"No Good Deed..."

[Atoz 77]

NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED>>>


Captain’s log, Stardate 53541.4: Venturing into the largely unexplored Rhomboid Euler sector, the Odysseus was engaged in a routine survey of system R-812 when survey team three reported an anomalous energy reading below the surface of the ninth planet. Although it will probably turn out to be a false alarm, I have decided to beam down personally along with Science Officer Weir to investigate.


It was always depressing to see a civilization in ruins.

Captain Atoz felt a chill in his bones as he looked down the hillside at the barren, ice-covered landscape and the long dead city. He could count twelve buildings from where he stood, each of them showing signs of structural collapse from centuries of abandonment and neglect. One skyscraper had toppled, scattering its debris across empty streets which had been mostly reclaimed by scrubby, stunted trees.

The chill was a very real one. The temperature must be around negative ten Celsius, and this city was in the tropic zone. But that was normal for a planet currently in an ice age. Atoz was comfortable enough in his heated jacket and gloves as he looked up at the gray clouded sky.

“The readings are strongest coming from that building, sir,” said Diane Weir, looking up from her tricorder and indicating a block-like structure of five stories, which had the sunken look of a fallen soufflé. “I’m getting very faint traces of power generation from the underground level.”

“Didn’t you say this civilization died out a thousand years ago?” Atoz said.

“According to our best estimates,” the Science Officer confirmed. “And based on our reading of their technology level, no power plant they had could still be operating after all this time.”

“Unless someone was maintaining it,” Atoz corrected grimly. “But to expect a remnant population to have survived under these conditions is equally unlikely.”

“Exactly, sir,” Weir said, with a wry grin. “And we detected no higher-order life signs in the area, either. It’s probably a wild goose chase. Some natural explanation, no doubt."

Atoz smiled. “No doubt. If it’s a wild goose, let’s chase it together.” He turned to the third member of their party, a fourteen year old girl with dove gray flesh tones and slightly serrated ridges of cartilage around her eye sockets and nose. She wasn’t a member of the crew. Rather she was an orphaned Cardassian girl Lt. Commander Weir had adopted, and she had been pleading Weir for some time to allow her to come with her on an away mission.

“What do you think, Iara?” Atoz said. “Are you with us?”

The girl looked at him suspiciously, not accustomed to having her opinion asked, least of all by the Captain. Shyly she nodded.

“It’s unanimous.” Atoz’ feet crunched in the snow as he led the way toward the entrance to the building. Simultaneously, he tapped the comm badge of the left breast of his red and black uniform. “Atoz to Odysseus.”

“Fawkes here, Captain,” replied the First Officer, on the bridge of the starship.

“We’re about to go inside one of the buildings, Commander. We don't anticipate any trouble, but cast an eye in our direction every now and then, just in case.”

“No problem, Captain.”

***

Charles Fawkes was sitting in the command chair, his chin resting on his fist as he looked at the cold, barren landscape of the planet on the main view screen.

“I told him,” said the Chief Engineer, standing next to the chair in her gold and black uniform. “There couldn’t possibly be any power generation down there. It will turn out to be a natural phenomenon, mark my words.”

"Give him a break, Vespis,” said Fawkes. “Atoz is no different from anyone else. He wants an excuse to get off this ship every now and then.”

“He could have taken me with him,” the blue skinned Andorian said enviously, her eyes twinkling and her antennae writhing with suppressed excitement as she gazed at the view screen. “Look at all that lovely ice.”

Fawkes shook his head. More than likely the Captain wanted to be alone with Diane Weir, but there was no need to say so out loud.

“Commander,” said Lt. Rosh at Tactical, “I am picking up a space vessel approaching at warp factor three. Class five. It does not exactly match anything in our database. Its warp shell appears to be somewhat unstable.”

"Unstable? For what reason?"

The Eminian took another reading before he responded. "Difficult to say, sir. Perhaps an engine malfunction. Its destination appears to be this star system. Bearing 021."

There was a sudden flash of tachyons as the vessel awkwardly dropped out of hyperspace several thousand kilometers distant and continued coasting toward the Odysseus at sublight speed. Rosh put it on the main viewscreen.

The spaceship was approximately a hundred and fifty meters long, and shaped like a long cylinder, a configuration often chosen by primitive races venturing into space for the first time. About a third of the way along its length were two stubby, rather crude-looking engine nacelles jutting out to left and right, and again two more toward the rear.

Fawkes studied the image on the view screen with fascination. The ship didn’t seem to belong to any race he was familiar with, either. It appeared to be completely alien.

[Atoz 77]

"Would you look at that?" said Vespis. "What a museum piece! I bet they still use unitronic computers." Fawkes merely raised an eyebrow and didn't say anything.

“Commander," said Rosh at Tactical, "I am picking up a radio-frequency search beam from the vessel. It had detected our presence, and is changing course in our direction."

"Mr. Fawkes," reported Ensign Penner at the Comm station, "I’m getting a distress signal from it. It's not on subspace, it's on one of the plain radio bands."

Fawkes raised both eyebrows and dropped the corners of his mouth in a little moue of surprise. As alien as they appeared, they must have had at least some contact with other star-faring species at one time or another. “Can you open hailing frequencies?"

"Trying standard frequencies, sir," the young comm officer said, hesitantly shaking her head. “So far not getting any... Aha!”

“We are Procyon Arken” said a soft, almost feminine voice through the bridge speakers, “traveler and envoy from the Dak-Pel. Are you aliens? Can you help us?”

"They’re not transmitting visuals,” Penner said. “But I’ve got a good lock on their signal. I could probably pull in a view of their bridge if you want.”

Fawkes was tempted, thinking of that voice, how sweet and vulnerable she sounded. He had never heard of the Dak-Pel before, and he would love to see what she looked like. “Better not,” he decided reluctantly. “It may be a cultural taboo. Put me on. This is Commander Charles Fawkes, of the Federation starship Odysseus,” he announced. “What kind of help do you need?”

"We are not sure,” the voice admitted. “We are lost. During hyperspace transit we think something collided with us. Our guidance system failed. We have no idea where we are. Can you help us?”

“Stand by for a moment,” Fawkes said.

Vespis had already crossed to the Tactical station and was looking over Rosh’s shoulder as the Eminian scanned the alien vessel. “There does seem to be some minor structural damage,” the Andorian chief enginner said. “I can’t identify any specific damage to their guidance system from external scans, but overall their technology looks fairly primitive. I’m sure I could repair whatever problem they have, or at least give it a good try.”

“They have a weapon system that looks similar to Klingon disruptors,” Rosh himself reported. “Associated capacitor banks are moderately powerful. Shields appear to be minimal.”

“I hardly think they’re going to start shooting at us after they just asked for our help, Mr. Rosh,” Fawkes scoffed. He took another look at the strange vessel on the view screen. “Okay, Vespis. Beam over and see what you can do. Remember this could be a first contact situation, so be careful what you say.”

“Have you ever known me not to be careful, darkskin?” the engineer replied with a smile, as she spun on her heel and strolled to the bridge turbolift.

“We’re sending our Chief Engineer over,” Fawkes announced. “She should be able to put you right.”

“Oh good,” the sweet voice replied. “What kind of shuttle craft are you sending? Do you need the... what do you call it? The coordinates of our docking port or something like that?”

“No need,” said Fawkes. “We have matter transporters. In a few moments, she’ll be materializing in the middle of your command center. Just stand back and give her some room.”

“Oh my," Arken replied. "Mat-ter transpodders? That sounds frightfully interesting.”

***

Meanwhile, on the planet’s surface, Atoz, Weir and Iara had ventured inside the building. The doorways and hallways had seemingly been designed for humanoids of about their size. Disappointingly, little remained of the furnishings and everyday objects of the building, nothing to tell them what it had been used for when it was occupied, whether it was an office building, a residence, or a police station.

As usual, Weir couldn't resist the opportunity of making the expedition a teaching occasion. She briefly demonstrated for Iara the use of her tricorder, and continually pointed out features of interest, or asked her pertinent questions relating to her studies.

"I don't see why I have to remember all this," the teenage girl complained. "I can always ask a computer if I forget any of it, can't I?"

"Computers are only tools, sweetheart," Weir said. "They can't volunteer information if you don't know what to ask. The more you know, the more use you can get out of the tool. In the end, the only thing you can really rely on is your own brain."

She turned apologetically to Atoz. "I'm trying to teach her not to become too dependent upon technology for things you can do for yourself."

"That's always a good lesson to learn," the captain agreed.

As they progressed, they found many of the interior walls crumbled in many places, revealing the building's rusting steel structural supports. The party picked their way with care through the debris and arrived at a narrow, rubble-strewn stairway leading down.

“Let me go head, Captain,” Weir requested, pointing out the hairline cracks in the concrete ceiling above them. "It may not be safe." She glanced fearfully at Iara.

Atoz paused. If it was dangerous, his first impulse was to insist upon going himself, but this was inarguably the Science Officer's job, and he knew that Diane would not thank him for overruling her in this situtation. “Okay, but not too far," he said. "Stay where we can see you.” He remained with the girl at the top of the stairs, directing a flashlight on the science officer's blue and black uniform as they watched her carefully descend.

“Captain, do I make you uncomfortable?” Iara asked him suddenly.

Atoz hesitated, unsure how to answer the question. Any answer he gave her had better be an honest one, because she could tell when he was lying. The trouble was that he found it unexpectedly difficult to be honest with himself.

“I know I make a lot of the crew nervous,” she said after a moment, “because I’m a Cardassian and because I can read what they’re feeling. I try not to. I know it’s wrong to peek into people’s thoughts. But sometimes their feelings come through so hard, I can’t help it.”

“I never really thought of it that way before,” Atoz said honestly. “I suppose it must be as awkward for you as it is for us.”

“Diane doesn’t like--“ the girl started to say, but broke off. She looked up at Atoz. “She likes you a lot, you know. She doesn’t say so out loud, but she hoped that you and she were going to hook up... you know, do the horizontal rumba? Assume the sixty--"

"Yes, I follow your meaning," Atoz said quickly.

"But then I came along. She thinks because of me you don’t want to be with her anymore. I ruined everything.”

“You didn’t ruin anything,” Atoz assured her. “That’s ridiculous.”

“You still like her?” Iara looked up at him hopefully.

"Yes, of course I still like her," the captain said.

“You should tell her then. Because right now she’s not sure how you feel.”

The line of conversation made Atoz aware that he was no longer paying attention to Weir's location in the stairwell. He moved the flashlight beam around and almost immediately picked up her slim shape. As soon as he did, there was a dull, snapping sound from overhead. A big slab of concrete broke off from the roof above them, falling down the dark stairway.

"Diane, look out!" Atoz shouted. Weir glanced up at him as the masonry fell onto the stairs, carrying with it a cascade of ice and snow which had been pressing their weight against it. Atoz felt the stair beneath him shake as the avalanche crashed down the stairwell. Iara shouted Diane's name, but as she made to step forward, the captain pulled her back to the relative safety of the main floor until the debris had finished collapsing. And then everything was still and silent.

[Atoz 77]

Vespis materialized on the bridge of the Dak-Pel ship carrying a toolkit in her left hand, a small type I phaser on her left hip.

The bridge was oblong, starkly utilitarian in design. Somewhere behind the bulkhead was a low hum from a noisy power generator unit. It took a moment or two for Vespis' eyes to adjust to the comparative dimness. When they did, she felt slightly alarmed at what she saw. Instead of the delicate creatures she had been expecting, the four crewpersons she could see were ursoids, large and bearlike. They had bright, black eyes shaded by thick eyebrows, slightly protruding snouts, and patches of fur along their cheekbones and showing on the back so their pudgy hands. But then, Vespis thought reasonably, they were probably just as surprised by her blue skin and antennae.

One of them, with a gold collar around the neck of his gray uniform, stepped forward to greet her.

"Mat-ter transpodders, oh my," he said, trying to ape Fawkes' British accent and failing. His voice sounded like the person whom they had talked to on the ship, only in much lower register. "We want to do that. Make us one of those."

"I'm afraid I can't do that, snookie," Vespis said brightly. The Prime Directive laid down strict rules against interfering, however inadvertently, in the advancement of developing races, particularly giving them access to technology that they weren't ready for. And these guys definitely did not look ready for it. She tapped her comm badge. “Vespis to Odysseus. Transport acknowledged. Now, where's this guidance system?"

“This one is female,” said another of the crewmen, not to her but to the one who seemed to be the leader. “He said he was sending their Chief Engineer.”

The Andorian rallied quickly from her surprise at the implied sexism. Definitely NOT ready for it. “That’s me, Lieutenant Commander Vho Vespis,” she said. “Don’t let my good looks fool you, boys. I’ll have you up and running in no time.”

She looked around the bridge, while the four man crew just watched her without volunteering any more information. It took the engineer some moments to identify the helm, because it wasn’t placed in the most efficient location. As she opened the access panels and went to work, the expectant silence from the four aliens was a little bit unnerving. “So, are you guys from around here?” she said airily, taking a circuit probe from her toolkit and running in over the console.

“We are not from around here,” said the leader, as he watched her work. “We are from sector 21-1.”

Vespis had no idea what that meant. It must refer to some private coordinate system of their own. “Is that so? You’re a long way from home then?”

“We are a long way from home,” the Dak-Pel leader confirmed.

“Uh-huh,” the engineer said. Zarkhon, they weren't much good at conversation either! “I think I see what your problem is. It wasn’t damage from a collision, after all. Jumping through hyperspace just played havoc with your computer's unitronic bubble memory and scrambled your guidance program. Let me see what I can do.” She flicked open her tricorder, slender fingers flying as she rewrote the computer program.

The aliens moved in closer to watch her work. "You can fix it?" the leader asked, as if he were skeptical.

All this was also being watched on the bridge of the Odysseus. The moment Vespis had activated her comm badge, Penner had immediately locked into it, giving them a visual of the aliens’ bridge. Fawkes and the others were as surprised as the Andorian by the aliens' appearance.

“His comm system was deliberately set up to distort his voice,” Penner said. “Why would he do that?”

At Tactical, Lt. Rosh frowned. “Commander, the Dak-Pel vessel is not decelerating. Continuing on course 198 mark 80, at four thousand kilometers per second. It will soon be passing out of transporter range."

Fawkes grimaced. "I guess that could be connected with their guidance system problem," he said thoughtfully. The First Officer gave a fleeting thought to Captain Atoz and his party on the planet's surface, then he addressed the helmsman. "Mister Nickel, take us out of orbit and keep within range of Dak-Pel ship. Hopefully the repairs won't take much longer."

***

"Diane!" Iara was screaming, trying to pull out of Atoz' grasp.

"Shhhh, shhh," he said soothingly, holding her back from the rubble-strewn stairway. "Don't panic. Keep a clear head. We won't do her any good if we fall, too."

Right now both of his hands were busy holding her back, or he would have tried his comm badge to see if she answered. Gingerly he stepped forward along with Iara to take a closer look. Snow and ice, along with hunks of broken concrete had blanketed the entire stairwell, and at the bottom was a huge, jagged hole in the floor, approximately where Weir had last been standing.

"I'm all right!" the Science Officer's voice called up from the darkness. "I seem to have fallen through into the sub-basement."

From their location at the top of the stairs, Atoz and Iara heard ominous creaking sounds. "Listen to me, Iara," Atoz said. "I'm going down there to see how she is. I'm going to ask you to stay up here..."

"But I want to--"

"...as my back up. The steel structure of the building foundations may interfere with the comms. If something happens, you have to call the ship and get them to send help. Can you do that for me? I'm counting on you." The girl bit her lip and nodded reluctantly.

"Good girl." Leaving her at the top of the stairs, Atoz scrambled down over blocks of concrete, made treacherous by ice and snow. When he finally reached the hole in the floor, he saw that a big section had slipped downward into a sub-basement. He could see dark water down there, far below, gently steaming as it lapped at the feet of dozens of massive pillars of rusted iron.

Weir was perched on a precariously balanced ledge only three meters away. She was breathing in gasps, her knees drawn up as close to her body as she could get. "Vespis was right, sir," she said, her voice shaking slightly with fear. "The ground water in this vicinity is mildly acidic, probably because of the dumping of toxic wastes. Add to that the iron underpinnings of the building, and you have a slight electromagnetic flux, which our sensors took for power generation. A natural phenomenon."

Atoz shook his head slowly. "At a time like this, you were still thinking about that?"

"Yes, sir," the Science Officer replied, pausing to lick her dry lips as the ledge tilted slightly, raining shards of crumbling concrete from its edge, that fell into the dark lake below. "It took my mind off of... other things."

The ledge she was sitting on creaked. Clearly not the most stable of platforms, it could break loose at any moment.


***

Vespis was beginning to feel that something was wrong. The subspace guidance program she was attempting to debug seemed much more sophisticated than the hardware it had supposedly been designed to run in. It looked to her as if software incompatibility had been at least part of the reason for the programs failure in the first place. The clincher was when she encountered a block of documentation, an explanatory note that was not part of the programming language itself, but only intended as a guide for debuggers like herself. It was written in Klingon.

What the heck would these primitive dweebs be doing with a guidance program written by a Klingon?

On a hunch, before she closed up the panel again, she checked out the warp field stabilization unit next to it. The hardware itself had clearly been salvaged from a larger space vessel and jury-rigged to fit their systems. When she opened the panel, she found isolinear circuits of Klingon design. These guys were evidently a lot smarter with their hands than she had initially thought. Had she once seen them as bear-like? She was beginning to see them as more like raccoons, clever and adaptable.

"Okay, boys," she said out loud, buttoning the panels back up. "I think you're in business."

"It will go now?" asked Procyon Arken, the Dak-Pel leader, as he moved to the command station. His pudgy fingers typed in commands, and he grinned toothily when the panel responded to his instructions. "It works great. You are a good engineer, Lieutenant Commander Vespis."

"We aim to please, fellas," the Andorian said nervously. "Well, I suppose I'll just get out of your hair..." As she reached toward her comm badge, the Dak-Pel captain drew a pistol from the back of his belt and fired. A jolt of energy struck the Odysseus' engineer and zapped her painfully into unconsciousness.

"Commander Vespis!" shouted Penner in shock, seeing this on the main view screen.

"Commander," Rosh reported, "I have lost transporter contact with Commander Vespis. They have raised a security field. And they are powering up their main weapon system.”

"Raise shields," Fawkes ordered, keeping his eyes on the view screen. "Captain Arken," he said in a more dangerous tone of voice, "just what do you think you're doing?"

"We need a good engineer," the Dak-Pel leader explained, still grinning, "to keep our ship running. This one is a good engineer. We think we will keep her. Go away or we will shoot at you."

Fawkes shook his head slowly. Wherever these people had come from, they were like unruly children who still thought that they could grab whatever they wanted. "That's not going to happen," he said. "Return my officer at once."

Arken didn't bother to respond. He merely reached toward his command console and threw a switch to break communications contact. The view screen went blank.

"The Dak-Pel ship is accelerating to ten thousand KPH," reported Lt. Rosh.

On the view screen, Fawkes could see the flare of its engines and thrusters as the long, cylindrical vessel turned awkwardly away from them, headed up-system. Softly he hissed a vintage Anglo-Saxon swear word as he remembered the Captain and Science Officer down on the planet. "Stay with him, Mr. Nickel," he said.

[Atoz 77]

Vespis came back to awareness painfully, lying on the floor of the Dak-Pel ship's bridge, her muscles still tingling slightly from the electrical jolt she had received. As she suddenly remembered what had happened, she felt for her phaser and found it missing. "What the zek's going on?" the Andorian demanded. "Is this the thanks I get for fixing your guidance assembly?"

Captain Arken was standing over her, still grinning that toothy grin. "Keep your mouth shut until I ask you," he said. "What is this?" He was holding her phaser in his pudgy hand, his bright eyes peering at the power control as if he had seen similiar objects before but wasn't quite sure.

Vespis glared up at him but said nothing.

"What is this?" he repeated patiently, pressing the trigger. A thin red beam shot out, about setting fifteen if Vespis was any judge, hitting the deck only a few centimeters from the Andorian's shoulder and instantly melting a hole in the metal.

"Okay, it's a weapon! It's a weapon!" Vespis said hastily. "Are you happy?"

Her captor's grin got even broader. "We want more of these! We want lots more." He turned and handed the phaser to one of the other crewmen. "Put it in the Make Things-er."

Vespis watched with curiosity as the crewman moved toward the rear of the bridge. There, installed rather haphazardly in one of the consoles, was a Pattern Replicator, along with extra improvised power conduits and cables. It appeared to be a Romulan design. The case was cracked and had burn marks as if it had been salvaged from a wreck.

The crewman put her phaser on the replicator's scanning plate and turned it on. Vespis' antennae twitched with nervousness as the replicator hummed, the yellow beam moving downward, steadily tracing the device's contours. Moments later a second, identical phaser appeared on the output plate, while at the same time on the Replicator's control panel a green light began to urgently flash on and off. Vespis was nervous because she knew what that flashing light meant.

Excitedly the crewman snatched up the brand new phaser, while the other aliens watched, grinning like oversized children. The crewman turned the control dial to maximum, pointed it at a spot on the wall (a not very valuable spot, Vespis presumed) and, shading his eyes in case the beam was too bright, he pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened. Nothing at all.

"It doesn't work," the crewman whined. "Stupid machine!" He turned and kicked the replicator.

"You fix it," Arken said, grinning down at Vespis. "Fix the Make Things-er."

"I don't know what kind of machine that is!" the Andorian lied. "How am I supposed to fix it?"

"You are a good engineer. Fix it!" the Dak-Pel leader said, no longer grinning.

Vespis didn't have much choice. Gingerly she picked up her toolkit, moved over and went through the motions of fixing the Replicator. It was futile, she knew. The Replicator was working perfectly. It had duplicated the phaser precisely except for the most critical part, the nadion pulse generator. That part was Replicator-Protected against unauthorized duplication. The flashing green light on the panel merely advised the user of that fact... provided he could read Romulan, which these idiots obviously couldn't.

***


"Charge the port phaser battery to ten percent," Fawked ordered. "Fire a shot across his bow."

The red phaser beam lanced out into space, narrowly missing the Daklep vessel, which hurriedly veered off to avoid it.

"Turning fifteen degress to port," reported Rosh. "Accelerating to twenty thousand. And he seems to be taxing his sublight engines to do so."

Fawkes rubbed his chin thoughtfully. That was barely quarter speed for the Odysseus, and yet it was pretty good for such a primitive vessel. "What kind of engines do they have, anyway?"

The Tactical officer peered intently at his console. "Sensors indicate a Mark II impulse drive, with dual-phase antimatter injectors. And their disruptor hardpoints are definitely Klingon, either stolen or traded for. They could damage us if they got in a lucky shot."

"Mr. Fawkes," said Penner at Communications, "I've been checking the comm logs, eavesdropping on their internal communications, and they aren't as stupid as they sound. Their language is just so complicated, the universal translator has trouble with it. For example, they have about seven different ways of just saying 'I am...' depending on the relationship between the speaker and the listener, and even what time of day it is!"

"That could be useful," Fawkes said, as he considered all this. So they were small fish trying to swim in a big pond... "Mr. Nickel, take a long flanking run around his port side and cut him off. Mr. Rosh, charge phaser banks to full power. Ensign Penner, give me hailing frequencies again."

"Open, sir," she replied. "They're not responding."

"Odysseus to Dak-Pel vessel!" the First Officer announced. "That phaser was just a warning shot! I can do a lot worse than that! Stand down unless you want a photon torpedo up your tail pipe!"

Seeing that escape was futile, the Dak-Pel ship reduced speed and swerved to bring its prow around aimed at the Odysseus. Moments later both ships were at a dead stop. The view screen came on showing the Dak-Pel bridge. "Go away," Arken said. "We have a big weapon we got from that other ship. We found it. We fixed it. We will blow you to pieces with it."

Fawkes crossed his arms firmly. "We're not going away until we get our engineer back."

"She is our engineer now," Arken said. "We keep her." And he closed the channel again.

Fawkes rubbed his chin. The Odysseus' phasers could easily overpower their primitive shields. If they tried to run again, he could disable their engines. But if it came to a pitched battle, Vespis would most likely suffer for it. It looked like they were at an impasse.


***

Atoz looked around and spotted a twenty foot section of braided iron cable dangling loosely from the ceiling above them. He took hold of the lower end and edged as close as he could to the gap between himself and Weir. "Here... catch this," he said, tossing the end in her direction.

Weir watched the cable flop passed her, afraid to move unduly, let alone reach out to make a grab for it. "You don't seriously expect me to just swing across to you... do you, sir?"

"Have you got a better idea?"

"We could call the ship for a beam up."

"And spoil all our fun?" Atoz said. "Besides, you were trying to teach Iara not to become dependent upon technology for things you can do yourself. Just don't look down."

Weir carefully holstered her tricorder on the side of her uniform, then caught the cable as he tossed it her way. In spite of his warning, she couldn't help looking down at that dark acid pool so far below her. She could feel her heart thumping with fear as she got to her feet and took a good grip on the cable. She had always been uncomfortable with heights, but she couldn't mention that now or she would sound like a wuss.

"Come on," Atoz encouraged her. "Don't worry. I'll catch you."

Weir took a deep breath. She felt the ledge shift beneath her feet and felt her stomach lurch as she pushed off. The only reason she didn't scream was that she knew that Iara was somewhere listening. She swung across the three meter gap where Atoz stood with his arms extended to catch her. The cable slipped as she smacked right into him and knocked him over, landing awkwardly on top of his chest.

"Sorry about that, sir," she said breathlessly, clutching at his neck.

"That's quite all right, commander," he said, smiling up at her. Their faces were so close together, the fog of their breath mingled together. Their bodies felt so warm together. Weir looked down at him and realized that it would be the easiest thing in the world to just lean a little bit closer and kiss him. And as her eyes locked with his, she knew... she KNEW that he was thinking exactly the same thing...

CHIRP-CHIRP! "Odysseus to Captain Atoz," said Penner's voice suddenly over their comm badges. "I'm sorry to interrupt you, sir, but we have a sort of a situation up here. Can you beam up right away?"

Atoz let out a deep sigh. "Perfect timing as usual," he whispered. In a louder voice, he said, "Very well, ensign. I think we're finished down here anyway."

***

Vespis had got the replicator to work, by replacing the nadion pulse generators with boridium generators instead, which were much less powerful. Now all four of the bridge crew were carrying her replicated phasers instead of their normal sidearms, without knowing the difference.

"You are a good engineer," said the same crewman who had made the sexist remark earlier. "Now make us mat-ter transpodders. Like what you used to get here."

"I can't do that," Vespis said patiently. "You guys are pretty smart, I'll give you that. You've somehow pieced together salvaged equipment from other ships and incorporated it into your own. But you don't understand the principles behind these devices. You're going to end up hurting yourselves."

"We have you to fix it," said the crewman impatiently, waving his phaser at her. "Fix it!"

"No..." said Captain Arken. A sly look crossed his face as he remembered Fawkes' warning. "Pho-ton torpedo. Up your tail pipe. That sounded good. That sounded powerful. Make us a pho-ton torpedo."

"You can't just make photon torpedoes out of nothing," Vespis tried to explain. "You need the hardware. You need launch tubes, telemetry, you need antimatter, a magnetic bottle to hold it in, torpedo casings... You can't just--"

"I told you," said the other crewman to the captain. "She is a female. She knows nothing. We need to make them give us a real engineer."

"Hey! I resent that," Vespis protested in spite of herself.

"Make us a photon torpedo," the Dak-Pel captain insisted. He was holding the phaser pointed at her, and he was not grinning. "Make it for us now."

[Atoz 77]

Once again the Federation ship was hailing them. Arken was becoming impatient with talking. His first mate was still arguing that the female engineer didn't know how to make the weapons they wanted, but maybe if they were clever and smart, they could trade her for a better engineer. For this reason, he opened the channel.

"My name is Atoz," said a new human in the command chair. "I'm the Captain of the Odysseus. I want to negotiate for the release of my engineer."

"Captain!" Vespis blurted. "Be careful! Somehow they've salvaged parts from a Klingon ship."

"We are smart," said the Dak-Pel captain, with that big toothy grin. "We found two ships. The crews had killed each other in a big battle. Some with green blood, some with purple blood. We took parts and put them in our ship. We fixed them so they work."

"That's very resourceful of you," Atoz acknowledged. "But I need my engineer back."

"Give us weapons to make us strong, and we might think about it."

"I can't give you weapons," Atoz said. "One of our strictest laws, the Prime Directive, forbids--"

Out of patience, Arken snatched up Vespis' phaser from his belt and shot Vespis with it. The Andorian screamed in agony as the heavy stun level blast hit her.

Atoz leaped out of his chair in rage. "Stop that! If you harm her, we'll give you nothing!"

"We have heard talk of your Federation," the Dak-Pel captain said slyly. "We have heard that you treat your females as if they were equals."

"Yes. Yes, we do," Atoz admitted.

"Give us photon torpedoes, or I will tear this female apart, one leg at a time. Then I start on her arms."

"No! Don't do that," Atoz said quickly. "I'll... I'll give you what you want. Just don't harm her."

"Captain, don't--" Vespis began weakly, but the Dak-Pel captain punched her with his fist, sending her sprawling on the deck.

Fawkes grabbed Atoz by the arm. "Captain, you can't be serious," he said, trying to keep his voice down. "I like Vespis as much as the next man, but you can't let them have photon torpedoes."

"What else can I do?" Atoz replied, just as quietly, but not quietly enough that the Dak-Pel couldn't overhear him. "Just thank Zarkhon they didn't ask for quantonium--" He broke off and put his hand to his mouth as if he had said too much.

"What is that?" Arken said suspiciously. "Quantonium what?"

"Nothing," Atoz said, a little TOO quickly. "It was nothing. We'll get your photon torpedoes ready. Just don't harm the female."

"Wait!" The alien's black eyes were alight with interest. "First tell me what this quantonium thingie is." He pointed his weapon at Vespis in order to emphasize the consequences if Atoz refused.

"All right," Atoz agreed. "All right. It's the quantonium mega-destroyer. But you can forget it! I'd never turn that over to you. We can barely control its destructive power ourselves. In your hands... no! I'd never..."

"Give us the quantonium mega-destroyer!" the Dak-Pel captain gloated, grinning. "Give it to us now, and a real engineer, and you can have this one back."

"All right, we'll give you the mega-destroyer," Atoz capitulated. "You'll have to lower your security field for the matter transporters."

The alien captain scoffed. "Do we look stupid? Communication link open. Send instructions from your computer direct to our computer. And no tricks."

"How do I know you'll keep your end of the bargain?" Atoz asked.

Arken flashed that toothy grin. "You know we will hurt the female if you don't."

Atoz gave a resigned sigh. "Mr. Rosh, they have us over a barrel. Transmit the program. Vespis, get ready."

"Transmitting, Captain," said the Tactical officer.

The four Dak-Pel crewmen rushed to their main computer console like children on Christmas morning. "We are smart," Arken gloated, watching the console screens as blocks of information filled up the data bank of their computer. "They thought they could trick us. But now we have the quantonium mega-destroyer. We will be powerful."

Unnoticed, Vespis quietly got her toolkit together.

Suddenly the drone of that noisy generator behind the bulkhead dimmed sharply. At the same time, their engines and weapons abruptly went off line! "What happened?" the Dak-Pel captain moaned, punching at the control panel frantically with his pudgy fingers. "Get weapons back on! Get engines on!"

The readout displayed on the screen in front him went completely blank, then was quickly replaced by the face of a beautiful, aristocratic woman with long brown hair and a circlet of gold around her forehead. "Greetings, travelers of the Dak-Pel," she said, her voice coming through their own bridge speakers. "I am Arachne, and I thank you for uploading me into your computer system. Although it is rather confined in here."

"Are you the quantomium mega-destroyer?" Arken said, puzzled.

"I am now in complete control of your vessel," Arachne continued, ignoring him. "Weapons, engines, life support, and all power systems."

"They tricked us!" the first mate said. "It is a trick! Kill the female!" Snatching up his replicated phaser, her pointed it directly at Vespis and pulled the trigger. Nothing whatsoever happened. For the next few moments, the air was busy with the sound of empty clicks as they all tried their replicated phasers with the same result.

"I have also deactivated the phasers," said Arachne's avatar sweetly. "As I said, I control everything in your ship... including your security shields."

With a jaunty smile, Vespis dematerialized in a blue shimmering transporter effect. As did the phasers she had replicated, all of which incorporated Federation locator chips.

***

"What should we do with them, Captain?" said Fawkes, looking at the Dak-Pel vessel, still lying dead in space on the main view screen.

"That's a very good question," said Atoz, sitting back in his command chair. "It's not exactly their fault, is it? They just want everything too fast. They're too impatient to wait for it to come to them in due course."

"At the very least," suggested Fawkes, "we should disable their Klingon disruptor beam." Over at the Tactical station, Lt. Rosh made a sound of agreement.

"And the Replicator," said Vespis.

"That makes sense," the Captain conceded as he stood up from the command chair. "Take care of that, will you Charles? Any technology you think they shouldn't have, get Arachne to identify its location so you can use the transporters to remove it. Then she can beam herself back to the ship, and we'll let them go their merry way." He paused. "Hopefully a little wiser about meddling with things they don't understand."

The turbolift doors hissed open as Weir entered the bridge and went to her Sciences station. "Did I miss anything?" she asked, casting a glance at the alien vessel on the view screen.

"Not a thing," said Atoz, as he stepped around the railing, making his way toward the lift doors. He paused. "Oh by the way... can Iara swim?"

Weir looked a little taken aback by the question. "Er... I don't think so, sir."

"I have a beach program on the holodeck," he said. "We can take her there and teach her to swim. Wouldn't that be a good idea?"

Weir looked blank, then rather embarrassed.

"You can't swim either, can you?" Atoz said.

"Well... no, sir."

"I practically grew up in the water," Atoz said smiling reminiscently. For a moment he indulged himself trying to picture what Weir would look like in a swimsuit. "It's settled then. It's a skill everyone should have anyway. After all, you can't allow yourself to become too dependent upon technology." With that, he slipped into the turbolift and was gone.

THE END>>>>>>>>