STAR TREK: Enterprise - Shockwave

by Paul Ruditis (Novelization)

  “So what kind of greeting should we expect from the Paraagans? Are there any ceremonial customs we need to be briefed on?” Archer asked as they made their way to the launch bay. The main level of the bay was up one deck, but [13] they could get to the shuttlepod just as easily by going through the lower level on E-deck.

  “While the Paraagans as a race do observe a number of ceremonial customs,” T’Pol explained as they continued their way around the corridors in the outer rim of the deck, “the colony has eschewed some of those customs. Their society has developed more of a ... nonconformist attitude.”

  “Sounds like my kind of people,” Trip said.

  “There are no ritual greetings to my knowledge,” T’Pol concluded, ignoring that last comment.

  Archer nodded to a passing crewman. “You know, we should really consider bringing some kind of gift from Starfleet in these situations. We might want to design some kind of commemorative souvenir that is indicative of Earth culture.”

  “How ’bout one of them night-lights in the shape of Zefram Cochrane they sell in the gift shops in the Embarcadero,” Trip suggested with a laugh. “Kids just love those things.”

  Archer chuckled at the idea as well, knowing it was purely intended as a joke. “That’s not exactly what I had in mind.”

  “Not all races appreciate the custom of exchanging gifts,” T’Pol reminded him as they reached the launch bay. “Some people may see it as an insult, no matter what the gift.”

  “Even so, I hate going places empty-handed.” Archer tapped a button to open the hatch. “Maybe I’ll discuss it with Admiral Forrest during our next briefing.”

  [14] “If you insist,” T’Pol replied as they entered the launch bay.

  He had gotten used to T’Pol’s tone of disapproving acquiescence; he’d heard it so many times before. At least I’ve been hearing it a lot less lately, he thought as they climbed up to the main level.

  “The shuttle’s ready for departure, Captain.” Lieutenant Malcolm Reed’s head popped out the hatch upon hearing their footsteps approaching. “I’ve completed the preflight.”

  “Good job, Malcolm,” Archer replied, stepping into Shuttlepod One along with Trip and T’Pol. He was always pleased when his ship ran like a well-oiled machine. It was a testament to his own abilities that his hand-picked crew always functioned in top form, especially considering they had departed Earth far earlier than they had planned and, as a result, had been playing catch-up for months. Having the shuttle ready for departure by the time he stepped into the launch bay was what Archer expected of his tactical officer. Enterprise was easily becoming the example of what a Starfleet ship should be.

  Pulling the hatch shut behind them, Reed took his seat at the helm, making final preparations to launch as Enterprise hovered in orbit. The planet was a swirling mass of blue and green—somewhat unexpected for a world that was a mining colony.

  From the underbelly of the ship, the bay doors slowly opened and Shuttlepod One drop-launched into the cold expanse of space. Reed fired the engines and began the slow and deliberate descent toward the planet. As they [15] approached the atmosphere, sunlight streamed through the pod’s ports.

  Working judiciously at the helm, Reed was concentrating on the procedures for entering the planet’s atmosphere. “This should take a bit longer than usual.”

  “It wouldn’t be very polite to ignite their atmosphere,” Archer casually observed, intentionally concealing any tone of concern in his voice. “When are you supposed to close the plasma ducts?”

  Focusing on both his captain’s question and the task at hand, Reed continued to work the helm. “The protocols said fifty kilometers, but to be on the safe side, I’m going to lock them off at about seventy-five.” With a few more buttons Reed confirmed that the plasma ducts were closed and locked. Going over procedures in his head, he double-checked his own work, knowing the importance of the calculations.

  As Reed continued working at the helm, Archer knew it was best not to distract the lieutenant, so he busied himself by mentally preparing his opening greeting to the Paraagans. At the same time T’Pol moved up to speak with him on that very same subject.

  Taking the jumpseat beside Archer, T’Pol expressed her concern. “Although the matriarchal elements of the culture have diminished, it might be best if I were to ask ...”

  But she never finished the sentence. A series of blinding flashes of light burst through the ports, illuminating the compact shuttlepod, followed by the sounds of a massive explosion.

  [16] Archer grabbed for a handhold as the shuttle was rocked hard by a massive shockwave. He watched his crew go flying as the ship was buffeted by the explosion, and he could feel it flipping end over end.

  “Report!” he yelled, but knew it was pointless. Reed was no longer attending to the helm, as he had been flung to the side.

  The ship tumbled through space and Archer heard a muted thud that he could only assume was one of his crew making hard contact with some part of the ship interior. His senses were assaulted by the sights and sounds of the out-of-control pod as his mind tried to fathom what was going on.

  Outside the small vessel a titanic explosion expanded in all directions for kilometers. It began in the heavens as the very air around the shuttle caught fire and spread down to the globe. Flames plumed off the land and spread faster than any wildfire could ever move as the blaze quickly covered the entire world.

  Once the blast subsided and the smoke cleared, the swirling blues and greens of the planet were gone—replaced only by scorched and dead land. The ground continued to burn in patches everywhere, looking like small fires from space, but in reality each covered kilometers and kilometers of barren expanse.

  Chapter 2

  The Enterprise bridge crew sat in stunned silence.

  They had front-row seats for the holocaust as they witnessed it through the main viewscreen. The explosion seemed to emanate from the shuttlepod and spread through the planet in a matter of seconds, destroying everything in its path. For a moment the entire planet looked like a giant fireball as the shuttlepod was flung through space and off the screen.

  Ensign Hoshi Sato ignored the instruments at her station, unable to tear her eyes from the viewscreen. This was exactly the kind of horror the communications officer had imagined in her once frequent nightmares associated with space travel. It had been months since she had let her fears overwhelm her in such a manner, but it was understandable at the moment. All those people, she thought. Shaking off the image of herself amid the flames, Hoshi realized there was a job to do.

  [18] “Enterprise to Shuttlepod One,” Hoshi said urgently into the com. “Captain Archer, please respond.”

  At the helm Mayweather was slightly slower to respond, still stunned by what they had just observed. “Did you see that?”

  Hoshi knew that, unlike herself, Ensign Travis Mayweather had spent much of his life in space. He thought of the empty void as home and had probably never witnessed such a horrific event or even imagined it could happen. She could certainly understand his being momentarily frozen as his safe haven turned into a living nightmare.

  But Hoshi currently didn’t have the time or ability to talk him through it. Instead, she checked her consoles for information on the pod. “The shuttles attitude isn’t right.”

  “I’m coming around.” Mayweather snapped into action, turning the ship as he prepared for the rescue. “Bring the grappler online.”

  Around them, the rest of the bridge crew started moving as they tore themselves away from the horrible image of the burning planet and took up their roles in the rescue mission. At least, Hoshi hoped it was still a rescue mission and not just one for recovery.

  The shuttlepod came back into view as Enterprise made the careful turn in its direction. With the burning planet now off the viewscreen, Hoshi could direct her full attention to the pod as it slowly rolled through the scorched atmosphere.

  “Enterprise to Shuttlepod One,” Hoshi tried again. �
�Come in.”

  Mayweather glanced at her, silently asking if she heard [19] anything, but she just shook her head in response. Hitting a few more controls on her console, Hoshi was able to confirm that the grappler was ready.

  Mayweather took the grappler controls. “Tell me when,” he said to Hoshi.

  “We’re almost there,” she said. Her instruments indicated that the shuttlepod was rolling closer to the ship. The movement would have to be precise. If the grappling arms missed their target, precious time would be wasted retracting them and firing again. Even worse, if they hit the pod at a wrong angle, rather than latching on, the grapplers could ricochet off the vessel, sending it tumbling in another direction and doing even more damage to the already battered team aboard.

  Endless seconds passed.

  “Hoshi.” Mayweather’s tension could be felt across the bridge.

  “Not yet,” she said, never removing her attention from the panel in front of her. “Now!”

  Mayweather hit the controls, and the ship fired two grappling devices from beneath the saucer. Slicing through space, the long arms shot out toward Shuttlepod One. Upon contact, the magnetic locking clamps took hold one at a time.

  The shuttle stopped its free fall through space. With the clamps locked on, Mayweather slowly reeled the shuttle in, guiding it back toward the ship.

  In the limited time Hoshi had spent on Enterprise herself, she knew that to consider space to be “dead” was [20] ridiculous. The void surrounding them was teeming with its own form of life, and Mayweather’s experience with the cosmos was beneficial to the precise movements he was now required to make. It looked easy enough to just reel the shuttle in, but she knew that looks could be deceiving.

  “Bridge to sickbay,” Hoshi called into the com, momentarily taking her eyes off the screen.

  “Phlox here,” came the doctors response.

  “We need a medical team sent to the launch bay.”

  “On the way.”

  Hoshi knew the captain would want a report the moment he saw her—if he was even conscious, or alive. She pushed that thought out of her mind, knowing she had a job to do. As Mayweather completed the retrieval of the Shuttlepod One, she turned her full attention to her own instruments, scanning the planet for signs of ... anything.

  It took mere seconds for the information to come up, but what she saw still managed to shock her despite what she’d witnessed on the viewscreen. Refusing to believe the computer, she ran the scans once more, hoping for something positive in the jumble of frightful data. She needed something good to tell the captain—something for the crew to latch on to in what she knew was about to become their most difficult challenge since leaving Earth.

  Once more, the information came up on her monitor confirming what she already knew. Hoshi ran the scans again ... and again.

  * * *

  [21] Gathered with the senior staff in sickbay, Archer could hear his crew speaking to him, but he was not quite clear on what they were saying. T’Pol and Reed had just gotten off their biobeds, shaken but physically fine. Dr. Phlox was hovering over an unconscious Trip, who had to be carried from the shuttlepod. Archer’s worries, however, were not for his friend at the moment. He could only focus on what Hoshi had just reported to him. How could it be true? he asked himself. What have we done?

  “I closed both plasma ducts,” Reed insisted, slamming his hand on a biobed in anger and regret. “I’m certain of it.”

  Archer knew that the lieutenant needed his captain’s strength and reassurances, but at the moment he had none to give. Instead, he could only concentrate on Hoshi, hoping that he had heard her wrong. “Are you sure there’s nothing left?”

  “We could see the colony at full magnification, sir.” Her voice was shaky. “The ground is scorched for at least a hundred kilometers in every direction.”

  “Could one of the dampeners have been malfunctioning?” he asked Reed, hoping for some kind of explanation for the tragic event. He was aware of the fact that there was a slightly accusatory tone in his voice, but he could not help it. We did this, he thought.

  “I closed both ducts,” Reed replied, taking a defensive posture. “Any kind of malfunction would’ve triggered an alarm—two alarms. There are backups to prevent these kinds of accidents. The ducts were closed!”

  And yet, the entire colony has been destroyed. The [22] unspoken words echoed through the captain’s mind. He knew that nothing could be done from sickbay, but he wanted as much information as possible immediately, and thus far the crew wasn’t providing what he needed.

  “This is no time to be placing blame.” T’Pol positioned herself between Archer and Reed, trying to break through the heightened emotions of the human crewmembers. “A thorough investigation should explain what happened.”

  Turning to Phlox, she moved over to the biobed in which Trip was still lying unconscious, attempting to switch the subject to one in which they could have an immediate answer. “How is he?”

  “He has a mild concussion, but should be fine,” the Denobulan doctor reported while continuing the examination.

  But Archer could not be swayed from the topic at hand. “Have you tried hailing the colony?” he pressed Hoshi for more answers. “There has to be someone down there.”

  “Sir, I tried to explain.” Hoshi’s voice grew firm, not wanting to have to hear herself say the words again. She spoke clearly and concisely. “There’s nothing left. No buildings. No trees. No people.”

  “That’s impossible.” His shock would not let him believe what she was saying. “There were thirty-six hundred colonists.”

  Silence hung in the air for seconds, until it was broken by the sound of Trip’s belabored breathing. The commander was slowing coming around as the entire senior staff hovered around him.

  [23] “Commander Tucker?” Dr. Phlox asked as his patients eyes flitted open, trying to focus on the bright room and looming shapes surrounding the biobed.

  Archer immediately moved to his friend’s side.

  “Wha-what happened?” he asked groggily.

  “We don’t know,” Archer replied, then added with steel resolve in his voice, “but we’re going to find out.”

  Archer had never before heard the ship so quiet. As he passed through the corridors, nearly every member of his crew was focused on the task of analyzing the information gathered from the Paraagan colony. The relaxed atmosphere he had experienced just a few hours ago was gone. The mood was now that of quiet determination and mournful silence. The captain knew that he should have been arranging some kind of memorial for the lives lost in the cataclysm. But how do you mourn a colony of people whom you’ve never met? he wondered. How do you ache for lives that you ended?

  He pushed the last thought out of his mind. The facts had not come in yet, and he refused to blame himself for the lives lost. There will be time to mourn later, he thought. Now is the time to act. But the nagging guilt in his mind was preventing that, and slowly beginning to overpower him. He knew that he needed to be there for his crew, but with no new information, the job was becoming increasingly difficult.

  Departments were sifting through the scans and putting together reports for his review, but no one was working fast enough for him. As Archer stepped into the turbolift, [24] he couldn’t help but think that no matter what the reports said, they would never bring back the dead colonists. There was one other undeniable fact: that no matter who or what was the cause of the catastrophe, as the captain of the Enterprise, it was he who was ultimately responsible. He tried to push all thoughts from his mind as he rode the lift. The captain prepared himself to receive the answers he had been awaiting.

  The turbolift doors opened, and Archer was deposited onto the silent bridge. Each of his senior staff was at his stations, including a now fully conscious Commander Tucker. Moving to T’Pol with quiet desperation, he willed her to have the information he needed. She was the least emotional member of the crew, and he hoped that her straightforward approach to t
he data would give him the strength he needed.

  “Have you finished the diagnostics?” he asked flatly.

  “I’ve analyzed six of the pod’s sensor logs,” she replied, betraying no emotion over the horror they had apparently caused. “I have two left.”

  That was not the response he was looking for. “Well, get them done. You’ve had three hours.”

  As the science officer continued her work, Archer took the slow walk across the bridge to his friend Trip, knowing that he would have some results.

  “What about the Enterprise sensor logs?” he pressed. “They must have recorded how much tetrazine there was in the atmosphere. Was the concentration greater than the Paraagans specified? Was it present at higher altitudes than it was supposed to be?”

  [25] “That’s the weird part, sir,” Trip said with a confused expression. “The tetrazine levels were less than three parts per million. That’s half what the protocols specified.”

  But Archer didn’t want more questions. He wanted answers. “What about the point of ignition?” he asked, turning to Reed. He was running out of crew to satisfy his inquiries.

  The lieutenant tapped several buttons at his station to reconfirm the information. “The flash point was directly beneath the shuttle, sir. It seems to have originated at the starboard plasma duct.” Reed sounded betrayed by the information he was detailing, but he reported what the computer indicated nonetheless.

  “A plasma duct you’re certain was closed,” Archer said with an edge. His words came out somewhere between question and an acquisition.

  “Every log on the shuttle indicates that both ducts were sealed and locked,” T’Pol insisted, more to keep the facts straight than out of a need to come to the lieutenant’s aide.

  “Then you’d better start reexamining those logs.” Archer addressed the entire bridge crew, fighting back anger. “Because something doesn’t add up here.”

  Don’t screw this up.

  Those words had popped into Archer’s mind numerous times over the course of their mission, but nowhere near the amount of times they had in the last three hours. It was the last order Forrest had given to Archer on the day he had accepted the challenge to ready Enterprise and depart for the Klingon homeworld ten months ago. Archer [26] knew at the time that the admiral had meant the comment only as a lighthearted warning, since both men were well aware of the importance of the mission.