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THE TEARS OF THE SINGERS
MELINDA SNODGRASS
POCKET BOOKS 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
1984 Paramount Pictures Corporation
First Pocket Books printing September 1984
An Original Publication of POCKET BOOKS
THE TEARS OF THE SINGERS
THE THIRD EXCITING STAR TREK® THE NEXT GENERATION™ HARDCOVER!
The Devil’s Heart—a legendary object of unsurpassed power whose location has always remained a mystery. But a dying scientist’s last words about the location of the Devil’s Heart puts the U.S.S.Enterprise™ in the middle of a frenzied, galaxy-wide quest for the artifact.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard soon discovers the awful truth behind all the legends and the ages-old secrets: whoever holds the Devil’s Heart possesses power beyond all imagining …
COMING IN MID-MARCH FROM POCKET BOOKS
A Hole in the Universe!
The gaudy colors of the phenomenon writhed forward, its outermost tendrils just brushing the pockmarked, cindery surface of the inner planet. The planet seemed to waver, becoming almost transparent, and then it vanished from view as the time/space rip enveloped it.
Spock swung about in his chair and looked at Kirk. “All readings have ceased. Scanners show only the meaningless readings associated with the phenomenon. For all intents and purposes the planet no longer exists.”
“But where has it gone, Mr. Spock?” Scotty murmured.
“Into wherever that,” he pointed at the aurora that danced and sparkled across the screen, “leads.”
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
An Original Publication of POCKET BOOKS
POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc
1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
Copyright © 1984 Paramount Pictures Corporation.
All Rights Reserved.
STAR TREK is a Registered Trademark of Paramount Pictures Corporation.
This book is published by Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc., under exclusive license from Paramount Pictures Corporation.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
ISBN: 0-671-69654-8
eISBN: 978-0-743-41970-3
First Pocket Books printing September 1984
10 9 8 7 6 5 4
POCKET and colophon are trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.
Printed in the U.S.A.
Prologue
An ice green sea lapped softly at the sparkling sands and crystal cliffs of the strange, silver-lit world. Along the length and breadth of the glittering beach played the junior Singers. Cubs, perhaps, although the adults resting in their crystal grottos showed no parental interest in the small furry youngsters who tumbled, hummed, chirruped and warbled on the beach below them.
The hunters stepped carefully, yet uninterestedly, through the gamboling packs of silver white creatures. The little fellows were cute enough, with their pale blue eyes and ingeniously smiling faces, but the money lay with the adults. Long and sleek they reclined in their grottos, unmoved by the icy wind that whipped off the whitecapped ocean. Their eyes had darkened to the profound midnight blue of adulthood, and they seemed to be staring into a place beyond time as they blended their strange siren voices into an intricate and never-ending song.
It behooved
a man not to look into those eyes when he fired the electric current that stilled yet another voice in the mighty chorus. Those who had, described it as looking into eternity, and they didn’t seem like men who had enjoyed the sight.
So they learned to do their work cleanly and efficiently, concentrating only on the rewards to be gained when the crystal tears were marketed back on Earth or Rigel, or any of a hundred other Federation worlds where men and women adorned themselves.
The creatures made no move to escape or even acknowledge their destroyers. They merely continued their particular harmony as the humans laboriously climbed the treacherous cliffs, and placed their shockwands at the base of a Singer’s skull. One of the hunters fired, and a discordant cry pierced through the perfect harmony of the song. The creature rolled ponderously onto its side, its eyes secreting a viscous blue substance. The “tears,” as the humans had dubbed them, soon solidified into the gleaming gems so prized on civilized worlds.
The man swept the seven crystals into a soft leather pouch. Something caught his attention, and he fished back the last jewel. He held it up to the diffuse light, and frowned when he noticed a minute flaw in the crystal. A bit of sand had become embedded in the gem, warping its perfect symmetry and color. Grumbling, he tossed it down the rock wall, where it shattered with the sound of a thousand bells. It was an eerie and melancholy sound in the frigid air.
Chapter One
James Kirk was bored. This was an unusual state for the captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise, but one which was all too common when he found himself trapped at a star base for routine maintenance.
He fiddled with his desk communicator, and debated about calling that attractive maintenance engineer he had met yesterday when she had been poking about the computers, much to Spock’s irritation.
He dismissed the notion with a quick shake of his head. He wasn’t in the mood for groundside company, however attractive. What he really wanted was the companionship of his own people, and God alone knew where they had gotten to. He supposed he could make a circuit of the more exotic saloons, and no doubt stumble across McCoy or Scotty or both, but even bar crawling had lost its allure.
With a sigh he poured a drink, flipped on the reader and tried not to think about the four days still remaining before they could leave. He had barely found his place among Nelson’s strategies at Trafalgar when his door page chimed.
“Come,” he called eagerly, and snapped off the reader. In his present mood it didn’t matter who was outside so long as they took him away from his own company, and the nineteenth century.
“Captain,” Uhura said as she stepped through the door. “I’m glad we caught you in.” Her slender body was swathed in a wrap of gold material which left one dark shoulder provocatively bare. Long golden earrings swung from her lobes, and tinkled softly with each step she took. Spock followed her through the door, his hands clasped characteristically behind his back. Uncharacteristically, he was wearing his dress uniform.
Kirk raised an eyebrow in unconscious imitation of his first officer, and a smile tugged at his lips. “You two are dressed to the nines. What’s the occasion?”
“I fail to understand what the numeral nine has to do with the lieutenant’s or my choice of attire, Captain.”
Kirk swallowed a sigh. “Old Earth phrase, Spock,” he explained. Spock nodded slowly, and seemed to withdraw into that Vulcan space he inhabited so much of the time.
“I had a feeling you might be getting itchy, so we came to see if you’d like to attend a concert with us,” Uhura said.
“Concert,” Kirk said somewhat dubiously. Music was not one of his favorite pastimes although he did enjoy listening to Spock and Uhura’s impromptu performances aboard the Enterprise.
“It is highbrow, Captain, but it’s really worth hearing. Guy Maslin is here for two days only, and he’ll be performing Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Weston, S’urak, and several of his own works as well.” She gave him a pleading look.
“The bad boy of classical music, eh?” Kirk asked, tugging at his lower lip.
“He might better be described as this century’s Mozart or S’urak,” Spock stated.
“However, his interstellar temper tantrums are of more interest to a tin ear like myself, Mr. Spock,” Kirk said with a twinkle in his hazel eyes.
“I managed to beg an extra ticket from Commander Li,” Uhura said. “And it would be nice if you would join us.”
“How about you, Spock? I don’t want to horn in on you and the lieutenant,” he said with a teasing glance to the beautiful communications officer.
“Hardly, sir. The lieutenant and I merely share an interest in classical music. Your presence would offer no intrusion.”
Kirk spread his hands in a gesture of surrender. “What can I say to such a generous offer but—I accept.” He left his friends and officers waiting while he quickly changed into a dress uniform.
Kirk was enjoying the concert. Maslin really was a virtuoso pianist, and the beauty of the outdoor concert hall, with its surrounding umbrella trees silhouetted against the night sky, diamond-hard stars and form-contouring chairs seemed to ease the jitters he had felt earlier in the evening. The Star Base 24 symphony orchestra wasn’t precisely the Terran Philharmonic, but they were certainly enthusiastic, and Kirk had a feeling that Maslin’s talent and presence could have made a jug band sound good.
The lights dimmed for the second half. Spock slid into a half-meditative state while Uhura sat bolt upright on the edge of her seat, hands clasped tightly about the program, eyes riveted on the still-empty piano stool.
Kirk leaned in to her and whispered, “Are you about to develop a crush, like ten thousand other women on a hundred other worlds?”
Uhura gave him a decidedly insubordinate look, and turned back to the stage. There was a ripple of applause as Maslin strode into view. He took his place at the piano and, with an impatient gesture, brushed back his falling black forelock.
Kirk had just settled back into his seat when there was a light touch on his sleeve. He looked up to find a young ensign standing nervously in the aisle next to him.
“Sir,” he whispered under the rising opening chords of the orchestra. “I have an urgent message from Commander Li. He requests that you report to his office at once, sir.”
Kirk leaned across Uhura to touch Spock on the arm. Instantly he was the focus of the Vulcan’s attention. “We’ve got a problem upstairs, and I think I’d like to have you along.”
Spock nodded, and followed the captain into the aisle. Uhura rose to accompany them, but Kirk pushed her firmly back into her seat. “Stay and enjoy for us. I’ll let you know if I need you.”
“Yes, sir,” she said gratefully.
Kirk and Spock trailed the ensign out of the hall as Maslin joined the orchestra with a brilliant allegro run that marked the entrance of the piano in his Concerto for a Dying World. Spock paused briefly to listen, then gave a nod of satisfaction and stepped into the courtyard lobby of the outdoor concert hall.
Commander Li’s office was on the top floor of an immense skyscraper at the edge of the spaceport. The commander’s desk was framed by a floor-to-ceiling picture window which overlooked the shuttle landing area. Li rose from behind his desk, hand outstretched; and Kirk wondered, as he stepped forward, why all base commanders had similarly situated offices. It was either a bureaucratic mandate from Star Fleet or a way for now-deskbound captains to get closer to the stars they had lost.
Li’s office was, however, less austere than most. Several fine Chinese scrolls hung on the walls, and a celadon bowl rested on the broad desk. Spock picked up the fragile bowl, turning it almost reverently between his long fingers.
“Tang dynasty,” Li said with a proud smile. “A fine piece, isn’t it?”
“Exquisite would be more accurate, Commander.”
“Thank you, Mr. Spock.” Kirk took a chair, and declined one of the thin, maroon-colored Beleteguese cigars that the tall Chinese commander affected, to the ruination
of the atmosphere in any room.
“Sorry to pull you out of the concert. I would be there myself if this problem hadn’t arisen. My wife is still there, and probably cursing me with every breath for deserting her.” He paused to puff the cigar to life.
“I take it from your call to Captain Kirk that this represents an off-world problem requiring a starship’s assistance?”
“Correct.” Li pressed a button on his desk, and a large viewing screen slid over the window. “A week ago the freighter Wanderlust sighted a strange spatial effect near the Taygeta V system. The freighter was returning to pick up some hunters which it had dropped on Taygeta, which is the only planet of any interest in the entire system. It was then that it noticed the phenomenon.
“They radioed us for instructions, and we requested they take a closer look. Apparently something happened to the Wanderlust during that investigation, for all that remained to be found by one of our patrol scouts was their jettisoned communications buoy.”
“No debris?” Kirk asked.
“None. It’s as if Captain Ridly realized he was in trouble, jettisoned the buoy, and then vanished—he and his ship with him.”
“This phenomenon?” Spock prodded gently.
“Oh yes.” The commander flipped another switch on the desk console. The room darkened, and the holograms taken by the Wanderlust in its last moments flowed across the screen. Captain Ridly’s voice maintained a running commentary under the swirling images.
“It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. It’s almost as if the granddaddy of all aurorae boreales had been rolled up and moved to this remote corner of the galaxy. We’re coming in for some buffeting now, and … wait….” Ridly gave a nervous laugh. “An insane sensation … I just tasted music.” There was a long pause while the incandescent lights played and rippled across the screen. “We’re all beginning to experience strange sensory hallucinations. People are feeling colors, tasting and smelling sounds. It’s weird—no, wait! Something’s beginning to happen to the ship!” A babble of voices rose over Ridly’s rapidly hysterical commentary. “Taru!” they heard him shout. “Taru! Jettison buoy! Jettison buoy!”
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