Captain's log, Stardate 6026.5 We are in orbit around Resliv III. Mister Spock, Doctor McCoy, and I are preparing to beam down to the planet surface to investigate a possible distress signal. Spock is conducting a sensor scan to locate potential life signs.
The log entry was vague enough to cover him for now, at least until someone at Headquarters thought to match up incoming encrypted communications with the timing of their course change. Kirk sat in the center chair, trying not to fidget as Chekov and Spock huddled over the science station, speaking occasionally in tones too quiet for him to make out. The rest of the crew thought they were here, right on the edge of Tholian space, in response to a not-unusual distress signal from a long-neglected border planet.
He could tell from Sulu's posture that the helmsman had slipped into a state of suspended readiness, and sensed Uhura behind him, attempting to counteract her boredom with busywork, fiddling with the quantum transistor board she had dug out from under her console earlier in the shift. He drummed his fingers on his armrest, about to leap up and start prowling around the bridge to stave off his own restlessness, when the doors to the bridge swished open and he heard the familiar footfalls of McCoy behind him and then the weight of the doctor's hands settling against the back of his chair. He forced the tension from his shoulders and gave his CMO a half-smile over his shoulder.
"So that's it?" came the gravelly inquiry.
"That's it," Kirk confirmed. He could feel the doctor bouncing impatiently on his heels and waited for the outburst he knew was building behind him.
"We've been here, what, three hours already? What's the hold-up?"
"Our sensors are detecting more life on this planet now than was identified during the survey on record, Doctor," Spock said, looking up from his sensor outputs. "And it is proving unexpectedly difficult to isolate the readings for which we are searching."
Or she is no longer alive and there's nothing to find. The qualifier hung in the air between the four of them who knew; unspoken, but weighing heavily nonetheless.
"We're not planning on getting too much closer, are we? Somehow I don't think the Tholians would take kindly to us coming over to say 'howdy.'"
"No, no closer than we have to, Bones."
He saw Uhura glance up from the corner of his eye and heard McCoy's retreat, probably leaning up against the rail as was his custom when he sensed hovering over Kirk's shoulder would serve only to increase tensions on the bridge. He heard murmured conversation between the doctor and Uhura, and a quiet chuckle from his comms officer, and remembered his otherworldly encounter with the lieutenant the last time they were this close to Tholian space, and her fury afterwards upon learning that Scotty had been sent back up to the Bridge while she—
Kirk anticipated the straightening of his first officer's shoulders before the Vulcan made any indication of speaking, and he wondered, not for the first time, how his tightly-controlled friend could so easily shift the emotions and atmosphere of his surroundings. He swiveled in his chair to face the science station.
"What is it, Spock?"
The science officer replied without looking up from his sensors.
"Captain, we have detected a humanoid life sign on the planet. Ensign Chekov," he ordered as the navigator scurried back to his station, "put coordinates on visual."
"Aye, sir."
The viewscreen zoomed in on a landmass well away from the equator, larger than all but one of the terrestrial areas that dotted the planet. Close up, there was evidence of previous habitation: a central cluster of densely-built, towering structures, now in a state of severe decay; an older plaza-type area set off adjacent to the taller structures, and all surrounded by loosely-grouped, circular areas of smaller buildings that, based on the patterns of pathways intertwining them, suggested communities of dwellings.
"Where, specifically, Ensign?"
The view swung westward, past a dense forest, meandering streams, and then a gradual clearing that morphed into a backbone of foothills that gradually descended into the edge of a deep canyon. There the sensors reached their limits, and blurred pixelations became the computer's best interpretations of what it could not fully resolve.
"Spock?"
McCoy's query was terse, and across the bridge crew members turned away from their stations, some more than others, to hear and observe the first officer's response, their finely-honed sixth sense picking up the undercurrent of urgency that now permeated the space.
The Vulcan straightened and clasped his hands behind his back, his expression unreadable.
"Captain," he said, "I believe we have ascertained coordinates that will enable us to beam down to the planet with a good deal of confidence. There is approximately four hours of remaining daylight at that location."
Kirk felt the unspoken hesitation in Spock's tone. "How's the weather?"
"There is a solar storm approaching, as well as significant atmospheric instability. We have a window of approximately sixty-five minutes during which use of the transporter will fall within safety parameters, but local meteorological conditions may significantly impair our visibility and ability to navigate."
The captain sighed to himself. Of course. There's always something. "Any other readings of interest, Spock?"
"No other life signs detected, Captain, either on the planet or approaching." Kirk nodded once and turned to glance at McCoy, who gave him only a grim look in return.
"Well, let's go see what we can see, gentlemen."
When the whine of the transporter faded, they were met with absolute silence.
He had asked Kyle to find a place a short distance from the location Spock had identified, to give them time to get their bearings. Spock pulled out his tricorder and bent his head over it, slowly turning as he took readings, while Kirk stood, listening and watchful. He had seen many atmospheres in his travels, more than he could count, some remarkable, others not. This planet met the second criteria; he suspected if the skies were clear, the vermilion sun would create a stunning sunset, but for now slate gray clouds loomed closely overhead, dispersing the sun's rays and casting a sickly glow over their surroundings. The light had a flat quality to it, rendering the terrain shadowless.
McCoy shivered in the muggy, chill air, glad that he had insisted on field jackets. He turned, saw to his left a clearing backed by leafless brush and boulders against a gentle rise; another turn revealed the earth sloping down toward a lake, placid and dark. It was shrouded in a blanket of fog that did not quite obscure a forest of barren trees standing like sentinels in the water, some still upright, others tilting listlessly against the glassy surface. He detected the faintest musk of peaty decay on a sudden shift in the breeze.
'Well, that's not creepy," McCoy said, his light tone failing to conceal his uneasiness.
"The phenomenon is colloquially known as a ghost forest, in this case likely caused by artificial interference in the riparian ecosystem," Spock replied.
"They built a dam where they shouldn't have?"
"Yes, I believe that is what I said, Doctor."
McCoy rolled his eyes then bit back a retort as Kirk pursed his lips, patience already dwindling at their bickering. "Life signs, Spock?"
The Vulcan shifted the pack of supplies he was carrying to his other shoulder. "Picking up readings that way, Captain." He pitched his voice lower as he nodded toward the brush, reminding Kirk that their voices and movements would carry easily in this hushed environment. "Near the foothills that lay just beyond that area of vegetation." He paused, an almost imperceptible wheeze in his voice that did not escape McCoy's attention.
"I can give you something to help you breathe, Spock. The cold and humidity here will catch up to you if you're not careful."
"I am quite well, Doctor. Thank you for your concern, but I believe my superior physiology will more than compensate for any environmental disadvantages."
McCoy muttered something under his breath and Kirk held up a hand.
"Let's go, then. We're losing daylight, and we have bad weather on the way."
Kirk led them across the clearing, their footsteps muffled by the sparse ground cover, then they slowed upon reaching a dense thicket of low, scraggly bushes as the terrain took on a gradual slope. Thorny branches reached out and caught on their trousers and field jackets and McCoy swore under his breath as one scraped across the back of his hand, raising an itchy, angry welt.
The undergrowth began to thin, and Kirk halted and crouched just inside the outer edge of vegetation. What he had taken to be shadows along the stretch of foothills from afar became a series of caves outlined against the rocky formations. She stood outside the entrance to one of them, eyes closed in concentration, oblivious to their presence.
Kirk gestured silently at Spock and they moved forward, carefully picking their way through the last line of brush, coming within ten meters of her before her eyes flew open and she froze, staring at them wide-eyed, before turning and crashing through the brush, her figure a blur as she soon disappeared behind a clump of tangled scrub downhill.
"Go."
In one smooth motion Spock tossed the load of supplies he was carrying in the direction of the cave entrance and followed her trail, Kirk and McCoy falling in behind. They didn't cover much ground before being thwarted by geography; as Kirk's internal map warned him, they were headed further away from the lake and towards a much more precarious area: the caves were tucked up against the foothills but also uncomfortably close to a deep ravine formed by a once-mighty river. Now, its ancient and deep etchings through the rock were traced by a slow, gentle stream that sent up a barely audible murmur as they neared.
She stumbled as she reached the precipice, arms thrown back to slow her momentum, then twisted to face them and backed up, barely a meter from the cliff edge. Kirk stopped in his tracks and reached out his hands to hold Spock and McCoy back. She glanced behind her and then turned a hostile glare on them, breathing heavily.
"Lieutenant," he called out, then paused to suck in a deep breath, wincing at the oppressiveness of the atmosphere. "Lieutenant, please step away. We'd like to talk with you."
He was shocked when she began laughing in between gasps of air, and shot a worried look back at McCoy, who gave him only a shake of his head.
"Lieutenant?" she said, and caught her breath. Her voice was hoarse and uneven, and he supposed she hadn't much occasion to use it recently. She pushed her hair out of her face as a gentle breeze arose and then shifted its direction against them. "I wouldn't think so, not after all this time, Captain. I won't go," she continued, her voice shaky. "I won't go back with you. I haven't found what's looking for me."
"Looking for you?" Kirk repeated, more to himself than to her, and thought back to the thing, the creature that had haunted her dreams.
Her eyes jumped from him to the others, a slight frown creasing the space between her eyebrows. She gripped a narrow cloak that was arranged around her neck. Beyond her, the canyon gaped, the opposite cliff wall rising in the distance. Kirk considered the odds of pulling out his communicator, ordering a beam-up, and getting her safely aboard before she had a chance to jump; then abandoned the thought.
"Bones?" he said under his breath, without taking his eyes from her.
McCoy took a cautious step toward her, and she shuffled backward and teetered, the precipice just beyond. He sucked in his breath as suddenly his ears were ringing and the edges of everything around him became brighter. "No—" he thought he shouted, but it was just a whispered scream in his head.
Then she found her footing and planted both feet firmly and he froze in place, blood thrumming through his head, frantically trying to dredge up something, anything he could say to forge a connection with her, because he could see in her eyes that there was nothing more than one wrong word standing between her and an irreversible decision.
To his annoyance, nothing immediately useful came to mind, so he resorted to the second-best trick he had learned to employ in these sorts of circumstances: buy some time and keep her talking.
"I need to tell you something," he said, but the wind suddenly picked up, carrying his words away along with a dusting of topsoil and a few scattered leaves, so he drew a deep breath and repeated himself. With that, he thought there was a shift in her expression from resolute to uncertain, which he took as improvement, and he held his hands out in the universal gesture of I mean no harm and took a step forward.
"It's…well, it's kind of between you and me," he said, shooting a quick look over his shoulder at Kirk and Spock. He gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile, and risked another step closer. He could see now that her time here had carved hollows in her cheeks and hardened her jaw, but he was relieved to detect none of the glassy-eyed paranoia or feverish mania he had feared he would find.
"Tara—"
At that, she crossed her arms and gave him a glower that clearly said he had wrongly assumed he still had first-name rights.
"Solorio," he amended, and his mind's eye cut to an image, her name on a Starfleet standard-issue death certificate: Cause of death: suicide; manner of death: gravity, and he bit back an irrational and adrenaline-fueled snort of black humor.
"I owe you an apology." He arranged his face into what he hoped was the least threatening expression possible.
She narrowed her eyes at him. "What are you talking about?"
He would have sworn that the thing around her shoulders tightened its grip as he responded. "That day we talked. Remember? Right before you left?" A faraway look came across her features, and she glanced away for a moment. When she looked back, the wind caught a lock of her hair, obscuring half of her face. He quelled the urge to reach out and push it behind her ear.
"I should have listened," he said, "but I didn't, and I'm sorry."
She studied him, wrapping her arms around herself again as the wind cooled. He thought there was a note of sorrow, or regret, in her voice as she responded. "This would have happened anyway," she said. "That's not why I'm here, you must know that."
He didn't know, and he wasn't sure what to make of that, but it was an opening, and he was grateful for it.
"Then why are you here?" he asked, pitching his voice lower as the wind changed directions, whistling up now from the ravine below, bringing with it the scent of earth and decay and the promise of rain. He glanced up at the sky and saw gray and purple clouds roiling along the horizon.
"I told you, I'm still looking. For…"
He marveled at how much could be said there, in that space between words, and forced down his impatient instinct to fill her silence.
"Something." Her gaze slid to beyond him, to the distance, and her eyes lost their focus.
What? His inner voice demanded again. The thing in your head? What you saw in your dreams? But he didn't dare go there yet, not standing here on the edge of earth that held her so precariously.
"Do you think you'll find it, Tara?" he asked, gently.
She brought her eyes back to his, and he pushed down his dismay at what was there now: the panic of something trapped without hope.
"I don't know anymore. Maybe not. Maybe it's time to give up," she whispered, and he thought that if she survived this, if she could walk away from this siren song, there would be no shortage of mucking through the wretchedness that had taken up residence in her psyche by now.
"Well," he said, thinking as he blinked dust out of his eyes. Then he decided to take a chance: "Whatever it is," he drawled, "I don't imagine it's waiting for you at the bottom of that canyon, my dear," and was pleased when her eyes flashed at him, lips pursed together.
"That's better," he mumbled under his breath, but she was already speaking over him, her voice shaking with anger.
"You may think you're here to take me back, but I won't go. I can't go. So there are two possible outcomes."
Actually, three, he thought, or four, if you counted both the last-resort plan of the hypo of melorazine in his jacket pocket—not a feasible option in this perilous position—and the outcome of Noel's impending approach, still unbeknownst to her. He tried to picture what might be going on in her head, and could only envision something enormous, overwhelming, frangible and that old verse All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put—
"Sulu's been taking care of your plants," he said, and if she was jarred by the non sequitur she hid it magnificently. She blinked and then pinned her gaze on him, her eyes jittery but clear, and he held his breath.
"I'm not crazy," she said finally, her jaw trembling with the effort to keep her voice under control, and it had the tenor of a question rather than a statement. She clamped her arms against her side.
"I know," he replied, not sure if he was lying or not. He watched and waited her out, counting, seven, eight, nine, and finally her shoulders relaxed and he felt a wave of relief flood through him. A mist, so fine it barely brushed against his skin, cooled the wind and he shivered. Below, in the gorge, he could see the beginnings of a blanket of fog tucked in around the boulders and the stream.
"How long have I been here?" Her question was almost inaudible over the wind and the creaking of tree limbs against the impending storm.
"About two months."
Her lips moved silently, as if she were tallying up in her head, and then a frown that spoke more of confusion than contention creased her forehead. Something in his gut told him the worst was over, and that if he just held his hand out, she would step toward him, and she did.
But then the earth beneath her feet crumbled and her eyes widened. And as the wind began gusting in advance of the howling storm front, though Spock closed the distance between them in one step—more quickly than McCoy could even contemplate—the Vulcan stumbled when his foot landed on an exposed root, and he went down just as McCoy and Kirk reached her. She leaned towards them, in defiance of gravity, but the yawning ravine prevailed, and she landed against the dirt with a grunt, then slid downward on her stomach, hands scrabbling for anything to slow her descent. McCoy grabbed her left hand, and her other hand found the root Spock had tripped over. She looked over her shoulder, and then back up at him.
Fear of heights was not among McCoy's carefully curated collection of phobias—shuttles in turbulence, yes; transporters, hell yes—but a single glance at the frank terror on her face told him she was not as fortunate.
"Don't look down, Tara," he growled through clenched teeth, as he fought to ignore the tearing sensation in his shoulder. "Look at me. And don't you dare let go."
The root broke free from its moorings and she yelped as she dangled now over the emptiness by one arm. Her left palm was suddenly slick with sweat, and he tightened his grip, both hands now searching for purchase further up her arm as he swore under his breath. He heard Kirk behind him, yelling something at Spock about the supplies, but it all sounded very far away.
"Give me your other hand. Now, damnit! Push your feet against the rock and reach up!"
Her gaze drifted to the cavern below again and he bit back the urge to curse at her. "Tara."
At her name, she twisted and settled her gaze upon his again and he felt his heart rate slow from galloping to merely frantic.
"This is the way back. Let me help."
She closed her eyes and placed her boots against the cliff to brace herself, then reached her hand up, and he released his right hand to grasp her fingers, but coated in dust and dirt they slid from his grip. As he felt the ground begin to give way underneath him, he inched forward and reached further, pushing away his dizziness at the glimpse of emptiness below and thought maybe we'll add acrophobia to that list after all and clasped her forearm as tightly as he could. He pulled with all of his might, aware that Spock and Kirk were there now, too, and then with a great dragging thump of relief almost like the final push came the thought out of nowhere, she was atop the edge of the cavern, panting, flat on her back. He tackled her without meaning to, momentum tumbling him over twice and landing his knee on her hip. She winced and cried out and tried to roll away as he pushed himself up onto his hands and knees, then she gave up and lay flat on her back, gasping for air. Kirk landed a precautionary hand on her shoulder, and she looked up at him and shook her head in between wheezing breaths.
"I won't try to get away again, Captain. You just…you surprised me. Back there at the caves." She wouldn't meet his eye, and he decided to overlook her fiction.
McCoy was already running his scanner over her. He noted some fresh abrasions from the near-fall, and knew she would have some impressive bruising later, but detected no breaks or sprains. He nodded at Kirk. "She's okay to move." He stood, stretched, and rubbed his shoulder. He felt something slip and pop that made him wince.
"You okay, Bones?"
"Yeah, I'm fine."
"All right, up you go, then." Kirk motioned at Spock, and they both grasped one of her arms, and held her steady after she rose to her feet. She pulled one of her arms free then brushed at the dirt on her jacket and untangled a leaf from her hair.
In the near distance, a bolt of lightning crackled, and she startled. Seconds later, an ominous rumbling began building. Spock studied the sky and pulled out his tricorder, then gave a quick nod in Kirk's direction. "I estimate four minutes before rainfall and dangerous meteorological conditions reach our location, Captain." Kirk, still settling his breath, turned his attention to his wayward lieutenant, who was giving him a look of equal parts desperation and resolve.
"I'll be court-martialed if you take me back," she said in between breaths. "Desertion. And this thing," she gestured vaguely at her head, "will still be there."
He squinted at her in the fading sunlight, fighting against the heaviness that seemed determined to settle into his lungs, searching her face for the indications of a lost connection with reality that he had come to recognize over the years—nearly universal was the look of madness—and found none.
"Your disciplinary status is not entirely up to me," he said finally. Doctor Noel's pronouncements notwithstanding, he thought to himself. "You have any—"
Then his communicator chirped and he sighed under his breath as he opened it. "Kirk here."
"Captain, solar activity will require that we raise shields within three minutes," came the familiar worried voice of his engineer, trapped up on the bridge away from his engines. "Computer estimates it will be safe to activate the transporter system again in approximately ten hours. Shall we beam you up now?"
"Intensity level on the planet, Scotty?"
"You should be safe, sir, without precautions, but when this blows in, we won't have any means of contacting or transporting you."
"Any company out there yet?"
"No, sir."
"Acknowledged. Stand by."
He turned to his first officer. "Time, Mister Spock?"
"I estimate earliest arrival within twelve hours, sir."
Solorio, who had been rubbing the back of her neck, paused and looked at Kirk, head tilted. "What does that mean? I thought Scotty said ten."
He looked at her without expression. "Intelligence is after you, Lieutenant, and should arrive within twelve hours. We were trying to get to you first."
Her eyes widened. "What? Why?" She took a half step back and he started to reach for her but checked himself.
"Suffice to say you'll be a lot safer once we get you back on board."
"Will I? What will that really accomplish?" she demanded. "You think...you think taking me back will make this go away? How does that play out? I get drummed out for desertion, or I get locked up in the Federation funny farm indefinitely? Maybe both, for good measure?"
"You could be facing a far worse fate if you are apprehended by Intelligence, Lieutenant," Spock said.
"You have any other ideas?"
She chewed her lip, eyes unfocused on the distance, then levelled her gaze at Kirk. "Twelve hours, right? Can I have twelve hours? Please give me that, Captain. I understand I'm in no position to ask for anything, and I'll go back with you afterwards. I won't fight it, I promise."
He gave McCoy a long look, and an unreadable message was exchanged between them.
Kirk flipped his communicator open again. "Scotty, we need to wrap a few things up. We'll keep an eye on the levels down here and will be in touch when conditions permit. Kirk out." He closed the unit with a snap.
Spock stepped toward Kirk. "Captain, the cave system we observed earlier may provide adequate shelter from the conditions overnight."
Kirk surveyed their surroundings, suddenly disoriented as the horizon and the tree line faded in the darkening skies.
"The caves?" Solorio asked, looking from Kirk to the others. "I'll take us there. This way," she indicated with a jerk of her head.