Ensign Folanir Pzial, a Rigellian and one of the Lovell’s junior communications officers, replied, “Aye, sir.” Okagawa heard the anxiety in her voice, and tried not to dwell on how much it mirrored his own. After a moment, she said, “Captain, we’re receiving an advisory from Vanguard’s weapons control. Phasers and photon torpedoes are standing by.” She paused before adding, “They want us to know that they’re targeting the Lovell.”
Nodding at the report, Okagawa said, “Not surprising. If that thing gets out of the cargo bay, it’s likely to head right for the station.” He knew that Admiral Nogura would be ready for this course of action, one that had been discussed when outlining the plan to attempt communication with the Shedai entity contained within the odd alien crystal. If the creature locked inside the mysterious orb managed to escape, Carol Marcus and her team believed it would target Starbase 47 itself, perhaps repeating its attempt to come after the Mirdonyae artifact contained within the station’s top-secret research facility. The station had already felt the alien’s wrath once, and Nogura was unlikely to want a repeat of that experience.
“Approaching fifty thousand kilometers from the station, sir,” reported Rodriguez from the helm. “Preparing to answer full stop.”
Pzial said, “Captain, Vanguard control reports the Sagittariusis powering up with orders to follow us.”
“And do what?” Okagawa asked, then waved away the question. “Never mind.” Though he had nothing but respect for CaptainNassir and the crew of the compact Archer-class scout, there would be precious little the ship could do if the situation became a shoot-out with an escaped Shedai entity.
Then the voice of Commander zh’Rhun erupted from the speakers. “ Bridge, the crystal is breaking down! We’re losing containment!”
“Jettison the container!” Okagawa ordered, but instead of a response from his first officer, he heard only the sounds of metal rending and twisting.
The Shedai was breaking free.
36
Alarm klaxons echoed in the cargo bay, and most of the status indicators on the various consoles overseeing the operation glowed and blinked red. Xiong felt sweat running down his back as he watched al-Khaled’s and Davis’s frantic efforts to keep the situation under control.
They were failing.
“ Jettison the container!” shouted Captain Okagawa, his voice blasting through the intercom. Commander zh’Rhun started to reply, but then a new sound rang in the cargo bay: metal being stressed.
“The crystal’s gone!” al-Khaled snapped, his attention split between his workstation and the isolation chamber, which was now shaking on the deck plates. Xiong looked at the monitor with its audiovisual feed from inside the chamber and saw that the Mirdonyae Artifact had disappeared, and in its place was a roiling, amorphous black mass. It appeared to be bouncing around the container’s interior, and Xiong could see dents and other rends in the bulkhead panels. Outside the chamber, tell-tale blue flashes of energy sparked each time the container shifted its position and came into contact with the surrounding force field.
“Engineering!” Davis called out. “Full power to the containment system!”
Over the intercom, the voice of the Lovell’s chief engineer, Lieutenant Commander Moves-With-Burning-Grace, replied, “ You’ve got everything we can push through, Lieutenant. Anything more and the circuits will overheat.”
Davis growled in mounting frustration as he continued to work his console. “Son of a bitch! I don’t think it’s going to be enough.”
“It’s not,” al-Khaled confirmed, before glancing over his shoulder to zh’Rhun. “Evacuate. Everybody out of the secondary hull. Now.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Xiong asked, incredulous.
“Just do it!” al-Khaled snapped.
Beside him, Davis added, “The field might hold for a couple of minutes, but only if I can keep the power levels steady. That thing in there is siphoning the power at an exponential rate. If we jettison the chamber, the field drops and it’ll be free.”
“At which point,” Xiong said, “it will likely attack the Lovell.”
“Exactly,” Davis replied. “But if we hurry, we can get everybody out of the secondary hull, separate, and let Vanguard blow this section to hell.” As though in response to the engineer’s statement, the isolation chamber shuddered, eliciting another flash of energy as it bounced against the inside of the containment force field.
Xiong realized what was being proposed. “But someone has to stay back to maintain the field levels.”
“Right,” al-Khaled said. “Davis is rotating the field frequencies, trying to keep the Shedai from locking into it and drawing power that much faster. The longer we wait, the less that trick’s going to matter.”
Moving to the wall-mounted intercom, zh’Rhun slapped the activation control with the palm of her hand. “This is Commander zh’Rhun. Commence immediate emergency evacuation of the secondary hull. This is not a drill. Repeat: This is not a drill.” She punctuated her order by smacking the panel’s Red Alert control, at which time a louder, more intense alarm siren began wailing in the cargo bay. She then turned back to Xiong and the others. “The three of you: out.”
“I can’t,” Davis said, not taking his attention from his console. “I’m making manual adjustments to the field settings. There’s no time to teach you what needs to be done, Commander.”
Zh’Rhun hesitated not one instant. “Fine. I’m staying with you in case you need help. Al-Khaled, Xiong, see to the evacuation of this section.”
“ Commander,” said Okagawa over the intercom, “ I’m not liking what I’m hearing.”
Appearing to ignore the captain’s comment, zh’Rhun pointed to Xiong and al-Khaled before gesturing to the cargo bay’s exit. “Move!” Then, in a somewhat softer tone, she added, “Hold the door, and contact me when everyone’s out. We’ll come running.”
Al-Khaled paused, sharing with the first officer a meaningful look that Xiong understood to be an unspoken exchange of mutual respect from two shipmates who together had seen and experienced their share of trials and challenges. “I’ll be there.”
“We’ll be there,” Xiong corrected.
Eyeing the two officers, zh’Rhun nodded in understanding and gratitude. “Go.”
Xiong followed the engineer out of the cargo bay, stopping at the hatch long enough to turn back and see zh’Rhun and Davis now standing alone at the row of consoles, whatever they might be saying now completely drowned out by the alarm klaxons. The isolation chamber before them was in a constant state of movement, with dents clearly visible all across its surface. How much longer would it hold?
Long enough, I hope.
He had to run to catch up with al-Khaled, who had already traversed the short corridor leading from the cargo bay and made it to the wider passageway running the length of the Lovell’s secondary hull. At the far end of the passage was another reinforced hatch, leading to the “access boom” that connected this part of the ship to the spherical primary hull. Essentially an oversized, reinforced cylinder, the boom contained a single passageway that allowed for transit between the vessel’s two main sections. It also supported the warp nacelles, though if the secondary hull was jettisoned, the ship would only be capable of achieving sublight speeds—more than enough to return to Vanguard, assuming the Lovellsurvived the next few minutes.