Star Trek - Blish, James - 04 Read online

  "I rather prefer the monster theory," McCoy said. "If we catch a man behind these murders, I think we ought to lower him into his own acid vat a quarter of an inch at a time."

  "If," Spock said, "is the operative word in either case..."

  He was interrupted by a distant, heavy boom. The room shuddered, the lights flickered, and then an alarm bell was clanging. A moment later, Vanderberg burst in from his office.

  "Something's happened in the main reactor room!" he shouted.

  They left at a dead run, Vanderberg leading the way, McCoy bringing up the rear. The trail wound up in a tunnel elaborately posted with signs reading CAUTION:RADIATION-MAIN REACTOR CHAMBER-ONLY AUTHORISED PERSONS BEYOND THIS POINT. The floor of the tunnel looked as though something very heavy had been dragged along it. At the far end was what had once been a large metal door, but which now consisted chiefly of curled strips around a huge hole. Before it was a small, blackened lump which might once have been a man.

  Vanderberg recoiled. "Look, at that!" Then he hurried toward the ruined door. McCoy knelt quickly beside the charred lump, tricorder out; Kirk and Spock followed Vanderberg.

  Inside, the bulk of the reactor was buried in the walls, showing only a large faceplate and a control panel. Pipes crisscrossed the chamber; and an appalled Vanderberg was standing looking down at a sort of nexus of these- a junction that ending in nothing.

  Kirk scanned the control panel. "I didn't know anyone still used fission for power."

  "I don't suppose anybody does but us. But pergium is money-we ship it all out-and since we have so much uranium nobody wants, we use it here. Or we did until now."

  "Explain."

  "The main moderator pump's gone. Lucky the cutouts worked, or this whole place would be a flaming mass of sodium."

  Spock knelt and inspected the aborted junctions. "Acid again. Like the door. Mr. Vanderberg, do you have a re-placement for the missing pump?"

  "I doubt it. It was platinum, corrosion-proof, never gave us any trouble; should have lasted forever." Sudden-ly, visibly, Vanderberg began to panic. "Look, the re-actor's shut down now-and it provides heat and electricity and life support for the whole colony! And if we override, we'll have a maximum accident that will poison half the planet!"

  "Steady," Kirk said. "Mr. Spock, might we have a re-placement on shipboard?"

  "No, Captain. To find one, you would need a museum."

  Kirk took out his communicator. "Kirk to Enterprise... Lt. Uhura, get me Mr. Scott... Scotty, this is the Captain. Could you contrive a perfusion pump for a PXK fission reactor?"

  "Hoo, Captain, you must be haverin'."

  "I'm dead serious; it's vital."

  "Well, sir-I could put together some odds and ends. But they wouldn't hold for long."

  "How long?"

  "Forty-eight hours, maybe, with a bit of luck. It all ought to be platinum, ye see, and I've not got enough, so I'll have to patch in with gold, which won't bear the pressure long..."

  "Get together what you need and beam down here with it."

  Kirk put away the communicator and bent upon Van-derberg a look of deep suspicion. "Mr. Vanderberg, I have to tell you that I don't like the way these coincidences are mounting up. How could some hypothetical monster attack precisely the one mechanism in an almost ancient reactor which would create a double crisis like this? And how would it happen to be carrying around with it a mix-ture of acids precisely calculated to dissolve even platinum-and also human flesh?"

  "I don't know," Vanderberg said helplessly. "You sus-pect sabotage? Impossible. Besides, Ed Appel saw the monster."

  "He says."

  "Ed's been my production chief almost throughout my entire career. I'd trust him with my life. And besides, what would be his motive? Look, dammit, Kirk, my people are being murdered! This is no time for fantasies about spies! The thing is there, it's free, it's just shut us down right under your nose! Why in God's name don't you do something?"

  "Captain," Spock's voice said from behind them. "Will you come out and look at this, please?"

  Kirk went out into the main tunnel to find the First Officer contemplating a side branch. "This is most curi-ous," he said. "This tunnel is not indicated on any of the charts we were provided. It simply was not there before."

  "Too recent to be on the maps, maybe?"

  "Yes, but how did it get here, Captain? It shows no signs of having been drilled."

  Kirk looked closer. "That's so. And the edges are fused. Could it be a lava tube?"

  "That seems most unlikely," Spock said. "Had there been any vulcanism on this level since we arrived, everybody would be aware of it. And it joins a charted tunnel back there about fifty yards."

  "Hmm. Let's go back to the ship. I feel the need for a conference."

  Spock brought with him into the briefing room of the Enterprise one of the strange spherical objects Vander-berg had called silicon nodules, and set it on the table. Then he sat down and stared into it, looking incongruously like a fortune-teller in uniform.

  "I think it's mass hysteria," McCoy said.

  "Hysteria?" Kirk said. "Dozens of people have been killed."

  "Some-natural cause. A phenomenon-and people have dreamed up a mysterious monster to account for it."

  Spock stirred. "Surely, Doctor. A natural cause. But not hysteria."

  "All right. You asked my opinion. I gave it to you. How do I know? Maybe there is some kind of a mon-ster..."

  "No creature is monstrous in its own environment, Doc-tor. And this one appears to be intelligent, as well."

  "What makes you think so?"

  "The missing pump was not taken by accident," Spock said. "It was the one piece of equipment absolutely es-sential to the operation of the reactor."

  Kirk looked at his First Officer. "You think this creature is trying to drive the colonists off the planet?"

  "It seems logical."

  "Why just now, Mr. Spock? This production facility was established here fifty years ago."

  "I do not know, sir." Spock resumed staring at the round object. "But it is perhaps indicative that Mr. Appel claimed to have hit it with his phaser. He strikes me as a capable but unimaginative man. If he said he hit it, I tend to believe he did. Why was the creature not affected? I have a suggestion, though Dr. McCoy will accuse me of creating fantasies."

  "You?" McCoy said. "I doubt it."

  "Very well. To begin with, the colonists are equipped only with phaser number one, no need for the more powerful model having been encountered. This instrument, when set to kill, coagulates proteins, which are carbon-based compounds. Suppose this creature's 'organic' compounds are based on silicon instead?"

  "Now surely that is a fantasy," Kirk said.

  "No, it's possible," McCoy said. "Silicon has the same valence as carbon, and a number of simple silicoid 'organics' have been known for a long time. And by the stars, it explains the acids, too. We have hydrochloric acid in our own stomachs, after all. But we're mostly water. Silicon isn't water-soluble, so the aqua regia may be the substrate of the creature's bloodstream. And the hydrofluoric- well, fluorine has an especial affiinity for silicon; the re-sult is teflon, which may be what the creature's internal tubing is made of."

  "Do you mean to imply," Kirk said slowly, "that this being goes about killing men with its own blood?"

  "Not necessarily, Jim. It may spit the stuff-and sweat it, too, for all I know. Its tunneling suggests that it does."

  "Hmm. It also suggests that it would have to have a form of natural armor plating. But our people have phasers number two, and I defy anything to stand up against that at high power, no matter what it's made of. The question is, how do we locate it?"

  "I would suggest," Spock said, "that we start at what-ever level these silicon nodules were found."

  "Why? How do they tie in?"

  "Pure speculation, Captain. But it would be helpful if it were confirmed."

  "Very well, assemble security forces. I assume that Mr. Scott is already
at work on the reactor? Very good, we'll assemble in Vanderberg's office."

  "You will each be given a complete chart of all tunnels and diggings under this installation," Kirk told his forces. "You will proceed from level to level, checking out every foot of opening. You will be searching for some variety of creature which apparently is highly resistant to phaser fire, so have your phasers set on maximum. And remember this-fifty people have already been killed. I want no more deaths..."

  "Except the bloody thing!" Vanderberg exploded.

  Kirk nodded. "The creature may or may not attack on sight. However, you must. A great deal depends on getting this installation back into production."

  "Mr. Vanderberg," Spock said, "may I ask at which level you discovered the nodules of silicon?"

  "The twenty-third. Why?"

  "Commander Giotto," Kirk said, "you will take your detail directly to the twenty-third level and start your search from there. Mr. Vanderberg, I want all of your people to stay on the top level. Together. In a safe place."

  "I don't know any safe place, Captain. The way this thing comes and goes..."

  "We'll see what we can do about that. All right, gentle-men. You have your instructions. Let's get at it."

  Spock, Kirk, Giotto and two security guards paused on the twenty-third level while Spock adjusted his tricorder. Most of Giotto's men had already fanned out through the tunnels. Kirk pointed to a spot on Giotto's map.

  "We are here. You and your guards take this tunnel, which is the only one of this complex that doesn't already have men in it. As you see, they converge up ahead. We'll rendezvous at that point."

  "Aye aye, sir." The three disappeared into the darkness. Spock continued to scan.

  "A strange sensation," the First Officer said. "There are men all about us, and yet because the tricorder is now set for silicon life, it says we are alone down here. No, not quite."

  "Traces?"

  "A great many-but they are all extremely old. Many thousands of years old. Yet, again, there are many brand new tunnels down here. It does not relate."

  "Perhaps it does," Kirk said thoughtfully. "Not tunnels. Not lava tubes. Highways. Roads. Thoroughfares. Mr. Spock, give me an environmental reading, for a thousand yards in any direction."

  "Yes, sir-ah. A life-form. Bearing, one hundred eleven degrees, angle of elevation four degrees."

  "Not one of our people?"

  "No, sir, they would not register."

  "Come on!"

  They set off quickly, keeping as close on the bearing as the convolutions of the tunnels would allow. Then, ahead, someone screamed-or tried to, for the sound was suddenly cut off. They ran.

  A moment later they were looking at a small, black-ened lump on the tunnel floor, with a phaser beside it Grimly, Spock picked up the weapon and checked it.

  "One of the guards," he said. "He did not have a chance to fire, Captain."

  "And it's only been seconds since we heard him scream..."

  There was a slithering sound behind them. They whirled together.

  In the darkness it was difficult to make out details, ex-cept for movement, an undulating crawl forward. The creature was large, low to the ground, somehow worm-like. It was now making another noise, a menacing rattle, like pebbles being shaken in a tin can.

  "Look out!" Kirk shouted. "It's charging!"

  Both men fired. The monster swung around as the two phaser beams struck its side. With an agonized roar, it leapt backward and vanished.

  "After it!"

  But the tunnel was empty. It was astonishing that any-thing of that bulk could move so rapidly. Kirk reached out to touch the wall of the tunnel, then snatched his hand back.

  "Mr. Spock! These walls are hot."

  "Indeed, Captain. The tricorder says it was cut within the last two minutes."

  Kirk heard running footsteps, and then Giotto and a guard, phasers at the ready, appeared behind them.

  "Are you all right, Captain? That scream..."

  "Perfectly, Commander. But one of your men..."

  "Yes, I saw. Poor Kelly. Did you see the thing, sir?"

  "We saw it. In fact, we took a bite out of it."

  Spock bent over, then straightened with a large chunk of something in his hand. "And here it is, Captain."

  He handed the stuff to Kirk, who examined it closely. Clearly, it was not animal tissue; it looked more like fi-brous asbestos. Obviously, Spock's guess had been right.

  "Commander Giotto, it looks as though killing this thing will require massed phasers-or a single phaser with much longer contact. Pass the word to your men. And another thing. We already knew it was a killer. Now it's wounded-probably in pain-back in there somewhere. There's nothing more dangerous than a wounded animal. Keep that in mind."

  "The creature is moving rapidly through native rock at bearing two hundred one, eleven hundred yards, elevation angle five degrees," Spock said.

  "Right." Giotto and the guard went out, and Kirk started to follow them, but Spock remained standing where he was, looking pensive. Kirk said, "What's troubling you, Mr. Spock?"

  "Captain, there are literally hundreds of these tunnels in this general area alone. Far too many to be cut by the one creature in an ordinary lifetime."

  "We don't know how long it lives."

  "No, sir, but its speed of movement indicates a high metabolic rate. That is not compatible with a lifetime much longer than ours."

  "Perhaps not," Kirk said. "I fail to see what bearing that has on our problem."

  "I mention it, Captain, because if this is the only sur-vivor of a dead race, to kill it would be a crime against science."

  "Our concern is the protection of this colony, Mr. Spock. And to get pergium production moving again. This is not a zoological expedition."

  "Quite so, Captain. Still..."

  "Keep your tricorder active. Maintain a constant read-ing on the creature. We'll try to use the existing tunnels to cut it off. If we have to, we'll use our phasers to cut our own tunnels." Kirk paused, then added more gently, "I'm sorry, Mr. Spock, I'm afraid it must die."

  "Sir, if the opportunity arose to capture it instead..."

  "I will lose no more men, Mr. Spock. The creature will be killed on sight. That's the end of it."

  "Very well, sir."

  But Kirk was not satisfied. Killing came hard to them all, but Spock in particular was sometimes inclined to hold his fire when his conservation instincts, or his scientific curiosity, were aroused. After a moment, Kirk added, "Mr. Spock, I want you to return to the surface, to assist Mr. Scott in the maintenance of his makeshift circulating pump."

  Spock's eyebrows went up. "I beg your pardon, Cap-tain?"

  "You heard me. It's vital that we keep that reactor in operation. Your scientific knowledge..."

  "... is not needed there. Mr. Scott knows far more about reactors than I do. You are aware of that."

  After another pause, Kirk said; "very well. I am in command of the Enterprise. You are second in command. This hunt will be dangerous. Either one of us, by himself, is expendable. Both of us are not."

  "I will, of course, follow your orders, Captain," Spock said. "But we are dealing with a grave scientific problem right here, so on those grounds, this is where I should be, not with Mr. Scott. Besides, sir, there are approximately one hundred of us engaged in this search, against one creature. The odds against both you and me being killed are-" there was a very slight pause, "two hundred twenty-six point eight to one."

  Not for the first time, Kirk found himself outgunned. "Those are good odds. Very well, you may stay. But keep out of trouble, Mr. Spock."

  "That is always my intention, Captain."

  Kirk's communicator beeped, and he flipped it open. "Kirk here."

  "Scotty, Captain. My brilliant improvisation just gave up the ghost. It couldn't take the strain."

  "Can you fix it again?"

  "Nay, Captain. It's gone for good."

  "Very well. Start immediate evacuation of all col
onists to the Enterprise."

  Vanderberg's voice came through. "Not all of them, Captain. Me and some of my key personnel are staying. We'll be down to join you."