the frantic compound noise and Scanner's Tennessee
twang. "Captain Kirk may be able to prevent her from
doing so 2'
"I can't make that assumption," I said, more
sharply than I intended. "I won't let him down again."
The determination in my voice caused silence be-
hind me. It swelled up like a cloak and covered my
s houlders. Whatever happened, I had to make it true.
He was counting on me.
As I stood there against the cold stone, every mus-
cle in my body knotted, knowing that lives depended
on my next decision, I realized the essence of the
schooner Edith Keeler. Whoever the woman was,
_ whatever she had been to James Kirk, she was now
personified in square yardage of sailcloth, gleaming
brightwork, brass, and bowspritmshe was what saved
him from the horror of these hard moments in the life
of a starship officer. It didn't get easier, as I had once
hoped. I understood that now. I would never get used
to these moments. I could only save myself from them,
find some ship to sail away on, to become sane again
and gather up what I needed to go back to space, just
as he had learned to do. Even with cold ground
beneath my feet, I felt once again the surging of the
deck under me, with the deadly and beautiful ocean an
arm's length away, nicely mastered. I heard once
again the wind whistle inside the main, and I almost
looked upward. If I could learn to pull those halyards
and sheets at the right moments, maybe... just maybe
. . I could pull the fight ropes here and get us out of
this alive.
178
Key word maybe.
No---I didn't want to hear that Shut up, Piper, and
get to work.
"Come on," I said before I'd even planned where to
go from here.
We made it safely across to the next building, a shed
of some sort with a maze of wooden fences in pathetic
disrepair, but terrific material to hide behind. Unless
they spotted our actual movements, they'd never be
able to pick out our forms in this mess.
"Sarda," I began, "they must have some kind of
communications board around here."
He moved close, keeping himself balanced in an
awkward position by holding onto the cross beam of a
crooked fence. "Indeed. In Ursula's main lab. She had
to be able to contact supply ships, and her guards, of
course."
"Just point in the right direction, will you?"
He ignored my irascibility and quite simply pointed.
We skulked across the paddock area, skirting fences
upon fences, halfway around the farm until only a
short expanse of open area lay between us and the
main lab.
"I'11 go alone," I said.
Both arms. Not even a chance to get up. I looked to
one side--a stern Vulcan truth. And the other side--
Tennessee smoke.
I let my head drop for a moment and took a deep
breath. "Listen, both of you. ff I fall, then you'll still
be free to try again. You heard what Captain Kirk said.
This mission is more important than any one of us.
Maybe more than all of us."
Sarda's expression never flickered. He had no inten-
tion of arguing, any more than he intended to let me go
in there alone.
It was Scanner who spoke. "ff we let you go,
how're we gonna know what crazy thing to try next?
Face it, Piper. Nobody thinks like you."
179
"Oh, thanks, Scanner, thanks a lot. And here I was,
waiting for an oath of loyalty."
"Oughta know better by now."
I stole a glance at Sarda and was relieved to see that
his mouth was drawn upward on one side and he was
deliberately not looking at Scanner.
"All right," I conceded. "I've got enough to fight. I
don't need to be fighting you too. But stay in close
formation. Sarda, you know the way in."
"Roughly. I was not permitted to roam freely."
"You lead then. Scanner, right behind him."
Scanner moved into position. "Bet you wish you
had a phaser," he teased as he shifted past me."
"Hell, I wish I had a slingshot," I admitted. Only
then did it occur to me that I probably could have
made one out of available materials if I'd had my
training screwed on straight. Luckily, neither of them
thought of that, and I got away with it. "Go," I said
quickly, taking advantage.
My nerves electrified as we hurried across the open
area, dodging searchlights as the beams swabbed the
ground in search of us. Mornay must have been plan-
ning the theft of transwarp for some time--at least
since the failure of Vice Admiral Rittenhouse's scheme
with the dreadnought. She must have had this com-
pound set up immediately afterward, and had the
security system already activated when she, Perren,
and Sarda arrived, though I now believed Mornay and
Perren had planned this from the moment Vice Admi-
ral Rittenhouse died. Even now, sporadic explosions
and crackling voltage told us the chain reaction of
sabotage was still running. Kirk must have found some
way to trigger those booby traps. It was the only
explanation that made sense--and I really needed
things to make sense right now.
Except the part about Dr. Boma. My heart withered
as I remembered that element. I deeply wished it
hadn't made such sense. I had a sudden, absurd,
180
overwhelming desire to stand up straight and yell at
the top of my lungs, "CAPTAIN KIRK, YOUR SHIP
IS IN DEEP TROUBLE! WHERE ARE
YOOOOOOOOO?" Luckily, I managed to keep it to
myseff for the moment. Somehow, I'd find him. To-
gether we'd make our way back to that distant
schooner with the mysterious name.
Even as the reassuring thought filled me with
strength, we slipped into an alcove and were met with
a sight that siphoned the strength out again.
A few meters away, between the main lab and a
carefully arranged pile of file crates, stood Ursula
Mornay and four mercenary guards. They held their
phaser rifles sighted coldly upon Captain Kirk and Mr.
Spock.
I crouched, almost by reflex alone, and pulled Sarda
down beside me. Scanner saw our movements and
dropped instantly. Our blood cooled as we watched
and listened.
The captain and Spock stood side by side, unflinch-
ing before the phaser rifles, but definitely sobered. She
had them. Somehow she had caught them. But what
about McCoy and Merete?
"How'd she get them?" Scanner whispered.
"Shh. Listen."
"... really think you can pilot a starship with a
handful of hired guns?" Kirk was putting to Mornay.
"I have crewpeople, Captain," Mornay said as she
opened and tuned a hand communicator. "All I have
to do is pick them up. And you'll help me do that, or
your crew will remain in their semi
coma until they die.
I have a knife at your throat, Capta'm Kirk. I promise,
I will cut you."
Scanner's voice buzzed faintly at my ear. "What's
she tawkin' about? She got 'em strapped down in front
of old movies, or what?"
"Obviously she has the crew hostage somehow,"
Sarda whispered back, even more faintly.
181
"A whole starship?"
I shushed them with a swipe of my hand, and myself
was stilled by the expressive glance Kirk exchanged
with Spock. I ached to read his mind the way Spock
could. I saw a thousand thoughts in that one glance,
truly a trade of minds, perhaps of plans. So close...
I pressed my hands on the jut of wood that partially
hid us in our alcove shadow, pressed until the wood
cut hard into my palms and forced me to accept the
damning reality that Captain Kirk was out of reach, at
least for the moment. My drumming message would
have to stay inside my head even longer.
Mornay brought the communicator to her lips.
"Samuel? Have the guards beamed aboard?"
From the instrument in her hand came a dull buzzing
voice. "All who checked in are aboard now. Some are
still missing and we can't seem to find them."
Mornay paced a few steps and eyed Captain Kirk,
who remained carefully impassive. "I'm not sur-
prised," she said. "As soon as you're ready, beam up
the captain and Commander Spock. I'm sure they'll be
cooperative, but have the guards ready just in case."
"They're ready, believe me. We've dealt with those
gentlemen before."
The voice was distorted by the distance between us
and the communicator itself, but there was no mistak-
ing that arrogant cadence. Boma.
My message to Kirk fizzled within me. He already
knew. And Boma had already won. The Enterprise
was in orbit, and Boma was in control. It seemed
unfathomable that one man could incapacitate 400-
plus people who were supposedly Star !eet's best,
but then again, I was supposedly Star Fleet's best too.
I drew my shoulders inward, fighting a terrible
shiver. Luck does run out, even for Star F!eet's best.
Perhaps my luck had been spent on the dreadnought
affair. Maybe that was the best I'd ever do. Maybe I
couldn't beat that act. It was hard enough trying to get
182
used to being called Lieutenant Commander when I
hadn't even completely gotten used to being called
Lieutenant. Everything I did seemed to be running
about ten minutes tardy.
Incapacitate a whole starship crew? Damn her, that
wasn't fair! I gritted my teeth and forced my insecurity
to become anger. Anger was workable stuff, and she
could only kill me once.
I dug what was left of my fingernails into the slat of
wood and listened harder.
Mornay was fiddling with the communicator. "Per-
ren, are you there?"
Static from the damaged electrical system caused
the frequencies to jump, but soon the cool voice came
through. "I am making final installments in the porta-
ble memory."
"Hurry up. We're ready to go."
"What about the guards?"
"They're already aboard the starship. We'll prepare
to leave the solar system as soon as you beam up.
We're going now."
"I shall be there momentarily."
Without the courteous, if mechanical, sign-offs usu-
ally used over communications channels, Mornay
flatly readjusted her instrument and hailed the ship
again. I kept my eyes on Kirk. He was absolutely
unmoved, as relaxed as he had been during those long,
quiet hours of ocean crossing when there was nothing
to do but watch the sea roll. He wasn't tensed, ready
to attack, waiting for that minute flinch that would give
him h is cue. Spock also stood calmly. Only when the
eerie whine of a transporter beam caused my skin to
tingle did I realize why the two officers made no effort
to free themselves; they wanted to get back on board
the starship. If there were fights to be fought, at least
Enterprise would know its guardians were where they
belonged, doing what she needed them to do.
As we watched, the clutch of oddly matched person-
183
alities dissolved into elongated prisms, and dissap-
peared.
Without a pause, I redirected my thoughts. "Let's
go. The main lab, Sarda." "This way."
We got about three steps before Scanner grabbed
my arm and said, "Hold it. Yawl aren't gonna believe
this. Look what I see."
What he saw was two familiar figures clumsily
skulking their way across the compound, heading in
the opposite direction from where we were going.
Before I could stop him, Scanner had stuck his fingers
in his mouth and let fly a. shrill whistle. Seconds later,
McCoy and Merete were gathered into our little nest.
"Where've you been?" McCoy hissed, eyes wide.
"Where're you been?" Scanner retorted.
"Looking for you."
"I can top that," Scanner crowed. "We bin lookin'
for everybody."
I squirmed between them. "Scanner, shut up or I'll
cork your face. Doctor, what do you know?"
flipped a hand back at the now-empty compound.
"Only the end of it."
"Oh." His eyebrows worked as he steadied himself
to tell us what he had hoped we already knew. In one
way he hated having to repeat it. In another, he was
quaking to get it out. The conflict within him showed
on his face, at once anguished and enraged. "Boma
waited until the ship was in Orbital status, then he
gassed the whole ship with a hypnogenetic com-
pound."
"A who?" Scanner blurted.
"A narcotic. Sleep-inducing gas. Deep and danger-
ous sleep. It causes severe reduction of metabolic
rate." He inched closer, as though to intensify his
words and used one hand to illustrate the terrible,
intangible truth. "Anyone who ingests it can literally
84
sleep himself to death unless an antidote is provided
soon enough."
"The knife at Kirk's throat," I murmured.
"It's more than that," Merete said, glancing at Dr.
McCoy as though she knew what he was thinking,
what he was feeling. "It's a progressive coma. The
time element makes a difference. Mornay didn't tell
the captain that. Maybe she doesn't even know it."
"That class of drug is an idiot's playground," Mc-
Coy insisted, his fist now clenched. Suddenly I saw
something in him that I hadn't before. He'd always
seemed amusing to me in his moments of exaspera-
tion, but now he moved beyond exasperation to down-
fight bitterness. He seemed to feel about the Enter-
prise crew the way Mr. Scott felt about the ship itself.
The crew was his. His children. His expression grew
stony with violence
as he thought of what Mornay had
done to them. "Many drugs in that category don't
have antidotes at all," he said, nearly growling. "She
might not know that or even care. She might just as
easily be lying to Jim by telling him that she can undo
what Boma's done. The crew might already be dead."
His fatherly wrath, and the accompanying sense of
helplessness, spurred me to convictions even beyond
my own. I leaned toward him and promised, "You'll
get your chance to turn the tables, sir. We'll get there
somehow."
"Yes, we must," Sarda interrupted. "Perren cannot
possibly know about this aspect. He would never
participate. I'll take you to the lab." He started away.
The quickness, the suddenness of his movements trig-
gered a foreboding deep inside me. He was hurrying
now, but his motivations had shifted. Some hidden
imperative in his movements told me that, and the
echo on his heels was Perren, Perren, Perren. Was
there enough logic in the galaxy to turn Perren now?
Sarda disappeared into a narrow doorway, leaving
only the question behind.
185
I motioned Dr. McCoy and Merete after him, mean-
ing to bring up the rear guard.
Scanner stepped past me. "Don't worry. It's just
hero worship."
Sharply I answered, "I can't count on that."
Unease set in on top of the fear. I set my determina-
tion on kill and pushed my motley group onward into
the lab building after Sarda. My memory kept scouring
the vision of Kirk's face, his glance at Spock, Spock's
silent response, for some hint of their plans, or at least
their opinions. No answers yet, though. I was still on
my own. Rats! Things were really getting bad when I
couldn't even pretend that Captain Kirk had all the
solutions in his pocket.
Sarda paused at the end of one hallway, confused by
the dimness and trying to remember which corridor
held the main lab. The passages were narrow and
moist, the stone walls considerably older than those of
the building we'd been held in. We had no idea how
long the farm had been abandoned, but a faint animal
scent still clung to the mossy walls. The corridor was a
dead end, with only one doorway at the left.
"Sarda," I called quietly before he reached the
door.