Aviophobia (Leonard McCoy)

13. Volcano

When they arrived at Nibiru a few days later, they did some preliminary scans of the planet.  None of them had expected to find anything very troubling, because they never had before.  That's why it was all the more shocking when scans revealed heavy seismic activity.  From Spock's best guess, the planet had at most a week before the large volcano exploded and covered the entire planet in lava, ash, and debris.  Almost immediately, Spock recruited her and Scotty to help him in creating a cold fusion device that would render the volcano inert.  It had been difficult to get the process started, and at times Kate regretted every taking any engineering classes to give her this knowledge to help Spock, but they soon got use to working together and were able to complete the device.  Just in time, too, as it seemed like the planet was becoming more and more unstable as the days progressed.

Finally, the day arrived for them to actually enact the plan to save the planet.  Jim and Leonard were going to go down to the planet as a distraction to keep the natives focused on them rather than any activity that would be happening around the volcano.  Sulu would fly the shuttle and take Spock to the volcano, and Nyota insisted that she join them so that she could help with communication between Spock, the shuttle, and the Enterprise.  Since so many of the high ranking officers were off ship, this was going to leave Kate in charge of the Enterprise while they were all away, and this was not something she was comfortable with.

Things were already tense, as Jim had the ridiculous idea to hide the Enterprise in one of Nibiru's oceans.  Ever since Jim suggested it, Scotty insisted it was impossible,  yet there they were: underwater in a spaceship.  Kate took a tentative seat in the captain's chair and felt entirely wrong doing so.  This was never something she aspired to be, so she hoped everything went smoothly on the planet.  Mostly because she wanted everyone, including Leonard, back safe, but she also knew she would never be able to handle the responsibility of being the ship's captain full time.  At thinking about Leonard, Kate thought back to Chris's words to her a few weeks ago.  It had been two weeks, and she still wanted to be transferred off the Enterprise.  She hoped, as soon as this mission was over, to be able to contact Chris again and try to make him see that it would be the best thing for her.

But, there were other things to worry about right now.  She had requested that everyone on the shuttle and on the planet keep a line open to the Enterprise so she would be able to communicate with them quickly if need be.  She grew nervous, as she wasn't really sure what Jim's plan was to distract the natives.  The longer she sat and waited to hear something from them, the more concerned she grew that something was going to go wrong.

Her apprehensions were not eased as she heard Jim yell out in surprise and heard a phaser fire.  She questioned, "Jim, what happened?  Are you alright?"

Instead of hearing Jim respond, she heard Leonard yell, "Dammit, man, that was our ride!  You stunned our ride!"

Jim sighed audibly and said, "Well, great."

Since they had begun talking, the line was open for them to hear, and Kate could hear the sounds of the natives growing louder, so she said, "Guys, I don't mean to be a backseat driver, but it sounds like you've got to get out of there!"

She heard Jim yell, "Run," then heard the sounds of labored breathing as she assumed they both began running away from the natives.

Leonard questioned Jim in between breaths, "What the hell did you take?"

She could almost see Jim's bemused expression as he replied, "I have no idea, but they were bowing to it," then he directed his attention toward her and said, "Kate, we've lead the natives out of the kill zone.  Make sure the shuttle knows!"

Kate nodded and replied, "Will do, Jim.  I've got to cut your line for a moment.  Don't do anything too reckless in the meantime," and didn't give him a chance to reply before opening the line to the shuttle and saying, "Locals are out of the kill zone, Spock.  You're cleared to neutralize the volcano."