Star Trek: KLV: More Beautiful Than Death by David Mack

Author:David Mack
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pocket Books/Star Trek
Published: 2020-08-10T16:00:00+00:00

* * *

“I need a solution, gentlemen.” Kirk stood behind Spock and Scott, who were huddled over the control panel for the Kathikar dark-energy weapon. “Enterprise can’t take this for much longer.”

Spock looked up from his tricorder readout. “Fortunately, the same damage that prevents us from turning the weapon off has also impaired its function, preventing it from firing at full power—which would have destroyed the Enterprise in a single shot, regardless of whether its shields were raised.”

“That doesn’t exactly qualify as good news, Spock. Wights are inside my ship.” Kirk slapped Scott’s shoulder. “Give me a plan, Scotty. Something. Anything.”

The engineer was despondent. “The control systems are goosed. Best we can do is pop the cork on this bugger.”

“In English, Mister Scott?”

“We’ll have to blow it up.”

“Great.” Kirk didn’t like where this was going. “Spock, didn’t you say we’d wipe out half the planet if we destroyed the generator?”

Spock thought for a moment. “Only if we cause an uncontrolled detonation using the ship’s weapons.” The look in his eyes told Kirk that his first officer was concocting a new plan. “We can induce a less energetic but equally effective reaction by creating a feedback loop between its primary and secondary phase coils.”

“But we can’t do that from here,” Scott said. “We’d have to go down into the generator and cross-circuit the buggers manually.”

Encouraged, Kirk asked, “How long will it take?”

Scott said, “Four minutes.”

At the same time, Spock said, “Sixty seconds.”

“Scotty, I’ll pretend not to notice you’ve been inflating your repair estimates. Once it’s done, how long ’til it blows?”

Spock answered, “Ninety seconds.”

Kirk grimaced. “Blast radius?”

“Approximately sixteen kilometers.”

“So much for reaching safe distance,” Kirk said. “I don’t know about you, but I can’t run sixteen klicks in ninety seconds, and Enterprise can’t beam us up with its shields raised.”

Scott raised his eyebrows. “Well, in theory, the weapon ought to shut down about eight seconds before the whole thing goes boom. That’ll stop the subspace disruptions and give us a window for transport.”

“Eight seconds? To beam up all twelve of us, plus the base’s personnel?” Kirk shook his head. “And I thought we were cutting it close. Okay, go—get to work. I’ll brief Enterprise.” He watched Spock and Scott sprint away to the base’s lower levels, then he flipped open his communicator. “Kirk to Enterprise. Sulu… you’re not gonna believe this.”

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