On a hunch and with a lack of any real information to proceed on (not a very promising base) he began pressing in disks, moving switches as best he could with clumsy hands. For a while nothing happened. Then, when he accidentally nudged a spiral-shaped knob, the lights in the console began to intensify. Spock murmured something, and Kirk glanced up at his science officer.
“The mirror-thing, Captain.” Kirk turned so that he could see the huge, hexagonal reflector.
It was beginning to pulse softly. The rippling waves of diffuse color started to flow more rapidly across its shifting surface. The mirror shuddered, turned to face them on some kind of hidden swivel mounting.
For a moment the four of them were reflected in the gleaming, curved material, enlarged and grotesquely distorted.
“What is it, Jim?” McCoy demanded. “What’s it doing?”
“I don’t know, Bones.” Kirk tried to watch the mirror and handle the console at the same time. Something had activated the mirror this far. Very well. His hands played over controls as yet untouched. After a few moments the colors started to fade, the mirror itself to brighten.
Then the chaotic display of color solidified, coalesced into blurred images fluttering across the screen. That’s what it was, a screen! And sound emanated from it now, too… a husky chittering like the song of a gigantic cricket. But the sound was much more varied, much richer in invention. Somewhere behind those sounds there was a guiding intelligence.
A picture began to form in the mirror-screen. The image sharpened. In the background was a control room of some sort. A familiar control room.
The control room they were in now.
More interesting still was the creature that dominated the screen. It was insectlike but not ugly. Its surface features were smooth, streamlined—not spiky, boney, or sharp. It was difficult to get an idea of its true size because of the way it dominated the mirror-screen. It must have been sitting very close to the visual pickup. But it was clear that it was much bigger than any man.
Big enough to need the two huge doorways they’d encountered thus far. Big enough to make use of a ship this size. Big enough so that each pod might be quarters for a single crew member.
Not big enough to prevent its destruction.
Now they could match up the strange sounds coming from speakers behind the screen with the being’s mouth movements. There was a definite tone of urgency in its peculiar, rasping words. It seemed—though it was hard to tell due to vast differences in voice-box construction—that some of its message was being repeated, over and over.
Kirk finally broke the silence that had settled over the little group. The creature on the screen didn’t react to the sound of his voice. If there was any lingering doubt about that, there was none now. They were watching a recorded message, and none cared to think how old it might be.
“Could be the ship’s log,” he thought out loud. “Or a warning. Or a religious service, or instructions for game playing, or music lessons.”
“I think not, Captain,” said Spock. “This preparation and care hints at more than mere frivolity.”
“True… there, there’s that same collection of sounds again!” Kirk insisted. “It’s repeating itself, all right—at least part of the time.”
McCoy murmured, “A message from three million centuries ago.”
“It is possible, it seems,” nodded Spock. “That much of their amazing technology has survived.” He was working with the tricorder again.
Kirk divided his attention between his busy science officer and the strange alien on the mirror-screen.
“Can you get anything out of this, Spock?”
“I may be able to affect a translation,” he replied. “The basic voice pattern does not exhibit any impossible aural characteristics. Perhaps we are deceived as to its potential complexity by sheer age.”
A sudden change seemed to come over the voice of the ancient speaker. His speech was louder now, more insistent. McCoy glanced back at the triple door. Scott followed the doctor’s glance with a worried one of his own.
The green and light-blue bands of energy sparking across its surface were thicker, less intermittent than before. Whatever was at work on the incredibly tough alloy was definitely working its way through.
“Hurry up, Spock.”
“Patience, Doctor.” He activated some switches on the tricorder. Leaving the compact instrument, he started to scan the console, examining switches and dials.
Eventually he seemed to find what he was looking for. He removed the tricorder from his shoulder and placed it carefully on the panel, setting it on top of a small six-sided grid set into the metal. A last switch depressed on the tricorder and then he stepped back, turning to watch the screen.
Instantly, the voice of the alien started coming from the tricorder speaker instead of from the mirror-screen. The cluttering sounds began to seem less garbled, more comprehensible. Blank spaces in the speech replaced chitters, where the tricorder’s marvelous abilities were unable to translate delicacies of alien syntax.
“Danger… (more cluttering sounds)… star… drawn to it…”
Spock reached up and made some final, fine adjustments to the ’corder. The voice was suddenly clear and understandable in the huge chamber.
“…Rather than carry this malevolent life form to other worlds,” came the voice from across time, “we have decided to destroy our own ship. The Thing had been trapped here by the tremendous gravity-well of the dead sun. So it must remain. So, sadly, must we. We have studied the problem quite thoroughly in the time remaining. There is no other solution.”
Kirk desperately wished he could read the expressions on the face of the speaker.
“The others are dead. Only I am left, to give warning. If you are understanding this message, comprehend that you are protected in this room only for the moment. The Thing… grows ever stronger… it wants…”
A spectacular flare of green phosphorescence erupted from the region of the doorway. The voice of the speaking alien was drowned out by a violent, hysterical flow of pure energy. Then the three segments of the door exploded inward as though struck by a small meteor.
The shock threw Dr. McCoy and Scott off the dais. Kirk and Spock were knocked down, but managed to hold onto the control chair and console. Fortunately, the splinters of flying metal from the ruined door somehow missed everyone.
The great curved mirror-screen began to vibrate, shiver as tremendous unrestrained power was played through it. A wash of stunning olivine boomed across the surface, absorbing the milky opalescence, drowning out all other colors. There was a deep rumbling.
The polished surface started to quiver at fantastic speed, then to flow. A crackling sound followed, then another, and another as shards of mirror material broke free, fell from the screen to the floor. Another powerful explosion tore the remainder of the wonderful device into tiny pieces of shining metal and blew a deep hole in the structure of the interior pod wall.
Clinging desperately to the unsteady, rocking console, Kirk and Spock watched as even the smallest fragment of mirror-screen was enveloped in soft green light. Each bit was then melted into a tiny, shapeless blob of hot metal.
At that point the command chair and console began to glow faintly green. Spock noticed it just in time.
“Off, Captain!”
Kirk was already jumping clear. Seconds later the temporary control center began to glow white-hot beneath enveloping green mists, then to run and drip like hot butter.
All around the great chamber, the other previously untouched mechanisms and devices started to show the now deadly green fire.
Kirk had a supportive arm around a dazed but otherwise unhurt Scott. Spock aided McCoy, who likewise had only been stunned.
“Out of here!” Kirk shouted into space. “Hurry!” Several pseudopods of translucent green started to advance towards them from various melting panels.
The men froze. Glaring light played suddenly over their forms. They dissolv
ed, became four small shapeless masses of colored particles.
“…Located them right after you pinned down the area of that last explosion, Mr. Sulu,” said Transporter Chief Kyle into the intercom. His hands were smoothly operating the transporter controls as he spoke.
“Locked on and beaming them aboard,” he finished.
“Good work, Chief.” Uhura’s voice echoed back over the grid from the distant bridge. “I thought we’d lost them when we were first cut off. And then when the pod they entered started to blow…”
Kyle looked up into the transporter alcove, saw flashing pillars beginning to take on solid, familiar outlines.
“Piece of cake, ma’m. They’re coming through now.”
The gleaming cylinders continued to build and take bipedal form. Kyle studied his dials and indicators intently, moved the levers down the final notch.
Kirk was in the foremost transporter disk. He blinked, took in the transporter room at a glance, and grinned in relief at Kyle. His expression changed fast when he noticed the chiefs face. Kyle wore the strangest expression, of shock, perhaps. He was staring and pointing at Kirk—no, not at him, behind him.
“Chief,” he began, “what’s the—”
“Captain!” Kyle finally managed to gasp out, gesturing. “Something beamed aboard with you!” Kirk whirled, looked behind him. So did Spock and Scott and McCoy.
The fifth disk was occupied… by a glowing and pulsing shapeless green mass.
“Transport it back out!” In an instant Kirk was dashing for the transporter console where the chief stood frozen. He dove for the activating switch. He’d think about saving Spock and McCoy and Scott later.
Too late.
The entire transporter room was suddenly drenched in light the color of deep rain forests, in diffused energy that tingled and sent waves of terror over every man present. Then the walls seemed to suck up the light like a sponge.
Kirk recovered, his hand precious centimeters short of the activating lever. Might as well have been parsecs. Standing slowly he looked around and saw that Spock and the others were staring at the walls. Then he noticed it also. The walls of the transporter chamber were now radiating a faint, greenish glow. At the same instant a roar of sound burst from the ship’s speakers. A bizarre, untranslatable, somehow triumphant cry. It was repeated, once.
In space, the Enterprise—infinitely tiny compared to the giant alien starship—suddenly flared with a halo of pale green. Then the seething mist thinned as the ship’s hull seemed to reabsorb the color into itself.
Kirk let out his breath slowly, trying to regularize his metabolism.
“Mr. Scott, are you all right?” The engineer was staring blankly at the no longer friendly walls. His gaze held hints of panic.
“MR. SCOTT!”
The engineer shook at the verbal blast, but it was what was needed. He drew himself up, holding his right shoulder with his free arm.
“Yes, Captain. This is just a bruise. But what… ?”
“Bones?”
McCoy rose slowly from his kneeling position on the platform, brushed at his lower back and grimaced, then nodded.
“I’ll be all right, Jim.”
Two unrelenting forces flowed through the Enterprise then. A green something that had lived at least three hundred million years ago now permeated the entire ship, and a holocaust of thought racing through the mind of her captain, who had lived somewhat less.
IV
Kirk, Spock, and Scott moved toward the bridge. Despite his continuing curiosity, McCoy had left them at another level. His job was elsewhere now.
To their credit, the crew on the bridge had remained reasonably calm. Less highly trained personnel might have done something drastic. The three returning officers took up their regular stations. A glance served to pass command back from Uhura to Kirk. They had no time to waste on formalities.
Reports were starting to filter onto the bridge from the rest of the ship as different sections responded to Kirk’s request for status reports. His initial nervousness relaxed, but did not disappear, as section after section reported neither damage nor loss of life—no harm done by the strange discharge of green energy.
Or whatever it was.
He sighed as Uhura relayed the report he most wanted to hear.
“Sick Bay reports, sir. Dr. McCoy on alert—no injuries.”
“No damage to engines or hull structure, Captain,” came Scott’s report a moment later.
So the Enterprise, was still healthy, organically and inorganically. That was something, at least. They’d been given some time.
But how much?
“Automatic bridge defense system activated and operating, Captain.” This from Spock.
Kirk spared an idle checking glance up and behind. A small metal globe, looking rather like a child’s toy ball studded with tiny pipes now protruded downward from a small hatch in the ceiling. A tiny red light on its side winked on, showing that the automatic phaser mechanism was powered up and ready to deal with any intruder.
Kirk had seen the last-gasp defenses of the enormous alien ship fail in an attempt to halt the forays of the green light. He didn’t pin much faith on the powerful phaser.
He nodded in acknowledgment and turned to study the main viewscreen. The now familiar shape of the ancient traveler, in reduced perspective, still floated against the vast blackness of dead sun, empty space. He thought a moment, then activated the chair comm unit, leaning slightly forward to project clearly.
“Uhura, give me all intership speakers. Open channel.”
“Channels open, Captain.”
“All sections are to remain on full alert until further notice. Section reports from Sick Bay indicate your companions are all unharmed. Engineering reports no damage to the ship. Nevertheless you will remain on full alert until told otherwise. All personnel will wear…” He caught himself. He’d almost said “will wear sidearms.”
What would they shoot at—green light?
“All personnel will wear clothes.” Sulu and Scott tried to stifle laughs, failed. McCoy would have approved. He tried to think of something brilliant to conclude with, failed as usual. “Everybody do your job… be ready for developments… and relax. Further orders and information will be forthcoming.”
He switched off the communicator and found that everyone was watching him expectantly.
“So—we’re in great shape, aren’t we? But whatever was on that ship—” and he indicated the floating alien starship, “used our transporter beam to come aboard when it was good and ready. I don’t think there’s any question but that it allowed the alien’s defense system to jam our communicators, the transporter, and our phasers until it was prepared to board the Enterprise itself.”
“This in itself says that it has some limitations, Captain,” suggested Spock. “If it was forced to rely on our transporter, then it seems certain it cannot move freely through space.”
“That’s true. We may have occasion to hope it has other limitations, Spock.”
“That alien commander, sir,” said Scott slowly, choosing his words with care. “At least, I assume it was the commander. His message confirmed that they had to destroy themselves. Why?”
Kirk didn’t reply. He sat and stared closely at his left foot. It was as good a subject to focus concentration on as anything else. Staring at Uhura would be more pleasant, but would have the opposite effect. Despite his concentration he was aware that everyone was still watching him, waiting. As usual, they expected him to get them out of this. It was so goddamn unfair!
Kirk’s opinion was not unique in the thoughts of captains.
When he finally spoke, the words came slow but clear.
“Until we learn more about this creature, Scotty, perhaps we should be prepared to do the same.” He paused, but Scott wasn’t going to help him out on this one. He’d have to say the words himself.
“Take two of your men and arm the self-destruct mechanism in the engine core.”
“Sir?”
“You heard, Mr. Scott. Carry out your orders.”
Scott came erect, snapped off a sharp salute.
“Aye, sir!”
An interval of solemn, respectful silence followed as the chief engineer left the bridge. He could have delegated the task to his assistants, but that was not Montgomery Scott’s way.
“Mr. Spock, any change in the Enterprise’s readings? Anything to indicate what this creature may be up to?”
“Nothing obvious or immediate, Captain. We are registering a slightly higher than normal magnetic flux. It’s not dangerous—not as it reads now. However, if it should go higher… and the level isn’t constant. It appears to be fluctuating irregularly. There is some slight pattern, some half rhythm to these pulsations, but nothing recognizable enough to…”
Kirk barely heard the rest. “Like the beating of a heart,” he muttered, half to himself.
A light blinked on suddenly on Uhura’s board. No one turned immediately to watch her. At the moment, private thoughts were of greater importance.
“Bridge here.” She paused, listening. Her life-support aura formed a lemon-colored nimbus around her, contrasting sharply with the red uniform of a communications officer.
“What?” The loud exclamation brought Kirk around. “Thank you, Lieutenant.” She swiveled to face the Captain. Her voice was grim.
“Sir, decks five and six report shutdown of all life-support systems.” An anticipatory shudder seemed to run through the bridge. “They’d just gone over to life-support belts—there was barely enough time.” She paused.
“If you hadn’t given the order for full alert, sir…” She left the obvious unsaid.
“What about manual override?” Uhura shook her head.
“According to the officers in charge, manual overrides have failed to respond, and—”
The raucous blare of the general alarm drowned out her concluding statements and all other sounds on the bridge. Kirk spoke angrily.
“Cut that, Mr. Sum.”
Flashing lights and siren died quickly. He shifted in his chair. “Mr. Spock!”