The security chief was scrutinizing his tricorder’s small display screen. “Looks like we’re about to have company.”
“I thought you said we were off the beaten path,” McCoy said.
“No,” Aylesworth replied as he turned in a slow circle, directing his scans in every direction. “I said our stuff was off the beaten path.”
“Are we being followed?” Girard asked.
Aylesworth nodded. “It’s a group of humanoids. About a dozen individuals. And they read as pretty damned big.”
“A hunting party, perhaps,” Wieland offered.
“I thought the beam-down spot we picked was supposed to be away from the locals and their campsites,” Shellenbarger said.
“So did I,” Aylesworth replied, sounding defensive as he continued making his scans.
McCoy realized how terribly exposed and vulnerable he was feeling. “I wonder why we didn’t notice them before we beamed down.”
“Probably for the same reason we couldn’t map the planet’s topaline veins from orbit,” Plait said. The science officer spoke distractedly as he manipulated the controls on his own tricorder. “An atmospheric interaction with a nearby topaline deposit might be a factor as well.”
Absurdly, McCoy recalled a conversation he’d had with Lieutenant Plait in the Yegorov’s galley, during which they had discussed planetological doomsday scenarios. The doctor had been impressed by the science officer’s seemingly boundless capacity for dreaming them up.
A low, feral snarl came from somewhere above him.
“I think we might have another problem,” McCoy said.
Craning his neck in the direction of the canyon’s sunward wall, McCoy shielded his eyes against the brilliance of the swollen suns, which shone through a jagged gap in the rocks to frame a large but graceful silhouette. The sleek, low-slung shape reminded him of a large predatory cat from Earth.
The silhouette leapt from the canyon wall, heading directly for McCoy, bypassing the security officers’ crisscrossing laser beams. An instant later the shadowy form struck him with the force of a rockslide. The ground did likewise half a heartbeat afterward. His body went rigid, as though electrified.
Then darkness engulfed him, thoroughly and completely.
Three
Stardate 685.4 (July 13, 2254)
The shards of a broken universe gradually reassembled themselves around Leonard McCoy. Very slowly he became aware of himself, beginning with the rhythmic pounding he felt emanating from somewhere deep inside his skull. At first, the pain felt like a thousand kettledrums pounding inside him. Fortunately it settled down, gradually but surely, to a dull but persistent ache all over.
It quickly came to him that he wasn’t aboard the Yegorov. Nor was he sprawled across the floor of some windy alien canyon. Instead, the air was still and he lay supine on a rough, canvas-covered floor, surrounded by piles of brightly colored furs and oversized, fringe-edged yet incongruously hard pillows. What he’d at first thought was a burned-orange sky that stretched hundreds of kilometers overhead resolved itself into the inside of the top of a very tall, very wide tent.
He was in a mobile living space made for giants.
Giants.
McCoy remembered the tricorder readings Commander Aylesworth had taken in the canyon. The group of large humanoids the team was preparing to encounter.
He sat bolt upright and immediately regretted it; the tent spun as though some prankster had lashed it to a centrifuge. Groaning loudly, McCoy collapsed back onto the brocaded shambles that surrounded him. He closed his eyes in a vain attempt to shut out this newest spike of pain.
Furs rustled against one of the tent walls. McCoy shut his eyes reflexively when a shaft of sunlight from outside struck his face. He heard movement and conversations nearby but couldn’t make out any of the words.
Until he heard an energetic, childlike voice speaking Federation Standard with great urgency. “Come quickly, Ay-El Zurth! Mak-Koy awakens at last.”
Ay-El Zurth. McCoy pondered the strange yet somehow familiar name. Ay-El Zurth.
Aylesworth?
He opened his eyes again and noticed almost immediately that he was no longer alone in the tent. He saw a young humanoid male, hooded and dressed in a cloak. Despite his obvious youth, this was probably the biggest, most robust humanoid child McCoy had ever encountered, given that the timbre of the boy’s voice pegged him as about ten years old.
A three-meter-high canvas flap behind the boy opened long enough to admit another shaft of light, along with more unintelligible gabble from outside. A relieved-looking Aylesworth stepped into the tent, followed by a smiling Doctor Wieland.
“Our thanks, Naheer. Good afternoon, Leonard,” the older man said with a gentle smile.
“The room keeps spinning,” McCoy said. He clutched at the furs around him, like a mountain climber grasping at a handhold.
“The disorientation is to be expected,” Wieland said. “But it’ll pass soon. You’re bouncing back faster than I expected.”
“Bouncing back? From what?”
“Doctor Wieland gave you something to put you out,” Aylesworth said. “I was starting to think you were never going to wake up.”
McCoy wrestled against a surge of panic. Focusing on Wieland, he said, “You sedated me?”
“Not precisely. I induced a temporary coma. I had no better choice, since we lack access to the Yegorov’s sickbay. You took a pretty hard blow to the head.”
McCoy realized he might have had to do exactly the same thing had their positions been reversed. “What happened?”
“It seems we blundered into the path of a party of hunters headed back to this camp with their latest kill.”
“What was it they killed?” McCoy asked.
“The locals call it a lightningbeast because of the nasty electrical discharge it can deliver. The creature the hunters took down appears to have been the mate of the beast that attacked you.”
McCoy nodded. “That would certainly explain its unfriendly attitude. How long was I out?”
“Two days, give or take an hour or so.”
Two days! McCoy thought, his head throbbing. Noticing for the first time since awakening that he was shirtless, he tried and failed to recall the journey from the canyon to this tent. But the incoherence of his memory didn’t surprise him, given the trauma he’d obviously experienced.
“What about the rest of the landing party?” McCoy asked. “Plait, Girard, and Shellenbarger. Are they all right?”
“Perfectly,” Aylesworth said. “Shellenbarger and I took the thing down with our lasers.”
McCoy certainly hoped nobody other than his landing party colleagues had witnessed that. Firing modern weapons in front of the locals remained verboten under the Prime Directive, this planet’s topaline notwithstanding.
“The others have been worrying about you,” Wieland said. “Whenever they’re not engrossed in sampling the biota or picking up rocks, that is.”
McCoy was relieved to hear that nobody else had been hurt. “Please tell ’em they can stop. Worrying, I mean.” His head throbbed again, making him wince.
Naheer seemed to have taken notice of McCoy’s poorly concealed distress. “Be of good cheer, one named Mak-Koy,” the boy said. “You have awakened from the sleep of death. This proves your worthiness.”
“Worthiness?” McCoy asked. “Worthiness for what?”
The boy tilted his head, as though he’d just heard one of the stupidest questions imaginable. “Survival, of course.”
McCoy found that pronouncement ominous.
He looked up at both of his uniformed visitors. “Is somebody going to introduce me to our new friend?”
“His name is Naheer,” the security chief said. “Judging from what I’ve seen of this place so far, he’ll get a lot bigger when he gets older.”
“You might call him a warrior-in-training,” Wieland said. “In fact, he was part of the hunting party that brought us here.”
Focusing past hi
s headache, McCoy directed a grateful smile at Naheer. “Then I owe you a very big ‘thank you.’ ”
Naheer beamed. The recognition made him appear to stand even taller. McCoy guessed his height to be at least one hundred and eighty centimeters.
“One day I will lead my House into battle, Mak-Koy,” the boy said. “And I will visit the camps of each one of the Ten Tribes, and tell our tales there.”
“I don’t doubt that for a minute, Naheer,” McCoy said, mirroring the lad’s easy smile.
McCoy tried to rise, but Wieland laid his hand gently on his shoulder, stopping him. “I don’t want you getting out of bed before you’re ready, but . . .”
“But?”
“The local chieftain is very interested in speaking with you. It’ll help make our case.”
“Our case?”
“The leader of this camp has been very hospitable to us, and that gives us the perfect opportunity to accomplish our mission here by returning the favor.”
McCoy understood immediately. “By offering him the wonders of modern medicine.”
“Exactly,” Wieland said. “Unfortunately, he hasn’t been terribly receptive so far. These people evidently believe that only the strong should survive. They’re not acquainted with the idea of actively nursing the sick or injured back to health.”
“So you’re saying we’re liable to face a very long four months here,” McCoy said.
Wieland shrugged. “Not necessarily. Maybe he’s persuadable. For one thing, one of his men was injured during the hunt.”
“He speaks of my uncle, Efeer,” Naheer said in a matter-of-fact tone.
“How bad is it?” McCoy asked.
Wieland displayed a grave expression. “Bad enough to require treatment that’s substantially better than the local standard of care. And it had better happen soon, before the question becomes moot.”
“Seems to me that a bad injury to one of the leader’s own people should have persuaded him already,” McCoy said.
“Maybe he just needs to see the results from a different case first.”
“You’re talking about me,” McCoy said.
Wieland nodded. “I made sure he saw the shape you were in when the hunting party carried you here.”
“Judging by how I feel now, I must have looked pretty bad.” McCoy was reasonably certain he was in no danger of winning any beauty contests, even after having spent the past two days under his medical mentor’s expert care.
“None of the locals expected you to make it through the first night, Leonard. But if the Grand Panjandrum gets another look at you now . . .” Wieland trailed off, his meaning plain.
Slowly and tentatively, McCoy rose to a standing position, ignoring the insistent pounding in his head. The hard ground beneath his feet seemed to tilt slightly but quickly righted itself and stayed that way.
“Well,” he said, spying his neatly folded uniform tunic in one of the tent’s corners. “Let’s not keep our host waiting.” He looked at Naheer. “Or your uncle.”
Four
Alpha Aurigae’s two primary yellow stars ambled incandescently into the midafternoon hours. Naheer led McCoy, Wieland, and Aylesworth past a flat, empty drill ground upon which several huge warriors were hard at work training. Each man was dressed in a brightly colored tunic with a cowl-like head covering crowned by either flowing braids or a horsetail-like topknot. The fighters were swinging long, flat sparring swords that looked heavy enough to herniate even the toughest log-throwers from Earth’s Highland Games.
Beyond lay a dense thicket of tall tents, whose area footprints varied wildly. Despite their obvious impermanence, these ranks of temporary canvas structures had taken on the settled, stable appearance of a village or a small town, thanks to the constant activity of the camp’s many smiths, weavers, food preparers, and various other craftspeople. Most of these folks—men and women alike—were in the same size class as the swordsmen McCoy had already seen, and none took any particular notice of their visitors.
As Naheer led the way through the campsite, McCoy noticed that both Wieland and Aylesworth appeared to be ready to catch him should he stumble.
“Relax, Commander,” he said. “I’m fine.”
“You don’t look fine, Doc,” Aylesworth said.
“Nonsense. Haven’t you heard? I just proved my worthiness.”
Naheer came to an unexpected halt, and the Starfleet officers barely avoided a collision with the lad’s broad back. It was still hard to think of such a large humanoid as a child. He stood at the front of a voluminous but otherwise unremarkable-looking tent.
“Is this your leader’s tent?” McCoy asked, nodding toward the entrance flap.
Naheer turned to face McCoy and looked down at him with an expression of profound sadness. “No, Mak-Koy. Subteer Usaak does not dwell here.”
“Who does?”
“No one lingers here for very long. This is the Tent of Dying.”
McCoy made a face. “What?”
“This tent is reserved for those who have yet to prove their worthiness, as you have done. I wish to stop here for a moment—to see if Skyfather Gaar has made his decision.”
“What decision?”
“The one that will determine whether my uncle Efeer lives or dies,” Naheer said. “My mother went to dwell with the gods while giving birth to me. And since my father died during last season’s hunt, his brother is all that I have left.”
McCoy didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry.”
“I will stand vigil over my uncle,” Naheer said. “It is not my place to accompany you all the way to Subteer Usaak’s tent.”
“I know the way,” Wieland said.
Aylesworth nodded. “I’ll assemble the rest of the landing party and meet you there.”
Wieland and Aylesworth turned away from the tent, but McCoy remained where he was. “Sir,” he said, “there’s an injured man in this tent who needs medical attention.”
Naheer shook his head. “Only family may enter the Tent of Dying.”
“Not even with the permission of a family member?” McCoy said.
Naheer said nothing, but his stoic features took on a vaguely melancholic cast. Without saying another word, he opened the tent flap and disappeared into the semidarkness inside.
McCoy felt a hand light gently on his shoulder. He turned to see Doctor Wieland regarding him sympathetically. “Only Subteer Usaak has the authority to let us into that tent.”
A sudden surge of hope galvanized McCoy. “Well, we’re on our way to see him. Let’s get his permission.”
“I’ve already tried,” Wieland said, shaking his head. “The word so far is ‘no.’ ”
McCoy frowned. “I hope I haven’t just heard you admit defeat, Doctor.”
The older man appeared nettled for a moment. “Of course not. As I told you before, I made sure Subteer Usaak got a good look at you right after you sustained your injuries. Our best chance of persuading him to accept our help is to show him how far you’ve come in just two days.”
McCoy made an “after you” gesture. “Lead on, then. While we still have time.”
Five
Doctor Wieland paused before the broad, elaborately woven awning that shielded the tent’s expansive entry pavilion against Capella’s pitiless twin yellow suns.
“This,” he said, “is the tent of Subteer Usaak.”
Wieland led the way into the tent, flanked by security officers Aylesworth and Shellenbarger. McCoy followed, hoping to overcome the obvious diffidence of science specialists Plait and Girard, who were cautiously bringing up the rear.
Flames leapt from the large bronze brazier at the tent’s center, imparting an illusory, undulating motion to the intricate patterns embroidered into the tent’s canvas walls. When the group came to a halt before the raised dais set against one of those walls, McCoy found himself standing directly behind Aylesworth and Shellenbarger.
It was only then that he realized that neither security man was carryi
ng his laser.
And just where the hell is my laser? McCoy wondered. It occurred to him then that he’d somehow lost track of all the gear he’d brought down from the Yegorov other than his medikits. He wondered if some tribal superstition or taboo had made the Capellans leery of handling those kits because of some magical property they believed they possessed.
The landing party members now stood before two hulking humanoid males, both of whom regarded them coolly from the dais. The man who was clearly in charge was lean and middle-aged, his great height apparent despite his seated posture on the elegantly carved, thronelike wooden chair that supported him. An ocher-colored cowl—whose open top showcased a long, braided topknot of white-blond hair—framed his dour face. The rest of his raiment consisted of a simple brown tunic and trousers, fur leggings, and a gold-fringed black cloak.
The second man, who stood beside the chair, was outfitted similarly, differing only in the two-toned orange color scheme of his cowl and clothing. A pale, waist-long braid hung from the top of his head covering, and he kept his thickly muscled arms folded before him; he stood like a statue beside his superior, maintaining a pose of watchful silence.
McCoy’s eyes were drawn to the glint of iron lit by the firelight; both men sported wickedly sharp-looking three-bladed weapons. They appeared to pay the blades no more attention than a Starfleet officer might his uniform insignia. But the quiet confidence that both men radiated warned McCoy that they probably could put those weapons to lethal effect within the blink of an eye.
Subteer Usaak nodded in acknowledgment to Doctor Wieland, then focused his attention on McCoy. Speaking in a cavernously deep tone, he said, “I am Usaak, chief of the Canyonfolk Tribe and subteer to the Council of the Ten Tribes. I speak for the people of this encampment. At my right hand stands my loyal subchief, Keer.”
Keer looked askance at McCoy. “I see that another has joined your group,” he said.
“Please allow me to present Leonard McCoy of Earth,” Wieland said. “He is recovered from his ordeal in the canyon.”
Star Trek: The Original Series: Seasons of Light and Darkness Page 3
