Genesis Force

by John Vornholt

  “I came here to help,” said Leah evenly. “The planet is ringed with these boxes, but I haven’t seen anyone get out of one for days.”

  Alexander nodded. “Ever since . . . the accident.”

  “But aren’t the Aluwnans getting ahead of themselves?” she asked. “They’re filling the planet with transporter booths when they don’t even know if the survivors are still alive.”

  “I’ve been told that they’re working on that, too.” The young Klingon lifted his hands helplessly. “What do you want me to do, barge in there and insist that she see you, when she’s kicked out everybody else?”

  “That would do for a start,” answered Brahms. “I could offer her something.”

  “What?” asked Alexander doubtfully.

  “Asylum,” answered Leah Brahms. “Even if you find her guilty of the murder of Overseer Tejharet, I could offer her asylum in the Federation. Or perhaps this rescue effort will fail, and she wouldn’t mind a change of scene.”

  Alexander furrowed his bony brow at the diminutive scientist. “You could do that? You would do that?”

  “Yes, to both questions. My boss, Admiral Nechayev, could authorize it. I believe we owe these people something, especially Marla Karuw. If they won’t take our help, perhaps they’ll take our charity.”

  “Come,” said Alexander, heading for the door of the transporter room. “I’ll let you relay that message.”

  The laboratory was only a few doors down the corridor of the royal yacht, and the lab was locked until Worf’s son identified himself. Reluctantly, a weary female voice said, “Yes, come in, Alexander.”

  They entered the laboratory, which looked more like a factory with a variety of parts, blue metal enclosures, and circuitry spread all over the place. The only people present were three Aluwnans, one older female and one female who was quite young, plus a wild-haired male who looked like a typical mad scientist. All three stared at her as if she were a bug-eyed monster stepping off a flying saucer.

  “Not you again,” muttered Marla Karuw. “Alexander, I told you that I didn’t want any onlookers or guards.”

  “I’m not a guard,” answered Leah, bristling but maintaining her calm. “I came here to help you, but I understand you don’t want our help. So I’m willing to offer you something else you might want.”

  “I only want to get on with my work,” snapped Karuw, turning her back on the visitor.

  “I’m here to offer you asylum in the Federation,” answered Brahms, ignoring the snub. “No matter what happens here, no matter what happens in the murder investigation, you will be welcome to spend the rest of your days on a Federation world, conducting whatever research you care to conduct.”

  The former regent turned slowly to face the newcomer. “Do you think I need asylum? Do you think I even need the Federation?”

  “Well,” said Leah, “you asked us for help many days ago, and we arrived too late to give it to you. Because you shouldered the burden by yourself, I’m trying to make it up to you.”

  “And what’s your connection again?” asked Karuw angrily. “Aren’t you one of those scientists who helped develop Genesis?”

  Leah met her gaze and answered, “No, I’m one of those scientists who lost her husband, all her friends, her homeworld, and everything I hold dear when the wave wiped out the planet of Seran. We didn’t save nearly the number of people you saved—we had two survivors from our entire population, and I was one of them. If you want to be noble and pretend that this didn’t happen anywhere but Aluwna, that’s fine . . . but it’s also wrong.”

  Karuw’s tough exterior cracked a bit, and she lowered her head. “I’m sorry. You had no warning?”

  “None,” answered Brahms. “And for the first three days, I was the only one warning anybody. I was at the beginning, and you were at the end—and there were a lot more in between.”

  Marla Karuw waved to the Klingon, who had remained silent and respectful during this conversation. “Thank you, Alexander. This woman is welcome to stay with us . . . for a while.”

  Looking relieved, the Klingon nodded and slipped quietly out the door.

  After he was gone, Leah Brahms said, “I noticed that you haven’t rescued anyone from the satellites in a few days . . . ever since the transporter incident. If you’ll recall, I was there.”

  Wincing, Karuw rubbed the rows of eyebrows lining her troubled brow. “Yes, we’ve been afraid to try it again, until we’re ready to bring everyone down. Time is running out, and we’re not sure how badly the fungus has spread along the bioneural network. It’s my theory that if we can minimize transfers and bring everyone down quickly, we can avoid the worst side effects.”

  “Well, I’ve got a theory, too,” said Brahms. “I presume you’ve still got the satellite that malfunctioned?”

  Karuw nodded. “Yes. After we checked it out and found out about the fungus, we returned it to orbit.”

  “Good,” said the human. “We’ve got a million of those giant slug creatures down on the planet, and we could certainly spare one or two for testing purposes. They’re about the size and weight of a humanoid. I say we beam one of them into the pattern buffers on the affected satellite—or any satellite you want to test—then beam it back to the planet and see what happens. If it re-integrates properly, you’ll know it’s working.”

  Karuw considered the proposal for a moment, and the only male in the room finally spoke up: “That’s a good idea, Marla. It wouldn’t be hard to do either.”

  “You’re Vilo Garlet?” asked Brahms.

  He nodded and gave her a grudging smile. “Yes, I am.”

  The human turned to the young girl. “And you are?”

  “Candra,” she answered shyly. There was an evasiveness around the girl’s eyes that bothered Leah, but she didn’t say anything. If this girl was welcome into Marla Karuw’s inner circle, then so be it. These Alwunans were suspicious people; maybe they hadn’t always been that way, but they were now.

  Leah started to the door. “I’ll go back to Aluwna and ask Worf to capture one of those creatures. Beam down to Base Two when you’re ready to conduct the experiment. Some of the Klingon shuttlecraft have transporters, and we can use one to beam it up. Then we can use any of your blue boxes to return the creature.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Brahms,” said Karuw. “We appreciate your help.”

  That brought the first smile to Leah’s face in many days, and she headed for the door and stopped. “Oh, one more thing—there’s more help on the way. The Enterprise is supposed to arrive tomorrow.”

  “Enterprise?” asked Karuw. “Is that supposed to mean something?”

  “If you were in the Federation, it would,” answered Brahms.

  “That’s our most celebrated starship, and we can’t give you any better help than that. When you’re ready, I’ll see you below.”

  * * *

  After Leah Brahms had left the laboratory, the smile melted from Marla Karuw’s face. “That’s just what we need,” she muttered, “more meddlers from the Federation.”

  “Still this experiment is a good idea,” said Vilo Garlet. “It will tell us if we have a chance to save our people.”

  “Oh, we’ll have more than a chance,” vowed Karuw with determination. “We’re going to save our world, and get even for what was done to us.”

  * * *

  Still feeling overwhelmed, Alexander Rozhenko walked down the corridor, headed to the quarters he’d been assigned on the Darzor. He alternated his time between Aluwna, the Doghjey, and his own ship, the Ya’Vang, but more and more he found himself spending his days and nights on the royal yacht. If diplomatic service meant sleeping in strange beds almost every night, he might have to give more thought to pursuing that calling, because the young Klingon had already moved around too much in his life. Right now, he just wanted to sit quietly for a few minutes and collect his thoughts.

  As he approached his door, he noticed that it was open a few centimeters, and bristles on the bac
k of his neck stood at attention. This wasn’t really a cause for alarm, he tried to tell himself, because the Darzor had poor security, with doors that opened easily and didn’t always shut automatically. Because the Darzor was so crowded with refugees, he was sharing quarters with two Aluwnan constables, both of whom were assigned to watching Seeress Jenoset. One of them was probably in the room, he decided, and had merely forgotten to shut the door.

  Still Alexander slowed his pace and put his hand on the butt of the disruptor in his holster. A murder had taken place on this vessel, and he was leading the investigation. Of course, if anyone knew how little he had found out, they wouldn’t be concerned enough to bother him. He approached the door and touched the panel on the bulkhead; the door slid open to its normal width, and he peered inside. Although he was sharing a room, his quarters were more spacious and luxurious here than they were on the Ya’Vang. The captain on a Klingon vessel didn’t live as well as a servant on an Aluwnan yacht, he thought ruefully. Clearly there was nobody in the room at the moment, which hardly explained why it was open. Perhaps there was a malfunction in the door.

  The Klingon entered cautiously, looking for signs of unauthorized entry. He found such a sign rather quickly, when he noted that a padd he had left on his desk was now missing. Then his ears picked up a telltale sign that most humanoids would have missed—the sound of someone breathing, and that someone wasn’t him. There were two closets and space under the bunk beds where a person could hide, but Alexander fought the temptation to tear the room apart. He remained calm and pretended that he hadn’t noticed anything amiss. After all, if someone was going to attack him, they would have done so by now. No, the entry had been to gather information—to snoop, as humans called it.

  So Alexander calmly washed his hands in the basin, spent a few seconds grooming himself, then walked out, making as much noise as possible. He made sure to shut the door behind him all the way, then he pressed himself against the bulkhead in the corridor and waited.

  It wasn’t long before his patience was rewarded, and the door slid open again. When a slight figure slipped out, he pounced like a Capellan power cat, grabbed the intruder by the neck in the crook of his arm, and almost snapped his neck. The padd dropped to the deck, and Alexander increased the pressure of his grip. Gasping and flailing, his foe never had a chance to resist, and he was whimpering within seconds.

  “Don’t kill me!” he rasped. “Please . . . I didn’t mean any harm!”

  Realizing it was the young seeress consort, the one named Farlo, Alexander released his death hold and hurled the youth against the opposite bulkhead. The young Aluwnan bounced off the cold metal and dropped to his knees, gasping for air, tears in his eyes.

  “Explain yourself!” ordered Alexander, his voice nearly as deep and forceful as his father’s.

  The boy heaved great breaths and tried to collect himself. “I . . . I wanted to see . . . if you had found out who did it.”

  “You mean, who murdered the overseer?” asked the Klingon. “Don’t you think I would tell you if I found out?”

  “Well,” said Farlo, looking up with plaintive eyes, “maybe you wouldn’t . . . until you found out for sure.”

  “You have a mouth,” roared Alexander, “so you could ask me. You don’t need to snoop around in my quarters. Your explanation is insufficient, and I’ve got a good mind to put you under guard with the rest of your family.”

  “Overseer Padrin would let me out,” claimed the boy, glaring defiantly at Alexander.

  The Klingon scowled. “Not if I grab you by the scruff of your neck and drag you to a Klingon vessel, where I would put you in irons! Give me a good explanation right now, or I’ll do it.”

  Farlo gulped and said, “I . . . I want to help you.”

  Alexander narrowed his eyes at his young captive, realization sweeping over him. “You know who did it, don’t you?”

  “I have a suspicion.”

  “Who?”

  Moving as quickly as a targ surprised in the bush, Farlo jumped to his feet and dashed down the corridor. Alexander took a step after him, but he realized that he could never catch the lad before he reached the safety of the cabin he shared with Overseer Padrin. When it came time to explain, it would be his word against the boy’s, and Padrin liked the boy. Scowling, Alexander bent down and picked up his padd.

  Actually, it was a relief to know that somebody on this crazy vessel had an idea who had committed the crime. Farlo was confined to the Darzor, so he couldn’t run far. There would be another opportunity to corner the lad and extract the information—Alexander would just have to plan it well. As his father had said when assigning him this murder investigation, such secrets could not be kept forever.

  Twenty

  The Klingons had killed so many of the giant slug creatures that Worf feared they might have trouble finding one for Leah Brahms’ experiment. Ever since they had discovered that they were indeed good eating, the Klingons assigned to the planet had been eating them in everything from stew to barbecued shish kebob, and they had even given them a name, nujgharg. The flavor was almost addictive, despite the distasteful necessity of cooking the slugs to kill the fungus. Of course, they had to cook them outside but eat them in the shuttlecraft, because they were still wearing protective gear.

  The ground troops had gone so far as to transport select cuts of the delicacy back to the ships, so that their mates in orbit could share in the bounty of the land. But it was one thing to wade into the bog with a lance or bat’leth, kill one, and drag it back to camp, and it was quite another thing to capture one alive. Their large, suckerlike mouths were ringed with sharp teeth, and when one latched on to a leg or arm, its head had to be cut off and the teeth pried open with a knife. More than once, a nasty nujgharg had been responsible for sending a warrior to sickbay, howling in pain.

  Worf had let his men decimate the local food animal, because it helped to eradicate the moss creatures, who had also acquired a Klingon name, poch’loD. Following a trail of dead nujgharg dragged along the ground, the starving poch’loD would shamble out of the forest into ambushes set by the Klingons, who would proceed to hack them into confetti before they knew what had hit them. There were great stretches of the planet where no one had set foot, and Worf imagined that both species still existed there in abundance. But for one Aluwnan day, he had seen nothing of the moss creatures or the big slugs. His men were starting to grumble, because this Genesis planet was getting too tame. It was no fun to fight plants that didn’t fight back.

  So it was that Worf now led a small band of six warriors fairly deep into the jungle from Base One. As usual, it was slow going in the thick brush and the awkward environmental suits, and they took turns slicing the path. Worf was beginning to think that they could do without the suits, but he couldn’t take the chance on anyone getting infected and losing their minds. Although nothing seemed more dangerous than a renascent vine at the moment, Aluwna was still a very dangerous place.

  The brawny warrior ahead of him suddenly got his bat’leth stuck in a vine as thick as a tree trunk, and he was so tired he could barely pull it out. That was Worf’s cue to relieve him, and he was the next in line and fairly fresh. After helping his comrade extricate his blade, Worf said, “I will take the point.”

  “Where have all the nujgharg gone?” muttered his comrade, stepping back into line.

  “They’re hiding,” answered another member of the group. “They’ve gotten smart.”

  “Remember,” said Worf, “if we find one, we need it alive. Do you still have the pole?”

  “Yes, sir!” panted the warrior at the rear, who was carrying a coil of rope and a large metal pole and having some difficulty maneuvering it through the thick branches and boughs.

  “What good is a live nujgharg?” wondered a warrior aloud.

  “To test their transporter boxes,” answered another. “We don’t want any more steaming goo coming out of them.”

  Worf was too busy hacking and slicing h
is way through the grotesque undergrowth to talk. Swinging his blade in time to his grunts, he was working too hard to pay full attention to the terrain, and he suddenly stumbled into a hole and was waist-deep in foul, slimy water. “I need aid,” he muttered, reaching back for his fellows.

  No sooner had the words left his mouth than a monstrous tentacle whipped out of the brown sludge and wrapped around his neck. It tightened like a noose and yanked him face-first into the mire, and instinctively he swung his bat’leth at the greasy appendage. It was so thick that he cut only partway through the massive knot of muscles, and he might have drowned immediately if his comrades hadn’t waded into the bog, blades flying. In high spirits, the Klingons slashed and stabbed at the massive creature hidden under the roiling waves, and the battle seemed to go on for a long time before Worf could surface, sputtering for breath.

  More tentacles whipped from the water, spraying globs of mud everywhere, but the thing was clearly in retreat from the flurry of slashing blades. Spitting up sludge, Worf finally crawled out of the brackish pool, still wearing the severed tentacle around his neck like an outrageous necklace. Panting heavily, he lay on a bed of roots and leaves until he coughed up enough water to breathe. He glanced over his shoulder and saw his comrades pursuing the unseen monster through the bog, and he yelled at them, “Let it go!”

  “But this one would feed us for a month!” shouted his lieutenant.

  “Let it go!” he repeated. “If it’s not dead yet, it’s too dangerous to hunt.”

  Worf staggered to his feet and inspected his suit; it was torn in three places, and the faceplate was cracked, which meant that he had to get back to the shuttlecraft as soon as possible. He had received treatment for the fungus, but who knew what other dangerous, insanity-provoking microbes lived in this prickly swamp? Luckily, the path hacked through the jungle remained clearly visible, and it wouldn’t be grown over for at least an hour.