Star Trek: Vulcan's Forge by Josepha Sherman & Susan Shwartz

Author:Josepha Sherman & Susan Shwartz
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction, Star Trek, Fiction
ISBN: 9780671009274
Publisher: Pocket Books
Published: 1997-01-02T08:00:00+00:00

FOURTEEN

Obsidian, Deep Desert Day 3, First Week, Month ef the Shining Cbara, Year 2296

The good thing about a nightmare, McCoy thought, was that you got to wake up from it. Unfortunately, he was already wide awake and wished he weren’t, so he could pinch himself, then go back to sleep.

Someone in the cave hurt. Someone was crying hopelessly, helplessly, and McCoy couldn’t find him. Her. Whatever. He couldn’t find his communicator either. Dammit, this “Master” and his pet fanatics had smashed his tricoro der. They’d stolen his medical bag, and that traitor of a Vulcan—a paranoid schizophrenic, assuming McCoy could even apply that diagnosis to Vulcans—had offered it back to him as a bribe.

All he had to do was sell out his friends. Little thing like that, and he’d be allowed to treat the sick and dying here in what looked and smelled like one of those filthy hospital wards back in the Dark Ages on Earth before they learned bout sanitation or anything else. Maybe if he threw his soul nto the bargain, this pointy-eared false prophet would give im back his communicator, too. hat keeps you from trying, boy? he asked himselfi imple. It was one thing to, well, bend the Prime Directive it. Hell, he and Jim had sprained it pretty severely a few imes in the past! But if he betrayed folks no.v, he could very ell be leading them right into a deadly trap. Even, Romu-ans and all that, a war.

His guts rolled. Ha, look, here came something edible at ast, brought by a contemptuous-looking Romulan who all ut hurled it at McCoy.

Lousy waiter, my friend. No tip for you.

The rations consisted of a watersack and some withered oots and the like, but at least it was food.

Yes, but there were others who needed it even more than he did. McCoy wisely took a good drink of the water—he wouldn’t do anyone any good if he collapsed from dehydration—and munched on one of the roots—ditto for collapsing from starvation—then got to his feet.

“Here.” With hand gestures, he urged the sick folks nearest him to take the rest of the rations, sharing the food and water out as far as he could.

A shadow loomed over him. McCoy, who’d been knecling beside a moaning woman, trying to get her to drink, turned to find one of the Romulans standing over him: that young centurion, Ruanek, face carefully impassive, body language not quite threatening him.

Aside from his politics, he looks like a fairly decent fellow. And I already know he has a sense of humor. Too bad he has a madman as a commanding officer.

For a time, McCoy tried to ignore the centurion. But Ruanek was standing so close that at last the doctor turned and snapped, “Go right ahead and try.” he Master, madman or no, had to have taken him prisoner for a reason, which meant, logically enough, that he would want to keep the captive in relatively undamaged condition. The centurion hesitated a moment, then

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