KIRK SAT IN HIS CHAIR at the conn, chin on fisted hand, staring at nothing. The pain in his side was a throbbing refrain now that the painkillers had worn off completely and the real pain of his injury had leached through to batter his senses. And now he felt cold, probably an aftereffect of his broken ribs.
Sulu had noticed and, with his captain's permission, had left the bridge momentarily to find field jackets for the entire bridge crew. It was cooler on the bridge than normal, but Kirk didn't like how cold he felt inside, where the jacket's warmth could not reach. Was it the injury? Was it worry gnawing at him? Or was it something else he hadn't yet considered?
A flash of annoyance with himself and everything around him dragged Kirk from the morass of his lethargy, and he straightened in his seat. "Uhura, has that shuttlecraft gone out yet?"
He'd never seen the communications officer look so apologetic. "Not yet, sir."
"Well, what are they waiting for? We've got a landing party stranded over there." He waved at the viewscreen. The image of the station was becoming harder and harder to see as time passed. Static had gone from snowstorm to blizzard proportions.
"They're having trouble getting the shuttlebay doors to open, Captain," Estano told him from the security station. He sounded almost embarrassed, though he didn't have anything to do with the bollixed condition of things. "Jaffe and Corey are in the shuttlecraft, ready to go. Engineering's working on it right now."
Kirk caught himself before he had a chance to say, "Well, tell them to hand crank if they have to!" He bit the words back, knowing that Commander Scott's engineering team was doing the best it could, as quickly as it could. He opted for just a nod, and turned back toward the screen. "Thank you, Ensign. Keep me apprised."
"Aye, sir."
The inactivity ate at Kirk like a tribble gorging on quadrotriticale. First and foremost, he was a man of action, a man of decisions who acted on those decisions with surety and swiftness. Yet here he sat, completely useless, while someone else planned to go and rescue his friends. The thought goaded him like a spur in the side. He was not a man who took easily to convalescence, as Bones would have been the first to tell anyone.
"Captain?" Uhura again, looking as frustrated as Kirk felt, and ever more apologetic for interrupting a thought loop that wasn't getting him anywhere, anyway.
Don't snap at your crew, Jim. They're the best you've got, the best in the world. Don't take it out on them, even if you do want to slap yourself silly. "Yes, Uhura?"
"More reports coming in from all over the ship, sir."
Control the sigh. Don't let them see it's getting to you … "Read it slowly, Commander."
Malfunctions of all sorts continued unabated. Doors either behaved like the jaws of a trap, sometimes seriously injuring crew, or didn't open at all, leaving stranded personnel little option but to use emergency hatches, if they were available, or try to call for assistance that would be a long time coming because work crews from engineering were dealing with problems elsewhere (including the shuttlebay doors). Currently, several of the crew were stranded in their rooms, the botanical garden, and a number of lavatories. And still it went on.
Food dispensers had made a gluey morass of several areas. One moment the computer could be used, and the next there was nothing but dead silence in response to repeated inquiries. The list was as long as Kirk's arm and as diverse as a mongrel's genealogy, and continued growing by the moment. The only plus side to the entire situation was that there were no severely ill patients in sickbay and no dangerous individuals being held in the brig. Considering it now, though, Kirk would have been happier tackling a wild-eyed murderer armed to the teeth and running rampant through the Enterprise than dealing with the starship's traitorous systems. Scott could check and recheck all he wanted to, but Kirk was convinced the problem lay outside the ship, and he was willing to bet he knew exactly where.
Kirk waved Uhura to silence partway through the list. "That's enough, Commander. Continue sending out a distress signal beacon. Attempt to contact Starfleet Command, and keep trying to reach the landing party. And find out what the hell's going on with that shuttlecraft!"
"Aye, sir!" Swathed in the deep red of her field jacket, the commander turned back to her board.
"Captain!" Estano called from his place at the security station. "Shuttlebay doors have been successfully opened. Shuttlecraft Valgard is under way."
Kirk's fist clenched in a gesture of victory. Finally! "Patch me through to the shuttlecraft, Uhura."
"I'll try, sir."
He watched her, waiting for her nod. "This is Captain Kirk to the Valgard."
Static greeted his sending, overlaying some type of conversation he couldn't quite make out. "Uhura—"
"Working on it, sir. Try again."
Kirk repeated his hail. This time the contact was clearer, the response understandable, though still scratchy. "Valgard here, Captain. This is Jaffe. Corey and I are under way."
"Well done. How are systems?"
Her voice crackled, overlayed with static. "A little jumpy, sir, but nothing we can't handle. It should be fairly routine to gain access to the space station."
Jaffe's optimism almost scared Kirk. It was just the sort of good feeling Fate routinely liked to chew and swallow whole. "Carry on and good luck. Try to keep us posted of your progress."
"We will, sir. Valgard out."
Kirk watched the viewscreen closely, waiting for the shuttle to come into view. What he did not expect was Uhura's excited exclamation. "Captain! I have Mr. Spock!"
Adrenaline rammed through Kirk and left his nerve endings tingling. "Put him through!" He heard the scratchy channel open. "Spock!"
Vicious static snarled any response, if there was one, and then Uhura said, "Go ahead!"
"Spock!" Kirk called again. "Can you read me?"
"… interference … unable … read you … one moment …" Suddenly the signal came in a bit stronger. It was nothing approaching clear, but Kirk could at least make out the words. "Captain, this is Spock."
Kirk smiled. "It's good to hear your voice, Mr. Spock. Is everyone all right?"
"Ensign Markson has died in an accident. Other than that, we are fine. Dr. McCoy and the others are currently exploring our present level."
Sorrow touched Kirk's heart. He hadn't known the security guard at all, though he knew Markson had been a new crewman aboard the Enterprise. Knowing him or not, Kirk felt despair at the loss of one of his men. "What happened to Markson?"
"He fell in a turboshaft. However, the details are not pertinent to our situation at this time, Captain. Since we cannot, with any assurance, determine how long our contact may last, we need to exchange important information while we have an open channel."
"Correct as always, Spock. Report."
"Captain …" Static flared, and Kirk feared they'd lost their tenuous, all-too-brief contact. Then the signal cleared, and he could once again hear Spock's voice. "We have made no headway in discovering why the station is here; however, we have discovered a score or more of dead Romulans on one of the lower levels. Dr. McCoy's findings indicate they died of hypothermia."
"Hypothermia?" Kirk felt a chill that had nothing to do with his injury. "Are you in danger?"
"Undetermined, Captain. We should not be, as the ambient temperature is not low enough for hypothermia to be a risk."
"Then how—"
"Unknown at this time," Spock cut in. "We have reached the station bridge, and I have managed to successfully tie in the generator to access the communications and computer system, hence my ability to contact you. I do not know how long this will last, but in the time allowed I will attempt to gain as much information as I can through the computer system as to why this station is here and why it lost power—"
Kirk spoke over his first officer. "Speaking of power, the Enterprise is suffering a power drain of some kind, Spock. It's affecting first one part of the ship, then another. Systems are redlined all over the ship. We can't trust the transporter enough to beam you back at this time."
"Fascinating." Kirk could practically see his first officer's eyebrow go up. "Captain, we are also currently experiencing some of the same difficulties, though on a much smaller scale. The drain is unusual in that even our handheld weapons and lights are affected."
"Then it's not just the Enterprise!" Relief that his suspicions had borne fruit flooded through Kirk in a wave, and he flashed a look at Scott, who grinned in return. They weren't out of the fire, but it did both men good to know that the problem didn't lie somewhere in the ship.
"Affirmative. I have every reason to believe that the space station is con …"
Static interfered, and Kirk's heart raced. "Uhura, get him back!"
"I'm trying, sir!"
Spock's voice came back on line. "… unable to hold channel much longer. I will endeavor to learn more on my hypothesis before exploring engineering. I …"
"Spock! We're sending a shuttlecraft to the station to access one of the airlocks and get you out."
"Inadvisable at this time, Captain. Power is too …" The line cut into howling static so loud Uhura had to turn down her speakers.
"Dammit!" Kirk pounded the arm of his chair and instantly regretted it when pain shot up his side and down his arm, freezing his breath in his lungs as though he'd just tried to inhale an iceberg. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly, forcing back the blackness, and all hell broke loose.
"Captain!" Sulu called from helm. "Valgard has cleared the ship, but she's skewed, sir! She's going off course!"
Kirk pried open his eyes and stared at the screen, trying to see through the interference. The shuttlecraft's forward momentum was a memory. The small vessel was cocked at an angle, her running lights already dimmed. Evidently, whatever was causing their problems was sucking the shuttlecraft dry of power as well. What had Spock been trying to tell him? The space station is con … Con what? Contributing, maybe? That made sense if Spock was planning to check out Engineering … And what hypothesis was he planning on checking out? Damn, but he wanted to talk to his first officer!
"Captain!" Scott called urgently. Kirk only barely refrained from yelling back at him. God, but his side hurt! "I had diagnostic sensors trained toward the station when Mr. Spock's communication cut off. I don't know how far I can trust their readouts, sir, pertaining to levels and such, but there's definitely a drain, and it's coming from that ugly piece of garbage out there."
Though it wasn't an official description, Kirk found it oddly appropriate. He glared at the station. So, he'd been right. Spock's cryptic words confirmed it, and Scott's reading nailed the lid on the coffin. If that was the source of the drain, then that was the enemy. That was what he had to defeat to get his crew and his ship back in his hands.
Only how?