Star Trek - Log 8 by Alan Dean Foster Page B

mechanism.
    "Fight it, Captain," Spock urged, "fight it as hard as you can. Don't try to listen, don't try to let them use you." He turned to McCoy.
    "They think so fast, their patterns of cogitation are so complicated, that their own thoughts are too complex for a human brain to assimilate." He watched as Kirk rolled to his knees, tried to keep his balance, and failed.
    "If he gives up, even for a moment," Spock explained with deathly precision, "he may go mad. The Lactran thought processes will overload his neural capacity."
    M'ress uttered a sound halfway between a screech and a feline yowl as the Lactran, still holding Scott firmly in its grasp, charged out of the turbolift onto the bridge. Arex rose from his position at the navigation console, but despite the shock and consternation, no one moved to abandon his post, no one ran for an exit.
    And that was the last thing Scott wanted, since the presence of others seemed to make his captor nervous. The chief engineer had been treated to one of the slug-thing's mental assaults and had no desire to endure another.
    "Everyone clear out," he ordered, seeing that no one was going to budge without being told to do so. "Don't antagonize it."
    "Antagonize what?" M'ress asked quietly, bearing Scott's admonition in mind. "What is that thing?"
    "I don't know . . . yet. But it hasn't injured anyone badly . . . yet. And I have the impression it doesn't want to. It could have sent pieces of me all over the ship by now but hasn't taken that option." The Lactran headed toward the center of the bridge. As it began to move, the bridge personnel started to edge around toward the turbolift doors.
    "All rright, what do you want us to do, sirr?" M'ress queried, standing by the open doors.
    "Just leave quietly, lassie. Report to Lieutenant Seelens, tell her to set up security teams on all transporters. I don't expect any more visitors, but I want to be ready to greet them in case I'm wrong."
    "Yes, sirr," she acknowledged. "But what arre you going to do, sirr?"
    Scott let out a resigned sigh. "What do you think, Lieutenant? Whatever it wants me to."
    M'ress filed into the lift behind Arex, turned, and started to say something. The closing doors cut her off soundlessly.
    He was alone on the bridge with the alien invader.
    The front end of the creature waved back and forth, like an elephant sensing the air. It slid forward and placed Scott in the command chair—gently and right-side up, the chief noted with thanks—and then turned its featureless front to stare at him.
    "Now look," Scott began, "supposin' you and I talk this over?"
    No response from the slug.
    "You can talk, can't you?"
    Silence, and that continuing eyeless gaze.
    "If you can't talk, how do you communicate?" He tried Federation sign language. "Well, what can you do?"
    The creature turned and began examining the control consoles nearby, beginning with navigation and working its way around to Spock's library-computer station. The tail end touched several switches, and the multiple screens at the station lit and began pouring forth a torrent of information. Scott couldn't even identify the sections the creature was studying, much less follow its progress.
    "Listen, you've got to be careful here," he explained patiently. "This is the control room of a—hey!"
    The tail had reached out and lifted him again, then replaced him in the chair. If this was the alien's method of indicating one should be silent, it failed to impress Scott. The chief was growing increasingly nervous as the alien continued to touch this or that control.
    "Now, look," he began as the Lactran switched off the library and moved around to face the helm and navigation consoles, "just keep your grubby little whatever-it-is off things you don't under . . . no, don't touch that! "
    Too late. The multitipped tail was moving across the consoles with blurring speed, far too fast for Scott to follow. It touched switches, pushed buttons and levers, activated telltales, and