Star Trek - TOS 38 Idic Epidemic (37 page)

The memory of Sendet, though, recalled the recep
tion aboard the
Enterprise,
where she had seen Sarek
and Amanda, Dr. Corrigan and T’Mir. It was possible, then. She remembered the day she had met
Deaver, how he had helped her with the children, how
pleasant it had been to be with him.

Undrugged and in her normal state of health, could she respond to a man who was so different from what
she was?

Were they so different? What had he called them
—betwixt-and-betweens?

At her long silence, Deaver said, “Stay awake,
T’Pina. Tell me more about yourself. You’re a medical
technician.”

“Yes,” she replied. “I’m going to work at the Nisus
hospital for a few years, until I decide what area to
specialize in. Then I will seek further education at an
appropriate institution.”

“Appropriate,” he said. “Have you ever done any
thing inappropriate in your life, T’Pina?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“You have? What?”

“Somehow
…
I got born Romulan.”

She felt his chuckle at that. Humans were strange,
this Human/Orion hybrid even more so. She did not
understand why he found her statement amusing.

Before she could say so, however, he was asking,
“Doesn’t that change your plans in any way?”

“What do you mean?”

“Aren’t you curious? I thought curiosity was the
only emotion Vulcans allowed themselves.”

T’Pina realized that she was curious; she simply
had not had time to think since receiving the startling
news.

Now, perhaps because the drug was working its way
out of her system, she began to wonder how she could
be Romulan. “I don’t know how to find out,” she told
Deaver. “The Romulans are enemies of the Federa
tion.”

“Ask Korsal,” Deaver suggested.

“Korsal? The Klingon engineer? Why would he
know anything about me?”

“I didn’t mean that
he
would know how you got to
that Vulcan colony planet. But the Klingons have
dealings with the Roms. Korsal may know how to put
your questions through Klingon channels and get
some answers from the Romulans.”

“
Mr. Deaver,” she asked, “how do you know that?”

“
Don’t you think that under the circumstances, you
could call me Beau?”

“
You are evading my question.”

“
Ah—logic returneth. Too bad. I liked you all sorta muzzy an’ sweet.”

“I asked you how you know that the Klingons are in
contact with the Romulans.”

“Well,” he replied, “I could suggest that you ask the Orions, but I think you can trust the Klingons a whole
lot further. At least when they’re hostile, they’re open
about it.”

“Oh,” she said, embarrassed. Then, “You’re saying
the Orions also deal with the Romulans?”

“Orions deal with anyone they can make a profit
offa,” he replied. “They deal
anything,
too: weapons, drugs, slaves. Almost sold me once, they did.”

“… what?”

“You know they sell their women.”

“Yes, everybody knows that.”

“Well, that’s the only commodity there’s enough
market for on the fringes of the Federation to make it
worth the risk. But on their home planets they sell
men, women, children. I was just a kid, but I musta
had some o’ me heartbreakin’ charm already. An Orion trader named Zefat thought I’d go fer a high
price as an exotic toy fer some rich Orion or maybe
Klingon family. Got me dad into a rigged game.
Gamblin’ was always me dad’s fatal weakness.”

He fell silent.

T’Pina could not believe what she was hearing.
“You mean … your father gambled, with you as the
stakes?”

“Not only gambled; he lost.”

“Then how—?”

“Me mum,” he replied. “Orion women aren’t stu
pid, you know. Orion men keep ‘em ignorant. But me
dad let Mum do what she wanted, long as she kep’
him happy. She learned to use the ship’s computer to
do more than keep the place clean. When she found
out what me dad had done, she come after me, armed with all the Federation had on Zefat, that she got outa
the computer, and info she got from other Orion
women.”

T’Pina felt his arms tighten around her as he remembered what was obviously a painful experience. “The hints she dropped got her onta Zefat’s ship. He thought she was tryin’ t’ blackmail him, an’
she let him think it. Got me outa the hold and into the
same room with ‘em.

“Zefat planned to kill me mum there an’ then—get
ridda her an’ teach me a lesson. But he didn’t know
Mum. She’d found out who his enemies were—and with the Federation info and the slan from the other
women she’d let them know, in exchange for my life,
exactly how Zefat had cheated them. She had Zefat
surrounded by three of his worst enemies.”

“Your mother was very courageous,” said T’Pina.

“Yeah,” he replied. “Always. She’s the one I think
about when the Orions do something dastardly, an’ I
wish I could deny I’m one of ‘em.”

“But you’re not—” she began, and then suddenly realized what he had just taught her. “You are not Orion any more than I am Romulan.”

He smiled. “Me point exactly.”

“I thought you were a mathematician, not a psy
chologist,” she said.

“Jack of all trades, ma’am,” Deaver said. She
shifted uncomfortably in his arms. “What’s the mat
ter?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” T’Pina managed. “It is suddenly … quite difficult to catch my breath.” She swal
lowed painfully. “Perhaps the serum is still acting to
dehydrate my body.”

“Or maybe,” Deaver said, “the air in here is start
ing to run out.”

Struggling, T’Pina turned herself over to face him.
“We cannot wait any longer. We have to try to reach
the surface.”

“Yer right,” Beau said. “Only …” His voice
trailed off.

She looked up at him. “What’s the matter?”

“Well,” he began. “I can’t—’ere, maybe it’s easier if
I just show you.” He lifted his robe to reveal a long, angry gash along the length of his thigh. T’Pina
gasped involuntarily, her own pain forgotten.

“I must’ve cut meself comin’ in through one of them windows,” he explained. “Hurts like bloody
hell—and I don’t think the leg’ll be much good in the
water.”

“You should have told me,” T’Pina said.

Deaver smiled. “Give you one more thing to worry
about? And what then? Nah, I was hopin’ someone’d find us so neither of us’d have t’ brave the water. Ah,
well—a fine pair we make.” He rested his hand on T’Pina’s shoulder. “Shall we?” he asked, nodding
toward the water.

T’Pina took a deep breath and nodded.

Chapter Forty

Spock guided the air car toward where they had
picked up the three flood victims. Below, the marine
vehicle manned by Landing Party Seven moved out
now that the water was calming.

He punched the communicator button. “Party
Seven.”

“Chevron here, Mr. Spock,” came the prompt reply. That was the computer tech, second only to Spock among the
Enterprise
crew at putting a com
puter through its paces.

“We know where the ambulance carrying T’Pina
was trapped,” Chevron told them, giving the location.

“On our way.”

The watercraft sped toward the intersection, bounc
ing over the rough water.

From their vantage point above, Spock and Sarek ran a scan for signs of life—and picked up strong readings in one of the buildings. “Survivors in the
Federation Building, Mr. Chevron,” Spock reported.
“Please have your squad rendezvous with us there, on
the rooftop.”

They set a course for that building. The roof was
broad enough to allow the air car to land. Spock and
Sarek jumped out and ran to the stairwell, where two
security men wearing wetsuits were already disap
pearing into the depths, trailing a safety line attached
to a stanchion on the roof.

Chevron was at the door, carrying extra air bottles
and breathing masks. He turned to the two Vulcans and said, “We’ve got enough heroes, I should think.
Besides, Vulcans are not exactly designed as aquatic
animals, are they? You can help to haul us out if we get
into trouble.”

With that, he clipped his own harness to the safety
line, pulled his breathing mask into place, and fol
lowed his colleagues into the stairwell.

Sarek frowned. “Insubordination?”

“Eccentricity,” Spock replied. “Captain Kirk allows a great deal of leeway as long as his crew-
members do their jobs well. Mr. Chevron simply takes
advantage of it.”

“That good at his job, is he?” asked Sarek.

“Indeed,” Spock acknowledged, “extremely good.”

There was nothing to do but wait. Michaels, the other man in the landing party, paced nervously on
the roof, checking every few moments that the safety
line was playing out properly. Spock said nothing.
Humans were perfectly capable of exhibiting stress
and at the same time performing adequately.

Besides, he understood how the man felt. He was
none too sanguine about standing here, waiting, while other
Enterprise
crewmembers risked their lives in the
icy water below.

Taking a deep breath, Deaver eased himself off the
cabinet into the water. T’Pina heard
him
gasp, saw
him go white with pain as the water struck his wound.
But somehow he gained control, teeth gripping his
lower lip.

“All right, now,” he said to T’Pina, who lay on the
very edge of the metal cabinet behind him. He reached up to her. “Give me your hand, and just
lower yourself in—”

She started suddenly. “Listen!” she said.

“What?”

It came again: someone was pounding on a metal
surface, three spaced strokes.