Star Trek - [Gateways 2] - [New Earth] - Chainmail

Diane Carey - Star Trek - Gateways 2 - Chainmail

Chapter One

Deep Space, Sagittarius Star Cluster

"keller. We're in."

A cloying jungle sensation of oily fingers brushed Nick Keller's shoulders as he lowered his

communica-tor from his lips. He turned, braced, knees flexed, and expected to be struck from behind.

No one there. Just this prehensile smell moving across his skin.

Then why did he feel somebody's eyes? He was being watched.

And why hadn't he drawn his phaser? Wasn't that supposed to be the efficient Starfleet reflex action?

When had things changed so much?

Challenger hadn't responded. Had they heard him? Was this place com-shielded? They'd barely been

able to get a transporter beam to take a fix, and only into this one four-meter square. Everything else here

was still a mystery. Scans just came back crying.

From a low-slung entry vestibule he moved into an excremental stink. His boots stuck in a marshy floor,

obliging him to repossess his feet from the suction with each step. He brushed his nose and ended up only

knuckling the self-adhesive fitted filter mask over his mouth and nostrils.

"Somebody piddled," he commented.

"Methane."

A few steps to Ms right, Search and Rescue Officer Sa-vannah Ring kept one eye on her science

tricorder while picking through the mushy flooring. A Haz-Mat/First Re-sponse pack on her back caused

her to stoop slightly even though she also wore a supportive emergency har-ness and belt A pale green

haze from some unseen light source turned her sangria hair into a helmet of lemonade.

"Don't take your mask off" she warned. "You won't last sixty seconds."

She moved ahead, off to the right, toward a corridor draped with silvery gauze curtains.

Keller stepped after her. He itched to lead the way, but Ring had the sci-tricorder and was better at

reading it Should a commander lead the way or keep his eyes open? What if he had to choose?

To his left, the sphinx-like presence of his tactical and security officer almost seemed at home in this

pre-historic grotto. Zoa's golden skin, decorated with story tattoos on her shoulders and arms, and the

hundreds of spaghetti braids framing her face were muted to bronze under the strange lighting. Her eyes,

dots of inky blue without pupils, keenly scanned the surroundings. She blinked seldom, which created an

almost doll-like de-meanor. Her lined lips made no comment Her only sounds were the soft jangle of two

sheathless Rassua dirks on her belts, pinging against brass loops woven into die leather braiding of her

leggings, and the ponk ponk of her sandals' thick soles. Every third step or so, her long toenails, curved

tidily over the soles, snatched up a bit of moss and threw it into her path.

Too dang quiet... no throb of engines, no click of machinery, no murmur of airflow or whisk of hiding

crewmen slipping behind die twisting silvery mesh as Keller brushed the curtains aside.

Savannah Ring ducked under another curtain and went ahead. "How about 'Colonial Guard'?"

Keller tasted the suggestion. "Nah, Belle Terre doesn't intend to be a colony any longer than it can get

away with. Governor Pardonnet's got some big ideas about planetary autonomy. He wants full-fledged

Fed-eration membership as soon as he can qualify for it"

"For sixty thousand people? Barely a city."

"Give'm time. Look at this interior decor... early mossbound."

"Not sure it's moss." Ring spoke from slightly ahead, one eye on her tricorder screen. 'I'm not picking up

any cell structure." She frowned at the readings. The in-strument's tiny screen flickered, unable to make

up its mind. "I hope our boys put their masks on before they came over. If they came over."

'Their Plume disintegrated," Keller said tardy. "If they're not in here, they're not anywhere." As his

stom-ach cramped with tension, he added, "I'm not ready to lose two crewmen."

She glanced at him. "Maybe it's our dues, Nick."

"Ain't paying."

The edge in his tone nearly tripped her. Ring stopped the glances and concentrated forward.

Before them lay a long swirling tube-like structure, more a cave than a ship's interior, but in fact they

were on a ship. In their last communication with their first officer, Shucorion said the basic shape

suggested old Kauld design. Then the two-man patroller he'd been flying went silent and...

Accept it. And apparently blew up. Outside, space glittered with microbits of the demolished craft.

Amaz-ing that a two-man craft could have so many molecules to disrupt.

His stomach crawled. His hands were cold.

As he and Zoa followed Ring's tricorder scan toward the far end of this airlock, the silvery curtains fell

be-hind them and the draping effect was taken over by sheets of something that looked like Spanish

moss, hanging in layers from unseen heights between sec-tions. Where was the ceiling?

At least there was gravity. But why was there gravity? Who needed gravity? Where was the ship's

complement?

They struggled into a greenish-silver cave of uniden-tifiable shapes, geometric forms, clearly not natural,

though overgrown with a coat made up of shimmering leaves here, tiny hairs there, thick spores over

there, as if some gardener had let otherworldly kudzu take over inside his house. No helm, no walkways,

no seats or consoles, yet this was a space vessel and it was mov-ing, feller hungered to ask Shucorion

why he thought this vessel might be Kauld, or might be masquerading as Kauld. But Shucorion was

missing.

Hardly a month in command, and Keller had mis-placed his plainspoken first officer and his fanciful

bosun, each newly appointed, each desperately needed.

Misplaced.

Lost... Shucorion was Blood, and he was talking about Kauld, and Keller didn't fool himself that die

al-liance between the two ancient waning cultures was temporary at best, an illusion at worst He knew

the Federation's push into the Ouster had upset an ages-old balance that had been about to tip in Kauld

favor. The Kauld were talking nice right now, but for how long? No matter what kind of overtures Keller

made, he and his one ship were a very thin stick to hold Blood and Kauld apart Had die stick snapped?

Why did things have to be this way?

A methyl-green^ canopy of living stuff, or what seemed to be living, dipped over snaggletoothed

struc-tures that resembled more than anything else man-sized mounds of decaying cheese. Upon those

grew lichen and some kind of coppery mushroom. Between diem were masses of three-inch-wide bulbs

with spines, and on each spine was a little glossy globe. Keller swore they were looking at him as he and

Ring picked past

'This place' 11 cure your hiccups," he muttered. "Never know you were in space if you didn't come from

outside."

Ring poked a probing finger at a piece of-was it machinery? 'There's something metallic under this

coating. Reads as alloy."

"What kind?"

"I'm picking up all kinds, all around us. Steel... manganese bronze... air-hardened steel... perminvar... pig

iron... silicon steel... fused metal... cupronickel... silver leaf... what the hell?" She stopped reading off the

list, cocked her hip in disgust, and grumbled, "The tricorder's having a hernia. Some of this stuff doesn't

read as any kind of conventional compound, even though I'm getting some base-metallic traits, 'these

bonds can't happen. There's got to be something wrong with this thing."

While she grumbled curses at her tricorder, Keller came up behind her and prodded the same formation,

a tall cylindrical column sticking up out of the alabas-trine mesh. His finger went through a draping of

hair-like fibers as soft as a woman's ponytail, and inside was something hard. "Is this some kind of tree?"

I

"In the Tin Man's imagination, maybe. I only read I metal." !

"Even this?" The soft stuff rolled in his hand. The only hint of metallic nature was the sheen over the

curves of his fingers. It left a satiny film on his skin. Lubricant?

He dropped it, turned, and pointed at the nearest cheesy mound. "Over here. How does this stuff read?

Stone?"

The tricorder paused as she redirected it. "Metal," she said. "Rings of various alloys ranging out from a

copper core."

They turned together, and looked out at the widening hold of strange and inelegant shapes, hanging

greenery and things recognizable as growing. The tricorder must be faulty, or blocked.

Keller wiped the sleeve of his maroon sweater across his right cheek. His face stung with chill. "How can

we be hot and cold at the same time? My hands are clammy, but my face and my feet are freezing."

"It's cold," Ring said. "A little more moisture and it'd be snowing in here. You're just nervous."

Now at Keller's side, Zoa wasn't sweating at all, or cold either despite her bare tattooed arms. She

peered at him with those dots as if waiting for him to say something smart

"If this is a transport," he attempted, "where's the crew and passengers?" His foot came down into

some-thing soft, and stuck. "Cow pats. I'm back on the ranch."

Ring squinted down. "Santa Fe in the early Devo-nian, maybe. Gorgeous, isn't it?"

How could this Halloween vessel look good to her when two of their shipmates were missing?

Keller shivered. "Girl, you're odd."

Slightly before him, Ring ducked suddenly, only to find that the offending obstacle was only a shadow.

"Belle Terre Secret Service," she said as she moved forward. "No, you don't want just the planet

Sagittar-ius Star Cluster Secret Service."

"Clunky."

"Keller's Cavaliers?"

"Please..."

"Nick's Knights."

"How long we been friends?"

"Um-going on six years."

"I quit after today." He took a few more steps. His tone wasn't very reassuring. His grumpy attempt to

lighten the mood had done nothing for his own. Savannah's mood was always the same, give or take

shifts toward passion. He thought again about drawing his sidearm, but without a visible threat he didn't

want to shake up the others. Be-sides, he needed both hands to pick his way through this place without a

fall. "We can't call ourselves 'Cavaliers,' anyway," he extended, a less than subtle apology for snapping at

her. "The living-history guys on Belle Terre have a whole regiment of horse that call themselves that"

"Are you going to the war next month?"

"What war?"

'The Revolutionary reenactors and the Civil War ones challenged the Medieval warriors and that little

stubborn bunch who call themselves Neo-Vikings. They want to stage a big battle on the meadow

outside Port Bellamy "

"On that meadow? They won't even be able to see each other. There's perpetual fog in there."

'Weather's supposed to stabilize in the valley any minute. The war guys want to celebrate and all kill each

other."

"I didn't hear about this."

"You've been neck-deep in the circuit trunks. The Revolutionaries promised to put away their firearms if

the Medievalists don't use archery."

"Swords only?"

"I guess. It's all nonlethal anyway. Just a show."

"Hmm... kinda like to see the tactics of that."

'Thought you might. Since you like studying hist-" Abruptly, Ring stopped moving forward. Zoa passed

Keller from behind and bumped into the other woman.

Something had changed in Ring's posture, the set of her shoulders. She no longer looked up, but fixed

upon the tiny screen of the instrument in her hand.

Keller shoved past Zoa and peered over Ring's shoulder at the unhappy tricorder. "Bacteria?"

Tiny yellow spores clung to Ring's hair. "Only if it's bacteria with a heartbeat"

His hand trembled as Keller pulled out his communi-cator and adjusted it for maximum gain, short-range,

then brought it to his lips. "Keller to Shucorion. Do you read?... Can you hear me? Come on, come on...

make a good noise..."

The palm-sized box scrabbled, dutifully searching for a voice. None came. In this gauzy, monochromatic

environment, all silvery yellows and greenie silvers, would he be able to spot someone like Shucorion, a

man with deep blue skin, wearing a blue sweater and gray trousers? Would Shucorion's dark brown hair

look as washed out as Savannah Ring's did? Would they be able to tell him from the shadows?

For the first time Keller looked down at "his own hand. More like grapefruit rind than flesh.

And at Zoa, poking at an object that might as well have been a roll of carpet stood up on one end. She

still looked gold. The green was probably just afraid of her. Her leather suit, though, looked pumpkin

orange in-stead of tanned.

/ should've noticed this.

Adjusting his perception for the weird colors, he moved forward again, hunting for a yellow or green

lump instead of a gray or blue one. In his hand, the communicator didn't seem so cold anymore.

Silence in this place had a bitter echo as they tracked the tiny signal on which they pinned their hopes. He

decided they were still in some kind of airlock. This vessel was clearly segmented, and this chamber was

narrower than the vessel itself, so it had to be some kind of entry path. From here he could see

mesh-draped chambers, one beyond the other, lying before them like an infinity mirror.

He touched the back of his hand to his own cheek. No more frosty sting. "Is it getting warmer in here?

Maybe I'm adjusting."

"It warmers." Zoa's sharp-gravel voice startled him. Though she was hard to scare, even she seemed

spooked in this place. Usually she hardly moved as well as hardly spoke. Here, she constantly scanned

and shifted, never staying in one spot for more than a few seconds.

Temperature was definitely above freezing now. While he wasn't close to comfortable, he could push

down the shivering now and his hands had stopped aching. Still, not exactly a heat wave.

He checked his communicator. Channels open. Still receiving. No one was sending.

'There!" Savannah Ring lowered her tricorder and pointed forward.

Ten feet before them, at the edge of the marshy ex-cuse for a deck, a purplish twist lay crushed against a

cheese mound, barely distinguishable as a torso and legs. The only real clue was the single two-foot braid

of hair draped over a hunched shoulder.

"Aw, no-" Keller bolted forward, careless of obsta-cles that might be hidden in the drapings of mesh. He

raked his way through with his guts in his throat.

But as he knelt and touched Shucorion's back and the ball of his shoulder, the Blood stirred. When he

tried to push himself up on both elbows, Keller eagerly helped him.

"Don't move him!" Savannah Ring hurried to catch up. Zoa came right behind her.

Unwilling to massage the moment, Keller ignored her. He pulled Shucorion up until they could see each

other. The Blood's blue skin was magenta in this odd lighting, but his eyes were the same clear

teardrop-blue as al-ways. Somehow the lighting here didn't change them. He blinked and squeezed them

tight as if they were stinging. The side of his neck was scored with abrasions and a bloody scrape

colored his jaw, but he was alive.

Alive! After an antimatter explosion!

"Shucorion, it's me!" Silly announcement-but Keller was so glad to see his first officer blinking at him that

all professional templates drained out his socks. He grasped Shucorion by both arms in a way he hoped

was reassuring, if urgent. "Where's Bonifay? Was he with you? Is he here?"

"Bonifay?... Bonifay-" Shucorion blinked, con- fused, then forced himself out of the fog and gestured

toward the cavernous guts of the big vessel. "He must... have gone there. I ordered him to stay on the

Plume-'* He clutched at Keller and rasped, **I ordered him!"

"Where did he go? Tell me where!"

As Keller's demand rolled on a weak echo, Shucorion pointed out, away from them, into the long throat

of the vessel.

Before his reaching hand, the wet-moir‚* cavern gaped, unhelpful, dour, and deep.

Chapter Two keller scrambled his brains to make sense of the past hour's events. Shucorion and Bonifay

had been alone on a Blood Plume, supplying the small force of Blood ships cooperating with Keller and

the colony on Belle Terre. The Blue Net was their own little ram fleet, Keller's at-tempt to appear

stronger against the unstable Kauld. Now that the Federation had a presence in the Sagittarius Ous-ter,

he was determined that the presence have some ef-fect After all, he and all the other colonial transplants

had intruded on a very old struggle and upset the balance. All Kauld had been about to win their ancient

tug-of-war with Blood Many, when in steps the United Federation of Planets, all shiny and new, and all

previous bets are can-celed. Blood saw a chance to side with the new guy. Kauld had cracked into a

civil conflict of their own, some friendly, some very much otherwise. Politics. Yech.

Now Keller relied upon his Blue Net, a cluster of Blood Savages, each with a handful of smaller Plumes

attached, spreading their presence out as wide as might be reasonable-nobody really knew what

"reasonable" was-like an octopus in its hole puffing up and show-ing just its eyes. Don't touch me. I'm

big.

But attacks still occurred. Kauld raiders, defying their own battlelords, had become posturing and

bel-ligerent. Shucorion and Bonifay had broken off to in-vestigate this unexplained new intruder, picked

up imexplainable readings, ventured too close hoping to explain them, and -been struck hard by what

must be an automated system. Hot-blooded Bonifay led an escape into the ship that had struck them

down. Maybe it hadn't seemed so crazy at the time.

And here they stood, without him.

"Did he have his mask on?" Keller held his breath.

"Oh..." Touching his own mask, Shucorion seemed only now to remember it was there. "Yes. We should

have fought to save the Plume... we had contain-ment-"

He almost got the words "shutdown" out before he collapsed into a coughing fit Slipping against the

sup-port of Keller's arm, Shucorion fought to sit up, though his legs were still folded in an awkward

position. His clear filter mask fogged with his effort

As he struggled, a hand pressed to his chest, his head turned enough to notice Savannah Ring's tricorder

humming over him. He lurched toward her and pushed the instrument down.

"Don't scan!" he wheezed. "Stop this!"

Ring drew back defensively, saving her tricorder from assault "Why?"

*The attack came when we-^scanned-for power source!.. turn it off!"

'"Rim it off, Savannah," Keller supported.

Shucorion looked at him. "Where is Challenger?"

"Laying off about eight thousand kilometers. We couldn't read emissions, so we beamed in."

"We neither." Shucorion's fingers sank into Keller's supporting arm and he used the leverage to rearrange

his legs.

"Slow " Keller cautioned.

"We picked up this vehicle... Bonifay read mass, but no power, no engines-----How does it move at

all?" His eyes were desperate and confused, even angry with the unknown as he broke off for another

coughing spell, a painful one.

"It's called inertia," Keller said, trying to sound con-fident.

**No-no," Shucorion insisted. "It came out of hyperlight speed-and slowed itself!"

"Then it's got a power source we haven't found yet, that's all."

"Keep Challenger away. When we moved near, we were-attacked. We must get out from here. This

ship is dangerous-"

Ring offered, "It's not making any moves toward the frigate. Might be an automated proximity alert."

"No power," Shucorion wheezed, shaking his head. "No engines, yet it crippled us. The containment

failed, and our-our... Bonifay should never have disobeyed me... this is very-bad-for him-"

'Take it easy," Keller soothed. "You're lucky to have escaped over here. Your Plume's antimatter field

col-lapsed completely. We read the explosion." A shudder of relief ran up his spine and he paused.

"Thought you were dead, shadow...."

They looked at each other. Shucorion's eyes were grim and haunted, as if he thought they were each

gaz-ing at a doomed man.

What's wrong? Keller's question went unvoiced.

Whether he might've mustered die resolve to ask, he would never know. A loud sssshdonng clanged

deep in the chambered ship, and echoed out to them. Zoa's thick-soled sandals clunked on the padded

deck as she vaulted between them and the great indoors, but she was confronted only with another echo,

another donnng, and then silence.

Then, a gentle gush of dry, warm air swelled into the corridor and made Keller's sandy hair flicker against

his forehead. He tried to stand, but Shucorion kept hold of him.

"What changed?" Keller asked.

Annoyed that he had ordered the tricorder off and now wanted answers, Savannah Ring turned the

scan-ner back on and squinted at the screen. "Oxygen. A lot of it. I'd say this monster just compensated

for us."

"How civil..." When Ring reached for her mask, Keller snatched her wrist. "Me first"

He drew a long deep breath of the good stuff, let it out, drew a second one deeper, then pulled his mask

away from his nose and mourn an inch, and sniffed.

Though the scent of methane still clung to the hairs on his hand, the overwhelming odor was diminished,

replaced by a crisp mountain-air scent. How could an alien ship know what he needed?

He drew in another quick sniff. The heavy aroma of moss and moisture lay beneath the new air. Casting a

nod at Ring, he watched as she took her own mask off and confirmed that he wasn't delirious or being

baited.

"Think it's a bluff?" she asked.

"Don't know."

This was definitely better air than the meager filter could provide. The masks could keep them alive, but

they weren't pleasant, nor did they last forever. If there was air, better breathe that and hold back the

masks for emergencies.

He hooked his mask on his belt, then took Shucorion's off and did the same. "Keep them handy."

Zoa, however, snatched hers off and joyously threw it to the moss-furred deck.

"Brilliant," Ring grumbled. 'There's foresight" She reveled in Zoa's caustic stare as she recovered the

other woman's mask and tucked it into her medical pack.

"Can your transporter bring us out?" the Blood asked.

"Only if we're back in there, the way we came," Ring said, pointed back. "We couldn't read any deeper

in."

Abruptly they all realized what that meant. When they looked at Keller, he felt like a chopped squid on a

hook. Had he let them get cut off? His communicator was still cold as he drew it up and readjusted the

gain. "Challenger, come in. This is Keller, come in."

They listened to a faint crackle. No response.

Rather than toy with their hopes by trying again, Keller tersely confirmed, "Cut off."

"Maybe we have to go back hi the vestibule to com-municate," Ring said.

"We should go back," Shucorion agreed.

Keller lowered his communicator. He left the channel open, in case things happened to be different ten

yards in.

Spurred by their isolation, Shucorion tried to pull himself upright, using Keller's arm for leverage. He only

half made it

"Stay here" Keller told him. "Catch your bream while we find Bonifay."

Even as he spoke, the words flaked away. Shucorion brought a knee under him, pushed off the furry

wall, shuddered to his feet, and determined to move. "We must work," he insisted.

"You'll just slow us down." This also had no effect. Keller let him go a couple of pathetic steps, then

slipped an arm around his dutiful-okay, stubborn- companion. "Kinda pigheaded, aren't you?"

'Thank you..." But he started off in the wrong di-rection, back into the entry corridor.

Pivoting bodily, Keller drew him around. "Whoa. This way."

'There are things I must explain-----1 contacted the

Blood Fleet-"

"Save your breath. We picked up the distress call."

**No, no-something more-"

What could that mean? And what difference did it make right now which kind of signal got sent to which

team of would-be rescuers? Keller determined to stay on course and that course was Bonifay.

"Concentrate on walking for now."

"Don't-don't scan!" Shucorion gasped as they moved into the next chamber. He reached for Ring's

tricorder.

She stabbed him with a glare and sidestepped "Hand's off, stranger."

Feeling his oats from their fifty percent of victory, Keller surged forward, the weight of Shucorion giving

him a sudden sense of power over this place. With Ring a few steps ahead and Zoa minding their flank,

he urged the boarding party through a vaguely demarcated archway into the adjacent chamber.

Instantly Keller understood why he felt as if he were being patched. Zoa raised her arm and pointed

upward, to each side.

"Persons," she announced.

Yes, persons-by the hundreds. Lining the bulk- heads, in rows at least three deep, stood phalanx after

phalanx of people, male and female, young and old, their bodies, faces, hair, and clothing coated with

bronze-green patina. Their eyes were open, gazing hi random directions. Their physical positions were

also random. Some stood, others sat, some knelt.

"Holy-!" Keller gulped. "Mannequins! Look at them all!"

He kept a tight grip on Shucorion, who had suddenly gone stiff and aghast.

"Gargoyles," Ring digested immediately. "This would make a great backyard...."

Keller cast her a bewildered glance. "Nosferat-you."

What a sight... there must be thousands of them!

Breathtakingly realistic, the nameless congregation mesmerized them with its silence and motionlessness,

a cast of thousands held in a freeze-frame.

Zoa, completely spooked, was crouched with her knees flexed tike a cat's, her back arched, her head

swiveling and eyes wide. Her sandals were tipped up on the toes. Her long arching toenails dug into the

moss. Her hands were on her Rassua blades as if to strike at the gaze of the sightless eyes.

"Humanoid, at least," Savannah Ring mentioned. "It's a start."

Only when his chest started hurting did Keller real-ize he was holding his breath. He forced air into his

lungs. "They're in the club, all right... castings?"

"They're all different from each other." Ring pivoted to look at the rows of statues on the transverse

bulk-head above them. "I don't see two alike."

Star Trek - [Gateways 2] - [New Earth] - Chainmail

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