by 09(lit)
McCoy said, "Jim, is the whole planet composed of this substance covered over by top soil?"
Kirk snapped off his phaser. "Lieutenant Sulu, it might help explain this place if we knew exactly what this rock is. I know it is Lieutenant D'Amato's field- but see what you can find out."
Sulu unslung his tricorder. As they watched him stoop over the first excavation, McCoy said, "I guess a tomb of rocks is the best we can provide for D'Amato." They were collecting stones for the cairn when Kirk straightened up. "I wonder if the Transporter officer on the Enterprise is dead, Bones."
"You mean that woman we saw may have killed him?"
Kirk looked around him. "Someone killed D'Amato." He bent again to the work of assembling stones. Then, silently, they dislodged D'Amato's body from the crevice. When it had been hidden under the heaped stones, they all stood for a moment, heads bowed. Sulu shivered slightly. "It looks so lonely there."
"It would be worse if he had company," McCoy said.
Sulu flushed. "Doctor, how can you joke about it? Poor D'Amato, what a terrible way to die."
"There aren't really any good ways, Lieutenant Sulu. Nor am, I joking. Until we know what killed him, none of us is safe."
"Right, Bones," Kirk said. "We'd better stick to-gether, figure this out, and devise a defense against it. Is it possible the rock itself has life?"
Sulu said, "You remember on Janus Six the silicon creatures that-"
McCoy cut in. "But our instruments recorded them. They registered as life forms."
"We could be dealing with intelligent beings who are able to shield their presence."
Sulu stared at Kirk's thoughtful face. "Beings intel-ligent enough to have destroyed the Enterprise?"
"That's our trouble, Lieutenant. All we've got is questions. Questions-and no answers."
In his apparent safety on the Enterprise, Scott, too, was wrestling with a question to which there seemed to be no sane answer. His sense of suspense grew until he finally pushed the intercom button in his Engineer-ing section.
"Spock here, Mr. Scott."
"Mr. Spock, the ship feels wrong."
"Feels, Mr. Scott?"
Both troubled and embarrassed, Scott fumbled for words. "I-I know it doesn't... make sense, sir. Instrumentation reads correct-but the feel is wrong. It's something I... don't know how to say..."
"Obviously, Mr. Scott. I suggest you avoid emo-tionalism and simply keep your readings 'correct'. Spock out."
But he hesitated just the same. Finally, he crossed over to his sensor board.
Down in Engineering, Scott, frowning, studied his control panel before turning to an assistant. "Watkins, check the bypass valves for the matter-anti-matter re-action chamber. Be sure there's no overheating."
"But, Mr. Scott, the board shows-"
"I didn't ask you to check the board, lad!"
"Yes, sir." Watkins wiped smudge off his hands. Then, crossing the engine room, he entered the small alcove that housed the matter-anti-matter reaction-control unit. He was nearing its display panel when he saw the woman standing in the corner. Startled, he said, "Who are you? What are you doing here?"
She smiled a little sadly. "My name is not im-portant. Yours is Watkins, John B. Engineer, grade four."
He eyed her. "You seem to know all about me. Very flattering. What department are you? I've never seen that uniform."
"Show me this unit, please. I wish to learn."
Suspicion tightened in him. He covered it quickly. "This is the matter-anti-matter integrator control. That's the cutoff switch."
"Incorrect," she said. "On the contrary, that is the emergency overload bypass valve which engages almost instantaneously. A wise precaution."
Frightened now, Watkins backed away from her until he was stopped by the mass of the machine. She was smiling lie sad little smile again. "Wise," she said, "considering the fact it takes the anti-matter nacelles little longer to explode once the magnetic valves fail." She paused. "I'm for you, Mr. Watkins."
"Watkins! What's taking you so long?" Scott shouted.
The woman extended a hand as though to repress his reply. But Watkins yelled, "Sir, there's a strange woman here who knows the entire plan of the ship!"
Scott had raced across the Engine Room to the re-action chamber. "Watkins, what the de'il-?" As he rushed in, the woman, backed against a wall, suddenly seemed to flip sideways, her image a thin, two-dimensional line. Then she vanished.
Scott looked down at the alcove's floor. His look of annoyance changed to one of shock. "Poor, poor laddie," he whispered. Then he was stumbling to the nearest intercom button. "Scott to bridge," he said, his voice shaking.
"Spock here, Mr. Scott."
"My engineering assistant is dead, sir."
There was a pause before Spock said, "Do you know how he died, Mr. Scott?"
The quiet voice steadied Scott. "I didn't see it happen. His last words... warned about some strange woman..."
Spock reached for his loud speaker. "Security alert! All decks! Woman intruder! Extremely dangerous!"
Sulu had finally managed to identify the basic material of the planet. Looking up from his tricorder, he said, "It's an alloy, Captain. Diburnium and osmium. It could not have evolved naturally."
Kirk nodded. "Aside from momentary fluctuations on our instruments, this planet has no magnetic field. And the age of this rock adds up to only a few million years. In that time no known process could have evolved its kind of plant life."
"Jim, are you suggesting that this is an artificial planet?"
"If it's artificial," Sulu said, "where are the people who made it? Why don't we see them?"
"It could be hollow," Kirk told him. "Or they could be shielded against our sensor probes." He looked around him at the somber landscape. "It's getting dark; get some rest. In the morning we'll have to find water and food quickly-or we're in for a very un-pleasant stay."
"While the stay lasts," McCoy said grimly.
"Sir, I'll take the first watch."
"Right, Mr. Sulu. Set D'Amato's tricorder for auto-matic distress on the chance that a spaceship might come by." He stretched out on the ground and Mc-Coy crouched down beside him.
"Jim, if the creators of this planet were going to live inside it, why would they bother to make an atmosphere and evolve plant life on its surface?"
"Bones, get some rest."
McCoy nodded glumly.
Spock wasn't feeling so cheerful, either. Though Sickbay had reported the cellular disruption of Wat-kins's body to be the same that had killed the Trans-porter Ensign, its doctors could not account for its cause. "My guess is as good as yours," M'Benga had told him.
Guesses, Spock thought, when what is needed are facts. He spoke sharply to M'Benga. "The power of this intruder to disrupt every cell in a body... com-bined with the the almost inconceivable power to hurl the Enterprise such a distance, speak of a very high culture-and a very great danger."
Scott spoke. "You mean one of the people who threw us a thousand light years away from that planet is on board this ship, killing our crew?"
"That would be the reasonable assumption, Mr. Scott."
Scott pondered. "Yes. Watkins must have been mur-dered." He paused. "I'd sent him to check the matter-anti-matter reactor. There are no exposed circuits there. It can't have been anything he touched."
"If there are more of those beings on that planet, Mr. Scott, the Captain and the others are in very grave danger."
Danger. Kirk stirred restlessly in his sleep. Near him the tricorder beeped its steady distress signal. Sulu, on guard, shoulders hunched against the cold, felt the ground under him begin to tremble. The strange light flared through the dark. Kirk and McCoy sat up.
"Lieutenant Sulu?"
"It's all right, Captain. Just another one of those quakes."
"What was that light?" McCoy said.
"Lightning, probably. Get some rest, sir."
They lay back. Sulu got up to peer into the dark-ness around
him, patrolling a wider circle. He ap-proached the beeping tricorder, looked down at it, and was moving on when the signal stopped. Sulu whirled -and saw the woman. He went for his phaser, pulling it in one swift movement.
"I am unarmed, Mr. Sulu," she said.
Hand on phaser, he advanced toward her cautiously. She stood perfectly still, her face blurred by the dark-ness.
"Who are you?" he said.
That is not important. You are Lieutenant Sulu; you were born on the planet Earth-and you are helmsman of the Enterprise."
"Where did you get that information?" he de-manded. "Do you live on this planet?"
"I am from here."
Then the planet was hollow. Rage suddenly shook him. "Who killed Lieutenant D'Amato?"
She didn't speak, and Sulu snapped, "All right! My Captain will want to talk to you!" He gestured with his phaser. "That way. Move!"
The melodious voice said, "You do not understand. I have come to you."
"What do you want?"
"To-touch you..."
He was in no mood for her touching. "One of our men has been killed! We are marooned here-and our ship has disappeared!" Her features were growing clearer. "You-I recognize you! You were in the Enter-prise!"
"Not I. Another." She started toward him.
"Keep back!"
But she continued her move to him. He lifted his phaser. "Stop! Or I'll fire!"
She maintained her approach. "Stop!" he cried. "I don't want to kill a woman!"
She was close to him now. He fired, vaporizing the ground before her. She still came on. Sulu turned his phaser to full charge-and fired again. The beam struck her, but made no more impression on her than it had made on the rock. He backed away, but stumbled over a stone behind him. The phaser skittered across the hard surface of the planet. He scrambled up-but she was on top of him, her hand on his shoulder. He leaped clear, screaming in agony. Then he fell to the ground, his face contorted, screams tearing from his throat. The woman reached for him, her arms outstretched.
"Hold it!"
Kirk, phaser aimed, had interposed himself between them. The woman hesitated, startled.
"Who are you?" Kirk snapped.
"I am for Lieutenant Sulu."
Sulu was clutching his shoulder, groaning. "Phasers won't stop her, Captain... don't let her touch you... it's how D'Amato died. It's... like being blown apart..."
The woman moved to go around Kirk. Again, he blocked her way to Sulu. "Please," she said. "I must. I am for Lieutenant Sulu."
McCoy had joined them. "She's mad!" he cried.
"Bones, take care of Sulu." Kirk eyed the woman, her dark loveliness, her misty, dreamlike state. He had to fight his mounting horror as he recognized her. "Please, please," she said again. "I must touch him."
Once more she advanced-and once more Kirk shielded Sulu with his body. They collided. Her out-stretched arms were around his neck. He felt nothing but revulsion. Shoving her away, he said, "Why can you destroy others-and not me?'
She looked at him, her eyes tortured. "I don't want to destroy. I don't want to..."
"Who are you? Why are you trying to kill us?"
"Only Sulu. I wish you no harm, Kirk. We are- much alike. Under the circumstances-" She broke off.
"Are there men on this planet?" Kirk demanded.
"I must touch him."
"No."
She stepped back. Then she flipped sideways, leav-ing only a line that thinned-and disappeared.
Kirk stared at the empty space. "Did you see that, Bones? Is this a ghost planet?"
"All I know is that thing almost made a ghost of Sulu! His shoulder where she touched him-its cells are disrupted, exploded from within. If she'd got a good grip..."
"Why? It's true we must seem like intruders here, but if she reads our minds, she must know we mean no harm. Why the killing, Bones?"
Sulu looked up at him. "Captain, how can such people be? Such evil? And she's-she's so beauti-ful..."
"Yes," he said slowly. "I noticed..."
Spock had changed the red alert to an increase of security guards. Sweep after sweep had failed to show evidence of any intruder. Uhura, bewildered, turned to him.
"But how did she get off the ship, Mr. Spock?
"Presumably the same way she got on, Lieutenant."
"Yes, sir." She spoke again, anxiously. "Mr. Spock, what are the chances of the Captain and the others being alive?"
"We're not engaged in gambling, Lieutenant. We are proceeding in the logical way to return as fast as possible to the place they were last seen. It is the reasonable method to ascertain whether or not they are still alive."
Radha spoke from where she was monitoring her station's instruments. "Mr. Spock, speed is increased to warp eight point eight."
He crossed hastily to the command chair. "Bridge to Engineering," he said into the intercom.
"Scott here, sir. I see it. It's a power surge. I'm working on it. Suggest we reduce speed until we locate the trouble."
"Very well Mr. Scott." He turned to Radha. "Reduce speed to warp seven."
"Aye, sir. Warp seven." Then, as she looked at her board, her eyes widened. "Mr. Spock! Our speed has increased to warp eight point nine and still climbing!"
Spock pushed the intercom button. "Bridge to Scott. Negative effect on power reduction, Mr. Scott. Speed is still increasing."
Scott, down in the matter-anti-matter reaction chamber, looked at the unit that had witnessed Wat-kins's death. "Aye, Mr. Spock," he said slowly. "And I've found out why. The emergency bypass control valve for the matter-anti-matter integrator is fused- completely useless. The engines are running wild. There's no way to get at them. We should reach maximum overload in fifteen minutes."
Spock said, "I calculate fourteen point eight seven minutes, Mr. Scott."
The voice from Engineering had desperation in it. "Those few seconds won't make much difference, sir. Because you, I, and the rest of this crew will no longer be here to argue about it. This ship is going to blow up and nothing in the universe can stop it."
Around Spock, faces had gone blank with shock.
Sulu's pain had begun to ease. McCoy, still working on his shoulder, looked up at Kirk. "There's a layer of necrotic tissue, subcutaneous, a few cells thick. A nor-mal wound should heal quickly. But if it isn't, if this is an infection..."
"You mean your viruses?" Kirk said.
"It couldn't be! Not so quickly!"
"She just touched me, sir," Sulu said. "How could it happen so fast?"
"She touched the Transporter Ensign. He collapsed immediately. Then she got to D'Amato and we saw what happened to him." Kirk looked down at Sulu. "Why are you alive, Lieutenant?"
"Captain, I'm very grateful for the way it turned out. Thank you for all you did."
"Jim, what kind of power do they wield, anyway?"
"The power, apparently, to totally disrupt biological cell structure."
"Why didn't she kill you?"
"She's not through yet, Bones."
Spock had joined Scott in the matter-anti-matter chamber. As the Engineer rose from another examina-tion of the unit, he shook his head. "It's useless. There's no question it was deliberate."
"Sabotage," Spock said.
"Aye-and a thorough job. The system's foolproof. Whoever killed Watkins sabotaged this."
"You said it's been fused, Mr. Scott. How?"
"That's what worries me. It's fused all right-but it would take the power of the ship's main phaser banks to have done it."
"Interesting," Spock mused.
"I find nothing interesting in the fact we're about to blow up, sir!" Scott was glaring at Spock.
The Vulcan didn't appear to notice it. "No," he agreed mildly. "But the method is extremely interest-ing, Mr. Scott."
"Whoever did this must still be loose in the ship! I fail to understand why you canceled the red alert."
"A force able to fling us a thousand light years away and yet manage to sabotage our main energy s
ource will not be waiting around to be taken into custody." He put the result of his silent musings into words. "As I recall the pattern of fuel flow, there is an access tube, is there not, that leads into the matter-antimatter reaction chamber?"
