“Aye aye, sir!” Stiles choked.
“We’ll be ready within five minutes,” the ambassador told him fluidly, then turned to the attendant who’d put the jacket on him. “Edwin, please bring out the consul general’s family and Mrs. De Gaeta and turn them over to Ensign Stiles.”
“Right away, Ambassador.”
As the man left, Spock turned again to Miss Theonella. “You have our records and diplomatic pouches? The legal briefs and service files? Personnel manifests?”
She held up a stern black pilot’s case with a magnetic lock, hanging from a strap on her shoulder. “All here, sir.”
“Very well. We should also bring the jurisdictional warrants. They could be confiscated and used to gain passage into restricted areas.”
“I’ll get them, sir.”
“No, I’ll get them.” The ambassador turned to leave, then paused and gazed briefly at the tiled floor, thinking. “Stiles…”
“Here, sir!”
Spock looked up at the inflamed response. Coolly he repeated, “At ease, Ensign.”
Stiles shivered, glanced at Travis Perraton, and again met the ambassador’s eyes. “Yes, sir….”
“Are you by chance related to—”
“Yes, sir, I am, sir! Starfleet Security Commander John Stiles, Retired, is my grandfather, sir! He served with you under Captain James T. Kirk, Stardates 1709 to 1788 point 6 as Alpha-Watch navigator aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise, NCC 1701, commissioned stardate—”
“I recall the ship, Ensign.”
“Oh…oh…aye, sir….”
“You have a long line of Starfleet service officers in your family heritage, I also recall.”
“Yes, sir! Several active-duty servicemen lost in the Romulan Wars, sir! A captain, two lieutenants, two—”
“Commendable, Mr. Stiles. Carry on.” Spock turned to the little gaggle of people behind him and said, “All of you please stand by until everyone else arrives. Then you’ll take your instructions from Ensign Stiles as to how you will arrange yourselves during the actual evacuation. As you know, the building is beam-shielded, and therefore we must go out the door and board the transport coach on foot. Unfortunately, our general safety compromises our safety during emergency evacuation. Karen, keep them in order. I will return momentarily.”
With that he disappeared down a different hallway and into an office, leaving a confused clutch of embassy persons standing here in the foyer, wide-eyed and obviously frightened. By nature, the two groups divided to opposite sides of the foyer, embassy folks over there, Oak Squad over here.
Stiles let himself be tugged aside, and barely registered the low mutters of his men around him through the afterglow of his meeting with Spock.
“Beam-shielding,” Matt Girvan grumbled. “There’s planning. What if they had to get out under more dangerous conditions than mudballs and molotovs?”
“It’s beam-shielded so assassins or terrorists can’t beam in.”
“Why couldn’t they make it one-way?”
“Too unstable. Sucks too much energy to maintain over time.”
“Doesn’t matter. We’ll get ’em out. Eric’ll carry them all on his back if he has to.”
“If he doesn’t choke up a lung first.”
“We’ll be lucky if he doesn’t make us bow backward out of the room.”
The team laughed. A cluttered sound, muffled…like a storm coming.
Beside Stiles, Perraton raised his helmet visor and smiled with genuine sympathy.
“You okay, Eric?” he asked.
Stiles felt his lips chapping as he breathed in and out, in and out, like a landed fish. He’d just met his hero and he didn’t know if he’d liked it.
And it wasn’t over. In fact, it was just beginning. He’d have to do everything perfectly from now on. No more botched formations. No more stammering. He had to be perfect. Smooth.
“Ease up, lightfoot,” Perraton suggested privately. “He’s just a guy.”
“Just a guy,” Stiles rasped. “He’s a hero, Travis…a Starfleet icon…the first Vulcan in Starfleet…Captain James Kirk’s executive officer…I’ve heard every story a hundred times all my life—do you know how many times he participated in saving the whole Federation? And even the Klingon Empire?”
“Doesn’t matter now. Anyway, the hard part’s over. You met him, you survived, and the experience didn’t suck out your brains. He was a Starfleet man for half a century. He knows the drill. So get a perspective. Here he comes.”
Do the job. Do the job.
The ambassador flowed back into the foyer, now carrying a slim red folder and followed by more than a dozen people and his attendant Edwin. Suddenly the foyer was swarming with civilians. At least they were mostly adults, a few teenagers—Stiles didn’t relish the prospect of herding toddlers through that mess out there. He stiffened as the ambassador came directly to him.
“We’re ready, Mr. Stiles.”
“Yes, sir…how would you like to do this?”
Spock handed the folder to Miss Theonella. “Pardon me?”
“I…I figured you’d have some preference about…what order you want them in and…how to do it.”
The ambassador thought about that briefly, his dark eyes working, as if he hadn’t considered such an option. After a moment he vocally shrugged. “Your mission, Ensign.”
Over Spock’s shoulder, Perraton smiled and gave Stiles a thumbs-up.
Sustained by that, Stiles forced himself to rise to the demand. “Uh…if you people would form a line, two by two, and Oak Squad situate yourselves between them, uh, one every…uh—”
He paused, tried to do the math, but couldn’t remember how. His brain had been sucked out!
Maybe he wouldn’t have to count and add and divide—his men were already arranging themselves into position. Perraton was taking the lead, and motioning the others into the queue at intervals.
“I’ll take the rear guard,” Stiles said. “Ambassador, would you mind coming back here with me, sir?”
“Thank you, Ensign, I will.”
“All right, let’s—no, no, you can’t do the door.” Stiles motioned to the funny-looking butler who was still standing his post at the door, waiting to open it for everybody. “Travis, put that man in line behind Girvan and you do the door. Then fall in.”
“Copy that.”
“Okay, phaser rifles ready.”
“Ready!” his men shouted.
“Rifles up!”
“Up!”
“Very well!”
Stiles took one more look at Ambassador Spock’s steady form in line before him, at the large UFP shield printed on the back of the blue jacket. The stars of the United Federation of Planets swam before his eyes.
He drew a breath. His voice echoed under the high tiled ceiling.
“Mobilize!”
Chapter Two
BRASH SUNLIGHT BLARED into Stiles’s eyes, smashing his dream of friction-less success. The sun courted the horizon now, directly ahead of them, as they charged the protesters crowding the courtyard. Curtains of fire roiled around them where the gasoline puddles had been ignited by molotovs. On the other side of the licking flames stood the coach and fighters and a half-dozen unconscious rioters. Apparently Brazil had needed to enable his stun phasers to back them off.
Now the rest of the protesters were giving the fighters a wider berth, and turned instead on the jogging queue of embassy personnel and their six Starfleet guards trying to wend through the pockets of stenchy flame.
A fist shook in his face—and Stiles rammed his rifle butt into some-body’s chest. Mudballs slogged through the line, striking the civilians. One caught Moose in the helmet. He staggered, but got back in line before Stiles could react.
Crack!—a molotov bottle smashed in front of the ambassador. New flames broke out, flooding the bricks, dividing Spock, Stiles, and one woman from the rest of the line. Spock instantly veered sideways, caught the woman in front of him, and steered her around the f
lames and back behind Moose’s protective form.
“Oak Squad!” Stiles shouted over the noise. “Phasers on stun, fire at will!”
He didn’t know whether or not they heard him until White and Perraton opened fire on a group of protesters blocking the way to the coach. The rifles blanketed the area with a red bulb of energy, and the rioters went down in a heap.
“Wish we could just toast ’em,” Stiles grumbled, tactlessly boiling with contempt for this civil unrest. Why couldn’t they just follow rules and stick within the law? Why’d they have to cause trouble?
“Stiles Oak-One! Ramp!”
The coach’s automatic ramp opened before them with a whine. Perraton led the frantic evacuees right to it, then angled to one side and shouted warnings to the crowd as the diplomatic people clomped up the ramp. Luckily nobody had to yell at them to stay in line. They were perfectly satisfied running for the cover offered by the coach’s maw. Just as the middle of the line was swallowed by the coach, Jeremy White veered away from the queue to drive back the same herd of angry teenagers that had harassed them on the way in. Now those teenagers were armed with iron bars—and the bars were red hot. White held back on firing his weapon, instead using it to bash away the iron bars threatening him.
“Jeremy!” Stiles called. “Stun ’em!”
But White couldn’t get enough room to turn his phaser rifle barrel down and take aim. He tried twice, and each time was pummeled by a hot iron bar—the teenagers were too close, surrounding him so he couldn’t move forward or back. If he tried to stun them at hand-to-hand range, he’d end up stunning himself too. And White was getting angry. Stiles could hear his furious grunts and barks as adrenaline took over and defensive/offensive training got a grip on him. Step by step he drove the teenagers back, inch by inch, but not enough for rifle stun. And they were hitting him with their hot bars until his protective padding smoked and sparked.
“On board, on board!” Stiles shouted to the civilians. He couldn’t help White until these people were all present and accounted for in the safety of the coach. When Ambassador Spock was finally on the ramp, Stiles wheeled around, jumped off the footboard, and rammed through the enraged teenagers. He drove one of them to the ground, then rammed his rifle butt into the ribs of another, until he could see White’s scratched helmet and smell the burning padding of his uniform.
“Jeremy! You’re covered! About face!”
White tried to turn, but was caught in the neck by a vicious blow and tumbled to the brick at Stiles’s feet. Stiles stepped over him, aimed his rifle, and fired.
A burst of bright energy engulfed four of the teenagers, so close that Stiles felt his skin go numb even under the protective gear.
“Get up!” he ordered, kicking White uncharitably. “On your feet! Board the ship!”
White rolled out from under him, possessing the presence of mind to keep a grip on his weapon, because they sure didn’t dare leave it here, and stumbled to the ramp. Perraton skidded down and caught him, then shoved him into the coach and shouted, “All clear, Stiles! Stiles! Eric!”
“Acknowledged! Power up!”
“Aye aye!”
“Nuts, Oak One, power up for liftoff!”
“Copy, Oak One.”
Instantly the fighters began humming with power buildup. Perraton disappeared back inside, and Stiles was two steps behind him, scrambling up the ramp on two feet and a hand, his weapon clutched in his other hand. Perraton was there to yank him inside, and backhanded the ramp control. The ramp whined upward and clacked shut, then the hatch bolts slammed into place.
Inside, Bill Foster was collecting the phaser rifles and slamming them back into their wall rack while the other men dumped their helmets into the reception locker.
“We’re secure,” Perraton reported. “Dan’s powering up for you.” He hit the hatch lock for takeoff, turned to Stiles and shrugged. “Wasn’t so hard.”
“It wasn’t?” Stiles gasped, scanning the crowd of frightened evacuees. “Is anybody hurt?”
They all looked at each other, but no one spoke up. They were bruised, dirty, coughing, no longer the prim bunch he’d seen in the embassy, and one woman was sobbing, but most of them were in their seats and belted in. Now he saw that Ambassador Spock was buckling up two of the family members. So Spock was responsible for the organization. No surprise there.
Stiles dumped his helmet on the carpet and peeled out of his flak vest. “Where’s Jeremy?”
“I’m over here.”
Jeremy White’s lanky form, smeared with dirt now, was sprawled in one of the crew seats, pressing a hand to his neck. His helmet was off too, and his uniform was still smoldering. Stiles stuffed his vest into Perraton’s hands and hurried forward to Jeremy White.
“You all right?” he asked.
White blinked up at him. “Affirmative, more or less.”
“Why’d you break formation?”
White’s glare roughened. “Gosh, Eric, I got this irresistible crush on a girl way over there and figured to ask her out if I could just get through those terrorists with the hot irons and broken bottles—what the hell kind of a question is that?”
“You follow orders from now on, have you got that?”
Slumping back a little more, White grimaced. “Put a leash on it, will you? We’re doing everything you say!”
Stiles almost snapped a reprimand, but what good would that do? And all the dignitaries were looking at him. Should he throw a tantrum?
Instead he surveyed White’s dirt-flecked face and sandy hair, and decided on a better choice.
“You’re all right, though?” he asked. “Not burned?”
The anger flowed out of White’s heat-blotched cheeks. “Except that now I have to tell my mother I scratched the little body she cooked for nine months.”
“Then take the portside defense guns. Let’s get off this planet.”
“Aye aye.” White pushed out of his seat and made sure his neck wasn’t bleeding.
“Girvan, starboard gun.”
“Starboard, aye.”
“Travis, navigate. We got a mountain range in our liftoff path.”
“Right.”
The three men went in three different directions, two to the defense pods and Perraton to the cockpit. A second later, Dan Moose came out of the cockpit and said, “We’re powered up. I can’t pilot this thing, though. You’re the only one who can fly it in an atmosphere.”
“I know, I’m coming. Sir, are you comfortable?” He paused before the ambassador on his way to the cockpit and asked a silly question. What difference did comfort make?
“I’m sorry about the trouble out there, sir,” Stiles babbled. “If it were up to me, we’d sweep the whole courtyard with wide stun. Why do people have to behave that way?”
Spock straightened from helping Edwin buckle up. “Those people are frightened, Ensign, and disheartened. The political situation here is volatile. This was our last chance to evacuate Federation personnel. Prudence dictated that we get out while we can. The Pojjana have abandoned any over-tures toward Federation membership, despite our efforts to help them protect themselves. This is an interplanetary squabble between them and the Bal Quonnot now, lacking clear rights and wrongs. Federation policy will now be hands off. The sector will be declared ‘red.’”
“Then why were they trying to stop us from leaving? If they don’t want us here—”
“A number of factions on this planet may find advantage in preventing our leaving. I should warn you,” Spock added, and lowered his voice, “they never attacked the embassy itself because that would have been an act of war according to the Articles of Confederation. The embassy building is Federation soil. However, once we’re in the atmosphere, they can shoot us down and claim any number of scenarios. We must be on our guard and ready to fight.”
“We’re ready, sir! I’ve got five fully armed fighter escorts, and this coach has two defense guns and a detachable midwing utility jump-plane.”
&nbs
p; Spock raised one eyebrow and drawled, “Yes…of course it does.”
Now what did that mean?
Stiles was about to ask, then realized that all these innocent civilians were looking at the two of them, hanging on every word. From the ambassador’s expression, Stiles got the idea he wouldn’t get any answers even if he did ask. He shouldn’t have asked anything. Gum stuck on your shoe doesn’t ask, “Where are we going?”—it just sticks to the shoe.
Spock, having been around humans all his life, seemed to recognize the look. Stiles was instantly mortified that the ambassador had read the questions in his eyes. Why hadn’t he taken the time to study the political climate here? Wasn’t that his job as mission leader? Thirty-five diplomatic persons including the famous adventurer Ambassador Spock—killing them would send vibrations across the quadrant. Kidnapping them would be an even bigger coup—for somebody. A shipload of diplomatic hostages, and Stiles had to make a fool of himself by needing the most elementary facts explained to him.
Shriveled like a prune, he glanced around at all the people watching him, judging him, and croaked, “Prepare for lift-off.”
“Very well.” Spock simply took a seat in the first row, next to Miss Theonella and Edwin.
Feeling completely shrunken, Stiles threw off his gauntlets and stepped through the hatch to the cockpit and into the pilot’s seat. Stinking of garbage, his jaw swelling up like a melon, he kicked the foot controls and threw the coach into antigrav so abruptly that the fighters were left below. Too bad. They’d catch up.
On his cockpit screens he noted all five Nuts coming up quickly on his flanks.
“Nuts, Oak One, I want some maneuvering room out of the city. Spread out. Attempt Emerald formation.”
They each acknowledged with a green light, and he knew he was free to maneuver the bulky craft out over the countryside and toward the mountains. It would take the coach about five miles to reach escape velocity and make it up to an altitude at which they could veer up and out of the atmosphere. Soon the city pulled away beneath them, and he steered around two water towers and a radio antenna and was clear. Now for the mountains.