“You will continue to try to pin down that source, but right now I’m more concerned about the possible danger to this ship. We’ve got to get a more precise reading on the projected radiation increase.
“Lieutenant Leslie,” Kirk said, swinging his chair around to face the stocky engineer.
“Sir?”
“You and Mr. Sulu will tie in your banks with the science console. I want exact data on the nature of that front.”
A chorus of “aye, ayes” sounded, and the officers turned to their consoles to feed in requests, collate incoming data, and to coordinate the operations of their stations.
“Ready, sir,” Helman said finally.
“Project,” Kirk ordered.
The image of Kyros disappeared from the great screen and was replaced by a grid on which each radiational component of the strange shell of energy was plotted on the ordinate against the abscissa of time.
Helman touched a button and, like glowing worms, the component projection lines began to creep across the screen, crawling forward through tune and upward in intensity.
“What a hash,” Sulu muttered. “It’s almost as if we’re running into a solar prominence.”
Kirk watched intently as the ship’s computers continued the projection.
“That readout is getting too complicated,” he said. “Blank everything but the hard radiation and high-energy particles, and give me a horizontal on hull shielding safety limits.”
The second science officer made a few adjustments and the confusion of the screen began to clear as, one by one, the lines representing the lower frequencies and slower moving particles began to disappear leaving only those charting lethal radiation, high energy protons, alpha particles, and heavy nuclei.
The narrow red line marking the maximum limits of the shields’ tolerance flashed on the screen. There was a dead silence on the bridge as the projection track of each component continued an unbroken climb toward the red line.
Suddenly, each of the lines bent sharply and shot upward vertically, slashing the red line in dozens of places and continuing almost to the very top of the grid before peaking and beginning an equally sharp decline.
The ship computer chimed softly and the emotionless voice began to speak to the silent crew. “Deflector shield activation necessary in eight days, thirteen hours, and twenty-four minutes or radiation penetration will exceed 100 rad.”
“And that’s enough to put half the crew down with radiation sickness,” Kirk muttered.
“At the rate those curves peak,” Helman said, nodding agreement with Kirk. “A few more hours’ exposure would kill us all, right?”
“Is a response required?” the computer asked.
“We aren’t going to be here long enough to make the answer more than academic,” Kirk said. “But as long as you have one, let’s hear it.”
“Data indicates that, unless corrective measures are taken, all crew members, with one exception, will receive a lethal dosage by twenty-three hundred hours, stardate 6728.5.”
“Who might be the exception?” Kirk asked. “As if I couldn’t guess.”
“Commander Spock,” said the computer. “Vulcans are twice as resistant to radiation as humans. If an exact prediction of Commander Spock’s resistance is desired, a tissue sample must be secured for molecular analyzation.”
“That figures,” said a familiar voice sardonically. “While the rest of us are heaving and watching our hair fall out, Spock and the computer will be playing three-dimensional chess.”
Kirk swung his chair about.
“Bones,” he asked, “what are you doing up here? I thought you had our sexpot in surgery.”
Dr. McCoy laughed. “I had her on the table, just ready to give her a local when the yellow alert came through. I thought I’d better report to the bridge to see if I was needed, so I told her to report back in the morning. I imagine she’s hanging around the transporter room on the odd chance she might get lucky when Spock is beamed up.”
He paused and gestured at the visual monitor dominating the front of the bridge.
“Looks like some nasty stuff is on the way in.”
“‘Nasty’ is an understatement,” the captain said. He gazed at the screen thoughtfully for a moment. “In order to weather what will be coming in a few days from now, we’d have to put the shields up, and at the rate that storm is peaking, we’d have to put them on maximum before too long. Twenty hours of that, and the power reserves would be exhausted. If we didn’t pull out before then, we’d fry. Buying a few more hours would be pointless anyway. The transporters won’t operate while the shields are up, and we’ve already gathered all the data on Kyros that can be obtained from orbit. There’s nothing urgent about the survey, it’s mainly a field test for the implants.”
Kirk swung his command chair to his right. “Lieutenant Uhura, we’re getting out of here. Open a channel to Starfleet, give them our situation, and tell them we’re leaving Kyros until things quiet down.”
“Aye, sir,” Uhura replied. She placed a hypertronic earphone in one ear and turned toward her console.
“In the meantime,” Kirk was saying to McCoy, “Spock and his department can pin down the reason for that intensity increase…”
Suddenly, he was interrupted by an exclamation from the communications officer.
“Captain, I’ve lost contact with Starfleet,” Uhura said. “I sent out the standard signal, but when I listened for their recognition call, a blast of QRM nearly blew out my eardrum.”
“Malfunction, Lieutenant?” Kirk asked.
“Checking now, sir,” she replied. Hesitantly, she replaced the earphone and bent over her panel. After a full five minutes of rapid checking, she straightened. “Negative, sir. Everything is in order, but there is something interfering on the sub-space bands.”
“That’s impossible,” Kirk said. “Helman, scan sub-space.”
The tall science officer bent over his console and moments later snapped upright with a look of surprise. “Computer!” he snapped, “check antenna and sensor circuits for malfunction.” He swung toward Kirk who had come out of his chair at Helman’s order to the computer. “Captain, you won’t believe this…”
“All sub-space sensors fully operational,” the computer said after a small pause.
“Put it on the main screen,” Kirk ordered.
As Helman complied, it was Kirk’s turn to feel surprise. The main screen showed a cloud-like formation, vast, pulsing, and ominous. It seemed to swell visibly toward Kirk, expanding outward evenly in all directions. Throughout it, hot spots and radiation peak points flared with rapidity and in close proximity to one another; it seemed as if the bridge crew was peering into the heart of an exploding sun.
“What is that?” Kirk asked.
Helman, looking puzzled, tried to answer. “It’s radiation, sir, and it must be a sub-space aspect of the front we’ve been tracking, but what it’s doing down there is beyond me.”
“Captain,” Chekov said, “it’s moving toward us at Warp Ten!”
Kirk stared at Chekov for a moment. “Warp Ten?” He glanced back at the visual monitor. “Whatever it is, Mr. Helman, it’s beyond me, too.” Looking at Chekov, Kirk said, “Prepare a course, Ensign, 246, Mark 347. Mr. Sulu, we’ll move out at Warp Factor Six as soon as the survey party is aboard. Uhura, once we’re out of this hash, contact Starfleet, give them a position report, and transmit full information on this radiation.”
As the navigator and the helmsman began laying in the course necessary to take the Enterprise out of harm’s way, Kirk stabbed a button on the arm of the command chair.