149Pavel was generous, he thought, when he made the decision to give the crew around him a total of three hours to come up with an alternative plan before he set out on his own.
But three hours came and went and he didn't even notice, still stuck in a corner of sickbay with Scotty and Spock debating how to best attack that planet and rescue Greg.
Kirk and Sulu had left them after a while, after their talk became more engineering and physics jargon than actual words. But Sulu made Pavel swear not to do anything stupid without reporting to him first, and Pavel made Kirk swear that any communication from the planet, from Greg, would get piped up to his own communicator too.
And debating the most feasible ways of finding Greg down there in that endless black sensor-dead terrain took up more time than he accounted for.
The only difference, really, between that and any other debate Pavel loved to get caught up in, was that he wasn't enjoying it.
Greg was in his mind the entire time. He spoke words about atmospheric interference and quantum field dampeners, but his mind chanted at him, low and constant, Greg's name.
He was hurt. He was gone, and hurt, and Pavel had promised to meet him halfway.
The three hour mark passed without Pavel realizing it, but eventually he simply shut his mouth and stood up as Spock was in mid sentence.
"We won't solve this fast enough," he said simply, since that was the only thing their hours of discussion had made clear. "I can't wait any longer."
Scotty, still pale and bedridden but showing no other ill effects from his attack, only shook his head. "It takes a bit of time sometimes, laddie, you've got to be patient."
"I can't." Scotty hadn't been on the bridge, hadn't heard Greg's weak voice. "I'm sorry."
"Mister Chekov." Spock spoke more evenly, as always. "While I understand the need for urgency, I suspect that you haven't let yourself fully consider the problem at hand. For instance, if you were to calculate your odds of actually locating the Lieutenant, given the size and scope of the planet and the lack of direction available to you, you would understand why solving this technical sensor problem is the most expedient way to proceed. Even then we aren't taking into account the interference from the demonstrably violent native beings and how they might slow your search."
That was true enough, but then Pavel had calculated his horrible odds already. He simply didn't care.
"My odds of finding him down there are better than the odds of finding him by sitting on this ship and doing research," he said simply.
He wouldn't be talked out of this, despite the respect he had for Spock. He had given rationality a chance, but they were no further along than they had been before they even went down to the planet's surface.
Spock studied him. "You have always acted on intellect more than emotion, Pavel. The chance exists that we will find a solution to this problem in short time, and once that solution is found it will take mere minutes to locate Lieutenant Harris. You must realize that your chances if you go down to that planet are dismal compared to our chances of finding a solution here."
"And how many hours should I wait? How many days? My odds of finding an answer up here will get better with time – his odds of still being alive when we find that answer get worse with time. It doesn't even out." He held up a hand even as Spock opened his mouth to respond. "Not to me."
Spock was wrong about Pavel in one important way: perhaps Pavel was given more to listening to his mind than his heart, but there was one giant exception to that rule. From the first moment Greg held out a hand to help him up off the pavement, Pavel had gone to him heart-first.
Sometimes he found it hard to reconcile those two sides of him – one time, months ago, he had let his mind take over in response to something Greg said. He had thought it over too hard, and ignored the feelings that should have told him that Greg's meaning would never be what his mind was telling him it was. He had slept in his old, lifeless quarters for almost two weeks before he realized his mistake.
Sometimes the two sides clashed, but this time he had no doubt which inner voice to listen to. Spock was right – the odds of finding Greg down there were dismal. Pavel understood that well enough.
It simply did not matter.
Staying still was unacceptable. When there was only one possible path ahead, a person couldn't waste time dreading the odds.
"Should I be worried about you two upsetting my patient?"
Pavel turned away from Spock's considering gaze, looking up as McCoy approached Scotty's bedside.
Scotty shifted under the thin bed sheet and gestured at Pavel. "The lad's about to do something cock-eyed. Upsetting me's the least of his worries."
McCoy glanced at Pavel, eyebrow arching.
Spock spoke up, to Pavel's surprise. "You understand how an illogical mind works, Doctor, perhaps you could explain to Mister Chekov why his transporting down to an unknown planet and wandering blindly in hopes of finding a single person might not be a good idea."
Doctor McCoy glanced at Spock, then turned sharp eyes to Pavel. "You think Jim's gonna let you go down there?"
"I have no intention of waiting for permission," Pavel answered simply.
"Uh huh." McCoy studied him with that cynical, dark-eyed stare of his. "So you're gonna go awol just to get yourself killed on a wild goose chase."
Pavel fought back a sigh and simply nodded.
"Well, hell." McCoy humphed out a breath. "Sounds like a plan to me."
"Doctor." Spock spoke sharply before Pavel could even register those words. "This is no time to be flippant."
"Who's being flippant?" McCoy turned his gaze to Spock even as he moved in and punched the display on Scotty's diagnostics screens. "I was right there with the two of you when those things attacked, you think I'm feeling anything like flippant about that damned planet?"
He turned to Pavel, a humorless little smile cocking his mouth up to one side. "You're a smart kid, you've already thought about the consequences."
"I have," Pavel agreed, studying the doctor in surprise. "All of them."
McCoy raised a hand at him, turning to Spock. "There you go."
Spock regarded McCoy coolly. Pavel watched them, and couldn't tell who surprised him more – McCoy for taking his side, or Spock for protesting so vehemently to keep him on the ship.
"He's an adult, Spock. You might think it's a dumb decision, but he's still got the right to make it. And let me just go ahead and point out that I've seen the emotional side of you real close, Mister Stoic, and I sure as hell know that if it was Uhura trapped down there you'd do the exact same thing."
Spock's expression didn't change, only seeming to harden that much more.
McCoy didn't seem bothered. "Every other day on this ship we go throwing ourselves into something stupid for some idiot reason. At least this time I can understand his reason." He flashed another drawn smile. "He's allowed to risk his own life. The needs of the one don't outweigh the needs of the one. Seems to me they're about equal."
Spock didn't answer, stiff.
The doctor's eyes shifted back to Pavel, and his smile faded. "You do realize you're gonna get yourself killed, though, right?"
Pavel couldn't stop himself from smiling back. It was small and sad, but it was a real smile. "I've considered all possible outcomes," he answered.
"Yeah, I'll bet." McCoy reached out suddenly and rested his hand on Pavel's shoulder. "He's a hell of a good man, Pavel. Someone ought to try."
Pavel nodded, swallowing against a tightening throat. "I know. Thank you."
McCoy squeezed his arm then turned away, moving back to Scott's bedside. "Okay, Scotty, I'm gonna keep you here until morning – these machines might say you're good to go but knees are tricky little bastards and I'm keeping this one elevated a few more hours, just to be sure."
Pavel stepped back as McCoy reviewed the rest of the diagnostics readings with Scotty.
He glanced over at Spock, who was looking back at him, ignoring McCoy and Scotty. Pavel wasn't surprised that Spock didn't understand, that he disapproved, but McCoy was right. If Nyota was down there Spock's logic would sway in another direction.
If McCoy was down there, Kirk would already be in the midst of those forests.
Maybe they didn't consciously realize that about themselves, and that was why they seemed so baffled by Pavel's choice. Maybe they were a bit overprotective when it came to Pavel – he was young, after all, the youngest on the crew by more than three years. More than that, he was an intellectual sort of officer, the kind who was supposed to stay on board in safety and conduct experiments.
Whatever it was, he wasn't going to let it stop him. They could think of him as different if they wanted to, but it didn't make it true. He icould/i be guided by his emotions over his intelligence. He was allowed the same feelings as the more headstrong people around him.
Greg was a good man, and someone had to try.
Spock spoke suddenly. "The captain asked that you report to him before making any rash choices. I will escort you to the bridge."
"Very well." Pavel looked back at Scotty and McCoy. He smiled as sincerely as he could.
Scotty barely managed a grimace in response. McCoy just waved him away, but Pavel didn't need any more from the doctor after McCoy defended his choice the way he did.
He expected Spock to continue his line of reasoning during the short trip to the lift and then up to the bridge, but Spock stayed silent. He stood still, hands behind his back in the lift, and didn't even look Pavel's way.
It was a feeling Pavel was unaccustomed to, this little niggle of worry that he had disappointed one of his mentors.
But that worry left his mind the instant the lift doors opened and they stepped onto the bridge.
"-know what he's gonna do."
Pavel froze when he heard that voice, rough and quiet and rasping over the speakers. Kirk had promised to let him know if Greg got in touch with...
His eyes shot to Kirk, and he realized in an instant that this wasn't an accident.
Kirk turned when they walked in, and he sat in his chair with a grimness in his eyes that hadn't been there when he left sickbay.
"Looks like now's the time, Greg." Kirk offered Pavel only a tired shrug and a gesture to come up and join him.
"Is he there? Pasha?"
Pavel moved slowly, a dark feeling rising inside of him. Kirk had contacted Greg. Why?
He moved up to Kirk's chair, speaking when he was near enough for the communicator to pick up his voice.
"I'm here, Grischa."
There was a pause, and Greg's voice sounded more hushed when he spoke again. "Captain says you're gonna do something dumb."
Pavel shot a glare at Kirk. "I'm coming to find you."
"But...you're coming alone? Pasha, you don't-"
"Wait." Pavel's glare only hardened when he realized that Kirk meant for Greg to talk him into staying in safety, since no one else had managed it.
Kirk had the decency, inadequate though it was, to be solemn about it.
Pavel spoke tightly. "I'm not having this talk in front of a dozen crewmen." He turned on his heel and marched behind Kirk's chair up to Nyota's station.
She was on her feet before he arrived, her eyes wide and sad. She held out a hand, her earpiece dropping into his palm when he reached out. "Turn this on and he'll bypass the speakers."
Pavel would have smiled if his anger had allowed it. "Thank you."
He sat down at her chair, turning his back on Kirk and Sulu and the rest of the staring, silent bridge crew. He worked the earpiece into place and thumbed the switch. "Grischa?"
"Hey." Greg's voice was even softer piping directly into his ear, and Pavel felt his eyes shutting and his focus tunneling on the sound of that hoarse voice. "Just you and me now?"
"Yes," Pavel answered, his own voice rough in his throat. "Whatever the captain has told you...I have to come find you. You know that."
Greg was quiet for a few seconds. "I...I know that if things were reversed right now I wouldn't let anything stop me from getting down here. But...I can't just..." His voice faltered.
Pavel had to fight the urge to glare over at Kirk again.
"I can't just say yes to this, Pasha. I didn't think...earlier, when you said...I didn't think about how dangerous it'd be."
There was no reason for this. No need to worry Greg when he was already hurt and stranded and alone. No reason except selfishness.
Between Kirk doing this and Spock arguing so intently, Pavel knew he ought to have felt...something. Flattered, or appreciated, or something. Something besides furious.
He bent his head, eyes still sealed shut so that he could focus on Greg. "If it's a choice between life without you or death along with you..."
"That's no choice. Nothing that ends with you getting killed is any kind of choice." Greg sounded exhausted, that gravel voice so drained that there was no real force behind his words. Pavel knew he meant it, though. "I'm not...I think I'm safe where I am. Safe enough. You've got time to...whatever, to science out whatever you need to, whatever the hell Kirk's talking about with the sensors. Right?"
Pavel smiled to himself faintly. "I know you too well, Greg. You're a horrible liar."
Another long pause.
"Yeah. Okay. I'm...I'm not doing too good. But that doesn't mean...I can't let you..."
Pavel drew in a breath, opening his eyes to look blankly at the panel under his bent head. "You know that nickname that I've started to call you, the one you ask the meaning of all the time?"
"The Russian? My...chudo or something? Yeah."
Pavel hunched in on himself even more, as if somehow it closed he and Greg in tighter together, protected them from the watching eyes around him.
"Do you remember...at your brother's funeral..." He hesitated, trying to steel himself.
This felt too much like a goodbye. He wasn't about to accept that, but he did have to acknowledge that there was a chance.
Greg didn't speak in the pause, and Pavel went on after a moment, soft into the mouthpiece of the communicator.
"I told you about my father. How he called me a miracle child because I have this brain. I said that it was no miracle, my growing up in a loving home and being successful now."
He closed his eyes, trying to imagine Greg was actually there in front of him, listening. Or that Pavel was down there, holding on to Greg as they waited for transport. But he didn't know enough about that planet to imagine it. He didn't even know if it was day or night where Greg was.
"I said that you, coming from such a horrible place and such monstrous people, you were the real miracle."
"That what those words mean?" Through the strain in his voice Greg almost sounded like he was smiling.
In some ways speaking like this was harder than just going down to the planet and facing whatever came would be. But Pavel could picture exactly the self-conscious little smile Greg would have on his face, and it made him brave enough to go on.
"My miracle," he answered. "It's easier for me to say those kinds of things in Russian. I imagine it sounds less sappy that way."
Greg made a soft, amused sound.
"I don't just use the words because of how you grew up. I use them because of what you have done for me." The next breath he drew in was ragged. "I refuse to let you go, Greg. I can't. If you want to forbid me I understand, but I will come anyway. You must know that I don't have a choice. Did you have one, when it was me in trouble? When the Klingons took us prisoner all those months ago?"
"Didn't wait around long enough to figure out if I had a choice or not," Greg answered, low. "But you see so much more than I do, Pasha. You can figure out plans I couldn't ever think of."
Pavel laughed , more breath than sound. "Right now I can't. I can't do anything but want to be where you are." The terse little laugh faded away. "I'm sorry, Greg. I don't want to make you worry when you're already in danger. But I can't sit here any longer. Not even like this, being able to talk to you but not see you here."
He let out a breath. "I wish there was an easier answer. I wish...I can talk to you, it should be such an easy thing to be able to find you. But..."
Greg chuckled, hoarse. "I'm shouting, not waving."
Pavel frowned. "What?"
"Like you said once. You were trying to talk to me about that work you're doing, the black hole thing. Remember?"
Pavel could almost smile at that. He did remember - after keeping his work and his relationship separate for so long, he found that once he started sharing his work with Greg it was a relief. It was enjoyable, and often surprisingly helpful. Greg would ask questions, trying to understand the advanced physics or engineering concepts Pavel worked with so often, and explaining the basics of those concepts could often point Pavel to something flawed in his thinking, some path he hadn't tried yet.
"I don't remember those words, though. Shouting and waving?"
"You were talking about light and sound, things moving like particles or waves or whatever. Remember? Waves spread out, like sound."
Pavel couldn't tell if he himself was short on sleep or if Greg was getting less and less focused, but either way something in his mind told him to pay attention to this.
"I remember," Greg went on, voice soft and uneven, "'cause that's what made me understand it. I mean...to see something you have to look right at it, but to hear something you just have to be near enough, the sound'll come to you. So...its easier to hear somebody than see them. Right?"
Pavel frowned. He opened his eyes, looking absently down at the blinking panel.
"Shit, I dunno, might not even be remembering it right. I'm kinda dizzy right now, and I'm hardly a fucking genius as it is."
Pavel sat up, lifting his head. He turned around in Nyota's chair, his gaze locking on the viewscreen. The silent orbit of the planet below.
He pictured that same planet as it appeared on the sensor display - an endless sea of black and small pockets of clear terrain.
Communicators sent out strong signals. They had to, to reach an orbiting starship from inside the atmosphere of a planet. And when calling on a general channel, as Greg was, those waves weren't directed towards anything in particular. They traveled in all directions, radiating from the center point until they were far enough to fade away, well out in the deep of space.
Pavel blinked at the viewer, wondering.
"Pasha?" Greg sounded hushed in his ear. "...you there?"
"Greg..." Pavel swallowed, getting to his feet slowly. "You're wrong."
"What's wrong?"
"You. You're wrong." Pavel tried to hesitate, to take a few minutes before jumping on this sudden untested notion in his head as if it was the answer for everything. But he stared at that planet and heard Greg breathing raggedly in his ear and he knew.
He knew.
"You just said that you're not a genius, and you're wrong!" He tried to fight a laugh, but it bubbled up and out and he grinned at that horrible planet on the viewer. "You're completely brilliant!"
He pulled the earpiece from his ear and shut it off. "Greg?"
Greg's voice came back through the speakers overhead. "What's going on?"
"You stay right where you are, okay? You just...just stay as safe as you can, I'll contact you in a few minutes."
"I know that voice," Greg answered with a faint chuckle. "I'll sit tight, go be a genius."
Pavel looked around as the speaker crackled and went silent. He spotted Spock standing over by the captain, and he darted over. "It's not the frequency!"
Spock's eyebrow rose.
Pavel beamed at him and Kirk. "Captain, can we get the sensor display on the viewscreen?"
Something in Kirk's face seemed to relax, and he nodded towards the helm. "You heard the man."
A moment later the planet's image flickered, replaced by the blackness of sensor failure and the rough edges of a few bubbles of clear terrain.
Pavel pointed, turning to Spock. "It's got nothing to do with frequencies or interference. The communicators work because the transmissions spread in waves until they reach one of these patches. They don't bypass the atmosphere, they simply spread out until they find a hole to pass through!"
Spock regarded the viewscreen. "That is possible."
Pavel fought back a laugh. "Of course it's possible. It's simple, and we were too busy trying to tear apart the makeup of the atmosphere to consider a solution so basic."
Kirk moved around to Pavel's other side. "Sounds like you think that's good news, but how's it going to help us find anyone?"
"It won't let us find anyone," Pavel answered, enthusiasm not dimming in the slightest. "But it will let us find Greg." He moved in close to the viewer, scanning the few patches of terrain. "Sound travels less quickly than light. It travels quickly, of course, but it isn't instant. All Greg has to do is send out a constant transmission. If we can orbit around the place where the landing party was attacked, we can determine exactly where the transmission reaches us the fastest."
"It would be only fractions of a second difference," Spock said slowly, approaching Pavel and the screen.
"Plenty of time, the computers can detect fractions of nanoseconds." Pavel grinned over at him. "We find the nearest gaps in the atmosphere, the places where Greg's transmission comes in the quickest, and triangulate using the fractions of seconds difference between those spots."
He turned, grinning back at Kirk. "We should be able to figure out exactly how far from each of those gaps he is, and that will give us his location. It will be rough, but we should be able to get his location down to...perhaps a square mile? Maybe even less."
Kirk smiled back at him, but his eyes went past Pavel to the screen. "And then what?"
Pavel blinked.
"We won't be able to use sound triangulation to beam him aboard."
"No." Pavel shrugged. "We'll still have to find him and bring him out of the dead zone. I will transport down as I intended. If I transmit with my own communicator it will make me visible to the ship, and you can guide my direction from up here."
Kirk's smile faded, and his head was shaking even before Pavel was done.
Pavel didn't care. He had been about to leave either way, how could he even hesitate now that he had a plan to actually find Greg?
But Kirk spoke up quickly. "The last thing I need is to get Greg back up here somehow and have to tell him that I let you get yourself killed down there. No way in hell I'm letting you go a-"
Something inside of Pavel, something tense and drawn tight ever since Hikaru first came by his quarters looking for Greg, snapped at that moment. Something he had stifled for the last two days, something that seemed to shoot through his veins with the next beat of his heart. He plummeted from euphoria to rage, instant and total.
"You will stop telling me no, Captain! I am through hearing it. I am through trying to convince people that Greg is just as deserving of rescue as anyone else on this ship!"
He had no idea what sort of expression was on his face - he had never felt his muscles harden the way they were at that moment. Whatever it was had Kirk gaping at him openly.
"Do you realize that since he went missing, since he ran into danger to save your crew, only one person has said anything to me that makes any sense at all? Only Doctor McCoy. He is the only person who has said that someone ought to go after Greg. I am going to be that someone, and if I die trying it than good. It's no more than he's risked for me, or for anyone on this ship! He deserves to be saved!"
Kirk stared at him.
Pavel swallowed, the silence creeping up thick around him as he clamped his mouth shut. But what did he care? Let people stare at him, let Kirk charge him with insubordination and send him to earth. If it got Greg back that was all that-
"So. Yeah. What I was starting to say, before I got interrupted." Kirk's eyes stayed hard on Pavel, but his mouth twitched. "Is that there's no way in hell you're going down there alone."
Pavel blinked.
Kirk turned his bemused gaze over to Spock. "How long will it take you to triangulate some kind of position?"
Spock regarded Pavel. "Perhaps an hour to orbit the site of tha landing party and determine where his signal is strongest."
"Okay then. You get on that. Chekov, keep your loud mouth shut for an hour and help him out. Sulu."
Hikaru spoke from somewhere behind Pavel. "Yessir?"
"Get that sword of yours and meet me down in security. I've got an idea that might give us a little time on the surface without those bastards down there realizing we're there."
"Glad to, captain." Pavel didn't have to turn to hear the grin in Hikaru's voice.
Kirk flashed an easy smile at Pavel, as if the last few minutes had been as casual as planning a picnic. "Between you, me, and Zorro back there, I'd say we've got a good shot at getting to him without anyone playing martyr. So for fuck's sake, stop trying to get yourself thrown out of the fleet. I can only handle so much public insubordination before I start getting grouchy."
Pavel drew in an uneven breath. "Yes, sir."
Kirk moved in, clamping his arm around Pavel's shoulder and steering him along towards the door. "Have some faith in us, kid. No one wants to leave him down there, and we're all aware of how many times he's saved our asses."
Kirk released him as they got close to the door, turning and walking backwards the last few steps as he gestured Pavel back towards Spock. "Besides, I've already lost one security chief over this mess. You really thing I'm ready to write off Porter's replacement?"
Pavel stopped where he was, watching Hikaru join Kirk and the two of them head out the door.
Right before the doors slid closed behind them, Pavel thought he heard Kirk's strange snickering giggle, and something that sounded like 'Chief Cupcake.'
"Mister Chekov."
He turned to Spock as the doors closed, feeling like his emotions had been pulled in so many directions in the last hour that he was close to shorting out.
Spock nodded back towards Nyota's station. His expression was, like always, calm, but there was a note in his voice. "Perhaps you'd like to call Lieutenant Harris and tell him to start transmitting for us."
Pavel moved quickly, his grin returning as he realized that he got to tell Greg again that he was coming for him, but this time he could say it with confidence.