McCoy was stamping his feet. The surface shrank from the irregular friction ... it was real snow, all right.
Giggles fell like snowflakes around them as the temperature plunged to arctic levels...
***
Scott was still trying to imagine how the computer had effected the "kidnapping" of his friends. The abduction puzzled him, the more so since a harried Kirk had not seen fit - or perhaps felt he hadn't the time - to explain the rec room situation.
Future speculation, he decided, would have to wait until he'd carried out the captain's command.
He turned a corner and confronted a sealed single door. He pressed his thumb to the sensor square below the stenciled lettered which spelled, "WARNING - AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY".
At the moment the main computer room was empty. Since this central cortex rarely required servicing and was kept sealed in all but critical situations, it hadn't been visited recently by anyone except the standard security patrol. His practiced gaze showed no hint of unauthorized activity.
This isolation was a pity, since in its fashion the central computer cortex was one of the more impressive sights on the ship. Bank on bank of tireless indicator lights, liquid crystal displays, glowing poured circuitry - and all this only the tiny, visible part of the ship's heart and brain.
His destination lay at the far end of the room. There he was required to supply his thumbprint again, not to mention having to present both eyes for a retinal identification check. Only then would a hitherto hidden slot present itself for the offer of a special key card. Insertion of the key caused a broad, man-high panel to click and then slide silently aside, revealing a series of sequential switches and controls mounted over a color-coded keyboard.
Human memory activated mechanical as he tapped out a rarely used combination. This caused several sets of the sequential controls mounted above to glow ... the higher logic and creative reasoning telltales. These were subdivided in turn into various sections embossed with such headings as Intuitive Reasoning, Abstraction, Deduction, and Stage IV Response. The unlit sections he ignored. "Time for a nap, old girl," he murmured. "Captain's orders." His hand moved for the first of the red-colored switches.
He never reached it.
A piercing whine filled the chamber. It soared into the range of imperceptible ultrasonics before Scott could feel more than a momentary pain. Total disorientation set in as he strove to readjust himself to the fact that he was tumbling toward the ceiling. He landed there with a thud, flat on his back.
Typically, his initial reaction was more emotional than effective. Once he managed to regain his balance and force his mind to accept the fact he wasn't going to plunge to the floor, he rolled over and crawled above the upside-down console set in the far wall.
"Engineering to Bridge," he bawled over the barely reachable intercom. "I've got a problem down here, sir."
Kirk was able to offer commiseration if not help. Exactly the same situation prevailed on the Bridge, where he, Spock, and everyone else had been similarly thrown to the roof.
Spock managed to activate the main intercom by crawling up his library-computer console - or was he crawling down?
"Scotty, what the blazes is going on?"
"I'm not sure, Captain." He tested himself carefully and with self-control only an experienced spacer could muster, walked across the ceiling toward the next bank of interdeck monitors. A quick check was enough to show him that his personal plight was being repeated on every level.
"Our gravity's reversed polarity - all by itself, it seems."
"The latter conclusion is an obvious falsehood," came Spock's clear voice. He was sitting upside-down in his seat, studying the information displayed, on his readouts. "This is an undeniable defensive maneuver by the computer, to prevent Mr. Scott from disconnecting its higher functions."
"Crazy," Kirk muttered, "this is crazy. Not jokes anymore. Our own computer's declared war on us ... and I haven't the slightest idea why."
"I do not believe the term 'war' is yet applicable to this situation, Captain. The computer has not yet shown itself to be openly antagonistic - only misguidedly self-centered." He looked thoughtful, relaxed despite his upside-down position. "I do have, a theory; but first I suggest that if Officer Scott moved away from the computer's logic terminal - far away - it might feel less threatened, and therefore less inclined to take direct action against us."
"Threatened? Mr. Spock, that computer is programmed with so many stabilizing circuits..." His objections were halted by the look on his first officer's face.
"All right," he murmured in resignation, "never argue with reality, I suppose." He directed his voice toward the intercom. "Mr. Scott ... vacate the computer room."
Scott's eyes widened at the order. "Vacate, sir? Now, after this?" His gaze strayed longingly towards the still uncovered terminal.
"On the double, Mr. Scott."
"Aye, sir," he sighed. For a brief moment he considered making a dash for the lobotomizing controls - then he decided against it. Not because of what Kirk might say, but because if threatened again the crazed computer might resort to an even more severe distortion of ecological controls. He couldn't risk exposing anyone but himself to danger more severe than a bad tumble.
Unable to insure that only he would be the object of the machine's retaliation, he turned and walked across the ceiling toward the chamber exit. He paused there for a last look backward. The panel he had opened had not been shut, the telltales still shone brightly. Apparently the computer hadn't managed to find a way to close off its own emergency shutdown. That was his sole encouraging thought. Once he was outside this door, however, those switches would be effectively protected from external manipulation. Kirk's voice sounded behind him.
"Mr. Scott?"
"Just leavin', Captain." He stepped gingerly over the low hurdle formed by the door overhead and turned on the other side, to watch it slide shut behind him.
Stretching downward, he could just reach the door control. As expected, his repeated touch had no effect at all. The door remained closed tight.
Years of experience in ship situations of all types enabled him to cope with what followed.
There was an abrupt cessation of weight, and then he found himself falling. He didn't quite land like a cat, but did succeed in turning his body enough in midair so that his arms and legs - and a less mobile portion of his anatomy - took most of the impact when he hit the floor.
Others were not so fortunate. There were some injuries - sprains, a couple of broken legs, a concussion or two - but nothing fatal.
The chief engineer rolled over and sat up, rubbing at the back of his neck and shaking a fist at the closed door. "Ye bloody big scatterbrain, make up your monumental mind!"
As expected, the door and its now isolated master did not deign to reply.
Experience had also told on the Bridge, where even minor injuries were absent.
"You were right, Spock," Kirk admitted. "Once the threat to its creative reasoning functions ceased, it no longer felt compelled to take defensive action."
The question now uppermost in his mind was, what kind of offensive action might the computer eventually decide to take? But Spock had mentioned a theory. Spock's theories usually turned out to be pretty solid.
"All right, Spock, can you tell me what's happened to my ship?"
Assuming a lecturing pose, Spock began, "Evaluation of the circumstances surrounding both the disappearance of Officers McCoy, Sulu and Uhura coupled with the many previous, though less dramatic, incidents leads me to believe that my first suspicion - that some unbalanced personality on board was tampering with the computer - is false."
"Your reasons, Spock?"
"The machinations which have been carried out so far involve extremely elaborate alterations in the computer's most delicate circuitry and programming. It strikes me that such adjustments and corresponding bypasses of all emergency overrides and fail-safes are beyond the capacity of any group of individua
ls on board, let alone any one. They would require the facilities and knowledge present only at a major cybernetics construction/repair center.
"With one possible exception," he finished. "Chief Engineer Scott."
"And we know Scotty's not responsible. For one thing, this kind of juvenile delinquency just isn't part of his personality." Kirk looked uncertain. "If it's not due to the actions of someone on board, what then? Central computers are supposed to be fool-proof. Ours ought to shut itself down, considering what it's already done."
"I believe there is only one possible explanation left, Captain. You remember the peculiar energy field we passed through in escaping the Romulans?"
Kirk nodded as he settled back in his chair. It had resumed its familiar location on the floor instead of the ceiling. He considered Spock's words carefully.
"I will assume," the first officer continued, "that the extremely active subatomic particles of which the energy field was composed have acted upon our computer's most sensitive circuits."
"The logic and higher reasoning centers," Kirk supplied.
"Exactly. A kind of electromagnetic infection, to put it crudely. The end result appears to have been an alteration, rather than a breakdown, of the ship's cognitive facilities.
"It is still capable of intuitive reasoning, but now along infantile instead of practical lines."
"So what you're saying," Kirk ventured by way of summing up, "is that the computer, and what it controls on board - meaning just about everything - is now in the 'hands' of a clown-mind." It was an awesome threat - even though, he had to admit, nothing terribly dangerous had happened so far.
Nothing dangerous? Then what was happening to Uhura, Sulu and McCoy?
"What can we do to correct the malfunction?"
"I'm afraid I've no idea, Captain," Spock replied solemnly. "There is nothing predictable about the computer's actions, other than its unpredictability. Without a pattern, I have nothing on which to formulate a potential solution."
***
Sulu hugged his arms to his sides. The gesture was more psychological prop than useful action. It did nothing to alleviate his shivering.
They had managed to stumble over a snow bank. It cut off much of the biting wind, though they all knew that if the fickle mind now in control of the computer chose to alter the gale's angle of approach, it could do so any minute. So they nestled together under the white lee and hoped their tormentor would remain otherwise occupied.
He's starting to turn blue, Uhura mused in wonderment as she stared at the shaking McCoy, her own teeth rattling. Odd ... until now she'd thought that sort of thing only happened on visitape, subtly prepared by professional makeup men. Apparently nature was equally adept at such cosmetics.
Coming as she did from a tropical climate, the temperature drop should have affected her hardest of all. Instead, she seemed to be standing it a little better than her two companions. Sulu was little better off than McCoy.
"The temperature must be twenty below, and still dropping," she observed frigidly.
"Twenty below what?" McCoy grumbled. "Are you on the standard scale or the old Fahrenheit?"
"Well, I'm on the Sulu scale," the helmsman broke in, "and on that scale it's twenty below freezing."
"Look, we're not taking a dispassionate approach to this," suggested Uhura. "No matter how it looks, no matter how radical the illusions set before us, this is still just the Recreation Room. If we travel far enough in one line, we've got to run into one of the walls. From there we ought to be able to feel our way to the door."
McCoy struggled to his feet. He had to shout for his voice to be heard above the steady howl of the wind. "I could punch all kinds of holes in that argument, Uhura, but it's the first suggestion I've heard that contains any sense. Let's move before we all turn into icicles.
"At least walking will help keep us warm. This blizzard shows no sign of letting up."
Also, though he didn't say it, it would keep them from dwelling any longer on the increasingly serious situation they found themselves in.
The doctor found himself in the lead simply by virtue of taking the first step away from their temporary refuge. As they fought their way through the whiteout, he kept those argumentative "holes" he'd casually mentioned to Uhura to himself.
There was no point in giving their invisible assailant any suggestions.
Whoever had commandeered the rec room controls could create any, absolutely any, type of environmental simulacrum. For example, a fake solid wall. Bending it slightly could keep them feeling around in circles for hours, days, all the while thinking they were traveling in a straight line toward a never-nearing exit.
They might counter that by measuring their steps, since they knew the size of the chamber. In that case, they could find themselves confronted with an infinite series of artificial walls and exits.
An exit could be found ... found to lead only to another section of the same snowstorm. McCoy's mind grew dizzy with the possibilities. The computer could let them out into a reproduction of the outside corridor. He could walk to his own cabin ... only to awake still inside the recreation room.
It was enough to drive a man mad.
He forced himself to stray from such ominous thoughts as he struggled awkwardly through the deepening drifts. So far their pernicious prankster didn't seem that far-sighted. Or that clever.
He found himself wondering if the designers of this marvelous method of electronic escape had considered its psychiatric possibilities...
***
Kirk studied the readout on the main viewscreen. So far, the deranged computer hadn't interfered with pure information storage and retrieval facilities. Probably, he mused, because it didn't think there was anything in its banks that could be utilized against it.
There were endless tomes on computer repair, on procedures for treating mislaid circuitry, even on treating the colossal machine mind for various psychological electronic traumas. But there didn't seem to be a thing on how to treat a computer whose reasoning power had been inexplicably distorted by the effects of passage through a free-space energy complex of unknown composition. That was hardly surprising, since this was the first time it had happened.
Kirk thought sardonically that they needed to pull the plug and he had no idea where the socket was.
The viewscreen shifted to internal communications channels again, replacing the universe and chromatic emanations of the field with the more prosaic features of a tired young technician. At the moment, he wore fatigue like a badge.
"Search party to Bridge - Ensign Apple reporting."
"Bridge here - the Captain speaking. Report, Ensign."
"Our sensors indicate the missing officers are still in the Recreation Room, sir. The door appears to be jammed from the other side."
A moment's consideration, then, "Hold your position, try the door from time to time, Apple. If it opens, get in there and get them out. Report immediately if there's any change in the corridor."
"Yes, sir."
Some fast switching and the face in the screen grew older, wiser.
"Engineering," Scott acknowledged. "Captain?"
"We've finally located Uhura, Bones, and Sulu. They're in the Recreation..." His voice dissolved in the middle of the word ... to a chuckle!
"Sir ... I didn't get the end of that."
Startled, Kirk coughed and tried again. "We need a full work crew, with power tools, maybe even a laser drill, to open a badly jammed door. Have them report to..."
In horrified fascination, he felt his facial muscles working, twisting involuntarily into a wide grin. "Report to ... to..."
He collapsed in a paroxysm of laughter. Fighting, battling his own body, he gripped the arms of the command chair so hard his knuckles turned white. His head rolled back and forth as he roared at some gut-wrenching cosmic joke.
Arex, M'ress and Spock stared at him in astonishment. But it was Scott who spoke first.
"Captain ... what's the matter, sir
? I don't understand what's ... what's...."
The chief engineer of the endangered ship snorted. Then he smirked. The smirk spread to a smile broken by giggles, then chuckles - and finally he, too, was bellowing with laughter.
M'ress was the next to surrender to the assault of merriment. Her throaty, feline giggles were in sharp contrast to the deeper laughs of Kirk and Scott. She was soon joined by the weird, amused piping of Arex.
Only Spock remained silent, though not unaffected. His concern grew rapidly as he studied his out-of-control companions, while unprovoked, unrestrained hilarity reigned on the Bridge. He was about to voice an observation when both hands suddenly flew to his temples. His brows drew together in an expression of shooting pain. There was nothing he could have done to mitigate the half-anticipated attack of migraine.
Still blubbering uncontrollably, Kirk finally noticed his first officer's silence and painful grimace.
"Come on, Spock," he managed to gasp, "where's that famous Vulcan sense of humor?" This apparent apex of jocularity caused Arex and M'ress to laugh even harder. Meanwhile on the viewscreen, Scott was fighting unsuccessfully to remain in focus.
Holding one hand to the side of his head and gritting his teeth occasionally, Spock turned his attention to his computer console. The crew still retained some control over certain localized monitoring equipment, facilities the central computer apparently disdained to trouble with. Spock already suspected what had happened. Environmental analysis quickly confirmed his suspicions.
"Just as I thought," he murmured painfully.
"What are you," Arex whistled heartily, "mumbling about, Mr. Spock?"
"The atmosphere on the Bridge and presumably also in Engineering," he replied tautly, "is being pumped full of nitrous oxide, better known in the human vernacular as laughing gas. I cannot yet tell what other decks have been affected by this aerobic alteration. In any case, it is no laughing matter." His other hand darted up from the console to press at his opposite temple. "Especially for Vulcans. Breathing nitrous oxide causes ... severe headache."