banners in English, apparently smart enough to know how to get to the Federation personnel.

 

 

It's getting to me. I'm allowing it to shake me. Just do the job, get the people out of the embassy, into the coach, and lift off Ignore the crowd. Just ignore them.

 

 

At his right elbow, Travis Perraton was watching a gang of Po'ljan teenagers on the other side of the embassy fence. A flash of flame--the teenagers were lighting up a fuel-soaked towel.

 

 

"They can't throw that this far, can they?" Blake asked from behind Stiles.

 

 

"They don't have to," Perraton said. "We're jogging toward puddles of kerosene." "Gasoline;' Midshipman Jeremy White corrected from the flank.

 

 

"Stinks" Dan Moose added, then cast to the man on his left, "Make room, Foster" "Sorry." "Bag the noise;' Stiles snapped, turning his head briefly to the right. "Don't splash through the gas. If we get it on our uniforms, we're in big trouble." And that was his error--that one glance over his shoulder.

 

 

A stunning force struck his left shin just below the kneepad, driving his entire leg out behind him. Blown forward by the force of his own movement, Stiles let out a single strangled yell, leaped forward over a slick of gasoline, and crashed to the bricks just beyond the slick. Though he evaded the gas, he slid sidelong into a pile of garbage dumped on the courtyard.

 

 

Managing to thrust his arms out, he somehow kept from land- ing on his phaser rifle, which instead clattered to the brick and butted him in the face shield, then scratched across his bared jaw. If his visor had been up, the rifle would've taken out his teeth.

 

 

A blunt force rammed into his lower back--a boot--as Carter tumbled over Stiles, crumpling to the bricks on top of the garbage. Carter rolled and ended up on one knee.

 

 

With his jaw and knee throbbing, Stiles tightened his body, twisted onto his side, and brandished his weapon at the laugh- ing crowd as his face flushed with humiliation. They were laughing at him. His fantasy of a clockwork mission had just cracked and blown up before his eyes.

 

 

Bile rose in his throat, a rashy heat down his legs. His lungs tightened as he felt slimy garbage soak into his uniform and the stench of petroleum knot his innards. The sky wheeled above him, cluttered with white helmets and flashing red visors reflecting the afternoon sun.

 

 

Smiling, Perraton reached to pull him to his feet. "Nice going, lightfoot." "Don't help me!" Stiles blurted.

 

 

As if bitten, Perraton retracted his hand. Stiles rolled to his feet, now smudged with the gummy remains of garbage and mudballs.

 

 

When he got to his feet, Stiles staggered a few steps in the wrong direction and was forced to endure the foolish chicken- scratch of turning around and struggling back to the front of his squad, and the further embarrassment of realizing his men were deliberately slowing down so he could get in front. He slammed his way between them, elbowing Perraton and White cruelly out of his path. He didn't need their charity!

 

 

At the gates, two Pojjan guards immediately opened the iron grid and let them in without a word. The embassy's medieval- looking carved wooden door, three guys wide and set between two gargoyles, also opened automatically.

 

 

No, not antomatically--this door was manual. Another guard or servant of some nationality Stiles didn't recognize was now peeking around the door's iron rim like a shy cow peeking out of a barn. He was an elderly man, with bent shoul- ders and bright green eyes set in a jowly dark face with stripes painted on it. More tribal weirdness.

 

 

Moving further into the heavily tiled foyer, Stiles suddenly felt ridiculously out of place. The foyer was splendid, its mosaics of gold-and-black chipped stone and glossy ceramics portraying some kind of historic battle scene and the corona- tion of somebody. Must be from way back, because this wasn't a monarchical culture anymore. Was it?

 

 

The guard pushed the big door shut and swung a huge titani- um bolt into place to lock them safely inside, then turned to the clutch of evac troopers and gasped, "One minute! I'll get the ambassador's assistant!" And he disappeared into a wide archway that was two sto- ries tall.

 

 

Oak Squad stood in the middle of the gorgeous tile floor, their uniforms scuffed and stinking, and looked around.

 

 

"I'd hate to be the guy who cleans the grout" Perraton com- mented.

 

 

White grunted as he scanned the mosaic on the ceiling.

 

 

"How long you think we'll have to wait?" "Not long," Stiles filled in. "They called for us to come get them, so they're probably ready to leave. And they're Vulcans, so you know they're efficient." "How do you know they'll be stiffs?" Moose asked.

 

 

"Because Ambassador Spock's a st--a Vulcan. They like to have their own kind around. They understand each other better than we do" "Oh, fight;' White drawled. "They do everything better than we do" Stiles scoured him with a glare. "Don't start on me, Jeremy" He turned away, but in his periphery he noted Perraton's quick motion to White, erasing any further mmoying com- ments.

 

 

Though they stood in this wide foyer feeling dirty and small, they were not alone. Sounds of footsteps and voices leaked from the depths of the embassy halls, and twice Stiles saw ethereal forms slip from one office to another. Did they trust him to get them out safely? Had they seen the botched choreography of the landing? Did they wonder whether the ensign in command was competent enough to handle this?

 

 

He gripped his phaser rifle until his hands hurt and shifted from foot to foot, halting only when a young woman--a human--skittered through the grand main door and into the huge foyer. Stiles didn't pay attention.... The small-boned woman, with tightly wrapped brown hair, tiny pearl earrings, and a twitch in her left eye, went directly to the tallest of them--Jeremy White--and breathfly said, "I'm Miss Karen Theonella, Ambassador Spock's deputy attach6. Are you Ensign Stiles?" She had a tight foreign accent that sounded Earth-based, but Stiles couldn't pinpoint the country.

 

 

"He's over there, ma'am;' White told her, and gestured.

 

 

Stiles stepped through the cluster of Starteeters and took his helmet off, revealing his sweat-plastered blond hair. "Eric Stiles, ma'am. I'm here to evacuate the entire embassy.

 

 

Nobody should be left behind." "We understand." Miss Theonella rubbed her tiny pink palms as if kneading bread dough between them. "All embassy envoys, functionaries, ministers, delegates, and clerks will be going, as well as four Pojjana defectors who lost their homes in the last Constrictor. They're being given asylum here and we have clearance for them to be evacuated with us. In all there are thirty-five of us." 'Whirty-five!" Perraton blurted. Then he insrandy clammed up, but the number twenty kept flashing in his eyes like bea- cons.

 

 

How could seven of them safely escort thirty-five dignitaries through fifty meters of rioting?

 

 

"We're prepared, ma'am;' Stiles shoved in, more loudly than necessary, before anyone else could speak up. "About the landing... the ambassador is probably wondering why we were so... out of formation.... " "What?" Miss Theonella's white temples puckered and her brows came together like pencil points. "We can't see the courtyard from here. There are only reception rooms on the court side of the building. Was there some reason you wanted us to be watching you? Was there a signal?" He stared at her, caught between relief and disappointment that nobody had been watching. "Uh... no, no signal" Preoccupied, the thin young woman simply said, "Continue to wait here, please, Ensign. I'll get the ambassador." Again the evac squad stood alone, holding their rifles, standing in the middle of the gleaming tile floor, listening to the drumming chants of angry people outside in the square and trying to imagine how they were going to hustle thirty- five dignitaries through that. The unpleasant possibility of rushing half of them out to the coach, then coming back for the second grouIv--Stiles winced. Two trips through that courtyard full of alien-haters? Was that safer than one big rush? If he ordered two separate groups, would the angry people see that as their last chance to get them and attack the second group?

 

 

"Wonder why they hate aliens" Dan Moose voiced.

 

 

Stiles noted that his men were looking at the windows and doors, but his own eyes were focused on the long hall of offices into which Miss Theonella had disappeared. The ambassador was in there somewhere.

 

 

All the men turned to face the hall to their left as a crowd of elegant dignitaries bobbed toward them. In the midst of them was the tall, instantly recognizable figure of the famous Ambassador Spock.

 

 

Bow? Kneel? Handshake?

 

 

"Don't faint! Eric, stand at attention!" Perraton's anxious whisper boomed in Stiles's ear like a foghorn.

 

 

"Stand at attention!" "Attention...." Stiles planted his boots on the tile, but wasn't able to get them together. He squared his shoulders, raised his chin, held his breath, clutched his rifle, and forced an appearance of adept steadiness and control. Cool. Calm.

 

 

Military. Crisp. In control. In charge. Confident. Smelly.

 

 

The ambassador and his party approached them, but Spock wasn't looking at them. Instead his dark head was bowed as he spoke to Miss Theonella, who was clipping along at his side.

 

 

The ambassador listened, nodded, then spoke again while a male attendant slipped a glossy blue Federation Diplomatic Corps jacket onto the boss's shoulders.

 

 

The sight was a shock--Stiles had expected the flowing cer- emonial robes that Vulcan seniors were usually seen wearing, but now that he saw Spock in the trim gray slacks and dark blue jacket with the UFP symbol on the left side, that outfit seemed to make more sense for a spaceborne evacuation.

 

 

Robes might be harder to handle on boarding ramps and in tight quarters.

 

 

Why hadn't he thought of that?

 

 

Though Spock--tall, narrow, controlled--possessed all the regal formality common to his race, his famous form was somehow less imperious in person than Stiles had anticipated, his angular Vulcan features more animated, and framed by the fact that he was the only Vulcan in the bunch. Of course, Stiles had only seen still photos or staged lecture tapes. Seeing Spock in real life was very different--he wasn't stiff at all.

 

 

As they approached, he could hear Miss Theonella's thready voice.

 

 

"... and the provincial vice-warden will be sending his pro- 1ocutrix as proxy to speak for the entire hemisphere at Federa- tion central. Also, sir, the consul general's wife and children are waiting in the Blue Room, and Chancellor De Gaeta's wife is in his office" Miss Theonella finished her sentence just as she and the ambassador and their party came into the foyer.

 

 

"Thank you, Karen, very good work," Ambassador Spock said gently, countering her quivering report with his silky bari- tone voice. "Suggest to the Sagittarian military attach~ that he post a Pojjana communications sentry, and that person must speak both Bal Quonnot and Ronmlan." That voice! That famous voice! Stiles had been heating it all his life! Historical documentaries, training tapes, mission interactives, holoprograms--now he was here, in person, right in the same room with that voice!

 

 

"This is Ensign Stiles," Miss Theonella added with a ges- ture. "And the evacuation escort men, sir"

 

 

The ambassador scanned the team, then fixed his gaze at Stiles. Directly at him. Right in the eyes! He was looking right at himl Those eyes like blades! Black blades!

 

 

Stiles tried to take a breath, but all he got was a gulp of garbage fumes from his soaked trouser leg. As his lungs seized up, he felt the boink-boink of Perraton's finger poking him in the back.

 

 

Report, you idiot.t "Ev... Evacuation Squad reporting as you requested, sir!

 

 

Ensign Eric J. Stiles, Starfleet Special Services reporting, sir!

 

 

One G-rate transport coach, evacuation team, and five fighter escorts, sir?

 

 

The ambassador's black-slash brows went up like bird's wings. The chamber fell to silence. Stiles' fervid report echoed absurdly.

 

 

Calmly Spock said, "At ease, Ensign:' His deep mellow voice took Stiles utterly by surprise.

 

 

"Aye aye, sir!" Stiles choked.

 

 

"We'll be ready within five minutes," the ambassador told him fluidly, then turned to the attendant who'd put the jack- et on him. "Edwin, please bring out the consul general's family and Mrs. De Gaeta and turn them over to Ensign Stiles." "Right away, Ambassador." As the man left, Spock turned again to Miss Theonella.

 

 

"You have our records and diplomatic pouches? The legal briefs and service files? Personnel manifests?" She held up a stem black pilot's case with a magnetic lock, hanging from a strap on her shoulder. "All here, sir" "Very well. We should also bring the jurisdictional warrants.

 

 

They could be confiscated and used to gain passage into restricted areas." "I'll get them, sir." "No, I'll get them." The ambassador turned to leave, then paused and gazed briefly at the tiled floor, thinking. "Stiles..." "Here, sir!" Spock looked up at the inflamed response. Coolly he repeat- ed, "At ease, Ensign"

 

 

Stiles shivered, glanced at Travis Perraton, and again met the ambassador's eyes. "Yes, sir...." "Are you by chance related to---" "Yes, sir, I am, sir! Starfleet Security Commander John Stiles, Retired, is my grandfather, sir! He served with you under Captain James T. Kirk, Stardates 1709 to 1788 point 6 as Alpha-Watch navigator aboard the U.S.& Enterprise, NCC 1701, commissioned stardate--" "I recall the ship, Ensign." "Oh... oh... aye, sir...." "You have a long line of Starfleet service officers in your family heritage, I also recall." "Yes, sir! Several active-duty servicemen lost in the Romu- lan Wars, sir! A captain, two lieutenants, two---" "Commendable, Mr. Stiles. Carry on:' Spock turned to the little gaggle of people behind him and said, "All of you please stand by until everyone else arrives. Then you'll take your instructions from Ensign Stiles as to how you will arrange yourselves during the actual evacuation. As you know, the building is beam-shielded, and therefore we must go out the door and board the transport coach on foot. Unfortunately, our general safety compromises our safety during emergency evac- uation. Karen, keep them in order. I will return momentarily." With that he disappeared down a different hallway and into an office, leaving a confused clutch of embassy persons stand- ing here in the foyer, wide-eyed and obviously frightened. By nature, the two groups divided to opposite sides of the foyer, embassy folks over there, Oak Squad over here.

 

 

Stiles let himself be tugged aside, and barely registered the low mutters of his men around him through the afterglow of his meeting with Spook.

 

 

"Beam-shielding" Matt Girvan grumbled. 'øIlaere's plan- ning. What if they had to get out under more dangerous condi- tions than mudballs and molotovs?" "It's beam-shielded so assassins or terrorists can't beam in." "Why couldn't they make it one-way?" "Too unstable. Sucks too much energy to maintain over time." "Doesn't matter. We'll get 'era out. Eric'll carry them all on his back if he has to." "If he doesn't choke up a lung first." "We'll be lucky if he doesn't make us bow backward out of the room." The team laughed. A cluttered sound, muffled... like a storm coming.

 

 

Beside Stiles, Perraton raised his helmet visor and smiled with genuine sympathy.

 

 

"You okay, Eric?" he asked.

 

 

Stiles felt his lips chapping as he breathed in and out, in and out, like a landed fish. He'd just met his hero and he didn't know if he'd liked it.

 

 

And it wasn't over. In fact, it was just beginning. He'd have to do everything perfectly from now on. No more botched for- mations. No more stammering. He had to be perfect. Smooth.

 

 

"Ease up, lightfoot," Perraton suggested privately. "He's just a guy." "Just a guy" Stiles rasped. "He's a hero, Travis... a Starfleet icon... the first Vulcan in Star fleet...Captain James Kirk's executive officer... I've heard every story a hundred times all my life---do you know how many times he participated in saving the whole Federation? And even the Klingon Empire?" "Doesn't matter now. Anyway, the hard part's over. You met him, you survived, and the experience didn't suck out your brains. He was a Starfleet man for half a century. He knows the drill. So get a perspective. Here he comes." Do the job. Do the job.

 

 

The ambassador flowed back into the foyer, now carrying a slim red folder and followed by more than a dozen people and his attendant Edwin. Suddenly the foyer was swarming with civilians. At least they were mostly adults, a few teenagers-- Stiles didn't relish the prospect of herding toddlers through that mess out there. He stiflened as the ambassador came directly to him.

 

 

"We're ready, Mr. Stiles." "Yes, sir... how would you like to do this?" Spock handed the folder to Miss Theonella. "Pardon me.9" "I... I figured you'd have some preference about... what order you want them in and... how to do it."

 

 

The ambassador thought about that briefly, his dark eyes working, as if he hadn't considered such an option. After a moment he vocally shrugged. "Your mission, Ensign." Over Spock's shoulder, Perraton smiled and gave Stiles a thumbs-up.

 

 

Sustained by that, Stiles forced himself to rise to the demand. "Uh... if you people would form a line, two by two, and Oak Squad situate yourselves between them, uh, one every... uh--" He paused, *died to do the math, but couldn't remember how. His brain had been sucked out!

 

 

Maybe he wouldn't have to count and add and divide--his men were already arranging themselves into position. Perraton was taking the lead, and motioning the others into the queue at intervals.

 

 

'Tll take the rear guard" Stiles said. "Ambassador, would you mind coming back here with me, sir?" " Thank you, Ensign, I will." "All right, let's--no, no, you can't do the door" Stiles motioned to the funny-looking butler who was still standing his post at the door, waiting to open it for everybody. '~rravis, put that man in line behind Girvan and you do the door. Then fall in." "Copy that." "Okay, phaser rifles ready." "Ready!" his men shouted.

 

 

"Rifles up!" "Up!" "Very well!" Stiles took one more look at Ambassador Spock's steady form in line before him, at the large UFP shield printed on the back of the blue jacket. The stars of the United Federation of Planets swam before his eyes.

 

 

He drew a breath. His voice echoed under the high tiled ceiling.

 

 

"Mobilize !"

 

 

Chapter Two

 

 

BRASH SUNLIGHT BLARED into Stiles's eyes, smashing his dream of frictionless success. The sun courted the horizon now, directly ahead of them, as they charged the protesters crowding the courtyard. Curtains of fire roiled around them where the gasoline puddles had been ignited by molotovs. On the other side of the licking flames stood the coach and fight- els and a half-dozen unconscious rioters. Apparently Brazil had needed to enable his stun phasers to back them off.

 

 

Now the rest of the protesters were giving the fighters a wider berth, and turned instead on the jogging queue of embassy personnel and their six Starfleet guards trying to wend through the pockets of stenchy flame.

 

 

A fist shook in his face--and Stiles rammed his rifle butt into somebody's chest. Mudballs slogged through the line, striking the civilians. One caught Moose in the helmet. He staggered, but got back in line before Stiles could react.

 

 

Crack.t----a molotov bottle smashed in front of the ambassa- dor. New flames broke out, flooding the bricks, dividing Spock, Stiles, and one woman from the rest of the line. Spock instantly veered sideways, caught the woman in front of him, and steered her around the flames and back behind Moose's protective form.

 

 

"Oak Squad!" Stiles shouted over the noise. "Phasers on stun, fire at will!" He didn't know whether or not they heard him until White and Perraton opened fire on a group of protesters blocking the way to the coach. The rifles blanketed the area with a red bulb of energy, and the rioters went down in a heap.

 

 

"Wish we could just toast 'em," Stiles grumbled, tactlessly boiling with contempt for this civil unrest. Why couldn't they just follow rules and stick within the law? Why'd they have to cause trouble?

 

 

"Stiles Oak-One! Ramp!" The coach's automatic ramp opened before them with a whine. Perraton led the frantic evacuees right to it, then angled to one side and shouted warnings to the crowd as the diplomat- ic people clomped up the ramp. Luckily nobody had to yell at them to stay in line. They were perfectly satisfied running for the cover offered by the coach's maw. Just as the middle of the line was swallowed by the coach, Jeremy White veered away from the queue to drive back the stone herd of angry teenagers that had harassed them on the way in. Now those teenagers were armed with iron bars--and the bars were red hot. White held back on firing his weapon, instead using it to bash away the iron bars threatening him.

 

 

"Jeremy!" Stiles called. "Stun 'era!" But White couldift get enough room to turn his phaser rifle barrel down and take aim. He tried twice, and each time was pummeled by a hot iron bar--the teenagers were too close, surrounding him so he couldn't move forward or back. If he tried to stun them at hand-to-hand range, he'd end up stunning himself too. And White was getting angry. Stiles could hear his furious grunts and barks as adrenaline took over and defen- sive/offensive training got a grip on him. Step by step he drove the teenagers back, inch by inch, but not enough for rifle stun.

 

 

And they were hitting him with their hot bars until his protec- tive padding smoked and sparked.

 

 

"On board, on board? Stiles shouted to the civilians. He couldn't help White until these people were all present and accounted for in the safety of the coach. When Ambassador Spock was finally on the ramp, Stiles wheeled around, jumped off the footboard, and rammed through the enraged teenagers.

 

 

He drove one of them to the ground, then rammed his rifle butt into the ribs of another, until he could see White's scratched helmet and smell the burning padding of his uniform.

 

 

"Jeremy ! You're covered ! About face !" White tried to turn, but was caught in the neck by a vicious blow and tumbled to the brick at Stiles's feet. Stiles stepped over him, aimed his rifle, and fired.

 

 

A burst of bright energy engulfed four of the teenagers, so close that Stiles felt his skin go numb even under the protec- tive gear.

 

 

"Get up!" he ordered, kicking White uncharitably. "On your feet! Board the ship!" White rolled out from under him, possessing the presence of mind to keep a grip on his weapon, because they sure didn't dare leave it here, and stumbled to the ramp. Perraton skidded down and caught him, then shoved him into the coach and shouted, "All clear, Stiles! Stiles! Eric!" "Acknowledged! Power up!" "Aye aye!" "Nuts, Oak One, power up for liftoff!" "Copy, Oak One." Instantly the fighters began humming with power buildup.

 

 

Perraton disappeared back inside, and Stiles was two steps behind him, scrambling up the ramp on two feet and a hand, his weapon clutched in his other hand. Perraton was there to yank him inside, and backhanded the ramp control. The ramp whined upward and clacked shut, then the hatch bolts slammed into place.

 

 

Inside, Bill Foster was collecting the phaser rifles and slam- ming them back into their wall rack while the other men dumped their helmets into the reception locker.

 

 

"We're secure," Perraton reported. "Dan's powering up for you:' He hit the hatch lock for takeoff, turned to Stiles and shrugged. "Wasn't so hard." "It wasn't?" Stiles gasped, scanning the crowd of frightened evacuees. "Is anybody hurt?" They all looked at each other, but no one spoke up. They were braised, dirty, coughing, no longer the prim bunch he'd seen in the embassy, and one woman was sobbing, but most of them were in their seats and belted in. Now he saw that Ambassador Spock was buckling up two of the family mem- bers. So Spock was responsible for the organization. No sur- prise there.

 

 

Stiles dumped his helmet on the carpet and peeled out of his flak vest. "Where's Jeremy?" 'T m over here." Jeremy White's lanky form, smeared with dirt now, was sprawled in one of the crew seats, pressing a hand to his neck.

 

 

His helmet was off too, and his uniform was still smoldering.

 

 

Stiles stuffed his vest into Perraton's hands and hurried for- ward to Jeremy White.

 

 

"You all right?" he asked.

 

 

White blinked up at him. "Affirmative, more or less." "Why'd you break formation?" White's glare roughened. "Gosh, Eric, I got this irre- sistible crush on a girl way over there and figured to ask her out if I could just get through those terrorists with the hot irons and broken bottles--what the hell kind of a question is that?" "You follow orders from now on, have you got that?" Slumping back a little more, White grimaced. "Put a leash on it, will you? We're doing everything you say!" Stiles almost snapped a reprimand, but what good would that do? And all the dignitaries were looking at him. Should he throw a tantrum?

 

 

Instead he surveyed White's dirt-flecked face and sandy hair, and decided on a better choice.

 

 

"You're all right, though?" he asked. "Not burned?" The anger flowed out of White's heat-blotched cheeks.

 

 

"Except that now I have to tell my mother I scratched the little body she cooked for nine months." "Then take the portside defense guns. Let's get off this planet." "Aye aye." White pushed out of his seat and made sure his neck wasn't bleeding.

 

 

"Girvan, starboard gun." "Starboard, aye." "Travis, navigate. We got a mountain range in our liftoff path." "Right." The three men went in three different directions, two to the defense pods and Perraton to the cockpit. A second later, Dan Moose came out of the cockpit and said, "We're powered up. I can't pilot this thing, though. You're the only one who can fly it in an atmosphere." "I 'know, I'm coming. Sir, are you comfortable?" He paused before the ambassador on his way to the cockpit and asked a silly question. What difference did comfort make?

 

 

"I'm sorry about the trouble out there, sir;' Stiles babbled.

 

 

"If it were up to me, we'd sweep the whole courtyard with wide stun. Why do people have to behave that way?" Spock straightened from helping Edwin buckle up. "Those people are frightened, Ensign, and disheartened. The political situation here is volatile. This was our last chance to evacuate Federation personnel. Prudence dictated that we get out while we can. The Pojjana have abandoned any overtures toward Federation membership, despite our efforts to help them pro- tect themselves. This is an interplanetary squabble between them and the Bal Quonnot now, lacking clear rights and wrongs. Federation policy will now be hands off. The sector will be declared 'red.'" "Then why were they trying to stop us from leaving? If they don't want us here--" "A number of factions on this planet may find advantage in preventing our leaving. I should warn you," Spock added, and lowered his voice, "they never attacked the embassy itself because that would have been an act of war according to the Articles of Confederation. The embassy building is Federation soil. However, once we're in the atmosphere, they can shoot us down and claim any number of scenarios. We must be on our guard and ready to fight." "We're ready, sir! I've got five fully armed fighter escorts, and this coach has two defense guns and a detachable midwing utility jump-plane." Spock raised one eyebrow and drawled, "Yes... of course it does."

 

 

Now what did that mean?

 

 

Stiles was about to ask, then realized that all these innocent civilians were looking at the two of them, hanging on every word. From the ambassador's expression, Stiles got the idea he wouldn't get any answers even if he did ask. He shouldn't have asked anything. Gum stuck on your shoe doesn't ask, "where are we going?"--it just sticks to the shoe.

 

 

Spock, having been around humans all his life, seemed to recognize the look. Stiles was instantly mortified that the ambassador had read the questions in his eyes. Why hadn't he taken the time to study the political climate here? Wasn't that his job as mission leader? Thirty-five diplomatic persons including the famous adventurer Ambassador Spock killing them would send vibrations across the quadrant. Kidnapping them would be an even bigger cout>--for somebody. A shipload of diplomatic hostages, and Stiles had to make a fool of himself by needing the most elementary facts explained to him.

 

 

Shriveled like a prune, he glanced around at all the people watching him, judging him, and croaked, "Prepare for lift-off?' "Very well." Spoek simply took a seat in the first row, next to Miss Theonella and Edwin.

 

 

Feeling completely shrunken, Stiles threw off his gauntlets and stepped through the hatch to the cockpit and into the pilot's seat. Stinking of garbage, his jaw swelling up like a melon, he kicked the foot controls and threw the coach into antigray so abruptly that the fighters were left below. Too bad.

 

 

They'd catch up.

 

 

On his cockpit screens he noted all five Nuts coming up quickly on his flanks.

 

 

"Nuts, Oak One, I want some maneuvering room out of the city. Spread out. Attempt Emerald formation." They each acknowledged with a green light, and he knew he was free to maneuver the bulky craft out over the countryside and toward the mountains. It would take the coach about five miles to reach escape velocity and make it up to an altitude at which they could veer up and out of the atmosphere. Soon the city pulled away beneath them, and he steered around two water towers and a radio antenna and was clear. Now for the mountains.

 

 

Since the mountain range surrounded the city on all sides, there was no way to avoid them. Coming in for a landing was less of a problem than accelerating to escape velocity, espe- cially since they had to get up to speed as quickly as possible.

 

 

This planet had an air force. He knew that much.

 

 

"Several Pojjan fighter aircraft just scrambled on an inter- cept course, Eric," Perraton reported. "Behind us?" "Angle two-five zero, port side and closing. Spreading out across our aft flanks." "I'm increasing speed. As the atmosphere gets thinner, we'll get fasten They'll never catch us." "Don't you want some defense back there?" "Yes--yes, I do. Nuts, Oak One. Take up Diamond forma- tion. Guard our aft flanks. Fall back, repeat, fall back.

 

 

Acknowledge as you take position." In his side ports he saw Pecan and Brazil fall away toward the aft, and soon all five green lights flashed in acknowledge- ment.

 

 

"Nothing'11 get by our guys," he muttered with satisfaction.

 

 

'q'he Pojjan planes are trying to come around, Eric;' Perra- ton warned. "All four of them coming around on the starboard side." "Moving to port," Stiles accepted, and steered the coach out of the way so the nuts on the starboard flank could deal with the encroaching Pojjan fighters. "I don't know why they're even trying. In two minutes they won't be able to catch up with space-ready vessels." "Oak One, Chestnut." "Oak One. Go ahead, Zack." "The Pojjans aren't firing on us yet, but they're trying to slip by us. Don't they know what our weapons can do ?" "Maybe not," Stiles said. "They don't have a space fleet." "I don't know--it's like they're touring or something here.

 

 

Should we open fire?" Determined not to ignite a situation the ambassador already described as volatile, Stiles tried to use reserved judgment.

 

 

He'd looked idiotic enough already. He had to make Spock proud of him.

 

 

"As long as they're not shooting," he said, "just stay between me and them. They can't catch me now." "Understood." "Ensign?" Stiles glanced over his shoulder at the chilling sound of that voice. Ambassador Spock stood at the hatchway, gripping the rims and peering through to the wide forward screen.

 

 

"Yes, sir?" Stiles responded. "Is there a problem? We're almost to flank speed. The mountains are coming up under us.

 

 

We'll be in space in about ninety seconds. I've positioned 'all my fighters in a rearguard, between us and the pursuit fleet, just in case the bad guys have more speed than they seem to.

 

 

Nobody can catch us now, sir." "Unlikely," Spock accepted, deliberately not stepping into the cockpit. "Ensign, may I make an observation?" Stiles almost fainted with the depth of that question.

 

 

An "observation" from Science Officer/Captain/Ambassador Spock? A Starfleet superior for as long as Stiles and his whole team had collectively been alive? That was virtually a direct order!

 

 

Stiles steered the coach through the first mountain peaks that reached toward them from a skirt of low snowclouds. "Of course you can, sir!" Spock now stepped through the hatch way and knelt beside Stiles to get a better view of the mountains.

 

 

Why was he looking at the mountains?

 

 

"As I am sure you know," Spock began, "it is unlikely those planes pose any danger to us." "Yes, sir. I mean, no, sin" "And it is likely that the Pojjana know their planes cannot overtake us." "Well... they might know it, sir...." "Then perhaps you should consider," the ambassador quietly advised, "that while the Pojjana do not possess strong space- faring, their atmospheric capabilities are formidable. Those planes behind us could be diversionary." Stiles heard the words, but for a moment they made no sense.

 

 

Then, gradually, the picture of reality crystallized in his mind and he abruptly understood the ugly mistake he was making.

 

 

"Oh... oh!" Stiles's mouth suddenly went completely dry, and he gripped his controls. "Oh, God!" Suddenly Travis Perraton tensed at his own console. "Tacti~ eal display shows something in front of us! Coming up through the clouds! It's an A/I! They've got an A/I blocking our way! There are mountains on both sides! Eric, can we climb?" By not taking any chances, by pretending to be a topnotcher who knew how to do his job and going for finesse instead of humility, Stiles had left everything wide open. Eric Stiles, man about town, citizen of the galaxy, had left the ship without for- ward protection. No vanguard!

 

 

Now he was coming into the targeting sights of whatever the Poijans wanted to throw in his way--he'd let those planes steer him into its firing range, and all his defensive fighters were five miles behind him, guarding him from planes that couldn't catch up. The Po'jjan planes didn't have a chance of catching him, but they sure had a chance of steering the coach toward an assault net hidden in the mountains!

 

 

Stiles felt his throat close up around the realization that he'd been completely duped. Spock hadn't interfered until it became obvious that Stiles was being suckered into a vulnera- ble position.

 

 

And no, he couldn't climb yet. Not that high--not yet.

 

 

He stared at the forward screen as a huge, nasty-looking assault/interceptor moved merrily through the mountain pass, essentially a giant gun platform, on an intercept course with the coach. And certainly that would happen, because in this short space there was no way to gain enough velocity to rise any higher, and there were mountains funneling them on both sides. All that Pojjan A/I had to do was move toward them in the sky and let the cricket fly into the web.

 

 

There were only moments left before the two craft would intersect. Seconds-- Stiles bolted to his feet, driven by a rash decision.

 

 

"Ambassador, can you pilot this coach? Ah--what am I say- ing! I'm so--I'm such---of course you can!" As Stiles stepped through the hatch, Spock stood aside as if he were clairvoyant about Stiles' intentions.

 

 

"I understand, Ensign," the ambassador said as he slid into the pilot's seat. "You know your nominal weapons will be ineffective against an assault/interceptor." Stiles yanked open the equipment locker and pulled out an air mask and gloves. Dry-mouthed and ashamed, he rasped, "It's my duty to try, sir." "Commendable." Perraton twisted around in his seat. "What's going on? Eric?

 

 

What're you doing? Where do you think you're going?" Then his blue eyes flashed with shock. "You're not going out in the Frog !" Harnessed by his failure to master the savoir-faire of com- mand, Stiles didn't respond. He yanked on his gloves and slipped the air mask's strap over his head.

 

 

"Oh, no!" Thrusting to his feet, Perraton grasped Stiles's arm, forcing Stiles to shake him off in order to yank on a ther- mal jacket. "Eric, you're not serious?

 

 

"As you were, Mr. Perraton;' Spock advised, steering the coach masterfully through the angry mountains.

 

 

Perraton shrank back into his seat, cold with astonishment, his lips working as he tried to think of something to say.

 

 

Spock adjusted his pitch controls, but continued speaking to Stiles. "The midwing is unlikely to be able to divert a craft of that mass," he attempted again.

 

 

Was he trying to talk Stiles out of going?

 

 

"I know that, sir," Stiles said. "But by my calculations you only need an additional fifteen seconds to get up enough speed to break out of the atmosphere over that thing." "Eleven seconds." "Oh... well, I'll try to get it for you. Good luck, sir." Even in the midst of piloting the heavy coach, Spock both- ered to turn and give him the gift of eye-to-eye contact, a deeply meaningful effort that Stiles didn't miss. "And to you, Mr. Stiles," he said.

 

 

Stiles closed his thermal jacket around his chest as he ran down the aisle through the glances of frightened passengers.

 

 

He wanted to forget about the jacket, but training had kicked in. If he didn't have the jacket, he'd been too cold to be effec- tive inside the uninsulated midwing.

 

 

As he passed the side-gunner pods, Jeremy White cranked around with surprise. "Eric, where do you think you're going?

 

 

Who's piloting?" Stiles ran past him. "Mind your gun, Jeremy." Spock hadn't tried to stop him. Why not? Travis was right-- this was hopeless. A twelve-foot one-man defense plane against a hundred-foot assault/interceptor?

 

 

As Stiles crawled into the Frog, the smallness of the utility craft struck him like a club. The little detachable was a holdover from previous technology, just something people expected to see on a transport coach and could be used now and then to scout a landing area or as a spotter. It had phasers, yes, but hardly more powerful than a hand phaser, and not very useful against large targets. It was amphibious, hence its nick- name, but was almost never used in water; mostly it gave pas- sengers the illusion of safety and options which it really couldn't deliver. It hung from the belly of the big coach, more of a wart than anything useful in a battle situation.

 

 

And he was about to launch himself in this crackerbox and pretend he could do something about a hundred-foot A/I plat- form.

 

 

He had to do something. This was something.

 

 

They didn't need him anyway. Spock could pilot the coach, probably better than Stiles could, so he was useless here.

 

 

Might as well take a wild shot at clearing the coach past the platform out there. The A/I was big, but not maneuverable. It was made to do exactly what it was doing--hover out there, block the path, and pounce on whatever those planes funneled through to it. If the coach could just get past it, the A/I couldn't chase them.

 

 

One chance... one chance.

 

 

He dropped into the pilot's seat, which accepted his back- side like a big hand, and didn't bother buckling himself in.

 

 

No--better buckle in, just in case he had to spiral or yaw hard.

 

 

Wouldn't help to fall out of the seat onto his head, would it?

 

 

The belts were hard and stiff over his shoulders and around his chest. His feet fell upon the lower trim controls. His gloved hands gripped the yoke. The Frog's comm system would auto- matically tie in with his cornbadge... he could still communi- cate with his team, with the ambassador... they'd be able to both see and hear him making a further fool of himself.

 

 

Though it seemed minutes were going by, in fact it was only seconds before he had yanked the release and the Frog had drifted away from the coach, instantly going to its own power once it felt itself let go.

 

 

Stiles rammed the throttle, and was suddenly rushing out from under the belly of the big gray-white transport as if burst- ing out of a cloud.

 

 

"Mr Stiles, Spock here." The voice in his ear startled him.

 

 

"Stiles, sir," he responded automatically.

 

 

"You are at full throttle. You realize that the Frog will burn itself out quickly at that speed. In less than three minutes, you'U have nothing left." "I know that, sir. I figure there won't be much point in doing any less." "Your choice, Ensign." "I'm coming into range, sir. I'm opening fire. I'll try to dis- tract them enough that you can get by." "Understood." Oh, that was charity. What were the chances his little pop- gun phasers could do any damage to the enormous assault craft rushing toward him between the snowy crags of the mountain belt?

 

 

He opened fire anyway.

 

 

Shoot/Shoot/Again/Direct hit/ Bolts of red energy cut through the mist and skittered across the big gunladen maw of the A/I. He was way ahead of the coach now, in range of those guns, but they weren't firing at him. Why not? He was firing on them, so why weren't they returning fire?

 

 

No point. They knew the Frog wasn't worth the trouble, couldn't pose a threat to them, couldn't possibly stop them from taking down the coach.

 

 

And judging by the way his phaser energy sparked and fiz- zled on that ship's shielded skin, they were right. In seconds he wouldn't have any power left, at this speed, this effort.

 

 

The Frog rocketed over the top of the A/I, treating Stiles to a vision of bristling guns just waiting to skin the coach to death.

 

 

All he had to do was distract them for eleven seconds, but they weren't playing. His last chance to be a hero was fizzling just like his phaser shots. They were ignoring him.

 

 

"They're ignoring me," he muttered. "Sir, how close are you to escape velocity?" "Twenty-five seconds, Ensign." "Sir... they're not paying any attention to me. How can I get them to chase me instead of you?" "It's unlikely that you can," Spock bluntly told him.

 

 

Oh, why not? He'd come this far into the valley of the stu- pid. One more step couldn't do any worse.

 

 

"Sir;' Stiles began, "I need a suggestion. I'll do anything for that eleven seconds." "Very good, Ensign. Consider this--that interceptor is not a space vessel. It depends upon lift." "Thank you, sir!" "You'll be in extreme danger, Ensign." "Doesn't matter, sir. In a couple of minutes, the Frog won't have anything left anyway. Here I go.... " Spock didn't respond to that. Stiles waited for the zing of heroism to strike him, but nothing happened. He was too laden with the silliness of his mistakes to take much credit for what he was about to do. Pulling back on the Frog's steering mecha- nism, he vectored full about and once again streaked toward the interceptor when he heard the decisive Dutch accent of Fighter Wing Leader Beret Folmer.

 

 

"Oak One, Brazil. Stiles, what're you doing? You can't fight that thing off with a Frog.t" "Maintain position, wing leader," Stiles told him. "Never mind me." "Eric, you're making the wrong decision." "No, it isn't. Cut the chatter" Before him he saw the A/I piercing the clouds on its way down the natural path formed by mountains on both sides, and beyond that the rushing coach heading directly toward him, its nose up slightly as it tried to reach up and over the A/I and gain escape velocity. Not being a fighting craft of any kind, rather the kind of vessel that would be protected rather than protect itself, it did nothing fast, nothing fierce. Everything was slow and steady--eleven seconds too slow.

 

 

In just a moment the coach would be in range of the blunt force of the A/I's guns, and be driven down with its precious payload.

 

 

Stiles aimed the nose of his Frog downward, directly at the AtI's tail fins. A slave to lift... to the air it rode upon. Not a space vessel... why hadn't he thought of that himself.

 

 

Like a mosquito buzzing a raven, he shot downward from the high peaks until all around him became a spiky blur. The A/I's big black body grew before him with stunning speed until it filled his forward canopy and he could see nothing but the interceptor and the nearing form of the coach beyond it. All he could see of the coach was the gleaming underbelly--what an angle Spock was piloting! The stresses--could the coach take that?

 

 

"Didn't know it could do that" he gasped, but there was hardly any sound. "Ambassador, this is Stiles. If I disable that interceptor, the five fighters can drive it out of your way. Do you copy?" "Understood. Three fighters would probably be sufficient, Ensign. The other two can effect rescue--" "No," Stiles said. "Not again. Keep them in formation, all five of them." "Explain your plan." "I'm gonna clip that thing." He was surprised when Spock didn't argue. Stiles found himself both gratified and humiliated by his hero's silence.

 

 

Then, abruptly, a giant hand reached out and slapped him blind. A crash like thunder deafened him.

 

 

Collision !

 

 

Chapter Three

 

 

ThE FROG RAKED its port wing hard across the A/I's tail pec- toral, shearing the fin off halfway down. With a sickening pitch, the tiny defender skidded over the metal top of the inter- ceptor, then scraped off to one side like water sheeting off, now hopelessly damaged, and for a silly moment hung side by side in the sky with its enemy. As Stiles watched, the big inter- ceptor almost casually yawed and lost altitude, falling away beneath the coach and rolling almost on its side, which pre- vented it from firing its forward guns at anything but the near- est mountain. The A/I took a couple of shots, but missed the coach entirely.

 

 

As if in a dream, Stiles listened to the reactions of his fight- er pilots.

 

 

"The interceptor's falling off! All wings, attack formation.t Get under the coach and drive the A/I down!" "Affirmative. Formation Attack-Alpha." Brazil's voice--giving the strike order.

 

 

Falling apart around Stiles, the Frog shook violently and rat- tled enough to make a man insane. Nothing responded as Stiles fought for trim--hopeless. The big interceptor was veer- ing out of control, but unfortunately so was he.

 

 

"I'm going down!" he shouted, more to himself than anyone listening. He was glad when Spock didn't try to give him last- minute instructions. The Frog was croaking and there was nothing to be done about it.

 

 

"The A/1 is veering off. They've got no control. Beautiful.

 

 

Stiles, you did it. Eric?" "I can't see him anymore.t Bernt, have you got visual?" "That's negative. He's of!my screens. No visual." "No visual, Travis." "Oak One, do you copy? Do you copy.t" "Pecan, Chestnut--stay information! We're not out yet/" Then, Spock's voice, like an oasis amid the youthful cries of the others. "Coming to fiank speed. All wings maintain forma- tion." Without control he skimmed through the mountains, past knives of rock and white slopes of snow, scratching and plow- ing through whatever scooped up into his path, buffeted fierce- ly by winds and the force of his own fall. Around him the Frog cracked, broke, screamed, until finally an insurmountable crag caught the starboard wing and whipped him into a snow drift.

 

 

"Formation Emerald, all wings." "I saw where he went. Right into the snow crest on the sun- side of mountain on the starboard beam. Permission to break formation and effect search." "Negative. Maintain formation." Spock's voice. Stiles clung to the low steady tone. It was the last thing he heard as his craft smashed into a snowy crevasse, as if the boot of a giant had scuffed a sandcastle. As the Frog plowed through fresh snow at flight speed, the impact 'knocked Stiles roughly left and fight, held in place by the straps he almost hadn't bothered putting on. He saw only a spray of white pitted with rocks as the Frog's nose drove itself into the mountainside. The din of contact with mountainous matter and hard-packed snow muffled his helpless shouts and gasps. He crammed his eyes closed and waited to die. Pain raced up his left arm so hard, so sharp that he tried to turn away from it. His left arm tingled, went numb. Had it been cut off.

 

 

And suddenly, sharply, like a flat stone dropping, there was silence.

 

 

No... not quite. He could still hear the skitter of bits of ice and rock settling outside. He opened his eyes.

 

 

Nearly dark... the Frog was completely buried in snow.

 

 

Entombed... and where? On top of an Alp? Even if he could get out, he could never survive.

 

 

Blood ran down the side of his face. Into his eye... and stung a little.

 

 

He was lying nearly on his back, with his knees up before him and the cockpit controls where the open sky should be.

 

 

Just lucky to have landed on his ass instead of his head. could're been worse, could be hanging here upside down with the blood rushing to his head, looking dopey and unable.

 

 

"Spock to Stiles. Can you hear me, Ensign ?" The voice from the comm unit jolted him as if he'd been stricken bodily. He flinched. "What... ?" "Ensign Stiles, this is Spock. We've reached escape velocity.

 

 

Sensors indicate you've crashed and are stationary, but intact.

 

 

Is that true? Are you down?" Stiles coughed and tried to focus his aching on the instru- ment panel. Yes, he cotfid still see... tiny emergency lights cast a soft red glow, just enough to see by.

 

 

"Yes, I, uh... I'm crashed" he muttered, coughed again, then winced at the searing pain in his arm. "Down behind the lines...." "Are you stable?" "No idea." Above him, the canopy was completely darkened to a severe gray by a ton of snow and ice and dirt, only the tempered windshield preventing him from being crushed or suffocated.

 

 

How much fallout was he buried under? No way to know.

 

 

Should he try to push out? Would it hold him here or let him slip down into a fissure? Was snow heavier than soil?

 

 

"Snow...." he murmured, perplexed. Then a gurgling laugh rose in his throat. "I'm from Port Canaveral." The sound of his voice drummed in his ears. Should he be doing something? Trying to get out?

 

 

There was no getting the canopy open under that much weight, and he sure couldn't do it with only one arm.

 

 

Still numb?

 

 

3(up.

 

 

"All wings, come to stratospheric formation. Transfer to space thrust." "Coach, Brazil. Copy that. All wings comply." "But I can still get down there. ! can land on that moun- tain-" "Don't take action until I get a fix on him. These readings aren't steady." That was Travis's voice. He sounded strange.

 

 

Several seconds went by, long ones. Almost a minute. Well past the time when the coach should're been clear of the mountains. What was happening?

 

 

Then Ambassador Spock's smooth words broke through the crackling sounds of the pilots. "The pursuit aircraft are mov- ing away. They have given up. The coach is no longer in dan- ger, Mr. Stiles." Stiles cleared his throat and muttered, "Thanks for telling me, sir." "One of the wings can now break formation and effect res- cue with relative dispatch." "Rescue?... oh... me...." With a grunt, Stiles pushed off his helmet, surprised to see a crack in it, and realized his head had been driven into the canopy's side support strut. No wonder his head hurt.

 

 

"They may want us to try that," he decided. "There might be other hostiles out there. One ensign against five pilots and thirty- five dignitaries... Leave the fighters where they are, sir. I'll just... stay here." It was all bravado. If Spock insisted, Stiles knew he wouldn't stand up to him. He could feel his friends listening, see Travis Perraton's friendly face blanked with astonishment that they were leaving a man behind, see Perraton's European features turn ruddy, his blue eyes widen. Suddenly Perraton--and all of them, really--seemed too young for tiffs job. Maybe Stiles was fooling them, but he wasn't fooling the ambassador.

 

 

No one said anything. Nobody wanted to interrupt with the ambassador talking.

 

 

Glad they didn't say anything... that would've been even harder. Hearing their voices...

 

 

Spock... a half-dozen Starfleet officers rolled into one. An ambassador of high standing and galactic respect. A name known in the farthest reaches, on the tiniest colonies, on the lips of every Federation enemy. Spock and Starfleet were almost the same word. He could're insisted on a rescue attempt. Stiles would've backed down, let himself be rescued.

 

 

Looked like a dopey kid being pulled out of the water because he'd showed off and fallen in.

 

 

Was he refusing rescue to avoid that moment?

 

 

Spock didn't press him. Stiles knew what that meant--he was being given something. Spock wasn't countermanding Stiles's decision to sacrifice himself. Ensign or not, Stiles was in charge, even if only in a token way. Nobody thought this would be a hard mission. He felt a little silly that Spock was giving in to him, handing him some kind of lollipop. On the other hand, was Spock going out of the way not to take some- thing away from him? Maybe.

 

 

A hard bump made the mountainside vibrate. He felt it, through the Frog's skin, through the snow, through his jacket.

 

 

"There's somebody outside," he spoke up. "Something just landed near me... it's got to be them! They're here--they found me!" "Yes, we have them on sensors. A Pojjana jump-jet just set- tled on the mountain near you." Stiles's mouth went suddenly dry. "How long... do you think they'll take to get through to me?" Spock didn't answer him. Maybe he was busy up there, steering that coach into space, avoiding the three Pojjan moons that looped the planet so far away, so much farther than Earth's moon.

 

 

"I didn't know the coach could take that much stress;' he sighed. "You put a lot of angle on it. Why didn't it stall? How do you do that?" "Simply, but the Academy prefers not to teach the tricl~ I forced the P/T levels over tolerance so the thrusters had more power." "Why didn't the tanks blow from the extra pressure?" "Tolerance levels are standardized at point of safety. Going over tolerance only means that measurement becomes unreli- able." "You mean you were just taking a chance?" "Exactly." "Wow..." Listening to thumps and thuds from the deep outside, Stiles saw a picture in his mind of the transport coach, piloted by Spock instead of himself, angling more steeping into the late- day sky than Stiles thought it possibly could. He never guessed a ship like that could take so much lift stress. He wouldn't have known to take the chance of added stress, wouldn't have been able to get the coach up fast enough to make use of the eleven seconds.

 

 

"I can hear them outside." He gazed up, only seven inches, to the snowed-over canopy. 'q'hey're looking for me in the snow. They're digging through... I hear the shovels.

 

 

Maybe they're putting explosives on me. Maybe they're not going to dig me out at all. Why should they?" "Steady, Ensign. You will not be killed." "Respectfully suggest you don't know that, sir" "Of course not. Ensign, this sector is now red. Some time may pass before the Federation can negotiate for your release.

 

 

Do you understand?" A tremor ran down Stiles's spine. "You mean... it might take a couple of months?" "Or longer." "Well... six months?" His hands chilled even beyond the cooling temperature in the cockpit. Sweat broke out on his brow in spite of the chill.

 

 

Spock didn't answer him. That meant something. Longer than six months?

 

 

"Sir, tell my family... tell them I didn't... or just say..." "I will, Mr. Stiles. Be assured of that." With a sudden groan, Stiles shut his eyes. His request sud- denly seemed silly, melodramatic. But more than anything else it was pointless. He reviewed in his mind the faces of his father and grandfather, his aunts and uncles, the wide extended legacy of Stiles service to Starfleet and several other notable planetary corps within the structure of the Federation. Wher- ever they lived, wherever they were, the Stiles family made a show for themselves.

 

 

He shifted this way and that, but there was no room for movement. He was denied even that pitiful comfort and was forced to sit bere and look back.

 

 

"Sir," he began again, "never mind about my family. Don't tell them anything. Just tell them I'm... not around anymore." There was a brief silence, heavy and notable, like the pause between movements of a symphony. The baton remained in the air, the audience didn't applaud, the instruments were up.

 

 

"1 shall tell them you performed your duty most admirably, young man," Spock slowly promised. "You rose to an unfore- seen challenge." A mirthless chuckle broke from Stiles's chest. More chari- ty. Good words for a pathetic slob, so he wouldn't feel so pathetic.

 

 

Too late.

 

 

"Rose to it? I caused it. It was only unforeseen because I didn't foresee it." He shivered deeply, to his bones. "Don't bother with my family. Starfleet'11 send them the official report. Don't tell them anything else... they won't be impressed. This story isn't that good. Doing duty's not enough for them. I'd be better off just lost at sea. No stories." "Ensign," Spock began again, "you needn't cheat yourself You fit into an age-old tapestry of military valor. Even the small deeds are knightly." "Oh, please, sir, I've heard that since I was six. We take an oath... we wear uniforms... we take action... when there's trouble, we go toward it instead of away from it. We're nfili- tary. Can't argue with that. It's got to mean something. if it means I stay here, then that's what it means." A mechanical whine, muffled by the snow, found its way down to him. Drilling. Or cutting, maybe. He must be trapped under rocks or--were there trees up this high? He hadn't both- ered looking.

 

 

His cold face cracked with a sorry smile as he reviewed the last few seconds. "I hope the other guys can't hear you talking to me this way." Spock's voice crackled. Growing more faint. Distant. "1 sent Ensign Perraton to tend to the passengers. I have no need of a navigator. We are quite alone." Overhead, the scratching sound was louder now, more delib- erate. The diggers weren't searching anymore. They were pur- posefully digging. They'd pinpointed this spot. Maybe a fin or wing was sticking out of the snow. Or maybe they had sensors that had caught him. They'd sure found him fast. Things sure could change suddenly.

 

 

Stiles let his head fall against the high seat back. "So. how'd you know I wanted to be alone? All my life I've heard how Vulcans don't have intuition... y'know, no... hunches.

 

 

No emotional anchors, like us fallibles do." "And you have believed the stories," Spock said.

 

 

Stiles touched a swelling on the side of his head and laughed minimally. "Oh, you're making fun of me now." "With you, Ensign," the ambassador offered gently, "not of yoU." "Everybody always says Vulcans can't joke." "Of course not. Nor do we love, fear, lie, or doubt." Stiles laughed again. Strange that he could laugh... strange that this particular person could make him feel better when none of his friends had been able to.

 

 

The shovels, diggers, drills... getting closer now. Some- thing scratched the nose of the Frog. Stiles saw a finger of golden sunlight appear in front of his left knee. They were almost here. In minutes, he'd be in the hands of the enemy.

 

 

Would they kill him?

 

 

They had a lot of options. He had none. Here he was, trapped in his capsule, probably about to die, and even though his mission was successful, he crashed because of his own lack of foresight. His family was going to be disappointed in him. all those commanders, captains, lieutenants, heroes of the Romulan Wars--and one kid who never made it past ensign because he made a mistake on hits first mission and got himself shot down.

 

 

He'd blown it. Allowed himself to be distracted. Put all his fighters behind him and figured nobody would think to come up in front. He was ashamed that Spock had been forced to point out something so obvious. That's what would go in the report, and on top of it all, after everything else, Spock was seeing that he was afraid.

 

 

"It's hard to breathe," he wheezed. Life support off.

 

 

"The blue marker dot on the upper left of your emergency grid, ensign. Push it upward." "Blue dot... oh. Got it--I hear the fan now. That's better.. :' Fresh air, siphoned from outside. Not warm, though. In fact, the incoming air was frigid. But air was air and it cleared his head.

 

 

At the very least, he'd be captured now. Maybe tortured.

 

 

Maybe killed. Would it be better to get killed fight now, here on this mountain?

 

 

A crawling aneurysm of mortal fear moved through his brain, infecting his body until he was cold and shuddering. He felt it working on him even as he tried to keep it in check. It tightened his throat and changed the timbre of his voice. Could Spock hear that in his voice? Hear that he was afraid?

 

 

The sound of shovels scratched the top of his packed snow prison.

 

 

"It's getting cold...." Stiles shuddered through a sigh and this time saw his breath, as the chill from outside permeated the cockpit.

 

 

Another scratch--broader, brighter. They'd have him in a minute or two. Now he could hear voices above. Bootsteps.

 

 

Shouts.

 

 

"Sir..." "Yes ?" "I don't know... how well I'm going to do," he admitted.

 

 

"This is hardly routine for you," Spock offered. "You are twenty-two." '~l'wenty-one." Miserable now, beginning to feel the pain in his shoulder through fading numbness, he tried to shift his feet but failed even to do that.

 

 

What did Spock mean? So he was twenty-one. So what?

 

 

Old enough to control simple fears. Old enough to put fear aside. What was a veteran like Spock really thinking of him?

 

 

He sank more deeply into his seat, let his legs go limp, flexed his good hand, and touched the frosted canopy near his face. "I guess this is where you tell me everything'11 be all fight eventually, and I'm brave and ought to be proud of myself." "I hesitate to quote poetry," Spock said, and Stiles could almost see the hint of a smile.

 

 

So he smiled too. "Sir, I wouldn't know what to do with it if you did. I don't even read the insides of my birthday cards." For a moment there was no sound from the now-distant coach, no response, no coddling. The comm unit crackled, struggling to pull in the spaceborne signal through systems that were probably broken or fried.

 

 

"I'm losing you, sir," Stiles said.

 

 

"Yes, your reception signal is thready." "Should I try to boost?" "Distance is a factor. No need to strain yourself I'U boost from here." Stiles's hand fell back to his side and he let himself go limp, trying to ease the ache in his head. A little shaving of frost fell from the canopy where he'd touched it. The flakes landed on his fight cheek and stuck there, like a frozen tear. His face was too cold even to melt it.

 

 

"The Federation will negotiate for your freedom," Spock told him placidly. "l'll see to it personally." "Don't make a spectacle," Stiles grumbled. "I don't want to be known as the little goof with the big rescue. Then some- body else'11 be the hero and I'll just be the jerk who crashed in enemy territory and cost a mint to get back. I don't need that.

 

 

God, my shoulder hurts... think they know how to set a human arm?" "Yes, they know how." Spock's voice was small now, but clear of static, patient and gentle, laden with understanding of what he was feeling. How could that be?

 

 

"I have worked with many humans in my lifetime. There is great comfort for me among them, and much to admire. Above all traits, ! believe, I most admire their resilience. Be pliant, Eric. Once you survive this, you 'tl be a more valuable officer.

 

 

And a better man." Stiles heard the words, but it was as if he were listening to wind. Substantial, effective... but he didn't understand what made it happen. An instant later he could barely remember what Spock had just said--all he remembered was the sound of his own name spoke so adaptably by that famous voice.

 

 

"What do you think I should do?" he asked simply. His throat was raw now. There were fumes in here. "If they don't kill me... what do I do to change? I already try so hard. how can I be better?" Now that the question was asked, he steeled himself to lis- ten, to remember a long sermon, the kind his grandfather used to lay on him when there was some lesson to be learned or some grave social gaff to be corrected. All the way home from wherever they were, talk, talk, talk, preach, preach, preach.

 

 

And that was why he was surprised. As sunlight broke through above his face and the snow was scraped away from the cockpit's canopy, as he saw the faces of Poijana soldiers peel back the rocks and crud from his Starfleet coffin, Stiles absorbed Spock's final word. Only one word... it echoed and echoed, rolled and settled, it chimed a resonant bell tone. He would hear it for the rest of his life.

 

 

"Relax."

 

 

Chapter Four

 

 

HARD TO BREATHE. STUFFY.

 

 

Metal banging against metal. The whine of mechanical treads. Lower pitch than the aircraft. A hatch breaking open-- and Stiles fell inelegantly forward and landed on a stone floor.

 

 

His head throbbed, his left shoulder and arm ached... at least the paramedics, or whatever they were, had bandaged the arm before stuffing him into the brig box on their plane. He'd thought it might've been broken, but it wasn't. His shoulder had been jammed into the side of the cockpit, numbing his whole arm. They'd given him a drug he thought might be poi- son, but turned out only to be a pain pill. For some reason, probably leverage, they didn't want him dead. Not yet.

 

 

Now he was here. He knew a prison cell when he saw one.

 

 

Unlike Starfleet's fancy bright brigs, this one just had the old~ fashioned titanium bars. Sure. Why use expensive energy beams to hold prisoners in when plain metal would do the same job and couldn't be shorted out?

 

 

Pressing his right hand to the stone floor, Stiles pushed him- self from his knees to a sitting position. Tile, not stone. Big squares of rough-glazed tile. What was it his mother had called that color? Terra cotta.

 

 

Over his shoulder, the oval door or hatch or whatever it was that he'd come through clanked shut and barked loudly as it was locked from outside. Nobody had talked to him, nobody had counseled or advised him, nobody had told him what was going on or how long he would be here, or what the legal process would be. Did the Pojjans even have a legal process?

 

 

How much of a coup was going on here? Was there a govern- ment in place at all?

 

 

Ashamed of his failure to do simple mission homework, Stiles realized he had no idea what to expect or any way to judge what had happened to him. The Pojjan soldiers had pulled him off the top of the mountain, bandaged his arm, mn some kind of scanner over him, flown him back and dumped him into this cell. Was this a prison? Or just a holding cell? Would he be here for six months, or moved to a trial, a sentence, a hotel room'?

 

 

"I'm not a criminal," he murmured, trying to sort all this out. "Not a rebel or terrorist... so what am I?" With notable effort, he stood up on shaky legs. His head throbbed relentlessly. The cell was dry at least, and warm enough. Well, at least they weren't barbarians. And there was light. Not much--enough to see by, not enough to disturb sleep. All the lights were outside his cell, beyond the titanium bars. Probably they had learned that light fixtures could be cannibalized into lock-blowing bombs. He remembered that from the Academy alternative-energy course.

 

 

A bunk and mattress, a woolly blanket, a toilet, a sink.

 

 

"Welcome to Alcatraz," he grumbled with a sigh. "Hope they feed me." "You'll be fed." Stiles flinched back a step. His heart drummed.

 

 

"Who's talking?" he yelped. "Where are you?" "In the next cell." Stiles pressed against the bars, trying to see, but the cells were side by side and there was no doing it. The bars were cold against his cheek.

 

 

"Are you a prisonefT' he asked.

 

 

"Seems obvious." A male voice. Sounded young. Not old, anyway. Sounded like it could be one of his own team.

 

 

"Are you a crinfinal?" "My incarceration is political." "Political... so's mine, I think. What're they going to do to us? Have they got courts on this planet? Are there laws?" "Yes, they have laws." "How soon will they--" "Not soon. They're in turmoil here. The Federation is leav- ing." "Yeah, l've heard that rumor..." This was getting him no where. He couldn't see the other guy, and if he asked too many questions, that guy would be justified in asking questions also and Stiles would feel obliged to answer.

 

 

Then again, why not?

 

 

"Who are you? What's your name?" "gevon." "Just 'Zevon' ?" "Yes. Who are you?" "Eric Stiles." "Human?" "Uh-huh." "Starfleet, then." "How do you know that?" "The only humans on this planet are either Starfleet person- nel or Federation diplomatic corps workers. The Poijana would never put diplomatic staff in prison." "Ah... they'll harass the..military but not the civilians.

 

 

There's brainy." "The military understands that capture is part of the job. The Pojjan know that." Stiles shuffled to his cot and sat stiffly down, then sank back against the wall. "Are you saying that if I weren't Starfleet, they wouldn't put me wherever we are7" "That's correct. They wouldn't have captured you at all. The Federation would be hostile if civilians were made political pawns. Starfleet is fairer game." "Oh, that's great.... " Lying back as he was, Stiles gazed at his uniform, at the black field of shirt and pants, the ribbed waistband, and the poppy-red shoulder band under his chin. It looked strange with the eombadge missing. They'd taken it. So they knew it wasn't just jewelry.

 

 

"But wait a minute," he began. "I was guarding a coach full of civilians and the Pojjana tried to shoot us downú Why would they do that? Isn't that making them political pawns?" "The Pojjana could have claimed the coach crashed. If they gained possession of the civilians alive, they probably would have put them back in the embassy and claimed some delay or other." "Buying time?" "Most likely. The Pojjana are clumsy with politics. They do things without knowing why." "Just hedging their bets?" "Perhaps. The lingering of a thousand civilians is easier to justify than the disappearance of one soldier." Stiles flexed his legs and winced at the stiffness. "What you're saying is that I'm small potatoes." "I would suspect so," Zevon confirmed quietly. "If that means what I infer." "Yeah.. ú mmm... ow..." From the other cell, the man called Zevon quietly asked, "Are you injured?" "My ship crashed. I got knocked around. I thought my shoulder was broken, but it's not. Mission was simple.ú. if headquarters... if they'd just cued me in to the situation, none of this would've happened. They should're briefed me. I'm just an ensign. I'm not supposed to know everything. Some- body should've known this would happen... so they can have it. They don't come and get me? Fine. I'll stay hereú I don't need Starfleet if they don't need me." Staring at the floor files between the frame of his bent knees, he sighed. "I have a date tomorrow night.... " Prison. Prisoner of war? But there was no war. why was he a prisoner? Did a cold war have prisoners? How long?

 

 

Ambassador Spock hadn't told him how long this might last. Now Stiles understood--the ambassador had just not known. He had deliberately evaded answering. The answer was bad. More than six months?

 

 

How long would it be before his hair got long enough to braid? How much longer before he actually started braiding it, just for something to do?

 

 

Staring ahead at the next few minutes, with an aching shoul- der and a throbbing head, somehow the concept of months eluded him. Right now even the concept of lunch was eluding him. How long before he got hungry? Would they feed him?

 

 

Was deprivation part of the torture regime? How much did this Zevon really know about Pojjan habits? If Zevon himself was Pojjan, he might not really know how they'd treat a human prisoner. l'm on my own.

 

 

"I wouldn't be here if I'd had a better team;' he complained.

 

 

"Travis was the only one with any off-station experience. It's not my fault what happened." "You were in command of a landing party?" "It wasn't my fault!" The other prisoner fell to silence. Stiles's own protest echoed briefly, then died. Ashamed and angry, he sat up and stared at the floor tiles, memorizing the grout. As if framed in each octagonal file, scuffed and scratched, he saw his team- mates' faces.

 

 

"Sorry..." he whispered. The faces all merged into one face, his own--scarred and shriveled like the picture of Dorian Gray sitting in the attic, hidden, corrupted with excesses.

 

 

He pressed a moist palm to his forehead, brushed back his hair, now gritty and sweat-matted, closed his eyes. Thoughts tumbled. Blames and guilts blended into a single nauseous mass.

 

 

"I shouldn't...." His voice pierced the tomblike quiet, then dissolved. He clamped his lips shut before he lost control of what popped out of them. Didn't know whether Zevon could hear him. Hoped not.

 

 

Hot in here. It hadn't been hot when he'd been dumped hereú Was somebody playing with the temperature controls?

 

 

Trying to break him down?

 

 

"It won't work!" He vaulted to his feet, skidding on the tile.

 

 

When nothing changed, he pacedú Across the cell, around the perimeter, along the bars, to the toilet, back to the bunk. There, he faced himself again.

 

 

He turned and continued pacing. His arms and legs ached.

 

 

Why was he hurting more now than when he'd crashed? "Do you feel anything?" "I feel insulted. I feel like I'm being laughed at. ! feel--" "That's not what I mean. Do you feel anything unusual-- anything physical?" Stiles paused at Zevon's sudden return to the conversation.

 

 

"Like what?" "Pressure..." "I've got a headache, if that's what you're asking." "No! Are you standing?" "What?" Suddenly his eyes began to sting fiercely, his head to throb horridly, as if he'd fallen into a vat of acid. Had he been shot?

 

 

Phasered? Some kind of Potjan weapon? Cramps gripped his midsection and he grabbed the titanium bars of his cell, con- tracting against them until his knees couldn't fit between them anymore and he began to slip toward the floor. The floor was shaking! The walls were rumbling!

 

 

As he forced his eyes open, he saw the stone wall across from his cell now tattered and flaking before his astonished gaze.

 

 

Over a whine in his ears he shouted, "What's happening!

 

 

What is this? An earthquake?" "Lie on the floor! Quickly!" The other prisoner called over the increasing roar of collapsing stone and cracking mortar.

 

 

"Lie face up! Put your arms flat at your sides! Breathe deeply !" "What is this? What is this! Why is this happening?

 

 

"It's the Constrictor! Lie down!" Stiles pushed off the bars and rushed to the hatch through which he'd been dumped in here. He pounded until his fist rang with numbness. "Hey! Let us out of here! The building's coming down on us! Let us out of here!" "Lie down, you fool," the other man said one more time.

 

 

"Ow--ah--ah--!" Grasping at his tinging head with both hands, Stiles staggered across the tiled floor, insane with new agony. As if iron bars were hanging from his limbs, brute force, like sheer invisible tonnage, pushed him to his knees.

 

 

The floor came up to meet him and he collapsed forward, pressed physically to the cold tile as if crushed by a giant's palm.

 

 

With one last effort he dragged his tight arm under him and managed to turn halfway over, then partially onto his back.

 

 

After that he gave in to the rule of sheer might. He gasped as his flesh flattened against the files with such duress that he could feel the edges of the tile and the shape of the gout lines creasing his body. He stared, consumed with fear, at his own arms stretching out before him.

 

 

As his face lay against a tile, he saw a crack develop in the floor, small at first and then larger, running through the bars and out into the corridor, then up the wall. The building-- Trapped on his side, Stiles tried to raise his head, to follow the crack with his eyes, but his skull alone weighed a hundred pounds. His am~s, sprawled out before him, actually began to bow into the shape of the floor over the indentation of a drain he hadn't even noticed until now. Insane with shock, he wit- nessed the surreal horror of his right arm breaking, his unsup- ported limb molding itself to the squared-off shape of the drain. His lips peeled back with sheer agony.

 

 

There, where his tight arm lay shattered and compressed into the shape of the drain, a fissure opened in the floor, swal- lowing the drain's metal grate, dismembering the tiles, uncou- pling the titanium bars as shriveling compression took over trod the planet opened up.

 

 

Stiles felt himself fall, deadweight, strong-armed through a cracking floor, and saw in his last glance the mangled building unravel itself and cleave down upon him.

 

 

Beneath the grind and roar of utter demolition, he listened as if disconnected to the echo of his own cries.

 

 

Chapter Five

 

 

"CAN YOU HEAR ME?" "You don't have to yell, Eric." "We're doing whatever you say." "Stiles?" "The Federation will negotiate for your freedom. I'll see to it personally." "Wasn't so hard." "This is hardly routine for you. You needn't cheat yourself" "Eric Stiles! Can you hear me?" "Relax." Voices pumped through a haze of agony. Had to answer them. How else would they find him?

 

 

Cold stuffy air lay against tons of crushed stone and the sharktoothed edges of cracked and disrupted floor tile that now formed more of a wall, bracing one side of a deep fissure.

 

 

Faint light swam above, dusty shafts of light, offering no comfort but instead flaming the ugliness of what lay above and around.

 

 

Water dripped somewhere nearby. Hear it, smell it.

 

 

Feel it--his left thigh was soaked.

 

 

At least l've still got a leg.

 

 

Eric Stiles tried to raise the leg he'd just rediscovered. The knee came up a few inches, which forced him to balance by raising his head and shoulders--agony seating through his right arm, shoulders, and right side. He threw his head back aud gritted his teeth. The effort drove him all the way to con- sciousness, suddenly, like hitting a rock, and his eyes shot open. The light he had seen as a blur now focused far over- head. It must be... forty feet up. Had that been the ceil, up there? Was that the same light in the corridor outside his bars?

 

 

"I hear you. I'm trying to reach you." Who was that?

 

 

Until he heard the other voice, this one clear and not far away, Stiles hadn't been aware that he was moaning, wincing out the sheeting pain in his right arm. Broken. He remembered now. It had been sucked into the shape of the tile drain, broken in at least two places.

 

 

Were the bones popping through the skin? Would he bleed to death from a broken ann?

 

 

"Eric Stiles, speak if you can." No, leave me alone. I'm almost dead. Let me finish. Com- plete one thing. Follow through on this one thing.

 

 

Slowly, more slowly than the trickling of thought or water, his body adjusted to the constant pain. As he stopped strag- gling, stopped trying to lift himself, gradually his ann settled from searing mind-numbing agony to an acceptable throb with his fingers numb. The numbness itself hurt, but after a time he was able to concentrate on the hazy light far overhead and play mental games with it. He endured its mockery, accused it of fickleness, fielded its insults, and claimed it was impotent.

 

 

Surging in and out of awareness, he conducted a conversation with the faint light and imagined that it was singing to him.

 

 

At that point, the fleeting thought that he might be delirious finally settled home and he cleared his throat just to hear his own voice. Just as he began to drowse again, something crashed---the sound of brick and tile falling.

 

 

Stiles flinched bodily and raised his head. "Who's there?" "Zevon." "Where are you?" "Making my way to you. Can you come toward me?" "My leg" Stiles gasped roughly, "it's pinned under some- thing." Only now did he comprehend that his leg was caught, only when he actually heard the words, even though he'd spoken them himself. Was the leg cut off?. Just an imagined sensation?

 

 

He could feel his toes. Was that important?

 

 

"Did the building collapse?" he asked. His words echoed slightly, enough to offer a sensation of cave dwelling.

 

 

Zevon's response filtered uneasily from far away. "A sink- hole has opened beneath the jail building. We fell into it. It may have saved our lives by relieving the stress at the critical moment." "What stress?" "The Constrictor. A particularly harsh one this time" Stiles paused and concentrated on breathing. He'd heard that Constrictor word before. Where?

 

 

Resting his left hand on his chest, he felt himseft breathe.

 

 

In, out, in, and a sigh.

 

 

"This is... this is really... what's the word--ironic?" "What is?" Zevon sounded closed-in, muffled.

 

 

"I pulled rank to get this mission" "How did you?" "The ensign who was up for duty that night, he was on my watch rotation. When I heard about somebody getting a chance to evac Ambassador Spock... what an opportunity! I rotated the other guy to an escort mission off the starbase. When the name for duty officer came up, it was mine." Glancing around his jagged stone prison, Stiles noted with clearing eyes the truly freakish surroundings which would now only in the most generous of mists have resembled a building.

 

 

Twisted pipes and structural supports lay in tatters around him, the walls of former street-level chambers now fractured in dozens of places, so that plasterwork, concrete sections, brack- ets, lathe, joists, and support rods showed their gory broken edges. His jail cell had been on the street level. Now he was forty feet below the street, in what could be described as a wide well-shaft walled in on all sides by the remains of the floors above.

 

 

"Still in the cell" he muttered.

 

 

Stone and metal collided somewhere in the dimness, behind a huge slab of concrete that must be the remains of the wall between his cell and Zevon's. How much of the broken build- ing had wedged itself between them?

 

 

"Is there anybody else in here?" Stiles raised his head.

 

 

"Wish I could move... rm so... cold..." "Can you see your bunk?" Bunk? Oh--S~es blinked and forced himself to figure out his surroundings. There was the toilet, standing on its head with a piece of support rod piercing the bowl. What if he had landed over there? What would that rod have done to his body?

 

 

"Has your bunk fallen somewhere near you?" Zevon asked again, more forcefully despite the muffling of the wall material between them.

 

 

Stiles turned his head to the left. "It's right next to me." "Pull the blanket or the mattress on top of you. Cover your- serf with it." "Why?" "Because you're going into shock:' "Oh, I'm just... it's just that my leg's stuck and... I can't...." "You're getting cold. The temperature down here is still--" "Look, I don't even know you! You could be some kind of a murderer or a criminal. Why should I listen to you? You're coming over here to kill me, aren't you?" "Pull the blanket over you. Cover your body." "You just don't want me to see what you're going to do to me:' "Cover yourself, Stiles. Do it immediately. This is an order!" His right arm shivered violently, transferring the shivering to his chest, his neck, and he suddenly tensed. The collapsed cell around him echoed with a grievous moan. He couldn't dis- obey orders. Starfleet officers had an obligation. Set a good example. He was older than all the others.

 

 

His left hand cramped briefly, shifted--he forced it upward.

 

 

The bunk lay on his left, tipped up on one of its points and leaning against whatever was behind it. Supported by some- thing he couldn't see... supported, as he had been by Travis, Beret, Andrea, the Bolt brothers, the whole team. The Evac Team.

 

 

"Come on, Eric, lift your hand. You can do it." Travis Perraton stood up behind that bunk, holding the metal rim, edging the bunk toward his hand until Stiles's fingers touched the blanket.

 

 

"Pull it down." Jeremy was there too.

 

 

The woolly fabric was cool, but warmed almost immediate- ly as he clutched it. Looking down at him, Travis and Jeremy detached tile blanket from where it was tucked under the thin mattress, and the blanket fell onto his arm and shoulder with just a tug.

 

 

"Thanks" he murmured. "I knew you'd get here." Travis nodded and looked at Andrea Hipp and Beret Folmer.

 

 

They reached down through the rubble and pulled the blanket over Stiles's chest.

 

 

Jeremy White's hand floated forward and tucked the blanket around Stiles's right ribs. "There you go, chief." "What took you guys so long?" Stiles grumbled, smiling.

 

 

"My right arm's broken... you guys really butchered this building. What'd you have to hit it so hard for? You could're just blown one wall. I could've walked right out. I guess you didn't want to take any chances. What a team... you're so great to me... I'm sorry I yelled at you." "You always yell," Travis told him. "We quit listening a long time ago." "Long ago" Andrea Hipp agreed with a grin.

 

 

'Tm glad to see you," Stiles told them. "There's some guy in the next cell... I think he's going to kill me." "why should he?" Andrea asked.

 

 

Bernt Folmer shook his head. "You're just nervous. Don't worry about him." "But he's a criminal or something," Stiles protested.

 

 

"How do you know?" "He's in jail, isn't he?" Travis smiled and jiggled Stiles's knee. "So are you, light~ foot." Heartened by the presence of his team, Stiles raised his head again and surveyed the sheered-off slab of wall that pinned his right leg. "Why don't you lift this off me? I think I can stand up if you do. My toes are moving." Uneasily Jeremy White glanced at Berut. "Well... we can't." "Why not?" Stiles blinked at him, then looked at Andrea and Bernt, then finally at Travis, from whom he would get the straight answer. "What's wrong?" Travis Perraton leaned against a jagged rock pieming a crack in the wall. "We didn't make it" "We tried to get you" Andrea added. "But they got us instead." "what?" Shoving up on his one good elbow, Stiles almost immediately collapsed in a surge of shock and misery. "Aw, Travis... how'd you and Jeremy get out of the coach? Why'd you leave? Berut, the fighters were guarding the coach! You were the Wing Leader... you had your orders...." "We didn't want to leave you," Bernt said.

 

 

"You're such a bag of emotions, Eric," Travis commented.

 

 

Jeremy splayed his hands in a shrug. "So we're ghosts.

 

 

Could be worse. Eric, you're going into shock." "Stay awake, Eric." Travis knelt beside him. "Eric, stay with me, lightfoot. Don't go to sleep. Are you listening? Open your eyes." "Cover up" Andrea reminded.

 

 

"Okay, I've got my own orders, I get it:' Pulling the blanket over his chest again, Stiles felt a series of moans run through his body. The sound was detached, as if made by a wheezing wind or a sighing pipe deep in the plumbing.

 

 

"Stay awake, Eric," Bernt warmly repeated. "That's an order." "Aye aye," Stiles murmured. "I feel better now. I'm warming up. Thanks for looking after me." Travis offered his continental maitre-d' smile. "Sure, light- foot." "We've got to go," Bernt said.

 

 

Stiles forced his eyes open again. "So soon?" Andrea shrugged. "It's just that they hate aliens." "See ya;' Jeremy threw in.

 

 

Stiles sighed. "See ya. Hey, what about my arm?" "I can set your arm, ensign." Another voice. Soothing and stable.

 

 

He turned his head to his right, and there in the haze of fee- ble light saw the one person who could sustain him in any cri- sis.

 

 

"Ambassador... you came" he rasped, as if thanking the famous man for dropping in at a party. "And I'm just gum on your shoe...." Spock tilted his elegant head accommodatingly and with his long hands caressed Stiles's demolished arm. "You're under great strain, ensign. I shall set your aim before I go. I have a splint here, but the arm will have to be lifted briefly. Relax." The words were clear and inspired confidence. Stiles closed his eyes, understanding that there would be terrific pain and he would do better if he relaxed as ordered. Spock pressed a reas- suring hand to Stiles's chest, as comfortingly as Travis or Jere- my might have done, then cradled Stiles's shattered limb. His expression became studious and determined.

 

 

Stiles closed his eyes tighter, turned his face away, and braced for punishment. When it came, the gripping anguish took him completely by surprise despite his preparation. To a young man in the prime of youth who had never had a broken bone, pain's sheer overdrive utterly disemboweled him. His head cranked back into the stone, his teeth gritted, and he was dimly aware of his body as it wrung and twisted. With every shred of self-control he possessed, he forced his right shoulder to relax and his arm to disengage from the cruelty as he felt his own bones grating.

 

 

A disembodied voice phasered gasps into the cool cellar, but he barely registered the sound as his own. Why was it taking so long? Did it take hour to set a bone? Why didn't Spock just cut the arm off?. Stiles dealt with the loathsome pain and the sudden heaving of his stomach at this, his first taste of dynam- ic physical torment.

 

 

"Another moment.." Spock's voice was his lifeline, but for the first time he didn't believe the hollow reassurance.

 

 

"Almost finished, ensign." "why do you have to hurt me?" Stiles moaned. "You're the only one I ever respected...."

 

 

"One more wrap... relax now. Let me secure this. Your arm will adjust in a few minutes. Relax, Ensign... relax." A gentle hand pressed to the hollow of his shoulder, poised there, and beneath the steadiness and reassurance of that con- tact Stiles let his neck and shoulders go limp, and finally con- vinced his legs to lie quiet. Then the nausea set in. His brow furrowed and his lips clamped against the surging in his stom- ach and throat. Moans shuddered through his body. He heard them, felt them, but could no more control them than harness the shattered building that now cradled him so far below the street.

 

 

His own groans wakened him from the drowse brought on by pain. The first concrete thing he noticed was that the sear- ing jab of broken bones in his arm had drained to a manage- able ache. Or perhaps it hurt more than he thought it did, but he was conditioned now to the racking and this was better than that. Desolation of spirit sank in on him, and he opened his eyes and looked to his right.

 

 

A narrow form stood over him, plucking at the wrappings on his arm. The slick dark hair seemed so familiar... the features somewhat less angular than he remembered, but close enough... soft light from overhead dipping into the curves of those famous pointed ears, which had come to represent such style and trust to anyone in the Federa- tion.

 

 

Stiles blinked his eyes clear and moved his right leg. The knee came up where he could see it. Torn pants.

 

 

His right leg? Wasn't it pinned under a rock?

 

 

"Did you move that by yourself?." "With a lever," the other man said. The voice was different.

 

 

"A piece of rod from the broken wall." He held up a three-foot remnant of wall rod, then set it down again. "It broke, but it did serve to move the slab from your leg. You're free now.

 

 

Don't move, however. You're injured." 'TII be fine;' Stiles protested. "Takes more than an earth- quake to get a Starteeter down." "Of course. Try not to move. I've splinted your arm with two bent pieces of linoleum and strips of my blanket. I hope it holds. Does it seem to pinch at all?"

 

 

"Where's everybody else?" Stiles asked, ignoring the other question. "Where'd they go?" "Who?" "The Evac Team. They were here... sit me up, will you, sir?" Stiles drew a full breath, the first one in a long time that wasn't cramped and tight. Oxygen surged into his body, clear- ing his head.

 

 

"You need not call me 'sir.'" "But I can't just..." "You may call me Zevon. I don't care for the other." Stiles gazed briefly at the long fingers holding him gently in place. Now that his eyes were adjusted to the dimness and no longer blurred by pain, he surveyed that hand, the long dark red sleeve, the velvety padded jacket of gunmetal gray and with a turtleneck collar of the same dark red, and above that a stranger's face with somehow familiar features. The upswept eyebrows, dark eyes, becalmed face but a young face. And the hair was not cut in the typically Vulcan slick helmet, but instead a rather roughly cut shag of cordovan brown, longer than Spock's, less orderly, tucked behind the lovely shell- shaped ears, the left of which had a small but noticeable scar, a slight nip out of the side edge. So he'd been through some- thing, some time in the past.

 

 

Young, though. Not a hundred-plus-year-old ambassador with a stunning history spanning back to the first openings of deep space--someone else. Stiles straggled briefly with trying to figure Zevon's age, but in his condition he couldn't compute human years against anybody else's.

 

 

"Did I lose consciousness?" Stiles asked.

 

 

"Briefly" Zevon admitted. "I have no anesthetic to give you, nor any pain medication. Sad thing, for a scientist to be unpre- pared;' His expression was efficient, as one might expect, yet some- how unashamedly sympathetic. Odd.

 

 

"I guess we've been down here alone the whole time." Stiles glanced past Zevon, just to make sure he wasn't seeing Travis or Jeremy anymore. Or even the ambassador he so deeply revered. Somehow they'd gotten him through the worst, and refu'ed.

 

 

"In fact;' Zevon confirmed, "I believe we were alone in the jail building when the Constrictor came." "Constrictor... so what are you doing here, anyway?" "I am a political prisoner. I was hunted and kidnapped." "You personally? They wanted you?" "No. Anyone of my race." "Why? I mean, I'm just here because my ship crashed.

 

 

That's how they got me. Nobody hunted me down. Why would they hunt you down? Is it just because they hate aliens?" "Some, but I command a particular kind of ship. They thought my presence here would give them leverage:' "You command a ship? You said you were a scientist, not a captain !" "Primarily I am a scientist. The command is a position of royal favor" With a small shake of his head, Stiles frowned. "I never heard of anything like that in the Vulcan fleet." "Not Vulcan." Zevon passively adjusted the position of Stiles's fight arm. "Romulan." Stiles drew one breath, sharply, and heaved himself to a par- tially sitting position, up on his right hip. The blanket slipped from his body and felt to one side. He reached over his own form, fished for the piece of rod he knew was here. His fingers struck the rod, knocked it a few inches, and he found it again.

 

 

In a single swipe he raised the rod, knocked the Romulan along the side of his face, drove him away, and pointed the sharp end of the rod.

 

 

"You get away from me!" he shouted. "Stay away from me!"

 

 

Chapter Six

 

 

FROM ACROSS THE RACrGED REMAINS of their two crushed cells, Zevon pressed a hand to his face where Stiles had struck him.

 

 

"I am not your enemy;' he said. "I have no reason to hurt you. We'll both die if you hold me off like this for long" "All Romulans are our enemies;' Stiles blistered. "You just keep your distance!" "But I freed you from the stone. I set your arm" "To use me as some kind of hostage! I've been stupid enough for one day! I'm not being stupid again. You stay back.

 

 

I'm getting out of here." Zevon lowered his hand. His face showed a single bruised cheekbone, but no open wound. "We must help each other. The prisoners are the last ones they'll dig out. You can't possibly climb out of here, ensign. I doubt you can take a single step." 'Tll take all the steps I need." Stiles held the metal rod between them like a club or sword, ready to use it either way.

 

 

His right shoulder and arm pumped fiercely now as he exerted himself, throbbing inside the splinted wrapping. Zevon had managed to splint the arm with the elbow bent instead of straight at Stiles's side, and that would prove an advantage as he tried to get out of this hole.

 

 

The nasty pit of broken rock wall and plaster sheets and plumbing spun around him suddenly, jagged edges and smooth sheets blending into a single blue-gray cylinder.

 

 

"Lie down," Zevon suggested, "before you pass out." "I don't listen to Romulans!" His chest heaving with effort, Stiles let his body rest slightly on the edge of a folded bolt of linoleum flooring. He had no idea where the flooring had come from--there had been noth- ing like this in the holding area. Probably from one of the floors above. How many stories had collapsed on them? Since he had never seen the building from the outside, he had no way of knowing.

 

 

Thinking of something else, he looked at his right arm. One i~Tegularly cut sheet of linoleum had been formed around his lower arm and another around the upper arm, held in place by strips of wool. A single wedge of metal slat, some kind of cor- ner brace, had also been strapped there, and was holding his arm in a bent position. By resting the ann on his lap, he could relieve the strain in his shoulder.

 

 

"We'll just wait," he gasped. "Somebody'11 come to rescue us. They'll come for us... they'll get here." "Ensign Stiles," Zevon attempted slowly, "we are prisoners.

 

 

There's been a Constrictor, a bad one. The Pojjana will be cleaning up for months. They'll be digging the survivors and bodies out for at least two weeks. Two of your weeks, I should specify. While we may live that long, certainly you can't hold that rod against me for so long. Is there a point in holding it BOW?" '`There is," Stiles forced through a tight throat. "You're a Romulan. I'm Starfleet. I don't have to believe a thing you say.

 

 

Maybe this wasn't an earthquake at all. Maybe you bombed the building, you or your people. The Pojjans could dig us out in an hour." "And so a standoff begins?" Zevon folded his arms, shook his head, and offered a parental gaze. "You make yourself suf- fer for nothing. I am no soldier." "I know what you are." His hand and ann shuddering under the weight of the metal bar, Stiles drew his legs up under him and tried to maneuver to a better position. The effort exhausted him, made his head spin. A dark tunnel formed on either side of his vision and he realized he was passing out. With a single heave he rearranged himself. Fighting a sudden clutching mus- cle spasm in his back, he twisted sideways and managed to shift until he could lean back against the tilted mattress on the bunk he had never yet slept upon.

 

 

Sleep... sounded so nice fight now... deliberately he drew long, steady breathes until his head cleared and the tunnel-vision faded back. "We'll starve in here, like this." Zevon nodded. Had he just said something like that? Stiles thought the conversation sounded familiar.

 

 

"I hear water" the Romulan said. "If we have water, we can survive." "Yeah? How long's a week on your planet?" Stiles blinked to focus his eyes. He saw his bandaged left arm shiver as it held the metal rod toward Zevon. One arm bandaged, the other broken and splinted.

 

 

Tightening his folded arms, Zevon leaned back against the cracked wail behind him. "I'm counting in your weeks. I know how humans think." Stiles raised his head from where he had allowed it to rest back on the upright mattress. "Oh? And how is that? Just how do we think? Since you know us so well, you who've never met one of us before, how do humans all think? For your information, soldier, humans are the least like each other of all the races around. That's what my grandfather told me, and he got it from nobody less than Captain James Kirk himself. So you just tell me again how all humans think." "I meant no insult." "Stay away from me." Zevon held up a peaceable hand and nodded. "You must pull the blanket back over yourself. You'll go into shock again if you fail to stay warm." 'Tll take care of myself, thanks." Trying to appear in con- trol, Stiles held the rod higher between himself and the Romu- lan, doing has best to convey an ongoing threat. "Spock expects me to act fight... get along here and... be an officer.