Star Trek by Kevin Killiany Page B

were upon her and her entourage, but rather than crowd around her as humans would have done, the mob compressed itself along one wall of the corridor. Though Corsi’s height and the curving ceiling kept her near the center of the corridor, the chiptaurs were doing their best to leave the right-of-way unobstructed.
    There were four chiptaurs to the core group, Corsi deduced from the loose formation of the small crowd. But just as individuals had joined her tour of the town earlier, another dozen chiptaurs had apparently attached themselves to the central four as they passed. She still had no idea whether this was a show of support or curiosity.
    The leader of the core group, a male whose reddish hair was almost copper in the light of the glow baskets, was holding something concealed in his clasped forehands.
    Taking a small step forward from the others, he extended his clasped hands slightly and he chittered at Corsi.
    â€œWhat is this?” asked a voice from his hands.
    Corsi almost whooped.
    â€œMy combadge,” she answered, keeping her voice level as chitters and ticks emitted from the chiptaur’s hands. “It enables me to talk to others.”
    Without ceremony the chiptaur opened his hands and extended the combadge to Corsi.
    Trying not to snatch, but not giving him time to rethink the gesture, Corsi took her combadge from the chiptaur’s palm and affixed it to her uniform. Pretending to adjust its position, she pressed a contact, broadcasting a nonverbal signal. There was no response. Either there were no other Starfleet personnel in range, or something had happened to them. Neither thought triggered any memory.
    â€œIt was silent for many meals,” the leader observed, bringing her mind back to her surroundings.
    Many meals? How long was I unconscious ?
    â€œThe universal translator needed time to learn your language,” she explained.
    The chiptaurs regarded her blankly for a moment. Given the level of their technology, she wondered if they thought she’d told them the combadge was a living thing.
    â€œMy name is Domenica Corsi,” she said, moving on. “How are you called?”
    â€œWe are the K’k’tict,” the copper-colored male answered. “My name is—”
    The universal translator rendered a series of clicks and ticks Corsi couldn’t follow. The other three in his group apparently introduced themselves as well, oblivious to the UT’s inability to render K’k’tict proper names in a form she could track. She wondered how her name had sounded to them.
    Corsi looked to Lefty and Spot, expecting them to tell her their names as well, but they remained silent. She deduced there was a social order at work and that they were not far enough up the ladder to take part in the conversation.
    â€œI thank you for the return of my combadge,” Corsi tapped the badge and smiled her most diplomatic smile. “Will you be able to return any more of my tools?”
    â€œNo,” the lead K’k’tict replied simply. “We fear one or more of them may be instruments of harm.”
    No arguing with that.
    â€œI have no memory of how I came to be here,” she said, trying another tactic.
    â€œYou fell from the leaves,” one of the females flanking Copper answered. “Perhaps from the sky above.”
    The image returned, clear and isolated, without context. The roof of the rain forest, the volcanic cones with streamers of steam, an objective…what? She was moving, reaching from branch to branch; a white sun with thin, high clouds overhead and a sense of great depth below. She tested a mossy branch, then trusted her full weight to it as she reached for the next. But the branch is an arm or a leg of some giant tree dweller. Like the sloths of Earth, it allowed moss to grow over its fur as protective camouflage. The creature twitched and twisted, trying to escape. She hurtled downward through branches toward