Phaser Fight was a TOS interactive young adult novel, the second of two published in the 1980s by Archway, an imprint of Pocket Books. The story was written by Barbara Siegel & Scott Siegel, with the reader making choices to affect the outcome of the story.
Description
- You're the star of your own Star Trek adventure!
- Welcome aboard, ensign! You've been assigned to duty on the starship Enterprise. Your mission: Investigate a mysterious meteor belt with Captain Kirk... or help Bones combat a deadly disease... or fight an alien race with Mr. Spock. You choose — you can beam over to a phantom ship overrun with fierce mirror-creatures... or match wits with a giant alien who wants to crush the Enterprise like a bug. But choose carefully, or the Enterprise and you could be lost forever!
Summary
Readers assumed the role of a Starfleet ensign newly arrived aboard the USS Enterprise. Choosing to go with Kirk, Spock or McCoy led to a different story.
Going with Kirk
A dangerous meteor storm appeared. Hikaru Sulu was knocked out when a meteor suddenly struck the ship through the shields. Spock reported that the meteors were composed of an unknown element that shields could not block. If the starship evaded the storm, Pavel Chekov detected an unrecorded planet two parsecs away. The ensign chose whether to travel to the planet through Klingon space or near a black hole.
Entering Klingon territory exposed three D7-class battlecruisers lying in wait. Luring the cruisers to the meteor storm crippled their ships, forcing them to contact their base on the planet and reveal that the meteors were built as a secret weapon against Starfleet. While one choice led to destruction of the base, two choices led to the loss of the Enterprise.
Traveling near the black hole put the ship at extreme risk, with one option bringing the Enterprise to a safe orbit around the planet with the Klingon base. The planet's owner, Professor Jinks, invited them down but provided questionable coordinates. The real Jinks was found confined in a cave by a group of Klingons — the other Jinks was an imposter responsible for building the meteors.
Going with Spock
When the Enterprise encountered an invisible vessel, Spock and the ensign beamed aboard. It was manned by alien entities which mirrored everything they encountered, including Spock, the ensign, and the Enterprise. Cutting power to the Enterprise deprived the beings of energy, and they melted away. Six choices led to the ensign's death or incapacitation, and three led to the destruction of the Enterprise.
Going with McCoy
Ship's personnel contracted hyper-aging, and McCoy estimated they had only two hours to live. He quickly synthesized an antidote. If the ensign took it, events led to an encounter with an ancient entity that reached out with a massive, green, clawed hand capable of crushing the Enterprise, but the antidote enabled the ensign to communicate telepathically with the entity. If the ensign didn't take the antigen, McCoy took it himself, but he miscalculated the dosage and mutated into an ogre-like creature. Reader choices determined whether the crew died of old age, de-aged into nothingness, mutated, or were cured.
References
Characters
- Ancient entity • Pavel Chekov • Jinks • James T. Kirk • Leonard McCoy • Spock • Hikaru Sulu
- Referenced only
- Chuck Norris • Montgomery Scott
Starships and vehicles
- Duplicator ship • USS Enterprise (Constitution-class heavy cruiser) • unnamed D7 class starships
Locations
- interstellar space • Jinks' planet
- Referenced only
- Beladorian asteroid • Earth • Federation Headquarters
Races and cultures
States and organizations
Science and technology
- communications • communicator • computer • coordinates • disruptor • forcefield • intercom • invisibility • isolation cubicle • laser • microscope • parsec • phaser • phaser pistol • photon torpedo • sedative • shield • tractor beam • transporter • tricorder • turbolift • weapon
Ranks and titles
- captain • commander • crewmember • doctor • ensign • Federation Starfleet ranks (2260s) • guard • jailer • officer • professor • rank • science officer • Starfleet ranks
Other references
- alert status (battle stations) • alien • alternate universe • apple • assignment patch • atom • banana • black hole • blood • book • bridge • cave • century • cosmos • disease • element • energy • epidemic • film • fire • flower • frog • fruit • galaxy • glass • gorilla • gravitational field • guinea pig • hour • hull • hyper-aging • Klingon flame creature • Klingon language • kung fu • landing party • language • lifeform • light • light year • logic • medal • meteor belt • microbe • mirror • octopus • octopus-gorilla creature • ogre • poison • prison • rock • rope • salad • second • security • sickbay • space • star • Starfleet uniform • Starfleet uniform (2265-2270) • stun • suicide • transporter room • uniform • universe • vegetable • Vulcan nerve pinch • warp factor (warp two • warp ten • warp 12 • warp 16 • warp 18 • warp 19 • warp 20) • water • year
Timeline
Chronology
- 500 million years ago
- An ancient entity was born.
- 31 million years ago
- The ancient entity first sought a cure for a microbe causing hyper-aging which killed off his species.
- 2270
- The ancient entity discovered the crew of the Enterprise suffering from hyper-aging.
Appendices
Background
- There were eight endings for Kirk's story, eleven for Spock's, and nine for McCoy's.
- Crew ranks and uniforms were from the 2260s, but an engineering suit shown on page 16 was from the 2270s. While the book cover depicted the Enterprise in its 2260s configuration, interior illustrations showed it in its refit configuration.
- The Klingons' "meteor belt" weapon acted like a meteor storm. Directed meteor storms were also used as a weapon against the Enterprise in TOS comic: "Where Giants Tread" and against Perinda IV by a madman in TOS audiobook: The Man Who Trained Meteors.
- The story stated that, at warp ten, one could travel 15 million light-years in a few seconds. In original Cochrane units, however, warp ten equaled 1,000 times the speed of light.
- In Spock's story, two reader choices had story-logic inconsistencies:
- At one point, Spock left the reader, and you decided whether to wait for him. If you decided not to wait, a fake Spock appeared before you took any action, leading to the Enterprise being saved. But if you decided to wait — functionally the same choice — the fake Spock did not appear, and the Enterprise was destroyed.
- At one point the reader decided whether to use a transporter with a flashing malfunction light. If you chose not to use it, but instead hit the side of the console, the light turned off. Spock determined that the transporter was working fine, only the light was malfunctioning, and you both beamed back safely to the Enterprise. But if you choose to use the transporter without hitting it first, it killed you both.
Related stories
- TOS comic: "Sceptre of the Sun" – In 2264, the illusion of a genie's giant hand grabbed the secondary hull of the Enterprise.
- TOS episode: "Who Mourns for Adonais?" – In 2267, Apollo's giant green hand, actually a forcefield, grabbed the primary hull of the Enterprise.
- TOS comic: "Jeopardy at Jutterdon" – In 2267, McCoy was mutated and grew fangs after being exposed to the Jutterdon machine.
- TOS comic: "The Aging World" – In the 2260s, James T. Kirk and Montgomery Scott contracted hyper-aging on the surface of Taunus.
- TOS episode & Star Trek 7 novelization: The Deadly Years – In 2267, radiation from a comet triggered hyper-aging in Kirk, Scott, Spock, and Leonard McCoy.
- TAS episode & Log Two novelization: The Lorelei Signal – In 2269, Taurean women drained life energy from Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Carver, resulting in hyper-aging.
Images
Connections
| published order | ||
|---|---|---|
| Previous book: Voyage to Adventure |
Which Way Books | Next book: last Which Way Books publication |
| chronological order | ||
| Previous Adventure: Voyage to Adventure |
Memory Beta Chronology | Next Adventure: Dreadnought! |
| Previous Adventure: Voyage to Adventure |
Next Adventure: Yesterday's Son | |
External links
- Phaser Fight article at Memory Alpha, the wiki for canon Star Trek.
- Phaser Fight article at Demian's Gamebook Website.