The Enterprise War

by John Jackson Miller

  Outside, he heard the troop module braking. They had arrived at the Straits—and the next engagement. He dispelled the candle image and headed for his deployment station. It was time to fight. Again.

  SEPARATION

  * * *

  April 2257

  INCOMING TRANSMISSION (ENCRYPTED)

  TO: CAPTAIN C. PIKE • U.S.S. ENTERPRISE • NCC-1701

  FROM: VICE ADMIRAL K. CORNWELL, STARFLEET COMMAND

  REALIZED I HAD NOT MESSAGED PERSONALLY SINCE MY RETURN FROM CAPTIVITY. IT HAS BEEN BUSY. GLAD ADMIRAL TERRAL HAS KEPT YOU APPRISED.

  STATE OF WAR CONTINUES. KLINGON ATROCITIES AT KELFOUR VI AND ELSEWHERE.

  U.S.S. DISCOVERY STILL MISSING. NO CHANGE IN ENTERPRISE MISSION. DO NOT RETURN.

  END TRANSMISSION

  27

  * * *

  Combat Module Carrier 539-Aloga

  Pergamum Nebula

  After each operation, Spock had returned to Carrier Aloga for what had become his best source of information about the organization and its practices: the combination armory and infirmary operated by Jayko. This time, to his surprise, he found Ensign Ghalka there, studying telemetry from the battlesuit worn by a now fully-bearded Connolly. It was the first time he had seen the other two since his transfer, weeks earlier.

  “I am pleased to see you in this role,” Spock said to Ghalka. “You are a technician now?”

  “They figured out I was telling the truth about being a scientist and not a security officer,” Ghalka said. “They need biologists to help the battlesuits acclimate better to our species.”

  “I knew I studied the wrong things in the Academy,” Connolly said. “Could you tell them we’re scientists too?”

  “Sorry,” Ghalka said, gesturing to Connolly’s readings on her monitoring device. “They think you’re in great physical shape. Even in the battlesuits, athleticism counts.”

  “Damn cross-training.”

  “And Spock’s Vulcan physiology gives him endurance that supplements his battlesuit.” Ghalka shrank a little, embarrassed. “Sorry. But it was a great day when Redsub said I belonged ‘in the rear with the gear.’ ”

  Spock’s brow furrowed. “That is a peculiar expression,” he said. “Your subaltern said it?”

  She nodded.

  “I’ve heard it before,” Connolly said. “Earth, way back. Tooey Monahan was the last first-round draft pick ever to be Rookie of the Year—until they drafted him for the Third World War. They put him in the rear too.”

  “I do not understand,” Spock said.

  Neither did Ghalka. “He was drafted—then he was drafted?”

  “That is not what I was referring to,” Spock said, forestalling another digression into Connolly’s hobbies. “Why would a phrase known on Earth be employed in this nebula?”

  “Oh,” Ghalka said, understanding. “Their first medical file on a human is well over a century old. Clearly somebody wandered in. They’ve been at this a very long time.”

  Ghalka had learned more. There were many species serving in the Boundless, but there were five founding member races—Kormagan and Jayko belonged to two. Child-rearing took place on the support ships that followed the waves around. The founder species were highly committed to the fight against the Rengru, Ghalka said, but they also understood that their numbers and weapons were insufficient to the task—hence the military units doing double-duty as pirates and press gangs.

  “There’s a good reason we have such an easy time communicating with the others here,” she said. “Apparently the outer spacefaring cultures have been influencing them for decades, whether we knew it or not. They’re mimics about more than just technology.”

  “You have learned much.” Spock looked about at the bustling center. “Is it wise to speak so openly?”

  “They don’t seem to care about what people say,” Ghalka said. “The Boundless encourage conversations between old troops and new to facilitate integration—and don’t mind them between fellow abductees, as long as they don’t lead to actions against their authority. Some of these warriors were born into it—I assume their parents actually had to meet.”

  “That’s how it usually works,” Connolly said.

  Ghalka looked about at the various technicians and their subjects. “You have to understand how much they all really do believe in this fight. Even the abductees eventually come around.”

  Connolly stifled a laugh. “Seeing the Rengru will do that to you! It only took Baladon two months to buy in.”

  “We have been here longer than two months,” Spock said, “and encountered the same things.”

  “I know. Still,” Connolly said, “I was afraid this part would be a lot worse.” He gestured to the overhead, indicating the whole ship. “More brutal, with everyone acting like Baladon was at the start. But they seem to save the violence for the Rengru.”

  “We are Starfleet officers,” Spock said firmly. He studied Connolly. “Where does your commitment lie, Lieutenant?”

  Connolly seemed gobsmacked. “That’s a crazy question, sir.” He shook his head. “I mean, the Boundless do seem to be under threat—they have a need. It might even be legitimate. But this isn’t the way to fulfill it.”

  Spock looked to Ghalka. “Ensign?”

  “Screw the Rengru,” she blurted. “I want to go home.”

  “Very well. Continue to learn what you can.”

  Across the infirmary, he saw Kormagan enter. Spock had seen earlier that her armor had been scored by acid, from a dousing that had come when she had led the assault on the Rengru station. Jayko spotted her and called out. “Welcome, Wavemaster. Pray tell did you spare any of that acid bomb for the Rengru?”

  “Shut up,” she said. “Just make sure everything’s working.”

  As Jayko left his patient to attend to her, Spock spoke quietly to Ghalka. “Your observations about openness noted, Ensign, perhaps it is better that I step away.”

  He had gotten only a few steps away when the Andorian whispered loudly to him. “Spock!”

  He turned amid the noisy room and saw Ghalka looking—not even pointing—directly at the wavemaster and the armorer. Spock casually followed her glance and saw that Jayko was tending to a rounded module behind Kormagan’s right shoulder. Like the rest of her armor, it bore scars.

  “I hate to tell you this,” Jayko said to her, “but you’re going to need a new governor.”

  Spock blinked. He had never heard of governors in the Boundless before. Then Kormagan responded: “Fix the one I have.”

  “I don’t even know why you have the thing,” Jayko said. “You’re not going to run away. How long have you been in charge?”

  “We’re all the same here,” Kormagan said. Seeing Spock listening, she repeated it more loudly. “We’re all on the same team.”

  Spock watched her—and nodded gently in assent before heading into the hallway. Once there, he reached around and touched the nodule behind his shoulder. Everyone in the Boundless might indeed be equal—but they were all governed. And now he knew what and where the mechanism was.

  28

  * * *

  U.S.S. Enterprise

  Pergamum Nebula

  “We may not be able to find these guys,” Amin said. “But we sure can tell where they’ve been.”

  “Convenient for us,” Pike said. “Not for their targets.”

  More Essfive victims had been discovered two hours earlier, prompting the staff meeting. Their detection was the result of cooperation by a crew newly enlivened with hope.

  During Enterprise’s stay alongside the Lurian derelict, Galadjian’s engineers, assisted by Una and Dietrich, had focused on one of the earlier clues: the Essfive probe that had led the kidnappers to Deathstrike. No one understood how it had contacted its creators. Subspace communications only worked locally in the nebula before dissipating in an ocean of interference. So how, his officers had asked, had it executed its mission?

  On partially reviving the Essfive probe, Pik
e’s team had discovered a clever program driving its actions. After sensing a potential target vessel, the drone traveled through the clouds to a checkpoint where it looked for other probes in local subspace range to communicate with. If it found none, it would head to a second checkpoint—and then a third, and a fourth. The “couriers,” as Una called them, allowed the attackers to use a relatively small number of probes to communicate across a vast amount of nebular space. What they sacrificed in timely communication, they made up in extended range.

  So after Enterprise’s team had wrung every last bit of valuable information from Deathstrike, the Federation starship had methodically visited each of the Essfive probe’s checkpoints. At the third, Dietrich detected faint subspace emissions on the expected frequency; those led Enterprise to yet another probe. That one, tagged Courier 2 for convenience, did successfully self-destruct on Enterprise’s approach—but a split second too late. Pitcairn and his aide, Sam Yamata, had already transported the probe’s data core safely to the Starfleet vessel before the blast.

  “Give me a schematic of an unshielded ship,” Pitcairn had said, “and I’ll beam the donuts right out of the mess hall.”

  The data was sweeter than any confection. It had not led to the attackers but, instead, another derelict. Pike walked to his chair in the conference room and sat down as Nhan and Colt, his landing party, entered. “Looks like the victims list is getting longer all the time,” he said. “What did we have over there?”

  “The ship is called New Tomorrow,” Nhan said, taking her seat. “An Antaran colony ship. Their onboard surveillance coverage was more widespread than on Deathstrike—still no sound, sadly. But we saw the same people attacking, same result. The two ships could be twins.”

  “Except New Tomorrow was easier on the nostrils,” Colt added. “It looks from the time codes like Essfive struck it just hours after they hit Deathstrike. So they weren’t done hitting people—and we’re headed in the right direction.”

  “Antarans,” Pike said. “Enemies of the Denobulans, right?”

  Una nodded.

  “Could our kidnappers be Denobulan? They were pretty warlike a few centuries ago.”

  “Not lately,” Una replied. “And I can’t see them going after a Starfleet crew. We’ve also checked the armor we saw against every known civilization in the database. No obvious connections.”

  “So we’re still playing catch-up.” Pike stifled a sigh. “Okay, here we go again. Courier 2 must have told somebody on its mail route that New Tomorrow was here. We follow its earlier checkpoints, we might find the next link in the chain—or our people.”

  Una looked toward him with small trepidation. “I’m not sure that’s going to be possible.”

  “What now?”

  “Captain, we’ve been in this mess for the better part of a year and we’ve only begun to figure out what’s where,” Amin said. “There are more layers to this nebula than—”

  “Than an onion. I get it.”

  “So we only know what we’re able to see from here,” the navigator said. “Our survey shows this particular mail route goes into rougher territory than we’ve seen. I don’t think we can make our way through it.”

  Pike blinked. “We handled the Acheron Formation.”

  “Radiation sources are more exotic here, Captain. The plasma’s thick enough to serve with a spoon. And there’s another difference,” Amin added, touching her ear with her fingers. “We weren’t trying to use our sensors for anything on that trip. This time, you’re looking for something.”

  “So we’d be going slower—which is more exposure.” Pike shook his head. “That adds risk for all of us.”

  Colt looked to Amin. “Couldn’t we just wait to scan until we’re at the checkpoints? That’s what worked before.”

  “You could, but the medium we’re traversing gets hairy in places. I can’t give you anything close to a straight line unless you can find a way to punch through material thicker than any Constitution-class starship has ever encountered.” She sat back. “I’m sorry, but I can’t change the weather.”

  This sounds like an engineering problem, Pike thought. Thing was, he already had an engineering problem. Galadjian had been uncharacteristically quiet ever since his little console-operating slip aboard Deathstrike had negated his previous triumphant mood.

  There wasn’t anything to be done about that. “We’re starting to run up against our end-of-mission time—and with the war, I think we at least owe Starfleet a check-in.” Pike felt the air go out of the room. “Believe me, I don’t want to start to leave again, especially when we’ve just made some headway. But unless we find more, someone’s going to have to make a—”

  Galadjian snapped from his trance and slapped the table. “Eureka!”

  “I was going to say, someone’s going to have to make a sudden discovery that solves everything.” Pike really wasn’t, but he looked to Galadjian nonetheless. “Something you want to share with the group, Doctor?”

  Galadjian’s eyes focused on a point far away—and he spoke. “As you know, normal penetration through plasma and other gaseous material requires the projection of magnetic shields, which are shaped to envelop the vessel while providing the most efficient angle of attack. Plasmadynamics is different in key ways from aero- or hydrodynamics, but the practice is similar: to place our vessel within the blade of the knife as it cuts.”

  They all knew that. “And your plan?”

  “Consider a different analogy, but also relating to sharp things. In my native Armenia, there was an ancient blade called the tsakat. It was used to cut vegetation.”

  “Like the machete,” Amin said. “The thing they cleared paths through bush with.”

  “Yes, though ours had a longer handle—our vegetation was not so tall. Now consider this: we do not place ourselves inside the blade, but rather as the worker holding the tool. Rather than generating shields to envelop Enterprise, we direct our systems to shape a high-intensity three-dimensional force envelope along the length of the deflector beam. Simultaneously, we continually rotate and refresh the shaped field—both opening our path and sweeping it clean.”

  “It sounds like an old weed whacker,” Nicola said.

  “Yes, but spinning many times faster.”

  “One ancient agricultural analogy at a time,” Pike said. He blinked. “You say we’ll be able to navigate gases far denser than we have before. More than in the Acheron Formation?”

  Galadjian nodded. “I calculate up to twice as dense.”

  “Because that was taking a boat into a pond full of molasses.”

  “I don’t know what that is,” Galadjian said. “But I can say that the procedure will ease our passage.”

  Dietrich looked shaken. “I’ve never heard of shields being used like that.”

  “I understand, my young friend. I helped to invent the specific kind that are aboard this ship—my first model was called the ‘meteorite beam.’ And while that name may not have caught on, I am still considering ways in which the systems can be used.” Galadjian sat back and crossed his palms, a grin on his face.

  “But if I understand correctly, it sounds like the ship itself wouldn’t be shielded.”

  “You have it,” Galadjian replied. “We would rely on our hull to withstand any impacts the shield did not protect us from—and also against the radiation. In this case, yes, we would want to traverse quickly.”

  Nhan gawked. “Did I hear this right? We’re expected to give up our shields?”

  “That’s correct, Commander.” His smile faded a little at being questioned. “We would not want anyone to shoot at us.”

  “The people we are after have shot at us, Doctor. This could be a problem. How fast can you revert to normal operation?”

  “Quickly. But we would have to come to a full stop.”

  Pike saw the looks around the rest of the table. He worried, as he assumed they did, that their onetime superstar was pushing too hard, seeking some kind of redemption thro
ugh the thing he knew best. “I’d like the room, please. Doctor, you stay. And you, too, Number One.”

  Galadjian looked uncomfortable as the others dutifully filed out.

  Pike spoke in even tones. “Doctor, we had discussed earlier that some of the operational matters aboard the ship might be beyond you—”

  “I have been working on that, Captain.”

  “I know, I know. But my concern is whether your plan might be beyond the limits of your staff to execute. It’s pretty cutting edge.”

  “An apt term,” Galadjian said, “considering we are constructing a beam that will—” Noting Pike’s wooden expression, he stopped. “Captain,” he said, more slowly, “the entire reason I am here is to push your staff beyond. If this is successful, the things we learn here will make all future Enterprises able to traverse many varieties of space.”

  “Forgive me if I’m more concerned about the current Enterprise.”

  “It can be done, Captain.”

  Pike frowned. He’d lost thirty people; he didn’t want to risk anyone else on a science experiment. He looked to Una. “Does this make sense?”

  Cautiously, she nodded. “Yes, I see where he is going. He’d need people behind the deflector dish in the stardrive section again, as Spock was last year in the Acheron transit.”

  “We are without Spock.”

  “I could do it, Captain,” Una said. “I understand the principles involved.”

  Pike looked to Galadjian. “If she’s working the dish, can you run this thing from the bridge?”

  “Yes, Captain. I can understand why you might want to—”

  “Can you be ready to run it?”

  Galadjian appeared to catch Pike’s meaning. “Yes. I will have mastery of all the interfaces.”

  “Then get started. Dismissed.”

  Galadjian stood and quickly departed, not noting that Pike had motioned for Una to hang back.

  “Are you sure about this?” Pike asked her.