They had been walking for about two hours when Kirk was forced to acknowledge the first twinges of self-doubt. He knew that if he had one weakness, it was to need to feel in control of a situation...even if that meant dragging his injured first officer and CMO on a probably fruitless, nearly thirty kilometer trek away from their only point of relative safety. Was it possible that he had pulled them away from the shuttlecraft simply to feel like he was doing something? No, he decided. It couldn't be. He was a better commander than that. He'd trusted to his intuition, which had told him, quite plainly, that they needed to get away from the Galileo. Harboring doubt of this sort was unproductive at best. It wasn't as if he was going to turn back or even mention his misgivings.

What the doubt did make him realize, though, was that if something were to happen to Spock or Bones, it would be entirely his fault. So? his mind countered. Don't let anything happen. Do everything in your power to make sure nothing happens.

Their progress was slower than Kirk would have preferred, but it was also faster than he had expected. Spock, of course, was setting the pace. The Vulcan had phasered a bent piece of piping from the Galileo to use as a walking stick, but he still couldn't move at more than a slow, halting gait. Just the sight of his heavy limping made Kirk cringe. Lately, he'd found himself inadvertently charging ahead of his officers and having to wait for them to catch up at Spock's pace. He doubted that they'd traveled more than eight or ten kilometers.

Always the devoted doctor, Bones remained staunchly at Spock's side. At first, he had asked Spock every few minutes how he was doing, often pulling out his medical scanner only to frown at the results, put it back, and ask Spock about his condition again. The doctor had only eased up when Spock had told him, in a strained voice, that he would gladly inform the doctor if his condition changed but that in the mean time, McCoy was contributing more effectively to his mental distress than were the injuries. This had shut Bones up for a while, but any time Kirk glanced back he could see that McCoy was watching the Vulcan carefully.

McCoy interrupted his musing by calling up to him, "Jim! Hold up for a second." Kirk turned around. Both McCoy and Spock had halted a few feet behind him. McCoy was standing close to Spock, one hand resting protectively on the Vulcan's arm. "Spock needs rest," Bones proclaimed. Spock neither affirmed this comment nor disagreed with it, though Kirk supposed that Spock's lack of argument was an answer of its own. He searched his first officer's face, but Spock's Vulcan mask was tightly in place. Maybe a little too tightly. Kirk felt a new flare of concern, but dampened it down and forced a smile.

"I'll take your word for it, Doctor," he said. In any case, his own head and shoulder ached enough that he couldn't mind a break, no matter how much time they lost. "Right here?"

"Unless there's another patch of dirt that strikes your fancy."

Kirk shook his head. "Not at all, Bones."

"Come on, Spock," McCoy muttered. "Let's sit down."

Kirk waited for an unconvincing assertion that Spock was fully capable of sitting without the doctor's assistance, but none came. The Vulcan only nodded wearily and allowed McCoy to support him on the way to the ground. He slipped the last few inches, however, and landed heavily, an uncontrollable grimace slipping through his emotionless veneer. Kirk's worry for his first officer flared again, and this time he didn't try to suppress it. He started forward to assist them, though by the time he arrived McCoy had already helped Spock to situate himself. The Vulcan sat with his splinted leg stretched out before him and his right arm wrapped protectively around his ribs. His eyes had closed.

Kirk stared down at his friend before looking up to ask Bones, "How is he?"

"Well, he's not good," Bones said. His tone softened. "I'll know more soon." He pulled the medical scanner out of his pack and let it hum by Spock's head for a few seconds. Spock glanced up at the doctor, and Kirk could see something, an understanding of some kind, pass between them. Then McCoy shook his head and turned back to Kirk. "He's not really worse physically, Jim, but the pain readings are…high. Really high. Remember Deneva?"

Kirk nodded and chewed on his lip, wishing that he could do something, anything, to take away Spock's pain. How could he forget Deneva? He'd lost his brother and nearly lost Spock too, in more ways than one. "That bad?"

"Gentleman, I am still here," Spock cut in. He deep voice was husky, but he sounded cogent and in control of himself. But of course, Kirk thought. Why had he expected anything different? Spock went on. "And…no, Captain. The pain is not yet 'that bad.' I doubt I shall ever experience anything that bad again." He took a deep breath. "At the moment, I am capable of continuing our journey."

"Oh, shut up," McCoy said. Kirk's eyebrows shot up in surprise and bemusement and when he looked at the doctor, Bones shrugged. "Spock isn't continuing anywhere for at least fifteen minutes," he explained, folding his arms and glaring at Spock, who met his gaze with feigned, wide-eyed innocence. Kirk felt a surge of affection for both of them. Now McCoy was shaking his head. "Don't let that Vulcan bravado fool you, Jim."

"Noted, Doctor," Kirk said. "Let's sit."

McCoy acquiesced and they joined Spock on the pale, rock-studded dirt. On his knees beside the Vucan, McCoy rifled through his medikit and began to prepare a hypospray. Kirk found himself unable to keep from watching Spock, as if close scrutiny might keep any unpleasantness at bay, and did so until the Vulcan met his gaze and raised an eyebrow. "Captain," Spock said gravely, "I assure you. I am quite all right."

"He's lying, Jim."

Now Kirk couldn't help but smile at the doctor's automatic, and no doubt unappreciated, intrusion. "I thought Vulcans didn't lie, Spock," he joked.

The hard lines of Spock's pain-tensed face relaxed for a moment, and he said with a smirk in his voice, "Captain, I think you would be surprised at what my father's people are capable of." Somber again, he turned to McCoy. "Doctor, the pain still exists. My statement, however, is not inaccurate. Simply…resting has allowed me to regain control over it. I am 'all right.' What was that?" McCoy had jabbed the hypo he'd been preparing into Spock's shoulder and released it with a hiss.

"General painkiller," he said. Then, "Jim. You too."

"Me?" Kirk asked.

"Your head is still killing you," McCoy informed him. Kirk nodded genially and offered his unhurt shoulder for the hypo. A few moments later, the pounding in his head had dulled to better than bearable and his torn shoulder was movable without more than a twinge of pain. His various bruises felt less tender as well. Already Bones had gone back to fussing over Spock. Seeing that he wasn't needed, Kirk sat back and considered their immediate future.

Even if the ship wasn't theirs—and even without hearing Spock's calculation of the odds, he knew it was unlikely—it belonged to someone, and had to've landed where it did for a reason. There had to be something there, something to work with. Whatever the case, Kirk determined silently, he would find a way to get them off this planet. He'd done crazier things in his command than steal a ship or storm a hostile community with only his phaser.

He became aware after a little while that Bones was trying to catch his eye. When he met the doctor's gaze, McCoy sighed. Kirk waited for him to speak, aware that McCoy only started bad news and arguments this way. McCoy said, "Look, Jim, I know it's too late for us to turn back, and I'm not asking you to. But…I have to ask this." Kirk nodded for him to continue. "What in the name of God are we going to do if we get to that site and it isn't our ship?"

Spock surprised them both by answering. He had been sitting back with eyes shut, not moving, but opened them now and leaned forward to say, "Doctor, we will do whatever must be done."

Kirk shrugged an agreement, Bones looked away, and, for a short time at least, they allowed silence to fall between them.


They began to walk again almost as soon as Dr. McCoy sanctioned Spock "rested." Even so, Spock could sense the doctor's frustration, couched as it was in his incessant hovering. He believed he understood it. Dr. McCoy did not like to see his patients out of his control any more than the captain liked to see his ship—or its officers, or his friends—out of his. McCoy wanted to see Spock laid out on a biobed in Sickbay pajamas with a strong analgesic and a bone knitter just as much as Kirk wanted him strong, fit for duty, and ready for whatever they might encounter. Though both scenarios were unlikely to occur any time soon, Spock thought that the two seemed at odds around him. Fortunately, Spock understood, they were too strongly united by friendship, common goals, and their strong if rather discomfiting concern for his well-being to be driven apart by other means.

Of course, as much as he appreciated his friends' concern, Spock preferred not to be hovered over. This was especially true when the hoverers were powerless to change the situation and could therefore do nothing but frustrate him. Even more so, he disliked the guilt and helplessness that radiated from both Kirk and McCoy when neither could alleviate his pain. The captain had developed a habit of staring unabashedly at him as he limped along, while Dr. McCoy still attempted to surreptitiously to check his vital signs and pain with the scanner at nine- or ten-minute intervals.

As a result of such combined mothering, Spock found himself directing a disproportionate amount of energy toward appearing, as best he could, to be "all right." As such he kept his face carefully neutral through the agony of pressing his right foot to the ground, and allowing the broken joint to hold his weight as he pushed off again against the uneven dirt, even as repetition increased the pain. He made sure to respond to Kirk and McCoy when they spoke. He used Vulcan techniques to disconnect himself from the feeling as best he could, reminding himself in mantra form that pain was a thing of the mind and that the mind could be controlled. I am a Vulcan. There is no pain.

He could not, however, help but limp deeply, and the trembling of his weary limbs proved beyond the power of his Vulcan control. He was aware that he was severely compromised and that his debility was only growing. He was becoming increasingly, and disturbingly dizzy, and the lightheadedness that plagued him made his reactions that much more difficult to control. He had also begun to stumble over small rocks and uneven areas in their path, too wearied by the pain to avoid them. Though he had not yet fallen, he realized that he probably would have had not Dr. McCoy's hands quickly found and supported him at each slip. Spock was grateful for the doctor's aid and relative silence, but he feared that in the face of more pain he would lose consciousness and become an insupportable burden on both of his friends.

His internal time sense told him that seventy-three point five minutes had passed since they had resumed walking when he became aware of something humming. He stopped abruptly, curious and concerned but for the moment unable to find the energy to explain his sudden halt to either McCoy or the captain.

"Spock, what's wrong?" McCoy said immediately, and a few feet ahead of them Kirk turned around.

Spock forced himself to stop wincing. He leaned heavily on his piping and tried to keep his uninjured leg from trembling too much under his weight. Then he glanced around, looking for the source of the noise. "I hear…something," he said finally, and paused. His voice was rougher than he had wanted or expected it to be. He went on. "A hum," he said. "Like the sound of a working engine."

"What do you think it is?" Kirk asked urgently.

Spock shook his head slightly. "I do not know," he admitted.

"Can you tell where it's coming from?"

Spock closed his eyes and forced himself to concentrate. Fortunately, the hum was growing louder, and he was able to point toward it with one hand, almost directly back the way they had come.

"I see something!" McCoy exclaimed. Spock opened his eyes. "Look, Jim. Something's coming our way. Just above the ground. Might be a hovercraft of some sort."

"Maybe more than one," Kirk said. He too stared intently across the tundra.

They waited for a little while, hardly moving. As the objects approached, it became apparent that two of them were hovercrafts, of different shapes and models but both of the sort used to travel short distances across land. Between them, apparently suspended by a tractor beam, was the crumpled carcass of a Class F Federation shuttlecraft.

"Is that…?" Kirk asked.

Spock nodded.

"Then we have to get out of their way," Kirk said decisively. "It must be whoever shot us down. We have to hide until they've passed."

"Yeah, Jim, but how?" McCoy demanded, looking wildly around at their surroundings. "Where? We're in the middle of a damn tundra. There's nothing but dirt and rocks and bushes for miles around."

"And ghembapt," Spock remembered suddenly. At the doctor's confusion he elaborated, "Similar to your Earth badgers, only larger. We have passed several of their burrows."

McCoy's exasperation threatened to explode to the surface, but Kirk only shook his head at the doctor and asked, "What's your point, Spock?"

"The last burrow that we passed is approximately forty meters in that direction." He pointed, arm now at an angle to the direction from which they had come, and from which the hovercrafts still approached. He felt dizzy, unsteady, and had to fight down the pain and nausea that had accompanied his rapid movement before he could explain his plan. "If we travel with haste I believe that we will reach it before we are visible to the hovercrafts, and we can hide ourselves within."

"Well, then, what are we waiting for?" McCoy said. The doctor surprised Spock by tugging one of Spock's arms over his own narrow shoulders and saying, in his most commanding voice: "Jim, help me." Kirk complied wordlessly, taking Spock's walking stick and pulling Spock's right arm over his own broader shoulders. Spock found that he lacked the ability to protest. His head was spinning.

"Ready?" Kirk asked.

Spock tried to answer in the affirmative, but apparently the question had not been directed at him. Dr. McCoy nodded and then they were off, jogging as fast as they could with Spock dangling between them. Spock attempted to limp or hop, but the jarring pain took its toll quickly, as his ribs stretched and his ankle slapped against the unyielding ground. He willed himself to take the punishment in silence, though he seemed no longer to be in control of his muscles at all. A roaring filled his ears and he felt his mind detach.

He was therefore only dimly cognizant of being lowered and slid foot-first, on his stomach, into some recess in the ground (a ghembapt burrow, some distant part of his mind supplied). He heard but could not quite interpret the words: "There isn't room for both of us. You stay with Spock. I'll hide myself in the bushes." "No, Jim—" "That's an order, Doctor. Stay with Spock. I'll cover both of you." Then he felt something warm and substantial settle close beside him. Something much lighter and scratchier and earthier came to rest upon his shoulders and head. A few moments of blessed stillness went by. Then, as Kirk and McCoy's exchange began to percolate his mind, he realized that he must offer his place in the hole to the captain and tried to pull himself toward the surface. But arms stronger at the moment than his wrapped around him and held him in place even as he struggled. Then pain flared again in his ribs and ankle, and the renewed agony sent his mind skittering, once again, into darkness.

When he fully awoke it was to the hiss of a hypospray. Several minutes had passed. He immediately regretted having lost consciousness—a failing of his human half, no doubt—and replayed the last few minutes' events in his brain. He remembered being placed into the ghembapt burrow with McCoy, and being covered, and attempting to escape. He knew that McCoy had held him and kept him from moving. Jim had been… Jim had not been with them. Jim had left them to conceal himself elsewhere.

Spocks' eyes flew open and he grabbed McCoy's arm with a shaking hand, pulling the startled doctor closer. "Jim," he requested urgently. "Where is Jim?"

McCoy shook his head and winced, and Spock released his grip, realizing that he had probably bruised the doctor's arm. "They got him," McCoy said thickly. Spock then understood that the doctor had not been reacting to Spock's grip. Instead he could sense a deeper, more fundamental pain. McCoy went on. "I don't know who they were or where they were going or what in God's name they wanted, but they came up in those hovercrafts and saw him. Stunned him without even getting out, then jumped out, picked 'im up and threw him in the back of one. They looked around a little but didn't see us, despite your best efforts at announcing our hiding spot."

Spock blinked in acknowledgment of the doctor's weary accusation but offered no comment.

McCoy went on. "Then they just kept going the way we were going. Galileo in tow."

Spock nodded, and tried to sit up. McCoy helped him.

"I pulled you out of the hole and gave you a stimulant, just now," McCoy said. "Fourth-to-last painkiller too, since it looked like you needed it."

"Thank you, Doctor."

McCoy seemed to leer for a moment, but the expression was tinged so heavily with worry and fear that Spock could read no ill will in it. Then the doctor sighed. "So, Spock," he said. "You are the commanding officer now."

Spock nodded.

"Got any great ideas?"

Spock did not answer for a moment, forcing instead himself to calm, ignore the pain, and discover the logic of the situation. Worry, anger, fear and discomfort were luxuries that he could not afford. "Obviously," he said slowly, "we must locate and rescue the captain." A surge of pain through his ankle clenched his teeth for a moment, but soon passed. "Then," he said, "we will need to discover a route of escape from this planet."

"Oh," McCoy replied, and dragged dirt-smeared hands across his face. "Is that all?"