U.S.S. Enterprise
Saucer Section
Cloud Complex Zedra
Since Spock’s move to the intensive care unit—and without much else to do with Rengru piloting his ship—Pike had found himself keeping to the pattern he’d established when the two were separated by tens of thousands of kilometers. Only rather than sitting by a communicator, Pike sat by Spock’s bedside, talking.
Spock had not always been awake—and when he was, it wasn’t easy to tell. He had rarely said anything that made sense, continuing to mumble planet names and other things. It was incoherent. He’d sounded like one sweating out a fever—only Vulcans didn’t have sweat glands, and Spock’s vitals had stabilized long before. His body was back from Skon’s World, but not his mind.
For a change, Pike had news he hoped would bring it back.
“Enterprise is reunited,” he said. “Well, not really—we’re not able to put the sections back together, not out here.” It was far from an automatic process, Pike lamented; the designers had assumed any calamity great enough to require a saucer to separate would have resulted in a stardrive section that was either unusable or destroyed. “But we’re in the same place, and we’ve been transporting people back and forth.”
Fused with a Rengru, Una had somehow tapped into the life-forms’ collective intelligence and prevailed upon the creatures nearby to deliver the saucer section to her. Time was of the essence, she’d said, because the Rengru had intended to destroy both halves of Enterprise to deny them to the Boundless—and if other Rengru forces who weren’t in communication with her stumbled over the saucer section, they might stick with the original program. The Rengru seized the saucer instead, following her directives specifically—even to the point of offering assistance to any injured crewmembers aboard.
“That’s why they helped Galadjian walk you in here a few days ago,” Pike said. “I expect the ride was a little rough, but Carlotti says it might have saved your life.”
Spock turned his head on the pillow, continuing to mutter as he looked at the bulkhead.
The directives had included walking Pike to the transporters as soon as the saucer section entered Cloud Complex Zedra—and then stepping outside the room while he beamed across to the engineering hull. They’d followed that practice since, as others had passed back and forth between the sections. Una’s mind-sharing with “her” Rengru had not given it full access to her knowledge, and she’d decided to avoid introducing them to the idea of transporters while the subject could be avoided.
“All that she’s been through, and she’s still thinking about the Prime Directive,” Pike said. He looked at the back of Spock’s head. “I’m sure you’d do the same.”
No reaction.
“She told me everything, Spock—everything she thinks she knows about the Rengru and their fight with the Boundless. Galadjian was right. K’davu is the Boundless’s homeworld, the place they’ve been fighting to reclaim. But there’s something they don’t know about it—and they’ll never know, because to communicate, the Rengru have got to make physical contact—and hold it, for as long as it takes for the joining to occur. The Boundless are all armored. And like you told me, whenever anyone’s armor is breached by a Rengru, the Boundless blow them away.”
More to the point, Pike said, so much time had elapsed since the war had begun that even the Rengru themselves had forgotten about any need other than to fight it. Una had convinced them that they’d gotten an innocent bystander—and had offered her services to mediate. But first, she’d demanded delivery of the saucer section.
“I don’t know if that was a feint to get us back, or not—but the Rengru seem to be cooperating so far. She thinks they really do believe something has gone wrong, something in the basic order of things.”
“No. No.” Spock’s mutter grew more audible. “It has not happened yet.”
Pike looked to him. “What hasn’t?”
Spock returned to naming planets. Pike sighed.
“Una feels there’s only one way to fix it,” he said, plowing ahead. “It’s something the Rengru would never think of themselves—and something they’d never do on their own. It requires us. And not just us.” He clasped his hands and leaned forward, talking more closely into Spock’s pointed ear. “It turns out we had aboard the one item she needs to make things work. You brought it to us, Spock. The Boundless battlesuit.”
Spock turned and fixed his eyes on the overhead. “Earth,” he said. “Qo’noS.”
“Spock, you have the key. Galadjian’s actually got engineers to work with now—they’ve certainly seen a change in him! But while they think they can get the unit juiced up again, the systems don’t respond to anyone.” He paused. “It needs to hear from you.”
“Vulcan. Vulcan. Vulcan.”
Pike looked down and shook his head. “I’m sorry this happened to you, Spock. I feel like I failed you. But we really need—”
“Vulcan,” Spock said more emphatically. He turned his head toward Pike. “It is . . . the keyword.”
He closed his eyes, let out a breath, and went to sleep.