Chapter Three
Cold. That was what he felt first. For a split second the illogical thought that he had been beamed into the icy vastness of space entered his head and was immediately dispelled. He remembered partially materialising on the transporter platform, and Visnic's startled expression as he began to dissolve before the security guard's eyes, then nothing, until now.
Shivering, Spock took stock of his situation. He was aware that he had lost some time. For one thing it had been daylight when Kirk had given the order for beam up; now, night was gathering around him and he could see faint traces of the planet's six moons in the darkening sky. For another, he had a sense of time having passed. He had been – what? Unconscious? Instinctively he touched his head but there was no sensation of pain and apart from the cold, no discomfort in any other part of his body.
More disturbing perhaps, than his sense of losing time, was his awareness that he was in a different place from the area of beam up. Spock looked around. There was no woodland here; as far as he could make out in the near dark, he was in a U-shaped, boulder-strewn valley, most likely of glacial origin and offering little in the way of shelter.
"Spock to Enterprise. Come in." He said, not really expecting a response. As he flipped the lid of his communicator shut, he regretted the worry that his non-appearance must be causing his Captain and he could all but hear McCoy ranting about his worst fears concerning the transporter being confirmed. He could do nothing to allay either man's concern.
At least he was unharmed. There seemed no alternative but to walk and seek shelter. He had no means of taking his bearings and for no other reason than that he could see the largest moon in front of him, Spock began to walk in the direction of its ascent.
He was grateful for the light of six moons, later, when after hours of walking he was still able to pick his way around the polished boulders with relative ease. At least the physical exertion and concentrating on hypothesising about what had happened helped keep the cold at bay.
Scotty had warned about the encroaching ion storm. The most likely explanation for his failed beam up was a transporter malfunction due to the storm's proximity. Such occurrences were common enough. One thing Spock did know was that Jim would be looking for him, and that he too, would be running hypotheses through his head, probably with McCoy's voice sounding in his ear. Despite his Vulcan reserve, Spock took a little comfort from that thought as he continued his moonlit scramble over the valley's endless rocky floor.
The planet's many moons fascinated Spock. Vulcan had no moon but, after spending so much time in the company of humans, he was well acquainted with the different kind of fascination that Earth's moon held for them. It never ceased to amaze him how much myth and folklore and indeed high art had been inspired by what was in fact a quite unexceptional example of a planetary satellite. Its association with love was the most perplexing of all. Jim and McCoy had tried to explain it to him once or twice, but he was no less baffled at the end of their explanations than at the start; how was it possible for a woman's face to be more beautiful by moonlight than by other, more practical forms of artificial illumination?
This planet's moons were more spectacular than Earth's, bigger, brighter and so close together that they seemed to hang in the night sky like opal beads connected by an invisible thread. As well as considering their astronomical interest, Spock found himself wondering in what kind of awe or esteem the natives of this world held their lunar bodies. It occurred to him that Earth's moon had dark associations also, with madness and men howling into the darkness as they transformed into beasts, and he shuddered involuntarily, thinking of the wildcat that had attacked Jim.
For a while he concentrated on picking his way over and around the rocks and boulders without stumbling. At an estimate – Spock loathed the inaccuracy – he had been walking for around three and a half hours. He was not yet tired but he was beginning to feel thirsty. He could, he knew do without water for some time yet and he was confident of finding a source of water before he became dangerously dehydrated, for, after three and a half hours of walking he could see the landscape beginning to change, stones and rubble gradually giving way to large rocks and boulders and the way ahead punctuated with vegetation. In another hour he would be walking through forest and where there were trees there would be water. And giant wildcats with floppy ears.
The evolutionary implications of the wildcat's ears was occupying Spock's thoughts when his own ears, with their acute hearing became aware suddenly of a droning sound overhead. Spock looked up. His eyes tracked an object moving rapidly across the night sky following a downward trajectory. His first thought was that Kirk had sent a search party by shuttle to look for him, but he quickly dismissed this possibility remembering Scotty's warning about the ionic front. By the time it was close enough for him to see that it was indeed a craft of some kind, within minutes the craft was also close enough for him to recognise the insignia of the Klingon Empire emblazoned on its hull.
From out of nowhere, a wave of anxiety engulfed him. Spock leaned back against a large boulder, shocked and puzzled by the intensity of the sensation that gripped him. "I am a Vulcan." He said aloud, "I am in control of my emotions." He repeated the words over and over, all the while acutely aware that his emotions were, for the moment controlling him.
The moment passed. Shaken by his reaction to witnessing the Klingon shuttle, Spock struggled to regain his composure as he watched the craft, which was clearly in distress, plummet downwards between the hills distantly ahead of him. He listened for any sound of an explosion and, when none was forthcoming, surmised that the pilot had managed some kind of landing. This was not a comforting thought, accompanied as it was by a too vivid recollection of his experience of being a captive of the Klingons on Organia.
Spock turned his attention to his uncharacteristic reaction, attempting to rationalise the cause. As if directing himself to the answer, he scratched the back of his left hand and felt an irritation on the surface of his skin. Was he experiencing a delayed effect of the substance Dr McCoy had discovered on the Skarran arrowhead? The doctor had used a routine spray to treat the wound, which had seemed minor since the dart had merely skimmed the surface of his skin, leaving a slight abrasion.
The CMO had run his mediscanner over Spock and infection by a foreign substance would surely have been indicated. Looking at the wound now, Spock was in no doubt that even if it were not the source of his wave if anxiety, it was a slight cause for concern. A ridge of inflamed greenish flesh surrounded the cut, which, far from being closed, was open and weeping.
Spock tore a length of material from his trouser leg and wrapped it around his hand, tying it in a knot. If the arrowhead really had been impregnated with poison, he reasoned, he might be in grave danger, but nagging at him also was the thought that Jim Kirk and the two security guards had also been nicked, albeit slightly. Logic prevailed over his anxiety on this matter; the Captain was aboard ship and medical facilities were at hand in case of emergency.
Spock walked for another two hours before locating both a source of running water – a small stream - and a place to rest for the remainder of the night. Knowing little of the planet's wild creatures, Spock opted for a hollowed out space in the trunk of a dead tree. The hollow was uninhabited and its earthy floor was surprisingly soft; he had rested in worse conditions. Even so, he did not expect to sleep; he was tense and more on his guard than the current level of danger warranted. More Tired than he knew, he slept for several hours.
In the early morning, he woke feeling groggy and disoriented. Used to instant alertness upon waking, he looked around him, unsure of his surroundings. He was cold and his left hand when he used it to prop himself up into a sitting position throbbed with pain. He did not bother to unwrap his makeshift bandage, sensing what he would see. It would be necessary, and soon, to find some kind of tool with which to cut the wound and purge the infection. As for the poison already in his system, there was little he could do about that.
Spock drank long and thirstily from the stream and examined the trees as he walked, hoping to find some fruit or berries to sustain him. Some green and purple-veined berries looked promising but, without his tricorder, he could not be sure that anything he picked was safe to eat, and he opted to defer eating until it became a matter of survival.
As he made his way through the forest, Spock had the distinct sensation of being watched. He could no longer be sure whether this resulted from a real presence in the woods with him or from the workings of his own mind, therefore he chose to ignore it and suppress the urge to keep watching his back.
The animal trap took him by surprise. Sharpened wooden claws sprang shut around his ankle, biting cruelly into his flesh. When the waves of pain and nausea passed, Spock looked down to see a simple pronged trap designed to ensnare a wild animal. His right foot was held fast between its bloodied teeth.
His attempt to push the teeth apart with his hands was hopeless and he reached for a branch from a tree close by to use as a lever. The branch snapped in two. Selecting a larger branch, Spock tried again, this time managing to prise the sharpened wooden teeth apart just enough to free his leg. He lay, exhausted with the effort before summoning the strength to inspect the damage. There was a copious amount of blood and his foot was punctured with deep holes on either side. Only the fact that the trap had been designed for a smaller creature had saved his leg from being pierced right through.
It seemed sensible to put some distance between himself and the trap, although curiosity to see who came by to find their quarry almost made him stay concealed in the undergrowth. Before departing, Spock wiped all traces of green blood off the prongs using a bundle of leaves. He deliberated whether to reset the device, but decided against it, reluctant to endanger another creature's life.
While he was examining the damage to his foot, Spock heard a sound that he knew did not originate inside his own head. The sound of women's laughter was one which he was used to hearing aboard the Enterprise, and one which he sometimes found perplexing, though, oddly, not displeasing. In his experience, women laughed more readily than men and he was not always able to ascertain the cause. Uhura, an otherwise excellent officer, was prone to fits of inexplicable mirth, particularly when in the company of other women, and often when he was in the vicinity.
Spock withdrew into the undergrowth and waited as the sound of laughter and now also, voices grew more distinct. Within moments two girls passed directly in front of him, so close that he found himself holding his breath lest they should detect the sound of his breathing. From his hiding place Spock could see that the girls were humanoid in form; something about their easy laughter suggested that they were very young. Both had long, fair hair and they were dressed in loose fitting robes tied at the waist; their striking similarity to each other suggested they must be sisters.
Spock considered his options. Should he make his presence known to these young women, who must have come from a nearby settlement, in the hope of finding food and shelter and perhaps, treatment for his injuries? Or, would it be wiser to follow them and take stock of the community they were a part of, the better to assess how he might be received?
The necessity of reaching a decision by logic or any other means was abruptly taken from him as he heard the snarling sound of some wild creature that sounded familiar. In a clearing straight ahead, he came face to face with a floppy-eared wildcat like the one that Jim had encountered in the Curie's Shuttle. Only this was obviously the male of the species, large and with a lion-like mane of matted hair. The ears, Spock noted with interest, were speckled with purplish spots.
That the creature was a dangerous predator was evident from its pacing and hungry drooling; strangely the girls seemed unafraid and merely looked from the creature to Spock, as if they themselves were in no danger. Spock wondered if the beast had been attracted by the coppery scent of his blood.
Advancing on the wildcat, Spock raised his stick in the air, at the same time uttering an aggressive howl, hoping to scare it off, but the animal growled back and coiled itself to pounce. As the creature sprang, Spock reacted with lightening speed slamming his stick down hard on its shoulder, but it recovered fast and mauled at his arm with a heavy, clawed paw, knocking the stick from his grasp. In seconds, the beast was on top of him, pinning him to the forest floor with its immense weight, razor sharp fangs moving closer to his neck.
With his injured hand Spock sought the place on its shoulder where the nerves were vulnerable and squeezed but the animal writhed free of his grip and snarled fiercely as it made to tear at his face. Spock felt himself weaken. He could not hope to wrestle against the creature's superior strength for long.
"Hyaah!" The girl's bloodcurdling cry startled both Spock and the wildcat. The beast looked up and received a firm blow to the snout – one of the girls had armed herself with Spock's stick. The wildcat was startled momentarily allowing Spock time to find the spot on its neck and squeeze; immediately the hairy mass went limp and sank on top of him.
He lay, exhausted with the wildcat's now lifeless form draped across him. Then, suddenly, the two girls were by his side, pushing and pulling at the creature. Spock summoned strength from somewhere to help them and at last he was freed.
"Thank you." He said, unsure, whether, like the humans he had encountered, this species required that which would be tacitly understood among Vulcans, to be put into words.
"The thanks are ours." Said the taller girl, her voice faint. Close to them now, Spock could see that they were not much more than children. It seemed strange that they should be allowed to roam these woods when there were such dangerous creatures abroad. As if reading his mind, the girl said, "It is almost unheard of for a sardur to be found in this part of the forest." She looked Spock up and down with an expression of compassion on her face. Her younger companion had been observing him silently, also with compassion and – something else – curiosity?
"You are hurt." She said.
"Indeed." Spock replied, unsure now, which of his wounds troubled him the most.
"That green substance – it is blood?"
"Regrettably, yes." Spock replied, struggling to stand. Instantly both girls moved to help him. "You must come with us. Our people will help you." Spock nodded.
There seemed no logical reason to refuse their offer of help. In all probability, he had just saved their lives, and all but the most hostile of communities would see that as a gesture of goodwill.
The young women placed themselves either side of the Vulcan and he leaned on them lightly, conscious that his weight would soon tire them out. They made slow, faltering progress. "Is your settlement much farther?" Spock asked, when they stopped to rest.
The girls stared at him and Spock blinked, thinking that he must be slightly concussed, for they seemed to be dissolving before his eyes.
"I'm sorry." She said, "It is difficult for us to hold this form. "We would have changed when we saw the sardur but for your presence." Spock struggled to make sense of what she was saying to him. They continued to vaporise before him, fading to transparency in the shadowy woodland until both, it seemed, had dissolved into nothingness. Or not quite – Spock was aware of their presence though he could no longer see them. He sensed that if he had a tricorder, their presence would not register.
"What are you?" he asked, but he was alone now, both girls having vanshed into the air. Had they been there at all? Spock wondered. The poison from the dart could be a hallucinogen in which case he could not trust his senses. Still, he could not shake the sensation that they were still with him, albeit invisible.
"My name is Spock." He said aloud, finally, his voice unsteady, an intense weariness enveloping him. He felt cold and feared that he might be going into shock. He lay down on the forest floor and slipped slowly into unconsciousness.
Before he opened his eyes, Spock surmised that he was being carried on some kind of stretcher, and that his arms and legs had been bound to its sides. Either this was a precaution against his falling off, or he was being treated as a captive.
Spock hoped that fears for his safety had been the motivation. Slowly he opened his eyes and looked up.
"He's awake." A gruff voice remarked, immediately. "Lie still, stranger. Your wounds bleed." There was something about the voice that stirred Spock's' curiosity and he raised his head slightly to see who had spoken. He saw the rear stretcher-bearer looking down at him, a tall, grey-haired man, clearly human. He was smiling down at Spock, but he was not the owner of the gruff voice, Spock was sure. He strained his neck to the side in the direction of the voice, and saw another humanoid figure whose looks and bearing astonished him, for the man whose voice had expressed concern at his condition was a fully-grown, Klingon male.