One Small Step Read online

  Mox felt his chest swell in anticipation. This was it! The flagship of Starfleet was at his mercy. The ghost of his father must surely be at his shoulder, giving him this chance to affirm the words of Kahless and restore honor to his house. It would be a victory that would be hailed by the followers of Kahless across the quadrant!

  “The Enterprise is hailing us, Captain.” Gulda’s expression was eager now, as if no shadow of disgrace had ever come between them.

  Mox was smirking as he settled into his command chair. “Let’s see what the captain of the great flagship has to say.”

  After some delay, the image of the Enterprise faded to be replaced by the head and shoulders of a puny human. His sparse black hair was no adornment for a warrior, and his face was smooth as a baby’s. This was the mighty Captain Kirk?

  Mox sneered at the human, certain he could prevail over him. “Captain Mox of the cruiser ’Ong.”

  “Chief Engineer Scott of the Starship Enterprise.” The man had a strange, lilting accent. “What’s yer business here, Capt’n?”

  A mere engineer. “Where is Kirk?”

  The engineer tightened his mouth. “Well, he’s indisposed right now. Ye’ll have to make do with me, Capt’n.”

  “I will speak to Kirk.” Mox’s fist hit the arm of his chair.

  “And I say,” the engineer countered grimly, “what are ye Klingons doing here?”

  “It is not your right to ask questions! This territory is unclaimed.” Mox leered into the screen. “What are you doing here, Enterprise?”

  “We’re exploring, as per our treaty! We’ve already notified Starfleet Command of your arrival, so you better explain yerself or hightail it back t’ where you belong.”

  Mox felt the pulsing blood of battle. “Hard words for a ship drifting on auxiliary power.”

  The human leaned forward. “Is that a threat, Capt’n Mox?”

  As much as Mox wanted to say yes, and back it up with two disrupter banks of power, he knew he couldn’t simply slaughter an entire Starfleet crew. He needed to win an honorable battle. He would have to provoke the humans into making a threatening move.

  “We detected an energy pulse of immeasurable power,” Mox stated flatly. “It originated here, and penetrated Klingon territory. Clearly that is a threat to our security. So tell me, engineer, what caused that energy pulse?”

  Scott’s expression hardly changed. “Energy pulse? Now yer just making excuses, Klingon. We haven’t detected any energy pulse.”

  Mox was certain he was lying. Who would tell the truth in a situation such as this. “Were you attacked? Is that why your engines are off-line?”

  “Attacked? No . . . we’re realigning our warp coils. Our engines will be back on-line soon enough, ye can rest assured of that.”

  Mox glanced at his first officer, making a slight motion with one hand. Gulda instantly terminated transmission. She kept her eyes on him as he considered the possibilities.

  “What are they hiding?” she asked.

  “They are hiding Captain Kirk,” Mox replied. “That is their weakness.”

  Gulda turned to her panel, amplifying the scanners. “Our sensors can’t penetrate their shields.”

  Mox considered the fist-sized disc on the screen. “Scan the planet.”

  While his warriors worked, Mox thought it was revealing that the Enterprise didn’t hail them again. Starfleet officers were notoriously chatty. Always wanting to talk rather than fight. The flagship was indeed hiding something.

  “Captain!” Gulda grinned, showing her jutting bottom teeth as she looked up. “I’m reading a slight ion diffusion on the surface of the planet. It barely registers, but it has the signs of a cloaking shield. Something must be down here.”

  Mox clenched the arms of his chair. He had longed for days to strike out at someone, to remake his life with his gloved fists. “I will take this victory in the name of my father, Sowron!”

  His voice rang out, and it was a measure of their position of power that his crew let out a resounding battle cry. Their eagerness came from all the wrong reasons. But it was enough that they were ready to destroy the Starfleet ship.

  Mox knew his eyes burned as he swung toward the screen. “Hail the engineer of the Enterprise.”

  When the pale-skinned, scrawny human appeared on the screen, he was standing, tense, behind his navigator. “I’m warnin’ ye, Mox — ye have no business being in this sector!”

  Mox let his fury flow freely. “You are concealing a weapon on that planet! We have found your cloaking device. You will surrender the weapon at once, or I will consider it a violation of the Organian treaty.”

  The human reacted as vehemently as Mox could have wished. “You keep away from here, Klingon!”

  Over his shoulder, Mox ordered, “Close in on the planet. Prepare to transport a security team to the surface.” He looked back at the human. “If you will not surrender the weapon, then we are forced to defend ourselves.”

  Scotty knew the situation was slipping wildly out of control. Captain Mox was spoiling for a fight. The Enterprise only had impulse engines operating, providing limited phaser power. Their shields were at a bare sixty-two percent under auxiliary power.

  “You don’t want to go startin’ a galactic incident,” Scotty warned. He returned to the chair, hoping to try to calm things down and defuse the situation. “Chargin’ in here with disruptor banks armed is not —”

  “If you will not surrender the weapon, I will take it from you. Prepare to transport to the surface.” Mox was one of the meanest, dirtiest Klingons Scotty had ever seen — and he had seen a few of the nastier ones.

  Lieutenant Radha sent a report straight to the arm-screen of the command chair. The Klingons had locked on to coordinates right next to the entrance to the Kalandan station. His shield had failed — after he had personally assured the captain that it would hold.

  “You will not defy me!” Mox bellowed.

  The transmission abruptly ended, and Mox disappeared.

  “Red alert!” Scotty announced. He knew that wouldn’t help the damaged systems.

  Lieutenant Radha was calm, as usual. “Sir, the ’Ong is closing to three hundred thousand kilometers.”

  “Prepare evasive maneuvers.”

  Chekov acknowledged and faced the screen with tight shoulders. The Klingon cruiser approached and prepared to enter orbit. Their intent was clear — they were planning to take the planetoid.

  “Let’s see if we can keep them from entering orbit.” Scotty ordered, “Fire a warning shot across their bow.”

  The intake of breath broke the hush, but no one protested. Scott wasn’t sure it was the right thing to do, but he had to try something. Captain Kirk and the landing party were holed up down there with nowhere to run!

  “Firing phaser bank, sir,” Radha announced.

  One bolt of blue phaser-fire lanced through space just in front of the Klingon cruiser. The brightness lit up the bridge.

  “Engaging evasive maneuvers,” Chekov reported.

  The curve of the planetoid swung away as the Enterprise changed orbit.

  Before they could get around the curve of the planetoid, the Enterprise was jolted by return disruptor fire from the Klingon cruiser. “Direct hit to our aft shields,” Radha reported. “Shields down to fifty-eight percent.”

  Scotty held on, hoping the Klingons would be satisfied with one exchange, but the jolting came again and again.

  “More direct hits to our aft and port shields,” Radha called out. The red-alert sirens were blaring and the power flickered uncertainly. “Shields down to forty-one percent.”

  “I said evasive maneuvers, Ensign!” Scotty shouted at Chekov. “Get us out of here!”

  “All we’ve got is impulse, sir.” Chekov hunched over and braced himself against the navigational controls as another solid impact shook the ship.

  “Fire phasers!” Scotty ordered.

  Radha could hardly input the commands, the ship was shaking so hard
from the quick succession of direct disruptor hits. They could see the jolt of their own phasers against the cruiser, sending a burst of dispelled energy into the surrounding space.

  “Direct phaser hit on their starboard shield. No damage!” Rahda called out.

  Now there were shouts from the other stations as damage reports flooded in. The lights were flickering and getting weaker.

  Another shudder shook the ship as the Enterprise finally slipped around the edge of the planetoid.

  “The Klingon’s gone berserk!” Scotty exclaimed.

  “They’re coming around!” Radha announced. “Shields at nine percent . . .”

  Scotty braced himself. So this was it. He knew Kirk would never surrender, but he couldn’t let this crazy Klingon destroy the thing he loved most in life — the Enterprise. He couldn’t bear to let her go down in a fight like this.

  “Open all channels!” he ordered Lt. Uhura. “Transmit our surrender to the Kling —”

  “Sir!” Radha interrupted, her dark eyes astonished. “There’s another ship!”

  Chapter Seven

  TIMING IS EVERYTHING, Tasm reminded herself. She had used the time they spent behind the nebula to absorb every bit of information Kirk relayed to his ship about the Kalandans. It would give her the edge she needed in this engagement.

  Just as the new vessel appeared on the edge of the sector, Marl had finally located a neutralizer for the virus. Their database held records of a similar sporophyte virus from the Gooha system in the Beta Quadrant. Marl was already bio-replicating the enzyme that would serve as a catalyst in the removal of certain necessary C-cells that allowed the release of the spores. The active female spores died within a matter of crons, and unless the virus was allowed to release more female spores, there would be nothing to activate the inert male fragments within the gamma globulin molecules. The inert spores were harmless, and would eventually be flushed from their systems. The virus itself could be removed from their tissue using a standard transporter biofilter. Marl’s lab team was fast on their way to having a vaccine that would temporarily inhibit the production of C-cells in their glandular tissue.

  The arrival of another vessel complicated her plan, so Tasm watched carefully while staying concealed behind the nebula. The exchange between the Klingon and the human was heated. She was the only Petraw who saw it, while the others were quietly absorbed in monitoring systems of their scout ship.

  Standing at the subspace station on one side of the small control booth, there was nothing to indicate that Tasm was in complete control of what happened on their ship. It was enough that the others knew, when an order from her appeared on their panels, they were to execute the function without comment.

  The Petraw scout ship was on full alert. They could go to faster-than-light and arrive at the planetoid in less than three crons. That gave her plan a nice flexibility.

  As the two ships engaged in an overt territorial display, Tasm called up the data on Klingons. The entries were unanimous, with a number of Petraw ships having encountered this species. Klingons were extremely aggressive and disdained any form of cooperation as a weakness. Petraw defenders usually dealt with Klingons, not scouts like themselves.

  So their target remained the same — the officers of the Enterprise.

  Because of the information she had absorbed on the Klingons, Tasm was not surprised when shots were fired.

  Tasm pressed the sequence that engaged the engines of the scout ship.

  Navigation was already keyed to the coordinates of the planetoid, and their two new quantum torpedoes were armed. Control of the targeting mechanism was routed to Tasm’s panel. They had recently acquired the quantum technology through contact with a people known as the Kikmu. Visiting the icy Kikmu planet had been novel and interesting. In her experience, it was the first time that the other species in an engagement appeared to be as happy with what they got as the Petraw were. But the Kikmu never did find out who they were dealing with.

  Though the scout ship was rapidly nearing the battle zone, Tasm was distracted for a moment by a movement of Luz’s head. She was standing at the post next to Tasm, controlling navigation. Her lovely Kalandan face grimaced as she stared straight ahead in thought.

  Tasm could tell Luz was preoccupied. “Keep your attention on your panel, Luz.”

  The other two looked up, surprised by the break in their customary silence. When they saw Tasm concentrating on her readouts, they shifted their eyes obediently back to their own panels.

  Two crons to go and they would reach the planetoid. The Enterprise was much larger than the ’Ong, but it appeared to wallow in space, rapidly losing power. In its damaged state, it hardly had a chance to defend itself from the punishing disruptor blows. Clearly the Klingons intended to destroy the starship.

  When the Klingons didn’t react to their approach, Tasm pushed the delay button on the targeting computer. They were entering maximum range, but she intended to take full advantage of the element of surprise.

  As the scout ship reached minimum range, the targeting computer automatically released the first quantum torpedo. At the last moment, the Klingon ship veered off at the approach of the Petraw, but it was too late. The quantum torpedo had its own targeting nodes, which led it straight to its intended victim. That was a useful piece of technology they had acquired. Most shields weren’t calibrated to resist the innovative quantum weapon.

  The Klingon cruiser was flung away from the planetoid by the quantum explosion, and began spinning helplessly.

  When the ’Ong slowly came to rest, sensors indicated that half of one warp nacelle had been blown away. Since the nacelle was joined to the body of the ship, it had also torn off part of the hull.

  The communications array revealed that the Enterprise was trying to hail them. The starship was also trying to slip around the planetoid, apparently convinced they were the next target. They were, but not in the same way.

  The Klingons had not yet reacted. The Petraw scout ship swung around them, nearly matching the cruiser in size.

  Suddenly, bright green disruptor beams shot out from the Klingon cruiser. The Petraw scout ship shuddered under the impact. Their shields were more than adequate to deflect the directed energy of a phase disruptor.

  Tasm carefully considered what to do next that would enhance and further her plan of engagement.

  Deliberately, she keyed the sequence on the second quantum torpedo to target the cruiser’s matter/antimatter containment field. The quantum torpedo would punch through the hull and disrupt the field, which would in turn disintegrate the cruiser.

  Luz looked up from her panel as the tactical information scrolled by. “But that will kill everyone on board!”

  Tasm finished her instructions to the tactical computer. Then she looked up at Luz. “Total destruction is the intended result.”

  Luz almost retreated into silence, but she couldn’t seem to restrain herself. “But why? You could have let the Klingons destroy the Enterprise and fight the men in the station before finishing them off!”

  Their other pod-mates in the command booth — Kad and Marl — were staring now with open mouths. Luz had made a spectacle of herself before, but never in the tricky opening sequence of an engagement. None of them questioned their leader.

  “I may have to remove you from this engagement,” Tasm said flatly.

  Luz immediately busied herself with her panel, apparently shaken by the threat. Tasm knew that Luz was different from her other pod-mates, but her passion for engagements couldn’t be questioned. Her fitness to perform would have to be evaluated later, not in the heat of battle.

  The Klingons directed two more blasts from their disruptors at the Petraw ship, which bounced harmlessly off their shields. The Enterprise was still trying to hail them.

  Tasm pressed the command for the tactical computer to proceed. The quantum torpedo launched and homed in on the Klingon cruiser.

  The ’Ong lurched as the explosion ripped through its side. T
hen a huge cloud of orange sparks mushroomed out, larger, then larger still, engulfing itself with successive waves of expanding energy.

  The advance shock wave hit the Petraw scout ship, knocking it from its course. Tasm was occupied while they regained control of the ship, but she did take a moment’s satisfaction in the good start to their engagement. Now the Enterprise would be beholden to them, and their guise of being the descendants of the all-powerful Kalandans would be reinforced. A touch of fear never hurt during negotiations, as long as that fear was properly channeled.

  Lt. Uhura couldn’t move when she saw the torpedo from the unidentified ship zeroing in on the Klingon cruiser. Chekov shouted, “It’s going to hit!” just as the torpedo impacted.

  Everyone on the bridge winced in sympathy at the explosion. The Enterprise was moving too slowly for comfort as they tried to get behind the planetoid. They were rocked by the shock wave.

  On the screen, the sparks faded, leaving no sign of wreckage. The Klingon cruiser and all on board were simply gone.

  It was so unexpected. The Enterprise’s shields were failing and they were about to be destroyed . . . the next thing Uhura knew, this strange ship was swooping in to annihilate the Klingons!

  “What was that weapon?” Scotty demanded.

  Second Science Officer Momita, a fleshy Tau Ceti female, was frantically trying to analyze the science readings. “The initial explosion was caused by some sort of quantum-level discharge. A warp-core breech finished them off.”

  “Quantum torpedo . . .” Scotty sounded impressed. “I dinna know they really existed.”

  “It sure packs a punch,” Chekov agreed.

  Feeling numb, Uhura automatically continued to try to hail the unidentified ship. Scotty was chewing his bottom lip, staring at the screen. He looked like he was wondering if the Enterprise was next.

  “No answer to our hails, Mr. Scott,” Uhura reported, trying to keep her voice from wavering. “Damage reports coming in from all decks.”

  “Aye . . . ” Scotty checked the reports on his arm console. Much of the damage was from overloaded secondary systems as the shields failed. The ship had been in bad shape before the pounding of the Klingon disruptor fire.