STAR TREK
  LOG 8
  BY
  ALAN DEAN FOSTER
  Also by Alan Dean Foster on the Ballantine
Books list:
  STAR TREK IOG ONE STAR TREK
IOG TWO STAR TREK IOG THREE
STAR TREK IOG FOUR STAR TREK
IOG FIVE STAR TREK IOG SIX
STAR TREK IOG SEVEN MIDWORLD IUANA
THE TAR-AIYM KRANG ICERIGGER DARK
STAR BIOODHYPE
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Alan Dean Foster Based on the Popular
Animated Series Created by Gene
Roddenberry BALLANTINE BOOKS NEW
YORK For REECE and CONNIE WOOLFOLK For
BEATRICE MURPHY They don't say much about
it, but their kind of people built this country.
  Copyright Can) 1976 by Paramount Pictures
Corporation
  All rights reserved under International and
Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published
in the United States by Ballantine Books, a
division of Random House, Inc., New York,
and simultaneously in Canada by Ballantine
Books of Canada, Ltd., Toronto,
Canada.
  Library of Congress Catalog Card
Number: 74-8477 ISBN
0-345-25141-5-150 Manufactured in the
United States of America First Edition:
August 1976 Cover art supplied by Filrnation
Associates
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT log of the Starship
Enterprise Stardates 5537.1-eecgcomb
Inclusive James T. Kirk, Capt.,
USSC, FC, ret. Commanding transcribed
by Alan Dean Foster At the Galactic
Historical Archives on S. Monicus
I stardated 611 1.3
  For the Curator: JLETTER
  THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER (adapted from
a script by David P. Harmon) "Captain's
log, stardate5537.1. The Enterprise is
embarked, for a change, on a routine follow-up
mission to search for a survey ship overdue for
report-in in the vicinity of Epsilon
Scorpii, last known to be investigating the system
of a Gbled sun designated Lactra on Federation
starcharts."
  He clicked off and studied the nearing globe and the
yellowish, slightly hot sun beyond. The world and its
star were no different from hundreds he'd examined
personally or on tape. Yet past experience had
shown that the innocuous-appearing worlds were often the ones
full of surprises planetffized
paranoia-inducing pinatas.
  The continuing silence of the survey crew the Enters
prise was here to locate could be due to some easily
explainable equipment failure or minor human
error. Could be.
  But Kirk was a veteran starship captain, and he
always wore two uniforms on such missions:
Starfleet regulation pull-one and an
intense, personal wariness.
  At the moment there was nothing to hint that Lactra
VII was anything other than the recently discovered,
inoffensive world it appeared to be. Only the small,
obviously artificial shape growing slowly and
silently larger on the main screen suggested
otherwise.
  The vessel was a long-range limited scout,
of a minor class designed for extensive
exploration of possible colonial worlds. It carried
a small crew of first-contact xenologists and no
frills, moving at high speed on an unvarying
course from starbase to eventual destination. Its large
quantity of complex instrumentation was announced by the
bristling array of antennae, external " 1
  - 2 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  sensor pickups, and other intricate detection
equipment which almost obliterated the small hull.
  Kirk noted with satisfaction that the scout looked
undamaged. That probably ruled out any messy
natural disasters such as meteorite collision and,
more important, interference from some inimical
spacegoing race. "Disarm phasers, Mr.
Sulu," he instructed the helmsman.
  "chasers disarmed, sir."
  The captain leaned toward the chair pickup and
activated the log again. "Captain's log,
supplemental. We have encountered and visually observed
the missing survey ship. It continues to maintain
communications silence." Glancing backward, he
noted Lieutenant Uhura's confirming nod.
All attempts to elicit some re- sponse from the
craft had failed, though she continued trying.
  "There is no evidence of violent damage or
sentient attack. Mr. Spock will lead a
security team in boarding the ship. land entry."
Shutting off the recorder once again, he addressed
another grid: "Transporter Room?".
  "Chief Kyle here, Captain. Boarding party
standing by."
  "All right, Chief, send them aboard." He
glanced backward. "Lieutenant Uhura, pick
up visual and aural transmission as soon as
transportation is complete."
  "Standing ready, sir."
  There was a tense pause, and then the view forward
changed to an internal view of the scout. Kirk could
see armed security personnel moving about as
someone's visual scanner played around the ship's
interior.
  "Boarding party has integrated, Captain," a
voice announced clearly . . . Spock's.
"Our sensors were correct. Ship appears
pressurised normally, temperature likewise."
  The view shifted jumpily. Spock was walking
through the cabin. "We are dispersing throughout
  the vessel, Captain."
  "Any sign of life?" Kirk asked
anxiously.
  "Negative. There is ample evidence of
previous tenancy, though. It looks as if the
crew fully expected
  STAR TREK LOG 3
  to return. There is nothing to indicate they were
surprised, or removed forcibly from the ship.
Personal effects are Iying neatly about. There is
no indication that the crew intended to leave their ship for
an extended period."
  "Very well, Mr. Spock. Continue your
  exploration."
  Several hours sufficed to show that the only living
things left on board the survey ship were
laboratory animals. Automatic feeders
kept them healthy in the absence of the crew.
  Spock did make one important
discovery,
  however.
  "Captain, Dr. McCoy," he began as they
  watched expectantly from around the small table in
the BrieIing Room, "we found this tape Iying in
the ship's library, next to the playback slot.
There is a duplicate in the ship's banks, but this
copy was deliberately placed in a prominent
position, obviously to attract the attention of
anyone entering the library."
  He picked up the small cassette and slid it
into a slot set in the table, then depressed the play
switch. Attention was focused now on the
  three-sided viewer which popped up in the table's
center.
  The tape showed a tense, worried officer in the
uniform of Federation Sciences. He was staring into the
pickup.
  "It is now thirty-two minutes since our last
contact with the three members of our crew who beamed
down to the planetary surface," the man
declaimed. "Each member of that crew was
  instructed to report in at ten-minute intervals.
  "As this deadline has long since passed, and
subsequent to our repeated failure
to contact any member of the landing party, I have decided
to take the following action. As senior officer
aboard I, Lieutenant Commander Louis Markel,
take full responsibility for this action and any
consequences thereof." He coughed awkwardly, then
continued on:
  "All three remaining members of the survey
team, myself included, will beam down in an attempt
to discover the whereabouts of our comrades and, if necessary,
to effect a rescue. If for any reason we should
fail
  4 STAR TRER LOG
  to return I, Lieutenant Commander Louis
  Markel, do hereby accept and acknowledge
  that his
  It was too much for Kirk. He jabbed the cancel
switch and both picture and audio died. McCoy
looked at him questioningly and saw that the captain was
struggling to suppress a rising fury.
  "What's the trouble, Jim?" he inquired
quietly.
  Kirk glared at him, the angry words tumbling
over one another. "Blatant disregard of standard
emergency procedure . . . utter suppression of
survey ordersl I tell you, Bones,
there's no excuse for his
  "Apparently the lieutenant commander felt the need
was pretty desperate, Jim," McCoy
  interrupted softly. "His friends had vanished, and
he decided going after them was more important than
anything else."
  Kirk calmed down slightly, but McCoy could
see the anger still simmering "It doesn't matter,
Bones. Letting personal feelings get in the way
of Starfleet regs . . ." He sighed. "Since
when were human beings otherwise?"
  "True, Captain," commented Spock.
  "Regulations specifically state, Bones, that in
a situation like this at least two members of the crew the
minimum necessary to operate a ship this size must remain
aboard. In the event that contact with the other four team
members is lost, they are to return to the nearest
starbase beam region and file a full report.
I don't care if the team commander is a full
admiral. Regulations must be followed. They were
created for a reason. Any sign of danger
to Pederation civiliza- tion . . ."
  "But, Jim, there was no sign of danger,"
McCoy pointed out.
  'what does not alter the fact,
Doctor, that the survey she's commander made what
is essentially a personal decision," Spock
observed.
  Now it was McCoy's turn to explode.
"Spock, you Vulcans are the most
unimaginative,
  unbending . . . to was
  'easy, easy Bones," soothed Kirk.
"You're starting to sound like me." He waited until
McCoy had calmed himself, then continued
  briskly. "None of this is help
  STAR TRER roe S
  ing the situation any. Nor is it helping
  Commander Markel and his people- assuming they're stiBut
down there and in a position to make use of our help.
Barring positive evidence to the contrary, we have
to assume that they are."
  "Sorry, Jim. Spock just has a way of
getting to me sometimes." McCoy grinned. "It's
an inborn talent, I guess."
  Spock replied amiably, "Some humans are
rather more easily gotten to than others, Doctor."
  "Mr. Spock," Kirk continued, "what can we
expect to find on Lactra Seven?"
  "We have little information on the world below us," the
first officer began thoughtfully. "What we do have is the
result of the drone's preliminary report, coupled
with information drawn from the survey ship's library.
We may assume this basic information is fairly
accurate. Our own sections are working to confirm this
now.
  "Lactra Seven is a Class-M world.
Gravity is approximately Earth-normal, the
atmosphere a reasonable analog of
Earth-Vulcan. Very little additional useful information
is on file. By useful I mean material which could
aid in the locating and rescuing of the missing crew.
What we do have is available in the printouts before
you."
  Kirk picked up the slim bundle of sheets and
leafed through them. "According to the survey ship's log,
Commander Markel and the other remaining members of his
crew beamed down six weeks ago."
  "Five weeks, three days, two hours, to be
precise, Captam," Spock corrected.
  "Careless of me, Mr. Spock:." He finished
scanning the printouts, then let the sheets drop.
'ationo indication of planetary life forms."
  'And in particular, of intelligent or large,
dangerous ones that is true, Captain,"
Spock admitted. "Life sensors are
experiencing some difficulty in penetrating a
distortion layer in the Lactran atmosphere.
  "Given the composition of that atmosphere, the
surface temperature, and the presence of large
bodies of
  6 STAR TREK LOG EIGGBBNT
  free water, I would suspect Lactra Seven
harbors a considerable amount of life. But without
additional data I cannot speculate on the form such
life has taken." His brows drew together.
  "Despite the distortion layer, the survey ship
was specially equipped for obtaining just such information.
Their records were surprisingly deficient in this
area, one of primary concern to any survey team.
Apparently they had no sooner entered into Lactran
orbit when this emergency overwhelmed them. Mr.
Arex is overseeing a full, detailed sensor
scan, which should reveal the relevant information," he
finished.
  'eventually," Kirk added. "Anything like a
comprehensive scan win take too long to
  complete, Mr. Spock. Minutes might make
the difference between life and death for Commander Markel and
his people if they're still alive. I want a
landing party to beam down to the last recorded
coordinates in the survey ship's tapes. If
they've had the sense to remain in that immediate area we
might be able to find them quickly."
  "tilde Don't you think that's taking an
extreme risk, Jim?" put in McCoy. "If
the first three were lost and remember, they never beamed
up any hint that something was wrong, no warning or
anything then we might run into the same
  silencing trouble."
  ""True, Bones. But if they experienced some
kind of mechanical problem, the risk might be in
leaving them stranded while we take endless readings. It
might involve that distorting atmospheric layer. For
example, maybe it affected their communicators.
That would explain why the first crew was unable to contact
the ship, and why the second crew failed
to activate the transit porter to bring them back.
  "They could be starving down there, sitting on their
acquired information and waiting for someone to haul them out.
We have to find out. They could have survived for six
weeks. They might not be able to survive six and a
half."
  "Still a risk," McCoy objected.
  Kirk's reply was matter-of-fact.
"That's why we're here, Bones." He rose from his
seat. "WerUs travel light,
  STAR TREK boa
  gentlemen. Phasers, tricorders,
  communicators and you'll take a full medical
kit, Doctor."
  It took only minutes to gather the necessary
paraphernalia; then the three officers met in the
Transporter Room. Scott was waiting for them.
He would handle the beam-down personally.
  "Any new information from Sciences, Mr.
Scott?" Kirk inquired as they exited from the
elevator lift and crossed to the alcove.
  "A little, sir," the chief engineer reported.
"Mr. Arex says that the distortion layer has been
penetrated sufficiently for sensors to reveal a
large variety of life forms on the surface. There
are substantial concentratffons in the area scheduled
for your landing, Captain."
  McCoy voiced the thought uppermost in their minds.
"Any indication of intelligent life?"
  'ationo, Doctor, none." Experienced hands
moved over the controls, adjusting settings, checking
energy levels. Playing with a man's molecules was
a dangerous business.
  'ationo large clusters of life forms in urban
patterns, and no hints of city outlines. No
rural patterns indicaffve of large-scale
agriculture."
  Kirk nodded. "You've set in the coordinates
taken from the survey ship's transporter tape?
That's where we want to be put down, Scotty."
  "Beggin" your pardon, sir," he countered
hesitantly, "but if I beam you down in the same
place, you could run into the same trouble . . . and end
up the same way. Quiet."
  ""We'll be expecting exactly that,
Scotty," Kirk explained. "At the first sign
of anything we can't handle, we'll beam back up.
Proceed with
  transporting."
  Scott shook his head, ever the pessimist, and
mumbled under his breath. That didn't affect the
precision with which he engaged the transporter
controls. Trfiple levers rose, and the three
officers dissolved mto elsewhere.
  Kirk experienced the momentary blackout, the
disofientation, and the usual twinge of nausea. Then he
materialised in an oven,
  8 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  A blast of humid, hot air struck him like a
sackful of hot mud. That first unexpected blast
seemed hotter than it actually was. But while
conditions at the setdown point were far from arctic, they
were bearable.
  After checking his footing he turned and took in their
surroundings. They were standing on the bank of a steaming
lake Kirk assumed it was a lake; but it could as
easily have been an ocean he couldn't see land across
it. Hot springs gurgled all around them, fining the
air with feathery streamers of pure steam.
  The thermal activity around them was as intense as in
the Waimangu valley on
  Earth noisy and nervous. But the ground
  underfoot was firm and gave every indication of having
been so for some time. So Kirk discarded his first thought that
the survey crews might have set down on some
unstable area, despite the safeguards inherent in
transporter sensors.
  "Everyone all right?"
  Spock nodded, then McCoy.
  "Ten meters either way, though," the doctor
pointed out, "and we'd have been boiled alive."
  Spock already had his science tricorder out and was
taking preliminary environmental readings.
He frowned. "Unusual that such a lake, of such
extent, could exist under the planetary conditions
prevalent at this latitude. Most unusual."
  "Speaking of the unusual, Spock . . . ,"
Kirk interjected. He was pointing at the surface
of the lake directly before them.
  A shape was rising from the steaming water. One could
read the writhing steam into
  fantastical forms, but this rapidly growing outline
was composed of something considerably more solid than
water vapor.
  It had a saucer-shaped body, limbs of still
unseen design but obvious power, and a short,
snakelike neck. A vision of quite adequate
ugliness bobbed atop that swaying extension.
  Spock nonchalantly turned toward it and
readjusted his tricorder to take a biologically rather
than geologically oriented reading. He studied the
results with un
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 9
  divided attention as they appeared in the tiny
readouts.
  "Most intriguing," he finally commented.
  "I'm not sure "intriguing" is the word I'd
choose," Kirk said, taking a step
backward. "That creature may be able to navigate
on land as well as in the water." Certainly the
apparition showed no sign of slackening its pace.
  "I know it can," an excited McCoy decided
ner- vously, "and I don't need a tricorder
to tell me so."
  In truth, the alien being appeared to be accelerating
as it neared them. Beneath heavily ridded eyes, black
pupils stared at them with the single-minded blankness of the
primitive
  carnivore. The interlocking fangs which protruded
sicklelike from both jaws parted slightly,
revealing an uninviting dark gullet.
  "Phasers on stun," Kirk ordered sharply.
"Stand ready."
  Each man pulled out one of the compact
  weapons, adjusted the tiny wheel on top, and
dropped to one knee. Spock held his phaser in
one hand and the stilloperating tricorder in the other.
Both were aimed with precision.
  The monster reached the shoreline, and any question of its
ability to navigate a nonaquatic environment
war. answered as it humped
  enthusiastically toward them
  "Fire!"
  Three bursts traversed me space between the men
and the huge monster. The creature halted its
seallike advance, faltering. The long neck lowered
and swung dazedly from side to side.
  A second round stopped the monster as if it had
frozen. It sat on the shore, momentarily
paralyzed. The nightmarish skull dipped until it
scraped the sand.
  Then, amazingly, it seemed to shake off the
effects of the double phaser blast. Its appetite
gave way to a blind desire to escape, however.
Turning with surprising agility, it rushed back
into the lake and vanished beneath the steaming surface.
  ""Not a very friendly environment," Kirk
observed idly, kicking at the warm earth. "I think
the survey
  10 STAR TREKG BTGT1That
  crew would have come to a similar conclusion."
  He turned. "They'd probably try for a
friendlier area inland. Let's move."
  Picking their way cautiously between pools of
bubbling clear water and thick, candylike mud, they
started away from the water's edge. Once, Kirk
knelt to probe the ground with a finger, and pulled it
away speedily. The soil here was painfully
hot just beneath the surface, but it was stable.
  "What do you think, Mr. Spock?" he asked,
referring to their first encounter with a representative of
Lactran life.
  "An interesting and no doubt dangerous animal,
Captain," the first officer replied easily, "but not
particularly so, and clearly not invulnerable.
Certainly not to the kind of weaponry a survey
crew has available as standard equipment.
  "Nor is it the sort of beast one would expect
to catch experienced personnel off-guard. Such
teams regularly expect far more lethal attacks.
For it to have surprised and rapidly killed not one but
two such teams no, Captain, I think it
extremely unlikely."
  "Exactly my opinion, Spock." They
topped a modest rise and started down the other
side. 'on such a situation his
  He cut off in mid-sentence, staring in surprise
at the land before them.
  No steam rose there. There wasn't a hint of a
boiling pool or steaming mud pit. The panorama
before them was flat, hot and dry. Only a few
isolated outcroppings of weathered rock broke the
gravel-and-sand plain. Here and There an
  occasional patch of defiant green stood out like a
flag. The change was startling.
  "Desert," muttered McCoy. 'ationot a very
welcome sight either, gentlemen."
  Kirk frowned as he pulled out his
  communicator. "We're on a hill here.
Let's see if we can pick up anything on the
emergency ground bands." He flipped open the
communicator and made the requisite adjustments,
then addressed it slowly and distinctly.
  "This is Captain James Kirk of the
U.s.s. Enter
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 1 1
  price, commanding a Federation rescue party, calling
me crew of the survey scout ship Ariel. Come in
please, come in."
  A faint whisper of wind on tired rock, nothing
more.
  "Try again, Jim," McCoy prompted.
  "Captain James Kirk of the Federation cruiser
Enterprise calling Lieutenant Commander Markel
or any members of the Federation survey ship
Ariel. Are you receiving me? Please acknowledge."
  Still silence. Resignedly, he made a slight,
standard readjustment on the receiver dial and was
rewarded wim a surprise. A slow, steady beep
began to sound.
  McCoy was startled. "Be damned . . .
they're an- sweringl"
  The beep continued for several seconds before stopping
suddenly. But not before Kirk, who had been
frantically adjusting further controls, registered
an expression of satisfaction.
  "You got a fix on it, Jim."
  The captain nodded. "Barely. The signal
didn't last very long, and I don't like the way it
cut off like that, in the middle of a series." He
turned slightly to their left and pointed. "Over that
way."
  Picking their way down the slight slope, they
started off in the indicated direction. "Likely
they're close by, staying near the touchdown point like
they're supposed to," Kirk murmured tautly.
He squinted at the sky. "We'll try this until
the heat begins to tell, then have Scotty beam us up
for a rest. We can set down and continue on after a
break."
  "Don't you think it's strange we didn't get
a voice reply to your call, Jim?" wondered a
puzzled McCoy.
  Kirk shrugged. "Could be any number of
  reasons we didn't. Mechanical trouble with the
communicators, as we originally postulated,
Bones."
  "Never mind counting them, Spock," broke in
McCoy dryly, seeing the first officer about to comment.
They continued on across the sand in silence, searching for
indications of human passage. There were none no
footprints, no trail of shredded tunic, no
lost instruments or survival equipment. Nothing but
harsh sky,
  12 STAR TREK LOG BIGEIT
  sand, gravel, and heat that stayed just the human
side of oppressive.
  Nothing moved on that brown-and-yellow
  landscape. There was no soothing wind to ruffle the
compact, squat green growths which leaned
possessively to any hint of shade or depression
in the ground.
  Kirk spent no time studying them. A single
casual glance was enough to show there was nothing remarkable about
the largest, nothing distinctive about the smallest. It
was the fate of six humans that absorbed his thoughts
now, not new outposts of alien ecology.
  eventually they reached the other side of the
gentle basin they had been crossing and mounted the
syrmnetrical curve of a large dune. Their
descent on its opposite side was as fast and
awkward as the climb had been slow and
  controlled. They reached the sandy base and found
themselves confronted by another basin, which terminated in a
twin of the dune they had just crossed.
  "At least it's not thermal springs and hot mud,"
McCoy observed.
  There was a sound like frying fat, and a sheet of
flame interdicted their progress. It missed
Kirk, who was in the forefront of the little party, by a
few saving meters. He scrambled backward.
  Slightly to one side of their intended route the
gritty yellow-and-brown sail erupted. Sand
streamed from crevices and cracks, and a
  nightmarish skull fringed with spines, its skin
decorated like a Gothic cathedral, burst from the
ground and turned warty jaws toward them
  "Left . . . run!" Spock yelled, barely
in time.
  The rippling mouth opened and belched a second
stream of fire. It scorched the sand where they had been
standing only seconds before.
  Stumbling backward even as they pulled
their phasers, they found themselves backed against the steep
inward side of the dune. All three weapons
fired, aimed to strike the monster in that cavernous
mouth. The monster paused, then swung ponderous
jaws to face them again.
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 13
  "The lining inside the mouth of a creature that can
spit fire," Spock lectured hurriedly, "would
seem to be composed of organic material highly
resistant to his
  Without knowing what prompted the thought, Kirk
yelled, "Aim for the underside of the neck!"
  Once more three beams of intense energy crossed
the space between the men and their assailant. AB
three struck the creature in the area between the lower
jaw and forelegs.
  Once again the effort seemed futile. Instead of
trying to incinerate them this time, the monster lunged
forward, jaws agape. It was slow, however, and
clumsy. The little group scattered. The primitive
machinery of its mind turning slowly, the monster
singled out one victim Kirk. It turned toward
him, then rose suddenly on thick hind legs.
  Broad spadelike claws on its forelegs
reached inward, clawing confusedly at its
throat. Then it toppled like a leathery grey
iceberg to lie unmoving in the yellow sands
  The impact of the monster's fall had thrown
Spock to his knees. Now he glanced around in
concern as he slowly got to his feet.
  "Captain?"
  "Here, Spock," came the reply from nearby.
"Are you all right?"
  "I am undamaged."
  Kirk joined him, brushing the sand from his tunic.
'there's Dr. McCoy?" He looked around,
suddenly conscious of the fact that the doctor was nowhere
to be seen. "Bones . . . Bonest"
  A distant, faintly desperate reply sounded.
'Em ... mmp)h!"
  Kirk and Spock turned, looking for the source of
that brief cry. There was no sign of Dr.
McCoy. Then it sounded again, muffled to the point of
unintelligibility
  Worriedly, Kirk glanced to his left, then
gestured. "I'm not sure. I think the sound came
from back there."
  They moved slowly down the length of the
  uncon
  14 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  scions creature's massive body. Spock
was the first to notice the two spinelike forms
protruding from beneath the thick tail.
  "Hang on, Bones," Kirk shouted, "we'll
get you out!" The officers moved alongside the two
projections, which proceeded to twitch insistently.
They shoved, but to no avail. "Again, Spock!"
  A second effort, both men straining and heaving,
failed to move that limp, incredibly solid bulk.
And the shifting sand provided poor footing.
  "It would seem," a panting Spock ventured,
"that another solution is called for, Captain. We
cannot lift the tail. Therefore, we must move the
doctor."
  Kirk eyed him uncertainly, then nodded in
understanding. They dropped to Heir knees and began
digging sand with the speed and efficiency of a pair of
small mechanical shovels. The thrashing of the
doctor's legs added desperation to their efforts,
growing more and more frantic with each passing second.
  Finally a lower torso and then a pair of arms
became visible. Pulling and additional digging brought
the rest of the ship's chief physician into the open
once more.
  McCoy drew his knees against his chest and
locked his arms around them, taking long breaths and
digging sand from his eyes, nose, and ears.
  Spock and Kirk waited and watched worriedly,
until McCoy acknowledged the concern in their eyes.
"I'm okay, thanks, but the air was just about gone under
there." He glanced back at the sloping pit now
leading under the tail. "The flesh was slightly humped
above me. I had a small air pocket.
Smelly, but I wouldn't have traded it for a bottle
of the Pederation's finest perfume."
  "You're sure you're not hurt?" Kirk
pressed.
  'loo ... just surprised. I didn't even see
the tail falling It isn't every day a dinosaur
falls on you."
  He sneezed and rubbed his sand-scoured nostrils.
"If the ground hereabouts had been hard, I'd be just a
smear now. But the sand was deep enough, and soft enough,
  STAR TREK LOGT 15
  and I was hit just right for the impact to bury me
instead of smash me. I lost a little wind, that's
all."
  Kirk helped McCoy to his feet, then
brushed sand from his hands as he turned his gaze beyond the
motionless tail. "How much additional desert
do you think we'll have to cross, Mr. Spock?"
  The first officer checked his tricorder and pointed in
the direction the terse signal had come from. "I have
no way of judging for certain, Captain, but,
extrapolating from temperature and atmospheric
readings, at least several additional kilometers.
It could be hundreds."
  "No," Kirk objected. "The signal
wasn't that strong. But we'd better pick up our
pace, regardless. There's no cover here, either from the
sun, or from any of the other hungry locals. I'd
like to make a bit more progress along the signal
track before Scotty beams us aboard for a rest
period."
  They resumed their march across the sands, detouring
around the still-stunned mountain which had almost trapped
McCoy. But as soon as they resumed walking,
Spock lapsed into an introspective silence which
Kirk recognized immediately. Something was troubling the
first officer.. If Spock had something on his mind,
something not yet sorted out, he would inform them about it in
his own good time.
  His own good time came several dozen meters farther
into the dry basin. "You know, Captain," he
suddenly murmured, "it was unusual the way
I seemed to know, rather than guess, that our phasers
would be ineffectual while aimed down the
carnivore's throat. The creature itself . . .
did it not seem familiar to you?"
  Kirk thought a moment, and found, to his
surprise, that he didn't have to search his memory for
very long The familiarity of the monster had bothered him
all along, but it took Spock's query
to crystalline it
  "Of course . . . I've seen soloids of
something just like it on Canopus Three. That's
impossible, though. Canopus is many too many
parsecs from here." He squinted into the unyielding
sunlight.
  "True, this desert is very similar to those found on
  16 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Canopus Three." His voice faded. "Very
similar. In fact, those isolated growths, the
color of the petrographic outcrops they're all
remarkably alike."
  "Are you suggesting, Captain, that a similar
environment presupposes identical evolution?"
  "My shoes," McCoy broke in, with
undisguised distaste, "are full of sand."
  Spock's concentration was broken.
"Doctor, your lack of scientific interest is a
constant astonishment to me."
  "I'll be glad to discuss that with you, Spock, the
next time you drop into Sick Bay for some medication,
or a checkup."
  "No need to become belligerent, Doctor. That
was merely a simple observation."
  "Spock, your simple observations," McCoy
rasped as they trudged toward the top of the next
dune, "tend to get on my . . ."
  He stopped in mid-sentence, mid-thought, to gape
at the scene before them. And he was not alone. Spock
and Kirk had also come to a
  momentary mental halt.
  Spread out at the base of the dune was a wall of
green so lush and colorful in comparison to the dull
plain they had just crossed that it was almost painful
to look at.
  Clusters of thorn-laden trees and broad,
thick bushes interwove with taller emergents and
exotically contoured growths drooping with strange
fruits. Practically at their feet a stream
emerged, vanishing in a sharp curve back into the
thriving jungle.
  There were distant hints of moss and fern
forest, of swamp and tropical lowland. They could almost
feel the humidity, smell the rankness of rotting
vegetation.
  For ad that, it looked a lot friendlier than the
country they had just traversed. "Food and water
anyone would have a better chance of surviving in there
than on that frying pan we just crossed" was
McCoy's opinion.
  Spock wasn't as sure. Turning slowly, he
studied the terrain behind them. His gaze lifted to the far
dune. Be
  STAR TRPK T OG PTGT-TT 17
  yond it, he knew, lay a violently active
thermal region bordering a vast, steaming lake.
  Again he directed his attention to the riotous
landscape before them, listened thoughtfully to the soft
susurration of small living things picking their
cautious way through the undergrowth.
  "Does it not strike you as peculiar, Captain,
that two possibly three Mdically different
ecologies exist literally side by side? Steaming,
unstable shoreline, backed by a thin line of desert,
and now another extreme change of climate and
living things."
  "I've seen stranger sights in my
travels, Mr. Spock. What are you driving
at?"
  "Nothing yet, Captain. Simply another
  observation." His voice trailed off as he glared
at the rain forest beneath the dune, taking this perversion of
natural law as a personal affront.
  Kirk flipped open his communicator again. "I
don't plan to do much walking through that not without extra
equipment." He directed his words to the tiny
pickup.
  "Landing party to Enterprzse." There was a brief
pause, rife with static and interference. But the
special tight-beam broadcast Scott employed
penetrated the mysterious distortion layer in the
atmosphere. Kirk heard the chief engineer's
reply clearly.
  "Enterprise, Scott here."
  "Any new information, Scotty? We're a little
puzzled by what we've found down here."
  "We've got plenty of confusing readings here,
too, Captain," Scott confessed. "There
appears to be a large concentration of life forms
slightly less than a hundred kilometers
north-northeast of your present position. How
large we can't tell this blasted distortion
effect jumbles every sensor reading we get. I'm
informed that it could be a city . . . or just a central
gathering place for migratory animals. I said
our readings were inconclusive.
  "That's all so far. Lieutenant Arex is
supervising information resolution. He hopes to have a
more specific analysis of the data within an hour."
  18 STAR TREK LOG BIGEIT
  "Very good, Scotty." He muttered to himself,
"Northeast." Then, louder, "That's the direction
of the signal we received, Mr. Scott."
  "I could transport you to the region of life-form
concentration, Captain."
  "Negative to that, Scotty. We don't know that
the missing crew is part of that concentration. They could be
anywhere in between, and we can't risk skipping over them.
We'll have to do this kilometer by kilometer. Let us
know the moment Mr. Arex comes up with a determination of
that reading, though. We'll continue in the plotted
direction for a while longer. Kirk out."
  "Aye, Captain. Engineering out."
  Kirk put the communicator away as they
  carefully picked their way down the dune. They
paused at the edge of the jungle, fascinated by the
way the rich flora appeared to spring with
supernal suddenness from the periphery of bone-dry
desert.
  "I don't like it, Jim," McCoy finally
ventured. "Too many unlikelihoods here. Why
only the one short signal? You can argue all you
want, but to me that implies something other than
mechanical failure."
  "I'm not ruling out anything, Bones," Kirk
replied slowly. "Their inability to respond
further could be due to something we can't imagine. It
does prove that at least one member of the survey
team is still alive, though. Alive and alert enough to be
monitoring an unexpected query."
  "Apparently alive, Captain," Spock
amended. "The signal could have been sent by other than
human hands."
  "There's no profit in pessimism, Mr.
Spock. For the moment I choose to believe they are
alive."
  They reached the edge of the stream. McCoy glanced
at it briefly before kneeling to satisfy the thirst that
had built up in him during the desert crossing.
  His hands had barely broken the surface of the
water when Spock put a restraining hand on his
shoulder. The doctor looked up, puzzled,
to see Spock staring at the pool.
  "Allow me to test the water first, Dr.
McCoy."
  STAR TREK LOG 19
  McCoy eyed the first officer dubiously, then
turned his gaze downward again and stirred the water with a
finger. He shrugged. "Go ahead, Spock, but
I've analyzed enough water to know a drinkable stream
when I see one. You know that, too."
  "Nevertheless," Spock insisted. The readjusted
tricorder was played over the surface of the rippling
brook. Spock concluded the brief survey and
studied the subsequent readouts, sending semaphore
signals with his eyebrows.
  "Well?" an irritated McCoy finally
pressed.
  "As you surmised, Doctor, the water is
certainly drinkable."
  McCoy looked satisfied, if still irritated,
and bent again to drink.
  "However, that is not what prompted my uncer-
tainty," Spock concluded. McCoy looked up
at him. "Captain, this water is too pure."
  McCoy grimaced and scooped up a double
  handful. He downed it, sipped a second
and third, concluding by wiping his parched face with wet
hands.
  "It tastes just fine to me, Spock."
  "Despite that, it is too pure, Doctor,"
Spock insisted emphatically. "Consider what that
means."
  Kirk chose his words carefully. "Then what
you're saying, Spock, is that it's too good to be
true?"
  "I would say that evaluation is decidedly under-
stated, Captain." Spock studied the silent
wall of green as if it might disgorge a hostile
alien horde at any moment.
  "Water of this purity flowing freely through thick
vegetation growing on loose, loamy soil is not
only unnatural, it is positively
illogical. As illogical" and he made a
sweeping gesture with one arm "as the proximity of such
a rain forest as this to the desert we just crossed." He
knelt and scooped up a handful of dirt.
  'ationote the composition and consistency of the ground we
are standing on now." He sifted it through his fingers.
"Fine sand and well-worn gravel of feldspar,
quartz, and mica." He stood and dropped the
dirt. "It barely supports a few
stunted shrubs."
  20 STAR TRBK LOG BIGEIT
  He took two steps forward. "Suddenly, I
am in a region of climactic floral
development, standing on soil" and he kicked at the
thick soil "of self-evident fecundity."
  "I'm not sure I follow you, Spock," the
captain commented.
  His first officer gestured all around. "Don't you
see it, Captain, Dr. McCoy? It's the
abruptness. There is no blending of jungle
into desert, desert into jungle, or desert
into thermal lowland. The borders between widely
divergent ecologies are as sharp as if they had
been drawn with a knife."
  "Which means what?" wondered McCoy.
  Spock drew himself up, then spoke slowly.
"It is my theory that what we have seen and
  encountered since we've landed has been
  carefully manufactured and not naturally
evolved. Environmental manipulation on a large
scale has taken place here."
  "Terraforming," McCoy muttered. "Or
  Vulcanforming, or whatever . . . I see. A
process which implies the presence of highly
intelligent life forms." Suddenly he found himself
staring at the green ramparts with nervous expectancy.
  Kirk rubbed at his dry chin. "Reasonable as far
as it goes, Mr. Spock. But Terraforming usually
follows a consistent pattern." He kicked at the
ground, sending yellow sand to stain the dark earth of the
forest. "On the strength of your own observations, this
hardly seems consistent."
  "It does appear to be almost random choice,
Captain. Unless, of course, the randomness is the
pattern."
  McCoy sighed resignedly. "Spock, don't
you ever say anything straight out?"
  Spock turned a blank stare on him. "I
thought I just did, Doctor."
  "Gentlemen, please," Kirk pleaded, "not now.
We have work to do."
  A short march parallel to the lush greenery brought
them to a path that charged in lazy curves deep into the
forest. It might have been worn by the passage of many
jungle dwellers . . . or it might have been
cut. It
  STAR TREK EM EIGHT 21
  was another piece of a puzz le that seemed to be
growing more and more complex.
  The jungle itself bore one similarity to the desert
region they'd crossed its familiarity. Like the
Canopus m desert analog, this jungle
  possessed an almost recognizable pattern which
Kirk struggled to place in his mental catalog of
well-known alien environments. But identification
of the forest world in question remained just beyond his thoughts.
  Kirk studied the fibrous exterior of the large
tree ferns they were now passing between. Those striking
purple-and-puce convolutions were familiar from a
vrell-studied text. To find the environment of one
planet reproduced here was startling enough. To find
two in such close proximity to each other held
profound
  implications.
  "Spock," he began easily, "what do you think
of his
  A violent warning cough sounded in front of them.
It was followed by a hoarse roar. One, two, three
forms and more appeared on the open trail ahead. The
powerful spotted bodies showed bristling dark fur and
deep-set, angry eyes.
  The pack of doglike creatures remained
frozen, obviously startled by the appearance of the three
figures. They sported huge curved
claws more suited to some clumsy digging creature like
a sloth, and long thin fangs. Insectoid
antennae projected from the thick ridges of thrusting
bone above the eyes.
  Those eyes narrowed now, with all the
  expectancy of an archeologist coming upon the bust
of an emperor instead of yet another pottery shard.
Visual evidence of unfrly intentions seeped from
thick-lipped muzzles. The pack began to edge
toward the intruders.
  With corresponding caution and patience the three
men started retreating
  "There was a cave in that cliff face we just
passed," Kirk whispered. "It didn't look
too deep but it's bound to be better than standing here
in the open. If we can make it . . ."
  They picked up their pace slightly, still facing the
  22 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  approaching pack. But, whether through
  impatience, hunger, or divination of Kirk's
intentions, the pacl: leaders abruptly charged.
  "You two, run for it!" Kirk shouted, pulling his
phaser and dropping to one knee. "I'll hold them
off. They can outflank us all here."
  "May I suggest, Captain, that three
phaserscom n
  "Get moving, Mr. Spock!" The first officer
hesitated, then turned and ran with McCoy for the
cave. His phaser still set to stun, Kirk fired at
the nearest of the loathsome apparitions. It yelped
once before folding up on the ground.
  That was the signal for the rest of the pack to split
up. Sinister rustlings and cracklings began to sound
on both sides. Kirk fired again, dropping one
lean shape that showed against the green on his right. He
couldn't hope to get them all they would come too often
from too many directions.
  He saw movement out of the corner of an eye and
whirled to find Spock and McCoy racing back
toward him.
  "I thought I told you two to set up your defence
in the cave!" he said angrily.
  Spock's phaser beam shot past him to knock the
legs out from under one of the creatures that had crawled
to within jumping distance of the captain. The animal
quivered and was still.
  "There is a small problem," he explained
  smoothly.
  "A large problem," corrected McCoy,
turning to point back the way they had come and
  simultaneously firing at a low shape.
  With Spock and the doctor covering, Kirk was able
to divert his attention long enough to peer back down the
path through the jungle. Prom here the cave entrance was
barely visible, a dark shadow beneath the looming,
fern-studded cliff.
  Something was coming out of that cave.
  It slid sinuously along the soft soil, emerging
from the recesses of the cave like a worm from an
apple. It was massive, reptilian, and
  two-headed. Further de
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 23
  scription called for extreme adjectives
Kirk had no time to dwell on.
  "Stay together and keep backing up toward it," he
ordered tightly.
  "Jim . . . to was McCoy started to protest
  "No time to argue, Bones do it!"
  McCoy looked anxious but took up a
position alongside the captain. Spock was already
firing from his other side. As the pack started to emerge
from the forest, the officers kept retreating toward the
cave and toward the horror that was coming out to meet them .
. .
  11
  It reached the point where McCoy decided he would
rather turn his phaser on himself. "Jim ... we can't
keep . . ."
  He didn't even have time to argue any more, so
tight had the pack closed in. Not only that, but it
turned out that the resistance of the doglike creatures
to the phaser beams was considerable. The beams knocked
them out, but those first stunned were back on their feet again
and once more closing in for the kill.
  "When I yell," Kirk ordered, "cut your
phasers and dive for that thick copse over there."
  McCoy looked in the indicated direction, but
saw only a large clump of high grass too thin
to keep out a determined mouse, much less a mass of
bloodthirsty beasts.
  And Spock nodded, apparently concurring in this
madness!
  The pack was nearly on them now. It had become
so bad that McCoy almost beamed Kirk in taking one
of the monsters before it could sink icimitarlike fangs
into the captain's right shoulder.
  24 STAR TREK EIGHT
  At that point, Kirk shouted, "Now!" and
plunged headfirst toward the high brush. Spock
sprayed the pack with a last sustained burst of
phaser fire and joined him. Both were a step behind
McCoy.
  The pack leaders sprang ahead. That concerted
action drew the undivided attention of the oncoming
leviathan. Its foremost segments expanded. The
driving head opened to seize the nearest pack member
in one set of jaws.
  The quasi-canine screamed, twisted, snapping
uselessly at the armored skull. Its fellows, their
memories extending only to the immediate prey, forgot
their smaller quarry to attack the flanks of the
snake-thing.
  Two sets of long fangs cut and stabbed at the
iridescent yellow and green body. Pained, the
Janussnake twitched convulsively, pure
muscle sending the two attackers flying
into oblivion among the surraunding trees.
  Less-bloodied eyes watched from the safety of the
neutral grass.
  "Stay low and slow," Kirk urged his
companions, "and let's edge around behind this."
  Nothing challenged them, and they reached the head of the
path, the point where the pack had emerged, without
incident. They kept to the bordering brush for another
thousand meters, though, despite the fact that
the pack's affection was occupied elsewhere. Like all
creatures of limited intelligence, the
dog-beasts" span of affection was brief and
easily diverted. There was no point in drawing
unnecessary attention to their retreat.
  Behind them, the monster reptile snapped and coiled
about the harrying pack . . . a colossus assailed
by hornets.
  "I begin to understand the difficulties even an
experienced survey team might encounter here."
  Spock breathed evenly as they jogged down the
path, now well away from the bloody clearing.
  "I don't see how anyone could survive on the
surface of this world for six weeks, cut off from a
base ship and outside support," puffed
McCoy.
  STAR TREK EIGHT 25
  Kirk observed sharply, "Don't prejudge
them, Bones we're still alive, aren't we?"
  "That's true, Captain," Spock observed,
slowing, his gaze focused on something high up and
ahead of them. "However, it is arguable if this can be
called surviving." He gestured at the cause of
his comment.
  "I wonder if hunting is merely bad
hereabouts, or if we constitute some sort of edible
novelty to the local fauna."
  Through the gap in the trees ahead, Kirk could see
three narrow-bodied winged horrors heading straight
at them in a long, gliding dive. They shared some of the
characteristics of both the pack and the two-headed
snake-thing. They had reptilian snouts and scaly
wings, but the lithe bodies were coated with fur, and they
didn't have the cold eyes of the unblinking reptile.
  "Keep your phasers on stun, but be prepared
to shift to a stronger beam if necessary," ordered Kirk
rather tiredly, McCoy thought.
  McCoy was right. Kirk had had about enough of this
world's unrelenting attacks. In light of the steady
assault, the Federation edicts forbidding the avoidable
destruction of alien life were beginning to grate a
b*.
  Once more the three officers assumed firing
position, once again triple poles of light
crossed open air. And the winged dragon-shapes
continued their confident dive right toward them.
  "Useless!" yelped McCoy, his fingers moving
to adjust the setting on his weapon.
  "Steady, Bones," urged Kirk. "These are just
like the dargoneers on Maraville the stun
charge will get to them eventually."
  "Before they get to us?" McCoy murmured, his
finger moving back from the setting wheel. He held
down the trigger of his phaser, as the flying reptiles
continued to come nearer and nearer.
  Then a most peculiar thing happened.
  The dargoneers jerked up in midair, their heads
snapping up and back and their wings abruptly beating
unsteadily at the air. Ignoring the continued beaming,
  26 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  they seemed to get control of themselves one by one,
turned, and flew off in separate directions.
  With nothing left to beam, McCoy clicked off his
phaser. Lower jaw hanging open, he stared at the
spot in the sky where the seemingly
  unstoppable aerial meat-eaters had come up
short.
  "Now that," he observed bemusedly, "is more than
passing strange."
  "An invisible force field, Doctor,"
Spock observed. "The knife I was talking about
before."
  He turned to look at Kirk. "I think if
we attempt to return the way we've come,
Captain, we will find similar fields
separating the three
  environments we have thus far encountered. They were
absent when we landed but have apparently been
restored."
  "Plausible enough, Spock," replied a
worried Kirk. "But why shut down such fields in
the first place?"
  "I cannot imagine, Captain. To find out, I
believe we must locate those who have created the
fields in question, as well as transformed this section
of the planet into a multitude of adjoining alien
environments."
  "That implies was Kirk began, but something cut
off his breath. He had the sensation of being lifted
clear off the ground, experienced that peculiar sense
of helplessness one has when one's feet no longer have
contact with anything solid. It was a common enough
experience in free-fall space, but highly
disconcerting on solid ground.
  He felt something like a metal band fastened around his
waist. When he looked down he saw a gray,
wide coil tight around his middle. It didn't
look like metal. He put both hands against it and
shoved.
  It didn't feel line metal, either.
  Then he turned and looked behind him and saw what
had picked him up as neatly as an elephant
plucks a lone peanut. He was in the grasp of the
tail end he supposed it could as easily be the
front end of a creature some six or seven meters
in length. It was built low to the ground and had no
visible external fea
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 27
  tares. No eyes, mouth, head, arms, or
  legs nothing save this single flexible tail or
tentacle.
  It looked very much like a common garden slug, yet
it wasn't ugly. The aura of intelligence, of
purposeful, controlled power that Kirk sensed,
removed any twinge of xenophobia he might have
felt at the mere sight of it.
  The creature started to move off down a partially
concealed path. Kirk tried to observe its method of
locomotion and found he couldn't see beneath its
slightly horny, skirtlike lower edge. Whether
on legs, cilia, horny plates, or something
unimaginable, the creature moved smoothly across
sometimes uneven terrain.
  At the moment Kirk was more interested in the front
end of the creature, for he had to assume it was
traveling headfirst. That end showed a single tubular
mouth that seemed to study him at length before turning
back ahead. Although unable to slip free, he
discovered he could turn his upper body easily
enough. Looking back, he saw McCoy and
Spock following, each similarly pinioned in the
grip of one of the dullhued creatures.
  The limb that held him terminated in several
smaller divisions, which were in turn separated into stin
smaller wiggling filaments. The flexibility of those
digits was promptly demonstrated when he tried
to reach his phaser. One curled around it and plucked it
from his waist.
  He managed to pull his communicator clear, but
that surprisingly delicate organ circled another
part of itself around the compact instrument and tugged it
firmly from his hand. The action was irresistible without
being crudely violent. Whatever had control of him,
then, was interested in keeping him intact and
reasonablv healthy.
  That knowledge, along with the fact that no attempt was made
to draw him closer to that strange tubed mouth' enabled
Kirk to relax ever so slightly.
  As soon as the path opened into a cleared,
well-kept trail, the three slugs
accelerated astonishingly. Their lower limbs might be
hidden, but they were amazingly
  28 STAR TREK LOG BIGEIT
  efficient. And despite the speed, the
tail-tentacle held Kirk firmly enough so that the
ride was not as bumpy as he had feared.
  "Would . .. would you say this is an intelligent
life form, Mr. Spock?" he called long
minutes later, his initial evaluation of their
captors complete.
  "It is difficult to say for certain at this time,
Captain," Spock called from behind. "Thus far their
only action that could be construed as intelligently
formulated was the removal of our phased and
communicators. That could be an acquired or taught
action, however. They may be more than advanced
domestic animals."
  As Kirk considered this, he noticed the squarish
shape still slung over the first officer's shoulder.
"Intelligent or not, they forgot something, Spock.
Can you get at your tricorder?"
  "I think so, Captain." One arm was pinned
firmly to his side, but he still managed to work the
other around enough to fumble at the
  compact instrument's controls. It was hard
to adjust the sensors with only one hand. If he could
retain control long enough to take even a few
preliminary readings, it might tell them a great
deal about
  Two protrusions of the multilimbed tail
plucked the tricorder neatly from his shoulder.
  "I believe I have an answer, Captain, to the
basic question. If these are merely trained animals,
their attention span and selectivity are
extraordinary. Consequently, even if they are not
the masters of this world, I think it reasonable to say they
can be considered intelligent on their own."
  "Personally I could do with a few more answers than
that," a discouraged, aching McCoy called from the
back of the strange column. "We've been
traveling like this for what feels like hours. Where are
they taking us?"
  "As near as I can tell, Bones, we're moving
northeast, in the approximate direction of that
lifeform concentration Mr. Scott reported on."
  His expression turned wry. "It would be a help
if he had clarified just what that concentration is, and
could let
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 29
  us know. We'd have some idea of what
we're heading nto."
  "I think it more likely, Captain, that we will be
able to identify it for Mr. Scott." He gestured
with his free hand. "Look ahead."
  Kirk turned his attention forward again. They were just
coming to the crest of a hill, and he had a glimpse of
something distant and pale through the green mesh.
  Then they were over the steep slope and traveling
down on the opposite side, their peculiar
captors never slackening the pace.
  The city spread out before them, marching in neat ranks
of low, blocklike buildings to the distant
horizon. It was an urban complex laid out
close to the ground, rather than high and skyward as many
of the great Federation centers were. The only
interruptions in the field of gently rounded
structures were provided by glistening bodies of
water, pools, and streams and by an
  alien-concvd yet still attractive landscaping. It
was not a place Kirk would have liked to live in, but
that didn't prevent him from admiring its
unmustakable, utilitarian beauty.
  "Quite a metropolis," he finally murmured.
Spock concurred fully.
  "If these are the builders and not
servants, they are capable of admirable feats of
construction."
  "I'm thrilled you two can admire the local
talent was McCoy commented sardonically, "but I still
have this sick feeling that we're about to become someone's
lunch."
  Spock looked indifferently confident. "For a
creature of this size, Doctor, you would hardly be
more than an appetizer. his
  "Now there's a comforting thought!" McCoy snorted.
"Not only am I going to be eaten, but even my
passing'll rate hardly a burp."
  "'We re slowing down," Kirk noticed.
  They had come up against the base of yet another
hill. Since it was no steeper than the one they had
just crossed, Kirk wondered at the stop. Then he
noticed that the creature holding Spock had moved
to the hill
  30 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  face and was doing something to a section of the ground.
  His guess was confirmed as the reason for their halt
became obvious. There was a muted hum from somewhere
ahead as the hillside, complete with vegetation and
rocky outcroppings, began to slide upward into a
concealed recess.
  Behind it a large, well-lit cavern appeared,
dominated by a huge, silvery cylindrical form which
threw back the morning sun in a way only highly
machined metal can.
  They started forward again. When they neared the
cylinder, Kirk thought it was suspended freely in
midair. As they moved closer, though, he could see
dust motes floating in the air around the base of the
metal construct. It was riding on a cushion of
air or something more advanced and less identifiable.
  They entered the cylinder through an oval opening in its
side. Kirk wondered if their captors also
traveled on a cushion of air. That would explain
the lack of visible limbs. Come to think of it, this
cylinder bore some resemblance to the Lactrans"
own bodies.
  It grew dark as the humming hillside behind them
slid back into place, but only for a moment. Some
hidden device compensated, and the
  interior light grew correspondingly brighter.
Kirk tried to identify the source of illumination,
but without success. The interior of the cylinder showed
nothing like a window, fluorescent panel, concealed
tube light, or anything else
  recogmzable as a light source. There was
only the smooth metal, his companions, and their
three enigmatic, silent captors.
  "They're undonhtedly taking us to that city," he
ventured aloud, as the faintest hint of motion jarred
the craft. "If we could manage to
  communicate with some of their leaders . . ."
  "They don't seem very interested in
  communication with us," McCoy noted curtly,
staring down at the dull grey back of his alien.
"That's assuming they're capable of interspecies
communication at all."
  "I'd tend to think like that, too, Bones," agreed
  STAR TREK LOG PIGHT 31
  Kirk, "except every now and then I seem to feel
something knocking about the inside of my mind, something that
won't stay still long enough for me to fix on it. Like
daydreaming. When we reach the city his
  He broke off as the oval portal drew
aside with unexpected speed. Their hosts slid through
the opening, still showing no strain from their bipedal
burdens. At no time, Kirk marveled, had they
let their load down to rest.
  "We're ... we're already here?" wondered
McCoy, staring in all directions. Spock's
amazement was still directed at their means of
transportation.
  "Remarkable. I expedenced none of the
  sensations of traveling at high speed, yet we have
obviously been carried at tremendous velocity.
I would very much like a look at the mechanisms
involved."
  Kirk wasn't listening. His gaze was reserved
for the big chamber in which they now found
  themselves. The vaulted room appeared to be divided
into doorless compartments dominated by intricate yet
massive machinery. Occasionally, complex
structures of metal overhead bathed them in
intermittent washes of multicolored light.
  A short ... walk, crawl? He couldn't
say, but by some means they entered one such side
  compartment. The powerful tail-hands dipped, and
Kirk, Spock, and McCoy found themselves
deposited gently on the ground with as much care as they
had been picked up.
  That was the one comforting aspect of this entire
episode so far. Throughout the entire journey and
despite their apparent indifference, the
slug-creatures had taken pains to avoid even
bruising any of their captives. Nor had they
made anything resembling an overtly
hostile gesture.
  "Any ideas, Doctor?"
  "Only one, Jim," replied McCoy,
studying their uninspidng, pale-walled alcove,
"and it's not very appealing. I'd guess they're doing
exactly what we would do in a similar set of
circumstances."
  "Which is?"
  "Well," he continued, as Spock knelt
to examine the
  32 STAR TREK BIGIIT
  half-metal, half-porcelain surface they
stood on, "if we encountered an alien creature
we'd never seen before on a Federation world, one which
science records made no mention of, the first thing
we'd do is make sure it was free of harmful
bacteria, germs, and other assorted little
surprises.
  "I wouldn't be surpAsed if those colored beams
we passed through had something to do with insuring our hosts'
health. That accomplished, we'd next proceed
to see if our visitor were intelligent."
  "Congratulations, Doctor," Spock said,
looking up from his study of the floor. "All most
logical assumptions."
  "A told you you should drop by the medical lab
sometime."
  "A more important question, gentlemen," Kirk
interrupted, "is whether or not there's a way out of
here." He pointed. "As you can see, we've been
left alone."
  Indeed, there was no sign of their captors. The
vast hoar of the chamber was deserted.
  "Gone off to report our appearance, maybe,"
Kirk suggested. He started toward the exit and was
brought up short by a half-anticipated barrier.
The sensation was akin to that of running into a giant
sponge.
  Reaching out, he slowly tested the apparently
normal air before them. It wasn't hard and
unyielding as some such barriers were. Instead, he
could push into it; but resistance grew stronger and stronger
until further progress grew impossible. At
that point, exerting additional strength merely caused
his probing fingers to slide off in various directions,
as though he were pressing on slippery glass.
  "force field, all right," Kirk murmured.
"It seems harmless enough. In fact, if it's
designed to do anything, it's to keep those inside
undamaged if they try to escape.
Absorbs impact rather than resisting it bluntly."
  "The bars of a cage are just as harmless," McCoy
observed pointedly, "unless you're viewing them from the
inside. And we are definitely on the inside."
He moved up to the force field. "Let's see if
this field is
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 33
  impervious to everything." He cupped his hands and
shouted.
  "Hey, listen, let us out of here . . . we're
as curious about you as you are about us, blast itl,"
  Something tickled his head.
  "A wasteful use of energy, Doctor,"
Spock commented. "I believe they can hear us quite
well without your shouting." He eyed them closely.
"I received definite hints of thought projections.
I understand that humans are not as sensitive, but did
either of you experience anything just now?"
  Both Kirk and McCoy nodded.
  Spock looked satisfied. "I thought I had
detected similar impressions earlier, but could not be
certain. I am now. Clearly, they are purely
telepathic."
  Kirk looked puzzled. "We've encountered
telepathic races before, Mr. Spock, and
had no trouble communicating with them. Why can't we
get a grip on any of the local transmissions?
I have the feeling I can almost see an image fanning
in my mind, but it never becomes stronger than
"almost." his
  "Analysis of the impressions I have received thus
far, Captain, would appear to indicate that their thoughts
move at a rate far beyond our comprehension. We can
only grasp at a fleeting image here and there. That
fleeting image we barely sense probably
represent many complex thoughts elaborated on at
length."
  "Surely we can communicate with them
  somehow," Kirk muttered, "even if only through
bits and pieces of information."
  "I do not know, Captain," a discouraged Spock
mused. "The sheer rapidity of their cogitation, the
incredible transport system which brought us here,
certain aspects of the instrumentation we have already been
exposed to that could be as
  advanced compared to Federation civilization as we are
to a colony of ants. There also remains the
possibility that they could communicate with us and are
simply not interested."
  "Don't they think we've anything
to say?" growled McCoy. "If that's so, they're
sadly mistaken. I've got
  34 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  plenty to say to them. Their methods of greeting
visitors . . ." His voice trailed off.
  "Wait a minute . . . what were they doing out
among those other creatures? We never did figure
out all those environments."
  "You will recall, Doctor," reminded Spock,
"that we recognized at least two species from
vastly different worlds and ecologies, and we landed in
yet another ecology altogether. Remember how we
felt that the environments we were passing through appeared
not only Unrelated to one another but to this world?
  "A civilisation this advanced might enjoy
transforming part of their own planet to" he
hesitated over his choice of terms "more
  conveniently provide for their specimens."
  "Are you trying to say that we beamed down into some
kind of local zoo?"
  "That is precisely my theory, Doctor."
  "Maybe they'll be kind enough to explain," said
Kirk, turning to face the alcove barrier.
"They're coming back."
  None of them could tell whether the three
Lactrans approaching them now were the same three that
had brought them there. They inched smoothly across the
chamber floor, moving easily via a still unseen,
unknown method of
  transportation, concealed beneath rippling skirts of
grey flesh.
  Stopping just outside the alcove, the three aliens
regarded those within in contemplathe silence.
  "Examining us," Kirk whispered idly.
  "Well, I'm sick of itt" McCoy
snorted. He moved up to the force field and
gestured
  emphatically at their captors. "Look,
we're as smart as you maybe a little smarter in some
areas and we don't take kindly to being locked up.
I think it's about time you his
  One of the colored beams from above abruptly winked
off as the nearest of the three Lactrans reached in with
its manipulative tail member to neatly lift the
startled doctor from between his companions.
  STAR TREK BOG BIGHT 35

  "Wait a minute," McCoy yelled. "Do
  you his
  His world suddenly turned upside down, and
he caught his breath. The slug was turning him
slowly in its grip and he found himself facing the
floor.
  "Heyl" Not caring one bit for the position he found
himself in, McCoy struggled violently, beating with
both arms at the encircling coil of rubbery flesh.
The Lactran took no notice of either the
doctor's physical or verbal barrage and
continued to examine him as unaffectedly as McCoy
would an experimental animal in his lab.
  "We've got to communicate with theml" Kirk said
tightly.
  "By all means, communicate," McCoy
mumbled, in no mood for diplomacy. His resistance
had faded to an occasional weak blow directed at the
clasping coil. "Tell it I'm getting dingy."
  "Try, Spock," urged Kirk. "If we
concentrate on the same thought, try to pool our
effort . . . Try to think at it, tell it
to release McCoy and put him his
  They never got the opportunity to try. Kirk's
voice and concurrent thoughts were interrupted as the other
two Lactrans reached into the alcove, one lifting
Kirk and the other Spock. They started toward the far
end of the vast chamber.
  A large section of the far wall appeared to be
constructed of the same silvery material as the
transportation cylinder. They paused before it and
waited while it slid upward. That action Kirk was
prepared for.
  What he was not prepared for was the sight on the other
side.
  He had expected to enter another chamber. Now
he
  36 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  blinked as he found himself out in open air and bright
sunlight once again, moving rapidly forward.
  He glanced down. They were traveling on a moving
road or sidewalk of some Idod. At the moment
it was devoid of any other travelers.
  Immense buildings slid past on either side of the
roadway. All were constructed of simple gently
curved squares and rectangles. There wasn't a
single straight line to be seen. Perhaps the
Lactrans attacked no importance to
  architecture on merely efficient principles.
  Kirk realized that the buildings were
  constructed with the same simpleness and lack of
external ornamentation as their hosts.
  Despite the oversized proportions of the
structures they moved through and the
  smoothness of the moving roadway, Kirk
  estimated they had traveled a respectable distance
when they finally emerged from the intensively developed
area into a vast open plain.
  The abruptness of the shift was startling. One minute
they were passing through the depths of the monstrous city and the
next found themselves in open country.
  At least, it looked like open country.
  Their speed increased. Kirk saw that the broad
countryside was actuary compartmentalised, divided
into sometimes radically varying ecologies. For
kilometers it seeme they passed nothing but arboreal
creatures some ."...f the fliers were recop tilde
izable, some less so, and a few that utilized exotic
me hods to defy gravity teased Kirk's
curiosity in passing.
  Moving beyond, they entered a region of broad
fields dotted with trees and flowering shrubs. One
such sect tion of grassland proved to be inhabited
by a small herd of unicorns, as neat and appealing
as if they had just stepped from the pages of an
illustrated fairy tale.
  "So much for mythology," McCoy commented
sadly, as they passed a horned stallion
nuzzling its mate.
  "Using a nonspecies standard of appreciation,
I confess I find them strangely attractive"
was Spock's only comment.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 37
  "Something even more intriguing coming up, gentlemen,"
Kirk called to them.
  They turned their attention forward, to where the moving
roadway executed a sharp turn. At the end of the
bend was a new habitat at once more familiar and
at the same time more alien than anything they had yet
encountered. Three small cottages, as perfect as
if they had just been transported whole from Earth
to Vulcan, were grouped neatly to the right of the
roadway. Kirk took in the carefully planned
details as their speed slowed.
  Each house had its own swimming pool,
  handball court, and other accouterments. The
emphasis, he noted, was on providing plenty of
opportunity and equipment for physical exercise.
Bach complex was set in a well-landscaped garden.
  Having thoroughly studied the arrangement, the
officers were not at all surprised when they stopped
next to it. They found themselves deposited on the
grass nearest the roadway.
  A gentle nudge from one of those incredibly
versatile and powerful tails urged Kirk forward.
As he couldn't very well resist, he accepted the
prod and took a few steps onto the lawn.
  "Better to do what they want for now,
  anyway," he murmured to the others. "We'll
figure this out, given time." He turned, as did
Spock and McCoy.
  The three Lactrans rested there, just off the
roadway, conveying the unmistakable impression of
watching without eyes. Kirk, receiving the vague
feeling that he vas expected to do
  something, walked directly toward them, slowly.
A couple of steps were sufficient to bring him up
against the expected resilience of the invisible field.
  "Our cage has been resurrected again,
Bones."
  No reply. He turned. "Bones?"
  McCoy was absorbed in a detailed examination
of the ground, but he glanced up at Kirk's second
query. There was a hint of genuine surprise in his
tone.
  "This is real grass, Jim. Real Earth-type
common
  38 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  grass. Real soil, too. Though I wouldn't
bet on how deep it goes."
  "Exactly," agreed Spock from nearby, where
he was engaged in cursory study of a rosebush.
"This area has been laboriously prepared for
human types."
  "How's that again, Spock?" McCoy prompted,
struggling to classify what looked like an
Earth-type weed.
  "We are now apparently exhibits in this zoo."
  "Zoo? Exhibits?" McCoy straightened,
botany temporarily forgotten. "Well, I'm
no exhibit."
  "Keeper-animal relationships have always been
fluid, Bones," observed Kirk, "even on
Earth. We have one category for ourselves and one for
most other animals. But then there are the primates
and the cetaceans. Intelligent behavior is often a
question of artificially applied standards. Maybe the
dolphins consider us part of their zoo. On this world I
think we ought to be flattered if they've put us into the
latter category. In any case, they've taken
the precaution of putting us behind bars."
  "Perhaps we can find out something from our fellow
specimens," Spack observed. "I do not
believe they could erect this elaborate habitat for
us in such an incredibly brief period, despite
their technology. They are not gods."
  "Fellow specimens?" McCoy echoed in
  confusion. Then he looked in the direction Spock
indicated.
  A uniformed man and woman were coming
  toward them from the farthest of the cottages, walking
quickly, the excitement plain on their faces.
  "Hellof" the man called as they drew close.
"I'm Lieutenant Commander Louis Markel. This
is our primary biologist, Lieutenant Randy
Bryce. We're darned happy to see you, whoever you
are."
  "James Kirk, captain of the U.s.s.
Enterprise. My first officer, Mr. Spock, and
chief physician, Dr. McCoy."
  "Pleasure beyond words, Captain," Bryce said,
her voice high, almost birdlike. "We received your
communicator call and acknowledged as best we could."
  "Which wasn't as thorough as it should have been,"
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 39
  admonished McCoy, taking in their surroundings
with a wave of one arm. "Why didn't you warn us, at
least to say you'd encountered intelligent
life?"
  Bryce looked at once resentful and
dejected. "We didn't have time to warn you." She
sighed. "Every now and then they'll let us have this or that
piece of equipment to play with. We can use it, under
their special supervision, of course. Our hosts
may look clumsy, but they can move with astonishing
speed when they want to.
  "We're kept under constant mental supervision.
There may not be any of them in sight, but you can't
escape the feeling of being studied. Everything they
give us is operational . . . except our
phasers, of course. We never know which bit of
equipment they'll give us next, or when they'll
take it back. When we think we can conceal our
true intentions from them, by thinking nonsense thoughts for a
while, we work on ways to produce an effective
weapon using cannibalised components from
scientific equipment tricorders and so on.
  "We were just lucky enough to have a
  communicator when your call came in, and we
decided to answer immediately. We didn't know if
you'd be able to receive us again, or how long they'd let us
keep the commumcator."
  "The reason we replied with a directional
distress signal instead ofwith an elaborate
warning," Markel put in, "was because we felt a
nonverbal communication had a better chance of being
ignored." He shook his head. "These creatures
are far too perceptive for that. They knew what we
were thinking, despite our best efforts to mask our
thoughts. Or perhaps our unconcealable excitement
worried them, or made them nervous. Anyhow, the
communicator was taken away immediately and
deactivated."
  "You mentioned, Commander, that they provide you with
certain items of scientific equipment from time
to time," Spock said. "I could certainly use my
tricorder."
  Market shook his head and smiled
  apologetically. "Not a chance, sir. They're
kept on a special exhibit
  40 STAR TREK LOG BIG-NThat
  table beyond the force wall. We get awfully
nervous when a new bunch of patrons or
  scientists or whatever our visitors are show up
and start playing with them. We don't know if we're
ever going to see them again in one piece."
  Kirk had scanned the cottages earlier from their
position by the roadway. Now he lowered his
tone as he spoke to Markel.
  "There were six of you on the survey roster."
  Bryce swallowed and stared at the unattainable
blue sky to their left. "We didn't beam down in
time to save the others." Kirk eyed her
  questioningly, and she shook her head in response
to his unasked question.
  "No, we don't think the Lactrans had
anything to do with it. They've been too solicitous of
our own welfare." She looked up at him.
"You've encountered some of the other inhabitants of this
zoo?"
  Kirk nodded slowly.
  "Well, the only reason we're alive and here
to talk to you now is because the Lactrans got to us before
some of their exhibits did." She shrugged
helplessly. "The others weren't as lucky."
  "Or unlucky," Markel corrected
philosophically, "if you consider our chances of
getting out of this place."
  "Don't be so pessimistic, Commander," Kirk
urged. "Eventually, my people may locate us.
Considering the technology we've seen so far, I'm
not sure a forcible attempt at rescue would be a
wise idea. I'm hoping we can find
another way out before Engineer Scott becomes
impatient with our continued silence."
  Markel's expression eloquently indicated how
he felt about that possibility.
  "There should be one other member of your group, then,"
commented Spock.
  "Oh, Lieutenant Randolph's in the end
house," Bryce told them. "She's running a
high fever, and we can't seem to bring it down. The
Lactrans don't take any notice of our
entreaties shouted, written, or otherwise. I
suspect they don't consider her illness severe
enough. And while we're well-supplied with food,
they give us nothing in the way of medical
supplies."
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 41
  "I'll check her out," McCoy said
reassuringly. "It would be ironic if our
captors didn't help because they were afraid of
wrongly treating a valuable specimen." He
looked grim. "Or maybe they're afraid you
might try suicide. A quick dose of some medicine
could kill you before they could interfere. Has anyone .
. . ?"
  Bryce looked back at him steadily.
"I'd be a liar if I said the thought hadn't
crossed my mind."
  McCoy nodded, his expression carefully
neutral. "Maybe I can at least diagnose
what's wrong with her, but I can't do anything else.
Not without my medical kit."
  Kirk spoke to Markel as Lieutenant
Bryce led McCoy toward the house the three
survivors had moved into. "What have you learned
about the Lactrans, Commander? You've had a lot more
time to study them than we have. An we've been able
to determine is that they run this zoo, are
telepathic, and possess a very high level of
technology. How high we've no way of
estimating."
  Markel looked disappointed. "I'm afraid we
haven't learned much we can add to that, sir. It's
difficult to study another culture from behind bars.
Particularly when you're being studied yourself. We're
not fond of the switch. Also, we were captured and
brought here at night.
  "But we did see enough to know that this zoo" and he
made encompassing motions with both hands "is so
enormous as to be
  unbelievable. The only boundaries we
saw before we were brought to this place were manufactured
ones. There's plenty to hint that the majority of the city
is built underground."
  Spock made a Vulcan sound indicative of
surprise.
  "That implies a metropolis of truly
gargantuan extent, Commander Markel. On what do
you base such an assumption?"
  "On what we saw before we were brought here, and on
the fact that despite these creatures being obviously
diurnal, there were many days when we traveled through the
city without seeing a single one besides our hosts."
  42 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  "And I don't see any now," admitted
Kirk, looking around. "That means that if we could
slip clear of this force field, we'd have a certain
amount of freedom and a good chance of
  regaining our communicators and phasers. That's a
considerable 'if," however. Have you made any
attempts to escape?"
  Markel made a muffled sound. "Oh sure."
He scooped up a handful of pebbles and spoke as
he chucked them into the air. They traveled only a
short distance before coming up against the force field and
dropping vertically to the ground. "A dozen
different ways, a few of them bordering on the
insane.
  "For example, we tried using one of our
communicators, when they allowed us one, to cause a
disruption in the field. You can imagine how well we
did with that one. We tried the inevitable tunnel."
He half smiled, but there was bitterness in it. "I
suppose we ought to have guessed that wouldn't work when they
permitted us to continue. We couldn't very well hide
the work.
  "The force wall extends as far below the surface
as you're willing to dig. Then we all tried going
on a hunger strike. All that brought about was a
steady change in our meals. There was nothing
to indicate that the Lactrans regarded it as anything
like a voluntary protest by intelligent beings. We
decided to give it up before we actually starved
to death." He threw the final pebble, hard. "Nothing
worked. I think we were getting a little crazy when we
received your broadcast."
  "Have you tried to communicate?" wondered Spock.
  "Naturally, sir. Constantly, endlessly.
We've tried talking to them, writing, thinking at
them, rearranging the landscaping everything. As far as we
can tell, the only response we've been
able to generate with our combined efforts is an
  occasional peculiar quivering movement on the
front part of their bodies. I'm afraid I'm not
much on quiver semantics."
  "They seem motionless enough now," Kirk informed them,
nodding toward the roadway. "It looks like we've
got company again, gentlemen."
  They turned to face the near section of field
wall. Two Lactrans were approaching with that by now
  STAR TREK T OG BTGETT 43
  familiar eerie smoothness. They settled themselves
opposite the captives and succeeded in conveying the
impression of lavishing their undivided eyeless
attention on the tiny group of bipeds.
  It produced, Kirk decided, a very cold
feeling
  Since the Lactrans appeared content to rest and
watch, Kirk and the others decided to use the
opportunity to study their captors in turn. They
strolled over and stood at the edge of the force field.
  "They built this sealed environment for us shortly
after we were captured," Markel
  murmured. "Fairly sprang up around us. That
was one of the first solid indications we had that they were
telepathic." He stared at the nearest
alien, striving to penetrate whatever shield blocked
the mind contained within that sluglike mass of
protoplasm. "None of us was thinking consciously of
anything like this layout," the commander continued, "when we were
deposited here. Our thoughts were about as far from comfortable
cottages and swimming pools as possible."
  "That would appear to indicate that they are capable of
reaching into one's mind and
  withdrawing imagery from memory," Spock
  suggested. Markel nodded agreement.
  "Ed think that would also convince them of our
intelligence," Kirk mused. "Still, we haven't
even defined our own parameters of intelligence.
We've no way of imagining what the standards are in
Lactran." He glanced at his first of ficer.
  "You mentioned correctly, Spock, that where
mental reception is concerned, you as a Vulcan are
more sensitive than the rest of us. That goes for thought
projection as well. Try. You may have more luck
than Commander Markel and the
  others."
  "I will attempt it, Captain, but I am not
optimistic."
  Standing still and silent, Spock closed his eyes and
drifted rapidly into a trancelike state.
Kirk and Markel continually shifted their attention from
Spock to the two Lactrans near the field.
  Without apparent cause, the front ends of both
aliens lifted slightly and twisted, puttylike,
toward each
  44 STAR TREK LOG BIGEIT
  other. Whether this action was the result of
Spock's efforts was something only the first officer
himself could answer.
  Spock kept up the effort for several long
minutes, then slumped, visibly exhausted by the
strain.
  "There are the same glimmerings of something supernally
intelligent, Captain," he reported slowly.
"Far different from anything I've ever encountered before.
But again, the rapidity with which they process their thoughts
defeats me. I cannot break through on their level. It
does not help that they seem to be absorbed in
  conversation with each other. A two-way effort is
required."
  "I see. And if one directed its thoughts at
you, then it wouldn't matter because it could detect our
intelligence on its own." He looked disgusted.
"I hate cyclic problems." He brightened.
  "Perhaps we'll have more success with a
technique I'm sure Commander Markel has
tried. A combination of Vulcan thought projection and
something graphic. Try writing something, Spock, and
concentrating at the same time. Navigational
computation, perhaps."
  Spock nodded. He broke a suitable dead
  branch from a nearby tree, then located a patch
of ground where the grass cover was nearly
nonexistent. The formula he scratched in the bare
earth was complex enough to indicate mental powers beyond
simple random doodling, yet basic enough to be
readily recognise able to any creature with a working
knowledge of elementary chemistry. At the same time his
eyes glazed over, indicating he was striving
to project his thoughts at the watching Lactrans.
  This time Kirk noticed a slight shaking, a
rippling of the grey mantle that lined the front fringe
of both aliens. This was accompanied by coordinated,
extensive movements of the
  tail-tentacle.
  "You seem to be getting a response," Kirk
mur- mured with repressed excitement.
  Spock stirred, his discomfort apparent even through his
muddled voice. "I have . . . have the vague
impression that . . . they are laughing at
me."
  STAR TREKG PTGT-TT 45
  That implied a general conception of what Spock
was writing and at the same time
  contempt it didn't make sense. It didn't
add up.
  It was frustrating and infuriating.
  "But basic mathematics," Kirk almost shouted,
"has been a universal language among every
intelligent race the Federation has encountered."
  The first officer blinked and left his state of
concentration. "That may be the problem, Captain. Our
formulations may be too basic, though this equation is
far from simple. It is possible that they are so far
ahead of us mathematically that my attempt was comparable
to a child's futile struggle to make words with letter
blocks. Many creatures can scratch out
imitative lines analogous to mathematical
equations. Talent in mimicry does not imply the
power of creative Bought."
  "Try something else," Kirk ordered
irritably.
  "Yes, Captain."
  Once more the trance of projection, again a new
formula etched into the dirt. Kirk
anxiously studied the Lactrans for the signs of
recognition due their captive's intelligence. That
they were paying attention to Spock seemed clear.
  There were definite reactions. The quivering in-
creased and spread to other parts of the aliens"
bodies. But, wish as he would, Kirk saw no
indication of anything like shocked amazement, no sign
of an attempt to contact him. Nor was there anything
pressing at his mind.
  This line of attack was useless. There was no point
in tiring his first officer needlessly. "It's no use,
Spock, you may as well relax."
  Spock tossed the stick away and rubbed with both
hands at his forehead and temple, like a runner
massaging his thighs after a steeplechase.
  "At least we know they are capable of humor,"
he observed.
  Market was not amused. "We haven't seen
anything funny about this so far, Mr. Spock."
  Spock replied imperturbably, "Animals
in a zoo rarely do."
  46 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  Kirk broke the rising tension between the two
by turning away from the Lactrans and starting toward the
occupied cottage.
  "Let's join the others. Right now I feel the
need for a bit more human company, and a bit less
alien." He wasn't sure whether the unbroken,
eyeless stares of the Lactrans were making him angry
or uneasy, or both.
  Letting either emotion overwhelm continued study of
their predicament would not bring them closer to a
solution, he reminded himself as they entered the house.
  The interior was frightening in its cheeriness. Frightening
because the creatures that had constructed the wooden
chairs, printed the bright wallpaper, were anything but
human. Frightening because those paper and chair designs
had been drawn unbidden from the minds of unknowing
human beings.
  A tall, middle-aged woman was Iying on the
couch beneath the front window. Her expression and
pose, even in that naturally relaxed position,
hinted at far more than normal exhaustion. Sweat
stood out on her forehead like quicksilver on a plastic
sheet.
  Lieutenant Bryce stood nearby as Dr.
McCoy continued his methodical, patient
  examination limb by limb, joint by joint,
pressing, feeling, laying on hands because of the absence of
instruments of metal and plastic and ceramic.
While less accurate, however, those hands were equally
sensitive.
  Bryce turned at their approach, offering a wan
smile. "Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock." She
gestured at the prone form. "Lieutenant Nancy
Randolph, our cartographer and navigator."
  Randolph managed a grin and limp handshakes
all around, but even that slight effort clearly
exhausted her. Kirk waited until McCoy had
concluded his extensive examination, then drew him off
toward the rear of the room.
  "How is she, and what's the matter tenth herd"
  "She's not well. Jim. As to what's affected
her, it's almost impossible to make anything like an
accurate diagnosis without proper
  instrumentation." He took a deep breath.
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 47
  "If I had to guess, though, I'd say she's
picked up some kind of malarial-type infection from
an insect bite. I can't tell for certain, of
course, much less prescribe any kind of
corrective treatment beyond applying cold
compresses in hopes of keeping the fever from rising.
Bryce has been doing that anyway." He
grunted. "If she's not improving, at
least she's not getting any worse. But her body can
fight the infection only so long. I've got to have
my medikit, Jiml Guesses make lousy
medication."
  Kirk nodded, then turned to walk back to the
large front window. The better to enable them to see
out? he wondered or to allow visitors to see in?
Angrily, he shrugged the thought away.
  The pair of Lactrans had not moved from their
resting place. They stayed there, squatting and staring
at the house, only occasionally turning front ends
to face each other. Kirk knew they were conversing as
surely as if they had been shouting in Federation
EL-NGLISH.
  "We haven't seen another Lactran since we
arrived except these two," he declared. "Is this
standard procedure, Commander Markel? Do
  these two have a function are they scientists, or
what?"
  "It's our joint opinion that they're guards,
sir," Markel told him. "Or keepers the
terminology depends on your mood of the moment.
Sometimes there are three instead of two, but always at
least a couple hovering around somewhere, except when
large groups of them appear. They're
probably there to see we don't damage ourselves,
or each other."
  McCoy grunted again. "Very thoughtful of them. I
suppose we should feel flattered."
  "You mentioned regular meals," Kirk went on.
"Do they feed you or supply game so you can fend for
yourselves?"
  Markel shook his head. "They bring us a large
case of various edibles once a week. The stuff
is funny-looking, but it tastes okay. I think
they synthesised our emergency rations." He smiled
at a sudden thought. "If
  48 STAR TREK BIGHT
  I'd known, we would have beamed down with steak and
seafood instead of concentrates."
  "How do they get it to you?"
  "I'm not certain. We've never been able to tell
if they shut the force wall down completely or just
at the point where the food is sent in."
  "The point?" Kirk perked up. "They always bring
it to the same place?"
  "Always," Bryce admitted, nodding. "Near the
display case."
  "Display case . . . what display case?"
  "Behind this house," she continued.
  "Commander Market mentioned the table our equipment was
kept on. It's set up there, outside the force
wad. They have all our toys in there, our digging
stones and pointed sticks. That's only
appropriate, isn't it?" She turned a warned,
tired gaze down to the feverish navigator. "It's
all part of the main exhibit us."
  "Phasers, communicators, medical
supplies, tricorders, and packs everything we
brought down with us," Markel finished.
  "That means my medikit should be there, too,"
McCoy surmised. "We've got to get it back
somehow."
  "Possibly we can persuade them to give it to us,
Captain," Spock suggested. "It is certain that
they are aware of the potential of each device. That
is shown by their refusal to return the phasers at
any time."
  "But the medical equipment wouldn't be
  harmful," McCoy noted. Spock shook his
head, once.
  "We have already commented on the possibility of
voluntary injury to a despondent captive," the
first officer commented, ignoring the sensibilities around
him in favor of cold reason. "That
explains their reluctance to turn such material over
to their captives."
  "Even at the expense of losing one of those
valuable specimens," McCoy snarled, staring
helplessly at the recumbent figure of
Lieutenant Randolph. His arms were held stiffly
at his sides, the hands curled tightly into fists.
  "A strong emotional projection, Doctor."
  "What of it?" a belligerent McCoy
objected.
  STAR TREK LOG EMHT 49
  "Possibly nothing, but continue with it. Reinforce
it, concentrate on it to the exclusion of all else."
  McCoy started to say something, hesitated, then
nodded as understanding of Spock's intention dawned on
him. He let the rage and frustration flow freely
over him, dwelt masochistically on the image of a
twisted, emaciated Randolph writhing on the couch in
her death throes. His face contorted and wrinkled, and
he fairly vibrated with the tension. McCoy was almost
a parody of concentration.
  Parody or not, it seemed to have some effect.
Spock was staring out the front window as McCoy
concentrated. As he watched, one of the two
Lactrans abruptly turned and scurried
off out of view.
  "One of the aliens has just left his companion,
Captain," he reported.
  "Keep it up, Bones."
  "I'm . . . trying, Jim . . ."
McCoy's face was a portrait of exaggerated
yet honest concern.
  "A little bit longer. Give them a chance and
we'll see what happens . . ."
  They waited. Markel suddenly broke the
silence. He was staring out one of the back windows and
called excitedly to the others.
  "Back here, Captain!"
  His concentration broken by the interruption, McCoy
turned and left the house through the back door, along
with Spock, Markel, and Bryce. They were just in time
to see the Lactran who had left, or possibly
another one, withdrawing its multiple-ended tail from
the force-field boundary. At a corresponding
point inside was a pile of exotic but
nourishing-looking fruit and vegetables.
  "Food different food, and it's not feeding time,"
a puzzled Markel observed.
  "I think I understand," began Kirk. "They must
have sensed Dr. McCoy's projection of
want, of need, and interpreted it as a desire for
food. The strength of the projection might explain the
new offerings. Possibly they feel we require
a different diet than you, at least
  50 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  at the beginning of our captivity." He considered
the pile of edibles carefully.
  "That means that their telepathic sense is less
than perfect, or they would have given us the medical
supplies. I'm sorry they didn't, but at the
same time it would be foolish to say I'm not glad
to see a hint or two of imperfection on our
captors' part."
  "It's nice to have confirmation of that fact, Jim,"
agreed McCoy tiredly, "but I could have told you
that already. And while you might think me a reactionary
anthropomorphise, I can also assure you that
they're not pretty." He wiped
  perspiration from his brow. The steady
  concentration had exhausted him, though in a fashion
different from the way such strains affected Spock.
  Logic ordered no rest, however, as Spock
suggested, "I believe we should all concentrate on
the need for Dr. McCoy's medikit, emphasising
our intention to use it only to help preserve
one of our members."
  Markel shrugged. "Worth a try."
  All five of them went silent, some with eyes
closed, others staring hard at the slowly retreating
Lactran, each using the method which seemed most
effective to him.
  The subject of this concentration responded with
satisfying suddenness. It turned to regard them
quietly, then sidled over to the oddly curved
display table.
  Waivering over the metal, the tail hesitated
over several objects before picking up ... the
captain's phaser! For a wild moment Kirk thought
that one of their weapons might be returned to them.
Similar thoughts occurred to several of the others.
  Either because of their thoughts or because of the Lactran's
own knowledge, the bulky alien immediately put the weapon
down. Kirk cursed himself for giving in so childishly
to the offensive image his mind must have conjured up.
He
  resumed concentrating twice as hard on
McCoy's medikit.
  The Lactran's next choice was more assured.
It picked up the necessary container. Handling it as
delicately as if it were the prize glass
sculpture of a master,
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 51
  it moved toward them and set the kit on the lawn
behind the house.
  Kirk watched the entire procedure imtensely,
but there was nothing to indicate any button depressed
or lever moved to deactivate that section of the force
field.
  Still, someone somewhere must have done exactly that. He
couldn't believe that the Lactrans possessed the
physiological ability to walk through their own
restraining field with impunity.
  He mused on the problem while the others made a
run for the precious medikit, lest the alien change
its mind and return to snatch it from them.
  "No telling when they'll decide we've had it
long enough," Markel explained as they ran toward
it. "We've been permitted to keep other equipment
anywhere from a few hours to a week."
  As McCoy anxiously examined the kit and the
others crowded around him, Kirk walked on past
to study the section of force wall the Lactran had
inserted it through.
  "It's all here no damage and nothing altered,"
dedared McCoy finally. "They haven't
removed any of the emergency ampules, either."
  "Unfortunately, nothing's changed here, either,"
Kirk replied. "The field's back on." He
stared outward, looking longingly at the table laden with
phasers and other equipment, their own as well as that
brought by the survey team.
  "So near and yet so far," he murmured sadly.
  Behind him, McCoy was heading for the house. "Have
to see to my patient," he muttered in
satisfaction. Doctor, patient, and medical
supplies the tripartite components of his
Aesculapian universe were once more complete.
  Kirk watched them wale toward the house. He
bestowed a final, concentrated thought on the re- treating
Lactran, pleading desperately for a simple,
harmless toy his communicator
  The Lactran ignored him completely.
  52 STAR TREK BOG BIGHT
  IV
  Meanwhile others were striving to pierce the isolation
which had swallowed up the captain, first officer, and
chief physician of the Enterprzse.
  "Are you raising anything yet?" an anxious
Scott inquired of Lieutenant M'ress. He
stood near the communications console and stared
at the squiggles and lines which appeared on various
read outs, in the hope that one of them might spell out
an answer in plain English.
  No explanation was forthcoming from those dispassionate,
uncaring instruments, plain or otherwise.
  "Not a thing, sirr," M'ress replied. She
had an- swered the same query from Scott with the same
information every five minutes since she had taken over
for Lieutenant Uhura.
  Scott responded with the same order. "Keep
at it. They're down there somewhere."
  Furiously, he turned over the same old
  possibilities in his mind. It was highly
unlikely that all three officers had experienced a
simultaneous breakdown of their communicators,
regardless of what might have happened to those carried
down by the survey crew.
  That left three possibilities.
  One, they were unable to use their
  communicators, for what reason Scott couldn't
imagine. Two, their communicators had been
rendered inoperative by outside forces. Three . .
.
  He refused to consider Three. As long as he
denied the possibility, it could never come
about.
  Scottish reasoning can be notoriously perverse,
and this was one instance in which Scott utilized its
roundabout methodology to the fullest. Spock could
say that
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 53
  Scott thought in pretzels all he wanted to
. . . as long as the absurd first of ricer was all
right.
  As long, the Enterprise's chief engineer thought
furiously, as he was all right . . .
  The little knot of humans left McCoy to his
doctoring, aware that their presence could only hinder his
ministrations. Lieutenant Bryce lingered the
longest, but eventually she, too, left the couch and
its tired occupant to join the others in gazing out the
front window.
  Both guards stood, or sat, where one had been
moments before. They regarded the inhabitants of the
house with identical but featureless stares. The
inhabitants stared back with somewhat more animation.
  "Let's sum things up, Commander," Kirk started
firmly. "Based on everything that's happened to you
since you've been trapped on this world, what's your
evaluation of the situation?"
  Market considered for a moment and ticked off his
observations on the fingers of one hand. "The
Lactrans treat us quite well. They want us
alive and healthy and are willing to go to some
inconvenience to insure that we remain so . . . though
they do make occasional mis-
  takes underestimating the severity of Lieutenant
Randolph's condition, for example. Most
  importantly, they want to keep us right where we
are."
  "A natural reaction for the curators of a
zoo," Spock observed drily.
  "We've managed to keep from going crazy,"
continued Markel, "only just. Part of the time we make
studious analyses of our guards, trying to discern
differences between them ... with little result. The rest of the
time we occupy by plotting absurd escape schemes
and executing them, and by making observations of this world not
  connected with our captors. For example, we've
worked out a calendar according to the
  movements of the Lactran sun and moon. It's a
close duplicate of our own, which helps us a little.
Oh, and every nine days we draw quite a crowd."
  54 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  "Undoubtedly the local equivalent
of a periodic rest time," commented Spock.
  Markel was silent for a while as attention was
divided between the guards and the couch, where McCoy
made steady, assured motions with his hands and
paraphernalia. Then he turned a concerned,
unwinking gaze on Kirk.
  "Sir, do you think there's any chance of getting
out?" It wasn't the sort of statement the leader of a
survey crew ought to make, but then, Markel
didn't feel much like a leader at the moment. He
felt like a laboratory rat crouched at the far
corner of its cage, regarding a monstrous hand
moving inexorably toward
  "As long as they keep us alive, there's a
chance," Kirk replied, properly encouraging. His
private thoughts went unvoiced. "Sometimes the
strongest force fields can be negated by the simplest
procedures. Tonight we'll try to find a frequency
commonality using Dr. McCoy's
  instrumentation, slightly rearranged, of course."
  "I'd say there was no commonality, Captain."
  "Not very encouraging, Mr. Spock."
  "I am not one for fanciful dreams, sir, as you
well know," the first of ficer replied evenly.
  "I never met a Vulcan who was."
Markel did not look across at Spock.
  "I hope," the target of that barb said carefully,
"that was meant to connote the value of being a
Vulcan."
  "ltm sure it was," Kirk said hastily.
  Spock was well in control of himself, but Kirk
saw that the survey commander was being pushed by Spock's
constant coolness. Spook could only be Spock,
however, and he continued relentlessly. His mind could not
make room for childishly optimistic speculation
where no grounds for such existed.
  "I think we should face our situation
  realistically, Captain. We are specimens in
a zoo. We have been taken captive by an alien
race of unusual technological accomplishments
and unpredictable psychology. To them, we are
caged for life. These facts, coupled with
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 55
  the Lactrans' undeniable demonstrations of
superior intelligence, do not add up to a very convincing
set of factors for eventual escape. And, while
not very encouraging, Captain, that is my reasoned
assessment of our present situation."
  "Thank you, Mr. Spock," Kirk replied.
"And mine is, let's sleep on it."
  Randolph was a new person the following morning,
thanks to McCoy's skilled treatment. New, but
not her old self, not yet. Her system would need
plenty of time and rest to return to normal strength.
So she remained on the couch under doctor's orders
as the other five officers left the house.
  Kirk was the first one out, and he pulled up short,
staring around in surprise. The others followed and
displayed varied expressions of equal amazement.
  "We seem," Spock observed mildly, "to be
drawing quite a crowd."
  Indeed, where only the presence of two guards had
marred the broad horizon the previous day, there now
milled a thickly packed throng of Lactrans.
The only visible differences between individuals were
slight variations in calor and somewhat greater ones in
size.
  "This is that ninth day I mentioned," Markel in-
formed Kirk, unnecessarily.
  "I'll be hanged if I'm going to do tricks for
them," grumbled McCoy.
  "We can move about as we wish, Doctor,"
agreed Spock, "but we cannot evade their mental
vision. I suggest we attempt to ignore them and
make ourselves comfortable."
  They moved around to the side of the house,
Lieutenant Bryce going inside briefly to inform
Randolph of what was going on. The recreational
section outside boasted a number of comfortable
chairs, and it was into these that the members of the trapped
group settled themselves.
  Bryce returned, indicating the pool and
surrounding equipment. "As you can see, they've given
us extensive facilities for enjoying ourselves and for
making sure
  56 STAR TRERLOG BIGHT
  we stay healthy." She snapped out the words. "A
very comfortable wheeh only the rats aren't in the mood
to climb in and run in place.
  "They feed us," she continued as she relaxed into a
free-form of orange plastic, "and
  apparently think this is all we want. To run,
eat, sleep, and" she paused only slightly
"play."
  "Exactly what we would expect from the
  animals we have in our own zoos," Spock
  commented. His tone was almost approving. Almost.
  "Well, I am not an animal," McCoy
muttered disconsolately.
  "Scientifically speaking, we all
are," Kirk reminded him, then turned to each in
sequence. "Instead of learning about us, a subject
we're pretty familiar with, why don't we
follow Commander Markel's suggestion and try to learn
something about them."
  Market looked resigned. "I don't see
what more there is we can learn, Captain, unless we
can either penetrate their minds or convince them of our
intelligence."
  "Known fact: They are purely telepathic,"
Kirk began, restating the obvious. "Mr.
Spock is, like all Vulcans, peripherally so, but
as yet has not been able to make successful contact
with them."
  "Their intelligence is so different that I can find
no common basis for an exchange of information, let
alone for complicated visualisations," Spock
added.
  "Exactly what did you learn yesterday?"
Market wondered.
  "That the thoughts and expressions of adults are
incomprehensible to a six-year-o1d infant," the
first officer declaimed, "and that the infant's babblings
are regarded with equal
  incomprehension by adults." He did not
have to place his companions into one of the two
  categories
  "I think we're missing something, Spock," the
doctor said.
  The first officer turned an interested gaze on
McCoy. "What do you mean?"
  "Well, we're assuming this extraordinary,
impenetra
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 57
  ble intelligence level is uniform throughout the
population. In any civilisation there are the gifted,
the norm, and the slow." He nodded once toward the
smoothly shifting crowd. "Maybe there are less
highly developed minds out there today. It's only
natural to expect me keepers to be reasonably
advanced. That's not necessarily so of those who come
to gawk. Try them. At least we'll have the general
public's impression of us, if we're lucky."
  "A fine suggestion, Doctor." Spock
turned his stare outward, concentrating without exerting me
maximum effort of the previous day.
  "It is only a vague generalisation," he
finally murmured softly. "I could be completely
wrong, but we appear to frighten some of them at least the
smaller ones. Probably juveniles.
The others have mixed feelings: Some are indifferent,
some curious, a few find us rather ugly." He
blinked. "It is a sign of their advanced
civilisation that none projected any hint of
antagonism toward us."
  "Okay, the feelings are mutual," McCoy
  commented without rancor. Changing the subject
abruptly, he asked Kirk, "What about those on
board, Jim?"
  "Scotty's patient, Bones, when he has
to be. Left to his own feelings, he'd probably
have beamed down yesterday to see what happened. But
he's under orders. He'll exhaust every ounce of
patience, try everything to regain contact with us without
taking offensive action. But eventually, he's going
to get worried enough to take action.
  "As I said before, the Enterprise might not come out
on top in a fight with our silent hosts. No,
Scotty will hold off. He'll need some proof
we're in danger before sending down an armed
  force and we're probably safer here man on
board the ship, thanks to the concern of the Lactrans."
  "We have to do something, then," McCoy
  exploded, "besides rest on our fundaments and
juggle the odds of a Federation-Lactran
battle . . . with us in the middle."
  "I have a suggestion, Captain, when the doctor
is finished.
  58 STAR TRBKBOG BIGHT
  McCoy threw Spock a sour look and
mumbled, "Y'm finished, Spock, what's your
grand
  solution?"
  "Not solution . . . suggestion," Spock
corrected efflciently, completely missing
McCoy's sarcasm. "Evidently they can pick
up our thought patterns if we all concentrate on
the same thing. If they care to go to the trouble."
  "This is the main problem. Believing that we are
animals, it is therefore not worth their effort
to descend to our level. Who cares what the vermin
think?"
  "Yes, yes," Kirk agreed rapidly,
"we've already proven that by getting them to give us the
medical kit. Where do we go from here?"
  "I see no reason not to try an idea that has
worked once a second time." The others eyed
Spock expectantly. "One of us must pretend
to be seriously ill. Even more important, the rest
of us must believe in the falsified illness,
so that our true intentions are masked from the
Lactrans. The lie must be close to the truth, for
us to have a chance. Our captors are perceptive and
react quickly. We have to concentrate strongly on the
thought that a communicator is vital to the patient's
recovery.
  "Naturally, we need not specify in our minds
exactly why a communicator is required, but it
is a thought an of us should be able to hold to." He
paused, then went on easily, "Surely a
return to the Enterprise would be one method of seeing
to the health of an ill individual."
  "Sounds possible, Spock," Kirk finally
  concurred. "Let's try it. And, visual
stimulus being an aid to concentration, let's move
back behind the house so that we can look at the
communicators while we're concentrating on one."
  There were far fewer Lactrans clustered at the
rear of the cottage than they had encountered out front.
That was only natural, Spock pointed out, since
the best view in any zoo was in front of the cage.
Possibly their novelty was wearing off, because no
rush of Lactrans appeared to gaze at them from the
new vantage point.
  Only a small number were clustered by the
display
  STAR TREK LOG ETGWT 59
  table. As they neared the field wall, Kirk
saw that one of the smaller aliens was busily engaged
in examining the equipment laid out on the table. The
larger ones rested nearby, apparently deep in
telepathic conversation.
  "Okay, who's our candidate for convincing
convulsions?" McCoy wondered aloud
  "I'll do it," Kirk said immediately. "I'm
sick of this place and sick of our situation, so I
won't have to exaggerate too much. The rest of you
concentrate like hell on the nearest
  communicator."
  "Maybe we'll get lucky," Markel
observed, his attention focused on the display table.
"That's a little one pretty much alone with the instruments.
If Mr. Spock's right, it could be a youngster."
  "Spock wasn't sure, Commander," Kirk
  reminded him. "It might merely be a small
adult. Or maybe the adults are the smaller of the
species." Markel looked disappointed.
  "Try to think about Captain Kirk's visible
manifestations of illness," Spock advised the
others, "instead of considering his actual
condition. We must strive to project an aura of
intense worry and concern, to the exclusion of all other
thoughts."
  "And remember, we have to be quick," Kirk
admonished. "As soon as I get my hands on a
communicator, I'll try to get enough information through
to whoever answers so that they'll know we require an
immediate beam-aboard." He
  settled himself close to the field wall.
  "Ready now . . ."
  Kirk became a dervish, spinning, whirling,
hopping about, clutching at his head, and finally bending
over with both hands pressed to his stomach. He
rolled on the ground, bugging his eyes and choking,
generally presenting the appearance of a being whose health was
  somewhat less than ideal.
  The others moved to form a half circle around him,
leaving the section between Kirk and the force field
unblocked. They stared down at the body in
spasms,
  60 STAR TREK LOG EMHT
  their faces reflecting the agony they forced themselves
to feel.
  The effect upon the small Lactran studying their
equipment was immediate. It turned its front
end toward the enclosure and gave that eerie
impression of ogling without optics. Moments came
and went, while Kirk struggled to maintain the
illusion of impending death and Spock wondered if
they were wasting their time.
  The versatile tail drifted over the exhibit
table, finally settling on some of the survey team's
emergency medical supplies. Turning
sideways, the Lactran extended its tad] and
deposited the sealed containers inside the field,
close to Kbbrk's thrashing legs.
  "It has the ideal" Spock murmured, his eyes
never straying from Kirk's writhing form. "We must
concentrate harder on the necessary
  remedy. The communicator . . . it is the only
thing that will save the captain. The only thing . . .
he'll die horribly without it, remember. That's
all you can think about, the captain dying . . . unless
. . . he gets . . . the communicator . . ."
  Several minutes of truly inspired
gesticulating on Kirk's part coupled with his
companions" shunning of the proffered medical
supplies, prompted the Lactran to reach farther
into the field cage to nudge the containers closer to the
pitiful, suffering specimen.
  When this further offering was also ignored, the slug
turned back to the exhibits. This time it picked up
one of the communicators, the
  compact device looking even tinier in the grip of
that massive grey limb.
  But the ruse was only partly successful. Either the
Lactran suspected the depth of their need for this
particular instrument, or else it was unsure of itself,
but, whatever the reason, it decided to keep a close
eye on its utilisation. So instead of handing over the
comrnunicator' it entered the enclosure with it.
  Like an elastic crane the tail swooped around and
down. to offer the instrument to Kirk. Apparently the
Lactrans held to the "heal thyself" principle.
Well, Kirk was more than willing to abide by it.
late raised a quivering, feeble hand and grasped it,
bringing the in
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 61
  strument down toward his mouth. As soon as he had
it opened and activated, he underwent a remarkable
transition. In fact, his symptoms of advanced
disease vanished as though they had never existed.
  "Enterprise, Enterprise, this is the captain.
Beam us aboard immediately, all of his
  The communicator was torn from his grip
before he could finish. Had he not let go, the
Lactran would have taken his arm along with the instrument.
  Whether it was the physical or mental
  commotion, or both, something finally caused the two
large Lactrans standing nearest the exhibit table
to cease their inaudible conversation and whirl. They started
toward the force field.
  A familiar flickering in the air had commenced behind
the force wall, a colorful shimmering that Kirk
gaped at in horror. The transporter effect was
not engulfing himself, Spock, or any of the other
anxious captives.
  The smaller Lactran brightened once and was gone.
  Scott fought the transporter controls, having
reacted instantly to Kirk's shipwide call.
He had focused on the area surrounding the exact
position of the communicator, as pinpointed by the
Enterprise's communications computer.
  Readouts indicated he had locked onto a
substantial mass presumably the captain and the
rest of the landing party, including any survivors from the
Ariel.
  He stared expectantly at the alcove, where
something was beginning to take shape.
  "Captain," he began, "for a minute
we thought sure . . ." He stared, swallowed.
"What in cosmos . . . ?"
  Instead of the captain, Mr. Spock, or anyone
else, a two-and-a-half-meter-long monstrosity
was coalescing in the chamber. It looked like a cross
between a cucumber and a squid, combining the least
desirable features of both.
  Its front endear was it the backs moped around
rapidly, until it was pointed at Scott. The
engineer's
  62 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  hackles rose as he felt as if something
unclean were picking at his mind. At the same time the
long tail whipped around, secondary limbs
contracting.
  Scott ducked down behind the console. The
tentacle probed. As it did so the Enterprise's
chief engineer made like a foot soldier and
scuttled fast for the door.
  A first palm thrust sent the metal partition
sliding shut behind him. A second activated the
wall intercom.
  "Scott here . . . Security, full team to the
Main Transporter Room, on the double! We've

  Metal groaned behind him.
  The door had begun to buckle inward. It was still
bending when three security guards skidded around the
corridor corner, phasers held at the ready.
  "I beamed up something out of a bad
  hangover," Scott yelled at them. "The
captain sent an emergency message, and instead of
him we got his
  The door gave in with a musical spann)g, and
Scott's half-coherent explanation went no
further.
  "Watch it!" he yelled, stumbling backward.
  The door slammed down against the deck. Scott
thought of yelling for phasers to be set on stun, but
changed his mind when he remembered through the confusion of the
moment that
  security phasers were never preset to deliver a
lethal charge.
  Nor was it necessary to give an order to fire.
Faced with an eight-foot-long slug emerging from behind
a crumpled door and a wildly gesturing officer,
they decided unanimously to try
  nonverbal means of persuasion on the apparent
cause of the trouble.
  Three phasers fired, three beams
struck the Lactran. Its skin seemed to ripple
slightly . . . and that was all. But the creature
stopped, though both Scott and the security
personnel had a feeling it wasn't because of the phaser
attack.
  Scott began retreating down the corridor
to organize a larger capture party, but immediately
came to a jerking halt as though an invisible cable
around his head had snapped taut. Both hands went
to his suddenly throbbing skull, where tiny gnomes
had set up a small warp tilde engine and were
running it at overdrive.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 63
  All three guards, being closer to the intense
mental blast, had been knocked to the floor.
Sliding along the deck like a heavy metal ingot
on oil, the invader sprinted forward, swept up
Scott with its tail, and raced down the corridor.
  Behind, the guards struggled to find their phasers, their
composure, and the tops of their skulls . . .
  V
  Far, far below, the situation was no less tense,
if somewhat less hectic.
  "Captain, I believe that for the first time they are
making an effort to transmit a
comprehensible thought pattern toward us," Spock
told them. "Our speculation as to the relationship between
age and size appears to have been correct. They are
worried about their child, the one caught in the
transporter beam.
  "These, I gather, are the parents of the missing one.
Despite the lack of external sexual
  characteristics, the standard male-female partnership is
in existence here."
  "Never mind the biological details, Mr.
Spock," a tense Kirk ordered, eyeing the two
silent Lactrans warily. "While they're
worried about their offspring, I'm more concerned about what
it might do to the Enterprise. Even an adolescent
probably possesses considerable mental as well
as physical powers."
  "What in Carrel's scalpel went wrong,
though?" a bemused McCoy wondered.
  "I'm not sure, Bones. Obviously Scotty
received our call for help, a call that was sorely
lacking in details. That thing snatched the
communicator before I could give him any details.
As soon as the alien took the communicator from me,
well, it was still activated
  64 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  when it was grabbed away. Scotty cantered on
it, of course."
  Spock was swaying slightly, drifting deeper
into trance. ""They seem to think you made the child
disappear," he murmured, "since you were the one who
operated the device. Their reaction . . . their
reaction . . ."
  "Go on, Spock."
  "They are surprised, and concerned. The concern is
for their missing offspring. They are surprised because we
had not been classed as either an intelligent or a
dangerous species. And they are somewhat shocked
to discover that we may be both."
  "We can't stand here," McCoy said nervously,
"we've got to do something . . . or they will."
  Kirk tried to calm the jittery McCoy. In
fact, everyone appeared increasingly nervous. That could
only make the Lactrans worry more about their child.
  "Calm down . . . all of you. Let's not
give our captors cause for concern. The best thing
we can do is his
  He doubled over and fell to the ground, twisting in
pain and this time he wasn't acting.
  "Jim!" McCoy was at his side, feeling
helpless. "What is it?"
  "My head! Inside ... my head." The words
came out with an effort. "I think ... the baby.
What hap- pened to the baby?"
  There was an odd, hollow tone in those last words,
as if something Inhuman was trying to operate a human
voice mechamsm.
  "Fight it, Captain," Spock urged, "fight
it as hard as you can. Don't try to listen, don't
try to let them use you." He turned to McCoy
  "They think so fast, their patterns of cogitation
are so complicated, that their own thoughts are too complex
for a human brain to assimilate." He watched as
Kirk rolled to his knees, tried to keep his
balance, and failed.
  "If he gives up, even for a moment." Spock
ex- plained with deathly precision, "he may go
mad. The Lactran thought processes will overload
his neural capacity."
  STAR TREK T OG ETGHT 65
  'press uttered a sound halfway between a screech
and a feline yowl as the Lactran. still holding
Scott firmly in its grasp, charged out of the
turbolift onto the bridge. Arex rose from his
position at the navigation console. but despite the
shock and consternation, no one moved to
  abandon his post, no one ran for an exit.
  And that was the last thing Scott wanted, since the
presence of others seemed to make his captor
nervous. The chief engineer had been treated to one of the
sluPeople-thin tilde 's mental assaults and had no
desire to endure another.
  "Everyone clear out," he ordered, seeing that no
one was going to budge without being told to do so.
"Don't antazonize it."
  "Antagonize what?" M'ress asked
quietly. bearing Scott's admonition in mind.
"What is that thing?"
  "I don't know . . . yet. But it hasn't
injured anyone badly . . . yet. And T have the
impression it doesn't want to. It could have sent
pieces of me all over the shin by now but hasn't
taken that option." The Lactran headed toward the
center of the bridge. As it began to move, the
bridge personnel started to edge around toward the
turbolift doors.
  "All rri tilde ht. what do you want us to do,
sirr?" M'ress queried, standing by the open doors.
  "Just leave quietly? lassie. Report
to Lieutenant Seelens, tell her to set up
security teams on all transporters.
I don't expect any more visitors, but I
want to be ready to greet them in case I'm
wrong."
  "Yes, sire," she acknowledged. "But what arre
you going to do, sirr?"
  Scott let out a resigned sigh. "What do you
think, Lieutenant? Whatever it wants me to."
  M'ress filed into the lift behind Arex, turned,
and started to say something. The closing doors cut her
off soundlessly.
  He was alone on the bridge with the alien invader.
  The front end of the creature waved back and forth,
like an elephant sensing the air. It slid forward and
placed Scoff in the command
  chair gently and right
  66 STAR TREK EOG ErGHT
  side up, the chief noted with thanks and then
turned its featureless front to stare at him.
  "Now look," Scott began, "supposin" you
and I talk this over?"
  No response from the slug.
  "You can talk, can't you?"
  Silence, and that continuing eyeless gaze.
  "If you can't talk, how do you communicate?"
He tried Federation sign language.
"Well, what can you do?"
  The creature turned and began examining the control
consoles nearby, beginning with
  navigation and working its way around to Spock's
library-computer station. The tail end touched
several switches, and the multiple screens at the
station lit and began pouring forth a torrent of information.
Scott couldn't even identify the sections the
creature was studying, much less follow its
progress.
  "Listen, you've got to be careful here," he
explained patiently. "This is the control room of a
hey!"
  The tail had reached out and lifted him again, then
replaced him in the chair. If this was the alien's
method of indicating one should be silent, it failed
to impress Scott. The chief was growing increasingly
nervous as the alien continued to touch this or that control.
  4'ationow, look," he began as the Lactran
switched off the library and moved around to face the
helm and navigation consoles, "just keep your grubby
little whatever-it-is off things you don't under . . .
no, don't touch that!"
  Too late. The multitipped tail was moving
across the consoles with blurring speed, far
too fast for Scott to follow. It touched
switches. pushed buttons and levers, activated
telltales, and checked readouts, while its front
end slowly weaved back and forth from one console to the
other.
  "Listen," Scott howled desperately, "if you
keep that up? you'll send us runnin' off to the back
of wherever!"
  His attention was diverted by the already altered
picture on the main viewscreen. It was anything but
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 67
  reassuring. It showed a rapidly shrinking green
and white globe, Lactra VII, become a
pinhead circle instead of a screen-filling orb.
  Seconds later the warp-drive was engaged. An
enraged, horrified Scott could only stare and
hurl Highland imprecations at the grey hippo before
him. His horror sprang from the knowledge that any idiot
could activate the Enterpri tilde e's
warp-drive engines; but the matter of navigation, of
determining where those engines were taking me ship, was a
chore for experience and expertise.
  And he had the sick feeling that me voiceless
mass in front of him had neither.
  The two Lactrans abruptly turned
from the en- closure to converse with each other.
  Simultaneously, Kirk's body relaxed.
His face was pale and his tunic drenched with
perspiration. As the others watched anxiously, he
rolled over, sat up, and let out a long whoosh of
exhaustion.
  "Have they stopped, Jim?" McCoy finally
asked, when he felt Kirk had recovered enough
to answer. The captain looked like a man who had
lust come out of an eighteen-hour sleep. "How are
you?"
  "They've left off . . . for now," Kirk
told them. "I mink I'm okay, Bones. But
I'm tired . . . so tired."
  "Understandable," McCoy agreed. "Spock, what
do you think of . . . Spock?" McCoy turned,
to see Spock staring as if frozen at the pair of
concerned Lactrans. He was startled to see three more
of the full-sized aliens sidling up to the first two.
It seemed me alarm had been raised.
  At least, he thought grimly, they had succeeded in
getting their captors to notice them.
  Spock left his trance and glanced down at
Kirk. "I am not certain, Captain, but I
believe they have concluded that they cannot break
into your mind on an individual or even a
dualistic basis. They are surprised."
  "Good!" McCoy exclaimed. "Maybe they
won't try it again."
  Spock turned a somber gaze on him. "On
the con
  68 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  trary, Doctor, they are now readying the mental
strength of five of their number in a more powerful
attempt."
  A wild, faintly desperate tone underlined
Kirk's reaction. "I can't hold out against that many.
It's not possible. I don't know why they stopped the
last time. You've no idea, Bones, what it's
like."
  He turned an anxious stare on the gathering of
Lactrans.
  "I don't know if I'll come out of another
attack like that last one, let alone one of more than
twice the strength."
  "Every one of us must help the captain," Spock
instructed. "Concentrate on him, try to become one
with him, a part of his mind and thoughts. Perhaps we can
create some kind of screen, or at least his
  But Kirk was already on the ground again,
spinning in pain and screaming for something to leave him
alone.
  "It's tearing to was
  Their concern was too great for those
  surrounding him to erect anything like an effective
mental screen, if such a thing were even possible.
Kirk rolled about for several minutes until his
body quit. He lay still, only a quivering of
arms and legs and an occasional jerk of his head
indicating that his spread-eagled form was still fighting
back.
  His continued resistance was as obvious as the fact that
he was slowly weakening. More minutes passed. Kirk
rolled onto his face, limp as a rag doll now,
his form twitching from time to time as if touched by a live
cable.
  A number of wholly alien feelings were
  approaching eruption inside the Enterprise's first
officer when a familiar and unexpected glow
appeared in the air inside the force screen, as if
someone were shining a colored light on a rippling
sheet of clear silk.
  Two figures began to emerge. "The
Lactrans are coming into the enclosure," Markel
began, "but why in this fashion if his
  He broke off as the shifting hues solidified.
One of the two figures was Lactran, all right.
But the other . . .
  STAR TREK LOG BIC.HT 69
  It was a surprise to see the small Lactran
reappear, but it was a positive shock to see
Chief Engineer Scott held thinly in its
tail-tilde ip.
  The surprise and shock worked equally on the five
Lactrans outside the field. Their concentration was
shattered by the appearance of the small one, and the
results were immediately apparent as Kirk finally ceased
his helpless spasms.
  The adolescent put Scott down gently. As
soon as the chief had moved off a bit, two of the
larger Lactrans not even Spock could tell if
they were the original two reached in and drew the
smaller one outside the boundary of the force screen.
Rather roughly, McCoy thought, as he turned his
attention back to the still supine Kirk.
  The others were already gathered around him. He turned
onto his back, and McCoy saw his eyes were
glazed. Slowly, he tried to sit up, but nearly
collapsed. McCoy bent to help.
  "No, I'm all right, I'm okay,"
he muttered thickly. But he did not reject the
support of McCoy's shoulder after he had
struggled to his feet. His eyes were clearing
rapidly.
  "Whew! I feel like my brain's been pulled
through a wringer." He looked around at the
assemblage of worried faces. "You've no
idea what it's like, Scotty." He blinked.
"Scotty? What are you doing here?"
  The chief jerked his head to indicate the activity
behind them. "My alien acquaintance brought me."
  Spock looked incredulous. though his words were as
evenly modulated as ever. "You succeeded in making
contact with it?"
  "Not exactly." The object of sudden startled
attention grinned. "It made contact with me. I
gather it was a tremendous effort for the poor child to slow
down to my level."
  "You were right, Mr. Spock. Our attempts at
communication were properly directed, only at the
wrong members of this society."
  "What did you learn?" Kirk asked.
  The chief engineer considered the question carefully.
  70 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  "Some of it doesn't translate verra
easily into human terms," he explained slowly.
"But I did succeed in grasping a few definite
concepts.
  "For one, our small friend is the emotional and
physical Lactran equivalent of a human
  six-year-old. Mentally, however, it is
considerably superior to any of us. The first thing it
did on appearin' on board was pick the nearest
mind for useful information. Mine! Then it went on and
absorbed all the knowledge in the ship's library computer,
science center, and general storage facility.
Bein' a curious laddie or lassie it de-
cided to play around with its new toys. That included
operating the ship's helm. Sent us tearin' right out of
orbit."
  Kirk, who saw the Enterprise gallivanting
all over known space at the mercy of a playful
alien infant, swallowed hard. "How did you
convince it ta come back?"
  Scott turned introspective. "I think it was
my concern for the rest of the crew that persuaded it. That,
and the fact that I never showed any hatred toward it."
He shrugged. "I suppose any child can tell
instinctively when a threat is present and when it's
not. And there was my willingness, the willingness
of another, uh, child, to chat with it."
  "Infant-to-infant communication," Spock
observed, showing no resentment at being likewise
classified. "My congratulations, Mr.
Scott."
  "Anyhow," the chief continued, "I managed
to convince it that I wasn't anybody's pet, and that
we're no mere grubbers in the dirt. And that it would
be a sight better for all concerned if it would bring the
ship back into orbit around its own home world. From
there, it wasn't too hard to convince * to reenter the
transporter so we could return home. By that time the
youngster was pretty sure I meant it no harm.
What finally reassured it was my readiness to come
along too. I think they can sense friendliness in
another's thoughts as readily as they can much more
complicated concepts. If we could only his
  Spock cut him off softly. "A moment,
please, Mr.
  STAR TREK LOG PIGHT 71
  Scott." The Enterprise's first officer shook
his head irritably, like a man trying to throw off the
first assault of an advancing migraine. "I
believe . . . they are trying to contact us
directly. I can . . . make out . . .
something. It is very difficult. The adults . . .
so concise, so fast in their mental formulations . . .
  "They are . . . trying now . . . to slow down for
us. Communication involves the insertion of many
transitional concepts they have long since discarded as
superfluous. The ... child ... has explained to them.
Adults are attempting to rephrase their normal
thoughts into . . . babytalk."
  The evident irritation and minor pain gradually
faded, while his attitude of attentive listening
remained unchanged.
  "There ... it's better now. The child has learned
much from us, particularly from Mr. Scott. It has
also acquired an enormous volume of information about
us, and is relaying this to its parents ... though I can
recognise only glimpses and snatches of what
it is relating. It is like trying to follow every
ripple in a fastflowing stream." A pause; then:
"It has concluded, Captain. Already it has told
its parents all about the Federation and the many aspects of
its composition, including all the races it
comprises."
  "Already," gulped McCoy, wondering not merely
at a youthful mind capable of delivering a torrent
of material so rapidly, but also at those more
mature minds able to absorb and assimilate it.
  At the moment, however, there were other concerns
tempering Kirk's admiration of the Lactrans'
mental calisthenics.
  "All that information ought to include enough facts about
ourselves to convince them we're not common animals. How
do they look at us now, Mr. Spock?"
  "It would appear that they have indeed revised their
initial opinions of us," Spock replied,
swaying slightly as he struggled to codify the
Lactrans' rapid flow of thoughts. "Apparently
we are now classed as simplistic life forms in the
process of evolving rapidly into a higher order."
  72 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  "Vulcans included?" McCoy couldn't resist
the opportunity.
  Spock's intense concentration didn't keep him
from sounding slightly annoyed. "Yes, Vulcans
included." He frowned as the Lactrans continued
to relay information.
  "They are confused now."
  "That's a hopeful sign," K'rk murmured.
"I was beginning to wonder if they were infallible."
  "It would seem not, Captain. Several of them are
arguing that on closer inspection we may
prove in certain unexpected ways to be equal
or even superior to them. I cannot follow all of the
discussion, but much of it involves the efficacy of
instinct as opposed to pure thought."
  "No need to ask which of those we're supposed
to represent!" McCoy snorted. "I don't know
if they're flattering us or insulting us."
  "It is purely a zoological question to them,
Doctor," Spock explained. "The question of value
judgment does not enter into it."
  "I can see why they're using you as their go-be-
tween," McCoy murmured, but so softly that no
one else could hear. Aloud, he observed, "So they
think that as far as we're concerned, equality is just
around the corner?"
  Spock nodded absently, as usual taking no
notice of the doctor's sarcasm.
  "At the moment I'm more interested in getting back
on the Enterprise than in reaching their mental
level," Kirk declared pointedly. To McCoy's
professional gaze the captain appeared and sounded
fully recovered from the withering Lactran mind probe
which had almost rendered him comatose.
  Kirk had no time to consider the speed of his
recovery. It had occurred to him that,
despite the Lactrans' apparent reconsideration
of their human captives, they might find other
reasons for not releasing them.
  "How do we manage that return or do we?"
  Another pause followed while Spock listened
to intense Lactran babytalk and strove to
  comprehend. If
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 73
  such delays were merely irritating to Kirk,
to Markel and Bryce they seemed interminable.
  "It appears that we do," the first officer finally
informed them. Bryce began to smile. "Under one
condition." The smile died aborning.
  "While we are still classified as beneath
Lactrans on the scale of evolution, they do
concede that we do not belong in their zoo. We grade
high in certain abilities and low in others. This
appparent contradiction continues to puzzle them."
  "That's hardly surprising," observed McCoy.
"The contradictions within ourselves have been confusing
mankind since the beginning of its history."
  "What's this condition they're talking about?" Kirk
asked, somehow sensing that it involved more than the
Lactran equivalent of a handshake. Their
captors had some purpose in mind.
  He would never have guessed it in a hundred years.
  But the Lactrans refused to be hurried.
  "Their abstract imagery . . . so difficult
to interpret." Again a frown of intense concentration
contorted the first offlcer's face. "They do not feel
that those who maintain zoos belong in them."
  "I wouldn't have put it that way," Markel commented,
fairly shaking with impatience. "How do we get out
of theirs, then?"
  Spock blinked, turned to the Lactrans, and
said, "Like this." He walked toward the display table,
past where the invisible wall had been, and over to the
table itself. There was no hum, whine, or revealing
flash to announce the abrupt termination of the restraining
force field. One moment it was present, and the next
it simply was not.
  Still pondering the mysterious condition under which the
Lactrans would agree to release them, Kirk
followed his first officer's lead. McCoy,
Scott, and Markel followed him. Lieutenant
Bryce hesitated, then turned and started back
toward the house to rouse the still weak Randolph.
  As the former captives left the enclosure, the
front ends of all five Lactrans turned in
unison to follow them with almost mechanical
  precision attentively,
  74 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Kirk thought. While he could not be sure, he was
willing to bet that their captors were prepared to prevent
any sudden "instinctive" surprises such as a
rapid attempt to beam back up to the ship.
  Eyeless stares followed the movements of the humans
as they picked up activated phasers,
tricorders, and other equipment. Kirk did not
miss the expression on Markel's face as the
leader of the survey team lovingly fondled the
familiar instruments he had longed for these past
weeks. There was much more to the way he
  checked out the devices, replacing many on his
belt and survey suit, than simple pleasure
at regaining denied possessions. They no longer had
the significance given them by captivity, but regaining
them held a symbolic significance far greater.
Markel found a freedom in handling Federation
devices manufactured by Federation machinery and
hands, instead of falsely familiar constructs
manufactured by an alien keeper.
  The survey commander had ample time to
  indulge himself in the inspection of his lost
equipment, because it took some time for
  Lieutenant Randolph, aided by Bryce, to join
them. When she finally appeared, McCoy hunted
forward to examine her, moving his hands toward his
medikit. She shook off the incipient attention.
  "Please, Doctor, no drugs. I want
to saver every second of our departure from this place.
I promise not to collapse until it's into a
Federation bed." McCoy hesitated, then smiled and
nodded understandingly.
  Kirk tried to appear interested in the
  remaining survey instruments, but his attention was
actually focused on the Lactrans, who appeared
to be observing the byplay between McCoy and
Randolph. The captain's hand shifted
imperceptibly toward the communicator, which once more
rested in its familiar place at his side.
  The movement was not as imperceptible as he thought,
however, because as his fingers touched the smooth edge of the
device, the front end of one of the watching adults
tuned toward him. The fingers slid on past and above
the
  communicator to scratch easily at his belly.
He sighed reluctantly. So much for trying to beam
clear from under the mental gaze of these jailers.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 75
  "Very well, Mr. Spock, let's have the
details of this condition. I give my word we'll
abide by whatever they have in mind." Easy enough to do, he
mused sardonically, without a hope of
  otherwise departing. For a brief moment, he thought
he sensed an alien mental laugh.
  Spock strained again, beginning to show some signs of
fatigue. The process of acting as translator
was starting to wear on him.
  "It is still difficult, Captain. Their thought
processes are so incredibly fast. It is becoming
slightly easier, though. We are learning from each
other as we continue to communicate. Somehow, I gain
the impression that the condition in some way involves this
"zoo" not quite the proper term, but it must serve."
  "If they think we're going to volunteer some
substitute exhibits," McCoy began
heatedly.
  "No, no, Doctor ... it does not involve
the continued presence of humans, Vulcans, or
any other Federation-member race."
  McCoy calmed down, satisfied.
  "It is more complex than that."
  "How so, Mr. Spock?" Kirk pressed
curiously. The first officer had turned
to face the largest of the adult Lactrans.
  "I am told by the Old One that their collection
is not complete. It will probably never be complete,
since the desire for expansion and acquisition has
faded on Lactra. There are temporal referents
that I do not understand. The Old One explains gently
that this does not matter. Apparently, one especially
desired creature is overdue for collection. It
is this that they wish us to help rectify."
  "One creature?" McCoy echoed uncertainly.
"You mean, they want our help in capturing some
unknown specimen?"
  "Essentially, that is correct, Doctor. It
seems that there is one creature they have known about for
hundreds of our years yet have not been able
to capture because" the young Lactran moved jerkily,
and Spock turned to gaze blankly in its
direction "because they have given up the knowledge of how
to construct
  76 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  artificial devices ships like the
  Enterprise capable of ranging deep space.
They have been content in past centuries to range for
specimens close to their own system, and to use the
years for refining their mind control. The
emphasis in Lactran society has shifted
during this period from the practical to the purely
aes- thetic.
  "Yet they still retain knowledge of this one special
creature, and wish to obtain a live example of
it. It is for this that they request our aid."
  Kirk considered gratefully the courtesy of the
Lactrans. That they could as easily take control
of the Enterprise as request the voluntary help of
its crew was something he did not doubt. But for some
reason it was important to them that such help be given
freely.
  McCoy walked close. He whispered
  cautioningly, "I wouldn't be too ready to accept
their claim that they've Forgotten' how to build
deep-space ships, Jim."
  "If it's an evasion, Bones, there's not much we
can do about it. We can either believe them or call them
liars. I don't think it would be wise to do the
latter. They obviously have their reasons for wanting
the use of the Enterprise . . . and us."
  "Then consider this," the doctor persisted. "If the
Lactrans, with all their amply demonstrated
abilities, their mental powers, and considerable
technology, have been unable to capture this
boojum so far, what makes them think we can do any
better?"
  "Good point, Bones," Kirk agreed
willingly. "Transportation we can provide, and
we have had some experience handling live alien
  specimens everything from tribbles to wauls. But
interstellar biggame hunters we're not." He
looked back at his first officer, and his voice
rose.
  "Explain to them, Spock, that we agree.
We're willing to aid in any way we can, in
return for our eventual safe departure from
Lactra. How should we begin? Do they have any idea
where to start looking for this prize creature? We
certainly have no experience of it, or the Lactran
youngster would have discovered some reference to it during its very
thorough examination of our library."
  STAR TREK LOG 77
  "On the contrary, Captain," explained a
listening Spock, "they say we have looked upon the
jawanda without seeing it "jawanda" is the nearest
pronunciation-conceptualization they can provide. The
actual name is quite unpronounceable.
  "Locating one of the creatures is not the
difficulty. It is the method of
capture, which requires apparatus of a very
special type which the Lactrans do not have access
to. Nor do we, I am told. Such apparatus
is beyond our technology."
  "Then how in blazes do they expect us to bring one
of these indescribable whatsises back?" McCoy
wanted to know.
  Spock explained slowly. "To do this we must
travel with them to a world known as Boqu. When the
Lactrans traveled the Long Crawling past
far-distant worlds many ghids ago, they chanced on this
planet of the Boqus. These people had developed a
method of controlling the jawanda. It is the
Lactrans' hope that they have not lost that knowledge."
  "Hope?" asked Kirk. "Don't they know for
sure?"
  "No, Captain. There has been no contact between
Lactra and Boqu for several minaghids."
  "Mina how long is that?" McCoy queried,
trying to make some sense out of all this talk of
jawandas and ghids and such.
  "It is not precisely his
  "Translatable," the doctor finished for him.
"I know, I know."
  "But it is a considerable time," Spock
concluded.
  Kirk thought rapidly, gazing idly at the
display table. If the Boqus had lost the required
knowledge, the Enterprise would simply return its
passengers to Lactra. Boqu might not even be
inhabited any longer. Or, despite the
Lactrans' encyclopedic store of information, their
story could turn out to be a myth accepted as truth.
  Nonetheless, it would be even better if he could
talk the Lactrans out of the idea. He was very much
aware of the compound behind them, its falsely
attractive little houses and grounds waiting
ominously to rewelcome the recent tenants. The
Lactrans could force
  78 STAR TRP.K LOG EIGHT
  them back into that landscaped cage as easily as
let them leave. He would have to be careful.
  "Explain that we would do our utmost to help,
Mr. Spock, but that the Enterprise has no
facilities for the housing and the care of unknown
  zoological specimens. Even if we managed
to capture one of these jawanda creatures, it could
die for lack of proper care on the way back
to Lactra."
  Another of those nerve-tingling silences
ensued while he awaited Spock's version of the
alien's reply. It was unexpected.
  "Their initial reaction I cannot be positive, of
course, Captain, but it seems to be one of mirth.
Now the explanation-reply is coming through. They
assure us that it will not even be necessary to utilize the
Enterprise to transport the jawanda. The capture
method itself, by its very nature as well as the nature
of the jawanda, handles all problems of transportation
and care."
  Well, it had been worth a try, Kirk
reflected. "It all sounds reasonable." he
replied guardedly. "How do we go about finding this
mysterious Boqu? I've never heard mention of such
a world. And, assuming we can locate it, how do we
contact the local population and go about explaining what
we need?"
  "They are not surprised at our ignorance,"
Spock countered. "Boqu is not an easy world
to locate, nor one we would stumble upon in the course
of normal exploration. As to finding the planet, as
well as to the problems of contacting the Boqus and
making the request. they have a simple solution.
  "Two of them are going to come with us."
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 79
  Vl
  This time it was Kirk's eyebrows which rose in
surprise. "I see," he muttered. The thought of
having a couple of Lactran superminds on board
the Enterprise, minds which could at any time take
control of the ship, was not a comforting one.
  Not that he had any choice, if he did not want
to experience the cold comforts of the force cage again. He
battled with himself, uncomfortably aware that his answer
was awaited.
  What was he so worried about, after all? Now that the
aliens had been apprised of the actual intelligence
of their former captives, now that they were actively
seeking their cooperation, what reason to suspect
treachery? He could not think of one. Naturally, that
set him immediately to try to conjure half a dozen
threatening possibilities.
  While the captain was debating himself, Spock
cocked his head slightly to one side, like a man
striving to make sure of something just overheard.
  "It appears," the first officer announced finally,
"that we may be host to three rather than two
Lactrans. The pair which have been selected to come with
us are the parents of the young Lactran who was
accidentally beamed aboard ship. The youngster
is presently arguing vociferously with his parents,
insisting that he be allowed to accompany the expedition."
  "Doesn't make much difference, I suppose,"
murmured McCoy. "Two Lactrans or
three."
  "Our feelings have nothing to do with it, Doctor,"
Spock informed him. "It is the elder Lactrans'
concern which opposes the youth's desire
to participate." A pause; then: "They are trying
to explain to their offspring that this undertaking is
potentially too dangerous to permit it to come along."
  80 STAR TREK LOG EMHT
  McCoy stopped his nervous pacing and glanced up
sharply. "Hey, if this is too dangerous for a
Lactran youngster, who's already shown he's capable of
taking over the ship, I'm not sure I want to his
  Kirk cut him off. "We have little choice,
Bones remember?" His attention was drawn
to Scott. Strangely, the chief engineer was
grinning. "You find the situation amusing, Scotty?"
  "What? Well, part of it, Captain, yes. I
canna follow the chatter of the adults, like Mr.
Spock, but I have a bit of a rapport with the youngster.
He overheard what Dr. McCoy just said. Now
he's tellin' his parents that if they don't
allow him to come along, then we might consider the
trip too dangerous for us. So they have to take him
along to convince us."
  Kirk found himself smiling in response. "Not
ordy precocious, but a budding diplomat. How
is his argument going over, Mr. Spock?"
  The first officer replied slowly. "Very well, it
would seem, Captain. The adults acknowledge the
validity of the youth's claims, which is more
important to them than our possible refusal. They
could force us to do their bidding" Kirk
  shuddered in remembrance of the mental assault
he'd so recently endured "but feel that for two already
stated reasons this would not be right: because we are not
animals, and because the success of the undertaking
requires full and enthusiastic cooperation on both
sides."
  "We've already consented to cooperate, Mr.
Spock," Kirk replied readily, "though I
can't vouch for our enthusiasm. All right, we'll
aid them in capturing a single jawanda, whatever it
is, and in returning it and them to Lactra. That will
discharge our obligation to them." He did not bother
to ask what assurance the Lactrans would give that
they would adhere to their end of the bargain. He
could not very well force them into anything. The men of the
Federation were
  entering into a possibly dangerous situation on
faith, a course acceptable only because of the absence of
alternatives.
  But he was curious. "What kind of guarantee do
they want to insure that we'll follow through on our part
of the agreement?"
  STAR TR-EKnowledge LOG ETGTIT 81
  Spockfrowned as though Kirk had said
  something betraying ignorance of the obvious. "They
see the honesty of your response in your mind,
Captain. No further assurance is necessary. They
are appalled that such a thing could be considered."
  Kirk grunted; he was satisfied. "So much for
intangibles. Getting down to basics" he studied the
huge bulk of the adult Lactrans "we come to the
matter of accommodations."
  "They say you have no reason to worry,
  Captain," the first officer declared. "While their
society may appear complex, it is actually as
simple as their needs. From what their offspring has
told them of the Enterprise, they feel they will be quite
comfortable in an empty cargo hold. They see no
reason why our food synthesisers cannot
produce nourishment acceptable to their systems. Other
than this, they anticipate nothing in the way of
special requirements even if the trip should
prove one of extended duration."
  "That's a relief," Kirk answered feelingly,
leaving aside for the moment the troubling question of what
constituted a journey of "extended duration" for a
Lactran.
  Just how far away was this Boqu?
  McCoy had sidled over close to him. "Just had
a worrisome thought, Jim."
  "Only one?" Kirk managed the first real
smile in days. "What is it now?"
  "We're supposed to be carrying out a
  straightforward rescue mission. Before too much more
time passes, Starfleet Headquarters is liable
to get nervous about the absence of reports. What do
we tell them if they manage to contact us?" He
nodded once, significantly, toward the silent
Lactrans.
  Kirk shrugged. "They'll assume we're still
searching for Lieutenant Commander Markel and his ship.
If anyone inquires beyond that ..." He paused
thoughtfully. "We needn't go into details. Sometimes
a starship captain has to make treaties
with newly met races without the aid of formal
diplomacy, has to create procedure in order
to respond to exigencies not covered in
  82 STAR TREK LOG EIGEIT
  the manuals. Our agreement to cooperate with the
Lactrans has the status of a temporary
treaty."
  "Under what classification?" McCoy inquired
relentlessly.
  "Expediency." The captain's smile vanished
as Kirk considered exactly what they might be
getting themselves into. "Maybe it would be better
to tell the truth and, if anyone asks, say we've
gone a-hunting. I wish we knew for what."
  "The Lactrans are prepared, Captain,"
Spock in- formed him. "They have given in to their young,
and it will accompany them. If all is in readiness,
they are anxious to depart."
  Kirk wasn't anxious, but saw no excuse for
further delay. He spoke to Scott. "Tell
Chief Kyle to beam us back aboard, making
allowance for three regularffize guests and three
large ones." He gestured toward the Lactrans.
  The chief engineer already had his
  communicator out and open. "All right,
Captain."
  "And have the chief use the transporter nearest
Shuttle Bay for our Lactran visitors. The
corridors are larger there and will make it easier for
them to move around, if they so desire."
  Scott nodded assent and relayed the
  instructions to the ship. The Lactrans appeared
thoroughly absorbed as several of the humans
vanished. Then they themselves were gone, accompanied
by Kirk and Spock.
  Once back on board the Enterprise,
Kirk's first concern was to make certain the
Lactrans were comfortably ensconced in their
temporary
  quarters. Despite the sterility of the surroundings
in the empty cargo hold, they professed to be quite
satisfied with the amenities.
  Leaving Spock to tend to any immediate alien
requests, Kirk made his way quickly to Sick
Bay. McCoy and Nurse Chapel were already well
along in their detailed examination of the three
surviving explorers.
  "Marker and Bryce are in excellent shape,
Jim," the doctor told him, "as would befit
valuable exhibits."
  "And Lieutenant Randolph?"
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 83
  "She'll be all right but she needs about a month of
doing nothing." McCov grinned. "Sometimes that's the
hardest prescription to assign. She's an
active type, physically and mentally' and it's going
to be difficult to keep her confined in a bed." The
smile faded. to be replaced by a look of concern.
his(confined she'll be, though. Her system is badly
weakened."
  "It may be improved when the official report
reaches Starl tilde eet, Bones. Endurance under
conditions of stress is often grounds for promotion.
At least you won't have to worry about the jawanda
assuming we can find and capture such a creature.
The Lactrans are convinced it won't require
any kind of attention. Spock is still trying to draw
the details of the animal out of them, but the
conceptualisations, as he keeps putting it, are
confusing. Also, some of our preconceptions about
jawandas appear to amuse our guests no end."
  "I'm glad they think it's funny," McCoy
observed wryly, indicating that he saw very little
humor in the situation. His gaze, revealingly, was
on the bedridden Randolph. "I haven't
exactly warmed up to our elephantine guests."
  "Think friendly thoughts, Bones," Kirk advised
him strongly, reminding him of the Lactrans' mental
abilities.
  Satisfied that the three survivors were okay,
Kirk headed for the bridge. Jawanda, jawanda . .
. the name meant nothing to him. He could not even
vaguely relate it to any creature he had ever
heard of. Well, the Lactrans would have to clarify
the nature of their quarry soon enough. There was no
real need to worry so long as it wasn't going to be
transported on board the ship.
  It didn't occur to Kirk to consider the
possibility that perhaps, for certain reasons, it could not
be.
  Spock and McCoy were waiting for him when he
returned to the bridge. Their presence was expected;
that of their new companion was not.
  "I was about to order the installation of a special
intercom unit for the use of the adult Lactrans in
the
  84 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  converted hold, Captain," explained the first
officer, "so that they would be in constant communication with
us. They informed me that this was not only
unnecessary, but a waste of equipment." He gestured
at the long grey mass near the science station, the
front end of which was presently exploring Spock's
instrumentation.
  "Their offspring will remain on the bridge. As it
is always in telepathic contact with its parents, it can
convey their impressions to us and a description of what
takes place on the bridge to them
instantaneously, without the need for, as they put it,
awkward mechanical contrivances. He fits into the
turbolifts, while the adults do not."
  "Thank the adults for their consideration, Mr.
Spock," Kirk told him. While he was not
thrilled by the prospect of having a
superintelligent child underfoot for the duration of the
journey, he could not deny the logic behind its
presence.
  While it might be unnecessary, there was something else
he ought to do. Moving to the command chair, Kirk
activated the interdeck communications network and
addressed the
  pickup:
  "Attention, all personnel. This is the captain
speaking. We are about to embark on an
  expedition of indeterminate length to perform
a service for our newfound friends, the Lactrans,
inhabitants of the planet about which we are orbiting.
Concurrent with this, we will have as our guests three
representatives of that race. Several of you have
already noticed their arrival on board. The
Lactrans are natural telepaths and ...
curious. The actions of an alien life form, or
its shape, should not prove offensive to any of you or
you wouldn't be part of this crew.
  "Two adult Lactrans are presently
installed in temporary quarters in cargo hold
Pourteen-B. A third, an adolescent of the
species, is at present with me on the bridge,
but it has been given the run of the ship." He
forbore adding that there was no way he could restrict the
youthful alien's activities. It was only good
diplomacy to grant gracious assent to the
inevitable.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 85
  "Bear in mind that this is the young, however
intelligent, of a species. It may be inclined
to act in sometimes inexplicable fashion. Rest
assured that, however misdirected, such actions are in
no way hostile. I stress this so that no one will
react in a manner in any way other than
friendly toward our guests." So that, he finished
silently, our guests don't get peeved and
decide to take over the ship.
  Ending the transmission, he rose again and spoke
to the helm: "Stand by to get underway, Mr. Sulu."
  "Standing by, sir," the helmsman acknowledged.
  "Spock, Bones let's go greet our
passengers and find out the details of this expedition."
  The two adult Lactrans were lolling about the
cargo hold, apparently somnolent. Spock
assured Kirk and McCoy that, despite the
appearance of inactivity, the minds of both adults
were as active and alert as ever. As he sat down,
Kirk felt a tingling probe at the back of his
skull and knew the correctness of the first officer's
announcement.
  He had expected the young Lactran to
  accompany them for this formal explanatory
session, but the youngster had chosen to remain on the
bridge, in the company of Engineer Scott.
Several members of the crew had already
  remarked that the young alien followed Scott around like
a dog attending its master.
  "Before you enjoy that analogy," the chief engineer
had responded, "keep in mind that in this
case the "don" is twenty times smarter than the
"master.""
  Glancing approvingly around the hold, Kirk
saw that Scotty's technicians had installed some
recreational simulacrum machinery. Despite their
insistence that nothing in the way of material comfort was
required, he thought he sensed the Lactrans'
approval at the way in which the "simplistic"
machinery projected three-dimensional
reproductions of the Lactran surface on the bare
metal walls.
  "They are indeed pleased, Captain," Spock
informed him, unnervingly confirming his
  unspoken supposition, "though more by our concern for
their comfort than by the actual projections themselves."
  86 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Kirk shifted in his chair. "If everyone's
comfortable, then perhaps they can give us a course?"
  "Naturally, Captain." Spock paused a
moment, then replied, sooner than Kirk had
expected, "They apparently have already done so."
  There was a buzz from the cargo-hold
  intercom, and Kirk rose to answer it. "Kirk
here."
  "Captain" it was Sulu's voice:
excited, confused, and just a bit awed "someting just
jumped inside my head. It was his
  "A series of coordinates," Kirk finished for
him, turning to study the impassive Lactrans
  respectfully.
  "Yes, sir but how did you know?"
  "Never mind that, Mr. Sulu. were the
  coordinates precise?"
  "Very, Captain."
  "That's our new course, then. Lay them in.
All ahead warp-factor four."
  "Yes sir," the helmsman replied, his tone
slightly dazed. "Bridge out."
  Kirk walked back to the chair and resumed his
seat slowly. "Mr. Spock?"
  "The adults relayed the information to their offspring,
Captain, the moment they sensed the request in your
mind. The youth, in turn, planted them clearly in
the thoughts of Lieutenant Sulu."
  "Wonderful communications system," observed
McCoy, a mite sourly, feeling even more left
out of things than usual.
  "I presume the terminus of those coordinates
is Boqu?" Kirk commented, expecting a casual
assent. It wasn't quite forthcoming.
  "The Lactrans hope so, Captain," Spock
told him. It took barely a second for the
import of that reply to sink in.
  "Hope?" a startled Kirk blurted quickly.
"What do they mean, "hope"? I understood that they
knew exactly where this world lies!"
  Spock was shaking his head slowly, his eyes half
glazed. "They do and yet they do not, Captain. It
was
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 87
  such a long time ago that the last Lactran ship
went out to Boqu. The records involved are quite
old. The coordinates should lead us directly
to Boqu, but the Lactrans cannot say this for certain.
For various reasons its position in the plenum is not
easy to plot."
  "What," Kirk went on, taking a long, slow
breath, "if Boqu doesn't exist where these
ancient coordinates insist it's supposed to?"
  This time Spock's reply was longer in coming. "If
that is the case, the Lactrans say, we will have
to begin a search for its present location."
  Kirk started to object, then caught himself. It was
impossible to tell what the aliens might consider an
unfrly gesture. Pointing out to them that the
Enterprise could not spend an infinite number of
years looking for a world that might be only an old
rumor might so be
  interpreted. Which led him uncomfortably back to the
possibility of the Enterprise's operating under
Lactran control, without his cooperation.
  He saw the Enterprise spiraling farther and
farther out from an empty point in space, stopping
only to take on fresh supplies at support
bases, to pick up new dilithium crystals and
power elements. He watched their Lactran hosts
insist on a continuation of the search, the ship's crew
growing older and older in pursuit of a mythical
planet ... How long did Lactrans live,
anyway? He suspected that it was wed beyond the
normal human or even Vulcan life span.
  It would be best to shunt that unpleasant scenario
aside and hope that the Lactrans' ancient
records were as remarkable as their mental powers
  "Now that we know where we're going," he declared
to Spock, and thus to the pair of watching aliens,
"perhaps we can have some more information on what exactly it
is we're going for? Can they describe one of these
jawandas for us?"
  Spock, attentive, recited slowly,
as though from the pages of an old old book "A
iawanda is a large, asexual creature of
unusual appearance with interesting cohering." He
blinked and looked across at the other two officers.
"That's all."
  88 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  McCoy grimaced. "That's not very informative,
Spock. Couldn't they be a little more
  descriptive?"
  "The Lactrans wish they could, Doctor," the
first officer explained. "They indicate that much
information is contained in records long since become
dust. It is yet another reason why they have been so
anxious to secure a specimen for their collection."
  Kirk's fingers drummed softly on one arm of the
chair "You said it was a large creature, Mr.
Spock. Do the Lactrans know how large?"
  Spock assumed an expression of indifference.
"It varies considerably from specimen to
  specimen, it seems. Again, the old records
are distressingly poor in detail."
  "If information is so scanty," an impatient
McCoy muttered, "how do they expect to identify
a jawanda? They're not even sure what it looks
like." The Lactrans appeared for the first time
to confer between themselves.
  "They say this does not matter, Doctor,"
announced Spock languidly, with only a slight
frown.
  McCoy threw up his hands in a gesture of
frustration. "Now how can anyone go hunting for something
when they aren't sure of its
  appearance? Of all the his
  "The Lactrans go on to say, Doctor, that there
is even a chance the jawanda looks like nothing."
  "I've had it, Jim! Sounds to me like we're
on a wild-goose chase and we're not even sure
what the wild goose looks like."
  Kirk rose from his chair. "It looks like there's
only one way we're going to find out, Bones, and
that's to go to Boqu. The answer to the Lactrans'
riddle is supposed to lie there. We'll find out the
same time they do . . . if we get to the world all
right."
  "If there is a Boqu," grumbled McCoy,
rising to join him in leaving the hold.
  Silent, the adult Lactrans watched them go.
  The following day Kirk entered the bridge
determined to locate the world in question. It could be
incredibly obscure, but there was still a good
chance it
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 89
  circled a sun listed in the star catalog, even
if it was itself as yet unsurveyed.
  Already he knew it lay a respectable distance from
the Federation periphery. A simple
  comparison of the coordinates with the many maps locked
in his memory had told him that no explored
systems were situated in their present path. Even
so, the actual figures provided a greater
surprise than he'd anticipated. Sitting in the
command chair, he studied the printout on the main
viewscreen.
  "Deeper, Mr. Sulu," he said, and the
helmsman replaced the chart with the star configuration
Iying behind it, and then replaced it again. And again. And
yet again. Their present course showed as a glowing red
line from one end of each three-dimensional chart to the
next without intersecting a single system, without
passing near even a postulated solar body.
  Finally Kirk was prompted to ask, "Mr.
Sulu, are you certain of those coordinates?"
  The helmsman looked back over his shoulder and
nodded readily. "Absolutely, sir. They
appeared in my mind like fluorescent
block letters, and remained there until I had them
memorized in spite of myself." He shook his head
admiringly. "Our visitors convey their information in
a manner I envy."
  "I see." Kirk studied the uninformative chart
projection a moment longer. "Double-check it
anyway, please." He turned toward the science
station. "Mr. Spock?"
  The first officer went into a momentary trance,
regarding the grey mass nearby. Seconds later,
Sulu also appeared to drift into a brief
dreamlike state before looking back to Kirk.
  "No question, sir . . . we're on the course
they've indicated."
  "Thank you, Mr. Sulu. That's all."
  Leaning back, the captain considered their present
path. A divergence of even a fraction of a degree
in one of several directions would have led them to at least
three systems, all unexplored but logged. Their
actual course, however, was taking them out of the
  90 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  galaxy at approximately a right angle to the
galactic ecliptic. No wonder the charts were
rapidly growing devoid of stellar phenomena.
  "Deeper, Mr. Sulu," he ordered
again. The chart was replaced by another, almost blank,
save for a few isolated, lonely suns and several
drifting nebulae. Beyond was nothing. Absolutely
nothing.
  "Mr. Spock," he began, looking toward the
science station and studiously ignoring the Lactran
offspring, "have the Lactrans recheck their
memories. Maybe there are several possible
locations given in their old records for this
planet."
  Spock listened to something no one else could hear.
Eventually he replied, "They have been monitoring
your conversation through their offspring, Captain. They
assure me that the coordinates transferred to Mr.
Sulu are the only ones given by the ancients for the
world known as Boqu."
  ""Are they aware," Kirk continued gently,
"that if we continue on our present course, the first
sun we encounter will be an unknown star in M33, the
Triangulum Spiral, roughly two point three
five million lighty tilde ars away?" He
added drily, "If this is the location of Boqu, we
won't get there for quite a while."
  "While regarding this as a doubtful possibility,
Captain, they refuse to discount it,"
Spock replied. "They are considering it with some
interest."
  "Not as much as I am," Kirk responded
rapidly. "Long before we could reach that system,
  everyone and everything on board, including the
warp-drive engines, would be long dead the
Lactrans included."
  "They are aware of this, Captain," Spock
continued, listening hard. "They theorize that Boqu must
lie somewhat nearer."
  ""Somewhat?"'" McCoy muttered
nervously.
  "There is something else, Captain," the first
officer added. "They are wondering if the Boqus will
still retain the knowledge and means necessary for capturing a
Rwanda. They also recall information indicating that the
Boqus are a traditionally private folk, and
wonder
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 91
  if they might not also have forgotten their former
association with the Lactrans. If this is so, there is
always the possibility of a hostile greeting."
  "Charming," Kirk noted dully. "Any other
small details like that last one that they might have
neglected to tell us?"
  "No, Captain," Spock insisted evenly.
"Not at the moment."
  Days lengthened into weeks, with no sign of a
possible destination. The Enterprise was still running at
warp-four, two factors below her maximum safe
cruising speed. Instead of nearing some unexpected
system on the fringe of the galaxy, they drew farther
away from all signs of activity and motion. The
last star marking the boundary of the home galaxy lay
far astern. Kirk had watched it fade from the rear
scanners, a dying beacon, and could not shrug off a
sense of awesome isolation.
  More days passed, and Kirk found himself brooding in
the command chair for long hours, staring at the
viewscreen. Long-range scanners focused
rearward showed a falsely dense-seeming arc of
brightness behind them: the spiral arm of the galaxy they were
crawling away from.
  Somewhere back there lay the Federation, and life in
all its swarming multitudes.
  Ahead lay a darkness so vast and empty that he
felt like a child tiptoeing into a colossal cavern the
incomprehensible abyss of intergalactic space.
  And still the Lactrans insisted stonily that they were
on course for Boqu. Kirk's sense of
  desperation reached the point at which he was considering
forcing a confrontation with the starship's imperturbable
passengers, even risking a takeover, when a cry
came from the helm:
  "Captain, I've got something on the fore
sensors!"
  "Position, Mr. Sulu?" Kirk inquired,
trying to keep the excitement from his voice.
  "Dead on course, sir." A pause; then the
uncertain information, "It appears to be a star, sir,
but not much of a star."
  92 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  "Confirmed, Captain." Kirk's attention
moved to the science station and to Spock, who was staring
intently into his gooseneck viewer. "It is a
star, with from six to eight companion planets and two
belts of asteroidal debris. A KO dwarf,
I think, and probably fairly old. Surface
temperature low, even for a weak star of its type."
  "Anything out here can be classed as a freak, Mr.
Spock," Kirk commented interestedly.
  "Planets it may have, but I don't see how a
habitable world could circle a sun that weak. It would
have to lie awfully close in, and there would have to be a
host of factors compensating for was he
broke off at a loud humphing sound from near the
science station.
  The young Lactran was giving every indication of
heightened interest as its front end regarded the
screen, which now showed a distant point of
white-orange light. Obviously, it was
  communicating with its parents and with Spock.
  "According to all indications," the first officer
announced, "that is the Boquian system."
  Kirk wanted to believe, but "I don't understand,
Mr. Spock. A habitable world out here, circling
a sun like this one, and completely isolated from the rest
of the galaxy! It staggers the imagination. It's
impossible." There was a buzz, and Spock paused
long enough to acknowledge a report from beldecks.
  "Not according to the astronomy section, Captain. They
cannot wait until we enter the system and they can begin
close-in observation."
  "You said there were six to eight planets, Mr.
Spock," Kirk went on, wishing he could be as
unrestrainedly happy as the astronomers. "Which one
is Boqu?"
  "The old records are barely adequate for
identification, Captain. However, I am assured
that we will know it when the adults, through the mind
of their offspring, sight it."
  "Very well. Mr. Sulu, begin survey with the
outermost world and take us in one planet at a time."
  "Aye, Captain," the helmsman acknowledged.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGEIT 93
  They moved into the system, passing and rejecting
several large dead worlds. Planets five through
three proved to be gas giants. The second out from
the chill star looked no more promising.
  "Boqu," Spock declared firmly, staring
  fascinatedly at the viewscreen.
  "Are you sure, Spock?"
  "The Lactrans are, Captain."
  Kirk shrugged. "Place us in parking orbit,
Mr. Sulu."
  "Yes, Captain."
  Boqu looked like yet another gas giant, but as
they moved nearer the Enterprise's sensors began
to produce some surprising information.
  Boqu possessed certain similarities
to Uranus and Jupiter, but it was not a
Jovian-type planet. It did put out more
radiation than it received from its cinder of a sun. A
certain amount of this radiation was being trapped beneath a
dense orange cloud layer, heavy with
carbon dioxide.
  The resultant greenhouse effect was as
natural as it was unexpected, creating a surface
warm enough to shelter life, though life that would have to be
radically different from that on Earth or Vulcan.
There was little water vapor and no evidence of free
water on the surface.
  Boqu was an enormous world, as large as
Neptune, but a true planet and not simply a
small inner core covered by a huge atmosphere.
Yet its gravity was barely half again as Earth's,
indicating an absence of heavy metals and a light
core.
  Still, it was not what Kirk would call a hospitable
world. Life-support belts would provide them with
warmth, a breathable atmosphere, and protection from
strong radiation, but could do nothing to counter the stronger
gravity. They would have to handle the strain of one and a
half g's as best they were able.
  He thought of the Lactrans. Undoubtedly they could
tolerate the gravity, but they had evolved on a world
similar to Earth. To travel comfortably on the
surface of Boqu they would need life-support
belts too. Con
  94 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  structing life-support belts for the Lactrans
would fall to Mr. Scott's ever inventive staff,
but the problem might prove troublesome even to those
resourceful minds. Not all the Lactrans"
mental prowess would prevail against a poisonous
atmosphere. Therefore, the first explorations of
Boqu's surface would fall to members of the
Eriterprise's crew if there was any reason
to explore that surface.
  Several days of shifting orbit around the planet
served only to justify Kirk's initial
pessimism. With every scientific instrument on board
trained on the surface, they were unable to discover any
sign of life.
  Kirk became convinced that if anything had ever
inhabited this peculiar world, it had long since
become extinct. Spock and the Lactrans were not so
readily persuaded.
  "There could be any number of reasons for our
failure to detect life below, Captain," the first
officer argued, following another day of fruitless
searching. "For one thing, the enormous quantity and
variety of radiation the planet is generating makes
it extremely difficult for our sensors
to separate signs of intelligent
surface
  communication from natural emissions."
  "If there is any intelligence down there,"
sniped McCoy.
  Spock continued, ignoring the doctor.
"Surface conditions on such a world might have forced the
inhabitants into other methods of long-range
communication."
  "It's not only that," a troubled Kirk
admitted. "We have instruments capable of piercing the
cloud layer. They detect nothing we recognize
as motile life on the surface."
  "What we recognize as life forms a very narrow
band in the spectrum of possibilities,
Captain."
  "A valid point, Spock, but that still leaves us
with the problem of identifying any life form below." He
gestured at the screen, where dense orange-and-pink
clouds completely covered a surface many, many
times greater in area than Earth's.
  STAR TREK LOG EMHT 95
  "Presumably we could detect life firsthand, but
this world is gigantic. To drop below the atmosphere
and explore visually from shuttles would take forever."
He brooded silently a moment. "What
about the Lactrans7 Do they have any suggestions?"
  "No, Captain," confessed the first officer.
"They can add nothing . . . except to reaffirm that
this system and this world fit all the ancient
descriptions of Boqu. Though they are willing
to grant, when I press them, the slim
possibility that, for all their reputed knowledge and advanced
technology, the Boqus may have become extinct."
  "Advanced technology on a world devoid of
heavy metals that's something else I find
difficult to swallow," Kirk murmured. "I
admit the
  existence of this world because I'm looking at it, but
that's all." His gaze turned to the quiet young
Lactran. "Tell the youth to convey this to his
parents: We'll circle and study for another of our
weeks. If by that time we've turned up no
evidence of intelligent life, they'll consent
to return home." His eyes moved to the rim of the
planet, to the total blackness of intergalactic
space beyond. No friendly stars formed a perceivable
backdrop for this world.
  "It's cold out here."
  A longer-than-usual wait ensued before the
Lactrans replied. Clearly, the
guests of the Enterprise were struggling through some hard
debating among themselves.
  "They are reluctant to return empty a
  conceptualization I cannot translate,
  Captain without a specimen. Yet they do not
dispute the validity of your statements. They are
agreed. We shall search the surface another week and
then we may depart."
  "With our obligation to them discharged? We'll leave
Lactra's orbit unmolested?"
  Spock nodded. "There will be nothing more to restrain
us."
  The light struck them on the fifth day.
  96 SlAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  V11
  Alarms howled and sensors on the bridge and in
all the attentive science stations went berserk as the
brilliant beam illumined the Enterprise from below,
pinioning it in a shaft of intense white radiance
powerful enough to pierce the thick clouds. It hit without
warning, harmlessly.
  When it became apparent that the beam was not
dangerous, the brief moment of fear and panic was
instantly replaced by curiosity. The radiance was not
a gesture of belligerence, but rather the cutting
cry of someone shouting, "I'm here, I'm here!
Look below, and find me!"
  The light vanished, then winked on again. This time
instruments other than alarms were ready. The light
blinked on and off in regular, obviously
unnatural sequence. There was no doubt that it
originated from an artificial source.
  A source, Kirk mused, of tremendous power,
to be able to penetrate that smothering atmosphere and still
light up the exterior of the Enterprise. The onstoff
pattern continued for several minutes before halting
permanently, it developed.
  "A signal, certainly," Kirk observed,
voicing everyone's conclusion aloud. "But why did they
break off? Why not continue to guide us down?"
  "Perhaps they are incapable of maintaining that strength for
very long, Captain" was Spock's comment. "Merely
to pierce the cloud layer with such force once is a
remarkable feat. To repeat it several times is almost
beyond comprehension. Clearly there is intelligence of
singular aleaility still active on the surface
below."
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 97
  Kirk looked to the helm. "Mr. Sulu, did
you obtain a fix on the source of the beam?"
  The helmsman studied his instrumentation a moment
longer before replying. "Yes, Captain as clear as
I was able without actually having direct line of
sight to the surface. I'm assuming it traveled
outward in a straight line, though it could have been bent
or otherwise distorted by some layer in the
atmosphere."
  "I think not, Lieutenant," countered Spock.
"Any beam of sufficient intensity to penetrate that
cloud layer and still retain its power of illumination at
this distance, apparently undiminished, would likely not
be affected by any cloud formation nearer its source."
  "We have a destination, then," Kirk noted, rising
from the command chair. "Mr. Spock, Dr.
McCoy, you'll accompany me to the surface."
He nodded at the young Lactran. "Together with our
youthful friend, if his parents are agreeable."
  Spock's eyebrows arose, and even the
Lactran adolescent looked surprised. Kirk
felt
  unaccountably pleased at having been able to startle
the seemingly unshakable aliens.
  "But how, Jim?" McCoy asked. "Scott's
  technicians are still working on the problem of
life-support belts for Lactrans and
his
  "We'll descend in the shuttlecrawler,
Bones. It's spacious enough to hold four of us and our
young guest, if not either of his much larger parents."
  "They are concerned, Captain, but see no reason
to object. It is important that they be
represented in some fashion. They agree to let the
young one go, even though it must remain in the crawler."
  Kirk had no idea which gesticulations were
indicative of pleasure among Lactrans, but it
seemed certain that the youngster was performing some of them now.
  He turned to communications. "Security,
Lieutenant Uhura. I'll want Lieutenant
Meyers to pilot the shuttlecrawler."
  "Very well, Captain."" Uhura moved
to contact the crewman.
  98 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  With the young Lactran aboard, the
  shuttlecrawler was loaded close to maximum.
So much so that there was no room for the large, well-armed
security team Kirk would have liked to take along
he hadn't forgotten the Lactrans' claim that the
Boqus might seek to enforce their privacy.
Instead, he had to count on the Lactrans'
familiarity and former association with the race
which now might still survive on the hidden sur- face.
  The shuttlecrawler's descent to the coordinates
plotted by Sulu and others was memorable, a
welcome change from the convenience but
  monotony of the transporter. They soared down
through an atmosphere structured like a
  cotton-candy parfait.
  Its outermost layers were thick, rich orange and
grey and pink. These colors gave way
  gradually to bright red-orange, then kilometers of
raging maroon, then to a wholly unexpected layer of
brilliant blue-green, which merged in its turn
into a lavish red.
  Eventually they emerged into a relatively clear
layer above the surface and were able to look up at the
sky as the Boqus saw it. Overhead rolled a
thick collage of mauve cumulus, while
hundreds of kilometers off to the south-southeast the
threatening hemispheres of argent nimbus
  seemed to bubble and collapse like shiny balloons
in a bucket of blood.
  Kirk forgot their mission momentarily as he,
Spock, and McCoy stared raptly at the silver
storm. Sequential flashes of many-fingered lightning
bolts deluged the surface with millions
of volts.
  Rising to meet the shuttlecrawler was a dimly
visible landscape of orange and brown. The ground was
pockmarked with deep pores filled with liquid
ammonia. Kirk would do no
  swimming on this world. Lieutenant Meyers
remained professionally oblivious to this beauty as he
skillfully guided the craft down through unexpected
blasts of hurricane-force wind.
  Vegetation became identifiable as Lieutenant
Meyers dropped them still lower. It was
  predominantly yellow and orange, with isolated
patches of sparkling white.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 99
  Kirk thought he saw a multiple-limbed growth
half as big as the Enterprise reflecting the light
like a diamond and hinting of a composition other than
cellulose.
  Meyers spiraled in around the point plotted
by Sulu. It was near the end of their approach that
McCoy exclaimed in surprise and pointed forward
  Ahead lay a valley. One end was dominated
by the glassy surface of a large lake of as yet
unknown composition. The other was filled with an
enormous fanlike artificial construction
mounted on struts sufficient to make a millipede
jealous. In the foreground was a city
  "Meyers?" Kirk inquired simply.
  "Yes, sir. According to my coordinates, that should be
the source of the light beam." Visual
reconnaissance accomplished, he banked the
awkward shuttlecrawler in the direction of the fan
end of the valley. They began passing over the city,
and the expectations suddenly raised so high vanished.
Even the young Lactran appeared to droop.
  Because it was dead. Dead as the hollow sockets of
an old, bleached skull. Not that it was crumbling and
broken like a hundred similar urban mausoleums
Kirk had seen before. In fact, it looked
remarkably well preserved. But nothing moved in
its streets, no vehicles stirred between
structures or above them. The silence below them was of the
dead, or, at least, of the dying.
  They flew on for a surprising distance over
abandoned edifices, past towering spires and the gaping
defunct domes resembling antique jewelry from
which a patient thief had pried all the gems. As the
city continued to unroll beneath them, Kirk began
to sense its true size, and that of the fanlike
structure they were nearing.
  Almost as if in response to their filling spirits, a
faint sign of life caught their attention, as well
as that of the sensors.
  From the far end of the valley, defining their destination,
the light beam began to rise, this time but a feeble
imitation a shadow in light of the cloud-piercing shaft
which had bathed the Enterprise in unexpected
  100 STAR TREK LOG
  radiance. It barely rose above the valley,
straining for an intensity apparently no longer
attainable.
  Once, twice, it flickered, the second time
almost reaching to the lowest layer of orange clouds before
dying.
  But to those on board the shuttlecrawler, who had
begun to give up hope, it was as encouraging as a
neon sign the size of a Starfleet station. Meyers
swung the shuttlecrawler lower, cutting speed as
rapidly as he dared in the tricky, buffeting
winds.
  "Ask our friend," Kirk told Spock, "to see
if he can sense any alien thoughts nearby." In
contrast to this world, the young Lactran seemed
  welcomingly familiar.
  There was a short pause, at the conclusion
of which Spock informed them, "There is nothing, but I
am told it does not matter. It is only what was
expected. According to the records relevant to Boqu,
they were never able to communicate mentally with the
inhabitants over any distance. A Lactran,
to touch the mind of a Boqus, would have to be in its
actual presence."
  Kirk refused to be discouraged. "Something caused
that beam to be generated, whether the Lactrans can
detect the mind behind it or not. Something that wanted
to signal the Enterprise and a moment ago attempted
to signal us."
  "It could have been automatic, self-sustaining
machinery, Captain," Spock pointed out coolly.
  "Always encouraging, that's our Spock," declared
McCoy with false gaiety. The
  shuttlecrawler rocked in a gust of hot
orange wind, and he put out a hand to steady himself.
  "I wish you would refrain from overutilization of the
possessive form, Doctor," the first officer
replied. "I was merely pointing out that his
  "Later, you two!" Kirk snapped. "Have a
look at that." He pointed out the side port.
  They were nearing the metallic fan, as peculiar a
conglomeration as Kirk had ever set eyes
on. It resembled the work of some careful colossus
of a spider. Not that of a web spider, whose miniature
marvels
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 101
  of engineering follow magnificently mathematical
patterns, rather the simple cobwebs of the less
precise arachnid, which throws and tosses its strands
of silk with seeming abandon in any convenient corner,
creating a less dignified though equally effective
trap.
  To the immediate right of this enormous arrangement of
struts, beams. cables, and things Kirk couldn't name
was a long, low building isolated from the nearest part
of the city. Like the other structures they'd passed
over, this one appeared relatively well
maintained.
  "Try to set down as close to that building as
possible, Meyers," Kirk instructed.
  "Yes, sir. I think there's enough clear space
alongside."
  As they commenced their final drop, Kirk gazed
wonderingly at the huge construct. That it was the
generator of the light beam he had no doubt. "It's
not a mirror, Spock." he commented, "it has
exactly the opposite of a smooth
surface."
  "According to the Lactrans," the first officer ex-
plained, "the peculiar light-meta1 and stone
technology of the Boqus originated in a unique
mind. The Lactrans do not find it unusual,
therefore, that Boquian physics should find unique
expression his
  "You can ask them yourself in a minute. Jim,"
McCoy broke in, settling himself tensely in his
seat. "We're setting down."
  Meyers made an admirable landing under
  difficult turbulence conditions. Once down,
he engaged the ground engine, and the shuttlecrawler
instantly became a vehicle for surface
transport. They moved slowly toward the single
large building near the fan construct.
  Kirk saw that it was several stories high, with a
gently curving roof. Totally devoid of windows
or similar apertures, it appeared to be constructed
of grey rock, though he did not doubt that on
closer inspection the material might turn out to be
something considerably more sophisticated. A race
did not evolve and mature on a world like this, make
contact successfully
  102 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  with an advanced people like the Lactrans, retain the
technology capable of producing, even briefly,
that atmosphere-slicing light beam, while building
out of plain rock.
  Gradually they neared the barnlike structure and
began hunting along its edge for something that might be
an entrance. They finally
  discovered one, facing the immense latticework of
metal, which towered above them now like a forest of
gigantic trees grown in free-fall and then
transported to the planet's surface.
  Kirk unstrapped himself and moved to the port,
walking with considerable difficulty under the strong
gravity. Beyond lay the vast enigmatic building,
containing either aid for additional journeying or only a
mechanical apologist for a dead civilisation.
  "I feel like I'm wearing lead boots,"
McCoy complained, fighting to keep from falling over
under the increased gravity.
  "At least we don't need armor suits,
Bones," pointed out Kirk. "Be grateful for
small favors."
  "The only small favor I'll be grateful for
is an indication we can return home," the doctor
replied irritably, though his irritation was
directed more at his own clumsiness in the one and a
half g's than at the captain.
  Like men drugged, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and
Meyers spent several long minutes moving
  experimentally about the cabin of the
  shuttgg'ecrawler, trying to acclimate themselves to their
increased weight. The young Lactran watched with
interest. His strange physical configuration enabled
him to move about with relative ease, though there were no
signs that might be interpreted as amusement as he
  regarded the awkward movements of the men.
Possibly, Kirk mused, the trip was having a
maturing effect upon him.
  "It regrets being unable to accompany us,
Captain, but will be in constant communication with us through
me as we explore the building. It expresses
anxiety for our safety."
  Kirk made an effort at effortlessness. "Tell
it we'll
  STAR TREK LOG EMIT 103
  manage," he told Spock.
"Life-support belts, gentlemen."
  Each man donned one of the thick,
  self-contained belts which had long ago (excepting
special situations) made the
restrictive "space suits" of primitive times
obsolete. Activation produced lime-yellow
auras around them,
  whereupon they entered the lock of the shut- tlecrawler
and waited as machinery cycled the air and opened the
outside door. Walking carefully but with increasing
confidence, they moved down the ramp and found themselves
standing on the densely packed, gravelly surface
of Boqu.
  "Anything from our young friend, Spock?"
  "Nothing, Captain. He can sense nothing."
  Kirk hadn't expected anything else. "Tell
it to keep us informed of any change it can sense . .
. and of any suggestions it comes up with as to how
to proceed."
  "Very well, Captain."
  More than anything else, the featureless structure
resembled an enormous warehouse, though Kirk
doubted that was its actual function. It rose
seamlessly above them and blended into the distant curving
roof.
  Directly before them what looked like several
doors were recessed into the wall, scattered
seemingly at random at various distances from one
another.
  "Might as well try the nearest one as any and
co on from there," Kirk announced, his open
  communicator carrying his words to his
  companions.
  Lightning flashed nearby as they began walking
slowly toward the closest door. Spock's
attention was still partially diverted by the giant
jackstraw arrangement behind them. "A remarkable feat
of engineering," he murmured. "The principles behind
it imply a metallurgic technology radically
different from our own. I wish I knew how it was
built, let alone how it generates the radiance it
does."
  "Maybe the Boqus can tell you," advised
McCoy, "if any are left."
  They had reached the wall and stopped before the first
recess. The door was of an unmistakably
different composition from that of the structure's
exterior, and
  104 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  had the 100k of machined metal. The recess was
narrow at the top and quite wide at the base, rather like a
pyramid with a domed crown, and rose to a height of
two and a half meters.
  "Indicative of heavy-gravity
physiology," observed Spock easily.
  "That's assuming this entrance is designed for the
Boqus themselves," argued McCoy. "For all we
know, this could be a local livestock barn. Maybe
the Boqus were tall and spindly and just raised
squatly cattle."
  "Unlikely, Doctor," countered a disapproving
Spock.
  Attempts to open the door which formed the far wall
of the niche met with failure. Attempts to open
succeeding doors met with successive failures.
Not only did none of them show signs of opening, they
betrayed no hint of how they might be opened.
Inspect as they might, the little party could find nothing
resembling a handle, knob, keyhole,
depression-response pit, or anything else they
would have recognized.
  Kirk was about to try a swift kick on the sixth
and last door, a gesture which would have been not just
futile but dangerous in the heavy gravity, when it
slid aside smoothly. Life-belt sensors
carried a thick whine to them as powerful machinery
shifted the massive door, fighting its inertia.
  "Automatics?" Meyers asked rhetorically,
regarding the dim interior with a
professional's eye.
  "Maybe," murmured McCoy, "though
despite my first impressions I've got to admit
it looks more and more like we're expected. After you,
Spock," he said, gesturing.
  Once past the door (which, Kirk was gratified
to see, showed no inclination to close suddenly behind
them), they found themselves in a long trapezoidal
hallway. At regular intervals its walls and
ceilings were lined with panels
  phosphorescent with orange light. It bent and
wound confusingly, but the distance covered was less than it
seemed (the gravity wearing on them again) before they
emerged into a vast, brightly lit chamber.
  The roof arched overhead, and the surrounding
  STAR TREK TOG ETGTTT 105
  walls were filled with consoles and
  instrumentation as alien and unrecognisable as the
material they were constructed of. Larger panels
threw more light here, though it was still of that uniform
orange hue. Kirk found the warm tint it lent to the
metal furnishings very attractive, though it could
never take the place of the familiar light of
Earth's sun.
  The greatest surprise, however, was not the
instrumentation but the decor. On first glance, the chamber
appeared to be lavishly landscaped, filled with
strange bushes and small clusters of trees.
McCoy had moved to feel the petals of a purple
leafed growth, and drew back in surprise,
apparently at the tactile sensation he received from the
bush. For a fearful second Kirk thought the doctor
had been stung.
  "Are you hurt, Bones?"
  "What? No, Jim, it's this thing." He glanced
around at the other growths. "It's all of them,
probably. The surface is cold . . . and
hard. Hard as rock."
  Kirk moved to stand alongside him, and
  regarded the construction. "Interesting ... is it
mineral sculpture, or what?"
  Nearby, Spock was studying a saner specimen.
"If so, Captain, the imitation is carried
to remarkable extremes." He gestured at the base
of the tree-thing, where it disappeared into the open earth.
"It seems to enter the ground, obviously drawing
support from it. I wonder if it may not draw more
than that."
  "Oh, come on, Spock! It's stone, or something
equally inorganic. Obviously it his
  A friendly, oddly prickling thought appeared
abruptly in McCoy's mind in ad their minds.
  "Nothing is obvious, everything is infinitely
indeterminate," the thought explained sharply. "You
look intensely, physician, but not well."
  Kirk spun and glanced around the chamber. It still
appeared deserted. "Where are you," he asked
warily, adding almost as an afterthought, "man of
Boqu?"
  "Closer than you think, Captain Kirk."
  One of the "trees" nearby started toward them.
  Kirk found himself face to ... well, to something,
  106 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  with one of the strangest creatures he had ever seen.
By comparison, the bulky, limbless Lactrans
appeared almost normal.
  The being moved on a base two meters across,
consisting of hundreds of long dark yellow limbs.
Stiff and many-jointed, they rippled with an eerie
clacking along the hard floor, like the march of
millions of ants on a sheet of paper.
  The centilimbs radiated from a thick central
post twice as broad as a man's body, roughly
circular in form, like an addled fence post. This main
part was shaded a deep brown, almost the
color of unpolished mahogany, and was veined with
exterior vertical ribs of gold.
  It rose in three jointed sections to the level of
Kirk's nose, then tapered slightly before spreading
out into a wide circular plate whose upper surface
was plano-convex, like the upper half of the
Enterprise's primary hull.
  The head, or such Kirk considered it was a milky
opaque crystalline substance resembling
rutilated quartz. Black striations ran through it,
bunching imto dark nodules at various points
within.
  From the flat underside of the head, set several
centimeters in from the fringe, dangled long
articulated tentacles of dark yellow. They were
similar in shape and form to the hundreds of skittering
feet projecting from the Boqus's base. They
swayed and moved easily, under obvious control.
  It was impossible to tell whether the expedition was
facing the creature's front, back, or side,
or indeed if such terms meant anything in regard to a
Boqus. Equally, there was nothing faintly
identifiable as a mouth, nose, eyes, ears, or
anything else indicative of a face.
  Kirk elected to regard the portion of the
being facing him as its front. "I'm was He cleared
his throat, still recovering from the initial surprise
of the Boqus's unmasking. "I am Captain
James T. Kirk of the U.s.s. Enterprise.
This is my first officer, Mr. Spock; my chief
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 107
  medical officer, Dr. McCoy; and see our
vehicle pilot, Lieutenant Meyers."
  This produced an agitated jangling of those
dangling tentacles, and the creature seemed to draw
back. Could he have made a mistake already, Kirk
mused?
  He had not. "Chief medical officer!" came the
excited thought. "Then you have come in response to the
prayers of the agglimax!"
  "Prayers? Animax?" McCoy echoed in
confusion. The Boqus's limbs relaxed, but its
thoughts were still in turmoil.
  "You have not come in response to our need, to end the
epidemic?"
  Kirk suddenly understood the reason behind the
deserted metropolis they had passed over, and
felt saddened as McCoy replied, "I'm truly
sorry. We know nothing of any local
epidemic."
  The Boqus appeared to slump, and the
  opaqueness in its crystal skull increased
until the striations within could no longer be seen.
  "Why then," it inquired with sudden brisk
curiosity, "have you come here? I cannot believe it was
by accident."
  That Kirk could sympathise with. Boqu was not a
world the casual explorer would stumble upon. "We are
here at the request of an ancient race acquainted
with your people," he explained, "the people of Law
  "Lactra, Lactra," the uncertain thought reached
them. "I know them not. I am old, visitors,
yet this is something well past my forming. Admitted
it is that we Boqus are sadly lacking in methods
of history and soc tilde al record. We
follow our past not as well as we ought
  The suspicions brewing in McCoy's mind,
temporarily interrupted when the Boqus had
revealed himself, now surged back full strength, not
to be denied.
  "Jim, these bushes and trees around us the Boqus
himself Spock's hesitation in classifying them was
justified. They're not sculptured any more than you
or I are sculptured." He rushed on, Bushed
with excite
  108 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  meet. "We've long postulated the
possibility of a living organism based on the
silicon atom instead of carbon. Boqu ...
Boqu is a whole world based on that substance. A
world of living crystal."
  "I sense carefully concealed distaste in your mind,
physician," came the thought from the creature before
them. "Pity us not. It is we who have always been
sorry for those we know of you. You poor carbonbased
creatures, with your saggy, flexible, unrigid
limbs. Your bodies lack discipline and form and
true beauty.
  "Even so, for all our inherent superior endurance
to disease, we are not immune, it seems." The thought
seemed to brighten in Kirk's mind, brighten with
uncertain hope. "It is true you are a medical
scientist, Bones McCoy9"
  "I'm a doctor," McCoy replied
readily. "My job's to make sick people unsick."
  "Concise, yet thorough enough," came the
response. "A great epidemic of tragic
proportions has ravaged Boqu for many nevars.
It is
  conceded among the surviving scientists that
a new approach to a solution is required. We
had despaired of ever finding one. Yet here you are."
  "Now just a minute," began a cautious
McCoy, but the Boqus rambled on.
  "If you could find a cure for this devastation, you would
gain the eternal gratitude of all the people of my
world." Many limbs moved,
  indicating all directions simultaneously.
"This is but one of many laboratories scattered about
the surface of Boqu, isolated to protect those
surviving scientists while they exhaust every means in
the search for a solution. I was granted the
opportunity of watching for an unlikely savior
from afar. It was I who signaled you with the light, and it
was you who responded. I solicit your aid."
  Everyone, it seemed, needed their help, Kirk
thought. McCoy returned to his protest.
  "I don't know how to cure a sick rock. I
don't know the first thing about silicon biology."
  "No one does, Doctor," pointed out
Spock, "since
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 109
  until this moment such a thing was not thought to ex
  . ..
  1SL.
  "However," McCoy added reluctantly, at the
overpowering sense of desolation the Boqus
projected, "I'm willing to try."
  "No more than that could be asked," replied the
Boqus ringingly. "I am Hivar the Toq, and will
aid you ..." The thought faded, to be unexpectedly
replaced by a mental frown of contrition. "But you are
here for another reason, at the request of these beings you
call Lactrans. I cannot interfere with prior
obligations."
  "I don't think it will matter," Kirk informed
him. "Matter of fact, the Lactrans are here
to ask for your help."
  "Poor help we can give now, for anything,"
Hivar the Toq confessed. "Yet I would hear the
circum- stances."
  "The Lactrans," Kirk explained, "have made
much of their world over into a great zoo, a collection of
diverse life forms the inspection of which provides
them with knowledge and pleasure. They wish to add one last
creature to this assemblage, one creature they have
failed to capture over the centuries. We were
told that only your people possess the means to capture
such a being, which they call a jawanda."
  Hivar considered for a moment, its mind
intent on unscrambling this new riddle.
  "The creature your friends call the jawanda troubled
Boqu for many multinevars," it finally informed them.
"We have not had the need to control them since then, for
they have learned to avoid us. Yet I have some knowledge of the
means you speak of."
  Kirk glanced to Spock, then McCoy. The
  Lactrans had been reluctant to divulge
details of the jawanda, for reasons unknown. Perhaps
true ignorance was the honest one; possibly the
evasion was intentional. Regardless, Hivar the Toq
apparently knew of the creatures. At the moment they
were in mental contact with the young Lactran, but out of
immediate danger of Lactran attack. If there was a
serious reason for this concealment of facts . . .
  110 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Kirk made his decision and asked hastily,
"We're still not too sure what a jawanda is. If
you could explain . . ."
  No mental blast sent him writhing to the floor,
but the Boqus didn't respond with an answer,
either.
  "I will bargain with you, Captain Kirk,"
Hivar announced, scuttling in small circles,
"and with your friends of Lactra." Several
crystalline tentacles pointed sharply at
McCoy. "If your medical scientist Bones
McCoy can discover a cure for the disease which plagues
my people, then I will consult with the surviving guardians
of the trust of science to see what can be done about the
jawanda."
  "Listen," McCoy objected, "I said I'd
be willing to try. But I've no experience. Making
our journey's success contingent upon my solving
something which hasn't even been imagined until now just
isn't fair."
  "Somehow you must do more than try, medical
scientist."
  Kirk had the impression of a stone back being
turned to them.
  "Whatever you need will be provided instantly. We
can expect no other visitors, for our signals have
gone unheeded. Your presence is proof of that, since
you are not here in response to them. We can expect
no help beyond your own."
  "How can you expect me, someone totally
ignorant of your body chemistry, your very makeup,
to succeed where your own best
  scientists have failed?" an exasperated
McCoy wanted to know.
  Hivar the Toq replied almost sullenly. "I do
not know myself. I know only that a new approach
offers the best remaining chance of a solution. Your very
ignorance saves you from the
  misconceptions and false approaches which have
stifled us."
  "F'irst time anyone ever complimented me for
ignorance," McCoy grumbled. "I've got
to forget four thousand years of biology and start from
scratch."
  "Does that mean you're convinced you can't do it,
Bones?" wondered a concerned Kirk.
  McCoy shook his head. "No. It means I'd
better get
  STAR TREK LOG LIGHT 1 1 1
  started. Let's see . . . I'm going to need
Nurse Chapel, and Ensigns M'baw tilde v
and Prox to help with the beginning research, certain
equipment . . . and I'm sure the Lactrans will
have suggestions and instruments I'll have to learn about."
  Kirk was studying the equipment set in consoles and
banks throughout the chamber. "There's plenty to keep the
rest of us occupied in the meantime, Bones. I
don't think the Boquses will object to answering a
few questions."
  "We do not, Captain Kirk," Hivar the Toq
admitted softly, "so long as there are any of us
left to answer."
  V111
  With the aid of Hivar and information relayed from various
centers of research on Boqu, McCoy made
progress which surprised him. It took two
weeks to understand what the result of the disease was.
  "I know what's happening to the Boqus now,
Jim," he explained, "but as to the cause, I've
no more idea than they do." He gazed helplessly
around the small medical lab which had been set up in
the shuttlecrawler, enabling him to work outside the
constraints of a life-support belt.
  He gestured toward a table laden with slides and
instruments. It reminded Kirk of something familiar,
yet elusive. His attention was taken by McCoy.
  "Something is causing an alteration in the structure
of the Boqus" upper parts, changing the chemical
composition in such a way that death is inevitable.
Imagine the blood in your veins suddenly
petrifying and you'll have some idea of what's happening
to Hivar and the others.
  "I've spent days hunting for a way to attack this
thing and, Jim, I don't have the faintest
notion of how
  112 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  to begin. This is as alien to my experience as we are
to the Boqus."
  "I have a suggestion, Doctor McCoy,"
came a prickling inside their heads.
  "Who's that, Spock?" Kirk asked.
  "One of the Eoquian scientists who has
traveled many nevars to reach here," the first officer
explained. "It has been observing us at work and
has considered the situation. Our presence our very
existence has given it an idea it wishes
to propose."
  "I'm all ... whatever it is I'm supposed
to listen with," McCoy announced.
  "There is no need to tense, Doctor," soothed
Spock. "The idea has been communicated to me
to relay to you. It is suggested that since your function
is the study and treatment of
  carbon-based forms, you consult with one of the many on
board the Enterprise who are experts in compounds of
silicon."
  "Spock," Kirk began, "we've already
explained to them that life based on silicon instead
of carbon is unknown was unknown to us until
we came here. We have no one who his
  "Of course!" McCoy blurted
unexpectedly. He ignored first Kirk's stare,
then his query, as he hurried to the forward intercom.
"Enterprise, Enterprise!" When no reply was
immediately forthcoming, he stared angrily at the console.
"Now what's the matter? Don't our maintainance
techs realize that delays . . . to was
  Spock quietly activated the communications
unit for him and stood aside.
  This time McCoy's entreaties were rewarded with a
flood of static, as the communicator strove to force
its way through dense atmosphere and the barrage of
internal Boquian radiation.
  "Enterprise, Lieutenant Uhura speaking.
Is that you, Dr. McCoy?"
  "Yes, Uhura. I want to speak
to Lieutenant K'ang Tel" He glanced at
Spock as if for
  confirmation, and the first officer nodded readily.
  Kirk searched hi, memory for one name out of the
  STAR TREK L tilde ETGHT 113
  hundreds on board the Enterprise. K'ang
Te, lieu- tenant; Sciences; head of the
geology section.
  Then he wondered why he hadn't thought of it. It
had been a Boqus's turn to find a different
approach . . .
  With the veteran mineralogist's assistance,
McCoy began to make progress man and
  woman, physician and geologist, working together in
search of a solution. Kirk watched them drive
themselves mercilessly and wondered worriedly which they would
find first an answer, or total exhaustion.
  It appeared to Kirk to be a dead heat between the
two possibilities when McCoy, drawn from the
work and the debilitating affect of hard labor under an
extra half gravity, staggered onto the bridge a
week and a day later.
  "Bones, you look terrible!" Kirk exclaimed.
  "I know. And I feel wonderful!"
  "You you did it, then? You actually found a
solution?"
  "K'ang Te and I, yes . . . At least,
we think so."
  Kirk looked past him. "Where is the
lieutenant?"
  "In Sick Bay, where I sent her." A hint
of a smile graced the doctor's dry lips.
"It's easy to prescribe treatment for
someone when you're suffering the same symptoms." He
sank gratefully into a seat vacated by Spock,
too tired to counter the gesture with sarcasm or too
thankful for the small courtesy.
  "I am certain the solution is as fascinating as
the disease, Doctor," Spock ventured, by way of
impelling McCoy to explanation.
  "You don't know the tenth of it, Spock. The
trouble was with their circulatory system you ought to see
it, Jim! Their blood, if we can call it that, is
thicker than machine oil, and flows just fast enough to be
called something better than paralyzed. In past
centuries certain crucial components within the
blood haven't been
  breaking down as they should have. Call it a buildup
of impurities, if you will. The Boqus thought something
in their own systems
  responsible for handling the breakdown of these
impurities had failed, and they've been
  114 STAR TREK LOG LIGHT
  going slowly insane trying to discover it. We found
it, but the real problem was finding an antidote."
He shook his head slowly. "The Boqus were too
close to the problem."
  "As so often happens," Spock finished
for him. "I am intriguied, Doctor. What kind
of remedy did you discover capable of affecting the
buildup of unwanted substances in the "brood"
of a silicon-based creature?"
  "To begin with, Spock, I had to disregard, throw
out, forget, and otherwise ignore
  everything I knew about serums and standard antidote
chemistry. Not only did it seem unlikely
I'd be able to find something the Boquian researchers
had missed, but I wouldn't have the faintest idea of
how to go about inoculating a rock for all its stiffly
formal mobility, I can't help thinking of Hivar and
its kind in those terms. Our eventual solution
came from medicine by way of physics, born out of
mineralogy." He settled himself into a chair, lowering
himself gently.
  "According to their meteorological records, Boqu
is periodically afflicted with long periods of
constant storm. We nearly hit one of them on our
way down remember the tremendous lightning
display?"
  Both Kirk and Spock recalled that casually
awesome discharge of energy clearly.
  "After more experimentation and search than I care
to think about, we discovered that in the case of this
last series of storms, the cloud layer over most of
inhabited Boqu had become so thick as to block out
certain radiations from the system's feeble sun. This was
accomplished by having Astrophysics prepare a
complete
  breakdown of the radiation the sun was putting out, and
comparing it with readings taken on the surface. From that
point, we had to proceed with special caution. One
of those screened-out wavelengths might be responsible
for breaking down the unwanted substances in the
Boqus' blood but the others might prove lethal
if too strong a dose was delivered."
  He sighed slowly. "As it turned out, nothing of the
sort happened, though that didn't keep all
involved from worrying constantly about it. We tried
four differ
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 115
  entradiants on several fatally ill Boqus.
Two did nothing, the third made the experimental
subject retch remarkably, and the fourth the fourth
had its subject on its, uh, feet in a few
hours. Similar radiation treatments ought to have most of
Boqu back to normal inside a month. The
equipment involved is simple to reproduce. A
technical team is on the surface now,
helping them set up facilities for duplicating the
proper projectors."
  "Fascinating, Doctor," commented Spock with
admiration. "I would enjoy a more detailed look
into such a unique physiology."
  McCoy's expression turned solemn. "That
shouldn't be too hard a wish to fulfill, Spock.
At present Boqu enjoys a surplus of
corpses. They'd probably find the dissection of a
Vulcan cadaver equally interesting."
  "Undoubtedly," agreed the first officer, missing
the irony of me doctor's statement completely.
  Unexpectedly, McCoy grinned. He leaned
his head on his left hand as he reminisced. "I
don't think we'll ever see a Boqus jump.
They're not constructed for leaping. But, Jim, when that
last patient suddenly showed signs of recovery and
we knew we'd found me answer, Hivar and the
Boqus medical scientists present came as near
to kicking up their heels as their bodies permit."
  "How long does the treatment last?" Kirk
wanted to know.
  McCoy considered. "Only about one of our
weeks. So until the intensity of this severe storm
cycle begins to lessen, every Boqus will have
to spend about fifteen minutes a week under a
radiation projector in order for its blood
to return to normal like humans used to do under sun
lamps."
  Spock looked querulous. was "Sun lamp,"
Captain?"
  "An old obsession of people in the Dark Ages,
Mr. Spock. Many of them used to spend hours,
even days, under the concentrated radiation of an
ultraviolet generator, trying to artificially
darken their skin."
  The first o tilde cer's confused expression did
not fade. "I see, Captain. But I was under the
impression that
  116 STAR TREK LOG
  during that period of human history the humans with
light-toned skin discriminated against the darker
humans."
  "That's right, Spock," Kirk admitted.
  Spock's puzzlement deepened. "Then why
  would the light-skinned humans try to burn their
skin dark? This is not logical, Captain."
  "Human actions of the Dark Ages rarely were,
Spock. As a matter of fact, I seem
to recall that certain humans of dark skin
used artificial means to try to lighten their skin."
  "So the light-skinned humans tried to make their
skins dark, and some of the dark-skinned humans tried
to make theirs light?"
  "You've got it, Spock."
  The first officer assumed an air of finality.
"I will never understand human beings fully,
Captain."
  "Don't worry about it, Spock," advised
McCoy, for once in complete agreement with him,
"you've got plenty of company. Actually, if you
bother to consider that ..." He stopped in
mid-sentence, aware that the first officer was no longer
listening. Instead, Spock's mind was drawn to something
deeper.
  "It is the Lactrans, Captain," he finally
declared, confirming what the watching Kirk and McCoy
had already suspected. "Though growing impatient, they
applaud Dr. McCoy's ability and great
talent in finding a solution to the Boquian
epidemic."
  "It's not a question of talent," an embarrassed
McCoy muttered, "just persistence."
  "I have so informed them," Spock added drily.
"They wish to know if we have made
inquiries among the Boqus for their help in
locating and capturing a jawanda."
  "They can ask our hosts themselves shortly."
  Kirk thumbed a switch on the chair arm,
  activating the intercom.
  "Engineering," a familiar voice acknowledged.
  "Scotty, this is the captain. How is that
special tech section coming on those big
life-support belts for the Lactrans?"
  STAR TREK T OG BTGTTT 117
  "I was about to call in myself, sir," the chief en-
gineer told him. "They're undergoin' final tests.
I think our guests will be pleased with them. No need
to use the shuttlecrawler any more. It wasn't too
difficult a job even for us primitive
types."
  Just time-consumin". They can even take "em off
and put 'em on themselves, with those flexible snouts of
theirs."
  "Thank you, Scotty. Kirk out." He
turned- back to the motionless Spock. "You can tell
our fAends they can describe jawanda-catching
requirements to Hivar the Toq in person. Mr.
Scott's people have built three specially modified
life-support belts for them. They can
beam down to the surface with us."
  When they beamed down that afternoon, Kirk saw hints
of tremendous activity in the direction of the formerly
moribund city. On the nearest outskirts,
crews of rejuvenated Boqus were at work in
incomprehensible machinery, modifying certain
structures, demolishing others, building still more.
  Obviously, McCoy's antidote was already
having extensive effects. Certainly, the captain
thought as they made their way cautiously through the heavy
gravity of Boqu, Hivar and its colleagues should
now be overjoyed enough to provide all the aid the
Lactrans desired.
  Those three massive aliens were sliding along
smoothly behind Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. The
captain envied them their ease of locomotion in the
Boquian gravity.
  At the moment they were deep in conversation among
themselves, long front ends bobbing and weaving as they
conversed at a speed which to human mmds was only a
confusing,
  head-throbbing blur. Enormous lightning flashes
arced from thick clouds to ground off to the north.
  "What are they so intent on, Mr. Spock?" his
curiosity finally prompted him to ask.
"The electrical display?"
  "No, Captain." Kirk forced his way through
thick, clinging mud that wasn't there. "The
laboratory struc
  1 l tilde STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  lure of Hivar the Toq." Kirk gazed at it,
but saw nothing remarkable about the large building save
its lack of windows.
  "What about it intrigues them so?"
  "The acuteness of its construction, Captain. It
is all sharp angles and abutments, excepting the
roof, whereas Lactran architecture is based on
an absence of sharpness. Their buildings and machines,
if you recall our stay on Lactra, were all
rounded curves, avoids, hemispheres and
circles. It seems that structure follows form.
The Lactrans are as rounded as their constructs, the
Boqus as sharp-edged as theirs."
  "And what about us?" asked McCoy curiously.
Spock paused a moment.
  "We are considered acute formations by the
Lactrans and curvilinear by the Boqus. It
seems we partake of something of both."
  "So we're mediators in form as well as in
fact," noted Kirk. "It's nice to be
consistent."
  This time the last door of reflective metal was
open awaiting their arrival. Scott probably could
have beamed them directly into the central chamber, but
Kirk wanted Hivar to have time to prepare for their
arrival and it might prove useful to discover if the
Lactrans could negotiate the building's
passageways.
  Nothing of the irritability mentioned in the
Lactrans" odd records was evident in the
manner of Hivar the Tog as it greeted them
warmly. The Lactrans studied the instrumentation and the
layout of the circular laboratory with admiration.
  The Boquian scientist had been taking
McCoy's radiation treatments, and the change in its
appearance was dramatic. The gold ribbing on its
central trunk shone as if polished, Kirk
observed immediately.
  Even more striking was the difference in Hivar's upper
region, the part that Kirk had come to think of as a
head. Except for a few isolated patches of
color, the opaque milkiness which had characterised that
hemispheric crystalline structure on their first
meeting was gone. Now the dark internal striations and
peculiar clumps and nodes of denser
material showed clearly,
  STAR TREK LOG ETGHT 119
  reminding Kirk of ferns and flies frozen in
Earth's ancient amber.
  It was a measure of this creature's personal
strength, Kirk realized suddenly, that in all this time
since their initial meeting Hivar had never once
indicated that it too was severely stricken with
radiation deficiency. Kirk wondered if he could
have remained as personally unconcerned if their
positions had been reversed if he had been the one
dying of a disease thought incurable and Hivar the possible
savior.
  "Greetings, Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock,
Doctor Bones McCoy." Kirk had the
impression the Boqus was glancing behind them, though,
try as he might, he could not identify Hivar's
organs of sight. "And anxious visitors from our
far past." Something scratched at Kirk's mind as
the Lactrans and the Boqus exchanged silent
mental hellos.
  When it continued, he wondered for a nervous moment
if something had gone wrong, if the Lactrans had
touched some ancient trouble. Spock reassured him.
  "According to the youngster, its parents and Hivar
are engaged in parallel telepathic
  conversation of an advanced mode. I can believe
that, as I have tried to listen in and have experienced only
a mild mental concussion as a result. While the
Lactrans must turn their thoughts to baby talk and
slow their
  conceptualisations to a crawl in order for us
to comprehend, no such restriction exists between them and the
Boqus."
  Whether Hivar the Toq sensed Kirk's
uneasiness at being so completely left out of what was
obviously a critical discussion or was just being
polite, Kirk would never know. In any case, he
appreciated it with loud thoughts of thanks when the
Boqus slowed its own river of conversation enough for the
humans to make some sense of it.
  "A jawanda you want to capture and take back
with you to your home world? A jawanda!"
  The Boqus' expression of surprise, coming when
they had expected a more casual acknowledgment, left
the humans startled.
  "Now listen," McCoy began, "we've been
put off
  120 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  about this jawanda long enough. I think it's
about time we his
  Hivar the Toq pivoted on centilegs, the
gesture of turning away from them more significant
than anything else. "I promised you our aid, it
is true, but ... I do not know." It was muttering
mentally. "Long ago we had a device for
manipulating the jawandas. But this was used only
to protect Boqu, to drive the creatures away from
our world. Never to capture one!"
  "Just a second, Hivar," McCoy
interrupted, waving his hands. "Let's back up a
minute. You said drive them away from Boqu?" The
doctor eyed Kirk uncertainly, and was rewarded
by a cautioning look of equal puzzlement. "Aren't
the jawandas native to Boqu? Are you trying to tell
us they originate on still another world?"
  "None of the other planets of the system appeared
capable of supporting even rudimentary life,"
Spock commented, without committing himself utterly. Perhaps
some minor error in their initial hurried
observations, some small factor of atmosphere
overlooked . . .
  "Do not tax yourself, friend Spock," came the
answering thought from Hivar the
  Toq accompanied, Kirk sensed with
surprise, by a twinge of amusement. "It would
appear that your friends the Lactrans have been less
than informative, Captain Kirk."
  Kirk turned his gaze on the always silent
aliens. The answer to his unvoiced question came, as
usual, from Spock.
  "No, Captain, they have told us no untruths,
they have not lied to us. They have simply neglected
to mention certain details concerning the jawandas."
  "I can imagine!" exclaimed McCoy
feelingly.
  "It is these details which they have not supplied which
should be of particular interest to you, Captain," Hivar
added helpfully. "I have said that we manipulated the
jawandas out of necessity, to keep them clear of our
world. This does not mean they come from another. We have
never been able to determine the origin of the jawandas if
indeed, such a term has application in their case.
We know only where the jawandas
  STAR TREK BOG BIGHT 121
  exist . . . out there." Half a dozen
reticulate upper tentacles pointed jerkily
skyward.
  "The jawanda is truly a creature of the
universe," Hivarexplained to a rapt
audience of bipeds. "They live only in
intergalactic space, drifting for unknowable cons
in the gulf between galaxies. We know very little of their
life, save that they are simple yet marvelously
efficient energy-mass converters, feeding on the faint
radiations extant in the vast Out There."
  "If these creatures exist on radiation,"
Spock in- quired, "why remain in the comparative
barrens of intergalactic territory? Why do they not
come nearer the galaxies themselves, and the suns which
produce the radiations on which they feed?"
  "Gravity," was the terse explanation. "Should a
jawanda come within the influence of a modest sun, it could
easily be trapped forever in orbit about it. While
there is no reason for assuming that a jawanda could not
live, even thrive, in such a confined existence, it
seems that they prefer freedom to satiety. It
may be a survival instinct or an actual
mental preference we likely shall never know. For
whatever reason, they avoid the gravitational density
of galaxies and star clusters. Only the isolation and
weak pull of our star made them bold enough to come near
Boqu."
  "Why Boqu, though?" asked McCoy.
  "Remember our measurements on
approach, Doctor," Spock reminded him.
"Boqu puts out more radiation than it absorbs,
qualifying it in certain astronomical lexicons
as a protostar itself."
  "Correct, Mr. Spock," the Boquian
scientist con- curred. "Jawandas used to frolic
freely about our world, successfully defying our
sun's poor gravity. Normally, this troubled
Boqu not at all. The jawandas' absorption of
radiation lost freely to space did not affect us.
  "Occasionally, however, it did, according to the old
records. No, Dr. McCoy, the question I see
framed in your mind is reasonable but not relevant.
The jawandas did not screen out any particular
radiation from our sun such as the vital one you
isolated as the cause of our epidemic. Instead,
they blocked out a ma
  122 STAR TREE: BIGHT
  jority of radiation, that wavelength included. More
important than any disease, this
  unpredictable screening caused slight but
disconcerting shifts in the surface temperature of
Boqu, lowering the warmth in the regions affected
by substantial amounts."
  ""I can see where it could be
uncomfortable to be enjoying warm weather one minute and
have it turn to winter in a few seconds," Kirk
admitted readily.
  "This situation persisted for thousands of our years,"
Hivar continued, "until we found a way to drag the
jawandas away. While doubtless they are dull,
thoughtless creatures, they do seem capable of learning
through repetition. They learned long ago not
to approach Boqu."
  Hivar abruptly went silent, and Kirk and
McCoy looked to the attentive Spock. "The
Lactrans wonder what has become of the
  mechanism for manipulating the jawandas and whether
it can be adapted to serve their needs. Hivar has
replied that it can conceive of no reason why the device
should not be so utilized, though it has never been done
before. The Boqus wished to drive the jawandas away,
not capture them."
  "I do not even know if the mechanism still exists,
and, if so, whether it remains operative," Hivar
broadcast mentally, slowed now so that the intensely
curious humans could also listen in. "Should it
prove so, you may employ it, though this must be done
with care. Certain of the extended components of the
mechanism hold a historical
attraction for us. We would not wish to see them lost."
  "What components?" Kirk wanted to know.
  That great crystalline head turned toward him.
"Boqu is circled by nine moons, Captain
Kirk. Por manipulating the jawandas properly
it is necessary to make use of six of them."
  "Six . . . moons." McCoy gulped,
turning to the Enterprise tilde s first officer..
"How big did they say one of these creatures
is?"
  "It has not been stated, Doctor. All
references to size have been of an indeterminate
nature."
  "Big enough to live in intergalactic space,
Bones,"
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 123
  Kirk commented slowly. "Big enough to pass between sun
and planet and cause climatic changes on the
surface. Big enough to . . ." His voice
trailed off, and he turned to face the Lactrans.
"We gave our word to help. That agreement stands."
He directed his final statement to Hivar. "Find
the device. Can it be mounted on the Enterprise, or
does it too have to exist in free space?"
  ""No, Captain Kirk," the
Boqus replied, bowing with surprising grace for so
nearly inflexible a creature. "The actual
console for controlling the confining elements of the
mechanism is quite small. It will fit easily on
board your vessel. As will I."
  "You?" McCoy gaped at the scientist.
"You're coming along?" Impressions of a mental nod
of assent. "But why? You don't owe the Lactrans
anything."
  "Your guests, no ... but you, Doctor
McCoy, are owed a great deal. In any case, it
is necessary, since only a Boqus could properly
operate the mechanism."
  The mysterious control console of the capture
device turned out to be something of an
  anticlimax. Kirk had been prepared to have
technicians cut out bulkheads and even cabins
surrounding the Shuttlecraft Bay in order
to provide a space large enough to accommodate a
monstrous construction. As it turned out, the actual
instrumentation bulked only about three times the size
of the Enterprise's navigation console. Hivar had
found it in the nearby city housed in a huge old
scientific warehouse that looked brand new, a
testament to the foresight and talent of
Boqu's pioneering engineers.
  Hivar activated the ancient machine and spent
several days replacing certain components and
realigning internal components while Kirk
fidgeted nervously on board the Enterprise, his
sleep troubled by snaggletoothed apparitions bigger
than starships.
  When, before long, the renovation was
  complete, Kirk inspected the incredibly dense
machine and ordered the bracing beneath a bu1k-cargo
transporter reinforced before beaming the device
aboard. He was trying to imagine where they could
conveniently place
  124 STAR TREK LOG
  the machine and how when Spock proposed a
solution so simple that Kirk had overlooked it.
  "Why trouble to move it anywhere, Captain?
Leave it where it is, on the transporter platform.
If the Boqus can operate it from here, there's really
no reason to shove it around the ship."
  "How about communication?" Kirk mused,
  studying the distance between the transporter platform and the
nearest intercom unit.
  His first officer considered. "We will request that the
young Lactran remain here with Hivar," he
finally suggested. "The youngster will be in constant
communication with its parents and with myself, on the bridge,
as well as with Hivar."
  "Boqus to Lactran to Vulcan," Kirk
concluded, adding with firmness, "We'll keep all
intercoms activated and open anyway."
  When finally beamed aboard with the
  mechanism, Hivar reactivated it and
pronounced itself satisfied with the arrangements.
Pressed for a more precise translation than
"mechanism" or "device," the Boqus scientist
confessed it was unable to name it any better for his
human hosts.
  "At least that's in keeping with its appearance,"
Kirk murmured, staring at the object in question. It
looked like a large blob of free-form slag composed
of half a hundred materials, metallic and
otherwise.
  He studied the bumps and spikes and wires
sticking out of the amorphous mass, trying to rationalise
the haphazard appearance of the thing with the knowledge that it was an
intricate, complex feat of alien engineering. There was
slight consolation in the fact that it looked as absurd
to the lumpish Lactrans as it did to him.
  Duplicating the outward form of the thing would
be no trouble, Kirk thought. Simply take a
room full of engineering components and turn a
low-power construction phaser on it. Several hours
later you would have produced a close approximation
of the object now squatting on the
cargo-transporter platform.
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 125
  As Hivar the Toq moved reflecting limbs
across the mound's surface, however, it generated
lights and hums and whines no half-welded dollop
of metal could ever produce.
  "The mechanism," the Boqus told them,
  "contains its own power source, which in turn links
it with the much more powerful old engines locked into the
crusts of the moons Drasid, Mett One and
Mett Two, Lethiq, Lathoq, and Oj." It
completed a few final adjustments, turned with a
crystalline flourish to face them.
  "All is in readiness, Captain Kirk."
  An awkward moment of uncertainty followed, before
Kirk finally replied, "You'll have to tell us how
to begin." He glanced at the young Lactran, who
showed no sign of providing instructions or
suggestions. "No one else on board has any
idea where to start looking for a awanda.
  "I expect your vessel possesses
adequate equipment for the transmission of sound
waves, since this is the method you use for personal
communication," Hivar ventured. "Do you also have the
ability to detect other types of
electromagnetic radiation?"
  "With considerable accuracy," Kirk informed it.
  "Then there is no difficulty. Instruct your
monitors of the appropriate instrumentation to listen
for" and Hivar provided a figure Spock
understood "which is the range of the jawandas' cry."
  "Interesting," the first officer commented. "They
communicate among themselves, then?"
  "So it is believed by many," the Boqus ac-
knowledged, "yet these sounds may be produced for a
variety of reasons having little or nothing to do with
communication. Should we continue outward from Boqu,
away from the galaxy, we will eventually encounter one."
A pause; then: "I see your confusion, Captain
Kirk. Given the density of our atmosphere, how
is it our knowledge of astronomy is so advanced? Let
me say simply that our progress in what you might
call radio astronomy and related areas which do not
require visual observation has been
substantial."
  126 STAR TREK
  "That wasn't really what was bothering me," re-
sponded Kirk. "It was your use of the term
"eventually.'How long is eventually?"
  Hivar transmitted a mental shrug. "It could
be tomorrow . . . or it might be a hundred years. I
would tend toward the former."
  "I sincerely hope you're right," declared Kirk
with feeling.
  Once back on the bridge, Rirk's first
concern was that the complex telepathic communications
system which, after all, relied on an adolescent of
an alien species was functioning smoothly.
  "Mr. Spock, what's the maximum acceleration
Hivar's mechanism can match?"
  Again the relaxation into semistupor, which no longer
troubled Kirk; then the first officer replied,
"Warpthree, Captain. Should we attempt
to travel any faster, the six moons which form the
bulk of the system will fall behind, soon to be lost
to control."
  Kirk nodded and glanced at the helm. "All
ahead varp three, Mr. Sulu."
  "Ahead warp-three," came the acknowledgment. It
was followed by a hesitant question: "On what
course,
  Kirk looked expectantly at Spock, who
  informed him, "Hivar says to use your own
judgment, Captain. One course should prove as
efficacious as the next, so long as we continue
to move outward from our galaxy."
  "Um. Mr. Sulu, resume our former course
heading, continuing on out from Boqu."
  "Aye, Captain," the helmsman replied
  unquestioningly.
  Kirk's gaze went to the main viewscreen. It
provided an expansive panorama of obsidian
emptiness, speckled fretfully with the pale light of
far-off galaxies and star clusters hundreds of
thousands and millions of lightyears distant.
  Given the Enterprzse's manelous
  instrumentation, of course, it was next to impossible
for them to become lost. Even so, one could not be certain
of anything this
  STAR TREK LOG LIGHT 127
  far from familiar starmarks. The idea of becoming
lost in this benumbing nothingness, to wander forever on the
fringes of the galaxy, was an eventuality he had no
wish to cope with.
  Resolutely, the captain forced it from his
mind.
  There were other things to think about. Like the actual
size of the mysterious jawanda, for example.
  "Activate rear scanners, Mr. Arex," he
ordered. The depressing view ahead was
temporarily replaced by a shrinking Boqu aft.
Raging
  upper-atmospheric disturbances stirred
  orange-and-maroon clouds like a giant's finger
dipped in paint. And there was something else.
  Six points of darkness, artificially highlighted
by the ship's scanner-computers, were following them at
a respectful distance. Six moons, detached from
orbit, trailed the Enterprise like balls on a
string. Kirk assumed that the long line was for
  convenience of manipulation. Surely the actual
use of the moons in jawanda capture involved some
more-complex configuration.
  The lift doors slid aside, and McCoy
strolled onto the bridge. "You'll be happy
to know, Jim, that Lieutenant Randolph is fully
recovered. I discharged her from Sick Bay an hour
ago." His gaze went to the screen. "Our six
attendant satellites?" Kirk nodded.
  "I hope Hivar knows what it's doing
with that ar- chaic hunk of machinery." McCoy
gestured at the trailing moons. "even if Hey
are all smaller than Luna, I'd hate for
Hivar to make one of them zig when it should zag. If
the Enterprise accidentally got caught between them,
we'd end up looking about as streamlined as a
Lactran."
  IX
  On the sixth day out from Boqu, Lieutenant
Uhura turned from her communications console and informed
  128 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Kirk, "I am receiving broadcasts in the range
indicated by the Boquian scientist, Captain."
  "You're certain, Lieutenant?"
  "Yes, sir. Pickup is clearly within the
frequency specified."
  "Mr. Arex, obtain a fix on the broadcast
source. As soon as you have it placed, instruct
Mr. Sulu on the necessary alteration in our course for
planned intercept."
  "Very well, sir," the Edoan navigator
replied.
  Kirk glanced back at Uhura, intending
to thank her and hesitated. The lieutenant was chewing
her lower lip, and she looked more than
simply thoughtful.
  "Something the matter, Uhura?"
  "I don't think so, sir. It's just that . . .
well, I'm sure I recognize those sounds.
I've heard them before."
  "That hardly seems likely, Lieutenant,"
commented Spock.
  "I know, Mr. Spock," she admitted, "but
I'm still positive I've encountered these particular
noises in the past or at least sounds very similar."
  "Amplify and put them on the bridge
speakers," Kirk decided.
  She spent a moment adjusting the controls; then the
bridge was filled with a moderate crackling sound.
It alternated occasionally with a regular electronic
chirp, which devolved rapidly into a low buzzing.
One moment it sounded like random noise, the next almost
like a programmed broadcast.
  "My apology to Lieutenant Uhura,"
Spock finally said into the silence. "I recognize
the sounds myself." Kirk was about to add that he also was
familiar with such noise when Spock added, "I have
communicated our discovery to Hivar, who is anxious
to hear it."
  "By all means. Uhura, transmit
to the Bulk Transporter Room the Boqus is
located in." There was a long wait.
  "It is the cry of a jawanda," Spock
announced, Hivar's own conviction mirrored in the
first officer's tone.
  Kirk was only confused further. "But that's a
famil
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 129
  far sound, Mr. Spock. Large
radiotelescopes, even the oldest ones on
Earth, have been picking up buzzes and crackles like
this one for hundreds of years. Of course," he added
softly, "there are many whose origin has remained a
mystery."
  "Certain of those unsolved origins may now be
explained, it seems," Spock went on, showing
excitement of an intellectual sort even in his
role of communicator. "It appears that in addition
to quasars, pulsars, radio nebulae, and other
known phenomena which are sources of deep-space
radio waves, we must now include the jawanda."
  "Proceeding on new course, Captain,"
Sulu an- nounced, "warp-factor three."
  Kirk had a sudden thought. "Mr. Spock, the
Boquian mechanism restricts us to a
maximum speed of warp-three. Ask Hivar how
fast a jawanda can travel."
  The reply took longer than usual. "No
faster than our present velocity, CaPtain . .
. or so it is believed. There is no way Hivar
can say for certain, since its race was always concerned
with putting distance between them and the jawanda and not closing
it."
  Kirk found himself once again trying to adjust to the
idea of a creature which could move at a speed
exceeding light. It made no sense but then, the
universe was full of things which did not make sense.
  "Quarry is traveling at an angle to us,
Captain. There is no indication that it has taken
notice of our presence. We are proceeding on an
intercept course which will bring us to capture range
within twenty hours.
  But it was a day longer before the extremely
longrange visual sensors were able to pick anything
up. There was a pause while Sulu adjusted
instrumentation and then they were gifted with their first sight of a
jawanda.
  It was all at once more magnificent and
unexpected than Kirk had anticipated: an
  enormous rippling rectangular shape.
The sensors were observing it from its flat side;
otherwise, as with Saturn's rings, there would
  130 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  have been almost nothing to see. were it not for the
fluorescent colors which ran rippling across its
featureless surface, even the
  computer-enhanced visual pickups would have shown
nothing. The dancing lights, radiation consumed and
transformed, gave outline and dimension to the
creature.
  "Looks like a big plastic sheet trying
to digest an aurora," McCoy offered.
  "Details, Mr. Spock?" Preliminary
  measurements?"
  Spock was bent over readouts and indicators.
"Its method of locomotion is unknown, Captain,
though it appears to throw off energy as well as
to absorb it. Thickness is apparently constant from
one end to the other, with no significant tapering at
either end."
  "How thick, Mr. Spock?"
  "Approximately one millimeter, Captain.
Viewed from the side, even at close range, the
creature would effectively vanish. By contrast, its
length and breadth are considerable."
  "You're starting to sound as vague as a Lactran,
Spock," grumbled McCoy.
  "It is difficult to estimate its surface
area, Doctor."
  "Why because some of it appears edge-on?"
  "No because there is so much of it, and because the
rectangular appearance is only approximate."
He looked up from his readouts and gazed straight at
Kirk. "I would say that this particular specimen is
capable of covering most of the North American
continent on Earth ... though, of course, only to a
depth of one miUimeter, and that assuming the continent
to be uniformly flat. Actual surface area is
  concomitantly somewhat less."
  "That's ... ad right, Spock," Kirk assured
his first officer, when he had his voice back. "It's
big enough for our needs and the Lactrans"." He sat
staring at the unimaginably huge creature.
Electric purples, mauve, metallic green,
and azure drifted through its nearly transparent
va/s, the discharges ample evidence of continual
energy transfer.
  "As a collector of stray radiation, it is a
wonderfully designed organism," commented an
admiring Spock.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 131
  "It maximizes surface-collection area
while minimizing mass. Absorbed radiation is
converted into operating substance and at least two kinds
of radiant discharge. One is the radio wave we
detect, while the other doubtless propels it through the
cosmos in some fashion we do not yet fathom. I
would give ten years of my life to know how it does
this."
  "If we can capture it, the Lactrans may
give you the chance to find out, Spock."
  "Captain!" Kirk looked sharply at Sulu.
"It's changing course."
  "Spock, ask Hivar if we're within capture
distance yet."
  Quickly now: "Jo, Captain. Hivar says
we must move considerably closer before the mechanism
can be effectively employed."
  Sulu spoke again. "Definitely senses us,
sir moving almost directly away from us now."
  "Speed, Lieutenant?"
  "Warp-three, sir."
  Kirk rubbed tiredly at his forehead. "Can it
sense a trap?"
  "Most certainly it can detect the
gravitational fields of the six moons trailing us,
Captain," Spock pointed out.
  "If that's the case, then we're going to have trouble
getting close to any of the beasts." He considered a
moment and decided, "Let's continue following for
another half day. It may grow tired."
  But as he made his way back to his cabin
to sleep, he found himself skeptical of outlasting a
being which existed comfortably in the space between galaxies
. . .
  Sure enough, when he returned to the bridge he
found the jawanda still traveling with apparent ease at
warp-three, directly away from them. They had not
closed the distance by a meter.
  The simplicity of the dilemma didn't lessen
Kirk's frustration. If they accelerated
to warp-four, they would overtake the fleeing quarry but
without the means necessary to capture it. And there was something
else he was beginning to wonder about, some
  132 STAR TREK T OG BIGHT
  thing which intruded on his thoughts to the point where he
found it necessary to put the question to their guests, via
Spock.
  "Is a jawanda dangerous, Mr. Spock?"
  "Hivar does not know, Captain, nor
do the Lactrans. The Boquian mechanism was
always operated from ground control, never from a ship.
Hivar actually has no idea how a jawanda might
react to one particularly one moving free of the
protection of a strong gravitational zone."
  "I thought our guest considered it impolite to read
thoughts," Kirk observed mildly.
  "Hivar apologises, Captain, but replies
that the image in your mind was so strong it could not
ignore it."
  The image the Boqus was referring to involved
Kirk's proposal to drop clear of the trailing
moons and proceed at a higher speed to overtake the
jawanda.
  "Once we do that," Kirk concluded, "we'll have
to find some way of turning the creature back toward
the six satellites."
  "Hivar is not certain," Spock relayed
slowly, "that this is a good idea. Despite its
apparent fragility, a jawanda remains a being of
unknown defensive capabilities, but one through which
courses a good deal of controlled energy. Hivar
desires that its ignorance of such abilities not
serve as a pretext for foolhardy action."
  "I see. What is the Lactrans"
opinion?"
  "They are of a similar mind, though equally
uncertain."
  "Does any of them have any better ideas?"
  A hopeful wait, after which Spock declared, "They
do not, Captain. Free space is not the element of
Boqus or Lactrans. It belongs to the jawanda
and, at present, to us far-ranging primitives. The
Lactrans concede that you must make the decision."
  "What of Hivar?" Kirk pressed, knowing that
without the Bogus's cooperation further pursuit of the
jawanda was useless.
  "As Hivar can think of no alternative save
to disen
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 133
  gage and search for a jawanda at a more favorable
intercept angle his
  "Which might not happen for that proverbial hundred
years," Kirk pointed out sharply.
  was he consents, reluctantly, to follow your
desig- nated course of action."
  "Tell him to break free of the six moons,
then."
  "He has already done so, Captain. He adds that
was but Kirk had no time now to listen to the
cautions and concerns of Hivar the Toq, or the
superior-minded Lactrans. Primitive
creature or not, it had been given to him and his
fellow savages to successfully bring to a conclusion
this unique hunt.
  For the first time since they'd left Lactra, he
felt in complete command of his ship.
  "Mr. Sulu!" he barked. "Mr. Arex!
Compute new course to bring us around and in behind the
jawanda." Both helmsman and navigator rushed
to comply.
  Sulu looked back alertly moments later.
"Course computed and laid in, sir."
  "All ahead on new heading, warp-factor
five," Kirk ordered.
  Moving far faster than their quarry now, the
Enterprise leaped ahead, circling in a great arc
around the fleeting creature, the ship's powerful engine
enabling it to all but vanish from the jawanda's immediate
vicinity.
  "Any indication it's detected us, Mr.
Spock?" he finally asked when they were moving toward
the creature instead of away from it. The
Enterprise's science officer studied the information fed
back by long-range scanners.
  "AD-PARENTLY it has not changed direction,
Captain. Either it is convinced we are still in
pursuit, or it believes itself no longer
threatened."
  Distance shortened rapidly. "Reduce speed
to warm two, Mr. Sulu. Let's see if
dropping to a velocity below its capabilities
affects it."
  "Still no change, Captain," reported Spock
seconds later. "Corning directly toward us."
A pause; then: "Hivar the Toq expresses some
concern."
  "Thank Hivar for its concern," replied Kirk,
too
  134 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  busy now to worry about diplomatic niceties.
"Slow to warp-factor one, Mr. Sulu."
  "Slowing, Captain. I have visual contact."
A quick adjustment and the jawanda appeared again on the
viewscreen forward. Only now the
  sparkling, rippling shape, a living microthin
continent, was charging toward them at
  war tilde three.
  "It's beginning to slow, Captain," Sulu
reported, a touch of anxiety in his
voice. "Still coming toward us, though."
  "Phasers on low power, Lieutenant."
  "Phasers, sir?" the helmsman inquired
uncertainly.
  "That's right. We're going to try to turn it back
toward the six moons of the Boquian mechanism.
Fire as soon as it comes within range." If it
comes within range, he added silently.
  "Creature is slowing . . . warp-two . . .
warp-one . . . range still decreasing . . . it's not
going to turn or stop in time, sir."
  "fire, Mr. Sulu." Kirk leaned forward and
gripped the arms of the command chair tightly. If they
killed it, they'd have to begin another search.
  "firing," came the helmsman's even reply.
Two dull blue beams jumped across the shrinking
gap toward the onrushing monster, struck the
  ever-twisting surface . . . to no apparent
effect.
  "Jo indication of reaction from the jawanda,
Captain," Spock informed him.
  "Still coming at us, sir." Sulu looked back at
the command chair for instructions.
  "Increase phaser power to half strength, Mr.
Sulu.
  Once more the two beams, this time shining far more
brightly in the darkness, crossed the space between ship and
jawanda. It reacted this time, slowing even further but
for some reason Kirk felt that the decrease in
velocity had nothing to do with the Enterprise's
attack.
  It continued to rush toward them.
  "Full power, Mr. Sulu!" he ordered
hastily. All that could be seen ahead now was the
  lightninglike display
  STAR TREK r OG I3IGHT 135
  of color rippling through the jawanda's substance as it
transformed and dissipated untold energy with the ease of
an earthworm digesting dirt.
  This time the two beams which touched the creature were
intense enough to blind, had not the ship's battle computer
automatically
  compensated for the anticipated brilliance
by suitably adjusting the forward scanners.
  Those two beams, striking with the full energy of the
Enterprise behind them, were capable of piercing the thick
hull of any vessel in existence, of reducing
mountains to rubble and boiling away small seas. They
struck the underside (or perhaps the topside) of the
jawanda.
  Flexible, incredibly tough cells contracted,
reacted where the beams hit. That enormous surface
curled like foil in
  five-hundred-kilometer-wide swirls.
  But it did not stop, did not turn aside, and
did not slow further.
  "tilde We're going to crash, Jim,"
McCoy
  murmured fatalistically, his fascinated gaze
frozen on the viewscreen.
  "All decks, red alert, Lieutenant
Vhura. Brace for collision! Mr. Sulu,
evasion course, warship emergency gravity
compensation!"
  Engines operating near idDe suddenly gulped
great amounts of energy as abrupt demands were made
on the ship's warp-drive units. The
  Enterprise shot forward and to one
  side three tilde tuarters of a second too
late.
  A thin filament of jawanda, a living peninsula,
caught the ship's secondary hull. It was a
small extension of the creature probably only a
few hundred kilometers long and wide.
  A gentle shudder went through the fabric
of the ship. It was felt on the bridge, in the
recreation rooms, in Engineering, throughout. One by one
the exterior scanners went dim as they were covered
by jawanda.
  The body of the monster was so thin that at first the
scanners could penetrate its substance. This lasted
until the jawanda began to fold in on itself, burying
the hull in more and more of its body, minimeter piling
on mil
  136 STAR TREK T OGETGT-TT
  limeter, until the cruiser was completely
enveloped in successive folds of jawanda.
  "Slow again to warp-factor two, Mr. Sulu."
The helmsman complied, but the action had no effect
on the jawanda. It continued to turn in on itself, still
only millimeters thick, but growing deeper and
thicker, like sediment deposited by some strange
intergalactic stream. Total darkness soon showed
on the screen as the jawanda's density finally grew
impenetrable.
  "I've seen a spider do the same thing to its
prey," McCoy muttered, "wrapping it again and again
in folds of silk. When it's finished, it bites
through the silk and his
  "Don't arachnemorphize,
Doctor," interrupted Spock.
  McCoy blinked, his morbid visualisations
temporarily shattered. "Don't what?"
  "Don't ascribe spiderlike characteristics to an
alien being."
  "Captain?"
  Kirk bent quickly to the intercom. "What is it,
Scatty?"
  "I dinna know for sure, sir. We're puttin'
out as much power as usual, but for some reason it's not
being utilised properly in the engines."
  "Mr. Sulu," Kirk asked tightly,
"what's our speed?"
  "Warp-two, Captain ... no, wait a
minute." The helmsman studied his instruments in
disbelief. "That is, we're supposed to be moving
at
  warp tilde two but we're not. In fact, we
seem to be slowing!"
  "if believe I know what is happening,
Captain."
  Kirk looked over at Spock, could sense
Vulcan mind-wheels turning rapidly. "The
jawanda is an energy converter, and a remarkably
efficient one. We are currently putting
out a tremendous amount of radiant energy, compared
to what it normally receives in the comparative emptiness
of intergalactic space. This energy is highly
concentrated, yet available without the threat of an
attendant gravitational field. To the jawanda the
Enterprise must seem a magical apparition of the
greatest delicacy.
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 137
  "Naturally, it wishes to maximize this
  unexpected new food source. By enveloping us
in repeated folds of its absorptive surface,
it is logically attempting to contain all the
radiant energy we produce, trying to prevent it
from escaping into free space."
  "Warp-factor one, Captain," came an
excited voice from the speaker at Kirk's elbow.
"Dilithium crystals showing stress patterns
along interval cleavage planes," the chief
engineer added. "If we don't shut down the drive
now, sir, we risk rosin" any chance of
reactivatin' it."
  Suddenly the awesome depths of the
  intergalactic gulf were pressing intimately
around Kirk's mind. The very possibility of becoming
trapped out here, many light-years away from
the outermost fringes of the Milky Way, let alone
the Federation, was not pleasant to dwell upon.
  "All right, Scotty, if you think it's that
vital, shut down the converters. We'll use
impulse power to maintain life-support functions
only and hope the jawanda isn't so starved it begins
to drain that too."
  "Aye, Captain."
  Kirk heard him shouting commands to assistants and
subordinates. His concern paramount, Scotty even
forgot to sign off.
  Kirk closed the open link to Engineering himself. A
low whine rose in intensity for a brief moment, then
faded to silence, the dying wheeze of an electronic
zephyour. For an instant the lights on the bridge
flickered confusedly before the changeover was complete.
They brightened again, as strong as before, dimmer only in
Kirk's anxious imagination.
  "Any comments on our situation from our alien
guests, Mr. Spock?" the captain inquired
  hopefully.
  Spock listened and informed him, "Hivar the Toq
had not considered the possibility that the ship's
radiation might prove an attraction to the jawanda.
Conversely, the Lactrans are
delighted."
  "Nice to know that the present predicament is
pleasing to someone," McCoy murmured
  sardonically.
  "They commend you on your speed in capturing one
  138 STAR TREK-LGI-IT
  so easily and in such a subtle fashion, and
wonder how soon we can begin the return journey
to Lactra."
  "That's fine, Spock, except our friends have things
a bit mixed up. It's the jawanda who's captured
us, not the other way around." Kirk thought several
uncomplimentary things about Lactrans, for the moment not
caring particularly if his emanations were detected.
Still, he mused, their present troubles were not the fault
of the Lactrans. Nor of Hoar the Toq, whose knowledge of
jawandas had admittedly extended no further than
the atmosphere of Boqu.
  "It is possible, Captain," Spock added,
"that the creature will depart the Enterprise of its own
accord, now that the main generator of radiation on
board has been shut down. I do not think we should
wait for this dubious eventuality. Somehow we must
make it release the ship, at least long enough to permit
us to get safely underway, at a speed
sufficient to prevent a recurrence of the present
awkward situation."
  Awkwardl McCoy shouted silently, amazed as
ever at the first offlcer's capacity for
  understatement.
  "It certainly can't worsen our difficulties
to make the attempt, Spock," agreed a thoughtful
Kirk. He studied the blanked-out scanners for a
moment, then decided, "Let's take a firsthand
look at what we're dealing with. Bones, you come
too."
  McCoy glanced at him curiously. was
"Come"? Come where, Jim?"
  "Outside, of course. We can't tell very much
about the jawanda from in here."
  While McCoy gaped at Kirk, Spock
wondered easily, "Shall I contact Chief Kyle,
Captain?"
  Kirk made a negative gesture. ""No,
Mr. Spock no transporters. The creature
could drain the power from the transporter as fast as it was
renewed, though I don't think it would notice such
a small output of channeled radiation. But I am
concerned that the transporter beam might fail
to penetrate the energysensitive substance
of the creature's body. Remember what Hivar
told us about its screening capabilities? Rather than
take that indeterminate risk, we'll go out
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 139
  through one of the emergency-access ports and hope the
jawanda doesn't decide to suck the energy from our
life-support belts."
  Before long the three men found themselves standing within the
lock of the emergency port nearest the bridge, on
the upper section of the ship's primary hull.
  "Activate life-support systems," Kirk
ordered. Lime-yellow auras instantly enveloped
them all. Kirk saw by McCoy's approving nod
that his own system was functioning properly. That slim
yellowish halo was all that stood between them and the
absolute cold of intergalactic space.
  "Cycle the lock, Mr. Spock." The first
officer touched the necesary switch, and the exterior
door began to slide aside. Kirk felt a
slight pull as the wisps of atmosphere missed
by the ship's recyclers rushed out through the widening gap.
  Looking out, he saw only the expected darkness.
Yet there was something different about it. There should not have
been a total absence of distant light, but there
was.
  Putting out an aura-shielded hand, he
  encountered resistance where none was expected. A
slick rubbery wall sealed the lock exit, though the
slickness was more imagined than felt, since his fingers
did not actually make contact with the jawanda's body.
Experimentally, he pushed. The dark material gave
with surprising flexibility. Kirk had had no
idea what to expect something hard and resistant,
perhaps, or soft like dark jelly. Instead, there was
only this easily elastic smooth- ness.
  For a moment he wondered if this was actually the
body of their continent-sized nemesis. Then he
jumped slightly as several small purple
  coruscations ran in uneven spurts across the
living surface before them. The jawanda was sweating
fire.
  "Wonderful creature," Spock murmured.
  "Let's admire it from a distance, Spock,"
suggested McCoy tersely. "What about trying a
phaser on it, Jim?"
  "Mr. Spock?" Kirk stepped back from the
exit and
  140 STAR TREK EIGHT
  regarded the dark substance expectantly as
Spock removed the small hand phaser from
his waist. The first officer set the beam on low power
and directed it outward.
  Blue light touched the black film blocking the
doorway. Where it contacted the surface of the
creature the material began to glow. The dark
substance turned a light yellow at first. This
melted rapidly into orange, then red, and finally
into a rich purple. The mild assault was
  exquisitely beautiful and wholy ineffective.
  "Try more power, Spock," Kirk advised.
Spock did so, gradually adjusting the phaser
until it was on maximum. The intense emissions
produced only a slight rippling in the jawanda's
body, causing it to retreat outward about half a
meter from the edge of the lock.
  Of course, this could have been due to sheer enjoyment
of the radiation bath as much as to discomfort or injury.
  "That's enough, Mr. Spock," Kirk finally
declared. The first officer flipped off the phaser and
reset it on his waist. Kirk was only slightly
disappointed. He hadn't really expected that the tiny
phaser would be capable of threatening the enormous
organism.
  "It absorbs energy like a sponge, Captain,"
com- mented Spock.
  "What about the ship's main phasers this close
to it?" wondered McCoy.
  Spock considered, "I think the effect would be
essentially the same as before, Doctor: a futile
waste of energy. There is so much jawanda to dissipate
so little power . .. and it could put a severe strain on
our already dangerously
  weakened power supply."
  Kirk studied the blank wall of living
material. The purple glow was fading slowly,
contentedly. "What about the possibilities of a
biological assault, Bones? Some sort of
injection?"
  McCoy almost laughed. "On a creature the
size of North America? As thin as it is, I
think it would handle the most massive dose I could
five it the same way Spock says it would a
blast from our main phasers by dissipating it throughout its
body. That's
  STAR TREK T OG ETGETT 141
  assuming I could concoct something able to affect its
body. There doesn't appear to be anything
remotely resembling a central nerve center, or
even nerves. They might exist, but even if the
creature allowed it, we could vivisect a
few dozen kilometers and miss any vital
points by a week's march.
  "No, thanks, I'm not ready to tackle this.
Give me a nice simple problem instead, like
solving a Boquian epidemic." He gestured
helplessly at the black film blockading the
exit. "I'm sorry, Jim, but there's nothing I
can do."
  "Then that leaves one thing," Kirk said deter-
minedly, "that we haven't tried." After
  double-checking to insure that the gravity specifics
of his life-support system were engaged, he walked
forward, put both hands against the dark
  skin and shoved hard.
  The jawanda's body parted like a torn sheet, and
Kirk's hands went right through.
  Rather than expressing satisfaction, he sounded
abashed. 'iWe overlooked the obvious in favor
of the technical. A common mistake of mechanically
minded civilisations." Using his hands, he widened the
gap. The substance resisted steadily, but continued
to give way under the captain's firm pressure.
  "Follow me." Stepping carefully through the hole,
he walked out onto the surface of the jawanda.
  They emerged facing rearward. Instead of the
sloping back of the Enterprise's primary hull,
flanked by the two torpedo shapes of the
  warp-drive propulsion units, they saw only
a black formlessness. It turned the streamlined
cruiser into a dark nebula of constantly shifting
outline.
  A long tail like the back of a black comet
stretched into the distance aft, glowing now and then with
vibrant sparks and the random
  chromatic streaks of internal lightning
  "Wonder what we look like from a distance,"
McCoy murmured aloud, at once amazed and
  appalled by the sight.
  "The cape of some fantastic giant," Kirk
hypothe
  142 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  sized, "or the image of legendedAzathoth ...
We've become a child's dream, Bones."
  "Or its nightmare," McCoy countered.
  "It is conceivable," Spock ventured, refusing
to be drawn into such useless, illogical
speculation, "that by utilising the manual labor of the
entire ship's complement we could physically remove
the creature from the hull. However, this would prove
futile in the end, since there is no way
to prevent it from reestablishing itself once all hands have
returned inside."
  "I dislike the thought of totally abandoning the ship
to automatics, even for a few minutes"" Kirk
added as they made their way across the black substance.
It rippled eerily underfoot wherever an aura-clad
boot touched down, like concentric circles fleeing a
stone flung into a pond.
  Kirk put a foot down with experimental
  firmness, then raised it quickly. Gently the
material reformed itself over the exposed circlet of
metal, apparently undamaged. Leaning over, he
peered intently at the dark flesh, but could detect
nothing resembling a seam or repaired wound
  "Remarkably efficient in all ways,"
Spock declared, also studying the area where Kirk's
foot had pressed down.
  "Yes. It seems to was He broke off, staring
rearward.
  "What is it, Jim?" a worried McCoy
inquired.
  ""Is it my imagination, Bones, or is the
jawanda starting to move?"
  McCoy looked around, and even as he watched the
activity Kirk thought he had sensed
increased visibly. 'Jo, I see it too,
Jim."
  At the edges the colossal mass seemed to be
rippling and fluttering with greater violence. A moment
later their life-support belts reacted
to similar action underfoot, keeping the men firmly
attached to the immediate surface beneath them as it too began
to move up and down in
  increasingly higher arcs.
  "Captain, I think it best that we reenter the
ship, at least until this sudden activity
subsides."
  "You won't get any argument from me, Spock,"
ad
  STAR TREK T OG BTGHT 143
  misted Kirk readily. He was already moving as
fast as possible back toward the open hatchway.
Despite the knowledge that the life-support systems would
hold them tight to the jawanda, he had to fight down
an urge to drop fiat and hug the surface.
  "Why do you think it's reacting like this, Spock?"
  "There may be any number of reasons,
  Captain," the first officer responded, a smooth
thrust of bodysubstance sending him arching meters above
Kirk and McCoy. Then Spock had
dropped into a low pit and they were looking down at
him.
  "Possibly it is irritated by our presence,
though I think that unlikely. It may be seeking
to realign itself to further maximize its energy
gathering potential. Or ..." He paused. "It
is possible that, with the ship's warp drive units
deactivated, the reason for its enveloping the
Enterprise to be wrapped tightly about a source of
intense and now vanished radiation has disappeared. It
may be preparing to leave."
  "Then I suggest we hurry," advised
McCoy, exercising a bit of understatment himself as
he increased his pace.
  After another couple of minutes had passed,
Kirk slowed his progress across the rolling
surface. Frowning, he muttered, "We should have
reached the hatchway by now." Turning in a slow
circle, he examined the living terrain behind them.
All was shifting, hilly blackness. No comforting
light showed through.
  "As a matter of fact, how are we going
to relocate it? The jawanda is so dense now that the
light from the lock can't penetrate it."
  There was silence, each man wrapped in his
own thoughts. Then McCoy said hesitantly,
pointing, 'I think it was over that way, Jim."
  Slowly they retraced what they hoped had been
their original steps slowly so that they wouldn't
overrun the lock entrance, and also because the jawanda was
now heaving up and down in
  twenty-meter-high ripples. Only plenty of
experience working in low-g environments kept them from
becoming violently ill.
  After five minutes McCoy had to admit that his
  - C tilde
  tilde -
  144 STAR TRIER LOG BIGHT
  guess had been wrong. Kirk and Spock were
equally disoriented.
  "It is imperative that we do not continue to search
blindly about, Captain," Spock declared, his even,
con- trolled tones a great comfort in the fleshy
chaos heav- ing around them. "I believe we must
risk the utilisation of transporter energy to have
ourselves beamed back into the ship. So long as the jawanda
remains attached to the hull, we will never locate the
open lock."
  "I agree," McCoy added quickly, the distant
glow of the Milky Way galaxy bobbing
drunkenly behind them. "Even though the creature
hasn't threatened us, I don't like the idea of being
stuck out here as our life-support charges run
down."
  "We don't know for certain that the jawanda is
harmless, Doctor," Spock observed coolly, not
enhanc- ing McCoy's current state of mind.
  Kirk nodded his assent to Spock, who removed
his communicator from his waist and flipped it open. His
words carried to his two companions as he addressed
the open speaker grid.
  "Spock to Main Transporter Room,
Spock to Main Transporter Room." There was a
silent pause. The first officer looked across at
Kirk. "Acknowledge, Transpor- ter Room."
Still no reply. ""Nothing, Captain not even
normal background noise."
  "Maybe your communicator is malfunctioning,
Spock," Kirk suggested. Reaching down, he
opened his own instrument. "This is the captain speaking.
Transporter Room . . . bridge . . .
anyone receiving, please acknowledge." Only the
emptiness of space sounded from the tiny grid.
  "I should have guessed," Spock broke in, in his
own quiet way furious with himself.
"Naturally the energy- screening abilities of the
jawanda blocks out the weak waves produced by our
communicators. There is only his
  Despite superhuman balance, he lurched
forward as the surface moved beneath them. Kirk nearly
fell back- ward, and McCoy tumbled flat.
  The jawanda, its primary source of radiation now
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 145
  completely cut off, was once again feeling the need
to spread its energy-gathering bulk as wide as
possible to gather the stray radiation drifting across the
intergalactic gulf. The violent contraction which had
thrown everyone off balance was caused by the creature's
beginning to separate from the Erzterprise.
  Kirk fought to keep from screaming in panic as the
starfieldwheeled crazily around them. The energyeater
finally straightened out, having unwound itself from the hull.
  Looking back, Kirk saw the Enterprise behind
them. It was shrinking at a terrifying pace at the
tail end of a vast dark carpet.
  Ahead of them lay nothing but black infinity . .
.
  Kirk rolled over and managed to sit up.
"Communicators, Spock. There's nothing to screen
them out now." But his first officer was already
reaching for the compact instrument, flipping the top open.
  "Spock to Enterprise, Spock to Enterprise
. . . Come in, Enterprise."
  A faint voice barely recognisable as that of the
ship's helmsman issued from the speaker, weak with
increasing distance and distorted by the crackle of
radiant discharge from the jawanda beneath them.
  "Mr. Spock . . . what's happened? Our
scanners are operating again. The jawanda has broken
free and his
  "Transport us back aboard, Mr. Sulu,"
Spock interrupted urgently. "Immediately."
  "What's that, Mr. Spock? I can't . . ."
There was a burst of static. "dis . . quite hear you."
Dimly they heard, "Sensors seem to indicate you
are no longer on the ship's hull. What his
  "Activate engines!" Spock ordered
crisply. "Follow
  146 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  the jawanda and overtake. We are stranded on the
jawanda, repeat, on the jawanda. It is moving out of
visual range. We are his
  "Never mind, Spock," McCoy advised, an
odd tinge in his voice, "they can't hear us any more."
  But Spock persisted, his voice never
breaking as he continued broadcasting. Rapidly the
Enterprise became a shapeless dot, then a star
... and soon was lost to sight as the jawanda sped
away at a rate no living creature should have been
able to attain.
  Three men more isolated than any in the universe
sat themselves with unnatural calm on the Win
surface of their unbelievable steed and took stock
of their situation.
  It was not promising.
  "We are fairly sure the Enterprise is
faster than the jawanda," Spock noted, "but it must
get underway rapidly in order to be able to track
us."
  Glancing to the side, he saw the vast circle
of the home galaxy dominating the darkness like a
gigantic pinwheel.
  "Even if they temporarily lose contact with
us," McCoy pointed out, with more confidence than he
felt, "they ought to be able to pick up the energy
field surrounding the creature. We located it in
empty space once before, by the sound it emits. No
reason why Sulu and Uhura shouldn't be able to do it
again." He essayed a timorous smile.
  "All very true, Doctor," an almost
but not quite shaky Vulcan voice agreed, "unless the
ship's instrumentation locks onto another of the
creatures. If that happens and the ship follows a
different jawanda for even a short while, we could be
carried far beyond easy sensor range."
  "Thanks, Spock," McCoy muttered
morosely. "A can always depend on you to cheer me
up."
  Absently he ran a hand over the smooth
obsidian film beneath them. Glowing phosphorescence
trailed his hand, like the night wake produced by a
boat traveling one of Earth's oceans. "I've
been marooned on several worlds and a few moons before,
but never on a living creature."
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 147
  "We've discovered a flying carpet that would as-
tound humanity's ancient story-tellers," Kirk
mused. "I wonder where it's carrying us."
  It was amazing, he reflected, how rapidly he
had adjusted to the possibility they might never be
found. At least they would die in space, and quickly,
when the energy powering their
  life-support belts gave out or was drained
away by the jawanda. His gaze moved again to the lambent
spiral of the Milky Way. A more fitting
subject for the final sight of a starship captain could
not be imagined . . .
  As had so often been the case in times past,
Captain Kirk's resignation proved
premature. Spock had been standing rigid for long
moments, almost at attention. When he spoke again, his
voice was relaxed.
  "There is no need for concern any longer,
Captain. The Enterprise is tracking us."
  McCoy scrambled to his feet, and together he and
Kirk stared rearward or at least in the direction
Spock was facing, it was impossible to determine
true direction. Kirk strained, could see nothing but
distant star clusters and nebulae, not even a moving
point which might turn out to be the ship.
  "How can you tell, Spock? I can't make out a
thing."
  "I am in communication with one on board. The
connection at this distance is tenuous, but with no other
intelligent minds around us his
  "The Lactrans!" McCoy exclaimed.
  "Yes, the Lactrans," Spock confirmed.
"While they have been unable to assist in the capture
of the jawanda, it seems that their presence has
produced an unexpected but welcome
benefit. The young one is in communication with its
parents, who relay instructions through it to Mr.
Sulu and Mr. Arex."
  Shortly thereafter the most beautiful sight in the
universe hove into view: the Enterprise. It
grew to the size of a small Dower and finally loomed
huge behind them.
  Or perhaps now it was before them, since they seemed
to be rushing toward it. Kirk studied the ship
  148 STAR TREK LOG ETGTIT
  as the first fold of jawanda reached outward.
Spock's comment mirrored his own thoughts.
  "The creature is once more rushing at the
Enterprise, sensing the nearness of renewed radiation
from her engines."
  Behind them, a towering black wave was curling
overhead, arcing downward like an onyx tsunami. It
blotted out the bright glow of the home galaxy, surged
ahead and downward. All three men had to fight down
an unusual tendency to
  claustrophobia as the black curtain descended
on them. No crushing weight shoved them flat as they
hurried toward the nearing hull. The blackness
settled with feathery lightness. Each time a new
fold of jawanda curled over them, they
pushed upward with stiff arms and forced a temporary
gap in the creature's body, emerging into the starlight
again and again.
  Finally the jawanda stopped wrapping itself about the
ship. They found themselves standing once more on a
black-coated hull, unable to recognize a single
feature through the amorphous structure of the
creature.
  "We're right back where we started," McCoy
observed, sighing heavily. "I can't say I'm
disappointed."
  "On the contrary, Doctor, we are not back where
we started," objected Spock. "I am still in
contact with the Lactrans." Turning slowly, he
faced toward the front of the ship and pointed. "That
way."
  Following the first officer's lead, they walked over
to an area which looked no different from any other, or
from the one they'd just left. Spock gestured
slightly ahead and down. "We're here,
Captain."
  Kneeling uncertainly, Kirk reached out and shoved
with both hands. Once again the multiple folds of
jawanda parted but this time a gleam appeared in the opening
thus produced. It was the most welcome
sight Kirk had seen in a long time.
  Widening the gap with his hands and with McCoy's
help, they were soon able to slip back into the comforting
closeness of the emergency lock. Undamaged, the
  STAR TREK BY BIGHT 149
  jawanda reformed behind them, shutting out the universe
once more.
  Spock activated the lock and it cycled shut
behind them. Atmosphere was automatically pumped
into the chamber as soon as the airtight telltale
went on, and the all-clear sounded a second later.
Gratefully, Kirk deactivated his
life-support belt, as did Spock and
McCoy. The doctor opened the inner door.
  A large, cylindrical mass the color of lead
filled the corridor beyond. Kirk still could not tell
when the young Lactran was standing or sitting or if those
terms had any referent to Lactrans. He had the
impression that the youthful alien was regarding them
attentively.
  "It apologises, Captain," Spock
announced.
  "Apologizes?" Kirk wondered if the
surprise was as clear in his mind as it was in his
voice. "Its parents just saved our
lives." He returned the creature's eyeless
stare. "We are more grateful than we can his
  "Nevertheless, it persists in its apologetic
attitude, Captain. The sudden disengagement of the
jawanda which carried us away from the ship caught it and
its parents by surprise."
  "They weren't the only ones," Kirk countered
feelingly.
  "They are sorry for the delay incurred in
directing the ship to us, and hope that our simple
minds have not suffered any damage as a result of this
negligence."
  "Tell them our primitive cogmtive
apparatus is functioning normally," Kirk
replied with a grin. ""If they hadn't acted when
they did, we wouldn't be functioning
  Making a strange weaving motion with its
multipledigited front end, the Lactran
adolescent turned and scuttled off down the
corridor.
  "It begs to be excused, Captain. It wishes
to visit its parents. The strain involved in reaching
across such a distance has weakened them. We must
return to the hunt, they insist with the foreknowledge that this
time they may not be able to help us."
  "Prom now on we're going to stay inside the
ship,"
  150 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  declared McCoy. "You can tell them that,
Spock."
  He turned to Kirk. "What now, Jim?" he
asked as he set his life-support belt in its
proper rack, making sure the recharge light was
on.
  His('Back to the Bridge, Bones. Prom there
. . . I don't know. Any ideas?"
  Neither McCoy nor Spock had come up with the
hoped-for miracle solution by the time the turbolift
deposited them on the bridge. Kirk acknowledged
the warm yet restrained welcomes of the crew as
Spock moved to his science station. McCoy
relaxed nearby.
  "I have a small theory, Captain," Spock
announced, sitting down in his chair.
  "Pursue it, Mr. Spock." The first
officer's theories often turned out to be more solidly
grounded than many supposed facts. Spock bent
to the library-computer console with a will.
  Glancing at the main viewscreen, Kirk was
rewarded with the expected picture of dull
blackness occasionally enlivened by scratchy streaks of
maroon-and-emerald lightning
  "Status, Mr. Sulu?"
  This time it was not necessary for the
  helmsman to check his instrumentation. "The jawanda
has once more enveloped the Enterprise, Captain.
As soon as we learned that you were safely back
aboard, Mr. Scott deactivated the drive
again." Sulu gazed uncertainly back at him.
"What do we try now, sir?"
  Hiswere' don't know, Lieutenant." Kirk
considered. "For our purposes the creature reacts
favorably to physical pressure, but I can't have
hundreds of people out on the hull shoving and pushing.
Energy weapons are useless against it in fact, they
probably strengthen it. A photon torpedo might
have some effect, but we can't very well explode one
against the creature when its body is only
millimeters from the ship. Besides, we want
to capture it whole, not chop it to pieces. The
devil of it is, we have the jawanda right where we want
it. Only we can't use the warp-drive engines
to carry it and ourselves back to Lactra."
  "A moment, Captain," Spock requested, as
Kirk was
  STAR TREK too 151
  trying to think of a way to utilize the jawanda's
docility under physical pressure. The first
officer was bent over the main readout from the
  library-computer console.
  "I am concluding certain calculations. There."
  He looked up, staring for a moment into
  nothingness, before turning to Kirk and informing him, "The
Lactrans also believe the idea is feasible, though
dangerous. They refuse to support or to reject
the proposal."
  . "What proposal?" Kirk wondered
guardedly.
  "To impel the jawanda to release us by
  providing too much of what it wants. In a word,
we shall appeal to its sense of gluttony."
  "I'm not sure I understand what you're driving
at, Spock.",
  "Consider, Captain. When we collided with the
creature we were moving, according to final readout, at
warp tilde four, coming up to warpffix, which we never
fully attained. If we suddenly fed a sustained
burst of emergency power to the engines, the equivalent
of war tilde factor seven or eight, it is
possible that the surfeit of energy of food
would dangerously strain the creature's absorptive
capacities.
  "It would have two choices: to burst from
overconsumption or abandon its hold on the
Enterprise. If the former happens, we will at least
be free to search for another jawanda, with our knowledge of its
abilities and habits enlarged. If the laker, we
may be able to engage the Boquian mechanism before the
engorged creature can escape.",
  "It sounds good," admixed McCoy hopefully.
"Why are the Lactrans leery of trying it?"
  "Their reasons are twofold, Doctor. Should the
jawanda nor be overloaded by the surge of energy, we
run the risk as stated by Engineer Scott of losing
our war tilde drive capability altogether. This would
leave us with only impulse power on which to recross
a considerable amount of space." His gaze
momentarily checked a figure displayed on one of the
science station's several screens.
  "On impulse power it would take us
  approximately three hundred and
sLxty-five standard years to reach
  152 STAR TREK BOG BIGHT
  the outskirts of our galaxy, with the Federation a good
deal farther away. That is assuming the
engine components last that long."
  "Let's hope we don't have to try it," Kirk
said. "What about our guests' other concern?"
  "It has already been mentioned, Captain,"
Spock declared. "They worry about damage to the
specimen."
  Kirk forebore formulating his first thoughts. It
wouldn't do to insult someone who had just saved your
life.
  "Any other proposals, Spock?" he asked,
hoping for an alternative that carried less of an
air of finality.
  "I am afraid not, Captain. This course of
action seems to offer our best hope of breaking
clear."
  Kirk sighed and activated the armchair pickup.
"Engineering?"
  "Scott here. What is it, Captain?"
  "Scatty, this creature drinks radiant
energy. Since we can't pull away from it, we're
going to have to try to convince it to let us go by generating a
cosmic bellyache. Somehow we've got to overfeed
it. I'm going to want maximum emergency power from
the converters for as long as you can provide it."
  "Aye, Captain," the chief engineer
assented reluctantly. "I dinna know how long
we can maintain it, the way that monster drains our
production."
  "We want it to drain us, Scotty until it's
sick of it. Keep the converters functioning for as long
as you can. This has to work."
  "I understand, Captain," Scott replied
solemnly. "Engineerin' out."
  Kirk clicked off and looked forward. "Mr.
Arex?" The Edoan navigator acknowledged, his
bony-ridged skull turning three soulful eyes
on the captain.
  "Yes, sir?"
  "If we do succeed in breaking free of the
creature, we're going to want to come back for it .
. . monumental pain in the stern that it's been.
We're liable to break completely free at
  warp-seven or warp-eight, so you'll have to try
to retain a position fix on it."
  "You'll manage, Captain."
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 153
  "I know you will, Mr. Arex." He studied first the
living dark matter covering the scanner, then the
viewscreen, while searching for a flaw in Spock's
reasoning and finding none. How many times, he
mused, had he found himself betting his existence and that of
his crew on a cut of the deck by Fate. His
record for turning up aces was unblemished ... so
far. It was time again to try to extend the streak: "Mr.
Sulu, all ahead warp-factor seven, emergency
power."
  "Engaged, Captain," came the response from the
helm.
  A steady whine began to sound, more felt than
audible. It rose to a pitch just shy of setting
everyone's teeth on edge, then held steady. Instead
of the normal rush of lights across the screen, they
continued to see only blackness. A minute passed,
two, three . . . Angry jagged bolts of
crimson and gold began to race bizarrely through that
living film. Four minutes, five . . .
  "It doesn't seem to be having any effect,
Captain," Spock reported calmly, his gaze
locked to the gooseneck viewer. "The jawanda is still
wrapped completely around us."
  "Increase to maximum emergency overdrive,
Mr. Sulu." Kirk said. "Warp-factor
eight."
  Sulu hesitated the briefest instant, started
to look backward, then murmured a tight
"Yes, sir" instead.
  The whine became a painful drone like the keening of a
single gigantic bee. Kirk felt a faint
throb through the metal structure of the command chair as the
ship's fabric sought to remain intact under the
enormous energies generated by her engines.
  Six minutes, seven, eight . .. a voice
shouting from the intercom, barely recognisable,
"Captain, we canna hold this much longer!
Converters are beginnin" to fail."
  "Warp-factor seven, sir," Sulu suddenly
announced. "Waro-factor six, five . . ."
  Kirk snapped at the intercom "Scotty,
maintain full emergency power! Never mind
Protecting the converters now, we need everything you can
his
  "That's what we're givin'. Captain," the
chief en
  154 STAR TREK BOG BIGHT
  gineer countered. "I'm tryin' to tell you the
energy's not bein' translated into thrust. That thing's
sucking up everything we can generate and searching for more his
  "Warp-factor four," Sulu declared worriedly
The bone-grating whine of emergency overdrive had
long since faded, along with its comforting
throb of power.
  "We must make a final decision immediately,
Captain," exclaimed an anxious Spock, "or
the converters will permanently collapse."
  Kirk's gaze was fixed on the viewscreen,
fascinated by the now continual display of lightning so
brilliant the battle compensators were hard
pressed to sop the intensity to below pain threshold. Every
hue of the rainbow was present in those unending discharges
as the jawanda fought to dissipate surplus energy.
Kirk wished he could be Boating free in space
nearby. The trailing cometlike portion of the jawanda
must present a spectacular sight. Indeed, an
unsuspecting observer who chanced to pass through the immediate
spatial vicinity would see jawanda and Enterprzse
as a colossal ablate opal, lit with internal
fire
  Kirk was about to order an end to the seemingly
futile effort when the colors vanished, revealing the
far plainer but much more welcome isolated lights of
distant galaxies pinwheeling through the gulf.
  "We're clears" McCoy yelped joyously.
  "Disengagement confirmed, Doctor," concurred
Spock, considerably less exuberantly. "It
worked ... barely."
  "The creature is falling rapidly off screen
astern, sir," Arex announced, in a tone almost as
relaxed as Spock'..
  "Warp-factor five," Sulu declared,
"factor six and increasing."
  "Reduce speed to war tilde four, Mr.
Sulut" Kirk or- dered quickly. "Don't lose
our quarry, Mr. Arex."
  "Not to worry, Captain," the navigator
assured him, examining his own sensor readouts. "It
is now by far the most obvious object in the heavens,
due to the amount of energy it continues to radiate."
  "Plot a return curve to bring us directly
back at the
  STAR TREK LOG MIGHT 155
  creature, Mr. Arex. We can't waste time and
allow * to regain its flexibility in converting
energy." He voiced a quick question to the arm pickup:
"Scotty how are the engines?"
  "Recoverin' rapidly, Captain," the chief
engineer reported, the strain of the last minutes
evident in his voice, "but it was a near thing. I
wouldn't like to chance it again."
  "We're going to do our best not to, Scotty,"
the Captain assured him, before clicking
off. His stare moved repeatedly from helm
to viewscreen. "What about the jawanda, Mr. Arex?
Is it trying to escape?"
  "It does not appear to be succeeding, if such is
its intention, sir," the Edoan announced carefully.
"It is moving away from us, but very slowly, and in an
erratic manner."
  "Bloated," McCoy decided firmly. "The
overload was too much for its converters to handle. I'd
venture to say that its whole system has been
affected."
  "The Lactrans," Spock put in, gazing
momentarily at the wall before him, "hope there is no
permanent damage."
  "We do too," admitted Kirk, "so long as the
alternative doesn't turn out to be rapid
recovery."
  "It is continuing to move away, Captain,"
Arex said softly, "but more slowly now."
  "Sensors indicate it is discharging energy at an
incredible rate, Captain," declared Spock. "It
may be regaining some of its ability."
  "I wonder Spock, do you think it's capable of
anger?"
  "I don't know, Captain. But the
instinct to defend oneself is basic to many very
primitive organisms." He eyed Kirk
expectantly. "You have something in mind?"
  "Somehow, Spock, we have to distract it long enough for
Hivar to engage the capture
  mechanism. If the creature doesn't actually
conceive of us as a threat, it should at least regard the
ship as a challenge. By now it should be dazed and
disoriented its present movements indicate that. I
can only see one way to
  156 STAR TREK LOG EI -- T
  draw it within range of the Boquian device and
that's to tempt it into chasing us."
  "Jiml" McCoy exclaimed, startled. "If
it manages to envelop us again . . ."
  "A know it's a risk, Bones, but we've got
full motive power back. We'll have to cut it
close, but if it gets too close we can
outspurt it at the last moment." I hope, he
added silently.
  Spock helped him make up his mind. 'I
agree it should be tried, Captalu."
  'what do the Lactrans think?"
  Spock listened silently. "They are agreeable
to anything which has as its final purpose the
capture of a jawanda."
  "Good. Mr. Sulu, slow our speed gradually.
I want it to look like we're having trouble of our
own."
  "Slowing, Captain," the helmsman responded.
"Should I notify Engineering?"
  Kirk considered and half smiled as he replied,
"Better not, Lieutenant. I can guess Chief
Scott's picturesque opinion of this idea."
He became an seriousness again as a pulsing spot
appeared on the viewscreen, an object the size
of his thumbnail, a seething pool of colon
  Pat and sassy, he thought. Probably thickened
its waistline by an enormous amount maybe even
another whole miBimeter. If the monster had the
instincts of an amoeba, it should be spoiling to defend
itself against anything that smacked of an attack
particularly an attack by a source of food.
StiUs, the jawanda's ability to relieve itself of
excess energy remained an unknown, unmeasurable
factor. As important as the time factor was,
they would have to proceed with caution.
  "Speed of target, Mr. Arex?"
  "Still moving away from us, Captain,
  approximately warp-factor one
point two two."
  "Spock, we're counting on its reacting like any
other living organism, but we still have no idea how
advanced it really is. Any chance it could be
intelligent?"
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT I57
  That, he thought, might complicate events
considerably.
  "I doubt it, Captain," the first officer declared,
glancing up from his instrumentation. "Its instincts should be
quite primitive. It gives every indication of existing
only to perform three basal functions: eating,
excreting, and reproducing."
  "I agree. It better ... I'm tired of
surprises, es- pecially potentially lethal
ones. Is Hivar the Toq ready?"
  Spock paused. "The Boqus is standing by its
equipment, Captain. An elements of the
  mechanism are in readiness."
  "Position?"
  "Still too far away." Not that Kirk had
expected any other reply they would have to draw the
dazed awanda into the trap.
  "Captain!" Kirk looked back to Arex. "The
creature is turning It has reversed its
direction and is now moving toward us."
  "Mr. Sulu, you are aware of the position of the
Boquian mechanism?" Kirk inquired
hurriedly. The helmsman nodded confirmation.
"Change course then, to take us through its canter.
Continue to slow speed toward warp tilde factor
one."
  "Coming about, sir . . . slowing."
  Long minutes passed, while the jawanda, its thin
body still blazing with all the fury of a translucent
reactor, expanded on the screen with startling speed.
The reason was evident: The Enterprise had
to change course in a wide curve, while the
jawanda had simply folded in on itself, in effect
going instantly into reverse.
  "It's closing on us, sir," Sulu announced.
"Coming on at warp-factor one point . . .
warp-two." He threw a hasty glance over his right
shoulder. "Should I increase our own speed?"
  "Steady as she goes, Mr. Sulu,"
responded Kirk calmly, his eyes never leaving the
viewscreen.
  A shorter pause, then, "Still gaining rapidly
on us,
  How beautiful it was, Kirk had
to admit to himself.
  158 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  Rippling, convulsing in smooth arcs of its body,
the jawanda enlarged to illl the rear scanners,
emitting energy in glowing discharges hundreds of
kilometers long. What other inhabitant of the
universe, however high, however low, sweated such
magnificence?
  "Captain," Sulu began worriedly.
  "It's all right, Mr. Sulu. Attention to your
station." He flicked a look sideways. "Mr.
Spock?"
  "Another minute yet, Captain."
  Kirk considered. The jawanda was almost within contact
distance of the ship's war tilde drive units. If
he accelerated, he chanced discouraging the creature.
Or, worse, making it wary. Was it still angry or
hungry enough to continue following them, even if he
speeded up? Or would it
  "We are within the cage, Captain," Spock
an- nounced sharply. "Hivar has activated the
mechanism." The first officer watched with interest through
the images funneled to him from the Lactrans as
Hivar the Toq drew strange sounds and lights from
the free-form shape of the Boquian console
with smooth movements of
  many-jointed crystalline limbs.
  "Quarry is slowing, sir," reported Sulu.
"Showing indications of uncertainty in its pursuit."
  "It senses the collapsing gravity wells,"
Kirk murmured. Was the jawanda capable in its
  energy-engorged state of breaking clear of the cage?
  "Slow to warp-one, Mr. Sulu."
  "Reducing speed ... It's beginning to change
course, sir."
  "Definitely suspicious now," muttered
McCoy, staring raptly at the screen. They were about
to play out the last act of the drama begun
  seemingly so long ago, back on the surface of
Lactra.
  'Mull course change," Arex announced, "and
it is accelerating."
  "Bring us about on a pursuit course, Mr.
Sulu ... but slowly. Let's see if it can
break free."
  The Enterprise commenced another wide curve, which
would bring it around behind the jawanda again if Kirk chose
to give the order to increase ship
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 159
  velocity, for the energy-eater was now
fleeing in the opposite direction.
  Kirk knew that if it broke free of the
Boquian mechanism they would never be able
to approach within capture range again.
  "It's slowing, sir," Sulu declared
positively. "Slowing . . . It s stopped!"
  On the heels of the helmsman's announcement,
Spock informed them, "Hivar pronounces itself
satisfied as to the mechanism's performance. All
six moons have been properly aligned, and the jawanda
is trapped by their gravity."
  "tilde or how long?" McCoy whispered,
gesturing at the screen. "Look."
  Twisting and writhing like confetti in a tornado, the
jawanda was rushing in tight circles around the inside
of its invisible cage. Incredible bursts of pure
energy bristled on its surface as it hunted
frenetically for a hole in the trap.
  Accelerating breathtakingly to warp-three it probed
violently at the weakest points of the cage, between the
moons. But no matter which way it darted, it could not
escape me attraction of at least four of the
controlled satellites. The octahedra] prison
proved secure.
  "That's a lot of energy it's throwing
off," Kirk noted. "Mr. Sulu, activate
our defensive screens."
  The helmsman touched several switches not a
minute too soon, it turned out, as something powerful
shook the bridge. There was a pause and then a
second enormous purple bolt of energy crossed
the space between ship and jawanda.
  "It may not be intelligent," Kirk observed,
stilling the slight shaking in his hands, "but it's not blind
and helpless, either." He knew the power of the
Enterprise's defensive screens, but it was one thing
to consider them from the standpoint of abstract statistics
and another to do so while looking down the throat of an
energy charge as big around as one of the ship's
warp-drive units.
  As Kirk ordered the cruiser to back off as far
as
  160 STAR TREK LOG EIGIIT
  possible, the madly convulsing jawanda continued
to throw harmless if awesome bolts at them.
  Spock observed dispassionately, "We already know
that the creature is able to transmute great
quantities of energy, Captain. It is not
surprising that so efficient a converter should be capable
of utilizing its ability to discharge excess
energy for defensive purposes."
  They remained in position while the attacks from the
jawanda decreased steadily in intensity.
  "Damage report, Lieutenant Uhura?"
  "All negative, Captain," she replied.
"All decks and stations report no injuries and
no damage, although Engineering reports that the first
several charges put considerable stress on the
defensive screens. Since then, however, they
report all attacks shunted aside with ease."
  Kirk's attention went once again to the screen.
Save for throwing an isolated spark toward the
Enterprise, the jawanda had apparently given up
its assault. Its movements, also, were much
subdued. There was no more violent spinning about and
contorting. Now it drifted in one place, its
black surface rippling slowly like the stomach of
an exhausted, overweight man drawing in painful
breaths after a long run.
  Bright bursts of light continued to show within its great
body, but they came in fitful spurts now instead
of the regular patterning previously observed.
  "We've tired it out, I think," Kirk commented.
"Is the Boqus ready to move, Mr. Spock?"
  The first officer nodded. "Hivar
indicates that the ancient components are performing
well. Given a modest amount of power to feed to the
control console, it foresees no difficulty in
sustaining the cage indefinitely. The Lactrans,"
he added unnecessarily, "are overjoyed at our
success."
  "We're not in orbit around Lactra yet,"
Kirk pointed out. "I'll accept congratulations
later. What about the possibility of our prisoner
absorbing fresh strength from the radiation we'll
encounter once we reenter the denser region of our
galaxy?"
  "All the energy it could assimilate from passing
stars
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 161
  cannot possibly match the quantity it has already
sapped and discharged from the warp-drive engines,
Captain," the first officer insisted, after performing
several calculations on the ship's computer. "We have
already handled its best assault without damage."
  "That's all I wanted to know. Mr. Arex?"
  "Captain?"
  "Plot a course to Lactra, presumably
retracing our original tack via Boqu. Mr.
Sulu, ahead warp-factor three."
  Their acknowledgments sounded
  simultaneously, and soon the Enterprise was again
Lactra-bound. Kirk's attention was still focused
on their giant captive. He hoped Hivar the
Toq was concentrating as intensely on his mechanism.
They couldn't dare allow the jawanda even a small
chance to escape.
  But the octahedral cage formed by the six moons
kept the energy-eater locked between them, dragging it
smoothly along as they sped back toward the galaxy
although Kirk would have employed a term weaker than
"sped," since at warp-three, they seemed to crawl
along. But they were restricted to the maximum speed of
which the old engines in the moons were capable.
  During the following days Kirk had ample time
to inspect that remarkable Boquian relic, its
peculiar power leads, and the strange broadcast
antennas temporarily installed on the epidermis
of the Enterprise antennas which somehow carried
Hivar's instructions through the shapeless console to the
six satellites caging the jawanda.
  "Remarkable piece of instrumentation," Spock
commented, bending to study the back of the console. It
looked no different from the front.
  "Prompted by a remarkable need," thought
Hivar.
  "How was it built?" inquired Kirk, wondering
if it would last the duration of the journey back
to Lactra.
  "I do not know . . . I was able to learn only how
to operate it." Hivar's concern mirrored Kirk's
own. "The sooner we deposit the creature in
orbit around your
  162 STAR TREK BOG BIGHT
  other guests" home world, the better I will
feel, as it will signal the beginning of my return
to Boqu."
  The intercom buzzed for attention, and Kirk moved
to acknowledge the call. "Bulk
  Transporter Room Three. This is the
captain speaking."
  "Lieutenant Uhura here, sir." There was an
underlying hint of anxiety in that dulcet tone which
made Kirk pay closer attention.
  "Trouble, Lieutenant?"
  "It's not certain, sir. According to Mr. Sulu, the
creature is generating an unusual amount of
energy. I've confirmed its output with my own
instruments."
  "You mean it's throwing energy bolts at
us again?"
  "No, sir." Kirk relaxed considerably,
even though they'd already successfully fended off one
such attack. "The discharge is in the form of radio
waves."
  "We already know that the jawanda is capable of
producing those, Uhura," Kirk reminded her.
"I presume you've detected something out of the
ordinary about its present output or you wouldn't have
called it to my attention."
  "I think so, sir," she said slowly. "The
emissions are in short, intense bursts of a type
previously unrecorded. I have no idea what
significance this holds, if any. But it's such an
extreme departure from everything the creature has
generated so far that I thought you'd wish to be
notified."
  "Rightly so, Lieutenant. I've no more idea
than you what the meaning of this new activity is."
He glanced back toward the attentive Spock.
  "Nor have I, Captain," he admitted.
  "Keep monitoring the output, Lieutenant,"
Kirk ordered her, "and begin taping." He flipped
off the intercom and looked at the curious Boqus.
"You'll have to continue the explanation of the
mechanism's history later, Hivar. It's
probably nothing, but . . ."
  "But what, Captain Kirk?" came the thought,
strong and heady.
  "It's probably nothing." Kirk decided he
was worrying unnecessarily over a harmless new
phenomenon, when he had plenty of known
  dangers to plague him
  STAR TREK LOG 163
  self with. A few moments of study should suffice;
then he could dismiss the development from his mind. But
those few moments were not to be ignored. Their knowledge of
jawandas still bordered on the nonexistent.
  On returning to the bridge, Kirk's first
instructions were for Uhura to play back some of the
noise the jawanda had already produced. As it turned
out, recordings weren't required.
  "It hasn't let up, sir," the communications
officer informed him. "It continues to repeat the same
pattern, identically modulated as the initial
outburst. Here, I'll put what it's currently
broadcasting onto the speakers." Her hands adjusted
controls.
  An earsplitting shriek drenched the bridge in
bonegrating waves of sound. Kirk's hands
went instinctively to his head. That soul-rending howl
was piercing his skull over and over. The impression was
worse than the actuality, since it was barely a
couple of seconds before Uhura could reduce the
volume to a bearable level.
  "I'm sorry, sir," she apologised
contritely. "I thought I'd reduced the level
considerably." She eyed an isolated readout
angrily. "Here's the trouble the creature has
intensified its output tremendously since I fist
contacted you." She shook her head in awed
amazement. "The amount of energy it's putting out is
just incredible, sir."
  "I see. Mr. Spock, your opinion?"
  Spock concluded his preliminary sensor study
of the new emissions and looked up thoughtfully. "Perhaps
it is merely another form of energy release,
Captain, an instinctive reaction to the unusual
situation in which it presently finds itself, akin in spirit
if not function to the defensive charges it attacked
us with before.
  "At first I suspected that the noise might
merely be the normal energy discharge of the creature,
its intensity the result of all the radiation it had
absorbed from the Enterprise. Now that I have
heard it, I begin to doubt this explanation. My
uncertainties are compounded by Lieutenant
Uhura's insistence that these dis
  164 STAR TREK I OG BrGHT
  charges are of a type previously not detected."
  She nodded ready confirmation. "Beyond the normal
excretion of surplus energy, I cannot begin
to imagine what function these violent pulsations have
Wait . . . wait
  . . .
  A clumsy grey shape squeezed out of the
turbolift onto the bridge. The young Lactran
was already in close communication with Spock.
  "The youth is relaying concern from Hivar the
Toq," the first officer explained thickly. "The
Boqus wishes to hear the sound for itself."
  Kirk, picturing the eyeless, earless Boquian
scientist, wondered if it "heard" in the same
fashion as humans, or if the sound waves were
absorbed uniformly across its sensitive
crystalline surface. The latter was quite likely.
The sound conductivity of crystals was known on Earth
as far back as the Dark Ages.
  "Pipe the broadcast through to the transporter
chamber the Boqus is located in,
Lieutenant," Kirk directed Uhura.
  Her hands again adjusted controls. "Transporter
Room locked into circuit, sir," she replied.
  Something about the sound must have been familiar to the
Boqus, because Spock's relayed response
followed immediately on Uhura's
  announcement.
  "Hivar recognises the sound, Captain. There
are recordings of identical vibrations on Boqu,
and al- though they are extremely ancient Hivar
insists the duplication here is unmistakable."
  "Duplication of what?"
  "A jawanda distress call."
  That caused Kirk to pause, all right! There was
only one possible corollary, but he asked the question
anyway. "Distress call? To others of its own
kind?"
  Spock turned to face him, though his gaze
remained focused on a point halfway between the command
chair and the science station. "Exactly, Captain."
  Rapidly Kirk performed some crude
  calculations in his head, then relaxed slightly.
Even if his estimations were a little off, there was still no
reason to panic. "We could do without visits from our
captive's cousins,
  STAR TREK 165
  Spock, but, judging from its initial attack, and
taking into account that we'll be prepared this time, our
screens ought to be able to handle energy charges from a
modest swarm of jawandas. Particularly from jawandas
who haven't been sucking up energy from our engines.
No, I don't see much reason for concern.
We're already traveling at war tilde mree.
Even if the calls are picked up, even if a
few of me creatures have an intercept angle on
us prior to our reentering the galactic field,
they'll have only their natural store of energy
to draw upon." He started to rise, intending to return
to the transporter room to conclude me examination of the
Boqus's console.
  "Hivar the Toq begs to differ with you,
Captain," countered Spock. "Hivar urges that in
the event another of the creatures is contacted, we
release our captive and accelerate away as
rapidly as possible."
  A thoroughly stunned Kirk settled slowly
back into his chair. "But ... why? For what
reason? My evaluation his
  "The Lactrans are arguing strongly against such a
possible course of action," the first officer
continued. "Hivar sidesteps. It insists that such an
eventuality is unlikely, but that it must be
considered."
  "I still don't see why." Kirk frowned.
  "The Boqus is embarrassed, Captain. It
has withheld information, in the manner of the Lactrans,
but claims that in this case it was only to" the first
officer strained, trying to translate alien concepts
"spare us needless worry. Hivar now feels that me
worry is needful. The Lactrans could not know, but
Hivar explains Mat if the old records are
correct, we have captured an
  immature jawanda."
  McCoy spoke for me first time since Kirk and
Spock had returned to the bridge. He had
  remained unusually silent, standing by the engineering
station and listening to the strange moans of their
captive. But this latest information moved him to comment.
  "You mean mat monster is a baby?"
  "Equivalent terminology has not existed in
reference
  166 STAR TREK LOG LIGHT
  to jawandas, Doctor, but in the present situation
Hivar feels it is appropriate."
  "Then how big," McCoy wanted to know
or did he, he wondered "does an adult
jawanda grow?"
  "No one knows," Spock murmured. There was
silence on the bridge.
  Xl
  "Hivar is struggling to recall long-dormant,
little-used knowledge, Captain," Spock finally said into the
lingering silence. "The estimate of our captive's
immaturity is based on such information. The largest
jawanda the Boqus were ever forced to drive away was .
. . a moment . . ."
  The pause was too much for an impatient
McCoy, who soon pressed, "Was what,
Spock?"
  "Please, Doctor," the first officer cautioned
calmly. "I am attempting with Hivar's aid
to convert ancient Boquian measurements to
  Federation equivalents." A longer pause; then
he announced firmly, "The largest specimen
recorded by the ancients was approximately two
hundred ten thousand by fifty-two thousand
kilometers. That is only an approximation,
remember."
  Kirk tried to envision a living creature with a
surface area five times that of the Earth and
gave up. "That's only the largest the Boqus know
of. I suppose . . ." He hesitated, and the question
came out in a whisper. "The possibility exists that
there could be larger ones?"
  "As a matter of fact," Spock agreed,
readily confirming Kirk's worst imaginings, "the
  planet-bound Boqus theorized from specimens they
observed and far-distant radiation they recorded that
exceptionally mature jawandas could grow considerably
larger."
  "How big," the captain queried masochistically,
"is "considerably"?" He was still trying to adjust
to the in
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 167
  formation that the continent-sized energy-eater trailing
them was but a midget of its kind.
  "Hivar suggests without humor that you use your
imagination, Captain. Theoretically, there is no
upper limit. There are no physiological
restraints on a jawanda's growth, and nothing is
known of their age. Hivar goes on to say that there is
no reason to suppose that, barring a collision with a
star, a jawanda could not grow to the size of a sun.
Though he reminds us that this is only theory."
  "How encouraging," muttered a dazed
McCoy.
  ""Never mind, Spock," declared Kirk
suddenly. "I have no desire to tangle with anything
even half the size of that old recorded
supergiant, whether the Boquian mechanism can
shove it around or not. But it win take something that
size, which can demonstrate its power, to make us
abandon this catch. Because I'm not sure which would be
worse fighting off such an antagonist or starting this
hunt all over again, from the beginning." He looked
forward.
  'heir. Arex, maintain maximum resolution
on all long-range scanners."
  "Yes, sir," the navigator replied
tersely.
  "Lieutenant Uhura, I want you to engage
your own long-range detectors and initiate a
  full-spectrum sweep in the region immediately
astern, with regular adjustments to scan every second of
sky."
  "Monitoring wave sweep, sir," she declared
several minutes later.
  Kirk's thoughts then turned inward, brooding on
ominous possibilities as he studied the
viewscreen. Five thousand kilometers of
thin organism rippled slowly aft. Listening to the
steady, powerful bursts of energy which still sounded over the
muted speakers, he considered the history of man's
efforts to turn amplified ears to the stars. Little had
any of those ancient scientists realised, when they'd
fought to make sense of the strange pops and crackles
and hums, that among that stellar babble might be the cry
of a troubled child.
  "It will not be long at our present speed,
Captain," announced Spock encouragingly, "before
we enter the
  168 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  first fringe star-clusters along our return path
into the Milky Way. According to the information imparted by the
Boqus, this should be enough to discourage any pursuit."
  "How can it be so sure?" wondered McCoy.
"The risk of permanent imprisonment, or even
death, wouldn't be enough to dissuade a lot of human
parents from trying to rescue their offspring."
  Spock eyed him reprovingly. "You are
  anthropomorphizing, Doctor. We cannot
ascribe even faintly human or Vulcan
motivations to these creatures. They lie outside the
boundaries of familiar xenobiology. Besides, it is
likely mat they reproduce asexually,
which renders Me parent-child relationship absurd."
  McCoy stared at the viewscreen. "I only
hope you're right, Spock."
  Days passed during which the captured jawanda
continued to emit regular cries. It showed no sign
of weakening. On the contrary, as they drew near the
outer fringe of the galaxy, Me outbursts intensified
slightly.
  Listening closely, Kirk sought to identify
something recognizable as a cry for help in those dips
and squeaks of electromagnetic radiation. He
failed, with a consistency that pleased him. The purely
electronic wail enabled him to regard the thing behind the
ship as an elemental force of nature instead of a
living creature which might possibly possess a
glimmer of the thoughts and emotions Spock insisted it
did not.
  "Captain," Uhura announced slowly, 'x
think I've got something." Amazing, Kirk mused,
how much was contained in mat single word,
  "something."
  "It's at the extreme end of my scanners,"
she went on. "It may be nothing at all, but
we're still in intergalactic space, and I thought that

  "Of course," Kirk cut her off
impatiently. "You've isolated it?"
  "Yes. It's definitely not a stable
intergalactic phenomenon. At first I thought it
might be a very small radio nebula it's
definitely generating strong radio
  STAR TREKG BTGHT 169
  pulses. But it wanders about too much. I can't
tell yet whether it's moving toward us or not, but .
. ."
  She gazed significantly at Kirk.
  "Keep monitoring it, Lieutenant," Kirk
  instructed her. "Mr. Spock, initiate
intensive sensor scan along the coordinates being
studied by Lieutenant Uhura. Let me know what
you turn up."
  "Very good, Captain."
  "How much longer before we reach a star with sufflcient
gravity to hold a jawanda?"
  Spock checked library information. "At least
another three days at our present speed,
Captain, possibly four. Naturally, that time would
shrink rapidly at warp-four or warp-five."
  Kirk spent a few moments ruminating on their
options. "Contact the Boqus, Mr.
Spock. Inquire if there's any chance, however
slight, that the six moons could attain a faster
speed."
  A short wait, and Spock replied, "Bihar
says no, Captain. We might as well abandon
the creature now to retain control of the mechanism.
The Lactrans are again arguing strenuously. They are
willing to jeopardize their lives in order to return
the jawanda to Lactra."
  "That's noble of them," snorted McCoy, "but
what about the rest of us who don't care to stick our
necks out so they can add that" and he gestured toward the
screen "electrified tinfoil to their zoo?"
  "Easy, Bones," Kit* advised him,
'we're not at that point yet. It may turn out
to be just a false alarm."
  The alarm was ringing louder the following day. Whatever
was generating those powerful
  pulsations was doing so at a steadily rising rate.
  "Estimated distance to the object, Lieutenant
Uhura?"
  She checked her readouts. "It's still hard to say,
sir. The strength of the emissions, and by inference the
distance separating us, could vary greatly depending on the
size of the creature."
  A sinking feeling ran through him. "You're con
  170 STAR TREK LOG BIGHT
  vinced the signals are emanating from another
jawanda, then?"
  She hesitated. "The differences in the type of
pulsations are significant, sir, but the
frequencies are identical. Say better than
fifty-fifty that it's another."
  "An inaccurate observation, Lieutenant,"
Spock commented mildly. He would never cease to be
fascinated by the human tendency to offer
approximations in place of absolute figures in
matters scientific.
  "Let it go now, Jim," urged McCoy.
"We'll circle far around and find another
specimen for the Lactrans."
  "Not yet, Bones. This new arrival if that's
what it turns out to be may only be curious.
Maybe it's not coming in response to the other's
cries. We've come too far and worked too hard
to give up easily. Remember our obligation to the
Lactrans."
  "Remember our obligation to the ship."
  Kirk threw him a sharp look. "I'm fully
aware of that, Bones."
  McCoy turned away. "Sorry, Jim . .
. Porgot myself for a moment."
  "forget it. We're all operating under stress.
The possibility of fighting something that could envelop a
few Earths is enough to rattle anyone's thoughts."
  What was troubling Kirk was not the chance that another
jawanda was the source of the new emissions that already
seemed fairly certain. It was the fact that the
mysterious generator was continuing to gain on them without
an intercept angle. It was approaching rapidly
from almost dead astern.
  That meant that at least some jawandas were capable of
moving at speeds above warp tilde three. Given
that, there was no reason to suppose that one of the
creatures might not be able to exceed war tilde
eight tilde he maximum emergency velocity of the
Enterprise.
  If Spock was right and the jawanda was purely a
superefflcient energy-converting organism, then it should
be as incapable of experiencing the desire for vengeance
as it was of feeling parental concern. In that case, it
didn't really matter how fast certain jawandas could
travel.
  STAR TREK LOG 171
  On the other hand, if Spock was wrong
and the creatures were able to feel higher emotions . . .
Kirk refused to consider the possibilities.
Long before that he would have to make other
  decisions.
  "It is obvious that we have two choices."
Spock pontificated from the science station. "We can
retreat at top speed toward the safety of stellar
gravity, abandoning our capture in the process, and
hope this will be sufficient to discourage any
pursuit. Or we can continue as we are and hope that
the creature closing on us will become disinterested,
give up, or prove unable to hamper our
movements."
  "Neither of which is an especially appealing
alternative," Kirk commented distastefully
  "I concur, Captain. With your permission,
therefore, I should like to initiate what is known in
human vernacular as a decoy action."
  "Decoy?" McCoy echoed. "What are we
going to do have the ship's nonmetallic fabricators
make up an artificial jawanda?"
  "No, Doctor. I doubt that a visual
simulacrum would have any effect. These creatures
obviously detect one another by means of their
emissions. Sight would be a superfluous
sense in the void."
  "Go ahead, Mr. Spock," Kirk urged.
"Whatever you have in mind can't worsen our situation."
  "I hope it can better it, Captain." He
faced Communications. "Lieutenant Uhura, have you
a precise record of the pattern of the captured
jawanda's out
  "Many, Mr. Spock. Its broadcast has
remained consistent, and I've had more than enough time
to examine its wave generation in depth."
  "How complex is the pattern?" Kirk began to have
an inkling of his first offlcer's plan.
  'ationot very . . . Oh, I understand. I don't
see why our equipment couldn't generate a similar
signal, Mr.
  It didn't take long for an emergency
  engineering and tech crew to ready one of the cruiser's
shuttlecraft for a high-speed deep-space run.
Lieutenant M'ress super
  172 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  vised the modification of the shuttle's
  communications equipment, which involved
  installation of components which would permit the tiny
craft to channel far more power than normal into its
communications instrumentation.
  The hasty alterations completed, the
  shuttlecraft hangar was cleared and the remotely
guided craft launched away at its maximum
acceleration. There followed a period of anxious
waiting for the shuttle to reach a decent distance from the
Enterprise. All the while, the source of new
radiation drew nearer and nearer.
  ""Time enough," Spock announced, looking up
from his readouts. "Begin broadcasting
  immediately, Lieutenant Uhura." As she
  acknowledged, Spock faced the command chair.
  "Utilising the full broadcast power of the Enter-
przseJs communications equipment, Captain, as
rebroadcast out into space through the
  shuttlecraft's modified instruments, we should be
able to produce considerably more noise than our
captive does. Hopefully, the pursuing jawanda
will consider the shuttlecraft's broadcast as the
distress call of a second one of its kind. We
are hoping that it will opt to aid the louder of the two
calls."
  Spock's logic, as always, seemed sound.
Uhura adjusted her controls, and soon a second
jawanda cry for help was filling space, one twice
as powerful as the first.
  "Captain?"
  Kirk looked toward the navigator. "tilde
What is it, Mr. Arex?"
  "I believe the second creature is changing
its course. Indications point to his
  A rhythmic screech drowned him out. Hastily
Uhura adjusted her instrumentation once again, and the
volume dropped.
  "tilde What happened, Lieutenant?"
  Uhura studied her gauges and sensor
  feedbacks. "Apparently our captive has
increased the strength of
  STAR TREK BE BIGHT 173
  its own radiations, sir. The level is
considerably above what we are rebroadcasting through the
shuttlecraft."
  "Second object shifting direction again,
Captain," the soft-spoken Edoan announced. "It
is once again following and it appears to have increased
its speed."
  Kirk wondered if they could fool their still unknowable
pursuer another time, wondered if it felt anger
at deception or was simply continuing to follow the
strongest signal.
  "Increase broadcast power,
Lieutenant," Spock directed her.
  "I'm sorry, Mr. Spock." Uhura threw
him a look of helplessness. "We're broadcasting
at maximum strength now. In fact, we can hold
this level only another twenty minutes before
components begin to melt."
  "That won't be necessary, Uhura," Kirk told
her. "Maintain power, though. Mr. Sulu, vary the
course of the shuttlecraft random pattern,
simulate erratic behavior. Let's see if the
second jawanda reacts to that."
  "Course still unchanged, sir," Arex reported
five minutes later. "Still in pursuit."
  Kirk sighed and faced the science station. "It was a
good idea, Spock only it didn't quite work. If
we could put more power into our decoy broadcast ..."
He shook his head slowly.
  Spock's head tilted at the odd angle
Kirk had come to recognise often these past weeks.
"Before abandoning the idea, the Lactrans wish
to make an attempt of their own." He looked
around. "And they want your approval before they do so .
. . Doctor."
  "Me?" McCoy was taken aback. "Why
mine?"
  "Because what they wish to try involves a certain
amount of discomfort for every member of the crew."
  McCoy turned pensive and finally said, was
"Discomfort" is a mild word. Do they think
whatever they have in mind could be dangerous?"
  A pause while Spock relayed: "They do not
think so, Doctor, but admit that they cannot be sure.
It is a new thought of theirs, something never before tried,
because the opportunity to do so with minds like ours has not
previously existed."
  174 STAR TREK BIGHT
  Kirk wasn't sure he liked the sound of that.
Still, he had to consider the enigmatic threat closing
on them every second.
  "Bones?"
  McCoy looked askance at Kirk. "This is
crazy, Jim. How can I estimate the danger when
I have no idea what they're going to try?" He
turned to Spock again. "You're sure you've got
your "conceptualisations" straight, Spock? They
did say "discomfort" and not "disablement"?"
  "Quite sure, Doctor."
  McCoy shrugged. "Then I suppose I can't
object."
  "All right, Spock," Kirk said
warily, "tell them go ahead." He activated the
general
  intercom and explained to the crew as well as he was
able what was about to happen. He clicked off finally.
"Tell them also that the second we receive any
indication that anyone is being seriously affected,
they'll have to stop whatever they're doing."
  "They understand and agree, Captain," the first
officer informed him instantly.
  Silence followed. Kirk sat tensely in his
chair, waiting for something to happen. When minutes
passed and nothing did, an impatient, nervous
McCoy asked, "When are they going to begin,
Spock? If they don't hurry up . . ."
  "They already have, Doctor. They are
  preceding slowly, so as to be certain they do not
hurt anyone including themselves. Don't you feel
it?"
  "Feel what, Spock? I don't ..."
Something was whispering inside his head. Irritated,
he tried to shake it off, but, like a persistent
mosquito, it refused to go away. Instead, it
intensified slightly, still irritating but not quite
painful. The internal humming became a headache,
then a throbbing behind his eyes, relentless and
unresolved. He started to speak to Spock, but
decided not to when he saw that the first officer was sitting
rigidly at attention. The more intensively
McCoy tried to analyze the sensation, the more the ache
increased.
  STAR TREK LOG 175
  "Captain," Uhura groaned, holding both
hands to her temples, "how much longer does this go
on? I can't stand it and monitor the sensors as
well."
  ""Discomfort" was the right term, Spock," the
captain admitted, wincing. "It's not quite as bad as
a migraine but I hope we're not supposed
to endure it too much longer. What are they doing?"
  Spock's reply came slowly, since he was
speaking under the dual stress of translating and this
new mental strain. "They say it win grow no
worse. As to the activity itself, the proposal
occurred to them when it became clear how limited was the
  broadcast capability of the Enterprise. They
are surprised that we did not recognize the
presence on board of several hundred additional
generators of modulated electrical impulses.
The mind of every crew member is such a
transmitter.
  "It is an ability of all Lactrans to serve
as a focusing point for such energies, much as a
magnifying lens concentrates sunlight. They are
presently utilizing the generative capacity of every
mind on board to beam a simulacrum of the jawanda's
distress cab to the same point in space as the
shuttlecraft. The combination of the shuttle's own
broadcast and this mental projection may be strong enough
to his
  Arex, who alone of the bridge complement seemed
relatively unaffected by the Lactrans'
activities, made both aliens and science
offirel into seers: "Captain our pursuers are
changing course once again. They are definitely
inclining toward the retreating shuttlecraft, by a
significant number of degrees."
  Kirk's response struggled through the pounding in his
brain. "Lieutenant Uhura, what reaction from
our captive?"
  "Jo ... change, sir," she replied, her
expression contorted from the effort of interpreting her
readouts. "It's maintaining the same level of
broadcast intensity. Maybe it's reached its
limits."
  "Still continuing on a divergent course,
s*," Arex reported. "They are definitely
headed away from us now and are beginning to fall behind."
  "Thank you, Mr. Arex. Continue close
sensor scan
  176 STAR TREK T OG ETGT-TT
  on was He broke off, rehearing the
navigator's recent words. "A moment ago you said
'pursuers," Lieutenant. There are more than
one?"
  "It appears likely, Captain. I am
tracking three to four sources sufficiently far
apart to preclude any other explanation. I thought
at first that the one very large creature might be
generating signals from various regions of its
body, but it seems now that the distance between sources is
too great. All, however, are angling toward the
shuttlecraft."
  Kirk wondered if the relief was visible in his
ex- pression. To have one of the monsters closing on them
was frightening enough. Three or four . . . "Mr.
Sulu, how long before we reach the gravity well of a
strong sun?"
  There was no formal "border" to the home galaxy,
of course. Distances between suns were so unimaginably
vast that the term was more
  suggestive than descriptive. But, compared to the
reach of intergalactic space, the gravityless
habitat of the jawanda, the region they were about to enter
was rich in stars and jawanda-pinioning gravity.
  "Twenty-two minutes ship time, Captain," the
helmsman finally responded. Kirk's anxiety
lightened a little at that encouraging report.
  "Keep a close scan on our decoyed
pursuit, Mr. Arex. Let me know the instant
they show any sign of changing course again. Mr.
Spock, can the Lactrans sustain their broadcast
for the requisite time remaining?"
  "They reply that they will have to, Captain."
  Kirk nodded understandingly, his gaze shifting back
to the lone-range scanner view now on the main
screen. It showed only dark, empty space aft
of the imprisoned iawanda. For another twenty
minutes it had to stay that way.
  They crept along at warp-three, Kirk chafing
at me restrictions of the Boquian mechanism which
forced them to travel at far below normal cruising
speed. As the Lactrans had promised, the
  throbbing grew no worse, but neither did it
decrease.
  STAR TREK LOG EIGHT 177
  Glancing around the bridge, he saw that Uhura,
Sulu, Arex, and even Spock were beginning to show
signs of real strain. He heard his own discomfort
reflected in the concern in McCoy's voice. The
doctor walked over, massaging his temples with
slow circular hand motions.
  "Jim, even a headache can produce damage
if it's allowed to continue untreated. I can't
prescribe treatment for something like this."
  Kirk checked the official chronometer set in
one arm of his chair. "A few minutes more, Bones.
We can survive a few minutes more."
  Then they would enter the vicinity of NGC 7332.
An unremarkable Ma star, hitherto unvisited
by anything more complex than a FedeMtion
  long-range mapping drone. But the cold
orange-red giant was a nearing haven for the
Enterprise, a ten-million-kilometer-wide
beacon whose gravity was now akin to the fire with which
primitive man had frightened off pursuit by hulking
furry carnivore.
  He berated himself for falling into the Imp McCoy
so often entangled himself in, ascribing familiar
characteristics to the unfamiliar in this case the jawanda.
That inexplicably efficient inhabitant
of deep space was neither furry nor carnivorous.
  A shout came from the normally placid
  navigator's station.
  "What is it, Mr. Arex?" he asked quickly.
"Have the signal sources changed course again?"
  "No, sir." Something in the Pdoan's voice
sent a tremor along Kirk's nerves. 'A have
detected a new source of radio emissions. It
is larger ... than all the others combined."
  "Bearing?"
  - "Directly for us, sir . . . warp . . .
warp-sevenI"
  "Time to gravitational tangency, Mr. Sulu?"
  "Three minutes twenty seconds remaining,
Captain," the helmsman shot back.
  "The new source is far off, Captain. We
should just slip into the safe zone before it reaches us."
  178 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  "Recalculate for precision," Kirk ordered,
thinking in astonishment that that was one phrase he never
had expected to direct to his first officer.
  "Inconclusive, Captain," Spock replied
  immediately. "Distance undeterminable at this time."
  "Source accelerating!" Arex gasped in
disbelief. "Nearing warp-eight!"
  "Less than two minutes to go!" shouted Sulu.
"Plotting minimum possible orbital radii
to maximize gravity effect."
  Still nothing on the rear scanners. Where was the
apparition? "Emergency magnification on
long-range sensors, Mr. Sulu," he
directed the helmsman.
  Sulu acknowledged, and once more the
  retreating emptiness jumped perceptibly to show
only a narrower view of nothingness.
  "Sixty seconds, Captain."
  "Warp-nine, sir," the Edoan said dazedly.
"Moving up to warp-ten."
  Whatever was after them was now traveling faster than
any Federation vessel in existence. It must be
converting energy at an incredible rate.
  Equally unbelievably, Kirk suddenly felt
better than he had in some time. Then he realized that
the throbbing in his skull had vanished.
  "comThe Lactrans are aware that their ruse is not
discouraging this new, nearer threat, Captain. They
see no reason for continuing their
  broadcast, especially since one of them is
verging on unconsciousness and they feel we may
soon require our full abilities."
  Kirk had time to feel ashamed. While he'd
been suffering along with everyone else during the
amplified mental broadcast, he'd neglected
to consider what toll it might be taking on the
amplifiers the Lactrans themselves.
  "Fifteen seconds, sir." Sulu was counting
down. "Eleven, ten, nine . . ."
  "NGC 7332 in sight on forward scanners,
Captain," announced Spock reassuringly.
Sulu continued to count off eternities.
  "Four, three, two his
  STAR TREK rOG BrGF-RThat 179
  An explosive shriek of outrage and
  disappointment erupted from every bridge speaker
despite Uhura's desperate attempt
to reduce it to bearable intensity. Sparks flared from
various seals and seams in the communications console,
and a small explosion blew out several gauges, the
concussion throwing her from her seat. McCoy was at her
side in an instant.
  'entering the strong gravitational pull of NGC
7332, Captain," Spock informed him
solemnly.
  Kirk didn't hear him. He was skill seeing
something which had appeared for a brief second
on the viewscreen, details of its appearance
uncertain because the overloaded scanners had
automatically blanked themselves out immediately after
contacting it.
  For an instant something gargantuan had drifted
there, filling the screen with discharges of purple and
crimson energy whose diameter exceeded that of half
a hundred Earths.
  Then the scanners came on again and the sun-shape was
gone, frustrated, soaring in angry desperation back
to the gravitational void of the abyss . . .
  "Status, Mr. Spock?" Kirk asked
slowly.
  "We sull retain control of our caphive," the
science officer assured him. "It seems to have ceased
all broadcasting. Undoubtedly it realizes that it
has passed the gravitational point of no
return."
  Kirk swiveled his chair. "Lieutenant?"
  Uhura was back on her feet and studying her
damaged station with professional concern. "I'm all
right, sir. That last outburst overwhelming."
  She smiled at McCoy. "Thanks,
Doctor." McCoy nodded and moved away, still
keeping an
  inconspicuous eye on her to make sure she was
as stable as she claimed to be.
  "Hivar the Toq," Spock continued, "states that
the mechanism is undamaged and still operating well.
We should have no difficulty in retaining control of the
captive all the way back to Lacbra. The
Lactrans are tending to themselves. They are
extremely wearied, and the youngster expresses some
concern. Both adults are extremely pleased with
us. We did not panic, as
  180 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  lower animals would have, and permit the
  jawanda to escape."
  "I'm glad we came up to their expectations,"
replied Kirk drily. "Continue on course
to Lactra at our present speed, Mr. Sulu."
  "Aye, sir . . . with pleasure."
  "How's your headache, Bones?"
  "Completely gone, Jim. No after effects,
either."
  McCoy looked thoughtful. "It occurs to me that the
Lactrans" ability to focus the mental output
of many minds into various wavelengths could be a powerful
weapon."
  Kirk agreed. "True, Bones, but
I don't think we have to worry about that. Not only
aren't the Lactrans a belligerent race, but
they'd hardly bother to involve themselves in the petty
private squabbles of such primitive creatures
as
  ourselves." He grinned and looked toward the
navigator's station.
  "Mr. Arex."
  "Yes, Captain?"
  "Before we entered the gravity well of NGC
7332, I thought we had a momentary view of our
pursuer certainly not extensive enough a glimpse
to tell anything. You were monitoring the long-range
sensors aft at the time. Did they succeed in
recording sufficient information to give us an idea of
its size?"
  "They did, sir," the Edoan announced slowly.
"Quite incredible. It appears that even the Boqus'
estimations of the jawanda's upper growth limits were on
the conservative side. were our last pursuer so
inclined, and able to withstand the radiation, it could have
enveloped Sol."
  "No wonder they exist only in intergalactic
space," Kirk whispered after a moment's
  reflection. "They need the room."
  McCoy was trying to adjust to the existence of a
living organism that size. He could not, naturally.
It was beyond the visualising ability of the human mind.
One could write a one and follow it with nine zeros and
call it a billion, but the sum could not really be
comprehended.
  STAR TREK BE BIGHT 1 g 1
  So it was with their final nemesis, an
  unimaginable colossus turned at the last
possible instant by a star trillions of times greater
in mass than itself.
  From NGC 7332 the journey back to Lactra
was mercifully uneventful. Their captive jawanda,
now revealed as a true midget of its kind,
occasionally testified to its continued health by emitting
outbursts of subdued electronic noise.
  But it somehow comprehended its position. It made
no fresh assaults on the Enterprise and did not
attempt to flee the gravitational bond of the
octahedral cage.
  At warp-three the trip back to Lactra took
much longer than the journey out, and Kirk and the rest
of the crew luxuriated in every minute of it.
Eventually, though, the jawanda was installed in polar
orbit around that strange world, to circle it
forever like some huge foil-shaped moon.
  Now fully recovered, the two adult
Lactrans and their boisterous offspring were
transported back to the surface, though not before
confessing that the expedition had enriched their knowledge as well
as their zoo.
  Thus, free of further obligation to the
elephantine superminds, Kirk was able with
inexpressible relief to give the order to return
at warp-six to Boqu.
  Everyone experienced a few moments of
apprehension as the Enterprise once again left the
safety of the galactic arm, apprehension engendered
by the fear that a vengeful cluster of mature jawandas
might be lingering to ambush them.
  But, for all their great size and efficiency at
converting energy, the jawandas were the most elemental of
organisms, from a mental standpoint. If they
possessed minds, these seemed not extensive enough
to include memories. The return to Boqu was as
peaceful as the race to NGC 7332 had been
panicky.
  Hivar the Toq and the marvelous Boquian
mechanism were returned to the planet's surface,
which was still undergoing a burst of activity,
thanks to the solution to the pandemic discovered by Dr.
McCoy's team.
  There was even a remote chance, Hivar assured
  182 STAR TREK LOG EIGHT
  Kirk, that Boqu might one day apply for
admission as the Federation's farthest-flung member an
eventuality which could be extremely discomforting to such as
the Klingons and Romulans.
  There was much more to be learned from the sociable
Boqusthan from the aloof inhabitants of Lactra.
In fact, the entire geology section volunteered
en masse to remain on Boqu to study the incredible
silicon-based ecology. A reluctant Kirk
had to deny their applications, for there was no telling when
another Federation ship might reach the distant,
isolated world.
  Leaving the orange-and-mauve storm clouds of
Boqu, they returned again to the comforting light of the
home galaxy. It was as they were traversing the final
stretches of intergalactic void that Spock
looked up from his station, wondering aloud.
  "One thing continues to prey on my mind,
Captain."
  "Not fatally, I hope," McCoy quipped.
  Spock continued, ignoring the doctor.
"We were astonished at the size of the jawanda we
captured, only to subsequently discover that it was but
an immature specimen of its kind. This was
emphasised by the apparent size of its unsuccessful
rescuers, who themselves shrank into smallness
by comparison with that somewhat larger his
  was "Somewhat larger," was McCoy murmured
derisively.
  was last pursuer," the first officer concluded, with an
admonishing stare at the Enterprise's chief
physician. "It continues to occur to me that that final
colossus might have its own masters out in the depths
of the abyss."
  That conception was sufficiently stupefying to silence
even McCoy. Together with Kirk, he stared at the
view brought close by the ship's after scanners. It
was hundreds of thousands of light-years to the nearest
pinpoint of light the outlying stars of Nubecula
Major. True, the size of their last pursuer had
been unimaginable ... but what was more unimaginable
than the va/s of the intergalactic gulf?
  "I don't know, Mr. Spock," Kirk mused
softly. "Until we encountered the jawandas I'd
always been ac
  STAR TREK LOG BIGHT 183
  customed to thinking of living beings in terns of
meters, or, rarely, in thousands of meters. The
jawandas have changed that to thousands, maybe hundreds of
thousands, maybe even millions of kilometers."
He gestured toward the viewscreen. "Perhaps someday
we'll encounter creatures out there who'll dwarf the
greatest jawanda, and then we'll have to grow used
to measuring organisms with light-years instead of
metrics."
  That was a bit extreme for McCoy. "'ationow
think a minute, Jim, about the impossibility of a
living being a light-year in length. Just consider . .
. consider . . ." His voice trailed off. "On
second thought, I'm not going to consider it right now.
One lingering headache in the past couple of months is
plenty. I think it's time to consider an extended
session in the Rec Room." He left the
bridge, the doors of the turbolift closing behind
him.
  But not before Kirk saw that the doctor's final
speculative gaze was focused on the screen and the
darkly ominous yet beckoning reaches of the fading
intergalactic gulf.