Star Trek: The Original Series - Bantam Episodes - 011 - Little Girls by James Blish

Author:James Blish [Blish, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780553135022
Publisher: Bantam Books
Published: 1975-08-15T07:00:00+00:00

Bread and Circuses

(Gene Roddenberry and Gene L. Coon)

There was no doubt about it. The space debris spotted by the Enterprise scanners was all that was left of the Bea-gle, an S.S. survey vessel posted as missing for six years. A mixture of personal belongings and portions of instrumentation, the floating junk contained no evidence of human bodies. The conclusion was plain to Kirk. The Beagle’s crew had managed to beam down to a planet before catas-trophe had destroyed their ship.

“Mr. Chekov,” he said, “compute present drift of the wreckage.”

“Computed and on the board, sir.”

Kirk glanced at the figures. Then he rose and went to his Science officer. “Mr. Spock, assuming that stuff has been drifting at the same speed and direction for six years… ?”

Spock completed a reading on his library computer. “It would have come from planet four in Star System eight nine two, directly ahead, Captain.”

Chekov called. “Only one-sixteenth parsec away, sir. We could be there in seconds!”

Kirk nodded to him. “Standard orbit around the plan-et There may be survivors there, Mr. Chekov.”

Spock had more information on the lost Beagle. “She was a small Class Four stardrive vessel, crew of forty-sev-en, commanded by—” He withdrew his head from his hooded viewer. “I believe you know him, sir. Captain R. M. Merrick.”

“Yes, at the Academy.” It had been a long time ago; and it wasn’t too pleasant a memory at that. Merrick had been dropped in his fifth year. Rumor had it he’d gone into the merchant service. True or false, he’d known him. If, by some chance, Merrick was down there, abandoned on that star …

Kirk turned to the bridge screen. They were coming up on the planet. The pinpoint of light it had been was enlarg-ing, growing rounder, transforming itself into a bluish ball, not unlike Earth. But the oceans and land masses were different.

He said so and Spock shook his head. “In shape only, Captain. The proportion of land to water is exactly as on your home planet. Density 5.5 … diameter 7917 at the equator … atmosphere 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen. Again, exactly like Earth.” He looked up, gesturing to his viewer-computer. “And I picked up indications of large cit-ies.”

“Development?” Kirk said.

“No signs of atomic energy yet. But far enough along for radio communications, power transportation, an excellent road system.”

Uhura slewed around from her station. “Captain! I think I can pick up something visual! A ‘news broadcast’ using a system I believe was once called ‘video’.”

” ‘Television’ was the colloquial word,” Spock observed.

“Put it on the screen, Lieutenant,” Kirk said. For a moment the bridge viewer held only the picture of the planet at orbital distance. Then, as Uhura made a new adjustment, the picture dissolved into the image of a city street—one that, apart from some subtle differences, could have been a city street of Earth’s 1960’s. Clearly a newscast, the scene showed onlookers in clothes of the pe-riod watching police herd up a small group of people in loin cloths.

An announcer’s voice, filtered, spoke from the screen.

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