Part 9 (2/2)
Communications twelve was occupied by a mix of junior officers and ensigns, all preoccupied with their current a.s.signments. That did not prevent several of them from looking up curiously as Kirk burst in.
Nearly out of breath, McCoy arrived in the entryway. Spotting Kirk racing to Uhura's station, the doctor caught up with him.
”Are you out of your mind mind? What's going on here?” Reaching out, he wrapped his fingers around Kirk's upper right arm. ”Maybe, just maybe, if we can get you back to sickbay without being intercepted, I can...”
Kirk met his friend's gaze. ”Bones, trust me.”
McCoy didn't hear him. ”Are you trying to get us both discharged from the service? On our first day on duty our first day on duty? I don't mind my name going into the books, but not attached to a record like that!”
”I'm trying to save your a.s.s.”
McCoy stiffened, and regarded his friend. ”d.a.m.nit, Jim, stand still!” He injected Kirk and released him.
”Ow, stop it.”
Racing down the crowded section, Kirk kept looking for the one person he knew would confirm his conclusion. Finally, he located Uhura. Any other time he would have found amusing the shock that registered on her face as she recognized him.
”Sorry. Listen, I need to talk to you.”
She gaped at him in astonishment. ”No way. way.”
”You gotta gotta listen to me.” Couldn't she hear the desperation in his voice? Was there no communication in communications? listen to me.” Couldn't she hear the desperation in his voice? Was there no communication in communications?
”No!” she shot back. ”I don't 'gotta' listen to you, James Kirk. You-you can't even be be on this s.h.i.+p! How on this s.h.i.+p! How did did you get on?” you get on?”
”Later.” He moved as close to her as he dared. His voice rose to a shout. Now everyone in the room was looking at him. Leaning to the side, one of the officers had begun whispering urgently into a pickup. Kirk knew he didn't have much time. They would haul him back to medical, and if not McCoy, some other doctor would then pump him full of sedative.
”The transmission from the Klingon prison planet-what exactly...”
Kirk might be insane, but he wasn't kidding. She shook her head. She stared hard at him. ”Oh my G.o.d! What happened to your hands?”
He had to get her to understand now. now. ”Who?” ”Who?”
”Your hands...”
Behind him, McCoy was dividing his attention between his friend, the communications officer he was badgering, his medical scanner, and the portal that somehow still remained devoid of a security detail.
Kirk knew his time was running out. ”Who is responsible for the Klingon attack?” He leaned toward her, heedless of how she might react. He didn't care if she punched him out so long as she concentrated.
”Was the s.h.i.+p woluam?”
Uhura was shaking her head slowly and frowning; she could tell from his inflections that Kirk was deadly serious. ”Was the s.h.i.+p what?”
”What's happening to my mouth?”
”You got numb tongue?” the doctor asked.
Horrified that something so stupid could stop Uhura from understanding, Kirk asked, ”Numb tongue?”
”I can fix that,” McCoy promised.
”Was the s.h.i.+p what?” Uhura asked, concerned that she would never understand Kirk.
Trying to form the word slowly and clearly, Kirk asked, ”Wolumn?”
”What?”
”Wolmun?”
This time the communication specialist looked at his lips, seeing how he was forming the word. ”Romulan?”
He nodded urgently. ”Yea.”
”Yes.”
”Yes!”
It was not the earthquake itself that drew Amanda Grayson from the interior of her home out onto the porch. It was the realization that whatever was causing the ground to shake was not a normal seismic tremor. It neither rolled nor heaved in the manner of a natural disturbance. Instead, the trembling mounted to a certain level and held there, steady and unvarying. Ignoring toppling sculptures, trembling furniture, and the cracks that the walls strove to automatically repair, she hurried outside.
Across the desert landscape rocks were tumbling and bouncing down hillsides of brown and ochre. Cliffs cracked away as the inspirational pinnacles and spires she had known for most of her adult life began to crumble like columns of stale cake. And all the while the ground beneath her feet continued to quake with a terrifying constancy.
All of that she could have dealt with. All of that she could have handled-there could be some natural law to explain it. But she could find nothing in her store of knowledge to account for the gigantic pillar of swirling energy that was visible in the distance. Fire and fury, it appeared to be drilling into the ground as if the rocky surface of Vulcan were made of nothing more substantial than the Viennese schlag schlag of which Sarek was so fond. of which Sarek was so fond.
Tilting back her head, she traced the colossal column of energy upward into the clear sky. It appeared to be descending from a metal disk whose proportions and details she was unable to discern. The disk in turn dangled from an irregular metallic thread that must have been of considerable diameter in order to be viewable at such a distance. As for the suspending cables, they vanished into high clouds and distance, their terminus invisible from where she was standing outside her home.
Had she been able to track it to its source, she would have seen that the ma.s.sive control and support line from which the plasma drill was suspended hung beneath a gargantuan s.h.i.+p of half-mad design. Equally unstable was its captain, who at present was standing in the most secure compartment of the entire enormous vessel, looking on as his chief science officer supervised the extraction process.
Suspended and held within a small yet immensely powerful magnetic field were a number of tiny red spheres. The spheres were the visible manifestation of what they themselves in turn kept in check within their own individual containment fields-minuscule specks of the most unstable material known to galactic science. As an isolation needle penetrated the surrounding dampening fluid to extract the material from its inner containment sphere, a sub-officer appeared and saluted.
”Captain Nero, drilling has begun.”
The captain of the Narada Narada evinced no sign of satisfaction. He had long since given up hope of experiencing again that particular emotion. Ignoring the sub-officer, he addressed himself to the s.h.i.+p's science chief. evinced no sign of satisfaction. He had long since given up hope of experiencing again that particular emotion. Ignoring the sub-officer, he addressed himself to the s.h.i.+p's science chief.
”I want the Red Matter injected into a core pod.” Implacable and expectant, he turned to the waiting officer. ”Let me know when we reach core depth.”
McCoy and Uhura both tried to catch up to Kirk, but the cadet was moving too fast for them-mentally as well as physically. By the time they succeeded in closing the gap between them, he was already bursting out of a lift. Crew members stationed on the bridge who did not know him looked up in confusion at the unexpected arrival. Those who did recognize the intruder gazed across at him in horror. Unauthorized entry onto the bridge was by itself a court-martialworthy offense.
None of which was on Kirk's mind as he rushed toward the command chair. ”Captain Pike! The energy surge near Vulcan...!”
A startled Pike stared at him in disbelief. ”Cadet Kirk? How did you...?”
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