DAY 130(tue) continued ...
By 1215 ship time the Caco was in orbit around Huroc. It was getting quite crowded on the ship with the addition of Marion and Guyus.
Seeing that there were a lot of mouths to feed and not wanting to waste dilithium on replicating food Kirk had the brain wave of harvesting the food on Huroc. While not a bad idea in and off itself, finding food on the drought and famine ridden planet would be difficult, as pointed out to him by Marion.
Kirk replicated a shotgun, ammunition and a merchant outfit for Marion and he was all set for another perilous landing on Huroc in a farming region in hope of buying some fruit and veg.
He must have been having doubts already though because when Murphy said,
'Shouldn't we be concentrating on the main mission? I mean, rather than risking everyone's lives again on stuff we can replicate anyway?'
Kirk realised this was true and after checking the water tanks (174 gallons in the 1000 gallon tank) he saw they were still a while away from dying of starvation or thirst and abandoned the enterprise.
At 1900 they were ready to land on Huroc again and Paterson took them down to the spot Kirk had chosen. She hit cliff face on the way down and landed badly, but everyone survived and the Caco only dented its shields.
Kirk loaded himself down with armour, weapons, ammunition, computer devices, gold, health packs, flares and rations, but forgot to take a torch so he and Adam stumbled about in the dark once they were clear of the ship, in the direction of the Preserver Temple. Kirk had banked on the MATSE providing visibility but it was being nullified by the Preserver Tech on the planet.
Marion came too, and Adam was there to carry the 'jammer jammer', the rest of the crew stayed with the ship.
The continued west, towards the temple and cleared the wooded area they had been travelling in. Up ahead they could see lights from fires and the sounds of people. The approached carefully but were met with a friendly welcome. The people of this region were of a vulcan/kazon mix and this was a wedding. There were caravans, a large camp fire and a crowd of about thirty people.
They were given food and drink and not long after that the father of the bride, a man called Lerda arrived and talked to them. He could speak a little vulcan and explained that they were from the city to the north and had been to the temple for blessing on the marriage and this was the after party. Lerda explained that the people of this region were mixed race outcasts and generally more accepting of strangers. He asked them a few questions but after being met with such obvious lies he smiled, nodded and let them have their secrets.
They stayed a couple of hours. As they left Adam left some rubies for the married couple, a gift that was unexpected and very lavish.
The temple was only a few hundred metres away. There was a stockade wall all around it and at the gate Kirk switched on the 'Jammer Jammer'. It seemed to work as his tricorder could now tell him that their were four lifesigns within.
Kirk knocked on the gate.
'Who's there?' came a voice from the other side.
'Travellers.'
'Wait a minute.'
The gate opened and an old man came out. The gate was shut behind him.
'Who are you?' he asked as he leaned on his staff.
'We are travellers, tourists.'
'I don't think so.'
'It's true. We have come through the desert from the west.'
'I doubt it,' said the canny old fellow pointing at their feet, 'Those boots are brand new! You look
like you all just stepped out of a salon on Redneedle Street.'
'Umm... well...'
'Admit you are offworlders. Where is your spaceship crashed?'
Before Kirk could speak Adam said, 'If you don't harm us or our device then we will not harm you.'
'Keep your threats offworlder. You may as well come in then.'
The old fellow was Sagra, Temple Guardian. Keeper of the Sacred Scrolls and Exalted one. The others were Gruton, a tough looking young man, Dredrick a young lad and Yelva who appeared to be an old lady that looked after the men.
Sagra led them to a small house inside the compound, then to his room in the house that held the sacred scrolls. Kirk asked about a Katric arc and on consultation of the scrolls Sagra told them that if they existed at all then they would be deep under the temple in the cavernous areas built by the Preservers.
Next Kirk gave the priest two gold bars in exchange for 'permission' to land the Caco next to the temple. It took two hours before a message eventually got through to the ship, but eventually good old 'Crasher' Paterson arrived and took out part of the stockade wall with the nose of the ship.
'My wall!' cried Sagra.
Adam had the idea of getting the prisoners out to rebuild the wall and at gun point marched the four kazon out. Kirk went into the ship to start replicating more projectile weapons, an activity that he enjoyed. He made two more assault rifles and solid slug shells for the shotguns.
He heard a commotion outside and went out to investigate. The prisoners had all run off into the night and although Adam had shot and injured them, he had not made a pursuit. The avatar then seemed to have some sort of break down and went inside to sit beside its AI core.
Kirk followed it back inside, wondering what on Earth (or to be more accurate 'on Huroc') was going on.
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