Killing time, p.23
Killing Time, page 23
And yet … the star pattern remained in the Vulcan's mind; and the phantom voice whispered in his ear, calling his name repeatedly. With a lifted brow, he rose from the bed, careful not to awaken McCoy or S'Parva with his quick movements toward the computer console.
The drummer sounded in his ears, a symphony of thunder. But he made it to the chair, slumped into it, and activated the terminal. After finding the correct mode, he stared at the screen for what felt like hours. At first, the star patterns of the Romulan Empire were nothing more than alien configurations of light. But when he continued his search through the files, viewing the stars as they appeared from various planets in the Empire, he suddenly understood the meaning of the dream. It was Kirk's distress beacon, Kirk's way of letting him know where he and Richardson were located.
At last, as he continued rapidly thumbing the switch which would advance the program, he came to the diagram of the star patterns as viewed from Remus, sister-world of the Romulan governmental planet. And there, almost like a smile, appeared the precise constellation which had filled his dream.
Neutral Zone … desert world … blue sun …
As he sat there pondering the simplicity of the message, Spock felt the first glimmer of hope he'd experienced in a long time. But when he turned, preparing to dress for the day's events, it was to see S'Parva leaning quietly over his shoulder once again.
Another time, he could have responded with a lifted brow or questioning glance; but with the dream still etched in his mind, the fever burning brighter than stars in his blood, and the knowledge that they would soon reach the Praetor's palace, his eyes widened as a gasp slipped past his waning control.
S'Parva eyed the screen, however, almost oblivious to the Vulcan's uncharacteristic nervousness. Her whiskers twitched. "I saw the constellation in my mind, too, Commander," she murmured. "They've made contact, but … without a ship, there's no way to get to them."
But the Katellan's voice came through a distant tunnel. A sound like an ocean began to roar, and long fingers of hot darkness reached into the Vulcan's mind, tugging him down into unconsciousness. For a brief instant, surprise registered on angular features.
Greedy hands covered his eyes, caressing reality with fire. He fell.
Chapter Nineteen
WITH A GASP, Kirk awoke, hands constricting on some invisible demon which had crept into the tent during the night and now attempted to strangle his very life away. Movement was impossible, and hot dry air stabbed his throat as he tried to breathe.
"Whoa! Wake up, Jim!" a distant voice commanded insistently.
Hands closed on his shoulders—gentle, reassuring hands of a friend. He inhaled sharply, his eyes focused, and he found himself face to face with Richardson. Glancing suspiciously around the tent, he felt paranoia as he tried to sit up; but the twisted sleeping bag constricted across his chest and arms, throwing him back at the ground.
Quickly, Richardson unzipped the restrictive gear, hoisting Kirk into a sitting position. Brown eyes narrowed with concern. "That must've been one hell of a dream, Jim," he remarked, crawling over to the "door" and throwing back the two main flaps. "When I went out to take a better look at our predicament, you were sleeping like a little crumb grabber.
After a moment, Kirk laughed wearily, wiping sweat from his forehead. "So much for mind links," he muttered to himself. But his eyes darkened as he recalled what he'd seen … what he'd felt during the "dream." Putting one hand to his brow, he forced himself to breathe at a normal rate; but the air which filled his lungs was searing, parched with the sharp scents of the desert.
With an effort, he dragged himself to his feet, staggered outside, and stared at the terrain once again. Even with the pale blue sun low on the morning horizon, heat-monkeys had already started to dance among the rocks. And within another two hours, Kirk realized, the inferno would be directly overhead. Wiping beads of sweat from his upper lip, he turned to find Richardson at his side.
"The spring's large enough to cool off in," the other ensign suggested, shielding his eyes from the sun with the splinted arm. "And I thought I saw a few scrawny fish in a pool up there," he continued, jerking his head toward the crevice which led up to the spring's source. "But you'll have to bait the hook," he added matter-of-factly.
Kirk grimaced, walked over to the edge of the rock-face and lowered himself to the ground, looking up at Richardson's puzzled expression. "How about you?" he asked pointedly, unable to shake the dreamlike quality. "Any luck with contacting S'Parva?"
Richardson shrugged, still standing. "I felt something," he said quietly. "But I'm not sure. . . ." The sentence trailed off. "Hey, c'mon, Jim," he said, easily detecting the other man's anxiety. "There's no point sitting here having a stroke." He reached down, grabbed Kirk's arm, and pulled him to his feet. "Let's shed a few clothes and see what we can do about staying alive. If that works, we can get back to work on the telepathic links after breakfast." He grinned reassuringly. "No point burning out your brain, either," he pointed out.
Without waiting for an answer, Richardson stripped off the uniform tunic; and Kirk noticed with a smile that his roommate had already cut a ring around the sleeve. It remained, like some reminder of a life they'd once known. He watched as Richardson began climbing up through the rocks, and finally forced himself to follow.
After a silent five-minute trek which left sweat-beads standing at attention on his chest and face, he found himself in a natural rock "room" of sorts. On three sides, smooth white boulders stretched approximately four feet into the air; and on the third side, the rock had been worn smooth. Water cascaded noisily down the far side of the buttress, forming a winding narrow stream which stretched off toward the afternoon horizon. Heat-demons practiced eerie rituals along the river bank; and from his current elevation, Kirk could discern that the end of the desert was nowhere in sight. He sighed to himself, then turned back to his immediate surroundings. In the center of the rocky walls, approximately twelve feet in diameter, a stream of crystal-clear water gurgled up to form a pool. In the pool itself, several large rocks jutted upward; and Kirk realized that they could, if necessary, simply wait out the heat of the day sitting in cold water.
"What'd I tell ya?" Richardson asked with a grin as he tiptoed carefully over the slippery rocks, sat down on the edge, then lowered himself in, water lapping up around his neck. He splashed playfully in Kirk's direction.
Staring down at the tempting water, Kirk grinned. "Well," he said, stripping off his shirt, "I guess it's a damned sight better than roasting!" He felt a trickle of sweat run down his spine.
But as he slid into the cold spring, letting the waters close over his head, he suddenly understood that the heat was within himself; the spring provided no real relief. Holding his breath, he sank lower into the pool, letting the absolute silence lull him along. But the link wasn't broken, he realized abruptly. And something was terribly wrong.
Kicking his way upward, he broke the surface, grabbing quickly onto the rocky edge for support. His head pounded ominously, and he did not look at Richardson.
Beneath the cold water, his body shivered … but the taste of Fire and Death filled his mind.
Chapter Twenty
McCoy SHOOK HIS head, pacing across the quarters and staring at the Vulcan who remained unconscious on the bed. Color gone, breathing shallow, blood-pressure almost nonexistent; defeatedly, McCoy slammed his fist against the wall as his eyes sought S'Parva's.
"There's nothing more I can do for him," he murmured, trying to make himself accept that unacceptable statement. He cared for the Vulcan—perhaps more than professional ethics should have permitted—and the knowledge that all the galaxy's medical skills couldn't help left him angry.
"If the Romulans discover this, Doctor," S'Parva said quietly, "they will soon realize that our commander is not who he is claiming to be. If Tazol begins to suspect …" Her voice trailed off. "Though they are physiologically similar, Romulans do not undergo the time of mating. . . ."
"Tazol need not know," a deep female voice intoned from the doorway of the large room.
McCoy whirled about to see Thea standing just inside the quarters, her own eyes fixed on the unconscious Vulcan. Anger flared again. "How long have you been standing there eavesdropping?" he demanded harshly.
"Long enough to receive confirmation of my suspicions, Doctor," the Romulan woman replied. She met the physician's wary eyes. "Can you help him?" she asked pointedly.
McCoy bounced on his toes. "If I could help him," he snapped, "I wouldn't be standing here!" He tried to shove his own emotions into the background, but found they wouldn't leave him alone. "And just what do you propose to do now?" he demanded. "Shove Spock into the nearest disposal unit and find someone else to pawn off as the Praetor?" He didn't wait for a response. "If you can't handle your own responsibilities," he accused, taking a step nearer to the woman and staring down at her through hot blue eyes, "then you've got no business even being the Praetor! Hell," he added, finding the Judas-goat he needed, "it would suit me fine if the Warriors did overthrow your glorious rule and you right along with it!"
"Do not forget, Doctor McCoy," Thea interrupted levelly, "that I am quite capable of snapping your spinal cord should you provoke me sufficiently." She held the damning gaze steadily. "And you may rest assured that I have suspected the nature of Captain Spock's illness for quite some time." She smiled gently in S'Parva's direction. "Your assumption that Romulans do not undergo pon farr is essentially correct," she stated. "However, despite mutations which have occurred in both species since our biological paths forked several million years ago, even certain Romulans are telepathically … receptive to this … condition."
McCoy's brows knotted as he struggled to hold his temper at bay. For himself, he didn't particularly care if Thea did break his neck; but for Spock's sake, he forced himself to listen. "Can you help him?" he demanded.
Thea stepped away from the doctor without responding and went to kneel by the Vulcan's bed. With one hand, she gathered the limp fingers in her own, entwining them. The other hand moved to the fevered brow in a motion not unlike a caress.
"Leave us," she commanded. "There are Romulan methods of reaching into the mind of one such as your stubborn captain; but I shall not employ them to satisfy your curiosity." She glanced up. "Leave us," she repeated.
Bur McCoy moved forward defensively. "Not a chance," he countered. "Spock's my patient, and I'm not in the habit of leaving an unconscious man at the mercy of the enemy!"
Thea's eyes turned cold as she faced the doctor, slowly removing her hand from the Vulcan's forehead. As the physical contact was broken, the captain moved restlessly, reaching out blindly for the phantom hand.
"Then you condemn him to death with your petty professional jealousy," she pointed out. "Do you deny that you are unable to help him?"
Refusing to budge, McCoy shook his head. "If I can't save his life now, then I can administer a drug which will put his body in a state of hibernation."
Thea smiled wistfully. "An effort to stall the inevitable at best," she deduced, her eyes closing for a moment. "No … I cannot permit that. Time will not stand still, Doctor; and I need your commander at the palace tomorrow." She rose from the floor, moving to the desk and activating a communication panel. A moment later, Tasme and Sekor entered the room. "You will both go with my personal attendants," she instructed McCoy. "And you will not disturb me again until I send for you. If I require your medical services when Spock regains consciousness, I will send for you."
McCoy stared at the two slaves; but despite his personal wish to remain at the Vulcan's side, he had already been forced to admit his own helplessness. Perhaps Thea did know a way. . . .
Fleetingly, he turned from the Vulcan. "C'mon, S'Parva," he muttered, following the two slaves out of the room. "Let's leave the witch doctor to her rituals!"
But Thea only smiled as she knelt once again by the Vulcan's side, taking his hand in her own. "Sometimes witch doctors can provide a cure which medical men would find impossible," she murmured to McCoy's retreating back. Once they were gone, she glanced at the Vulcan once again, studying his face openly.
Lined with pain, he was nonetheless a desirable—and useful—creature. "But you will live," she whispered to herself. "I cannot permit you to die, for no one else can do what you must do once we reach the palace." She waited for only a moment longer, then turned her full attention on the Vulcan as she brought her hand to his face, seeking the neural centers into the mind.
For a moment, there was rejection, but she swept it aside with a single thought.
"You belong to us now, Spock," she intoned in the ancient ritual. "You belong to me. . . ."
Spock's mind opened to ponder blackness. At the end of what appeared to be a long corridor, a single light shone through. But gradually, the light split into two distinctive halves. One was pale … distant; the other held an immediacy which could not be ignored. He moved toward it, feeling heavy and surreal, weighted down by some forgotten burden which continued to burn its way through him.
As he came closer to the second light, he saw that it had a name, an identity. Thea.
His mind fought; she must not know, must not see the plan in his thoughts. She must not see that his charade was nothing more than a charade within a charade.
With an impossible effort, he tore himself free of the link, black eyes opening to study the Romulan woman leaning over him. For a moment, he wondered if he had already slipped into Death, if this was some fleeting illusion left over from life. For another instant, he wondered if the field-density between the two universes had already closed; and he himself was quite mad.
Thea.
He tried to speak, but the word hung suspended in his throat until he understood precisely what was happening. She had come—uninvited—into his mind, had sought out the last remaining ember of life, and had artificially sustained that spark with her own strength, wrestling him back from the eager arms of death. There had been no time for her to travel beyond superficial layers of consciousness, the Vulcan realized, allowing his mind to relax. His eyes closed, safe in the knowledge that his plan was still known only to himself. Perhaps she'd bought a few more hours of time. . . .
But he soon became aware of the gentle hand which caressed his forehead, smoothing damp hair back from his face. He tried to pull away from the enticing touch, but she grasped his hand in midair, forcing him to meet her eyes.
"Without my assistance, you will die, Spock," she informed him, her voice coming as if from a great distance.
He wrestled away from the words … but found himself too physically weak to move. She had broken his resistance, he realized with a flare of anger, had soothed the logical portion of his mind into something bordering dangerously on acceptance … even desire. He remained taut and unyielding. "You do not understand, Thea," he replied, voice escaping as little more than a whisper. "Our minds … are not … not enough alike. . . . No bond …" His head moved restlessly on the pillow as he struggled to form coherent syllables. "Cannot establish a link … not enough time. . . ." He drifted into silence, darkness moving closer. Still, he could feel the strand of her mind brushing against his own, refusing to deliver him into unconsciousness.
"At last, you have underestimated me, brave Captain," Thea replied, her hand drifting down to soothe the tight muscles in the Vulcan's back. "But no matter. A temporary link already exists; even you must admit to feeling something. . . ." She paused, then gently turned his face toward hers. "Look at me and tell me to go; and I will follow your orders."
The Vulcan's eyes clenched tightly shut, and he realized with a certain horror that she was right. He had been a fool not to recognize her seductive nature before. In the madness of pon farr, he did want her. But in a last attempt to serve logic, he shook his head violently, trying to sever the link without success.
"I … I cannot, Thea! It is a decision to be made for life … and I cannot stay with you!" He felt the shame and despair building in his throat, drove it away with an effort which hurt more than he would have thought possible. She was Romulan. She was the enemy.
… She was the only logical alternative.
"Sshhh," she replied, soothing the damp forehead once again. "In the Empire no one speaks of forever. There is only now … and the link we share is temporary. But for as long as you remain here, your mind is twin to my own. Come," she murmured, slipping her arms around his back and drawing him to her with remarkable strength. "As a creature sworn to the ways of Surak, you must realize that your own death would be illogical. It would accomplish nothing—other than, perhaps, to redeem your precious dignity." But despite the biting truth, there was no malice in her voice.
"I admire you for your conviction, Spock," she whispered, her lips tracing a line down the Vulcan's neck despite his continued resistance. "And now you must learn to admire yourself." She paused as some of the resistance slowly ebbed away. Eventually, she knew he would recognize her for who she was—a woman of his past, an enemy who had promised to make a place for him years ago. "We have met before," she added, trying to soften the psychic cries which slammed against her own mind. They faded slowly, quietly … until she knew there was no more hesitation left. "In another time and place, perhaps we would have chosen this freely. . . ."
Painfully, the Vulcan opened his eyes, staring through the red haze of fever to study the face which was poised less than an inch from his own. For a moment, he could almost believe her. And he knew now that he did find her compelling, mentally stimulating … physically intriguing. And yet, logic dictated that those feelings were present simply because of his own shameful condition. He took a deep breath, letting the pain take him.
"I do not … do not know you," he lied to himself.
"Then you will," Thea promised. "And perhaps one day you may be able to forgive me for saving your life in this manner." Her words drifted away as she leaned down to kiss the parched lips, placing her hand once again on the side of his face. As the link deepened, however, she could no longer hold herself in the role of savior. She succumbed to his needs, his thoughts, his desires. "I have almost forgiven you for the incident with the cloaking device," she whispered. "Perhaps you can be as generous someday."
