Arc 1: Absolute Zero
Chapter Four
Sirens began to scream, lights flashing through the hallways as Jim and Spock raced toward the Queen's Hall. They reached the enormous room, and, finding the guards and their ruler still stunned, continued past it into the corridor beyond.
"Ow, my side," Jim complained breathlessly. Without breaking stride, he reached down and clamped one hand hard over his left flank.
Spock glanced at Jim, dark eyes filled with concern. "Are you injured, Captain?"
Jim shook his head. He dashed through another open doorway, up a sloping incline, and past what looked like some sort of freezer room. "Just a side-ache," he explained, grimacing. "I don't know if you'd noticed, but there's not a whole lot of oxygen down here."
At the end of the hall was an archaic elevator, consisting of a large wooden board attached to four ropes and a pulley.
Jim came to a dead halt when he reached it. "Ah, come on," he groaned. He turned back toward his First Officer, shaking his golden head. "We have to turn around," he said. "Only one of us can go up this way."
Spock lifted one eyebrow. "Have you considered the possibility that the two of us may be able to operate this mechanism while standing on the lift?" he said evenly.
Jim glanced back at the pulley system, frowning. "You think we can lift all that while both of us are standing on it?"
Spock inclined his head. "I am capable of lifting upwards of three times what you can, sir," he reminded Jim. "I believe that it will work."
Reaching up to run one hand through his hair, Jim nodded. They couldn't risk any more delays. "Yeah, okay. Let's do this." He took a deep breath, absently rubbing the throbbing muscle in his side again. "After you, Mr. Spock."
They had just stepped up onto the lift and began the painfully difficult process of pulling themselves up when the hoard of guards from the prison room entered the hallway just beyond where Jim and Spock stood. A small segment of them, four strong, had split off from the main search unit, and happened down the right hallway at the right time.
"Akin amadi'i!" the creature at the front yelled, pointing. "Get them!"
Jim swore enthusiastically. "Keep pulling!" he growled, throwing all his weight against the rope. The rough, fibrous pull-string scraped against the cuts on his palms; he ignored the sharp sting and clung to it with all his considerable willpower and strength.
"They will reach us moments before we reach the next level," Spock pointed out. The serene expression on his face did nothing to give away the effort the rest of his body was exerting Gravity fought hard to bring them back down, and every inch gained was won only after a ferocious struggle.
"The countdown's not helping, Commander," Jim said, wincing as another shock of pain shot down his arms from his now-bloody hands. "Save the 'Your Plan is Shit' spiel for later."
The aliens were approaching with all the fury and speed of a herd of charging bulls. They hissed commands to one another in their strange, rolling foreign tongue, reaching back to unholster weapons ranging from cruelly curved knives, to crude dart guns.
"At least these assholes are still stuck in the technological stone age," Jim said, glancing up at the ledge above them. They were getting closer now; safety was only ten feet away. Still too high to jump, Jim thought. He bit his bottom lip as a wave of mixed exhilaration and nerves washed through him.
"Without our phasers, our pursuers do seem rather ill prepared," Spock agreed mildly. The half-Vulcan had both hands wrapped tight around the lift's pull-string, muscles straining beneath his blue shirt as he hoisted himself and his captain toward the elusive promise of safety only a couple meters away.
The creatures were fifty feet away. Forty. Thirty.
"Harder, Mr. Spock!" Jim yelped, and oh god, that phrase was so incredibly sexual even in proper context.
"Captain!" Spock said, urgency a faint undercurrent in his otherwise neutral tone. "Climb up the rope, and hold it steady once you have reached the top. I will follow you."
Jim obeyed immediately. After all, a Vulcan plan was usually a bulletproof plan, in his not-so-limited experience.
Spock pulled himself up and landed beside Jim on the carpeted floor. Moments later, the first darts began to fly. Ducking a shot headed for his chest and falling back against the nearest wall, Jim turned to Spock, gripping his First Officer's shoulder in one bloodstained hand. "Run!" he yelled.
Side by side, they took off down the hall, away from the curses and calls of their pursuers. Once they'd gone far enough to be mostly out of danger of the aliens' crude guns, Jim turned back in the direction they'd come from, his phaser raised and ready to fire. Taking careful aim, he fired a single shot at the pulley and rope attached to the lift. The glowing beam went clean through the rope; Jim heard a satisfying CLANG-CLUNK as the archaic elevator fell heavily back to the level below. "Got it!" he shouted, ecstatic.
"A well aimed shot, Captain," Spock said. "However, I suggest that we do not linger. It is not prudent to celebrate such brief victories."
Jim snorted, rolling his eyes, but heeded Spock's suggestion nonetheless. As they rounded yet another bend and started up an incline heading steadily toward the surface far above, he said, "That should be the name of your first album, Mr. Spock: Brief Victories. Has a good ring to it."
Spock's eyebrows contracted. "Had I previously expressed a desire to create a musical album, sir?" he asked. "I do not recall doing so."
Jim laughed, the explosive sound a lot louder than he'd intended. He couldn't help it—the expression, subtle as it was, on Spock's face was comically sincere. "No, no," he amended. "I just meant, y'know. Sometimes humans make weird jokes. Never mind. Forget it." He waved it off, still chuckling.
His amusement was cut short a moment later when Spock said, "I believe that the title 'Brief Victories' would be more befitting of your life and experiences than my own, Captain."
Jim stared at his First Officer in open astonishment. But then he grinned, blue eyes sparkling with a new kind of mirth. "Did I just get burned by a Vulcan?" he said. He shook his head. "This has got to be an all time low."
"I do not understand," Spock said, "how my statement could possibly have caused any part of you to catch fire."
Jim burst out laughing again, and didn't stop until the cramp in his side returned full-force. The combination of running uphill, the less-than-ideal oxygen levels in the alien complex, and his continued laughter weren't doing anything to alleviate the sharp, biting pain.
They rounded another corner, and Spock came to a halt so fast Jim nearly smacked into him. Coming to a stop himself, the captain glanced at his First Officer inquisitively. "What's up?" he asked.
"The passage ahead," Spock said, "is a dead end."
Jim raised an eyebrow. "How do you know?"
Spock nodded to the upward curve of the hallway before them. Through the dimness of the overhead lights, Jim could just make out the faint outline of a door. "Dammit," he sighed. So the shit-storm continues.
Spock began walking, climbing up the steep incline to where the door, in all its thick, immovable metal glory, stood like a sentinel guarding a famous tomb. The half-Vulcan pressed both hands against the door, long fingers ghosting across the shiny chrome surface. "I believe," he called back to Jim, who was still in the passage below him, "that this door will not move unless you assist me in forcing it to do so."
Jim was at his First Officer's side in an instant. Rubbing the blood from his hands off on his pants—at this point none of his clothes were salvageable, anyway—he moved into position beside Spock, pressing his shoulder against the door. "Are we trying to break it down, or…?" he began to ask.
Spock cut him off not with words, but with a quick, sharp look. "Captain," he said evenly, "it would be impossible for us to, as you put it, 'break it down'. However, there is a good chance that we may be able to push it inward, once I have disabled the lock."
Jim reached up to rub the back of his neck with one hand, grinning sheepishly. "Right. I knew that," he said. Spock didn't even spare him the expression of disbelief that Jim knew his friend would be wearing.
It took Spock under a minute to figure out just what was keeping the door shut and bolted tight, and another one and a half minutes for Jim to bust the mechanism open using only his fingers and the metal Starfleet insignia he had torn from his uniform. When the door clicked open, grinding on its hinges as the two of them simultaneously threw their weight against its surface, Jim turned to Spock with a wide, bright grin. "Like I said, Mr. Spock," he said. "We make a great team."
On the other side of the enormous metal door was a dark, circular room with no apparent ceiling that Jim could see. As far up as he could see—which wasn't that far, given the heavy, blank gloom that had settled over this corner of the complex—was a massive, ascending spire of tiny, glowing, flickering, multicolored electronic lights. "Is this some kind of power source?" Jim guessed, frowning contemplatively as he approached the center of the room where the tower stood, like a pillar holding up the inky black sky.
Spock followed close behind. "I believe that this is the center of all electronic power within the complex," he agreed. "Despite their many technological shortcomings, the Morrowi do seem quite capable of harnessing electrical power for their own use."
"Which is why they're so interested in us," Jim added. He stopped a few meters from the base of the wire-covered, flickering spire, and crossed his arms over his chest. "They've figured out this much, but they've still got a hell of a ways to go before they reach anything close to what we've got on the Enterprise."
Spock inclined his head. "They no doubt took us as prisoners in order to ascertain the methods used in the building of more advanced engines, computers, and weapons. Which is also why they captured the multiple other starship crews of varying species and origins that were also unfortunate enough to land on Gemini II."
Jim nodded. He took another step toward the pillar, eyes cast upward to where the thousands of glowing, pulsing, green, red, and blue lights faded as the spire continued up and up into the impenetrable, gaping void above. "I'm glad they never got around to interroga-" he began, but was cut off when Spock seized him by the back of his gold command shirt, pulling him back away from the pillar.
"Careful, Captain!" Spock said. He released Jim's shirt, but stayed poised and tense, watching his captain with a hint of steel in his dark eyes. "There is a channel cut in the floor directly ahead of us, around the base of the control spire. Although I am unsure of the nature of the substance it contains, I would not hesitate to guess that it is likely dangerous."
Jim ran a hand through his hair, taking a short, sharp breath in through his nose. "Jesus, Spock," he said. "Do you have any idea how many times I would be dead if it weren't for you?"
"Approximately two hundred and fifty times, Captain," Spock replied promptly. "Excluding all instances where my absence would have resulted only in your minor or serious injury. And assuming that you would be able to die on multiple occasions without staying deceased."
Jim laughed, surprised and delighted at the prompt and specific answer. "You're keeping score," he said with playful accusation. Moving forward once more (and much more cautiously now) he began to loop around to the back of the pillar, looking for a door on the other side of the room. After all, they still needed to get back to Bones and the other captives. As soon as possible.
"Captain," Spock said, and Jim immediately picked up the trace of unexpected urgency in his First Officer's tone. "There are four Morrowi approaching this room. They will be here in under a minute."
Jim swore. Turning around, he pulled out his phaser, lifting it and taking aim at the door. "I could shoot them as they come through," he mused, setting his phaser to stun, "or-" he set it back to kill, and closed one eye as he took careful aim at the door's lock, "-I could just do this-" he sent a blast straight into the heart of the door's lock mechanism, effectively melting it into place and slamming the door shut all in one shot, "-and let them think there's no way in." He grinned as he turned to Spock, more pleased with himself than the situation actually warranted.
Now, with the door closed completely, the darkness was almost overwhelming. The only light left was the soft, almost nonexistent glow of the lights covering the electronic spire at the room's center.
Just seconds after Jim broke the lock, the sound of alien voices became audible outside. The voices were followed by the heavy, dull thuds of fists against metal as the creatures attempted to break down or wrench open the door.
"Captain, I suggest we attempt to find another way out of this room," Spock said. "In the highly likely event that they eventually find a way to remove that door, they will likely kill us rather than attempt to recapture us."
"At this point, yeah," Jim agreed. In the darkness, his voice echoed back at him from the curved walls, the muted tones dull and hollow as an old drum. "Alright; you go left, I'll go right. Let's see if we can't get the hell out of here."
Separating, the two men started to walk in opposite directions around the edge of the enormous electrical column, careful to avoid touching the liquid moat surrounding it.
After a few minutes of searching in vain, they regrouped in front of the door, which was now beginning to dent and bend under the tireless onslaught of their Morrowi pursuers. "Fuck me," Jim said under his breath. "Guess we're trapped."
Spock was quiet for a long moment. The fierce, rattling sounds of the aliens trying to break down the door was jarringly noticeable against the backdrop of silence. But then, he said, "Unless we attempt to climb the tower itself, Captain. It is possible that it leads to other doorways or vent openings."
Jim looked back up at the electronic column to his left. At the soft, ever-changing flickering and pulsing of thousands of indicator lights. "It's worth a shot," he agreed. "If we can get past the moat. Which," he continued, carefully sliding his feet across the concrete floor until he stood on the very brink of the unknown liquid in question, "might not be that hard, depending on how many wires are sticking off of it."
Even without being able to see his First Officer's face, Jim knew immediately that Spock did not like this idea. "That plan," the half-Vulcan began, "is based entirely on an unfounded assumption that-"
"I know," Jim cut him off, "but what other choice do we have?"
Spock was silent.
"Hold on." Jim raised his phaser, flicking it to the lowest setting. Aiming just to the left of the column, he fired several shots, one after the other, that lit up even the darkest, most remote corners of the room. "There," he said when the blasts illuminated several long, twisting wires bulging outward from the mass of twisted cables twining around the pillar. "We can grab onto those and pull ourselves up. No problem."
Now completely flash-blinded by the phaser blasts, Jim had to strain his eyes to make out even the brightest flashes on the electronics tower as he and Spock edged around the strange, eerily glassy liquid, positioning themselves directly across from where they'd seen the longest, thickest wires. Crouching down, Jim flexed his fingers, subconsciously digging his teeth into his bottom lip as he prepared himself mentally for the jump. "I'll go first," he said. "That way, if I fall in, you'll be able to rescue me." He tried not to let his nerves show through his tone of voice. After all, the gap between the edge and the pillar wasn't exactly an easy leap away. He swallowed. "If one of us is going to fall in, Mr. Spock, it's not going to be you. That's for sure." He forced a smile.
"Of course, Captain," Spock replied. "Given the superior strength and dexterity that my race possesses, I am inclined to agree with you."
Jim rolled his eyes. It was so dark that Spock couldn't see him anyway, so no big deal. "If I didn't know better," he said, muscles tensing as he inhaled deeply and prepared to leap, "I'd say you're bragging."
He jumped. For a long, desperate moment, he was airborne, hands stretched out before him, legs tucked up against his abdomen, over the gaping moat of icy black liquid. And then his feet struck the base of the tower, and his hands found purchase around the thick, insulated wires looping out from the tower. He clung, breathing hard as relief overwhelmed him, and adjusted himself so that he was half-wrapped in cables. Secure. "Alright," he called over to Spock. "I'm on. Come over whenever you're-"
Spock landed, cat-like, beside him, cutting off the rest of his sentence. Jim could just make out his First Officer's face illuminated by the dull glow of a set of flashing blue lights just above their heads. "You were saying, Captain?" Spock said, with just the faintest hint of triumph in his tone.
Jim huffed. "Showoff." Reaching up, he sought out the next highest loose wire, pulling himself up the tower. This turned out to be a lot harder than he'd expected—the metal beneath the wires was smooth, slick, and nearly impossible to find a foothold on—and he almost fell several times before he made it to the first of a series of ledges sticking out from the main column. "Maintenance decks," he said as he scrambled up onto the first one. "Hey, Spock! Up here."
His First Officer joined him a moment later. Although Jim was out of breath from the dangerous and difficult first ascent, Spock didn't seem to be anywhere close to winded. Spock knelt beside Jim on the small protrusion of metal, one hands still wrapped in a wire-in case the deck's supports failed, Jim guessed—and looked up at the climb of unknowable length that they still had to make.
"You ready to go?" Jim said after a long silence, through which his breathing was the only sound.
"After you, Captain," Spock replied evenly.
Jim straightened up as much as he dared—the ledge was precariously slick and narrow—and launched himself upward. The cuts on his hands ached dully and persistently as he grasped the narrow wires. His body hurt everywhere, he was beginning to realize. The adrenaline (and the drug, most likely) in his blood had been keeping him from noticing until now, but now that he was noticing it, the only thing he wanted to do was drop back down to that ledge, curl up on his side, and pass out for a few years.
The next ledge was only thirty or so feet up from the first, but the climb to it was excruciatingly difficult. Not only were there virtually no footholds, but the stabilizing beams that had been present nearer the bottom of the column were now too far below to be of any use.
"Captain," Spock called up to Jim. "It is no longer possible for me to see the base of the tower. I estimate that we are nearing one hundred meters above the ground."
Jim took in a deep breath through his mouth, and let it out slowly through his nose. Keeping perfectly calm was of the utmost importance. If they both wanted to get out of this place alive, they would have to keep usually alarming facts—such as the fact that, at the moment, one misstep or slip would mean a long and almost certainly deadly fall into an unknown liquid—from, well, being alarming. "Got it," he called back down. "Fall, and you're dead. So just don't fall. Easy enough."
Jim reached the second ledge with only a few near misses. Pulling himself up onto the smooth, blissfully horizontal surface, he turned to watch Spock finish the second leg of their ascent. Once the half-Vulcan was safely by his side again, Jim let the tension bleed out of his shoulders, and allowed himself a few minutes to relax, stretch his muscles, and prepare himself for the next climb.
"Are you adequately prepared to further exert yourself, Captain?" Spock asked, and Jim recognized the barest hint of concern in his First Officer's voice.
He shook his head with vehement certainty. "Sometimes I can't tell if you're insulting me, or just underestimating me," he said. Spock didn't grace this with an answer, so instead, Jim added, "Fuck yeah, I'm ready to go." He began to climb again with as much energy and gusto as he could muster.
He made it almost twenty feet up from the ledge before it happened: he slipped, his foot sliding along a patch of bare, slick metal, and, with a shout, reached out and seized the nearest wire with both hands. The cable was thin and bare; the insulation slid off as Jim's weight fell onto it. The cruelly sharp narrowness of the bare wire caused it to slip into the cuts across Jim's palms, sinking into his skin and drawing a fresh torrent of blood. Jim's mind went blank as white-hot pain rushed through his hands, and up into his arms. Without thinking, without meaning to, he let go of the wire and fell, sprawled midair as he dropped away from the tower, toward the unforgiving floor and dark, untouched moat far below. He let out a cry of unfettered fear and surprise.
"Jim...!" Spock turned and caught Jim by the front of the shirt as he fell past, the half-Vulcan's long, nimble fingers fisting desperately in the slick, thin material of the captain's clothes. For one moment, one horrifying moment, Jim saw Spock slip, his hold on the tower failing. But then Spock grabbed hold of a particularly solid, thick cable, and they both stabilized. Jim's free-fall came to an end with a jarring jolt.
At that moment, the crashing sounds of the aliens attempting to get through the door finally ceased. Jim held his breath, still dangling out over the void with only Spock's strength (reliable) and the durability of his shirt (much less reliable) between him and sudden, painful death. He listened to the sound of a hoard of booted feet clumping across concrete and metal, and his heart, already pounding in his chest, missed a beat. "Shit," he breathed. "They're in."
Spock froze completely. He was like a statue, muscles bulging with the effort of holding both himself and his captain up. Even in the darkness, Jim could see the lines of tension in his First Officer's straining neck, shoulders, and back, and did his best not to be a limp deadweight.
"Look around!" one alien shouted. Jim risked a glance down, and saw that they had flashlights. His heart sank. If they happened to look up…
"Captain," Spock said, his voice barely audible even though Jim was only a few feet below him. "Do not move."
Where the fuck would I even go? Jim thought, in a moment of stress-fueled frustration. The bathroom? But he didn't dare say it aloud. He knew Spock was right: if they were seen now, it was all over.
"They've got to be here somewhere," another alien guard growled. The beam of his flashlight traveled far up the base of the tower, just barely avoiding passing over where the Spock and Jim hung, before falling back down and sweeping across the floor. "Find them!"
Could this get any better? Jim thought. Again, that little sarcastic voice in his head needed to fuck off. Immediately, if at all possible.
Apparently, though, it could get 'better.' As usual, Jim's own personal brand of bad luck saw to that.
Spock tightened his grip, fingers flexing through the relatively flimsy material of Jim's shirt, and the fabric began to rip.