STAR TREK - TOS - 93 - New Earth - Thin Air

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s

imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or

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For Jim Kiser and Judy Joyce

Good Friends

THIN AIR

“CAPTAIN,” SCOTT SAID, “THEY’VE STRIPPED THE CONESTOGAS DOWN.”

“How long to get one ready for inhabitants?”

“Three, maybe four days,” Scotty said. “And that’s without me doin’ a full check of the environmental

systems. How many ships are ya gonna be needin’ again?”

“All the Conestogas,” Kirk said. “And we have less than three days to get people to safety.”

“Not possible, sir,” Scott said. “Even if we found all the environmental equipment in one piece, it would

take us weeks to get it all working again.”

“It’s going to have to be possible, Mr. Scott. Sixty thousand colonists may have no other choice. Kirk

out.”

Sulu frowned as Scott just shook his head.

Around Scott, the giant ship seemed even emptier than it had a moment before. This was one miracle he

didn’t think he could pull off for the captain.

K R I S T I N E K A T H R Y N R U S C H

AND

D E A N W E S L E Y S M I T H

NEW EARTH CONCEPT BY DIANE CAREY AND JOHN ORDOVER

POCKET BOOKS

New York London Toronto Sydney Singapore Belle Terre

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

STAR TREK®NEW EARTH #6 CHALLENGER

Look for STAR TREK fiction from Pocket Books

Chapter One

THECLEAR CANISTERsitting on theEnterprise science lab bench held no more than a few handfuls

of brown soil, taken directly from a field just outside of Belle Terre’s main colony on the island side of the

planet. It was farm soil, nothing more. Recently tilled, the soil smelled of rich possibilities, seasons full of

fresh, crisp vegetables, and the very future of Belle Terre.

Only there was something very wrong with this soil. And Spock was trying to figure out exactly what

that was.

On the counter beside the canister were almost two dozen other canisters, all containing soil from

different areas of Belle Terre. The soil from the explosion-blasted side of the planet seemed darker,

almost black with the radiation damage from what the colonists were calling “the Burn.” Two canisters

seemed almost to be full of light sand.

But, from what Spock had been told, areas of soil around the planet were “going bad,” as the colonists

put it. Plants were dying, and in places the soil even smelled foul and rotten. Lilian Coates had asked

Captain Kirk to look into it, and the captain had assigned Spock to help the colonist scientists discover

what was wrong.

All the soil canisters in the lab were carefully labeled and sorted by region and continent. It had taken

threeEnterprise crew members most of a day to collect all of them for Spock. And he had spent the last

two hours analyzing the data from scans of each sample. His findings had not been what he had

expected. The soil contained polymers that just didn’t belong logically on Belle Terre, let alone in every

sample from every region of the planet.

Spock held his tricorder over the sample of rich soil from the largest island on the undamaged side of

Belle Terre, then inserted a small silver probe into the soil. He again checked the readings of the soil, then

stepped back and flipped a switch on a nearby panel, sending a slight jolt of electricity into the soil

through the probe. What he had expected from his readings was a small puff of smoke as the electrical

jolt broke down unknown gel molecules he had discovered in the soil.

That wasn’t want he got.

The soil sample exploded with the force of a large bomb.

The impact smashed Spock back against the wall, knocking the wind from him. The room swirled with

smoke and Spock’s ears rang. He could feel a dozen cuts and gashes on his body from flying glass and

debris.

He ignored the wounds, the shortness of breath, and his damaged ears and forced his attention

completely on the explosion. He had not expected it, and did not know why it had happened. Simple

farming soil did not normally explode when touched with electricity. Clearly the soil problem developing

on Belle Terre was far worse than he had first thought.

Alarm bells were sounding throughout the ship as he slowly stood.

“Spock! Spock! Come in.” Captain Kirk’s voice carried over the alarms.

Spock stumbled a few steps through the glass and debris, and tapped the comm link on the wall.

“Spock here, Captain.” His own voice sounded hollow and distant in his ears, and he had to lean against

the wall for support.

The captain’s voice came back instantly. “Spock, what happened? Are you all right?”

Spock looked through the smoke at the completely destroyed science lab, then said, “I fared better than

the science lab. And I made a discovery.”

“What?” Kirk demanded as two emergency personnel shoved the jammed door aside and rushed into

the lab. They stopped, clearly stunned at the destruction; then one moved toward him as the other moved

to stop the small fire in a panel.

Spock understood the men’s reaction. He was surprised as well by the force of the explosion. He had

grossly miscalculated and it had cost them a lot of important scientific equipment. It was equipment that

would not be easily replaced this far from Federation space. It was also lucky that he had been the only

person in the lab at the time. A human would have had little chance of surviving such an explosion.

At that moment Dr. McCoy shoved in through the half-open door and glanced around. “For the love

of—” He instantly moved toward Spock, his medical tricorder in his hand. “What in green-blooded

blazes have you done?”

“Spock?” Kirk demanded over the comm as McCoy scanned him. “What discovery?”

“Belle Terre is in trouble, Captain,” Spock said.

“Explain,” Kirk said.

“Jim,” McCoy said to the comm unit on the wall before Spock could say a word, “if you want to talk to

your first officer, it’s going to have to be in sickbay.”

McCoy waved over the two emergency crewmen to help him with Spock.

“I can walk, Doctor,” Spock said, pushing himself away from the wall.

“I doubt that,” McCoy said, his voice not hiding his disgust. “But you are more than welcome to try.”

Three stumbling, painful steps later Spock realized the logical choice was to have help getting to sickbay.

In fact, it was the only choice.

Spock was thankful that McCoy had the good sense not to say “I told you so.”

Lilian Coates awoke with a start, gasping for air, sweat dripping from her forehead, her hair stuck to her

cheeks. What an awful nightmare.

She looked around her bedroom, trying to get something familiar back while forcing herself to take a few

deep breaths. That was the worst dream she had had since right after the Burn. For the weeks after that

she had dreamed she was back in the cave with the children, trying to save them, but always failing.

Luckily, in real life, she had been successful. She, her son, Reynold, and five other children had ridden

through the explosion of the planet’s olivium-filled moon inside a cave. After a month or so the

nightmares of Reynold dying, just as her husband had done, ended. But the memory of them always

seemed just below the surface of every minute of every day.

She took another long, deep breath and blew outward, letting the fresh air clear her mind. Then she

swung out of bed and in the faint light she padded to Reynold’s room, glancing in at him. Their cat, Nova,

a gift from Dr. McCoy, lay curled around Reynold’s feet. Both seemed to be sleeping fine, so she moved

on into the kitchen area, trying not to think about the nightmare until she calmed down some.

A large glass of cold water helped and she sat at the kitchen table still cluttered with a few dishes left

from last night’s dinner with Reynold and Captain Kirk. Jim had returned to his ship shortly after dinner

and she just hadn’t felt like cleaning up. Right now she wished he were here. Someone to talk to,

someone to tell her that staying on Belle Terre, not going back to Earth, was the right thing to do for her

and Reynold.

Slowly she let the nightmare back into her thoughts.

She is outside, standing in her garden, under clear,sunny skies. Around her all her plants are dead

andwilted. Suddenly her feet become rooted to the soil, asif she is a plant as well.

She can’t move.

Then she feels pressure around her face, as if someone is putting a hand over her nose and

mouth, chokingoff her air. But there is no one there.

She can’t run.

She can’t breathe.

She is dying, just as her garden is dying.

Reynold is beside her, also planted, also unable tobreathe.

She can’t save him either.

She knew they were about to suffocate when she awoke.

Awful nightmare.

Another long drink of water pushed the images back again. It seemed she was more worried about her

garden, and other plants around the area, than she had even told Jim. No doubt the plants dying had

something to do with the Burn and the extreme changes in climate and weather. She knew there was a

logical explanation for it.

But it seemed her subconscious didn’t.

She glanced at the time. Two hours until she and Reynold had to be up. There wasn’t going to be any

getting back to sleep now. Not after that nightmare. She stood and picked up the last of the dishes from

last night’s dinner and moved to the sink, where she could wash them.

She was the school administrator for the colony and librarian. She had more than enough work to keep

her busy.

Two hours later, as she fixed her and Reynold’s breakfast, the nightmare still haunted her, like a shadow

she didn’t want.

And looking at the slowly wilting plants in her garden as she and Reynold headed off to school, she

knew that part of the nightmare was truth. The question that worried her was,Which part?

Governor Pardonnet smiled at Tegan Welch as if she were a child, giving her his best false smile. She

desperately wanted to smash it into his face. It was that smile that had at first convinced her to trust the

man, to follow him for light-years to this planet. And it was that smile that was condemning her son,

Charles, to death.

She was a short woman, at best five feet one inch tall, but she knew how to fight and defend herself and

her son. She stepped right up close to him, staring up into his face, forcing him to step backward in the

tight space of the medical lab. “Take a look in that room again, Governor.” She pointed to a closed door.

“My son and four others are going to die unless you get us back to Federation space.”

“I understand that, Ms. Welch,” Pardonnet said, trying to ease sideways from where she had him pinned

against a medical stand. The small medical supply room was no bigger than a closet. It was where she

had asked for a word privately with him the minute they learned the cause of the illness her son and the

others were suffering from.

“So what ship are you planning to send and when?”

“We’re going to get them to the hospital ship first,” Pardonnet said, “now that we know the cause of

their illness.”

She shook her head. “Not enough and you know it.”

All the doctors, including Dr. McCoy from theEnterprise,had been clear that the only way to save these

people was to get them a long distance away from olivium and the subspace radiation it was emitting.

After the explosion of the Quake Moon, olivium had pelted the planet and spread like a wave through the

system. Her son and the four others were allergic to the standard radiation treatments—and all the others

McCoy had been able to whip up. Deathly allergic.

Her son would die unless he was away from the olivium and she was going to make sure he got away

from it, one way or another.

“We don’t know that getting them to the medical ship won’t be enough,” Pardonnet said, anger in his

voice as he pushed passed her, trying to get to the door. She moved to block his way.

Pardonnet stopped and stared at her. “Ms. Welch, getting your son out of the atmosphere might stop the

spread of the reaction. On the medical ship we can get him and the others into a sterile, protected ward.”

“And what exactly did Dr. McCoy say about that idea?” she asked.

Pardonnet stared and said nothing.

“It seems I remember him saying along the lines of ‘That would work when pigs fly.’ Am I correct?”

“Dr. McCoy can be wrong,” Pardonnet said. “We’re going to try it first, then face the next step.”

“My son and the others’ lives are not worth a ship to you, are they?”

Pardonnet actually looked stunned at the accusation; then his eyes hardened and he said, “I have sixty

thousand lives to worry about every minute of every day. Now excuse me.” He shoved past her and out

into the ward.

She had been right. Five lives were not worth a ship to the governor.

She stood staring at the medical supplies for a moment. Somehow there had to be a way to get her son

out of the deadly poison from the olivium and, ideally, back to Federation space. But just away from the

olivium first.

And if there was a way, she was going to find it. The first step was getting Charles off the planet and to

the hospital ship. From there she’d figure out what to do. If it meant stealing a ship and flying it herself,

she’d do it. She just hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

But if it did, she wouldn’t hesitate.

Chapter Two

KIRKSTRODEINTOSICKBAY, glancing at a preliminary damage report an ensign had handed to him

in the hall. The science lab had pretty much been destroyed, as well as minor structural damage to the

deck both above and below it. Very little of the equipment in the lab would be salvageable. From the

looks of this report, Spock was lucky to be alive.

Very lucky.

McCoy was standing over his patient, sealing cuts and healing scrapes. From the looks of what was left

of Spock’s bloodied uniform, the Vulcan had more places on him cut and scraped than not. A large gash

cut from just above his left eye to the middle of his forehead. McCoy had closed it, but the wound would

still look nasty for some time.

“How is he?” Kirk asked, ignoring his first officer’s failed attempt to push himself up on his elbows.

“He’s going to live,” McCoy said. “But only because he’s lucky to be half Vulcan.”

“There is no luck involved, Doctor,” Spock said, again trying to rise. McCoy easily pushed him back

and kept working on the cuts and scrapes on Spock’s left arm.

Kirk moved up closer to the bed and looked down at his first officer. “What happened, Mr. Spock?”

“Can’t this wait, Jim?” McCoy asked. “Let me at least stop all the bleeding.”

Kirk looked at the cuts and scrapes on his friend, then nodded. “I suppose another few minutes—”

“It cannot wait, Doctor,” Spock said. He raised his head enough to look Kirk in the eye. “The sample of

soil taken from the south side of the main colony island exploded.”

Before Kirk or McCoy could react, Spock continued. “To be more precise, a group of polymers

contained in the soil sample expanded in an explosive fashion when struck with a charge of electricity of

the intensity of a normal lightning strike.”

“How?” Kirk asked. The colony on Belle Terre had been through enough already. Spock had simply

been trying to discover what was causing crop failures in different areas. What had led him to this?

Spock pushed McCoy away for the moment and sat up, clearly not back to his normal self, but

regaining at least enough strength to sit up.

McCoy just shook his head and moved around to the other side, where he could work on Spock’s

back while he talked.

“I discovered,” Spock said, “that in all the soil samples taken from different areas of the planet a

polymerized chain of silicon dioxide molecules is forming.”

“Silicon dioxide? Isn’t that sand?” Kirk asked. “That’s a basic in most soil samples.”

“In its normal state, yes,” Spock said. “But for an unexplained reason this polymerized chain of

molecules is forming what is commonly called a ‘siliconic gel.’ When completely expanded, a cubic foot

of this ‘siliconic gel’ would be almost invisible, and very brittle.”

“Lighter-than-air soil,” McCoy said, laughing. “Now I’ve heard of everything.” McCoy tossed an

instrument on a tray with a loud bang and picked up another, which he used to start sealing one cut on

Spock’s arm.

“It’s not a laughing matter, Doctor,” Spock said. “Siliconic gel was first discovered on Earth in your

twentieth century, but deemed to be a fairly harmless discovery, since in nature the material never existed

in large amounts.”

“So what caused the explosion?” Kirk asked. He stared at his first officer. So far none of this was

making much sense at all.

“This type of molecular structure, by its very nature, expands,” Spock said, using his hands to show a

slowly expanding circle. McCoy pushed his arm back down in annoyance as Spock continued.

“It can enlarge quickly to thousands of times its size when introduced to a certain stimulus, in this case an

electrical current. In essence, Captain, the soil expanded in an explosive fashion to form the ‘siliconic gel’

instantaneously.”

Kirk just stared at his first officer, not really wanting to believe what he had just heard. But the ruined

science lab and ripped uniform and cuts on Spock were a clear indication of the seriousness of what

Spock was saying.

“How much did you test?” McCoy asked. “Had to be a lot to do this much damage.”

“Approximately half a standard beaker full, Doctor,” Spock said.

“A handful of soil caused this much damage?” Kirk asked. The idea of that kind of power being

contained in simple garden soil stunned him.

And then he thought of the garden outside of Lilian’s house, and the idea of it exploding with that same

amount of force, and he shuddered.

“Yes, Captain,” Spock said.

“You said you found this siliconic gel forming in all the soil samples?” Kirk asked, trying to get his mind

to wrap around the problem facing them.

“Yes, Captain,” Spock said again. “More in some samples than others, but this phenomenon is clearly

contaminating the entire planet.”

McCoy stopped and stared at the Vulcan, clearly shocked.

Kirk was feeling the same way. “Why didn’t we see this before now?”

“Because it wasn’t there,” Spock said simply.

STAR TREK - TOS - 93 - New Earth - Thin Air

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