Chapter Eighteen

The wispy edges of the cloud had looked like gigantic aurora borealis effects, the Enterprise whipping past and through towering graceful draperies of transparent colored light.

“Full power on navigational scanners and deflectors,” ordered Kirk to Ilia.

“Full on scanners and deflectors, sir.”

Until now, they had been using navigational deflectors at minimum power, accepting the risk of encountering large asteroids or other heavy space debris. Kirk had feared that the Intruder could mistake full-power navigational deflectors for the forcefield defenses of a battle-ready vessel. And, of course, the navigational scanners searching far in advance of their path for space hazards might be mistaken for a sensor scan—it had been a sensor scan by Epsilon Nine which had triggered the destruction of that outpost station.

Tension. Except for Spock, every eye on the bridge was on the viewer in the hope that green death would not appear out of all this loveliness. But the risk had to be taken—the cloud was large enough to hide literally anything, even a star with planets, and they needed scanners to detect and alter the vessel’s course to avoid hazards too large to be handled by the deflectors. The scanners were also vital in locating whatever was at the heart of the cloud, and in guiding them into a parallel course with it. They had sent high-speed linguacode transmissions explaining all this, but had received no reply.

The actual entry into the cloud was even more spectacular than the approach. At the last instant, it appeared so filled with brilliant-patterned color that they seemed to be plunging headlong into a giant star. There had been the sensation of a slight impact—Kirk thought it felt strangely like a clean entry into the water after a good dive. The Enterprise seemed to be riding, into the cloud on the crest of a great wave of colors, a breaking wave that crashed, tumbling the colors into streamers and globules which slowly faded and disappeared in the unrelieved white brilliance of the cloud’s interior. The Enterprise became like a white paper submersible exploring a sea of milk.

The phenomenal color displays of cloud entry had been like a pyrotechnics celebration of their success in arriving there. Despite whatever might await them at the center of the cloud some twenty minutes ahead, the bridge crew felt themselves relaxing a bit—for the time they had done all they could do until they met whatever lay hidden ahead.

Decker indicated the main viewer to Spock. “Are you still convinced that the cloud is a powerfield?”

“There is no longer any doubt of that,” Spock announced from his science console.

“Even assuming the possibility of a powerfield this large,” challenged Decker, “it still doesn’t explain what makes it visible.”

“The annihilation of hydrogen atoms,” said Spock. “At the Intruder’s velocity, there are more than enough free atoms in space to create a visible effect.”

Decker pointed out that it would take nearly unimaginable power from something at the heart of the cloud to annihilate free hydrogen on a scale like this—and he challenged Spock for an explanation of how a mere powerfield could destroy hydrogen atoms in such a way as to produce the mixed colors and patterns they had seen. The Vulcan replied that the power source was no doubt as complex as it was powerful.

“Are you suggesting it could be a fleet of vessels, Mr. Spock?” This from Chekov at weapons defense.

“Perhaps even an armada,” Spock answered.

Then the Vulcan had seemed to realize he was near to feeling a human enjoyment of the discussion, and he had gone immediately back into his self-imposed shell. He had stayed there through the long minutes that followed as the Enterprise continued decelerating, slowly probing its way toward cloud center.

“I read a large object . . . ” Ilia stopped, uncertain of what her navigational scanners were actually showing. “Unable to say for certain what this reading means.”

“A fast sensor scan?” Decker had suggested.

Kirk shook his head. There had been no choice but to use navigational aids. But a sensor scan might still be considered an invasion of privacy. No, sensors were not vital—at least not yet.

Kirk was surprised to see the cloud was apparently thinning toward its center. They passed through a small, clear area, then a larger one.

“Like the calm weather at the eye of a hurricane,” said Uhura.

Then they saw something! Sulu’s hands went to the emergency maneuvering controls with a blur of speed, but a long filament of cloud immediately hid the object from view again. Sulu hesitated, his hands ready—his reaction had been like that of a winged craft pilot sighting un unexpected mountain peak in the clouds.

They saw another gigantic shape. “That’s two of them . . . ” began Sulu.

“It is all part of the same object,” interrupted Ilia. The Deltan navigator indicated the proof of this on her scanner reading.

“Hold this relative position,” said Kirk quickly. He had seen them approaching another larger “hole” in the cloud, and his order was timed to bring the Enterprise into the clearing as its relative motion stopped. Their course and velocity were now exactly the same as the unbelievable bulk which loomed out ahead of them, continuing to where it was obscured by fragments of cloud in the distance.

“Distance to object is seventy thousand kilometers,” reported Ilia.

Whatever it was, it was huge enough to be almost beyond comprehension. They were on the same scale to it that a mosquito would be approaching their own starship. What could be seen of the object appeared generally to be an oblate spheroid shape—its surface had a strange shimmering texture, as if it held uncountable details which at this distance could not be made out separately.

For all his experience with alien vessels, some of them enormous, Kirk’s mind at first refused to accept that this could be called a vessel. It was the largest thing he had ever encountered in space, bigger even than the largest orbital cities. He had readied himself to face the spectacular, even the terrifying—but this was the unimaginable. If this is a ship, thought Kirk, it is the apotheosis of all ships. If a God should ever build a ship, it would be like this one.

Uhura whirled toward him. “Captain, negative contact with Starfleet. Transmissions will no longer not penetrate either in or out of the cloud.”

“Activate a message drone,” Kirk ordered. “Send these images and our current status.”

“I make its dimensions as . . . seventy-eight kilometers in length,” Decker was saying.

Almost eighty kilometers—the vessel out there was double the length of old Manhattan Island!

“It could have a crew of thousands, hundreds of thousands,” said Ilia.

“Or just a few of them hundreds of meters tall,” said Sulu.

“No reply to our hailing signals,” reported Uhura. She had been transmitting them at the Intruder’s high-speed rate, through a full spectrum of frequencies.

“Message drones launched,” Chekov said.

Kirk turned to Ilia and Sulu. “Give us a three-minute closure to within a hundred kilometers of Intruder.”

Ilia put it on the course plot instantly. The others looked toward Kirk nervously, even Spock giving him a glance, a raised eyebrow, as Sulu touched his maneuvering controls.

“Beginning approach to Intruder,” said Sulu.

The starship’s parallel course changed only slightly, but the new heading had it angling closer toward the immense alien.

As they moved closer and the alien vessel continued to grow in size, the shimmering texture of its surface began to resolve itself into highly detailed fine patterns. At the science console, Spock had seen enough and he was now sitting in meditation, apparently in hopes of again contacting the consciousness which had seemed to him to fit the proportions of that alien vessel. Decker was crossing back from Chekov’s console, where he had been using the ranging optics.

“Estimate it as two hundred fifty-seven times our length, sir,” said Decker quietly. “Its displacement calculates as about six million times larger than us.”

Still closer, the alien vessel was growing impossibly huge—its outer “texture” had become complex patterns of . . . of what? The complexity of its surface was as incredible as its gigantic size. Kirk wondered if some of what he was seeing could be solid sheets of subatomic particles. At another place the surface seemed to be walls of energy—yet how could energy act like matter?

Decker’s thoughts were racing along similar lines. Was he seeing coherent matter? It was barely a possibility in some scientists’ minds. It might be possible for a very highly advanced technology to organize matter in parallel, disciplined sheets to become thousands or perhaps millions of times stronger than any ordinary substance. Decker was grateful to have been able to see this, even if it had to be as Enterprise’s executive officer rather than her captain. Whatever the outcome, it was a stupendous experience.

“What is our distance?” asked Kirk.

“Nine hundred sixty kilometers and still closing,” replied Sulu.

It seemed impossible to Kirk that they could still be so far away—the alien vessel loomed like a small moon. But its crew had given no indication yet of any unhappiness at the Enterprise’s close approach. Kirk was aware, uncomfortably aware, that the Intruder’s warp velocity would have it and them entering Earth’s solar system in less than a day now. He did not have time for a leisurely investigation. He had to make contact with the life forms there—force contact, if necessary.

“Mr. Spock,” said Kirk, “we’re going to risk sensors. Begin with a low-grade surface scan.”

“Aye, Captain,” replied Spock.

Kirk heard the low hum of the scanners as they came on—then everything on the bridge was blasted by a blinding explosion of light.

Blinding—literally, and still continuing. Kirk shielded his eyes with his hands, then fought to see through his slitted fingers. He could hear a loud, undulating humming sound—bright patterns danced and flickered as he slowly regained vision and began to make out a presence, an alien presence which was standing on his bridge!

“I believe it to be composed of plasma-energy,” said Spock over the sound of the thing.

As Kirk’s eyes adjusted to the glare of it, he could see that it was not actually standing on the bridge—it floated there. And plasma-energy seemed as good a description as any. It was a swirling mass of dull red and violet mixed with brilliant flashes which stabbed at the bridge crew’s eyes like white-hot needles. It was double the thickness of a big man and about a head taller.

“I believe it to be a form of machine,” added Spock. “Perhaps a probe sent to investigate us.”

Spock was right. Or so it appeared to Kirk, whose eyes were adjusting well enough to make out shadowy whirling and pumping movements within the red-purple swirl of plasma. It had the look of intricate mechanisms created out of different kinds or grades of energy.

No panic on the bridge. Kirk was grateful he had experienced people here. But the plasma-energy thing seemed totally oblivious to the crew. As it floated toward the center of the bridge, a technician edged out of its way and was ignored. Then it stopped moving—a “tendril” of plasma lashed out, almost a cobra-strike movement, narrowly missing Uhura’s head as it fastened itself into her communications console. All the console readouts flashed on brightly—the frightening energy thing was obviously activating the entire console, exploring all its functions.

“Stand clear of all bridge positions!”

Kirk gave the order just in time as still another tendril lashed out and fastened into the bridge engineering console, which lit up brightly, too—then another snaked out and entered the starship’s helm controls as Sulu rolled clear just in time.

The probe hovered near bridge center, its ominous hum louder as its tendrils entered console after console. It looked like some great energy-octopus now, starved and feeding ravenously off the information being sucked from the starship control circuitry.

Kirk was on his feet and Spock came to his side as the elevator doors snapped open and a pair of security guards burst in.

“No weapons!” Chekov shouted the warning immediately, but it came too late—one of the guards had raised his phaser and a tiny version of the green whiplash bolt roiled across the bridge. The security man vanished. The second guard carefully returned his phaser to his belt as Chekov gave a fast intercom warning that no more security personnel were to be sent.

Some consoles were going dark again as the plasma-energy probe withdrew its tendrils—it was floating over to hover near Chekov.

“Don’t interfere with it!” Decker warned.

“Absolutely I will not interfere!” promised Chekov fervently. The probe inserted one of its energy tendrils into Chekov’s console, directly past his face.

“It is not interested in us,” Kirk murmured, “only in the ship.”

“Fascinating,” said Spock. “What better way to examine a vessel than from its control center here?”

The probe seemed to become aware of some information it had not investigated yet. All other tendrils had withdrawn and the thing now floated in Kirk’s and Spock’s direction.

“Watch out!”

A much heavier tendril snaked out to the science console complex, which flashed brightly into life and began to yield information. Then Kirk reacted, alarmed, as he saw the science computer flash into life, too—Spock’s computer was the only one which interconnected directly with the starship’s main computer.

“Computer off!” Kirk snapped. The science computer ignored the voice command.

Decker edged past the tendril, hitting the computer’s manual shutdown switch, but without results. “It won’t switch off, Captain. It’s taken control of it!”

“It’s running our records. Starfleet strength, Earth defenses . . . ” Kirk trailed his words helplessly.

Spock was in motion. Even as Kirk spoke, the Vulcan was locking his hands together overhead, and now he brought them down in a tremendous two-handed chop into the computer pedestal.

The entire face of the console shattered . . . bridge lights dimmed as the panel was shorted out.

Spock pivoted, attempting to back away fast, but an energy tendril brushed him—a pinpoint green flash at the contact point sent the Vulcan spinning under the rail and down at Ilia’s feet. A thick energy tendril followed after him . . .

“Mr. Spock, don’t move!”

The Deltan navigator Ilia was stepping past Spock, trying to distract the probe’s attention. She succeeded.

“Ilia!” It was Decker shouting a warning, but the probe enveloped Ilia, exploding into blinding white light again, and disappeared, taking Ilia with it. A tricorder fell to the deck—it was the one she had been holding in her hand.