ANOTHER EXCITING EPISODE
FROM TELEVISION'S MOST POPULAR
SCIENCE FICTION SERIES
—Complete in this volume—
SLAVER WEAPON
A Slaver stasis box—a relic of a fabulous,
long-dead civilization—is discovered on a
remote planet. The Slavers died out
millennia ago, but their powerful weapons
have been well preserved in these boxes
which are found throughout the Galaxy.
Whoever possesses such weapons
controls a lot of power, and so Kirk and
the crew want to get this one into secure
hands as quickly as possible.
But they are not the only ones who have
designs on the Slaver weapon . . . and the
fate of the Federation hangs in the
balance!
SIC TRANSPORT . . .
"Mr. Scott, Doctor McCoy . . . what happened?" There was an odd lilt to Kirk's otherwise normal voice. But after the disturbing experience of being frozen in a transporter field for an abnormal length of time, a few side effects were to be expected.
"There was a malfunction in the transporter, Captain. Maybe due to damage received from that pulsar we encountered. We had to put you in limbo for a while until I could get it fixed," Scott said. "You gave us all a bad scare."
Then Sulu's eyes widened, and he extended both arms out in front of him, rotated them over and back. His hands went to his face, felt his features.
"Oh my God. What's happened to us? What's happened to me?" He gestured shakily toward the body of the Captain. "If I'm Kirk in Sulu's body, then who are you?"
"I'm Lieutenant Uhura, of course," Kirk replied!
By Alan Dean Foster
Published by Ballantine Books:
The Black Hole
Cachalot
Luana
Dark Star
The Metrognome and Other Stories
Midworld
Nor Crystal Tears
Sentenced to Prism
Splinter of the Mind's Eye
Star Trek® Logs One–Ten
Voyage to the City of the Dead
. . . Who Needs Enemies?
With Friends Like These . . .
The Icerigger Trilogy:
Icerigger
Mission to Moulokin
The Deluge Drivers
The Adventures of Flinx of the Commonwealth
For Love of Mother-Not
The Tar Aiym Krang
Orphan Star
The End of the Matter
Bloodhype
Flinx in Flux
The Damned
Book One: A Call to Arms
Sale of this book without a front cover may be unauthorized. If this book is coverless, it may have been reported to the publisher as "unsold or destroyed" and neither the author nor the publisher may have received payment for it.
A Del Rey Book
Published by Ballantine Books
Copyright © 1978 by Paramount Pictures Corporation
STAR TREK® is a Trademark of Paramount Pictures Corporation registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
This book is based in part on the short story "The Soft Weapon," by Larry Niven. Copyright © 1967 by Galaxy Publishing Corporation.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 74-8477
ISBN 0-345-27212-9
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition: January 1978
Second Printing: September 1991
Cover Art by Stanislaw Fernandes
For EYTON G. MITCHELL, good friend,
doctor to the sick, minister to the helpless,
who realizes that the only difference between
a hand and a paw is a little fur
CONTENTS
SLAVER WEAPON
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
IX
X
XI
XII
XIII
XIV
XV
XVI
STAR TREK LOG TEN
Log of the Starship
Enterprise
Stardates 5538.6–5539.2 Inclusive
James T. Kirk, Capt., USSC, FS, ret.
Commanding
transcribed by
Alan Dean Foster
At the Galatic Historical Archives
on Ursa Major Lacus
stardated 6111.3
For the Curator: JLR
SLAVER WEAPON
(Adapted from a script by Larry Niven)
I
Stardate 5538.6. Transmission/private-personal. Code to officer annual allotment #C-5539, personnel budget U.S.S. Enterprise, on patrol in sector (censored) to: Mr./Mrs. Alhamisi Uhura, rural route 5, Kitui province, Kenya state, Africa, Earth 100643.
Begin transmission:
Dear Mom and Dad:
Not much new from out here, since the scenery doesn't change too quickly. By the time this letter reaches you, Dad, the harvest should be in. I hope the corn has done well, because I understand that hog prices are fairly high and are expected to go higher, so you and Mom ought to be able to do very good business this year.
How is everyone else back home? I am fine, thanks, and so is everyone else on board. We are enjoying a little routine, quiet patrolling for a change. Quite a relief after all the trouble we had with the Pandronians. I'm sure you read about that business in the local news. While I'm not at liberty to discuss details, take my word for it that there's more to that story than you've heard. We almost lost Mr. Spock to a (details deleted, ship compucensor).
Dr. McCoy has promised to send brother David some interesting information on the multiple-community Pandronian life systems (at least, anything which Star Fleet doesn't censor). It's purely biological material and should be passable for communication. David could get a paper or two out of it, I think. Dr. McCoy will send it to David's office at Makere University Hospital in Kampala instead of to the house there, so it can be transmitted as official business.
I'm still enjoying my work tremendously and am doing what I really always wanted to do—help to push back the frontiers of knowledge just a little bit. I've never been sorry for going into Star Fleet or for having specialized in communications.
Do you realize, Mom, that when I'm on duty on the bridge I'm the only one who knows what's going on all over the ship? That's because I'm constantly monitoring interlevel and interdepartmental communications as well as deep-space transmissions. What other career could offer me anything to compare in excitement with what I'm doing right now?
Well, got to go now. This letter will use up all my personal communication's allowance for the next month, so you won't be hearing from me again before then.
Your loving daughter,
Uhura signed the message, punched it into the ship's computer for deep-space transmission, and drifted off into a daydream. She remembered killing the lion.
It was the day after her sixteenth birthday. The midsummer East African sun turned the soil to dust. Motionless regiments of hybrid corn grew higher than a man, hiding any glimpse of the towers of now-distant Kitui or the parched veldt ahead.
Uhura sat pouting beside her father as he guided the car over the lightly traveled roadway. She held the elaborately decorated spear indifferently, though she was careful not to let
the sharp point scratch the transparent bubble-dome of the car. There was a certain boy she could have been picnicking with, and she would have far rather been there than here.
"I still don't see why I have to kill a lion, Dad."
Her father looked over at her, smiled through his neatly trimmed beard. "It is traditional. Once upon a time the tradition applied only to manchildren. But"—and his grin grew wider—"you women changed that a couple of hundred years ago. So now the ritual applies to you as well."
"I didn't change it." She folded her arms, looked exquisitely bored. The air-conditioning was crawly on her body. The short skirt she wore provided little warmth. "Besides, it's cold in here. Can't I put my shorts and halter back on?"
"Tradition should be upheld, Uhura. Sometimes that's all one has to remind one of the past. Tradition says that to prove you have become a woman, you must kill a lion with a single spear, by yourself. Since you must do this in the manner of your ancestors, that means you must do it wearing their archaic attire also."
She fingered the heavy metal and bead necklaces which hung awkwardly from her neck. "Can I at least take these off? How could anyone fight while wearing five kilos of jewelry?"
Her father tried to soothe her. "Come now, it's not that bad. This will all be over with soon enough. You will do well, too. Your grandfather has foretold it in the bones."
"Your grandfather has more respect for ancient lore than most of his contemporaries, and certainly more than you children today! One day you'll admire him for it. Besides, he does no worse with his bones than the computer does when it comes to forecasting long-range weather."
"He loads the tapes," she said, but unconvincingly. Grandfather Uchawi was a lovable but peculiar old man.
Her father turned his attention back to the road. "Besides, you've always been a straight-A student in physical education. I trust in that even more than in your grandfather's bones."
Humming silently, the electric vheicle turned off the main roadway and moved down a much narrower path. Traffic here was infrequent. They had emerged from the yellow-green ocean of corn and were traveling over undulating, grassy plains: cattle country. Shining like milk quartz in the noonday sun, the benign crown of white-capped Kilimanjaro gazed down on them. Soon they would leave private land and cross force barriers into the Serengeti.
Uhura regarded her spear again, wishing the ceremonial feathers tied just below the blade were sewn to one of her summer dresses. Matching feathers were tied behind her, to the base of the oval shield and to the second spear she was permitted. This extra spear was a concession to the times. Since the ancient skills were so rarely practiced, she would be permitted two chances instead of the traditional one. Both weapons, however, looked much too fragile to challenge the tawny king of the veldt.
Her father reached the Serengeti force barrier and turned down a road paralleling it, until they reached a game-park gate. The path beyond was not paved. None of the paths in the vast parkland were.
He exchanged greetings with the automatic gate. It confirmed their names and appointment time and admitted them. For another hour they drove on, passing through rugged brushland. The area looked no different from pictures Uhura had seen of this country as it had been a thousand years ago.
Eventually the land cruiser slowed to a halt, settled gently to the ground. Her father slipped out, helping her with the bulky shield and second spear. Slinging one spear across her back, Uhura, by then resigned to her fate, hefted the shield in her left hand, the other spear in her right, and faced the high thornbrush across the way.
"How will I find the lion?"
"Don't worry, my daughter. The lion will find you. Be ready at all times, don't panic, and remember what you were taught in school."
With that he bestowed a brief, affectionate kiss on her forehead and returned to the land cruiser. She watched it rise, turn, and disappear down the path they'd come.
She stood alone, listening to the warbling of secretive birds.
Her nose itched, and she rubbed it with the hand holding the spear. Clear of the land cruiser's air-conditioning, she was no longer cold. If anything, she was rapidly becoming hot standing in the sun. Then she began to understand the appropriateness of her dress—or rather the lack of it.
With the disappearance of the vehicle, more birds sang freely in the surrounding trees and brush. Sounds of larger creatures moving about reached her. Monkeys, most likely. The sun was beginning to bother her, but she remembered what her lore instructor had told her, and hesitated before retreating into the shade. If there were lions about, the shade was a likely place for them to be resting.
Something brushed a bush on her right. She turned to stare at it, saw only branches. It was probably another monkey. If so, then this would be a safe place to escape from the sun. No monkey would move close to the ground in the vicinity of a lion. But it wouldn't take much to make sure. Finding a suitable rock nearby, she cleared it of ants, aimed it, and threw it into the rustling copse.
Something that sounded like a demolished building crumpling to the earth shook her ears. Though she had heard that thunder on many tapes, the real thing still paralyzed her. A shape the size of a small land cruiser erupted from the brush, an umber nimbus framing a vast mouth full of flashing white fangs.
In place of coherent thought, months of practice at school took over. Instantly Uhura dropped to her right knee. The shield stood braced against her left foreleg as she wrapped both hands tightly around the shaft of the spear, left hand over right as she ground the spear-butt sharply into the dirt.
The lion leaped.
A terrific concussion traveled along her arms and shoulders as the lion came down on the blade of the spear.
A killing strike first time was as much a combination of luck as skill. Uhura had been lucky. She wouldn't need to use the second spear. The point of the first had missed the ribs, slid between them to pierce the heart.
Even so, her posture was not quite perfect and the lion's trailing leg caught her, knocked her over backward, and sent the shield tumbling. But as she rolled to her feet and fumbled for the second spear she saw that the great cat was already lying still on its side. Her first spear protruded brokenly from its chest.
So fast had the attack come that she had the remainder of her allotted hour free. She was sitting in the shade enjoying her sparse lunch when her father finally arrived to pick her up. He emerged from the land cruiser as it settled to the earth. Curious, he inspected the motionless form of the lion, then came over to greet her. Pride glistened in his eyes and she felt a little embarrassed.
"You did very well, child."
"Thanks," she replied. "I'm glad it's over, though." She checked her wrist chronometer. "If we hurry I might still make the end of the picnic."
"That boy again?" He smiled. "All right, we'll hurry."
She pointed to the corpse as they walked toward the vehicle. "I hope I didn't break anything. It hit pretty hard on the spearpoint."
"Don't worry." Her father put an arm around her and playfully tugged the traditional Masai braids that hung from her head. "The operative motors, the generator, and the controlling elements are well protected in the head and legs. I've seen the insides and they're beautifully put together. Made to take a lot of punishment, too. See? The hour's up and they're starting it up again."
Sure enough, the lion rose as they watched. It used one paw to pull the spear free. There was no blood. Just a few shreds of torn plastic. The simulacrum walked over, politely handed Uhura her spear, and loped easily back into the brush.
"What happens, Dad, if somebody misses a kill with both spears?"
"In that case, sugar, the lion comes over, pats you on the head, and goes back into the forest to wait for the next tester like yourself. If you fail, you get to try again in six months."
He regard
ed the veldt silently for a moment, then added, "In the old days, if you missed with your spears, you never got a second chance."
Another land cruiser had pulled up alongside theirs. Two sixteen-year-old boys jumped out, accompanied by an older man and woman.
"We'd better leave. We're running into someone else's testing hour, and the simulacrum won't begin its stalk until both cars have left."
Uhura trotted alongside her father as they returned to their land cruiser. Both boys eyed her curiously but said nothing. The one nearest her was pretty good-looking, but their minds were elsewhere and she couldn't say anything to them anyhow. That was against the rules.
As she climbed back into the chilled cab of the land cruiser and reached gratefully for her everyday clothes, it struck her that according to modern tribal tradition she was now a fully adult woman. Probably she was supposed to feel different—excited or something. All she felt was relief that the ordeal was over.
The ritual hadn't been as boring as she had expected, however. The simulacrum of the lion had been very real, much more so than the ones she had practiced against in school. But her primary emotion was impatience to return to town.
As the land cruiser hummed smoothly toward the park gate, she wondered for an instant what it must have been like hundreds of years ago, when Masai youths had to go out on their own and confront real lions, not a composite of fluids and metals and circuitry. Ones with real teeth, which could cut through a shoulder in a single snap or crush a skull like an eggshell. She shuddered a little, and this time it wasn't an effect of the air-conditioning.
She had often gazed on the wild lions hunting out in the Serengeti. What made her queasy wasn't the thought of being eaten by one, but the concept of slaughtering one of the magnificent creatures simply to prove a point about aging which she found upsetting. Thank goodness she didn't live in such superstitious times, although her grandfather would have chided her for such disrespect.