Firestorm

by L. A. Graf

  Of course they had. Kirk rubbed his eyes with a sigh. "On what grounds? I thought we had agreed—"

  "Evidently," Spock interrupted with dry aplomb, "we have somehow managed to offend the Elasians in the time since that agreement was made."

  Why didn't that surprise him? "All right, Spock, I'll be there in a minute. Kirk out."

  The turbolift whisked open onto a bridge quietly busy with its own efficiency. Kirk trotted down the small flight of stairs leading to the command level, noting the faces of those manning each station with a quick, perfunctory glance. It didn't seem strange yet that Sulu, Uhura, and Chekov were gone—it was evening shift, when they would have been off duty anyway. Kirk would notice their absence most keenly tomorrow, he knew.

  Kirk trained his thoughts on the present, trying not to drum his fingers on the arm of the command chair while Spock rose to relinquish it. "Updated status of the landing party?"

  "Commander Uhura reports that they have been allowed to land their shuttle outside the Elasian mining camp," the Vulcan reported, stepping aside to let Kirk round the chair and sit with restless impatience. "However, they have not yet been permitted to enter. The Dohlman's chief underling has indicated that they will be detained until we agree to stop spying on them."

  "Spying on them?" Kirk frowned at the aqua-and-turquoise planet on the viewscreen. It was frustrating to see only oceans and the occasional smudge of volcanic ash. "What does he mean? Using our sensors?"

  Spock lifted his eyebrows in an eloquent, very Vulcan shrug. "The exact nature of our 'spying' was unclear, Captain. Commander Uhura is attempting to obtain clarification on that point."

  Kirk couldn't help wondering if she actually had any hope of getting it. "Have we started any new sensor scans of the planet since we sent out the landing party?" he asked, trying to think what sort of behavior could be construed as subversive by a culture so aggressively paranoid as the Elasians. "Or launched any remote probes into the volcano?"

  Spock shook his head. "Neither, Captain. Our scanning systems have continued to monitor the planet at the same level as when we first arrived. If the Elasians can detect our sensor activity at all—" A note of unexpected dryness entered the Vulcan's tone. "—which I doubt—" Kirk suppressed a smile. "—they must have been aware of our scanning before they agreed to allow the landing party access to their camp."

  True. "Then it's not us causing the problem." He watched a patch of sharp shadow slice its way across Rakatan's bright disk, realizing it was the edge of the planet's moon, Skaftar, only when he caught sight of a faint string of lights outlining the edge of one otherwise invisible building. "How about the geologists on the Johnston moonbase? Any new scanning activity from them?"

  Spock removed himself to his science station without giving any other sign that he had heard the captain's question. Long fingers coaxed a series of unseen readings from the panel. "Negative. At present, the Johnston Observatory is monitoring the satellite uplink from their network of seismic stations, nothing more."

  "Uh, sir?"

  Kirk turned to face the ensign at the security station. "Yes, Mr. Howard?"

  "They may not be scanning from the moonbase, sir," Howard told him, trading uncertain glances between the captain and his own boards, "but the observatory did launch a shuttle into orbit about thirty minutes ago."

  Kirk felt a little sting of apprehension. "Was that after the landing party left the hangar, Mr. Howard?"

  Howard nodded. "Aye, sir."

  "Did the geologists on board that shuttle say why they were going out?"

  "No, sir." Howard's hands curled into nervous fists, a trace of embarrassed color darkening his bearded cheeks. "I didn't query them, sir. Since the shuttle never tried to approach the planet, I assumed it was a routine data-gathering mission."

  "Let that be your first lesson, Ensign—never make assumptions." Kirk found it more than just a little ironic to consider who had taught him that lesson on board this very same ship all those years ago. He put Elaan out of his mind with more ease than he'd ever known and turned to Ashcraft at communications. "Mr. Ashcraft, contact that geology shuttle."

  "Aye-aye, sir." Ashcraft's eyes grew distracted as he listened to the voices through his ear transceiver. "Coming on screen now."

  The image of Rakatan on the viewscreen blurred and rippled, coalescing into a wash of gold-and-black color and a pert bob of sun-lightened hair. "I'm right in the middle of a laser scan, Enterprise." Wendy Metcalfe didn't even glance up from the shuttle's monitors. "Can you wait a minute?"

  Kirk resisted an urge to tap his foot. "No, Ms. Metcalfe, we can't."

  The young grad student jerked her head up to blink at him with startled blue eyes.

  "Would you care to tell me," Kirk asked her coldly, "just what you're doing out there?"

  She frowned in confusion, shaking her head ever so slightly. "Using our precision laser to make a topographic scan of Rakatan Mons." She flicked a worried look back at the abandoned monitors, but apparently didn't feel safe in completely turning her attention away from Kirk. "It looks like there's been at least five millimeters of uplift at the volcano's summit since our last—"

  Kirk cut her off without waiting to hear what new scientific wonder she'd unearthed about the planet. "Does this survey of yours involve maintaining a stationary orbit over Rakatan Mons?"

  Metcalfe offered him a scowl approaching casual disgust. "Well, of course, Captain, how else—"

  "And are you shooting laser beams down at the Elasian mining camp?"

  "Well, not at it"—she shrugged—"but near it, I guess." She waved impatiently at the equipment crowding the shuttle behind her. "They're very low amplitude laser beams!"

  Kirk tipped a look back at his first officer. "Mr. Spock, I believe we have found our 'spy.'"

  Spock aimed a stare of cool disapproval at the viewscreen. "Indeed."

  "Ms. Metcalfe, you're going to have to go back to the moonbase."

  "But, Captain!" She closed her hands around the edges of her monitor station as though planning to prevent his taking it by physical force. "We haven't seen this much uplift on Rakatan Mons since we arrived at the planet! I can't go back with an incomplete topographic scan for the most critical data point in my doctoral thesis."

  "You also can't disobey a direct order from Starfleet."

  She turned resolutely back toward her equipment without even bothering to cut off the channel.

  Kirk twisted his mouth in grudging respect for her tenacity. Two could play at this game. He punched the intercom button with his thumb. "Bridge to Engineering."

  "Engineering," a familiar brogue replied. "Scott here."

  "Scotty, there's a Federation geological shuttle positioned directly over Rakatan Mons." Kirk kept his attention trained on Metcalfe, poised for her response. "Lock on to it with a tractor beam and pull it into the hangar bay."

  Metcalfe spun away from her equipment. "Hey!"

  "Mr. Ashcraft, contact the Elasians and tell them that the geologist 'spy' is being withdrawn. We apologize for any inconvenience this might have caused them."

  "That's not fair!"

  Kirk tipped his head in acknowledgment and gave a little shrug. "Fair may be a human and Vulcan concept, Ms. Metcalfe, but it's not an Elasian one." He saw the young geologist stumble as the tractor beam caught her shuttle and rocked it to a thudding halt. "And right now, we're playing by the Elasians' rules."

  "'Insert optical aperture control sensor into angle between diffusion resistance meter and polarizing mirrored filter lens …'" Sulu's voice droned as he read from the instruction manual.

  Chekov listened to Mutchler drop the half-assembled laser sensor into his lap and growl at Sulu with frustration. "There is no angle between the resistance meter and the lens! I should never have let you help me with this." The geologist reached across the seat back in front of him to snatch the operations manual away from Sulu. "Are you sure you're reading this in the right language?"

  "What kin
d of question is that?" Sulu climbed to his knees in the passenger seat he'd claimed since Gamow's landing, hanging over the back and bending the booklet in Mutchler's hands so he could read it upside down. "English, Vulcan, Spanish." He pointed to each section in turn. "What I can read of the Spanish agrees with the English, and the Vulcan probably just goes into even more excruciating detail." He let the book snap back into place. "If you can't find space between the components, Doctor, I don't think it's the fault of the translators."

  "Is that supposed to be an insult?"

  No longer able to just sit and listen to their squabbling, Chekov stood and came down the shuttle's main aisle to pluck the laser out of Mutchler's hands. "Let me see that."

  "Careful!" Mutchler yelped, half-standing as though to follow the small focusing device and optical housing. "That's sensitive geologic equipment, Lieutenant!"

  Chekov snorted. "A laser is a laser, Dr. Mutchler." He smoothed out the schematic where it spread on top of Mutchler's seismic equipment, and bent to compare the aperture sensor against the fine-print specs. From the front of the shuttle, he could hear Uhura's patient voice reciting assurances to the Elasians on the other side of the communications link. Her dialogue didn't seem to have changed much in the last hour or so. "I've probably assembled more targeting systems and experimental rifles than you have seismic stations in your network."

  "Which means what?" the geologist demanded, sitting back. "That you can put together my ground-motion laser so it can kill somebody?"

  Chekov scowled at him over the scattered laser components. "Do you want help with this or don't you?"

  Mutchler sighed, but didn't answer. After a moment, he rocked forward in his seat to ask, "Do you think they're ever going to let us in?"

  Chekov wondered if the scientist was just trying to make conversation, or if he really thought either of them had any answer.

  "Probably not." Sulu sighed and dropped his head into his hands, relinquishing the operations manual by tossing it atop where Chekov was trying to jockey for the appropriate space between the meter and the lens. "I don't even understand why they let us get this far if all they're going to do is keep their defense screens in place and question our intentions."

  "To scare us."

  Chekov flicked the manual back into Sulu's lap without looking up. "Knowing the Elasians, Dr. Mutchler, I suspect their scare tactics would be somewhat more straightforward."

  "I don't know. . . ." Mutchler stood and paced to the rear of the shuttle, then bent down to peer out one of the small viewports with worry glittering in his gray eyes. "The place just gives me the creeps. An old slump site like this, with valley walls so steep …" His voice trailed off, and he scrubbed at his temples as though nursing a headache. "I don't know why anybody would set up their base camp here."

  Chekov didn't know why anybody would choose to set up on the surface of this planet to begin with, so didn't venture a guess. "Well, they can't keep us here forever."

  Sulu gave a little laugh of disbelief and settled lower in his seat. "I wouldn't count on that."

  "Mr. Sulu, Mr. Chekov." Uhura's voice from the front of the shuttle sounded fine-edged and alert. A sure sign that something wasn't going as they'd planned. "Would you join me, please?"

  "At last." Sulu bounced to his feet with a breath of relief. "Our lives have meaning again." Bending over to the row behind him, he helped Chekov gather the laser's scattered components, carefully keeping internal and external modules separate between both hands without even having to be told. "Do you think the Elasians have had a sudden fit of reasonability?" he asked Chekov in a low voice.

  Chekov snorted and deposited the unfinished laser in Murphy's lap on their way past. "I think Ensign Murphy should amuse himself until we get back. Do what you can," he told the younger man, not expecting much from either the Elasians or the ground-motion laser at this point. "Consider it practice for the next time you have to field strip an optic cannon."

  Murphy blinked dubiously down at the pile in his lap, and nodded glumly. "Uh, yes, sir … I'll try."

  Uhura didn't acknowledge their arrival when they entered the cockpit. Forehead in one hand, the other drumming silently on the edge of the panel, she listened with strained patience to the clear tenor voice over the communications board as though she'd heard his complaint a million times before. Beyond the forward viewport, Chekov could barely glimpse the few surface buildings that made up the Elasian mining camp peeking their tops above the horizon. From here he couldn't see anything that could house a full-scale field generator, but he could just discern the watery heatripple effect of screen meeting oxygen several meters away from the shuttle. It was the same system they'd picked up from the ship, and it was still holding them away from the Elasians despite an hour or more of discussion.

  "Kessh Takcas—" Uhura addressed the communications panel as politely as though the Elasian chief underling were standing there with her. "Perhaps if you let me speak with the Dohlman myself—"

  "No." The Elasian's hard voice cut her off as sharply as a slap. "She will not speak with deceitful pigs. Our sensors detect an onboard energy source not connected to your shuttle's engines. The very fact that you lie about its presence proves it must be a weapons system."

  Chapter Five

  CHEKOV PULLED his attention away from the outside view to exchange a startled glance with Sulu. The helmsman paused in slipping into the pilot's seat, eyebrows and shoulders raised in a silent admission of ignorance.

  "This is an unarmed passenger transport, Chief Underling Takcas." It never ceased to amaze Chekov that Uhura's voice could convey such calm and friendliness when every micrometer of her body exuded anger. "The only weapons we have on board are personal sidearms, used by my cohort to ensure my safety."

  "Then it is Her Glory's command that you dispose of those sidearms," Takcas's icy voice replied. "Throw them clear of your craft and allow us to destroy them."

  Chekov captured Uhura's attention with an urgent touch to her arm. No, he mouthed silently, frowning. She was nodding before he even finished the word.

  "Chief Underling Takcas," she all but sighed, "I could not debase my cohort so by allowing you to endanger their purpose. Please tell Dohlman Israi that this arrangement is unacceptable."

  There was a long moment of dead time on the radio, during which Chekov imagined a brawny Elasian male scurrying to the other end of the mining camp to grovel before his mistress with Uhura's unhappy news. He reached over the lieutenant commander's shoulder to thumb the audio mute for their side of the transmission. "This is ridiculous," he told her, crossing his arms and leaning back on the panel between the seats. "I thought the captain settled whatever their problem was already."

  "That was when they were accusing us of spying on them," Uhura pointed out with a sigh. "As you heard, now we're arguing about hidden weaponry."

  Chekov made a disgusted noise. "Nonsense. Even counting the power signatures from things like our hand phasers and Mutchler's laser ground-motion detector, there's no way the Elasians could mistake anything we have on board for a shipwide system. The readings are completely different."

  Uhura sighed and sat back in her chair. "You would know that," she agreed wearily. "But would the Elasians?"

  Chekov snorted. "If they're going to use black-market technology," he complained, "they should spend the extra money to learn how to use it."

  Sulu smiled indulgently and leaned forward to give the lieutenant's arm a sympathetic pat. "Well, it's a nice sentiment, at least."

  "Dohlman Uhura!"

  They all jumped at Takcas's imperious summons from the radio. Uhura shot a hand out to answer with a speed that could only have been second nature. "I'm still here, Chief Underling Takcas. What is—"

  "Her Glory commands that all power sources within your craft be deactivated so that we may scan your craft and verify that you have disarmed all systems."

  "No!" Mutchler yelped from the main compartment. The geologist strained forward in h
is seat, eyes wide and liquid with alarm. "We'll lose the memory in the seismic equipment if we disconnect the power supply. Without it, I can't calibrate the surface equipment and this whole trip will have been for nothing!"

  "Then Her Glory commands that you evacuate your shuttle so that we may search your compartments without interference."

  Sulu shook his head with slow emphasis. Sabotage, he mouthed, and pantomimed an explosion with his hands.

  Uhura responded with a hopeless toss of her hands, and Chekov reached across her shoulder to switch off the audio signal before speaking. "Tell him you'll do it."

  Uhura stared up at him. "You've got to be joking."

  "Tell him that they can search the ship," he continued, waving Sulu into silence when the helmsman would have interrupted, "but that you're leaving the leader of your cohort behind to supervise their behavior."

  Uhura chewed her lip, considering. "I don't know how many they'll send."

  "It won't matter," Chekov assured her. "They aren't interested in hurting anyone, just in making sure we know that they're serious about protecting their Dohlman." He felt heat come up into his cheeks, but admitted anyway, "I would do the same, if I were them."

  "How come you get to be the chief underling of this cohort?" Sulu asked, feigning disappointment.

  Chekov scowled at him. "Because it was my idea." He turned back to Uhura. "They'll agree to it. They know you have as much right to be cautious as do they."

  "All right." Uhura reached for the comm switch in front of her. "When did you get to be such an expert on Elasian psychology?" she asked with a teasing smile.

  "I don't have to be—I know how the cohort's job works, and that means I know how they think." He caught her wrist to stop her just before she reopened the channel. "Give me five minutes to secure our weapons and arm myself before you let them in."