by Diane Carey
Without answering, Spock lowered gingerly into his chair, ran his fingers over his controls.
Kirk waved over his shoulder for Nordstrom's attention. "Send Starfleet a recording of what we've seen so far. Do it right away."
"Deploying, sir." A crack came out in her voice. She was getting scared.
"Tractor proximity, Captain," Donnier struggled.
"Get it on, Mr. Donnier, don't wait for orders when you know what to do. Keep Kellen from colliding into that ship."
"Aye, s-s—" Donnier didn't get the response out, but he did get the tractor beam on.
The starship hauled back on the tractor beams and Kellen's drifting ship drew up sharply just as its sagging starboard wing grazed the edge of a purple scale that would've cleaved it in half.
"Power astern," Kirk ordered at the right instant.
"Astern." Byers was hypnotized.
Kirk leaned forward. "Let's go, move … don't baby her, Mr. Byers. Throttle up."
He wasn't watching the Klingon ship being drawn away from the Rath. He was watching the Rath.
Would Zennor fire on him?
"Position of the Klingon fleet."
The ensign shook himself and bent over his sensors. "Eight vessels … three completely disabled … one more moving at less than one-quarter power … four others regrouping."
"They actually retreated," McCoy observed. "After just a few minutes."
"How many patrollers left?" Kirk asked.
Chekov squinted into his screen. "Six … seven still functional, sir."
Looking blanched and strained, Spock pressed his wrist to the edge of his console and paused to look at the screen. "A great deal of damage with very few shots."
"Unless we find weakness, we can't deal with that ship under these conditions," Kirk agreed. "Bring her midships, Mr. Byers. Back straight off. I want my intentions clear."
"Aye aye, sir." Byers licked his lips as he worked to equalize the helm while hauling the Klingon vessel, whose damaged systems were still trying to propel it along its last ordered course.
If Kellen would shut down, this would be a lot easier.
"Pull, Byers. Faster."
"Trying, sir, but there's some kind of resistance."
"Yes, the cruiser's automatic drive—"
The petals of the Rath, filling the screen like huge theatrical flats, began to glow with that sickly yellow-lavender electrical presence.
Kirk drew a breath. "Uh-oh … double shields Brace yourselves!"
He turned to say something to Nordstrom, but suddenly the ship heaved up as if in recoil and the night opened up with purple dragons, cutting a blazing wave across the primary hull and straight through the bridge, throwing the captain and the standing crew to the deck in a tangle.
"Overload!" Assistant Engineer Edwards shouted, the first time since coming on the bridge that he'd said anything at all.
Byers shielded his face from sparks launching from his console, then waved at the smoke and shouted at the screen.
"They fired on us! They fired on us right in the middle of a rescue maneuver!"
Smoke boiled across the bridge. Ventilators came on and sucked valiantly. Somehow the onrush of near-death had shaken Byers out of his timidity and made him mad.
Good.
Generally, those two, Byers and Donnier, would be nowhere near the bridge, yet they'd rallied here today, under adverse conditions. Ordinarily in battle Kirk preferred to have his senior crew there, Sulu and Chekov, or Sulu and another navigation specialist, but Sulu was down, Chekov was helping Spock, and Donnier had just caught the bad luck of the draw.
Donnier and Byers would be able to claim having served in the best crew in Starfleet—yes, they were the best, but they were the best at their own specific jobs. Nobody could be the "best" when thrown into somebody else's job. Almost anyone could fake it at the technicals of another position, but there would always be a loss of art. Kirk knew that he could bull and cackle his way around engineering, but that Scott would be a far better captain than Kirk would ever be an engineer. That was why people had specialties, and why the Enterprise was staffed with specialists. The art of the technology.
That was also what they needed today. A little creative art among the technical business. A little sorcery …
Kirk waved at the smoke, motioned McCoy back against the rail so he had something solid to hold on to, and spoke past him to the engineering station, though he couldn't see through the gushing smoke.
"Compensate," he authorized.
"There's a burnout on the crystal triodes, sir."
That was Nordstrom, but it came from the engineering area. She was either helping Edwards or replacing him, if he was down. The curtain of smoke went from the ceiling to the upper deck carpet.
"Compensating," Donnier called from the starboard side, up where Chekov had been. Unable to cough up much volume, he spoke from the science subsystems station, leaving Byers to handle helm and weapons.
Was Chekov down?
Kirk flogged himself for not thinking to overstaff the bridge. With Sulu down, he should've called an all-hands, summoned the main watch, and just let it be a little crowded up here.
Violent lights, shadows, and sparks argued all around and hadn't settled when Zennor's ship turned loose another whipcrack of purple fire.
"Full astern! Byers! Byers!"
He plunged for the helm console, found the chair empty, poked through the smoke for the motive action menu and forced his fingers to tap the impulse generation up to full power.
"Power's wobbly, sir," Edwards reported innocently, as if he didn't notice the ship being pummeled around him.
"We've got to move off. Mr. Scott'll find the power."
The starship bolted again and his stomach went with her. The deck groaned as if in convulsion beneath his hands. A piece of the hull screamed past his face and he swore it grazed him, but it was gone before he could raise a hand to fend it off. The carpet and the deck beneath it slammed him hard and drove his knees into the side of his chair. The chair swiveled and he couldn't hang on. He sprawled to the deck.
Splinters whistled past his ears and speared his shoulders. He buried his head for an instant until the whistling bore off, then grabbed for the sky and caught part of the helm. He dragged himself to one knee, finally to both, and was about to cheer his accomplishment when he made the fatal error of looking up to scan the damage.
He saw Engineer Edwards' red and black form propelled sideways by a vicious eruption at the port console, slam into the bridge rail, and collapse to the deck.
The purple and sulfur twine of energy shined again on the main screen. Zennor's ship basted near-space with another razor of energy, and over Kirk's head—the ceiling exploded.
Chapter Twenty
JIM KIRK waved at the smoke as it piled before him and stung his eyes. Was the tractor beam holding? He couldn't see the forward screen.
He grabbed for the foggy shape of his chair and hit the comm. "Scotty, bridge!"
"Scott here."
"Trouble."
"See it, sir."
"Put everything to the shields and tractor beams. Reduce life-support if you have to, but keep those shields up."
"No priority to the weapons, sir?"
"We can't punch through those hull plates. Just keep the shields up."
"I like it, sir."
"I thought you would, Mr. Scott." He wheeled away, toward starboard. "Mr. Spock?"
From the anterior glow of emergency lights, the blue-blacks of Spock appeared out of the smoldering fabric of the bridge. "Here, Captain."
"Where's Mr. Chekov?"
"On the deck, sir."
"Hurt?" He squinted into the rolling smoke near the service trunks.
"No, sir," Chekov called, looking up from between his arms, which disappeared past the elbows inside one of the trunks. "Radiation wash in the bypass conduits, sir." He stumbled across the English syllables as though he believed he was speaking Russian.
/> Kirk turned, and realized the deck was at an angle. "Are the tractor beams still on? Mr. Donnier, where are you?"
"Here, sir!" Donnier dodged under a puff of sparks near the main screen trunk and landed on both feet.
"Take over assisting Mr. Spock while Mr. Chekov effects repairs. Lieutenant Nordstrom, take navigation and weapons. You're going to have to learn to shoot."
"Coming, sir!"
"Somebody have relief personnel sent to the bridge."
"I'll do it, Captain," McCoy called from the boiling gray mist. "Relief personnel to the bridge. Repeat, relief to the bridge, all stations!"
At once he realized they were all shouting. What was all this noise they were shouting over? The red-alert klaxon was howling, yes, and that god-awful whistle—must be a hull breach somewhere up in the damaged ceiling.
Somebody would pick up on it. Until it was sealed, atmosphere would pour out in a bitter silver funnel into the ice cold of space, and compensators would pump more and more into the bridge so they could keep breathing. The ship was exhaling herself to death to keep them alive and she'd go down to the last quarter centimeter of reserve oxygen before she gave up. She'd sacrifice deck after deck, hoping her crew heard the warnings and evacuated in time. If they didn't, they'd die there while she tried to save the rest of the crew, until failsafe made it all the way to the bridge. The bridge would be the last to be sacrificed. She'd steal from her own guts if that would work.
And it just might. It would buy them time. The bridge had to breathe if the ship was to be saved.
The turbolift wheezed two-thirds open, then jammed. Four bridge relief crewmen poured out, followed by three men in atmospheric suits. One of those carried a collapsible ladder. They went to work on the sparking ceiling while the relief crew dropped into appropriate positions.
Byers was back at the helm. Kirk had no idea what had happened to him, if he'd been knocked silly, if he'd frozen with fear, or what. He was back now.
Two medical orderlies dropped at Edwards' sides while relief personnel manned the engineering stations. Kirk hadn't seen the medics come out of the lift, but then he hadn't paid much attention.
The pair checked Edwards' vitals, then scooped him up and carried him to the lift. The lift wasn't happy about having to close that jammed door and protested with a metallic screech, but then that was done.
"Course, sir?" Byers asked.
"Away from the big ship any way you can do it, Mr. Byers. Ensign, how are you doing on that radiation wash?"
"I think I have a formula, sir," Chekov called as the ship bucked and whined again.
He cursed himself for his trust, his hope. Zennor had lashed out with no sign of regret or hesitation, and with a greater punch than Kirk would've bet on. He'd hoped to maneuver out of the trap, and now he had to fight his way out. He hunched his shoulders and glared at the screen.
"Magnification point five," he called over the whistle of the fans.
Ventilators had cleared the bridge of about sixty percent of the smoke, and he could see the action on the forward screen as it backed off its zoom view. He saw the tractor beams still holding Kellen's crippled ship, and he saw most of Zennor's huge Rath.
He also saw the Klingon fleet moving in again.
"Ship to ship, General Kellen," he said. But no one was at the communications console. He looked around and found McCoy hovering at the starboard steps. "Bones, get back up there and stay there."
"Oh—sorry." The doctor tucked his injured arm against his side and pulled himself back up the tilted deck to the communications station. "Ship to ship …" he muttered as he poked at the controls. "I think this is it. Try it."
"General," Kirk spoke up, "call off your ships."
"Fire! Fire, you coward! My weapons are down! Fire at them!"
"I'm telling you, the disruptor fire is providing power to Zennor and he's hitting us with it. Tell your ships to back off and save their energy. I need time to tow you out of here."
"Thank you for the tow. Now mind your own business."
"All right, but at least shut down your thrusters so we can get out of here. Your ship is providing resistance."
There was no response at all this time.
"General! Damn it." He motioned for McCoy to cut off the communication. Like the patrollers, he was knocking his head against the same kind of brick wall.
"Captain!" Byers called.
Kirk looked at the forward screen again in time to see four scorched patrollers soar past the Enterprise and viciously strafe the Rath, looking completely ridiculous in their total ineffectiveness. The energy they deployed simply washed down the cone-shaped hull and disappeared inside somehow. Damn it, damn it, damn it.
Zennor's ship glowed in retaliation, and Kirk braced to take another hit, but this one shot out in bright rings right where the patrollers were passing and selectively hit them. So the weapons were directional as well as area-wide—either that, or Zennor and his crew were learning as they fought.
"Shouldn't we return fire, Jim?" McCoy asked, sensing the starship would be next. "Isn't there some way?"
"It's a waste of effort. There has to be a weakness."
"I hope you find it."
"I hope so too."
He stepped to the bridge rail, and only now realized he was limping—his hip was hurting. He must've struck it on an edge when he fell. He reached up for McCoy to take his forearm and hoist him out of the center of the command deck, giving the repair crew more room to maneuver as they climbed about inside the ceiling like squirrels in an attic.
Byers ducked out of the way as much as he could, but somehow managed to do it without taking his hands off the helm, shuffling around in front of the console while repair work was done above him.
The repair crew went about their business with a zeal that suggested they were enjoying the terror, for it gave them something to do. Within a couple of minutes, the loud wheezing was reduced to a sorry whistle, then finally to nothing, and the hull breach was sealed.
The ship sighed with relief. Everything suddenly became quiet, as if to feign that nothing was happening.
Between Spock and McCoy, Kirk watched the Klingon patrollers being basted by the Rath's selective hits. The patrollers shuddered and veered off, but one of them veered in the wrong direction.
"It's gonna hit!" Byers gulped, only an instant before impact.
The patroller decimated itself into the pleats of the Rath. The body of the ship exploded first, leaving for a terrible moment only the wings flying through space, unattached, before they too were caught by the points of the scales and the plasma inside them blew up.
"That's it!" Kirk said, and the sound was much softer than the thought. Only McCoy and Spock heard him.
Spock looked at him, but didn't have to ask.
"Look at the hull plates," Kirk said, pointing. "They're bent."
Seemingly impregnable moments ago, the fifty-foot plates of Zennor's ship were scored and misshapen where the patrollers had stricken them, but most important, they were peeled back several feet—several meters even.
And under there, he could see the faintest shimmer of bare hull.
Bare unshielded hull.
"That's it, that's our target … there it is—"
He started to step down to the command arena again, when, overhead, one of the repair crew fell out and landed on his back across the command chair, then rolled off, stunned.
Kirk picked him up roughly, then looked up. "Come down from there! Is that secure?"
"Yes, sir!" another repairman called as he and another one scurried down and folded the ladder.
"Then get out of here."
"Aye, sir!"
He stepped up to his chair, littered now with insulation crumbs and sharp bits of ceiling material that hadn't been cleaned off yet. Eventually somebody would come up here and vacuum it up. For now, he would sit on chips and fuzz.
"Sir, General Kellen's ship is no longer under thrust," Spock reported. "We are fr
ee to tow."
"I don't want to tow him anymore. Bring him out behind us and drop him."
"Sir?"
"And bring the tractor beams to bear on the forward points of those hull plates. Pick up as many as you can without reducing tractor capacity. Then I want to heel back and peel those plates up on whatever they have for hinges."
Spock thought about this for a moment, then said, "May I ask your intentions?"
"Yes, you can. We're going to fire straight down into the cracks."
The bridge crew blinked at him for a moment.
He glanced at each of them, waved his hands, and snapped, "Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir!" Byers said, and licked a bleeding lip.
"Aye aye, sir!" Donnier nodded furiously.
"Complying," Spock responded. He brushed crumbs of hull material off his console, then looked again at Kirk and waited for the order.
"Concentrate three-quarters from the aft end of the ship. I want to target the area of Zennor's original ship. That's where I think the command center still is."
"Aye aye, sir."
"I'm ready, sir."
"Ready also, sir."
Kirk settled into his chair, on top of the chips and the fuzz and the grit. "Haul away, Mr. Spock. Mr. Donnier … prepare to open fire."
"I'm ready, s-sir."
"Fire."
As the tractor beams strained and the impulse engines thrust furiously to pull back the scales of the Rath, one at a time, the ship's volleys of phaser fire opened up the bared hull between the sheared-back plates.
Cutting like a surgeon's lasers into the underskin of the Rath, the phasers immediately gave Kirk gratification. Sparks, hull matter, and atmospheric gases spewed past the starship and out into space.
"Shields are fluctuating, sir," Chekov reported. "The tractor beam is compromising deflector power consumption."
"We don't have any options, Mr. Chekov. Maintain."
Zennor's ship let loose another whip of glowing power, thudding the Enterprise viciously, but this wasn't the time to do anything but lie close and take the heat.
The tractor beams howled now, drawing power and arguing with the shields.
"Shut down aft shields," Kirk instructed. "Forward shields only. Keep pulling … full traction … good … maintain fire."
