He frowned to mask his frustration. “Dammit, I hate when you’re right.” He looked around. “It’s freezin’ in this hole. You gonna be okay till I get back?”
“I have rocks, I have a phaser. I’ll be fine.”
“Yeah, yeah.” He helped her over to the machine so that she would have something to lean against, and then he kissed her. “If all goes well, I’ll be back in six hours. Don’t you go wanderin’ off on me.”
Bridy pressed her gloved palm to his face and flashed him a smile to die for. “I’ll be right here. Now go. Time’s wasting.”
Quinn kissed her again, and then he let her go and started running.
17
Quinn felt like a meat popsicle as he staggered inside the Dulcinea. Two steps off the ramp, he dropped to his knees and slumped against the bulkhead as the hatchway lifted shut behind him. He could hardly feel his feet, and his fingers were almost completely numb. All his layers of cold-weather gear had been barely enough to protect him from the brutal cold once night had fallen.
Bridy was right,he admitted to himself. If I’d had to bring her with me, we might not have made it. The other saving grace for his return journey had been the clear path they had left in the snow as they crossed the frozen lake. Without the tricorder to lead him back to the ship, his only guide had been their footprints.
Between pained breaths he told himself to get up, but his body felt as if it had been cast from lead. Move, you lazy sack of crap,he admonished himself. Bridy needs you. Get your ass in gear!He reached up and found a handhold. By slow increments he hoisted himself back to his feet, and then he hugged the wall as he made his way forward to the dispensary locker. He shrugged off his backpack, opened it, and pulled out the shelter kit to make room for more urgently needed supplies: the ship’s second medkit, a bundle of compact field rations, a large canister of vitamin-enhanced water, and two fistfuls of heat sticks.
A few of those in our pockets’ll keep us from freezin’ to death on the hike back,he reasoned. He zipped the pack half-shut, hurried forward, and grabbed Bridy’s backup tricorder from the equipment locker near the cockpit. So far, so good. He checked the ship’s chrono. Just under three hours. Should be faster goin’ back.As he tried to stuff the tricorder inside his pack, he realized his hands were shaking. And not just a bit—a lot. Hang on,he cautioned himself. If you drop dead rushin’ back to her, you ain’t gonna be doin’ anybody any favors.
Quinn eased himself into the pilot’s seat and scanned himself with the tricorder. Within seconds, its display confirmed what he already suspected: he was hypoxic, borderline hypothermic, and seriously dehydrated. In other words, a dead man walking,he concluded. He turned off the tricorder, put it in his pack, and pulled out the medkit. His numbed fingers could barely fit an ampoule of triox compound into the hypospray, but then it clicked into place. He pressed the injector’s nozzle to his throat just above his carotid artery and pushed the trigger. A fleeting hiss and a momentary twinge of discomfort were followed by a sensation of profound relief. Quinn’s head cleared, and his vision sharpened. That’s better.
He put away the medkit, then cracked a few heat sticks and stuffed them into the inner pockets of his coat and the pouches on the legs of his pants. That ought to keep me from freezing on the walk back,he figured. And I can set up a tube from my canteen so I can hydrate while I walk.
Closing the pack, he got up and started aft—then halted as a ping of sensor contact resounded softly in the stillness of the cockpit. He turned back and checked the display, which indicated the arrival of a starship in orbit above the Dulcinea.
About time,he mused, fishing his communicator from his pocket. He flipped open its gold-plated grille and opened a secure frequency. “Bridy, you read me?”
“Yeah,”she answered over the staticky channel, “I’m still here.”
“I’m at the ship and about to head back. And I’ve got more good news: the cavalry’s here.”
“Thank God. We have to get Xiong and a science team down here, pronto.”
“Roger that. We—” Another signal appeared on the sensor display. “Um, honey? What’re the odds Endeavourbrought reinforcements?”
Her reply was freighted with fear and suspicion. “What’s happening?”
“Multiple contacts. Three—no, check that, five ships on approach vectors.”
“Quinn,Endeavour is the only Starfleet vessel in the sector. If you’re reading multiple ships—”
“Then we’ve got company.” He dropped the pack and ran aft to the weapons locker. “You better dig in, darlin’.”
“There’s no time! Listen to me: let the Klingons land and then take off and make a break for orbit. One of us needs to get away.”
“Dammit, Bridy, don’t do nothin’ stupid! Let me call the play this time!”
“It’s too late for that. You need to—”
“No! Not another word! Lay low till I scope the situation.” He slapped the grille shut on his communicator, put the device away, and opened the weapons locker. I need something with kick that won’t give away my position. From his limited arsenal he selected a semiautomatic .50 caliber sniper rifle with a flash suppressor and inertia-free firing mechanism. He nodded. This, two clips of spun-duranium rounds, and a pack of plasma grenades should do nicely.
Rifle in one hand and a bundle of ammunition and grenades in the other, Quinn sprinted to the hatch and elbowed the button that opened it. As soon as it passed the half-down point, he rode it like a slide, dropped off the end, and landed knee-deep in snow. He had dashed a dozen strides toward the edge of the Dulcinea’s narrow mountain perch when the banshee howls of the wind were devoured by the thunderous roar of engines cruising past overhead.
The sound wave hit Quinn hard enough to knock him facedown in the snow. When he lifted his head, he gazed in dismay at three Klingon birds-of-prey making their descent to the frozen lake between him and Bridy. Following the trio of sleek warships were two bulky, gray-green Klingon troopships.
Quinn pushed himself back into motion, and he scrambled into a tight space surrounded by jagged outcroppings of black rock. He balanced the rifle in a narrow gap between two boulders, peered through the scope, and focused its image.
Far below, the birds-of-prey had already set down on the far side of the frozen lake, near the entrance to the caves, and the troop transports were only seconds away from touching down. Wide ramps descended from the warships’ ventral hulls, and armed Klingon troops poured out of them.
Quinn flipped open his communicator and set it beside him on a level patch of rock. “Bridy? You read me, darlin’?”
“I read you.”
“I won’t lie to you, sweetie. It’s bad. Real bad.”
“Give it to me straight.”
“Three birds-of-prey and two dropships, right outside your front door. I’d say two full companies of ground troops, another hundred in flight crew.”
“Okay. Go ahead and say it.”
“You sure?”
“I’ve earned it.”
He sighed. “Told you so.”
Bridy lifted the ordnance package from her backpack. It was heavier than she’d remembered from just a few hours earlier. Part of her refused to believe she was really holding her own death in her hands, or that she would find the will to do what she knew needed to be done.