Uhura's Song Read Online Free PDF Page A

Mr. Spock?"
     
     
To her relief, he turned. "That is a computer simulation of the night sky of Eeiauo in the era in which we believe the Eeiauoans arrived on this world," he said.
     
     
Black stars against a white sky...Curious, Uhura stepped to his side to look more closely. So many stars! To find just one out of so many stars! "Is that what they'd have seen?" She shook her head at the impossibility of the task.
     
     
"No, this is the view without atmospheric interference." Spock gave a command to the computer and a large number of stars vanished. He said, "Given atmospheric interference and the average visual acuity of the Eeiauoan, this is what the first colonists would have seen, had they landed in the northern hemisphere." At her questioning look, he added, "From the pattern of their city development, a northern hemisphere landing would seem indicated."
     
     
She nodded and looked again at the screen. Too many stars remained.
     
     
At his second command, the stars moved, slowly wheeling past the screen. "You are seeing the seasonal changes in star position."
     
     
Something caught her attention. She tried to bring it into conscious focus but could not. "Mr. Spock, could you reverse the colors? I can't-see it properly."
     
     
If he thought the request illogical, he made no comment. At his touch on the console, the stars went white against a black field. They continued to wheel across the "horizon" but one formation stayed always in the sky. It resembled an open eye, its iris the edge-on view of a nebula that gave it the Eeiauoan catlike slit.
     
     
"This," she said, and touched the screen.
     
     
"The gaseous remnants of a supernova that took place within a few hundred years of the time of the Eeiauoans' arrival here. The computer extrapolates from the archeoastronomy of several nearby civilizations and from the faint indications that still linger."
     
     
Uhura gripped the edge of the console. "They watch us still, and disapprove," she quoted softly. "A refrain from one of the earliest ballads, as nearly as I can translate it.... I have that hunch for you, Mr. Spock."
     
     
"Indeed?"
     
     
She nodded. "The Eeiauoan homeworld has to be somewhere in that constellation."
     
     
"That would be consistent with my calculations. However, that is still a great deal of area to cover. Let us attempt to refine your hunch."
     
     
Jim Kirk watched the main screen from the bridge of the Enterprise as the Federation medship Dr. Margaret Flinn and her escort of four destroyers assumed orbit around Eeiauo. The destroyers told him just how serious Starfleet considered the situation.
     
     
As if a destroyer could stop the Long Death! He thumped his knuckles impatiently against the cold metal arm of the command chair, ignoring the concerned glance Lieutenant Vuong shot in his direction from nav. What the Eeiauoans need most from us is the one thing we can't give them- speed! I can no more hurry Spock and Uhura than Bones can command a breakthrough.
     
     
From the communications console, Ensign Azuela cut through his angry thoughts. "Captain? Captain's regards from the Flinn, sir, and Chief Medical Officer Mickiewicz requests that we make ready to have those personnel who may have been exposed to ADF beamed aboard without delay."
     
     
He must have scowled, for Azuela added, "Orders from Starfleet, sir."
     
     
"Acknowledge," he said, curtly. "Request coordinates and relay them to the quarantine transporter room. Inform Dr. McCoy- and Dr. Wilson." He rose abruptly. "Lieutenant Vuong, you have the conn; I'll be in sick bay if anybody needs me." He doubted anybody would and that did little to improve his mood.
     
     
By the time he reached sick bay, he had fine-tuned his resentment from Starfleet Command in general to Dr. Evan Wilson in particular for the implied slur against the Enterprise's medical facilities and personnel.
     
     
The door to Bones's office was open. Of course, he told himself, the senior