Star Trek: The Trellisane Confrontation by David Dvorkin

Author:David Dvorkin
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction, Star Trek, Fiction
ISBN: 9780671700959
Publisher: Pocket Books
Published: 1989-09-01T07:00:00+00:00

Scott looked around at the bridge crew, his

face grim. "I'll remember," he

said. He stared wordlessly at Mori for a moment.

"I'm not about to forget

about you, you can be sure of that." He strode back

toward the elevator,

the Assassin close behind him.

Only minutes later, the faint lurch of

transition between normal space and

subspace, more psychological than physical,

hit Mori. On the great screen

in front of him, the star field disappeared

momentarily and then shimmered

back into existence. But now it was static, the motion

apparent because of

the enormous velocities of the higher warp speeds

utterly absent. The

illusion of a flowing universe had given way to the

illusion that the ship

was absolutely still in a static universe. Although

Mori ordered Sulu to

press on at the greatest speed the impulse

engines would provide, he knew

that those speeds were so low in comparison to the vast

distance yet to be

covered, that the Enterprise might as well be standing

still. Their

pursuers, if there were any, would surely not be so

limited. It must have

happened when the ship was damaged and he and his

partners had escaped. Why

had the fool let his ship be damaged that way?

If Mori had been in charge

already, it would never have happened! But it had

happened. Mori groaned.

He was too preoccupied to notice the rush of

hope that had buoyed up the

slumping Sulu. He knew from his console that the

ship's speed had been

constant before, under warp drive. Scott had lied,

quickly and

extemporaneously, but apparently convincingly.

Now they had gained a few

hours, another ally in the form of the chief engineer,

and their captors

had been weakened by one. It had taken a

lot to make Sulu's natural

cheerfulness go dormant; now it came bubbling up

again.

At the sound of a throat being cleared, McCoy

looked up from

report from an assistant he was reading.

Spenreed stood in the

doorway, looking stricken. "Doctor. I

wanted to thank you for

helping me. I'mMy call has come."

"Your what?"

"My, uh, my call. So you won't see me

again."

"I don't understand," McCoy said. "You're

going somewhere?"

Spenreed choked back a sudden sob. "No.

No, I'm not. Yegemot

don't go anywhere. We just die."

"Die!" McCoy thought he began to understand.

"Are you trying to

tell me you've received some sort of premonition

of death?"

Spenreed nodded. "The call. I was officially

informed by a

representative of the Food

Provenders gemot. He said it must be

before the banquet for gemot leaders."

"Oh, yes. That damned banquet. I have to be

there, and I'm sure

not looking forward to it. Now, you listen to me,

Spenreed. I've

run into this sort of superstition, this fortune telling

and

forecasting men's deaths, on other worlds, and I can

tell you

it's nonsense. It doesn't

matter where in the Galaxy you run into it, it's still

nonsense. You come to me after that banquet, and I'll

repeat everything I just said, and we'll see how you

feel about it then."

Spenreed laughed suddenly and grinned a fierce,

broad grin. "You may see me at the banquet,

Doctor. Tell me then." He stalked off down

the hall,

leaving McCoy to wonder at his sudden anger.

McCoy pondered both that anger and the rest of the

curious episode for some minutes. Finally, he

shook his head and dismissed it all. "Damned

ignorance," he muttered. Maybe I can

force-feed some science into these

slaves. If their masters don't object.

Well, their

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.