9.

Kirk fixed his eyes on the three men who moved into the doorway of the store room, blocking his view of what was outside. All three looked tired, thin and unshaven, with expressions ranging from tired desperation to outright hostility. Their clothes were dirty and creased, as if they had not been changed in weeks.

Spock took half a step forward, closing the distance between himself and his captain, unsure as to whether he was moving for his own protection, or for Jim's. Blind or not, he knew he would be a force to be reckoned with in a physical fight. He could see nothing of the men's clothing or expressions, but he could feel the thick haze of anger and exhaustion in the air. Despite the strength of those emotions, the repressed fury from Kirk's mind almost overwhelmed his perception of them.

'Would you care to tell us what you mean by assaulting us, dragging us here and locking us in?' Kirk asked icily. Spock had heard that tone of voice many times before. It meant that his captain was white-hot with anger, and at his most dangerous.

'Out,' a rough voiced man said shortly. 'Get out there.'

There was a brief hesitation, then Kirk said quietly, 'They've got my phaser, Spock.'

Spock reached out silently and cautiously for Kirk's arm, but was stopped by the sharp crack of a stick across his forearm.

'Watch it, Vulcan,' one of them said – a man with a thinner, higher-pitched voice. 'Keep your hands by your sides.'

'I cannot see,' Spock said in a brittle tone. 'I need guidance.'

'Oh, that's what this is for,' the man replied, tapping something to the ground. 'They let blind people into Starfleet now, do they? No wonder it's going to hell.'

The sense of Kirk's anger increased palpably, but fortunately he had the restraint not to do anything foolish. Spock realised the stick that had hit him must have been his own cane – and also that either these men had not been part of the crowd that assaulted them, or that they had not heard him announcing his blindness to them. He pressed his lips together. He wanted to ask for the cane, but he did not expect to be given it, and he did not want to beg for it. The sense of curiosity he could feel in the room had suddenly increased, and he did not enjoy the sudden scrutiny.

'I need guidance,' he repeated. 'Will you allow me to hold my captain's arm?'

'Go on – just don't try anything,' the man said.

He reached out again, holding Kirk's arm perhaps a little tighter than was necessary. He felt irrationally vulnerable. He could feel Kirk's tight sense of worry through the touch, and he could not help but be angry at himself for provoking that concern.

He sensed the space getting larger as they left the storeroom, as if they had entered another room rather than a corridor. His suspicion was confirmed as one of the men said, 'Sit down over there,' and Kirk led him on a rather circuitous course through the room. He held his right hand out despite the injury to his finger and felt the corners of what he presumed were desks as they moved.

'Here, Spock, sit down,' Kirk murmured, putting his hand to the back of a wooden seat.

He sat, laying his hands on his thighs as Kirk drew up a chair beside him. The men stayed on the other side of the room. He could sense that they were highly nervous – of their captives or of the situation he could not tell – but their nervousness made him deeply cautious.

'First,' the rough-voiced man said. 'I know you're a captain. I want to know your names.'

'Kirk,' Kirk said shortly. There was no gain in hiding their identities. 'This is my science officer, Mr Spock. And you? Are we allowed to know the names of the men who're holding phasers to our heads?'

'Brown, Artois, and Shelley,' the man said shortly, presumably indicating who was who with his body language.

'Well, Mr Brown. I – don't suppose you've got any painkillers?' he asked, touching his hand gingerly to the swelling on his head.

The rough-voiced man laughed shortly. Presumably he was Brown, then. Spock sensed that Kirk's question was angled so that Spock could put the names to the voices.

'You think we've got a painkiller left on this whole damn planet?' he asked.

Kirk paused, then gave a tired laugh. 'No, I guess not.'

'Painkillers are not effective against the creature's exertion,' Spock said tonelessly.

'That don't stop you trying, Mr Scientist,' the thinner-voiced man snarled.

'No,' Spock said quietly.

'Spock was infested by one of those things for almost a week,' Kirk added, hoping that might garner some sympathy from their captors. 'He's blind because we tested the light treatment on him that killed the creatures.'

There was a long pause, then Brown said, 'That's lovely. We're very grateful to him. But it don't mean a goddamn thing right now.'

'What do you require of us?' Spock asked. He did not relish using his blindness as a bargaining tool.

'You know how long it is since we've had a Fed ship come here?' Brown asked. He seemed to have slipped into the role of spokesperson for the small group.

'Four years, six months, fifteen days,' Spock said smoothly. His precision did not seem to help. 'Your last official radio contact was one year, three months, seventeen days ago.'

'We're supposed to be a Fed colony,' the man said bitterly. 'You don't think we merit more visits than that?'

'Deneva voted for secession almost ten years ago,' Spock said flatly. 'You agreed to limited contact at five year intervals. If I recall correctly, you wanted contact intervals of fifteen years.'

'No,' Brown said sharply. 'The slime-ridden, money-grabbing government wanted it. They never asked us about contact. They never asked us about secession. And you - you have a duty to – '

'We have a duty to listen to the elected government of the planet,' Kirk cut across crisply.

'We were infected for *eight months*,' he snapped. 'You think it's all right to leave humans to suffer that kind of pain for eight months?'

There was a long silence. Spock could feel a tight pain and regret emanating from Kirk. Obviously it was at least that long since he had had contact with his brother – and perhaps he had died as a result.

'What do you want from us?' Kirk asked finally.

There was another silence. The tension in the room was palpable.

'They do not know,' Spock said quietly to Kirk. 'They have no logical plan or intentions.'

'Shut up,' the thin-voiced man snapped suddenly, his voice full of uncontrolled anger. 'Shut up, get up, come over here.'

Spock clenched his uninjured hand in his lap. He had sensed that it was best to remain quiet. He should have listened to his intuition.

'You will need to help me,' he said reluctantly.

'No. Just come over here and stop your smart remarks to your friend there.'

Spock pressed his lips together, then, in deference to the phasers he knew they had, he stood and began to make his way towards where the man had spoken from. He felt a desk in front of him, and moved along to the end of it, then stepped out into open space, knowing that soon he would meet another desk or chairs or, considering the state of the storeroom, anything that could be strewn on the floor. He moved with painful cautiousness, and he could feel the men becoming more impatient with his slowness. He felt a stab of anger at being seen like this by strangers, but he pushed it away, trying to focus only on his task.

He stumbled into something that felt like an overturned chair, and felt his way around it, then felt another desk in front of him. It seemed to be taking an age just to cross what he estimated to be about seven metres of classroom. Every time he was forced to move around an obstacle he had to reassess his position in the room, and reorient himself to his goal. Finally one of the men exhaled noisily and came over to him, taking hold of his arm and steering him through the room.

'They don't like non-humans much – you'd be best staying quiet,' he said in an undertone, then said in a louder voice, 'Come on, over here,' as he pulled him around a desk.

This was the man who had barely spoken until now. The other two voices were the same ones that Spock had heard talking outside when they were locked in. Perhaps this was the one who had been moving objects in this classroom earlier. His mental emanations seemed less angry than the others. But then another hand grabbed at his arm and pulled him roughly across the last metre of floor, and he felt the pressure of a phaser touching his side. He knew before he spoke that it was the thin-voiced man – his fingers matched his voice, pinching and bony where they clenched on his arm.

'What do we want?' he said tersely. 'We want food, we want medical supplies, we want our government to acknowledge that we need more Federation help. One million people aren't enough for an independent planet.'

Spock raised an eyebrow, but he was unwilling to speak in his precarious situation. Kirk laughed bitterly, however.

'For a start, you'll be lucky to have three quarters of your population left after what's happened. Thousands of people have died. Secondly, even if your government's survived they're certainly not active right now. Thirdly, you're *getting* food and medical supplies. You'll get more once relief ships get here. Holding us here isn't going to get you anything you're not getting already.'

'I've not seen any food,' the man hissed. 'I've not seen any of your men handing out anything.'

'We're having to prioritise aid to the sick and vulnerable,' Kirk said firmly. 'We're a ship of four hundred and thirty. We don't have the resources to feed this many people. Maybe *you* should do something, Mr Artois. Gather people together, gather the remaining food together, ration it out.'

'There *isn't* any remaining food,' Artois blazed, his voice roughening with the force of his anger. 'Not in this part of the city. We've been searching for days.'

'Well, if that's true I'm sure we can get you some ration packs,' Kirk said reasonably.

'*If* it's true?' Spock felt the phaser pressure a little harder into his ribs, and he closed his eyes, willing himself to stay relaxed. It was likely this man was not familiar with such weapons, and he knew that it was possible he would be shot entirely by mistake. '*If* it's true?'

'All right,' Kirk said quickly. 'It was just a figure of speech. Now, if that's all you want…'

'Oh, we want more than that,' Artois said, his voice now dangerously calm. 'We want the Federation to agree that our government made an illegal decision and take back control of this place.'

'But we can't – ' Kirk began.

Artois' hand pushed suddenly at Spock's back, and he stumbled forward, holding out his hands before him.

'Kneel down!' Artois said, almost in a scream. 'Kneel down there now.'

Spock didn't have to see it to know that the phaser was still pointed at him. He knelt swiftly, putting his hand to the floor in front of him. There was a noise of fumbling, of something being thrown and clattering onto the floor near Kirk.

'Call your ship, tell them to give our demands to the Federation council – or I'll spill some of that lovely green blood on the floor here.'

Spock tensed, overwhelmed by the sense that *something* was being held above his head by the man.

'Hey now, come on,' the calmer one of their captors said. Spock presumed this was the one called Shelley, since he had now put names to the other two men.

'Put that down,' Kirk said almost simultaneously in a low voice.

'We weren't going to hurt them bad,' Brown put in. 'Put it down, Jed.'

'I'm beyond caring,' Artois hissed. 'Now go on, Starfleet-boy. Call your ship.'

'Even if I do – ' Kirk began.

'What should I break?' the man said menacingly, cutting across Kirk's protest. 'Arm? Leg? How'd he like a broken jaw? Will he know which way to move to try to dodge it when I swing?'

The silence stretched out. It seemed to last for minutes, but Spock knew that in reality it was only ten seconds. The whole time he could feel the oppression of that *something* being held over him, and the only warning he would have of it hitting him would be the noise it would make as it swung through the air. Then there was the noise of a communicator chirruping, and Kirk said in a tight voice, 'Kirk to Enterprise.'

'Captain!' Uhura's voice replied. 'We've been trying to locate you. Your communication cut off. Did something happen?'

'In a manner of speaking,' Kirk said wryly. 'Who's in command, Lieutenant?'

'Mr Scott, sir.'

'Let me speak to him.'

There was a short pause, then the voice of the chief engineer saying, 'Scott here, Captain. Are ye all right?'

'Commander Scott, Mr Spock and I are being held hostage on Deneva,' Kirk said succinctly. 'Our captors request that we contact the Federation council and demand that they bring Deneva back under Federation jurisdiction.'

He could see little sense in prevaricating or attempting to get hidden messages through to Scott. There was very little chance of anything happening swiftly in response to the men's demands, whereas there was a high chance of Spock being seriously hurt if their captors detected any deception.

'Oh,' Scott said slowly. 'Do they now?'

'Scotty, they're threatening to injure Mr Spock,' Kirk said seriously.

'Och, well, I'll pass on their demands, Captain,' Scott said carefully. 'Are ye both all right?'

'We're not too bad – so far,' Kirk said, casting his gaze at the heavy metal bar that was being held above Spock's head. It was doubtless that it had the potential to seriously hurt him if the man holding it decided to strike him with it.

'But you could be,' Artois said softly.

'But we could be,' Kirk repeated. Spock was kneeling motionless, his face expressionless, but Kirk knew him well enough to see an unusual degree of fear in his bearing. He knew the Vulcan had little fear of pain, but vulnerability was a different matter.

'Do what you can, won't you, Mr Scott?' he asked, trusting his chief engineer to understand the double meaning of his question.

'Aye, of course,' Scott replied. 'I'll update you within the hour. Scott out.'

'Does that satisfy you?' Kirk asked tartly, closing the communicator. 'Will you stop threatening my science officer now?'

He locked eyes with the man behind Spock. He held the bar steady for a moment, then lowered it slowly and put it down on a nearby desk. Kirk began to move, then looked at Brown questioningly. He hesitated to give Artois too much credence as group leader – he seemed too unstable. Brown nodded slowly.

'Come get him if you want. Just don't try anything.'

Kirk rose swiftly and went to Spock's side, touching his arm as he got to his feet. He could feel the tension in the Vulcan, that slowly dissipated as Kirk touched him.

'All right, Spock?' he asked in a low voice.

'Quite,' Spock nodded, his voice perfectly steady. 'I – regret that my disability is providing such a point of leverage, Captain.'

'It's not something that can be helped, Spock,' Kirk murmured, moving him away from their captors slightly. 'I'm just sorry I got you into this.'

'You have got me into nothing, Jim,' Spock told him. 'I requested to come with you. I understand the risks of such situations. My blindness does not affect – '

'All right,' Brown cut over Spock's words. 'You've got the ball rolling. Get back in that room now.'

Kirk hesitated, glancing over to the open door to the storeroom. He didn't relish the idea of being shut back in there, with nothing but old text books and a flickering electric light as distractions.

'Tell me,' he said, focussing on Shelley as the most rational of the group. 'This is a school, isn't it. Don't you have replicators here?'

'Yeah, there're replicators,' he nodded. 'In the canteen.'

'Then why are you going hungry? All you need is some matter with the right chemical elements to feed into it.'

'We *know* that,' Brown snapped. 'They're smashed. Someone smashed them.'

'Perhaps they could be fixed,' Spock suggested.

'By who? Do I look like a technician? Why don't *you* fix them, with all your Starfleet training?'

'I cannot,' Spock said flatly. 'I am blind.'

'You might be able to tell me what to do,' Kirk offered.

Spock raised an eyebrow, trying to keep expression from his face. They were already in enough peril as it was. It seemed foolish to offer out promises to these desperate people – especially promises relying on his skill at repairing equipment by touch.

'It's worth a try,' Kirk urged him. 'It's better than being locked in there, Spock,' he said in a quieter voice. 'And depending on how long we're here, it could be in our own interest.'

'Point taken,' Spock nodded slowly. 'It – is possible. Perhaps if I could feel the circuits, if the power is off…'

There was a long silence, then Shelley said, 'If they can fix it – we could feed more than just us. Leslie too, Jed. She's near incapacitated with hunger, isn't she?'

There was silence again, then Artois said, 'Yeah, she is. I guess…'

'It can't hurt,' Brown put in. 'We can bring the units up here – there's the right power connections in this lab for them, and all the tools, too.'

'If we agree to try to fix them – will you let Spock have that cane?' Kirk asked carefully. 'We can't use it as a weapon – it's not strong enough. It won't hurt you to let him have it.'

There was quiet again, then Artois picked up the cane and threw it. It clattered onto the floor in front of them, and Kirk bent to pick it up and touched it to Spock's hand. Spock took it wordlessly, but Kirk could read the relief in his frame as he took hold of the one device that gave him a small sense of being able to function without assistance in this place that he had never seen.

******

'They're being held *hostage*?' McCoy asked incredulously of the voice at the other end of the intercom. 'By the people whose lives we just saved?'

'Aye, Doctor. The very same,' Scott replied grimly. There was no real tactical need to pass the information on to the ship's doctor at this stage, but he saw a definite need to pass on the news to Kirk and Spock's closest friend. 'They want the Federation to take Deneva back under their wing – but I canna see them agreeing to a demand like that made by hostage-takers.'

'And you can't find them?' McCoy asked, sounding as if he was close to bursting with frustration and anger.

'The captain's nigh on impossible to find anyway amongst so many humans,' Scott told him. 'But we've scanned multiple times, and we canna even pick up Spock's signs. They must have something blocking out their lifesigns.'

'Are they in danger?' the doctor asked, looking towards his medical kit, almost picking it up, and then realising the uselessness of that action while he was on the ship and Spock and Kirk were lost on the planet's surface. He hated situations like this. Given a living body in front of him, he at least had a chance, but all he could do now was trust to computers and their operators to do their jobs.

'They – were threatening to hurt Mr Spock if the captain didn't do as they said,' Scott said tightly. 'I got the feeling from the captain that they were serious.'

'Damn them,' McCoy muttered, banging his fist hard onto the desk. This was the last thing they needed right now, with the ship flooded with casualties and so much in need of attention on the planet below.

'Aye,' Scott said. 'I'm beaming some teams down to search, and we're doing what we can to find and pierce their sensor shield. I canna help feeling – well, I canna help thinking we oughtn't to leave Mr Spock in their hands – not blind as he is now.'

'No, I know,' McCoy nodded pensively. 'Spock would be the first to say it's not logical, but I feel the same.'

'In their hands?' a female voice asked anxiously. McCoy looked up to see Chapel standing in the doorway to his office, concern clear on her face. 'Where's Mr Spock, Doctor? What's happened?'

'Scotty, I'll get back to you,' McCoy said quickly. 'Let me know if anything changes.'

He flicked the intercom off, and looked up again to meet the nurse's eyes.

'Christine, come sit down,' he said, indicating the chair on the other side of his desk.

'What is it, Leonard?' she asked insistently, coming over to the desk but ignoring his invitation to sit.

McCoy took in a deep breath. 'The captain and Spock beamed down to Deneva to pick up some things for young Peter Kirk. It – seems that they were taken hostage by some desperate people down there.'

'But he's – ' She faltered, then seemed to recover control of herself, and began again, 'Doctor, are they in danger?'

'They – were threatening to hurt Spock.'

Chapel sat suddenly, as if someone had stolen the strength from her legs. She clenched her hands, staring at her own fingers as she flexed them open and closed.

'It can't be so hard to pick up Vulcan life signs,' she began hopefully after a moment of thought.

'Scotty thinks they've got some kind of blocking device. We can't pick up his life signs.'

She fell silent again, biting her lip into her mouth, willing herself to stay composed.

'Christine, you've gotten – close – with Spock over the past few days, haven't you?' McCoy asked her suddenly.

She looked down, seeming for a moment that she was going to deny it. Then she looked up and met his blue eyes with ones equally blue, but lightly hazed with tears. 'Yes, I have, Doctor,' she said with a tone of defensiveness.

'Have you slept with him?'

She stiffened, her eyes widening a little. 'Leonard, we may be friends, but I think that's pushing the bounds of – '

'Hell, Chris, I'm not pumping you for the latest gossip,' McCoy said in exasperation. 'Now, just tell me – have you slept with him?'

She nodded silently, her lips pressed together.

'More than once?'

She nodded again. 'Why?' she asked. 'What relevance does this have?'

'I know very little about Vulcan relationships, Christine, but I know that if he slept with you he's likely to have melded with you during – the act,' he said uncomfortably.

'Well,' she began hesitantly. It simply felt wrong to be revealing what had happened between her and Spock in such private moments, even to a friend as close as Dr McCoy. 'Yes,' she admitted. 'Yes, he did meld – just a very light touch.'

'Well, it may be enough to help. They may be able to throw up screens to stop our machines picking up their life signs – but there's no better machine than the human mind. Come on,' he said, grasping her arm above the elbow. 'We need to get down there and start helping.'