Star Trek - Log 8 Read Online Free PDF Page B

experienced that peculiar sense of helplessness one has when one's feet no longer have contact with anything solid. It was a common enough experience in free-fall space, but highly disconcerting on solid ground.
    He felt something like a metal band fastened around his waist. When he looked down he saw a gray, wide coil tight around his middle. It didn't look like metal. He put both hands against it and shoved.
    It didn't feel like metal, either.
    Then he turned and looked behind him and saw what had picked him up as neatly as an elephant plucks a lone peanut. He was in the grasp of the tail end—he supposed it could as easily be the front end—of a creature some six or seven meters in length. It was built low to the ground and had no visible external features. No eyes, mouth, head, arms, or legs—nothing save this single flexible tail or tentacle.
    It looked very much like a common garden slug, yet it wasn't ugly. The aura of intelligence, of purposeful, controlled power that Kirk sensed, removed any twinge of xenophobia he might have felt at the mere sight of it.
    The creature started to move off down a partially concealed path. Kirk tried to observe its method of locomotion and found he couldn't see beneath its slightly horny, skirtlike lower edge. Whether on legs, cilia, horny plates, or something unimaginable, the creature moved smoothly across sometimes uneven terrain.
    At the moment Kirk was more interested in the front end of the creature, for he had to assume it was traveling headfirst. That end showed a single tubular mouth that seemed to study him at length before turning back ahead. Although unable to slip free, he discovered he could turn his upper body easily enough. Looking back, he saw McCoy and Spock following, each similarly pinioned in the grip of one of the dull-hued creatures.
    The limb that held him terminated in several smaller divisions, which were in turn separated into still smaller wiggling filaments. The flexibility of those digits was promptly demonstrated when he tried to reach his phaser. One curled around it and plucked it from his waist.
    He managed to pull his communicator clear, but that surprisingly delicate organ circled another part of itself around the compact instrument and tugged it firmly from his hand. The action was irresistible without being crudely violent. Whatever had control of him, then, was interested in keeping him intact and reasonably healthy.
    That knowledge, along with the fact that no attempt was made to draw him closer to that strange tubed mouth, enabled Kirk to relax ever so slightly.
    As soon as the path opened into a cleared, well-kept trail, the three slugs accelerated astonishingly. Their lower limbs might be hidden, but they were amazingly efficient. And despite the speed, the tail-tentacle held Kirk firmly enough so that the ride was not as bumpy as he had feared.
    "Would . . . would you say this is an intelligent life form, Mr. Spock?" he called long minutes later, his initial evaluation of their captors complete.
    "It is difficult to say for certain at this time, Captain," Spock called from behind. "Thus far their only action that could be construed as intelligently formulated was the removal of our phasers and communicators. That could be an acquired or taught action, however. They may be more than advanced domestic animals."
    As Kirk considered this, he noticed the squarish shape still slung over the first officer's shoulder. "Intelligent or not, they forgot something, Spock. Can you get at your tricorder?"
    "I think so, Captain." One arm was pinned firmly to his side, but he still managed to work the other around enough to fumble at the compact instrument's controls. It was hard to adjust the sensors with only one hand. If he could retain control long enough to take even a few preliminary readings, it might tell them a great deal about—
    Two protrusions of the multilimbed tail plucked the tricorder neatly from his shoulder.
    "I believe I have an answer,