by Barbara Paul
"Aye!" the Sacker said enthusiastically. "He's me teacher!"
McCoy smiled. "I never would have guessed. Ah … you must be an engineer."
"Aye, that I am. I'm hopin' to be chief engineer someday. Just like the Scott."
"Well, you've picked a good man to model yourself after—there aren't many like Mr. Scott. In the meantime, stop that wriggling and lie still. Bonesovna, isn't there something you can do to make him keep still?"
"I could hit him over the head." Both she and the green patient started jiggling.
McCoy rolled his eyes. Sacker humor. Just what they needed.
The Vinithi had stored the baryon reverter in their ship maintenance section, high up on a platform where it would be safely out of the way until needed. The maintenance area was the largest open space aboard the Babe in Arms, crisscrossed with catwalks and hanging gear. The reverter itself was a black, primarily rectangular affair with two domes on top and an extruding section holding the controls. It was enclosed in fiberglass netting still attached to the multiple-geared pulley that had been used to raise it up to the platform. Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, Uhura, and Chekov had discarded their helmets and were now moving around aimlessly on the main deck, craning their necks to look up at the reverter.
They were moving around because the hot deck under their feet made standing still more than a little uncomfortable. The fire had left the shafts and reached the main body of the ship, burning furiously one level below. The engines were safe, and Environmental Control—but with none of the ship's fire-control sprayers cutting in automatically, the fire had gone on burning far longer than it should have. And now it was beneath them; they needed to get the baryon reverter to the transporter room as quickly as possible.
"We will need to lower the reverter to the main deck before we can attach antigrav units, Captain," Spock said. "The standard antigravs cannot be sufficiently strong to lift the weight of the reverter to that height, or else the Sackers would not have troubled rigging the pulley."
"Vinithi," Kirk said. "They're called Vinithi."
"Indeed? I am gratified to learn their name at last. Vinithi."
"It does look heavy, doesn't it?" Kirk mused. His eyes followed the power line of the automated pulley from the baryon reverter across to a smaller platform where a control panel had been mounted. "There!" he said, pointing. "Uhura, I want you to climb up there and see if you can figure out which one of those switches controls that pulley."
"Yes, sir." She hurried to a nearby ladder and started up to the catwalk.
"I'll go up to the platform and guide the reverter down. Spock, you and Chekov are going to have to—Scotty! What are you doing here?"
The chief engineer took off his helmet and wiped the sweat from his face. "I'm not needed at the fire, Captain. The heat has fused the circuits controllin' the sprayers for this section of the ship. I checked 'em in the adjoinin' sections, an' I think they'll be comin' on if they're needed."
"What about the fire fighters? What are they doing?"
Scotty did a little dance as the heat from the deck worked its way through the soles of his boots. "They've laid down a wall of flame-retardant foam all around this section here, so they've confined the fire to this area, at least."
"They've got it under control?"
"Just about, sir. It's only a matter o' time."
"Well, that's something," Kirk said. "There's the baryon reverter, Scotty—up there. See it? We've got to get it down."
"Looks heavy."
Spock explained the plan to him as Kirk started climbing the ladder to the platform where the reverter was stored. The ladder was attached to a bulkhead that was about a meter from the edge of the platform. Kirk stepped across the open space and called, "Uhura?"
"I've found it, sir. When you're ready."
"One second." Kirk waited until the three below were in position and then called out, "Now!"
A long catwalk away Uhura reached for the switch—but didn't make it. An unexpected cr-a-a-ack! made her jump. The switch was forgotten in the shock of what she witnessed happening. Numb and horrified, she watched in stunned disbelief as the center of the main deck collapsed with a roar. Pieces of repair equipment and machinery started a slow-motion slide into the newly created abyss, and Uhura looked down through the open-grid platform under her feet at the tongues of flame shooting up from below.
This was it. This was the fire she'd been dreaming of.
With a surge of fear she remembered the three men who'd been standing on the deck and jerked her head around to look for them. What she saw made her heart pound. Chekov and Scotty had managed to jump to safety. But Scotty was lying on his stomach at the very edge of the chasm, holding one of Mr. Spock's arms with both hands. Chekov scrambled over Scotty to the other side, where he could reach down and grab the other arm. Together they managed to pull Spock up to what was left of the deck, a perimeter of two or three meters circling what was now a flame pit. The knot in her stomach eased somewhat when she saw the Vulcan stand up unaided, apparently not harmed by his close call. Someone was calling her name.
Someone was calling her name? Yes … it was Captain Kirk. He was yelling at her to pull the switch.
Pull the switch.
What switch? Which one was it? She knew only a minute ago. But now … Uhura slapped her forehead to wake herself up. There. That one.
She pulled the switch.
The pulley's automation hadn't yet been put out of commission by the fire. The baryon reverter in its fiberglass net lifted smoothly from the platform, and Captain Kirk steered it toward the edge. The pulley line slanted at about a forty-five degree angle between the platform and that spot on the deck perimeter where the other end of the pulley line was anchored. If the anchor had been placed another two or three meters away from the bulkhead toward the center of the work area … Uhura's mouth grew dry when she thought of what that meant.
The reverter cleared the platform. It had barely started its journey downward … when the automation went out. The instrument they were all counting on to save them hung suspended over the flames, halfway between Kirk on the platform and the other three below.
Something had to be done! "Manual override!" Uhura shouted. "It has a manual override!"
But she couldn't make herself heard over the roar of the flames; the noise had become deafening within just the past sixty seconds. She jumped up and down and waved her arms to attract the attention of Spock and Chekov and Scotty. When she got them looking at her, she pantomimed hauling on the pulley chain. They understood. As soon as all three had taken hold of the chain, she switched to manual. The reverter descended in jerks to the safety of the deck perimeter.
But the surge of satisfaction Uhura felt at seeing the reverter safe was cut short. With a series of sounds like small explosions going off, the ladder she and Captain Kirk had both climbed pulled away from the bulkhead and dropped into the fire pit.
She could see the captain staring in horror at the place where the ladder had been attached, as shocked by this loss of their escape route as she was. The same idea came to her that must have occurred to the captain. If the fire could destroy the ladder supports, how long would the platforms and the catwalks hold up?
This is where I'm going to die. The thought had come unbidden; but try as she might, she couldn't drive it away. This is where I'm going to die, high up on a flimsy platform in the belly of an alien ship. This is where I'm going to burn to death.
She looked down; the flames were only inches beneath the scorched soles of her boots, and the waves of heat were making her dizzy. But there was no way to get off the platform. No—wait, she thought. The ladder that had fallen into the fire couldn't be the only one in this place. Hastily she looked around, trying to spot another way down; but the heat and smoke were making her eyes water, and she was having trouble seeing.
Then she saw the first tongue of flame spurting up through the open grid she was standing on, not more than a foot away from her left boot. She couldn't mo
ve. She couldn't breathe, she couldn't swallow, she couldn't take her eyes off the flame. During a seconds-long break in the roar of the fire, she heard her name again.
It broke the spell. She looked over to where Captain Kirk was gesturing to her frantically with a come-here motion. The three men below had sent the grappling hook back up, the one that had lifted the net holding the baryon reverter. The captain had gripped the hook with one hand and was gesturing to her with the other. They were going to lower him down … over that pit of fire.
And he wanted her to descend with him.
But how could she, when she couldn't move? Between Uhura and Captain Kirk stretched a long catwalk that bisected the fire area below. It was wide enough to permit the passage of only one person at a time, and the guard rails must be blistering hot by now. And it was a certainty that the catwalk would collapse at any moment. But her only chance of getting out of there alive was to cross it—directly over the inferno. Uhura shuddered in spite of the heat. It was impossible. Unthinkable. Mad. Was the captain crazy, expecting her to walk out over that hungry, merciless fire? She couldn't do it; didn't he know she'd lost the use of her legs?
No, there was no way she could go out over that fire. She knew she'd never make it. And the longer Captain Kirk stayed on that platform waiting for her, the greater the chance was that he'd never make it either. With a heavy heart she shook her head at him, No. She gestured with her whole arm that he should go down alone.
But he didn't go.
She could see his face contorting as he yelled something to her. He kept gesturing to her to come; she kept gesturing back that she couldn't. Yet still he would not go, foolishly risking his own life in the vain hope that somehow she would float over that fire untouched and they both could escape the danger. Why didn't he leave? Why did he keep hanging on, and yelling, and gesturing to her …
The memory of a responsibility not fulfilled.
Long ago someone close to her had died because she'd let the flames of a raging fire drive her back. Was it going to happen again?
It was clear the captain wasn't going to budge without her. How could he do this? How could he put the responsibility for his life … upon her?
She looked down to where Spock and Scotty and Chekov were all waving their arms, pointing up toward Captain Kirk. She could see their mouths moving, but she couldn't hear a word. Go, they must be saying.
Uhura was split in two. There was the ineffectual, immobile Uhura, too terrified of the fire to take the steps that would save her life as well as that of the captain. And then there was the "outside" Uhura, the one who looked with annoyance at her paralyzed self and said aloud, "Pick up your right foot and put it down in front of you."
She picked up her right foot and put it down. And then her left. And then her right again.
She was out on the catwalk. Straight ahead she could see but not hear the captain yelling encouragement. Like a zombie she moved out over the fire, keeping her eyes on the captain, looking neither right nor left, and not permitting herself to look down into the incinerator waiting for her. She couldn't go any faster. She couldn't go any slower. She couldn't stop. One step. Another. Another.
Another.
And then Captain Kirk was grabbing her and laughing and sweating and laughing some more. "I knew you could do it, Uhura! I knew it!"
"You did?" she said weakly.
"Of course I did! Look, you're going to have to hold on to me. We're not going to have time for two trips." He grabbed the grappling hook with both hands.
Uhura stepped behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist, locking her right hand around her left wrist. "Ready," she said.
"Here goes."
As they left the platform, her grip on his waist slipped a little but she managed to hold on. She wondered vaguely about the strength in his arms—they had to support the weight of two people, after all. She noticed with a curious detachment how large the flames beneath them had grown. She was calm.
And then they were down. They had made it. They were safe. She had not burned to death. It was all right.
Scotty greeted her with a cheer and a sweaty hug.
Spock said, "I commend you on your courage, Lieutenant."
Chekov just stared at her wordlessly for a moment and then blurted out, "I vas afraid you vould not make it!"
"So was I," she answered in a tone meant to reassure, "but we did."
Scotty and Spock were fitting antigrav units to the baryon reverter. Kirk stepped out into the corridor for a look around. When the reverter was fitted and towed out of what remained of the maintenance section, the captain said, "That way is cut off—the flames are starting to eat through the deck. We'll have to go this way." He headed off in a direction away from the quickest route to the transporter room, the other four following with the reverter in tow.
The turbolifts were out, so they were looking for a crawlway. The Vinithi must have been evacuated from that section of the ship because there was no one in sight. No fire fighters, either. They were in some sort of storage area; the corridor was lined with fitted bins on both sides.
"There, Kepten!" Chekov ran toward a crawlway at the end of the corridor. He leaned in to see if the crawlway was clear of flames—and jerked back as a geyser of white foam spurted up at him and overflowed into the corridor. "Vhat is thet?"
"That's the flame-retardent they're usin'," Scotty said. "The fire fighters must be fillin' all the shafts they can find."
"So how do ve get out?"
"That's a good question, lad."
Kirk held his hand out. "Spock—your communicator." Spock gave it to him. "Kirk to fire fighters, come in. Kirk to fire fighters!"
The communicator crackled with static and then a voice said, "Captain Kirk! Are you all right?"
"For the time being. Where's the fire now?"
"We've got it localized, Captain. We've blocked off the exits and filled the crawlways and air shafts with foam. It's just a matter now of foaming down the main blaze. That fire'll be out in half an hour, forty-five minutes at most."
"But where is it?"
"We've got it confined to just two corridors—let's see, now. According to the schematics, they're labeled H-2 and G-2."
"Uh-oh," said Chekov, and pointed. Painted on the bulkhead under an unreadable Zirgosian symbol was a big black G-2.
"We're in G-2," Kirk told the communicator tiredly. "Five of us, and a piece of equipment that's more important than any of us."
"Captain, find cover—quickly, don't waste any time. Look for a compartment you can make airtight. Anything—but hurry."
"Right. Kirk out." He looked at the others. "You heard the man. We've got to find us a hiding place."
They all looked around helplessly. There were no living quarters in this corridor that could be sealed, no rooms of any kind that they could see. What to do? Kirk couldn't think. He was tired; he'd already lived a hundred years that day.
"Captain," Spock said, "perhaps inside these storage bins? One of the larger ones should be ample to hold the baryon reverter."
"Oh, good, Spock," Kirk sighed with relief. "Of course—the storage bins. We'll have to empty the largest ones … come on."
The two largest bins were directly opposite each other at the far end of the corridor. The first one contained crates of nonperishable food supplies which slid out easily on belts that fell into place when the side-loading door was raised. They stacked the crates out of the way and guided the baryon reverter into its new hiding place. Spock latched the door and remarked that the fittings looked airtight.
"This one unloads from the top," Uhura said of the other large bin directly across from the one now holding the baryon reverter. She opened the lid to reveal a supply of the cloaks the Vinithi wore when dealing with other races.
Whoosh. The other end of the corridor burst into flames.
"Get that stuff out of there!" Kirk yelled. Uhura was already pulling out the cloaks as fast as she could move; the others pitched
in, getting in one another's way more often than not. Scotty tripped over Chekov and went sprawling.
"We are not well organized," Spock commented in the understatement of the century.
But the bin got emptied nevertheless. "All right, everybody in," Kirk ordered.
"Captain!" Scotty exclaimed in dismay. "We canna all fit in that one bin!"
"We're going to have to—we don't have time to empty another one. Come on—move!"
They scrambled in, in a tangle of arms and legs. "Wait," said Uhura, "I can't get my—"
Ker-thunk. The lid fell closed while they were all still maneuvering for position. There was much grunting, some swearing, and a great deal of muttering under the breath.
"It's pitch black in here," Kirk grumbled. "Didn't anybody bring a light?"
"Mr. Chekov, if you could move your knee five centimeters to the—"
"Thet's not my knee, Mr. Spock!"
"Oof! Who's sitting on my stomach?"
"Lassie, at any other time I'd be happy to have ye breathin' in me ear, but—"
"I can't move my head! Somebody has a foot right in back of—Captain, is that you? Could you move your foot?"
"Love to, but somebody seems to be using my leg as a stepladder."
"Captain, I am merely attempting to achieve a little leverage to facilitate a shift in position that should prove beneficial to all of us. I am not intentionally using any part of your anatomy as a stepladder."
"Ow! Thet is my bad shoulder!"
"Sorry."
"Please! Whoever it is in here who's got roving hands, you're trespassing on private property!"
"I do beg your pardon, Lieutenant."
Cough. "Somebody's got an elbow up against my windpipe!"
"Sorry, Captain, I was tryin' to get me right arm free an'—"
"Uhura, I hate to ask you, but could you possibly scratch my nose?"
"I hef a cremp in my leg."
"If two of us could possibly manage to elevate ourselves sufficiently to allow the other three to draw their bodies into a more compact configuration—"
"Somebody's mashin' me favorite right hand an' I don't want to be mentionin' any names but if she doesna move soon—"
