Crisis On Centaurus Read online

  Kirk switched over to the third frequency. "Hangar deck duty officer, this is Galileo. Requesting permission to depart."

  "Permission granted, Captain; go well. Duty officer out."

  Kirk clicked his transmit/receive switch twice—a communications officer's shorthand for "thank you"—and clicked over to Sulu. "We're clear, pilot. Take her out."

  "Aye, aye, Captain."

  Kirk switched over. "Columbus, we are leaving. Stay close, Mr. Chekov."

  "Aye, Captain. Ve guarantee ve vill not bump you on the vay down."

  Together, slowly, the two shuttlecraft each rose a little higher and moved toward the hangar port.

  "Rear view, please, helmsman," Uhura said.

  "Aye, aye, ma'am," Siderakis responded as he pushed a button. The familiar forward scene on the bridge's main screen swam for a moment and then steadied into a similar sternward view—the stars resting timelessly above the planet—except that now two small squarish craft were moving closely together into sight. Each presented its keel to the other, and they were not more than three meters apart. "That's Galileo to port, ma'am," Siderakis said. "Good departure pattern."

  "Sulu and Chekov are a couple of our best," Uhura said. "Angle the view down, please, helmsman; I want to keep visual track of them for as long as we can." The view changed again; now they were looking downward toward the departing shuttles and fully against the glare of Centaurus; Uhura was forced to squint. "Tickle that down, please, Peter," she said, and the stark brightness of the scene faded to a tolerable level. "Dossie, what do the sensors say?"

  "Nothing yet, Lieutenant," the navigator responded. "Everything's clear. I've plotted the five most likely paths of attack between the shuttles and the ground, and there's nothing there yet, either." McCoy, still standing next to the command chair, slipped a hand secretively behind his back and crossed his fingers; Sergei Dominico, sitting at the communications station, saw McCoy do it but pretended not to notice.

  * * *

  Kirk noticed some interference in Galileo's sensor readouts—some reception modes depended on the frequencies most affected by the tachyonic fallout blanket surrounding Centaurus—but satisfied himself that enough signal was getting through on other wavelengths to allow a safe approach. He could no longer see Columbus on his monitor, because Galileo's outboard camera system did not allow a view directly "down"—that is, in the direction of the keel. "Sky is still clear, Sulu," Kirk told his pilot.

  "Hope it stays that way, Captain," Sulu said. "Uh, we're maintaining a distance of two point seven meters from Columbus. Speeds are matched, courses are parallel. Chekov is hanging on out there like he was bolted on. We're right on track."

  "Very good." Kirk switched the vidmonitor for a departure angle. It had been quite a while—a year, anyway—since Kirk had eyeballed his ship close-up from the outside; he rarely went on shuttle rides. He saw the stern of the Enterprise, lit brilliantly by the two suns that mattered to Centaurus. From here the starship's long and graceful warp nacelles, starkly white and almost glowing, appeared splayed against the ultimate blackness of space.

  Somewhere in the middle of the stern, Kirk could see an even brighter gleam of light, which shrank to nothing even as he watched. That would be the hangar deck, as its giant doors closed again, sealing that most vulnerable part of the ship from the hostile vacuum. The Enterprise herself was rapidly growing smaller and smaller as the shuttles accelerated. Kirk felt a bit lost without his ship around him.

  "Distance from Enterprise nearly one hundred kilometers, Captain," Sulu said. "We'll begin descent in tandem with Columbus according to flight plan—now."

  Sulu smoothly sent Galileo into a shallow, precise descent while keeping an eye on his proximity readouts with Columbus. Kirk saw them, too, and noted that Chekov and Sulu were maintaining no more than three meters' distance between them. This is one masterpiece of piloting, gentlemen, Kirk thought. If we pull this off, I'll be more than happy to process the commendations . . . .

  As Galileo's angle of approach changed, Kirk saw the star-speckled blackness of space supplanted by the glowing blueness of Centaurus; they were headed directly for the surface now, at a speed well within the shuttles' re-entry tolerances. That thought reminded Kirk of another Galileo, the predecessor shuttle to the one he was now in. The first Galileo had been lost in a burnup over Taurus during a mission commanded by Spock; those aboard had been saved at the last moment by what had been some of Scotty's quickest and most deft transporter work ever.

  One thing I don't like about pressure suits, Kirk said to himself, is that your breath is too loud in your ears. It's like living in a giant nostril.

  His thoughts were interrupted by an indicator light on his copilot's panel. "Sulu, I have a launch indication from the surface," Kirk said calmly. "Data reading in now."

  "Damn!" Sulu said. "The defense system's still watching us, after all."

  "So now we know." Kirk clicked over to the ship-to-ship communicator frequency; there was now a roar of heavy static, caused by the rising tachyonic interference from below. "Spock, did you get that?"

  "Affirmative, Captain. It seems to be a single missile launch from a silo located not far from the Defense Center site itself. Since we are headed generally down toward New Athens, I infer the computer is attempting a quick, direct response to our supposed 'attack,' but it is trying nothing more than a simple interception. I would have expected more … finesse … from an undamaged computer system of this advanced type."

  "I understand, Spock; I hope you continue to be as correct as you have been. Chekov, stand by for Operation Razzle-Dazzle."

  "Standing by, Captain."

  Kirk clicked over to the fourth communicator frequency, but found he could not raise the Enterprise; the tachyonic interference was now overwhelming. He switched on the cobbled-together shortwave transceiver. "Kirk, aboard Galileo, to Enterprise. Come in, Enterprise."

  "Uhura here, Captain. We've seen the launch and are tracking. Phasers ready." Uhura's voice was clear and sharp; Scotty and his people had done a superlative job on short notice.

  "Very good, Lieutenant. Kirk out." He looked again at his status board and saw that the incoming missile was quickly gaining speed as it rose into the Centaurian sky. Kirk carefully consulted his board; he could see no evidence of a second launch. Good, he thought. The defense system thinks both shuttles are a single spacecraft, because we're flying so close together—and Spock is still right; the defense system's apparently lost its capacity for follow-up attacks. Just as it never hit the ship again, it's not ready to fire on us a second time if this first missile doesn't do the job. There's no backup missile in place, hanging back to 'see' what happens. Advantage, us.

  Kirk clicked back to the first frequency setting. "Altitude now fifty kilometers above the surface, Sulu," he reported. "Missile altitude ten point seven kilometers. Steady track."

  "Good enough," Sulu said. "Interception time?"

  "Assuming the track remains steady, fifty-eight seconds."

  "It'll stay steady—I hope," Sulu said.

  "I'm pretty much depending on that myself," Kirk returned. "Fifty seconds."

  Kirk heard a signal in his ear and switched the radio to the intership frequency setting. "Captain, this is Spock. Mr. Chekov informs me he is ready to commence Operation Razzle-Dazzle whenever he should get the word."

  "Very well, Mr. Spock. Good luck."

  There was a pause. "All luck to you and Mr. Sulu, Captain. Spock out."

  Kirk consulted his board's chronometer. "Twenty seconds to interception, Sulu." Galileo, like Columbus, was flying with her nose pitched down toward the planet below; peering out the forward window, Kirk could see a very small, but very bright, point of light against the swirling white clouds of the planet. Is that the son of a bitch? he wondered, looking at the tiny pinpoint of fire. "Fifteen seconds, Sulu."

  Sulu grunted acknowledgment. "Captain, please tell Columbus to stand by; I'm not going to give much notice. This is sea
t-of-the-pants stuff."

  "Right." Kirk radioed the other shuttle. "Columbus, stand by to commence Operation Razzle-Dazzle on my signal. Acknowledge, please."

  "Acknowledged," Spock said amid loud static.

  "Ten seconds," Kirk told Sulu. He could see the helmsman nod quickly. Kirk counted down to himself: Nine . . . eight . . . seven … six . . .

  "Now!" Sulu shouted, and bore down hard on the shuttle's joystick as Kirk shouted "Now, Chekov!" into the radio. The shuttle strained with the abrupt change of velocity; Kirk and Sulu found themselves struggling to retain their seats, even belted in.

  Kirk watched Sulu's board; Columbus was pulling away in much the same maneuver at rapid speed, plunging outward and downward. He noted with great satisfaction that both shuttles were now—just barely—out of the circle of destruction of any expectable nuclear explosion taking place at the interception point.

  Three … two … one … zero.

  Nothing happened. Kirk consulted his board quickly. The missile was still heading up and was now well above its expected detonation point. What the hell is going on—my God, it's changing course! But not toward us . . .

  The shortwave unit buzzed for attention; Kirk activated it. "Captain, this is Spock. The missile is now on a direct interception course for the ship. I assume this is a 'smart' missile, and it selected an alternative target upon our 'disappearance' from its sensors. We have apparently provoked the defense system into rediscovering the ship's presence. Estimated interception time is sixty-eight seconds."

  Uhura watched the abstract display on the main viewscreen. The two shuttles were small orange dots against the green map of the planet below; the missile was a pulsing red triangle heading directly for the white sphere that represented the Enterprise. A digital chronometer in the lower right corner of the screen was counting down the number of seconds to estimated interception time: 0067 … 0066 … 0065 … 0064 …

  "Phasers locked on target," Dossie Flores reported. "We're ready to go, Lieutenant."

  "Let's let it get a little closer," Uhura said. "Helm, are you ready?"

  Siderakis nodded. "If Dossie misses, I'll pull us out of here so fast we'll leave a hole in the sky. Impulse engines are at forty-two percent capacity."

  Dominico, at the communications station, said, "Captain Kirk is standing by on the shortwave."

  "Does he want to talk to me?" Uhura asked.

  "He says both Galileo and Columbus have reached safe altitude, and each is proceeding to its destination. No further missile launches detected. Other than telling you that, he said not to bother you. He'll stand by."

  "Thank him, then, and tell him we're fine." I'm glad he's there, Uhura thought as she watched the chronometer pass 0050. Maybe he knows I need him there.

  At 0045 Uhura said, "All right, Dossie. Prepare to fire; this is one that doesn't get through!"

  "Yes, ma'am!"

  0042 … 0041 …0040.

  "Fire phasers!" Uhura ordered, and Dossie Flores crunched a button. The display showed a line of intense blue leaping between the Enterprise and the red triangle that represented the missile …

  … and the triangle blinked three times and disappeared.

  "Target destroyed, Lieutenant," Flores said. "Not bad for a minor leaguer, eh?" She gripped her hands above her head in a gesture of victory.

  Uhura grinned. "Good work, everybody. Sergei, message to Galileo: 'Target destroyed. We are maintaining orbital position and speed. All is well. Uhura out.'"

  And Uhura settled back in her command chair with a satisfied sigh.

  Chapter Ten:

  New Athens

  THE SMALL SHUTTLECRAFTColumbus sliced through the thin air high over the east coast of Centaurus's northern continent, New America.

  "Our altitude is tventy thousand meters and holding, Mr. Spock," Chekov reported. "Braking sequence ended; speed is now seven hundred thirty kilometers per hour. Ve are subsonic."

  Spock looked out the trisected forward ports. It was beautiful up here in this clear, clean sky. Columbus was flying well above the cloud cover, and so their little craft was surrounded by pleasant shadings of purest blue. Spock had not "cut sky" in quite a while; he found himself admitting—not without some embarrassment—that he liked it.

  The first officer consulted his status board and saw that Galileo was making good speed westward. At this altitude the planet's damaged defense system would dismiss both shuttlecraft as friendly air traffic. Spock did not see the logic of that—there was no logic to it, because an invader was, in theory, as fully capable of mounting an air-to-ground attack as a space-to-ground assault—but the datum helped Spock build a mental picture of what the internal state of the defense system's computers must be. It bothered him that, even after hours of concentrated thought, he had still not found a sure, exploitable flaw in the system's logic. That was why he'd felt it necessary to come down to the surface … just as Captain Kirk had found it necessary to go to Mclverton for a face-to-face meeting with the leaders of the Centaurian government. He will deal with the broken human element, as I will deal with the mechanical, thought Spock. He cannot rely on this planet's new leaders to do right; neither can I rely on this planet's defense mechanism to work correctly. We must each confront our task directly. The spaceport explosion has left us both with massive damage to repair; we must repair it—but perhaps both of us will face insurmountable problems in our attempts to do so. And I have one other task …

  "Mr. Spock?" Chekov said, interrupting the first officer's thoughts. "Ve vill be over the site of New Athens Spaceport in three minutes. Any instructions, sir?"

  Spock nodded. "Yes, Ensign. Take us down below the clouds. I desire to make a visual inspection." Three minutes at this speed puts us at a distance of thirty-six point five kilometers from ground zero, Spock calculated. We ought to be able to see the fringes of the blast area by now; our course has us approaching from the southwest, bound for the site of the Defense Center.

  Chekov pushed his joystick forward, and Columbus began a quick descent. She pierced the top of the cloud cover at eight thousand meters and plunged on through. The window revealed nothing but the gentle white interior of the cloud … and then, very suddenly, the cloud turned a deathly gray.

  "Significant radiation readings, Mr. Spock," Chekov said.

  "I see them, Ensign." Spock swiveled his chair to face aft and addressed the three others aboard. There was a gentle hiss of static under his words. "We are now entering the radiation-affected area of the blast. You will notice the greater tachyonic interference on our communicator frequency, but as we will be within very close range of one another at all times, it should not be a significant problem. With radiation in mind, I caution you once again to maintain the integrity of your pressure suits. The readings are rather higher than I might have expected, but they are still well within suit safety limits. It seems likely that weather patterns—high winds from the north, perhaps—have prevented an equal distribution of fallout in this general area. This gives some hope that the region to the north of us might be more free of contamination."

  "Mr. Spock?" came a voice. It was Rawlings, one of the computer techs Spock had selected for the repair job; the thin technician appeared engulfed by his bulky pressure suit. "Is there any chance the Defense Center area will be clean enough to operate in without the suits?"

  "I think not," Spock answered. "The site of the complex is quite near the spaceport and not sufficiently north of it to matter."

  Next time I vill bring vith me a giant radiation-proof Baggie and live in it, after poking two holes in it for my eyes, thought Chekov. It could not be less comfortable, and at least I could have vith me a sandvich. And I could put some ice on my eye.

  The cloud began to break into a wispy pattern of gray and deeper gray. Chekov spoke up. "Mr. Spock? Ve are beginning to see the ground. Range to spaceport is now twenty-three point four kilometers northeast of our present position."

  "Thank you, Ensign." Spock gazed intently ou
t the window as Rawlings, Nurse Iziharry and the other computer tech, a man named Hudson, watched the same scene on their video screens. Columbus continued downward.

  And then, suddenly, they were in the open air.

  "My God," Chekov breathed for all of them.

  Columbus was two thousand meters above the ground. There was no green anywhere at all; there was no movement. There was nothing but black and gray, the charcoal colors of death. Everything below had been burned, blasted, and burned again; heavy black smoke still rose here and there. There had been buildings and houses and roads and cars and people below, once; all were now gone, cremated and covered. The area below Columbus was well outside the eight-kilometer circle of total destruction from the spaceport explosion, but secondary heat and blast effects had been more than enough to wipe out everything that had been here. If there had, somehow, been survivors, they'd fled long before now—and Spock, for one, could not imagine how anyone might have escaped. Perhaps by flitter, the aerial craft most often used on this planet, he considered. But how would one fly such a flimsy thing in the maelstrom that must have existed here? I believe they must have been forced to walk out … through a sea of radiation and death. No, there can be no one left.

  Spock's face suddenly contorted with overwhelming emotional pain. He recovered almost immediately and realized his helmet had hidden his weakness from the others; no one had seen. Yet even in his personal shame he knew that there was no discipline, Vulcan or otherwise, which would allow a being to view this hell without cost.

  "Tventy kilometers from the spaceport," Chekov said in a dazed voice. "No one down there, no one at all."

  Spock opened his eyes—the pause had helped—and consulted his map of the area. The Enterprise's map storage banks had been lost in the ship's mysterious computer breakdown. What Spock had in hand now was a paper map of the area; he'd borrowed it from Lieutenant Siderakis, who was from New Athens. The relief helmsman had been reluctant to give it up, and Spock had understood that; the map had become a precious souvenir of a lost home town. But Siderakis had quickly come to see for himself the necessity of Spock's having the map for this mission, and had surrendered to the logic of the situation without argument. Spock had appreciated that, and planned to do his best to return the map undamaged.