12.
'Captain ... Jim.'
Kirk was shaken gently and respectfully out of deep sleep by Spock's hand on his shoulder. He moaned sleepily, and rolled over, keeping his eyes firmly closed.
'Captain,' Spock insisted. 'You requested for me to wake you up after eight hours of sleep.'
'Mmm,' Kirk mumbled, wishing that he hadn't. He opened his eyes slowly, blinking in the light of the torch. 'I'm surprised that light hasn't run down after being on all night.'
'I switched it off shortly after you and Chekov fell asleep, Jim,' Spock admitted. 'The noises did not return - and I sleep a good deal better in dim light.'
Kirk smiled sleepily at the Vulcan. 'How long have you been awake, Spock?'
'Two hours, twenty minutes,' Spock told him, squatting down beside him. 'I explored down the corridor for some small distance. We have three options as to our direction. A branch to the right, one to the left, or straight on.'
'I guess we take the one that points towards the centre,' Kirk decided. 'You shouldn't have gone on alone though, Spock. You can't tell when something might happen. This is a big place to find a missing person in, and we can't even find the exit.'
Spock regarded him with an unreadable expression, that Kirk interpreted as his unwillingness to argue with his captain despite the fact that he heartily disagreed with his opinion.
'Maybe it was unwise, but I am unharmed,' the Vulcan said finally. 'Captain, I don't believe it's necessarily logical to take the passage that is aimed towards the centre of this structure. These corridors wind about so much that we'll probably be facing in a totally different direction within the space of a few minutes.'
'We may as well take that one, though,' Kirk argued. 'It's as good a direction as any, and we may as well keep consistent, instead of just choosing passages on impulse. If we keep taking corridors that point to the centre we're bound to get to it sooner or later.'
Spock's eyebrow rose at the human's dubious logic, but he simply said, 'I certainly hope so, sir. The prospect of being trapped in here until we die is not exactly inviting.' He paused for a moment as he let that thought run through his mind, then looked across to the lump in a sleeping bag that was Ensign Chekov, still peacefully asleep. 'Shall I wake Chekov?'
'Good idea. We'd better get under way.'
Kirk began to don his jacket and pick up his rucksack while Spock shook the ensign's shoulder. The man woke up with a violent start, obviously on edge.
'Vhat?' he exclaimed, then pushed his head out into the open. 'Oh!' He struggled out of the bag and stood up. 'Are ve ready to move on, Captain?'
'That's right.' Kirk straightened up, ready to walk off, but Spock touched his shoulder.
'Captain, we cannot leave our sleeping bags here.'
'Sulu can beam more down,' Kirk shrugged.
'Jim, maybe the enormity of this structure makes you forget, but this is a grave,' Spock said seriously. 'It is a tomb to the greatest kings that Vulcan ever possessed. We cannot simply leave all our rubbish behind in the corridors. And the bags are very light.'
'I guess you're right,' the captain smiled, ashamed. 'It is easy to forget.'
He rolled up the thin bag and stuffed it into his knapsack, then took some rations from an outer pocket.
'We eat on the move,' he ordered, starting off down the corridor. Spock followed obediently, declining to eat, while Chekov munched at some kind of snack bar behind him.
******
They walked through the long, tedious corridors for more than an hour, and Spock was beginning to feel faint pangs of hunger that told him it was time to eat now. He took a small swallow of a nutritional drink, then pushed the flask back into his bag. At that point the passage they were in began to widen steadily, and Spock pointed at heavy gold doors blocking their path.
'More chants and prayers, sir,' he indicated, as they reached them. 'May I?'
'Go ahead,' Kirk invited. 'I don't want to be turned into ash.'
Spock went to the door and knelt, and solemnly recited the chants he saw on the gold panels, in a low, murmuring voice. Then he touched a certain spot on the surface, and the doors swung open. A blast of cold air hit them like a wind. The Vulcan hurriedly slid gloves over his hands, which gave surprising warmth considering the thin material they were made of. Spock looked up again into an enormous chamber, the faces of its walls and ceiling studded with jewels and embellished with gold-plated pictures in relief.
Chekov gasped at the glittering room before them. 'There must be more vealth in this place than all of Wulcan!' he exclaimed.
'What is this, Spock?' the captain asked, twisting his head to scan the room. 'Not the king's chamber?'
'No. I doubt that.'
Spock walked forward to touch a huge, dusty tomb, that stretched along the great room. He wiped his gloved hand over part of the stone, and read the writing he saw there.
'This is where the slaves and animals belonging to the third king, Stiyok, are entombed, Captain. They would have been lined up outside the vault, then each would step up to the rim, and his or her neck would be broken. The animals were killed in a similar way.'
'You mean they'd stand there seeing all those bodies of people who had gone before them, and just let themselves be killed?' Kirk asked incredulously.
Spock turned to face him.
'They would have no choice,' he said simply, with a slight shrug of the shoulders. 'It was believed that the deceased would need his slaves and livestock in his new life, so they had to die with him. I am sure that occasionally there was a struggle, and obviously the children would be terribly afraid - '
'They killed the children?'
Kirk began to feel sick. The vision it conjured up reminded him of Klingon death camps. It was chilling to think that Vulcans were once so cruel. Spock saw his expression of disgust.
'Vulcans were people of great passion, Captain, and dedicated to their traditions,' he explained, as if trying to excuse his ancestors. 'That is why we had to learn to suppress our emotions. Without that control - '
Kirk looked at Spock as a startling realisation hit him, suddenly seeing the Vulcan in a new light. Without that control… He had seen Spock angry before. He had heard McCoy's account of what happened in the Tyok caves only a few days ago. Sometimes a Vulcan's passion escaped, and who could tell when...
'Captain.'
Kirk cringed with embarrassment when he saw that Spock had read the shocked look as easily as if he had spoken his feelings out loud. The Vulcan gestured for Kirk to follow him, and they moved away from Chekov, who staring in fascination at the intricate decoration on the huge tomb.
'Captain,' Spock began again in a low voice. 'In times of great pressure emotion does sometimes escape, but Vulcans have not only mastered their passions - they have also developed with time. I am not capable of such an act – of such carnage – any more than you are capable of committing the atrocities of your ancient civilisations.'
'I know that,' Kirk smiled weakly, ashamed of even thinking of it. 'I never truly believed you would be. All this happened thousands of years ago. It'd be a totally different race of people. But the children, Spock - '
'They killed all except the youngest babies,' Spock confirmed. 'Some fortunate mothers were granted their life so that they could raise the infants.'
'And the condemned just went up there like sheep?'
Kirk couldn't keep from staring at the huge stone vault. It was difficult to force his mind to accept that it could be full of remains, and that there were many more tombs like it in this enormous building.
'There would have been fights at the executions, but Vulcans did have more unpleasant ways of putting people to death than breaking the neck, and ways of life which are worse than death,' Spock said ominously.
'I take your point - but this thing is enormous, Spock.'
He nodded solemnly. 'It does indicate the wealth and power of these men.'
'Captain,' Chekov interrupted, back at Spock's side. 'I can hear a transporter.'
'Sulu?' Kirk questioned. 'I didn't ask for anything.'
'More to the point, he does not yet know where we are,' Spock reminded him. 'It isn't our transporter.' He cocked an ear towards the noise. 'It doesn't sound like our transporter. It is definitely a different pitch.'
The captain nodded, although the sound seemed no different from that of the Enterprise transporter to his ears. But Spock was usually right, and he took the Vulcan's word as fact.
'Get down,' he said swiftly.
Kirk crouched, obeying his own order as he spoke it, huddling against the side of the cold stone tomb. Then he crept, staying low, to the corner of the stone, and watched six humanoids materialise, in an unusual, red sparkling transporter beam. It was the same colour and shade as the beam of the counterfeit MIPTD, he noted.
Spock came silently to watch over his shoulder.
'D'you think they know they can't beam out again?' the captain whispered to Spock.
'Unknown, Captain. That is irrelevant. The important question is, what are they doing in here, and who are they?'
'Pzyiomans, I'd assume. Maybe they know Dempster got in, and're coming to investigate why they haven't heard anything. They might know Enterprise has been beaming things in here.'
Kirk stopped speaking as the beam released the figures, and he watched with pleasure the surprise on their faces when they realised their weapons hadn't come through with them. One tall man took a strange communicator from a shoulder holster and spoke into it in a fast, harsh tongue. Then he stamped his foot on the floor and kicked at a tall, beautiful pillar that was decorated with patterns of flowers and animals. He impatiently beckoned for the group to follow him out of the room. The leader stopped at the door, said some words awkwardly in a different language that was obviously strange to him, and disappeared through the doorway that opened before him.
'Obviously they have brought someone down who knows my language,' Spock said with a hint of surprise.
'They might not know as much as you do,' Kirk reasoned, mostly to reassure himself. 'And they might not know this grave bites back,' he said seriously.
'Their impatient and careless attitude shows that,' Spock agreed with him. 'It usually benefits to have respect for whatever one is dealing with. And the man does not have a total knowledge of Vulcan.' He shuddered, although the slight movement was almost invisible to the gesticulative humans. 'His pronunciation was extremely poor.'
Chekov grinned. Anyone who was not born to it – except perhaps the Romulans – would find Vulcan hard, or near impossible, to pronounce. Almost as hard as these English speakers found Russian. Kirk grinned too. He knew that with the mouth movements Vulcans grew up learning to use, they found English an equally strange and awkward language to articulate, even if they never showed it.
'I guess we better be moving on,' the captain decided quickly, before Spock had a chance to see their smiles, and think they were laughing at him.
Kirk ran his eyes over the room, looking for other routes out. There was another door at the opposite end of the room, facing the centre of the tomb.
'Well, shall we follow the Pzyiomans, or take the other door?' Kirk asked the two men.
He didn't run his starship as a democracy, but he figured they should have some choice when all their lives were at stake with each decision they made.
'Ve do not vant to bump into them, sir,' Chekov pointed out. 'They do not look as if they vould velcome us.'
'On the other hand,' Kirk argued. 'We want to know what they're doing. If Dempster was serious, then it's the whole galaxy hanging in the balance.'
'I suggest that we follow at a discreet distance,' Spock advised, 'first contacting the Enterprise, apprising them of our situation, and requesting a universal translator so that we can understand what these men say if and when we locate them.'
'That sounds logical,' Kirk agreed. He looked at Chekov, and the ensign nodded. The captain opened his communicator. 'Kirk to Enterprise. Come in.'
'Enterprise. Scott here,' came an unexpected voice.
'Scotty?' Kirk asked, glancing across at Spock with faint worry. 'Where's Sulu?'
'Och, there's nothing wrong with him, sir,' Scott reassured him, reading the concern in his voice. 'I sent him off to take a rest. I've taken over command for a wee while. Are ye all well, Captain?'
'Yes. We're all here,' Kirk told him, smiling. 'We're fine for now.'
'Little T'Si's been screaming for you, Mr Spock,' Scott said dismally. 'We cannae settle her.'
'Who is attending to her?' Spock asked immediately.
'Christine Chapel's taking care of her in sickbay. The nurses are going broody over her. You'll have all the fairest lassies leaving the ship to have bairns, Mr Spock,' he said reproachfully.
Spock responded with a disapproving grunt. 'Then I cannot speak to her to reassure her,' he said.
'She has lungs like the devil's foghorns,' Scotty said helplessly. 'She'll wail until we're all stone deaf.'
'Then I suggest that someone explain the situation to her,' Spock said, as if that had always been the most obvious answer. 'If simple words are used, and strong tone of voice, she should understand.'
'Aye, sir,' Scott grinned. 'Why didn't I think of that?'
'Scotty,' Kirk intervened. 'I hate to interrupt your baby talk, but we haven't loads of time. I want a universal translator sent down. There're six more Pzyiomans in here, and they're bound to be up to no good. We're going to follow them.'
'Aye, aye, sir,' the man said enthusiastically in his Scottish brogue. 'Right away, Captain.'
Kirk smiled at Scott's efficiency when, less than thirty seconds later, a translator materialised on the floor in front of him.
'Thanks, Scotty. We'll check in again as soon as possible. Kirk out.' He attached the communicator to his belt again, and looked up. 'Come on, Spock. We have to catch up with them.'
'I'm sure they will not be going too fast, sir,' Spock said, approaching the door. He gave the blessing and it opened, to reveal another brown passage, this time with doors at regular intervals in either wall.
'Can you hear them, Spock?' Kirk asked. 'We need the flashlight again, Chekov.'
'I hear them, and I believe I smell them.' Spock's eyes bored into the darkness ahead, then the torch dazzled him, lighting up the passage for twenty metres. 'They went straight ahead, Captain.'
'Okay. That's the way we go then.'
And they began to trudge along the passage. Kirk felt weary before they'd even started. He'd had about as much as he could take of long brown corridors. After a long while they came to another door blocking their way – a plain one this time, simply put there to cut off the end of the passage, perhaps as some kind of fire precaution.
Spock nodded, 'Through there, sir.'
The door was opened cautiously, and Kirk gasped as a flight of stairs that seemed to stretch forever was revealed. He stared up into the dim light, straining his eyes, but he couldn't see the top, nor could he see any movement above them.
'Switch that light out,' Spock ordered quickly. 'I see them,' he whispered, his sharp eyes seeing further into the gloom than the human's. 'They are a long way up. They will not hear us, but I advise we proceed with caution. We have no weapons.'
'Neither do they,' Kirk reminded him softly. 'But they do outnumber us two to one. Come on. Slowly, and quietly. I'm not taking any chances.'
'All the vay up there, sir?' Chekov asked apprehensively. 'It's a long climb, Captain – and with our bags on our backs.'
'Then the sooner we start the better.'
Kirk put his foot up determinedly onto the first sandy coloured step, and beckoned the others to follow.
******
They seemed to climb for hours, Spock always seeing the dim figures in front of them. Every now and then there was a flat, wide landing, a bend in the flight of stairs, and the opportunity for a short rest, then they carried on up, and up. Chekov stumbled up a step in the dim light, and Kirk steadied him.
'We can't use the flashlight,' he apologised. 'They'd see it.'
'I know, sir,' Chekov nodded. 'It vas only a broken step that I tripped on.'
'My legs are getting pretty shaky,' Kirk grinned. 'I don't know how far up we've come.'
'About three and a quarter light years, I think,' he complained grimly.
'Now, Chekov. Surely it's further than just one little parsec?' the captain laughed.
'Three and a half light years then.' Chekov paused, subconsciously waiting for Spock to tell him that was illogical, considering the structure was only one mile high – or perhaps to comment on the inappropriateness of humour in this situation. 'Captain?' he said, when Spock said nothing.
His voice had changed to concern. The ensign nodded at Mr Spock. The Vulcan was standing as if he had been frozen, directing a sharply pointed ear toward the ceiling.
'Spock?' Kirk asked, recognising the posture. 'What do you sense?'
Spock answered without realising he was speaking. 'I sense – I sense life – the essence of life. Not of the body. Something is watching us from somewhere.'
There was a look of intense concentration on the Vulcan's face, then it cleared rapidly, and Spock became aware of the captain touching his arm.
'Captain,' he hissed, suddenly urgent. 'I hear something.'
Abruptly there was a loud creaking noise. As the Vulcan whipped around to investigate, stone slabs crashed down below and above them, cutting them off from the rest of the stairs, creating a chamber.
'What is it?' Kirk snapped.
'I do not know,' Spock replied calmly. 'Sounds like a sucking noise.'
'Yes. I hear it now. What is it?' Kirk repeated, then choked, as all the air was sucked from his lungs. He gasped, strangling, and grabbed hold of Spock's arm as he collapsed to the ground. 'Vacuum,' he wheezed. A dizziness spread through his mind as it was starved of oxygen, and lights started to flash in front of his eyes. The flashing spots of colour spread rapidly, blocking all his vision, until they merged into blackness.
