Assignment: Eternity

  Humanoid voices came from up ahead. Osiris issued a warning rumble as they approached a stretch of black metal grillework in the floor of the tunnel. Snatches of conversation drifted up into the shaft through crisscrossing apertures, each one only a sliver wide. Light from below streaked the roof of the tunnel until Osiris passed over the steel lattice quickly, moving remarkably quietly for such a massive animal. Following behind the cat, Seven paused momentarily to peer through the slits beneath him, spying the tops of gleaming golden helmets and the toes of polished military boots.

  There were at least two Romulan soldiers below. One of them shifted his position and Seven spotted the muzzle of a disruptor rifle. He strained his ears to make out what they were saying. After over a year on Earth, his Romulan was pretty rusty, but he caught a few words and phrases:

  “Federation scum!”

  “. . . doing here?”

  “catch them soon . . .”

  I certainly hope they’re talking about Ensign Chekov and Lieutenant Sulu, he thought. He did not want to think that the Romulans were aware of any intruders on the premises just yet. Holding his breath, his cautiously made his way over the grille, feeling fairly safe in assuming that Captain Kirk would be equally stealthy in his movements. Starfleet trains its officers well, he recalled.

  The soldier’s voices faded away as Seven and his allies gradually left the lattice behind. They continued to snake through the shadow-dark channel, the wind blowing in their faces. Although Seven prided himself on his peak physical condition, wriggling forward on one’s elbows and knees was tiring work. Exertion left a thin layer of sweat between his skin and his borrowed Starfleet uniform. His knees and spine felt cramped and sore; unlike Osiris, he was not accustomed to going about on all fours. Thank goodness, he thought, that claustrophobia was bred out of my ancestors generations ago.

  By Seven’s count, they had already descended three levels from the surface. The command center could not be much farther away. Almost there, he thought. At last.

  The tunnel eventually connected with a vertical, tube-shaped shaft similar in diameter to the channel they had just traversed. Warm air blew up from somewhere below. Osiris stopped at the brink of the gap and growled.

  Seven listened carefully to the horned cat’s description of what was ahead. “This is it?” he asked.

  Osiris rumbled his assent. Keeping his voice low, Seven passed the information onto Captain Kirk. “There’s a ladder ahead that leads downward to another horizontal shaft that runs above the ceiling of the command center and intersects with the bottom of a turbolift shaft. Assuming there is no turbolift in place, we should be able to open the doors to the command center from within the shaft.” Seven watched as Osiris dropped headfirst down the vertical tube in front of them. “Captain, if you will still not return my servo to me, I suggest you have your phaser at hand.”

  “I’m ready when you are, Mr. Seven,” Kirk replied. “Let’s get on with it.”

  My feelings exactly, Seven thought. Despite their differences, he suspected he and Kirk had more in common than might seem obvious. An equal devotion to duty, perhaps, no matter how differently they defined it, and a similar preference for dealing with problems in a hands-on manner. Although he had learned to rely on Isis and Roberta, Seven had never been good at delegating the most dangerous jobs to others. Kirk must feel much the same way. Why else, with a starship full of trained personnel to command, had he beamed down to this planet himself?

  Thinking of the ship reminded him of Isis and Roberta, back aboard the Enterprise. He hoped they were still alive and well, despite the ongoing threat of Romulan patrols in this sector of space. If nothing else, he was going to need their help when and if he ever completed this mission. They can take care of themselves, he reminded himself. Certainly, this wasn’t the first time he had left Roberta in a tight fix, with or without Isis to keep an eye on her. Like the time she had outwitted that power-hungry megalomaniac with the white Persian kitten . . .

  Now was not the time to reminisce, though. Seven crawled over the circular hole in front of him, then backed into the opening so that he could descend feetfirst. Sturdy steel handholds, positioned to accommodate humanoids of conventional height, made the downward climb easier. He heard Kirk scrambling in the tunnel above him, then Kirk’s steps on the rungs over his head.

  His knees ached in protest when he reached the bottom and crawled into the horizontal tube. Not much longer, he promised them. According to Osiris, the opening to the turbolift shift was just ahead—and the command center directly beneath him.

  Another ventilation grille, no more than six square centimeters in size, waited a few meters ahead. Light from the control room below cast a checkerboard design on the ceiling of the tunnel. Seven listened carefully as he approached the grille. What was going on underneath him? How many Romulan guards had been stationed in the command center? He needed to assess the situation before they barged in.

  To his alarm, he suddenly heard the sizzle of disruptor weapon firings, accompanied by the sounds of bodies hitting the floor and/or groaning in pain. He counted at least three distinct blasts, and smelt the stomach-turning odor of burnt flesh. “Seven!” Kirk whispered urgently from behind him. Clearly, he, too, heard the sounds of warfare. Osiris’s tail twitched nervously.

  What is happening down there? Who is shooting whom? Seven scurried forward on his elbows and knees until he could see through the slits in the grille. The view was a frustrating one, showing him little of the room below. All he could see was empty floor; a corner of a couch, upholstered in black fabric; and one arm of a Romulan soldier stretched out upon the floor. The arm did not stir. Seven could not tell if its owner was dead or simply stunned.

  He heard more groans and ragged breathing. Someone stumbled in the chamber below, smacking into something hard and resistant, then treading with agonizing slowness across the room. He’s limping, Seven surmised, whoever he is. The image of Septos’s face, as it had appeared on the Beta-5’s monitor back in Manhattan, rushed back into his mind. 146 had been bleeding, he recalled, and obviously injured. . . .

  “No,” he gasped out loud as the truth sunk in. “Osiris! Kirk! We have to hurry!” It isn’t fair, he agonized. I came so close!

  The ventilation tunnel opened up onto a vertical turbolift shaft, several sizes larger than the cramped tubes they had crawled through so far. Osiris growled a report and Seven was relieved to hear that the shaft was currently empty, with no turbolift compartments approaching. The emerald cat pounced onto the floor of the shaft and was quickly joined by both Seven and Kirk. The empty shaft stretched above them for at least four stories, its opposite end lost in murky shadows. It felt good to stand up straight again, but Seven had no time to savor the sensation. Taking no chances, he directed Kirk to use his phaser to fuse the turbolift tracks above their heads, so that no fast-arriving compartment could arrive to squash them flat before they could exit the shaft. The scarlet glow of the phaser beam lit up the interior of the shaft, casting its ruddy radiance over Kirk’s face and turning Osiris’s green fur the color of mud. The cat’s gleaming horn reflected the light as well, shining red as fresh-spilled blood.

  Seven approached the sealed door to the command center. Although he listened carefully, he did not hear any more alarming sounds from the other side of the door. Was the struggle already over? Had he arrived too late? Hang on, 146, he thought. Help is on the way. Aided by the light from Kirk’s phaser, he located the manual controls to the turbolift doors. “Get ready!” he whispered to Kirk and Osiris, who stationed themselves in front of the sliding double doors, fully prepared to confront whatever might be waiting for them on the other side. Kirk aimed his phaser at the door and nodded at Seven. With any luck, he thought, we still have the element of surprise on our side. Seven pulled down the emergency handle, every muscle in his body tensed to spring into action, only nothing happened. The doors stayed shut.

  “What in the . . . ?” he gasped, caught by surprise.
He tried once more, but the manual controls did not respond. A chance malfunction, he wondered, or deliberate sabotage? He might never know. All that mattered was that time was slipping away. Frustration and impatience raged inside him, but he struggled to remain in control of his feelings. “Kirk!” he barked. “Use your phaser. We have to burn our way in!”

  Kirk did not wait for an explanation. Adjusting the setting on his phaser, he directed a high-intensity beam against the sturdy metal doors. Sparks flew and burning steel sizzled as Kirk cut a man-sized rectangle along the outline of one door. So much, Seven thought, for the element of surprise. . . .

  * * *

  Someone was burning their way in! Glancing back over his shoulder, Septos saw sparks flying, glowing blue and red, from the closed door to the turbolift entrance. It must be Dellas and her soldiers, he guessed, coming to get me. He had used the Beta-7 to block turbolift passage to this level, and even ordered a complete lockout on the manual controls to the entrance, but obviously that had not been enough to stop Dellas.

  He could smell the odor of burning metal, hear the hiss of the energy beams. Already he could see the charred, black outline of the entry the soldiers were cutting into the steel of the door, marring the geometric designs that decorated the door’s face.

  He was running out of time. His enemies would be through in a matter of seconds. He looked around for his own disruptor and saw it lying on the floor a few meters away. Leaning out of his chair, he reached for the weapon, but it was not close enough to grab onto. He stretched his fingers out as far as he could, but all he could grasp was empty air. The disruptor pistol remained a centimeter or two out of reach, taunting him with its deceptive nearness and accessibility. He tried to lean further, but the effort made his head spin. The pain in his side, where the guard had shot him, was an inferno. He felt close to blacking out.

  Never mind, he thought, abandoning the weapon. He was in no shape for a firelight. His thoughts were getting fuzzier with every heartbeat. His limbs trembled. He’d lost too much blood. It was all he could do to stay conscious. Even with the phaser, he couldn’t hold them off forever. His only hope now was to alert Supervisor 194 before Dellas and her henchmen burst through the door. There was nothing he could do to stop them, or to prevent them from realizing their foolhardy and wildly destructive plans.

  My duty is almost over, he thought, experiencing a singularly Vulcan sense of calm. A line from an ancient human playwright sprung to mind: “The readiness is all.” Humans were a peculiar species, but some sentiments were universal. Septos was ready to face death as well. It would be up to Gary Seven to stop Dellas now—if only the message got through.

  An image gradually formed on the screen of the Beta-7 computer, an image from decades in the past and light-years away: the head and shoulders of a human male on an Earth that had not yet even heard of the Romulan Star Empire. “Yes!” Septos breathed, staring at the screen. Behind him, he could hear the metal door sizzling loudly. They weren’t through yet! Maybe he still had a chance to warn the past of the danger Dellas posed to the future. All I need is a few more seconds.

  Intent on transmitting his warning, he didn’t notice the blue haze forming on the transporter pad behind him. The luminescent fog grew thicker and more turbulent. A figure formed inside the haze, gaining shape and solidity. . . .

  * * *

  Kirk switched off his phaser, but kept it aimed in front of him. Lifting his boot, he gave the metal door a heavy kick and a large rectangular sheet of steel fell forward, clanging against the stone floor of the chamber beyond. “Watch the edges,” he warned, darting to one side to avoid any possible enemy fire. “They might still be hot.”

  Light from the command center flooded the shaft, momentarily blinding Seven, whose eyes had grown accustomed to the gloom of the ventilation tubes. Blinking rapidly, he peered through Kirk’s improvised doorway into the chamber beyond, half-expecting to see a battalion of Romulan centurions.

  Instead, the first thing he saw was his own head and shoulders, projected three times larger than life on a viewscreen that was mounted on the wall across from the turbolift entrance. For a second he feared that his arrival had been detected by some security monitor, then he realized that the Gary Seven upon the screen still wore the conservative white shirt and tie of a professional American male of 1969, the same clothing that he had worn when he first received Supervisor 146’s urgent plea for assistance.

  That’s happening right now, he realized, just as I feared. Even though he had anticipated this very paradox, a thrill of déjà vu ran through him as he listened to the solitary figure, seated less than five meters away in front of a blinking computer bank, gasp out words that, at least in part, Seven had heard before:

  “146 to 194. Cover exposed by Romulan Intelligence. Capture imminent. Hostiles have seized technology beyond their current capacity, placing all at risk, including the future history of this quadrant. Recommend immediate action. Situation urgent. Must activate emergency self-destruct procedure. Repeat: emergency. I fear there is no escape for me. . . .”

  “Acknowledged,” Seven whispered to himself. “194 responding.” He stepped forward to assure 146 that help had indeed arrived. Thin tendrils of smoke still rose from the edges of the entrance the phaser had carved.

  Intent on his mission, the figure at the computer ignored the sound of the door crashing to the floor. Even from behind, though, Seven recognized Supervisor 146 immediately. His gaze was drawn to a trail of fresh green blood that stretched across the room to where Septos was sitting. Seven wondered how badly his Romulan counterpart had been hurt.

  “Watch out!” Kirk cried out from behind him. His arm thrust past Seven’s head, his upper finger extended. “Over there!”

  Tearing his gaze away from the injured Septos and his own face upon the computer screen, Seven looked where Kirk was pointing and spotted an unidentified Romulan woman emerging from the swirling blue energies of an active transporter platform. The woman wore a Romulan military uniform, circa the twenty-third century or so, and carried a menacing-looking disruptor rifle. Her dark eyes fixed on Septos, who seemed oblivious to her arrival. Utter malice filled her expression.

  “No!” Seven cried out, realizing at once what was about to happen. He charged toward the woman, but not fast enough. She raised her rifle with the speed and efficiency of a trained professional and fired a single bright green disruptor bolt at the unsuspecting Septos. The beam burned through the back of the chair and emerged from his chest, right where his heart had been. It was a perfect shot—and a killing one. Septos only had time for a single scream before collapsing onto the floor in front of his chair. The beam continued on to strike the control panel of the computer. Sparks flew from the panel and the oversized image of Seven’s face disappeared as the view-screen went blank.

  It’s not fair, Seven raged inside, knowing better than most that the universe was seldom fair. He had arrived almost exactly on time, to the very minute, and he had still been too late.

  Too late for Supervisor 146, and perhaps for them all.

  Chapter Thirteen

  ROBERTA FELT LIKE a hijacker, but she didn’t know what else to do. The Enterprise did not belong to her, yet she couldn’t let Doc—no, Mr. Spock—take the spaceship back to Earth, not before she could contact Gary Seven and find out what he was planning next. Mr. Spock was right, of course; it was always possible that Seven had finally run out of luck, but if she started thinking that way, what was the point in taking off on ridiculous adventures to the future anyway?

  Yes . . . but . . . maybe . . . if . . . All her thoughts and arguments seemed to circle around and bite each other, like a serpent devouring its tail. She felt impossibly conflicted. She wondered if there was any way a space alien like Mr. Spock could possibly understand or sympathize with what she was going through.

  Even now, sitting somewhat uncomfortably in Captain Kirk’s chair on the bridge of the Enterprise, part of her still found it hard to accept that
she was actually dealing with a genuine extraterrestrial life-form. Granted, Mr. Spock looked a lot more human than most of the space creatures you saw in the movies, but it was still a trip to be talking to a genuine, living, breathing alien. Okay, so Gary Seven theoretically worked for aliens, and she wasn’t quite sure what exactly Isis was (although “demon from hell” was Roberta’s best guess), but it was one thing to hold the idea in your head hypothetically, and something else altogether to look a pointy-eared alien in the face while staging a one-woman mutiny on a space ship umpteen-hundred light-years from Earth. Heck, I’m a New Yorker. I don’t even have a driver’s license!

  “So, don’t you see?” she tried explaining to Mr. Spock once more. “I don’t have any choice.”

  “Sentient beings always have choices, Miss Lincoln. Some are simply more difficult than others.” The alien first officer stood calmly a few steps away from her, his hands folded behind his back in a reassuringly unthreatening manner. His stiff and formal posture reminded Roberta of the guards outside Buckingham Palace; boy, had they looked surprised when she and Seven had transported in right behind them!

  At least Mr. Spock hadn’t tried to have her thrown in the brig or zapped her with his ray gun or anything. Then again, she thought, he can hardly do that while me and my glowing green little friend are in control of the ship. She turned the crystal cube over and over in her hands, wondering what to do next. She was so stumped she was almost tempted to ask the darn cat for advice. Almost.

  Unable to meet Mr. Spock’s eyes, she looked around the bridge. She got a good vibe from Dr. McCoy; he was a grouchy old guy, but he seemed to be on her side, although she wasn’t at all sure why that should be so, especially after Seven zapped him and the cute Russian guy earlier. The rest of the bridge crew was harder to read, although Uhura seemed to be trying very hard to reach Captain Kirk down on the planet. I wish there was some way I could help her, Roberta thought, but I wouldn’t know how to begin.