I won't let him down. Somehow he'll know how I did. I've got to make him proud. ~.."

 

 

Tilting his head, Zevon asked, "The ambassador? Is that who you were evacuating?" "Sure was. Did it, too. He's out and you can't have him." "We don't want him, ensign. Please try to relax and put that " "Don't you tell me to relax! Don't you say that word to me!

 

 

That isn't your word." "Very well... I'll find another word... with whom did you have a date tomorrow night?" "Huh?" Stiles narrowed his eyes. Was this man telepathic?

 

 

"How'd you know... her name's Ninetta. Ninetta Rashayd.

 

 

She works down in atmospheric control at the starbase.

 

 

Y'know, the base life support. Air. Took me two weeks to pro- nounce her name right so she wouldn't give me that look when I asked her out. Not that it matters much now...." "What kind of look?" "Well... that look. The one that tells you to keep your mouth shut and don't even ask." His quivering left arm sagged a little, the rod now resting on his knee. '~I'ravis used to rib me about it. Jeremy used to imitate the look. He was really good at it... really funny. I wonder if they're really dead...." "I beg your pardon?

 

 

"I shouldn't have yelled at them," Stiles murmured, scouring the recent past, smelling his mistakes. "They were doing everything I said to do... they were with me. And I gave thean hell because I couldn't take a little fibbing." "Hardly matters now. Please put the blanket back on your- self. Your face is going pale--" "What did you say made this Constrictor thing happen? Did you tell me? If you did, I forgot it all." "Grayiron waves;' Zevon patiently explained. Clearing a place for himself, he sat down on something Stiles couldn't see. "They originate in space and bathe the planet. A recurring disaster for the Pojjana. As unpredictable as lightning-lit wild- fires. When the waves strike the planet, everything suddenly gets two, three, or even five hundred percent heavier. What you felt was the pressure of yourself suddenly weighing several hundred pounds. Blood trying to slog through compressed veins, muscles screaming for reliefi..."

 

 

"I remember that part." "The Constrictor causes massive shifts in tectonic plates, tidal waves, earthquakes, as you call them. Buildings collapse, air vehicles crash... some people suffocate if it lasts more than a few seconds... elderly people are crushed to death by their own weight...." Waving his hand at their surroundings, Zevon glanced up into the cylindrical pit that trapped them.

 

 

"Sinkholes and fissures open up under people while they're pinned helplessly to the ground...." The rod sagged a little more, finally resting against Stiles' leg with his limp hand upon the close end. He gazed at Zevon, listening to the ghastly narrative just as he had listened all his life to the stories of trial and triumph with Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock at the helm of their legendary starship. This story, though, had a glaze of the horrific. It was real. He'd just been through it.

 

 

How many other people out there were suffering? What had happened to those rioters in the courtyard? The people in the other embassies lining that brick area? "How 1ong's this been going on?" "Nine years," Zevon said. "The first Constrictor wiped out a fifth of the planet's population. Nearly a billion people died." "A billion ?" The word pulsed in Stiles' head, cooling down the throbbing of his ann and back. How many million was a billion? Why couldn't he do the mathematics? He was a pilot. he could multiply figures... do the trigonometry for atmos- pheric... for... landing.

 

 

A billion. The number grew and grew, pressing him down beneath the utter oppression of its swelling. If so many could die, he could endure some discomfort. A broken arm abruptly seemed surmountable, his moans and winces petty.

 

 

"Yes," Zevon said. "At first I could scarcely absorb such a number. Now I can put a face to each one." "Why would you care so much about this Constrictor thing?" Stiles asked.

 

 

But Zevon did not answer that. "Half the buildings were destroyed," he continued instead. "Countless trillions of tons of planetary material suddenly heavier for a few critical, dead- ly moments... even the most stoic among us was disturbed to his core. The people of the planet worked valiantly to rebuild.

 

 

Then it came again, and we knew it was a recurring phenome- non. After the second time, they gave up rebuilding and con- centrated on structural shoring of the buildings and bridges which had been strong enough to survive the first two. They've constructed pressure-tolerant housing and connected buildings so the structures could hold each other up... I could liken this to a meltdown in a nuclear plant. Now the Po'jjana hate all aliens, who brought this thing upon them. If they could put the aliens off the planet, perhaps the Constrictor would go with them. They've scrubbed their planet clean of all who were not native, and still the blight from space has struck on. It will continue to strike, and they will continue to hate you and me and all aliens for what we have done to them. Periodically the Constrictor will send out a roaring burp of radiation into sub- space, which causes waves of gravitons. There is no turning it off... it will go on indefinitely now. Our meager lifetimes will never see the end of it." Something in the Romulan's voice, something in his beating and the set of his shoulders caught Stiles with an unexpected wave of empathy. Zevon's arms were still folded, as if to pro- tect himself, and he gazed not at Stiles but at a nearby pile of russet files that no longer resembled a floor. He seemed resigned to the facts, but troubled by heating them so clinically reviewed in his own voice.

 

 

Again, with a different tone, Stiles raised the question that his clearing mind insisted needed asking.

 

 

"How do you know so much about this?" In a clear silence that now fell, moisture dripped from an unseen pipe, draping its solemn percussion on Stiles' question and Zevon's answer.

 

 

"I caused it."

 

 

"Nobody told me the Ronmlan Empire was at war with these people!" At such a declaration, the walls crackled and vibrated, peb- bles shivered down the tilted slabs into the sinkhole that had trapped the two unfortunate prisoners.

 

 

Across the well, the young Romulan's brows rose at Eric Stiles' abrupt statement. "War? Oh... no, no, there is no war.

 

 

This was... utterly unintentional." Curbing a lifetime of parochialism for the moment, Stiles reined in his assumptions. "Well... what happened, then?" "This sector is run by the Bal Quonnot, on another planet in this system. They allowed us to conduct quantum-warp experi- ments here." "Us? The... Romulan Empire?" "Yes." "You?" "Yes. The Pojjana have been struggling for identity amid the Bal Quonnot administration. The Pojjana did not want to deal with the Empire." "I don't think I'd deal with you either," Stiles said. "If you caused this thing." Zevon actually nodded, perhaps in agreement, but certainly in understanding. "The Pojjana let the Federation court them for membership, to see if an alien science could retract what another alien science had done to them. The Federation went so far as to establish a planetary outpost." "How many of these things have happened?" "Six, now. In nine years. Not in predictable intervals. The Pojjana led the Federation along, but avoided committing to membership, hoping you would help. They wanted the benefits but not the obligations." "It's happened before" Stiles confirmed. "I've heard of planetary governments trying to get the best of both worlds, refusing to make the decision but still accepting Federation protection and help." "The Federation is disappointed," Zevon went on. "To your credit, you practice what you preach. The sector is red nOW." Stiles paused to fill his lungs with a full breath. His shoul- ders squeezed in a muscle spasm, and he closed his eyes briefly. "That's what Spock said... red sector. I don't know what it means.... " "It means many things. Many banishments, many edicts, many restrictions." Stiles cleared his throat, and the effort made his ribs ache.

 

 

"How do you know so much about... stuff I'm supposed to know?" "All Imperial royal family members are well-schooled in astral politics." Raising his head sharply, Stiles blurted, "Royal family!" "Yes." He stared, but Zevon did not meet his eyes. "How close. how high..." "The Emperor is my mother's brother. I am fourteenth in line for the throne." "Is that... close?" "In a population of two hundred billion inhabiting ninety planets, it is considered very close. However, it's unlikely that I shall ever actually take the throne. Certainly I have no desire to take it." A cold rock formed in Stiles's chest as he digested the fact that he was involved in something with far more depth than he had first imagined. What moments ago had been two minor players in somebody else's huge drama now became some- thing entirely different.

 

 

"How did they capture you?" he asked. "If you're so. royal" "I made the error of accompanying a landing party to take measurements of--not that it matters. I forgot I'd been declared a public enemy. There were bounty hunters. They turned me over to the government. That riot out there... it was sparked by my presence here in the city." "And the government is holding you here? Sounds like they wanted the riots to spark. Why else would they keep you here?" With a nod, Zevon congratulated him. "Very possibly. This is not a usual holding area for political prisoners. They're usu- ally held in the mountains." "So we're hostages?" "Certainly we carry some incendiary value for leverage" Zevon contemplated, "but neither the Empire nor the Federa- tion can cavalierly enter a sector declared red by any major power. That is one of the few agreements between the Federa- tion, the Empire, the Ktingons, Orions, Centaurans, and others that has in fact stood the test of time and trouble. Compromise of that is considered irremediable. Relations, friendly or strained, would change instantly. The Pojjana may hope to tempt all that, but..." The young Romulan shook his head, a gesture of clear understanding of the situation. "You and I. we are on our own here for some time, I should think." "Alone," Stiles echoed, "on a planet full of people who hate everybody who isn't them." Shift the legs again. He forced himself to adjust. His shoul- ders seemed like water now. In his hand the metal rod was like ice and suddenly heavy. His elbow quivered as he tried to con- tinue holding the rod up.

 

 

"You're a captain?" he asked, fighting for concentration.

 

 

"Centurion. I have... I had command of a science vessel.

 

 

My command was a royal favor. It's common to give lower royalty command of royal barges. I thought myself very lucky not to be carting one of my own relatives about in a barge. I always remained aware that I hadn't earned command. I ceded most ship responsibility to my subcommander. The crew understood... they never spoke ill of me. What I earned was status as a fully qualified astrophysicist. I was supervising the unit conducting quantum-warp experiments that set up a sym- pathetic subspace vibration of free-floating gravitons. Now the Constrictor breaks on the shores of the Pojjan planet. And no one will ever stop it." Zevon dropped his gaze to the messy excuse for a floor. He didn't look up anymore.

 

 

"I'm something of an embarrassment to my family," he went on, so quietly that Stiles could barely hear him. "I'm not..." "A 'leader of men'T' Stiles supplied.

 

 

As odd as it now seemed to see someone who looked like Zevon return a smile, the Romulan did in fact grin mildly.

 

 

"Just to prove it, if you said that to any of my uncles or broth- ers, they would kill you just to prove differently" Returning the grin, Stiles chuckled. "Call my mother a sow, but don't tell me I'm no leader of men?" "Something like that." As Stiles felt his small troubles shrink to inconsequence, he gazed at Zevon and absorbed what he had heard. A hundred questions--none good---crackled in his mind.

 

 

"Well, here we are then," Stiles groaned. "A senior duty ensign who finagled his way into command of a landing party because of a family connection with Ambassador Spock. Big me, I thought I could distinguish myself. You know what I see when I look up the ladder? Captain Stiles, Lieutenant Stiles, Lieutenant Commander Stiles, heroes of the Romulan wars, officers on starship service... and little Ensign Stiles, who died in the pit after botching a simple evac." He let his head drop back and gazed up, far up, to the patch of dim light at the top of the hole. "I wish I were Ensign Anybody Else." "Surrounded by giants," Zevon offered. "No wonder you could barely see." Registering only slightly the favor just done him, Stiles clung instead to the sorrow and shame. "So here I am," he trudged on, "trapped in a sinkhole with a Romulan duke who doesn't want the command he's got, and a collapsed building's about to come down on us. Aren't we pathetic? If you had any emotion, you'd probably cry." Sharply Zevon kicked at a plank that lay between them, sending it clacking into another position. His eyes hardened. "I am not Vulcan" he snapped, and instantly looked away again.

 

 

The reaction was so sincere that Stiles almost reached out physically to yank back his words. "Sorry," he offered. "You can pretty much count on me to say the wrong thing. Look, if you were in the sector conducting experiments--everybody does that. Quantum warp... that's tricky business. There's nobody who knows everything about that. It's almost not even science. It's practically magic. ff something went wrong, it's not your fault." "It was my fault," Zevon insisted. He pressed a hand to his left thigh and seemed to hurt himself with his own touch. "I should're stood up to my superiors when I first saw what the result might be. The grayitoh impulses were too erratic. I knew that. I knew it before we started. I should never have condoned the switch-on. As senior scientist, I had the right to postpone." "Why didn't you, then?" "I was... thnid. Yes, I was the senior authority, but only because of my bloodline. There were other scientists who were more qualified quantum specialists. They warned me... but I was afraid to fail." So familiar. Why did everybody have to go through this?

 

 

Just doing their jobs, and all this had to happen. Sitting here in the near-darkness, three levels below the street, cradled in wreckage and out of the line of sight of any judgmental forces, Eric Stiles released himself from the bondage of prying eyes and pointless opinions. How foolish did he have to be to keep holding this weapon on Zevon? If only he could put it down.

 

 

With a cleansing sigh, he muttered, "Listen, I... I feel.... " In his left hand, the metal rod wobbled between them, stub- bornly holding its position. "Do me a favor, will you? Come over and... hold this for me." Across the wreckage, Zevon blinked, stood up stiffly, and moved toward him.

 

 

Stiles parted his lips and started to say something else, but in sudden punctuation of Zevon's dire prophesy, a loud crumbling noise erupted over their heads. Buffed in a gray cloud burping from above, Zevon disappeared as several large chunks of building material and a gout of rabble shattered through the hole in the floors above them, chittering like a rockslide, and came sheeting down into their chamber. The rain of rock and pebbles hissed furiously and crashed in a million pieces onto the desk of their little area. Stiles threw his working arm over his face and bent to one side, but he couldn't move far enough to avoid being painted with dust and grit. The metal rod he had claimed as a weapon flew out of his hand and clanked some- where in the dimness. Cold, stinging debris sheeted his body.

 

 

The Pojjan guards had taken away his padded vest, gloves, and knee pads, leaving only his daywear uniform to fend off the sharp bits. He felt himself being cut in a hundred tiny places.

 

 

As soon as the sound faded, he shoved himself up on his left elbow and twisted around. "Zevon? Where are you?" In response, he only heard the sound of Zevon coughing somewhere in the cloud of dust. Alive, at least.

 

 

Stiles pushed up on his elbow. "Are you okay?" Out of the puff of stone dust, shimmering paint fragments and insulation, Zevon finally and slowly came to his feet. Rock bits sheeted off his back and shoulders as he stood and limped over the jagged wreckage to Stiles' side, where he braced him- self on the thing Stiles was sitting upon.

 

 

"You okay?" Stiles asked again.

 

 

Zevon wiped dust from his face. "What is 'okay'?" "You don't know? Something tells me you speak English, right?" "Classroom English." "Oh. I guess it got started with two alphabetical letters, O and K. It means... agreement. All right. Well. No idea why it would mean that." "I see... yes, then, I am both O and K." "But you're limping." "A piece of this rod went through my thigh. I pulled it out." "What? You got speared by a piece of that stuff?." "Yes, when we first fell--" "Come here! You could be bleeding to death! Let me see your leg." Tunting to show Stiles a crudely bandaged part of his thigh above the knee, Zevon winced and tolerated Stiles's tucking the strips of blanket which now bound each of them. "A few moments ago you were willing to spear me with a piece of this material." "Well, never underestimate the capacity of Eric Stiles to make a dunderhead of himself. You're still bleeding here. That stuff's blood, isn't it? The green, uh--" "Yes. I thought it had stopped." "It hasn't. Let me---come a little closer. Your pant leg is soaked with blood. God... we gotta stop this. Pad the wound with something... just a minute." As Zevon gripped a standing slab and winced, Stiles ripped apart the edge of the mattress near him and pulled out a wad of stuffing. He folded the stuffing into a crude pad, then worked it between the blanket strip and the wound on Zevon's leg, unfortunately causing considerable pain, until Zevon could barely stand when it was over.

 

 

"That'll help," Stiles hoped. "Come here. Take the weight off it. Sit here next to me."

 

 

He smoothed a place on his slab and pulled Zevon to his side. They sat leg to leg, facing each other, as Stiles adjusted the knot on Zevon's bandage. "It didn't pierce through your leg, did it? You could be bleeding in two places. I can't tell--" "No," Zevon told him, his voice weak now. "No... a simple puncture.." Stiles looked at him and paused. "You dragged yourself all the way from your cell to mine, through that wreckage, with your leg impaled like this?" "I thought you would die if I didn't come" As pebbles con- tinued to trickle around them, Zevon dug through the rubble to the blanket that had fallen off Stiles. Without meetAng Stiles's eyes, he pressed the blanket back around the ensign's chest and hips and tucked it as well as possible. "We must keep you warm. You could still go into shock." Surveying his companion, Stiles allowed himself to be cared for by these unlikely hands. "Don't take this wrong," he began a moment later, "but why would you care? We don't know each other. I could've been just a garden-variety criminal. Why would it matter so much to you if I died?" For many moments Zevon was silent, though obviously troubled. He tucked and retucked the blanket two or three times before the ringing question demanded attention.

 

 

"Because the count is crushing me," he said.

 

 

Stiles frowned. "What count?" Settling his hands in his lap, Zevon sat suddenly still. He sighed roughly, and his expression took on a shield of burden.

 

 

His eyes crimped. He couldn't look at Stiles. Again he sighed.

 

 

"Tyrants have made names for themselves by murdering a thousand people," he slowly said. ''Ten thousand, a hundred thousand... a million. I have surpassed them all. There are no Hitlers, no Yum Nects, no Stalins or Li Quans who can com- pete with me. Among all the men and women of the galaxy, you have the privilege of sitting with someone who is utterly unique. You see, I'm the only person, anywhere, on any world, living or dead... who has killed a billion people."

 

 

As he sat on his rock, gazing at Zevon and hearing the echo of true burden, feeling as if he had known this man all his life, Eric Stiles grew up ten years in ten seconds. The urge to say something, to trowel away the grief with mere words, failed him entirely. There were no words for this. Not this.

 

 

Rather than flapping his gums as usual, he was completely disinclined to speak at all. Instead he shifted his good hand a few inches and gripped Zevon's forearm in a sustaining way, and did not shrink from the contact. Empathy flowed through the simple touch. The concept of billions of people dead at a single sweep overcame them both and seemed oddly tangible.

 

 

For an instant or two, critical instants, Stiles totally compre- hended the number.

 

 

Then, as all huge things do, the grasp of such volume fled and he was left only with the tremendous drumming regret that Zevon must have borne all these years. It wasn't the kind of thing that got better with time. Some things didn't.

 

 

There had to be another effort, a different one. One that looked forward for a change.

 

 

And that view was tricky for Eric Stiles, but for the first time in his life he didn't care what had happened in the past.

 

 

For the first time, the future was everything.

 

 

With his hand still pressed to Zevon's arm, Stiles spoke qui- etly, firmly.

 

 

"I'm here now. This is where I am. Things are going to be different for both of us. We're getting out of here eventually, and when we do, everything's changing. You and I have both been dragged along by our situations like being caught in a river current or something. It's all we've been able to do just keeping our faces up out of the water all our lives. This... it's got to stop. We have to get our own grip on things." Zevon gazed at him with 'all the fascination and confusion of a child looking into a kaleidoscope. "How can we?" "By making sure that things are different because we're here." Stiles hitched himself up to a better position, still hold- ing firmly to Zevon's arm. "When they pull us out of this hole, we're going to still be alive. Then we're going to go to work.

 

 

We're gonna pay back the universe for all the goofs and gaffs we've made before. We're not going to think about escaping or fighting. This is our planet now. We have a lot to do before the next Constrictor hits." Mystified, perhaps wondering if his companion were deliri- ous, Zevon narrowed his eyes. "What?" Heartened by his own words and by the new determination welling in his heart, Stiles willed his conscience into line and saw the future as a clear tunnel of purpose.

 

 

'Tll tell you what;' he said. "We're going to save a billion people."

 

 

Chapter Seven

 

 

Four Years Later, Federation Standard Time

 

 

"ZEVON, I THINK WE'VE GOT something this time! Look at this!" "If I'd had the right equipment, this could've been found months ago." "It reads like a Richter scale! We're actually picking up spaceborne disruption. Watch this." "But not focused. No way to tell if we have minutes or hours, or even days." "But we know this time that it's coming. That's something!" "There hasn't been a Constrictor in more than two years.

 

 

We've predicted it twice before. The first time we predicted the Constrictor would come in three weeks. It came in three hours. The second time, nothing happened at all" "But we learned from those mistakes!" "They won't believe us, Eric." "But this time we know!" "They won't believe us." The lab smelled of a burning circuit. Off to Stiles's right, in the comer, the tired dust collector clacked and whirred, creat- ing a sense of action where in fact there was little.

 

 

His taxed back muscles shuddered as he sank back in his chair. "How can we convince them? What do you think we should do? It's not like we can threaten Orsova, and he's got the keys to all the telephones." Beside him in the only other chair, Zevon seemed more troubled than vindicated by their good work today and the breakthrough they'd been waiting for, which now blinked before them on the overworked spectrometer, its flickering screen data reflected in the cold contents of their two soup- bowls.

 

 

"You need to eat," Zevon said, his voice a rasp of fatigue and frustration.

 

 

Only now did Stiles realize that his partner was looking not at the glimmering jewels on the screen, but at the filmy soup.

 

 

Stiles pressed back and stretched his arms. "Four years of horse-drool soup. So I skip it once in a while. So what?

 

 

Limosh t' rui maloor." Zevon looked at him. "Telosh li cliah maheth." Stiles felt abruptly self-conscious and guilty about his appear- ance. He almost never looked in the mirror over the sink back in their cell anymore---he even trimmed his beard without looking.

 

 

If he didn't look, he could convince himself from moment to moment that his cheeks were not so sunken beneath the scruffy yellow beard he'd allowed to grow there, his eyes not dull, he could imagine the fullness of youth and the sheen of health he had once possessed and not even noticed in those days. He could ignore the bruises on his temples mid the black blotches under the sleeves of his sweater. At least they'd given him a sweater.

 

 

He'd stopped looking in mirrors a long time ago, right about when the beard had stopped helping him hide his deteriorating physical condition. All he could tell from the beard was that he was still blond and hadn't gone prematurely gray from the daily stress and struggle.

 

 

Over the past four years the Pojjana behavior had been fre- quently baffling, inconsistent, sometimes maddening, some- times solicitous, as political temperatures surged or chilled.

 

 

Things changed every few months---except for a couple of things. The most consistent parts of his life and Zevon's were this lab and the prison's assistant warden, who unfortunately did not have enough to do.

 

 

"They've let us come to the lab almost every day;' he voiced, shifting from just thinking to also speaking his thoughts. "Why wouldn't they listen to what we find out?" Weary, Zevon simply gazed at him, seeing something other than the problem of convincing the Pojjana that there might be a way to save lives from the Constrictor. Lately Zevon had had more trouble concentrating, and Stiles was worried. They needed this breakthrough, not just for the billion, but for the two of them. They needed sanity and purpose, some reason to rise above the endless sense of being broken down and dull as barbells. After four years, they needed a win.

 

 

Stiles shifted uneasily under Zevon's toil-worn gaze, know- ing that the Romulan saw him clearly and hated the sight. A shaft of burning pain ran through Stiles's innards, but he bat- tled to keep it out of his face. He knew Zevon didn't miss it, though. He wasn't fooling anybody.

 

 

"Stop watching me," he protested when he could speak again.

 

 

"You're in pain, aren't you?" "No." "You should eat. It always helps." "It helps because it makes me throw up, and then I'm too weak to feel anything. Typical Romulan logic." "Typical Eric defiance," Zevon muttered, his eyes deeply solicitous and sad.

 

 

For a moment they simply looked at each other. Eventually, in his mind Stiles stopped seeing his own demolished physical condition and started seeing Zevon's. Zevon had started out typically lean, as was natural for his genetics, but four years ago he'd been strong and well-nourished, with good muscle tone in his arms and shoulders and a glow of privilege in his face. Now his complexion was sallow and his arms were thin.

 

 

His hair had lost its mahogany luster and had grown below his shoulders. He kept it out of his way by simply pushing it behind his ears. Being Vulcanoid ears, they did the job very well. He was less inclined to bothar cutting his hair, though Stiles occasionally offered a trim when he was cutting his own.

 

 

Strange---Stiles, so used to Starfleet spit-and-polish, had made a silly effort to clh~g to neatness during their four years as political prisoners, even trimming his nails and cuticles just to have something to do. He was the one who did their laundry and mended the rips in their clothing.

 

 

He would've expected the same, even more, from a prince of the Romulan royal line, but Zevon didn't really care what he looked like. His long-suffering uniform, stained and tired, would've dissolved from his shoulders if Stiles hadn't both- ered keeping the seams stitched. The only echo of civilization offered them here was their privilege to use the lab, and the fact that every couple of days they got showers. The Pojjana hadn't built a new jail. They'd just pushed the old one back up from the pit and nailed it together. A concrete floor now replaced the filed one Stiles had first seen when he'd been thrown in here. Generally speaking, though, the food stunk, the quarters were dank, the mattresses sagged, the floor was cold, and the light was bad. Otherwise, home sweet home.

 

 

"I wish I had a communicator," Stiles mentioned. "Just one, and I could broadcast this new information to the whole plan- et. Somebody'd listen." Shifting his weakened legs, he added, "I don't miss home very often, but at moments like this I do." Zevon rubbed his chilly hands. "The silence from home is an old story now. The royal family must not know I'm here, or they would have come by now. They must think me dead. The Pojjana must not be communicating with the Romulan govern- ment, or word of my presence would filter out." "The Pojjana aren't about to tell the empire you're here.

 

 

You're their trump card. Why should they stir up trouble? And if it comes, they want you here as leverage." Uneasy with this line of talk, Zevon grew irritable. "My people would come if they knew. We've discussed this enough before." "Well, mine wouldn't" Stiles concluded. "Obviously.

 

 

Because they sure as hell know I'm here." "The Federation declared the sector red, so they have to observe it or they can't expect anyone else to. It has nothing to do with you personally, Eric. Ambassador Spock would've had you out of here if influence mattered." "If they made it away from the planet alive. They could all be cosmic dust for all we know."

 

 

Zevon turned to him. "Eric, you must cling to better hopes.

 

 

I've had to watch you deteriorate physically, it's taken its toll on us both, but I refuse to watch your hopes turn to dust.

 

 

Spock expects you to behave like an officer and a gentlemen. I expect that also." Stiles grinned. "Talk, talk." He gestured at the vibrations playing out on the data screen. "Look at that... here we sit with information that could save the billion, and we can't fig- ure out how to get the word to anybody farther up than Orsova.

 

 

He'll eat it, probably choke, then hit me." "He is a victim of alien backlash. The Pojjana no longer know whom to trust. You and I are convenient representatives of all the trouble brought down upon these people by the Con- shfictor. If they knew it was I personally who had----" Defying the numbness in his legs and shoulders, Stiles launched forward and grasped Zevon's ann. "Quiet! Shut up.

 

 

Don't take chances." Zevon's gaze fell. "I wish, now and then, just to tell them and be done with it. I deserve whatever they do." "You keep your alien mouth shut. You want to risk these plush surroundings? If they 'knew, they might put us someplace... oh... tacky." Now Zevon looked up, and his expression tightened. "We have to risk a change, Eric. You can't stay here much longer. You can't stay on this planet, much less in this prison complex---" He was interrupted by the sharp clack of the lab door lock.

 

 

They both tensed visibly, though Stiles was too weak to do much more than uncross his legs. "Uh-oh--" Assistant Warden Orsova came in first, as he always did. He was a typical Pojjana northern-hemisphere male, built like a brick, a head shorter than Stiles or Zevon, but nearly as wide.

 

 

His coppery complexion shimmered in the lab light. His eyes were black as the drawer knobs around the lab. Following him was one of the guards of the lower ranks, with an infantry symbol emblazoned on his uniform front and the colors of an unfamiliar unit.

 

 

"Hello, you men" Orsova slurred the words as he drawled his way through his own language.

 

 

He was drank. They recognized the signs. Orsova held his liquor well, but there was a certain lingering odor, and his behavior would change, submerged anger bubbling behind his eyes. On days like this, his frustrations and boredom fluttered to the surface, and he would eventually come to act on them.

 

 

The soldier, though, seemed perfectly sober. His dark eyes glowed with anticipation, and his fists were clenched.

 

 

Orsova looked at Stiles and Zevon. "What are you doing today?" Fighting his nerves, SOles fiddled with the spectrometer, making sure not to do anything by mistake that could wipe out their newfound readings. "Just sitting here making up my mind that zebras are white with black stripes instead of the other way around." "Get up," Orsova ordered.

 

 

Suddenly icy, Zevon turned to the clutter of equipment on the lab table. "We have twenty more minutes." "Not you, ears," Orsova corrected, and looked at Stiles.

 

 

"Just him." Stiles chuckled and shook his head. "Orsova, your timing smells to Tarkus. So does your breath, by the way" "Get up." "He can't get up," Zevon protested, but too quietly.

 

 

Orsova buried his wide hands in Stiles's collar and dragged him to his feet. Holding Stiles with one hand, he held the other hand out to the soldier. "Pay." Grinding his teeth, the soldier dug into his thigh pouch and came up with several of the thin nonted chips the Pojjana used as a medium of exchange and piled them into Orsova's hand.

 

 

Without ceremony Orsova handed Stiles over to the soldier, who by now was fairly gasping with the thrill.

 

 

Zevon said nothing, did nothing as the soldier hauled Stiles to the middle of the floor, reeled back his muttonlike arm, and backhanded Stiles across the jaw. Lacking the strength to counter the sheer force, Stiles whirled into the far wall. As he slid down, a streak of blood smeared the dirty plaster.

 

 

As he landed on his knees, Stiles pressed the back of his hand to his cut lip and hoped the blood would clot. He didn't want to die of a slap. That'd be so stupid.

 

 

He turned and slipped farther down, but looked up as Orso- va's barn-wide shoulders blocked the bare light from the ceiling.

 

 

"Picked a weakling this Ome" he choked. "No loose teeth." "He'll try again;' Orsova said.

 

 

"Sure. I can't feel much these days anyway." Beyond the soldier's balled fists, Stiles could see Zevon seated at the lab table, both hands pressed to the edge of the table. As the soldier's fist plunged into Soles' gut and the familiar lights of agony flashed, Stiles let his mind go blank.

 

 

That little trick was getting easier as the months and years drained away the defiance Zevon somehow still saw in him.

 

 

He was glad he was on his knees already, for he could never have stayed on his feet and he didn't want to be seen falling again. His lungs cried for air. If Orsova's soldier hadn't been holding him by the collar again, he'd be on the deck, shriveled up like a jellyfish.

 

 

"You aren't afraid anymore," Orsova commented from over there.

 

 

Stiles blinked at him, still seeing only the flash and pop of pain's decorations. "Well, what's another pound to an ele- phant? So you hire me out again. So what? One of these days you ought to beat me up yourself instead of auctioning me off.

 

 

Or can't you handle it?" Furious, the soldier heaved his victim to his feet, then rammed his thick elbow into Stiles' ribs and flung him into the wall again. Stiles tried to go limp, but this particular soldier didn't fall for the trick. Some did, but this guy knew to drive the air out of his plaything's body before flinging him, assur- ing that Stiles was tense as he struck the wall. Worked.

 

 

Shuddering, helpless, Stiles writhed like an unlicked cub on the cold cement. His own moans rattled from his throat, but he had no connection to them nor any control, and was blinded by the lights popping behind his eyes, so familiar he'd started to name them. He was up to Louise when they began finally to fizzle and he blinked back to the apparition of Orsova's left boot near his nose, as the big warden pulled the rabid soldier off and held him to one side.

 

 

"Let me finish him!" the soldier bellowed. "He's an alien!

 

 

There's no other 'alien anywhere!" "No;' Orsova flatly refused.

 

 

"Then let me kill the Romulan !" "No." "You dumb drunken mule," Stiles straggled. "You're blow- ing a--chance to--save half the planet. We've found a way to--predict the Constricton Pound me all you want--but get a message to the--authorities. We've finally--done it!" "Done it" Orsova echoed. "You know we're tired of keep- ing you. There's talk of just executing you." "Fine," Stiles grunted. "Execute me. But bury me deep. I don't want to come heaving up when the big one hits." Orsova's reddened eyes turned hard. "There hasn't been a Constrictor in two years. Maybe it won't come again. Why should we feed and keep aliens here, and give you a lab and let you work, after what you gave to us?" "It wasn't him," Zevon said without turning. "It was--" "Shut up, Romulan," Stiles barked from the floor. "I don't need your--pointy help." "And it will come again" Zevon persisted, looking now at Orsova. "Like seismic activity, it doesn't go away. It builds up to something worse. The two of us have used our time learning to read the spaceborne graviton pulses---" "You two aren't as much fun as you used to be." Orsova cast a furious glance at Zevon and added, "I know the game. Pre- tending." Stiles wiped blood from his mouth with a shaking hand.

 

 

"Not--pretending. We just don't--give a damn anymore.

 

 

You've had two---two years of good crops... that haven't been squooshed... two years of " "I paid you!" the soldier roared, shoving at Orsova's arm, Orsova held him back. "Less and less reason to let enemies work on our equipment," he said to Stiles. "We should put you on trial and execute you now. It isn't enough that we stop tak- ing care of you when you're sick." Might as well talk to the wall.

 

 

"Take the message;' Stiles attempted one more time.

 

 

"There's another Constrictor coming. The planet... can get ready. Save the billion " The effort of speaking coiled Stiles into a knot and appar- ently gave Orsova the idea that this was the best satisfaction he would get today.

 

 

"I paid!" the soldier shouted.

 

 

"You paid to beat an alien," Orsova said, "not to kill one. Go out now. Go." Orsova yanked the door open and shoved the soldier out, then left the lab and shut the door behind him.

 

 

That was the paradigm of their life Orsova sold opportuni- ties to beat up the human alien, while he got his own jollies from watching the effects on the Romulan alien.

 

 

Zevon watched the frosted glass door, saw something that held him in his place--Stiles couldn't see the door from where he lay, but knew to simply lie gasping and wait. Ultimately a shuffle in the corridor spared him, and Zevon broke from the table and rushed to his side.

 

 

"Curses," Stiles wheezed, "foiled again." "Eric..." Zevon sorrowfully turned him enough to raise him to a nearly sitting position and held him there. Stiles could never have held himself, but would simply have slumped back into a supine position and probably suffocated on the deck.

 

 

"Look at you.... " "What a way to---live--aw, God--I hate that son of a bitch...." "Orsova is a walking symptom. He lost his children in the last Constricton Now he tortures us to ease his bitterness. The soldiers he brings here... they're the same." Zevon got to one knee, then hoisted Stiles up and deposited him on the only cot in the lab. The Romulan's face was creased with misery, overlaid by a firm mask of bottled rage.

 

 

"Hey" Stiles gasped. "Your emotions are showing." "I keep telling you--I am not Vulcan." Zevon angrily snatched a beaker of purified water from a shelf, soaked a rag, and pressed the cool compress to Stiles' bleeding lip.

 

 

"We'll never convince him to let us talk to the chief warden or anybody;' Stiles murmured. "How can we convince them that this is their chance?" "We're not that certain of our readings," Zevon reminded.

 

 

"The prediction might be off by months. Stop moving." "I'm not moving... I'm writhing in agony." "Exercise some self-control." "But you're not a Vulcan." Obviously troubled, Zevon frowned. "All we know is that another Constrictor, a very strong one, has been building for two years and will certainly strike. The phenomenon hasn't gone away at all." "But we know, Zevon, that's something. Help me---" With Zevon's help, Stiles jerkily shifted onto his side as his aching ribs and stomach muscles cramped again. His eyes clutched shut as he bore through the spasm, feeling worse for Zevon than himself. Zevon could do nothing more than grasp him and wait until the torment worked its way out. Stiles paced himself, breathing chunkily, until he could finally count through ten long breaths and his face and hands stopped invol- untarily flinching.

 

 

"Orsova and his kind" he began when he could speak again, "they think we're just stalling to avoid execution... we've got to convince them somehow. Or go over them to the consul general." "They will be convinced when the Constrictor comes." "And we can laugh in their faces, if Orsova or some other anti-alienite doesn't find a way to kill us first." Zevon sat down on the cot beside him and gazed at the dirty floor. "I can hardly blame them. A billion people dead. what would we do to anyone who caused that on our planets?" "If we can predict the Constrictors," Stiles muttered, "then it's only a matter of time before we can reduce the effects" "A thousand years of time, perhaps, between those two mir- acles." "But if we can just predict them, then planes can be landed, people can put on compression suits, get into reinforced build- ings, put the babies and old people in antigrav chambers--you know how to build those. Why won't they listen?" "I don't know" Stiles managed a sustaining sigh, let the lungful of oxygen flow through him and clear his head a little more. When he could relax a little more, he gazed at Zevon. "You think I can't feel what's happening to me? I know how sick I am. My mus- cles are deteriorating. I can feel my innards slowly dissolving.

 

 

When Orsova's customers kick me now, it doesn't heal any- more. I won't survive the Constrictor when it comes. You don't have to pretend. Even without the Constrictor I don't have that long. Orsova'11 have me beaten up once too often, or i'll fall down and my heart'11 collapse... I can't have more than a few more weeks." "If I hadn't caused the Constrictor, you would be some- where else today. Probably a lieutenant." His sharp features creasing, Zevon pressed the heels of his hands into his thighs as if the mental torture caused him some physical pressure too.

 

 

Several seconds passed before he could finally say, "Now my great mistake has killed my only friend" Stiles gazed at him, feeling supremely wise. The inner peace would've knocked him over like phaser stun if he'd been standing. He was completely content, as if lying in a hammock under a bower of autumn leaves. Zevon's grief actually amused him, and he smiled.

 

 

"Jesus, do you do Irish tragedies too?" he chided. "Zevon of the Sorrows... Listen, clown, you gave me four extra years.

 

 

My own mistake killed me that night, the night we met. I was in the hole. I died there. You crawled through the wall and gave me four years I wasn't gonna get." Irritated by the compliment, Zevon shook his head. "You wouldn't have been here at all--" "Yeah, well, flog yourself again. Gimme that broom over there to hit you with. If I could get up, I'd beat your ass blue." "It's 'already green." Stiles laughed, despite the fact that his midsection had cramped again. He stiflened and moaned, but then he laughed again. Zevon smiled as he stuffed a rolled lab apron under Stile's head. For a moment they retired into peaceable silence.

 

 

Over the years, they had learned to be silent together. In fact, they seldom talked like this anymore. Seldom needed to. They knew each other so well, and what a great feeling it was to be silent, silent together.

 

 

The lab seemed quiet, but now as they sat together Stiles focused on the chitter of the computer as it doggedly worked on the last problem fed into it, the burble of chemical proces- sors trying to separate molecules for identification of space- borne particles brought to them by the Pojjana Air Patrols, and the plink of the faucet in the sink drippingú Plink... plink. plink.

 

 

Nice sound.

 

 

He dared to draw a longer breath, which forced him to cough convulsively. When that cleared, he wiped spittle from his beard and tried to relax.

 

 

"I was pointless back ill Starfleet," he wandered on. Why did he feel like talking? Oh, well. 'Where were a thousand of me.

 

 

Ensigns by the carton. Probably most of 'em officers by now.

 

 

Wouldn't have happened to me... botched the mission like I did... might as well be here, distracting somebody like Orsova.

 

 

I mean, if he wasn't hitting me he'd just be... hitting you." "Quiet." "After I die, you go on without me. Don't you quit. You don't need me. Don't let Orsova slow you down. If you can predict the Constrictor within days, you can save thousands.

 

 

Within hours, you can save millions. If you can get the Pojjana to listen, they can save ten million this time, maybe a half bil- lion the next--" "Without you, I have no wish to keep working." "You don't need me." Stiles raised his head and grasped Zevon's arm with a ferocity of strength he didn't think he still had. "I've never been anything much more than raw material anyway. Starfleet tried to whip me into something worth hav- ing, and I thought they'd succeeded, but twenty-one-year-olds never think they're young. They'll go out and hoe a row of stumps before they realize they forgot to bring seed. That was me... was it ever me." "Eric," Zevon pointlessly admonished, but had nothing new to say about that.

 

 

"You think you can do it, right? Whether I'm here or not, you can do it, right?" "I can improve the predictions... if this first one is accurate within days, I can learn to fine-tune it. Bring it to hours. After the first one, I'll know how. If they let me continue--" "They'll let you. You'll convince them. Don't you stop try- ing, right? If you stop trying, I'll be dead for nothing. I don't mind being dead, but dead for notlfing stinks."

 

 

Inexpressibly disturbed, Zevon nodded. "I promise, Eric." Scarcely were the prophetic words out than the door sud- denly rattled and both men flinched they hadn't even noticed the sound of footsteps in the hall. Abruptly aware of the great serviceability of silence and how much they sacrificed if they talked too long, Stiles willed himself to a sitting position and shifted until his legs hung over the end of the cot and Zevon was sitting almost beside him. They didn't stand. That would've been taken as threatening. They'd learned that too, a long time ago, the hard way.

 

 

Orsova rolled in, a little less drunk than before, his bulky guard uniform somewhat askew and a bundle under his arm.

 

 

Desperate at the prospect of two beatings in a single day, Zevon bolted to his feet between the big Pojjana and Stiles, standing out of the way of Stiles's grasping hand. "Leave him alone! If you want me to beg, Orsova, this time I will." But the big assistant warden skewed a glance at him, then said, "I didn't come to beat him. I came to give him clean clothes." The astounding claim literally drove Zevon back a step, enough that Stiles could get a grip on his arm. "Why?" Stiles asked.

 

 

Orsova dumped the bundle of clothing onto Stiles's lap.

 

 

"Because a deal's been made. They're coming to get you.

 

 

You're going home."

 

 

"Starfleet's conting?" "Somebody is;' Orsova confirmed without commitment.

 

 

"The orders to free you come all the way from Consul Belli- horn, and he hates everybody." At the name of the chief provincial judiciary consul, Stiles felt the air fly from his lungs. "We're. ú. we're going home?" Orsova shrugged. "Just you." "What? What about Zevon!" "He's Romulan." Stiles used his grip on Zevon to yank himself up despite the protests of his body and rage gave him the strength to be there.

 

 

"You're kidding! I'm not going without him?

 

 

"Yes." "No! You're doing this on purpose!" "Stop, Eric." Zevon pulled him back.

 

 

Orsova blinked his reddened eyes, peered with something like sentimental regret at the bundle of clothing, shrugged again, and simply left the room, bothering to chink the door shut behind him, as if to give them a few final minutes alone.

 

 

Courtesy? Since when?

 

 

Shuddering like an old man, Stiles stood beside Zevon, and the two of them stared at the door. They couldn't look at each other. Not yet.

 

 

"He's lying," Stiles rasped. "He's tricking us for some rea- son... he wants something. That's got to be it, Zevon. He's telling lies. This is Red Sector. Starfleet wouldn't come in here. It's a lie." "Perhaps something has changed," Zevon suggested reason- ably. "If the sector has been declared green, how would we know it, here in prison?" "We'd hear about it... somebody would say something.

 

 

We'd hear rnmors." Slowly shaking his head, Zevon stood with his arms at his sides and common sense on him like a cloak. "No, Eric. No." "We'd hear about it...." "No." Barely aware of where his legs were, Stiles sank back onto the cot. The metal frame squawked under his weight and the sound nearly knocked him unconscious. His head drummed, hearing the squawk again and again. Before him, Zevon's legs seemed to be surrounded by a slowly closing tunnel.

 

 

After a moment, Zevon came to sit beside him. Together they stared at the lab, still not looking at each other. Their world, this lab, this prison, this planet, turned inside out for them both in the next ten seconds. Suddenly everything was changed, heaving as if in some kind of earthquake, and for a ridiculous moment there seemed to be a Constrictor holding them both to this cot, to this floor, to the bedrock beneath the building.

 

 

Who was coming? If the Sector had turned green, they prob- ably would've heard about it, and there hadn't been a whisper.

 

 

Not a thing had changed, not a flicker of instability--nothing.

 

 

Who was strong enough to come through Red Sector after Eric Stiles?

 

 

"It must be the ambassador," Zevon said, as if reading Stiles's mind. "He must finally have found a way to bring you out." "I don't care if God Himself is coming," Stiles uttered. The words gagged in his throat. "I don't want to go." "You must go," Zevon told him firmly.

 

 

"I don't have to go. Nobody can make me... I won't go.

 

 

Not even for Ambassador Spock... no, not even for him.

 

 

Everything I've done, I did so he'd be proud of me. If I go back, everything'11 fall apart. If I die here, he can be proud of me. I'tl be lost in the line of duty. If I'm alive, I'm headed back to disgrace. Court-martial. Home to humiliation. Zero purpose... complete uselessness. I cheated my dopey destiny for four years. Now I'm twenty-five and dying, about to be crushed in name as well as in body... and you and I.

 

 

Zevon... we'll never see each other again. I don't want to go.

 

 

I'm not going." Without really turning to face him, Zevon glanced down at his side, at his own arm pressing against Stiles's, and he moved enough to clasp Stiles's hand. Still, they did not look at each other.

 

 

"You must go," Zevon told him firmly. "They can save you.

 

 

The Federation will cure you. You will go." Despite the physical abuse, the sickness, the deterioration, the pain, Stiles found himself looking fondly back upon the years of working side by side with Zevon, at first concentrat- ing on keeping each other alive, later on the goal of decipher- ing the erratic Constrictor pattern. Their discoveries--that there was no pattern, but that waves did build before a Con- strictor and could be measured... the possibility of predicting the disasters before they hit.

 

 

"Y'know, I didn't mind the pain or the beatings, or any- thing," he said. "I didn't mind the chance to stay here and do what I perceived as my duty. It's better for me to die here than go back and die humiliated. You understand, you're Romulan--it's better for my family to believe that I died in battle." "That is often best," Zevon conditionally agreed, "but not always. Not this time." He squeezed Stiles's hand, careful of his own strength and the possibility of actually crushing the weakened muscles and the thready bones.

 

 

Stiles gazed at their clasped hands, and sucked each breath as if it were his last.

 

 

"You're the only friend I've got," he uttered. "I'm dying and they're taking me away from my only friend" "They'll cure you. You'll live." "I don't want to live humiliated. I want to die here. At least I died trying, instead of going back disgraced and a failure, court-martialed--" "No, Eric. You must go" "Why'.7 Why do I have to go? I'd rather die here" "You must go for the billion." "Huh?" "You forget, as usual, that others are involved who are not looking at you orjudging you." "Who?" "The billion we can save." "You son of a bitch... don't do this to me." "And me, Eric. You'll save me too." For the first time, the idea of going home seemed less prick- ly. "How?" he demanded.

 

 

In a measured tone, Zevon explained, "If you go back and they cure you, you can get word to the Romulan Empire that I am here, that I'm alive. The royal family will have no choice but to breach Red Sector and get me out. My people don't think I'm alive, or they would have come already. They can find resources to make a deflection system. Look what I'm working with--ancient trash, chips and coils and conductors, a spectrograph the age of my mother, and still we've found a way to predict. Look at those copper wires! On my ship~ I had more facilities in my cabin than we have here. Mathematics based on assumptions of certain things happening at the same time--think what I could do with real technology!" Zevon paused, seemed to dream briefly, then leaned back until he could rest against the wall. He had to tip his head for- ward a little to avoid scuffing the points of his ears against the wall when he turned his head to glance at Stiles.

 

 

"I am still royal family, Eric. If they know I'm here, they'll get me out. They'll negotiate, they'll threaten, but they'll gain my freedom. And I will come back--I'll wring cooperation out of my people for what we've done here. The Pojjana will final- ly believe, when I come back with resources. I know what can be done. You must go out of Red Sector, Eric. Go out and get cured, and tell my people. And they will come. This is the greatest favor you can do, of all the good you have done here." Stiles blinked, surprised. "Me? What'd I do? I'm barely an assistant. Don't treat me like that." "1 would never bother to patronize you," Zevon said, giving him a glare of inarguable clarity and conviction. "You are noth- ing like the young man in the pit. That boy, yes, he died there.

 

 

But the boy in us always fades, Eric, if we're fortunate. Now you're a different man, a better man. Look at what you've learned in four years. I know technical things, but you're the one who had the breakthrough with the flux meter. You're the one who told me to check for invisible phase shifts in the infrared. I told you how ridiculous that was, but you insisted I check, and you were right. Look what you and I have done here, with tricks and dirt and screwdrivers. I explain what I'm doing, and you provide the leap of imagination that sends us to the next step.

 

 

We... Romulans and Vulcans, even Klingons, we were all in space before Termns, but look at you. Look how fast your progress has been... You've caught up in a century and charged beyond us. You are the people who see things the rest of us miss. One day together, with real facilities... your people and mine, working together... some day we'll stop shooting at each other, and think what we can do then!" Now Stiles did look at him, and did not look away. Zevon's dark umber hair had long ago lost its polished-wood gloss, his complexion its glow of youth, and his face was creased now with weariness, starvation, physical stress, and the unending worry that their time would run out, yet still his brown eyes held a glimmer of purpose and hope that had never once flagged in all these years. Zevon had been in the pit with Stiles. Together they had crawled from the lowest place a man can go, the place of worthlessness and damage, and they had made something of it. They had made a bond with each other, and they had achieved a breakthrough that could save a billion people. if things went right... just a little more right.

 

 

"If I go," Stiles murmured, "we'll never see each other again." The words struck them both with the force of a physical blow. It was the one thing they'd never mentioned. Excuses, platitudes, hollow reassurances dodged through his head. The Federation would make peace with the Romulans. There'd be a treaty. Most Favored Systems status. Mail. Visits. The curtain rising so the two of them would be able to... see each other.

 

 

No matter how the story played in his mind, the final scene was the same. None of that would happen. He and Zevon would never see each other again.

 

 

He held on to Zevon in mute torment, the light touch becoming a sustaining grip, and he didn't know what in the universe to say.

 

 

"You must go," Zevou quietly insisted, "because you must live. You must live because I have to get off this planet so I can save these people even against their will. If I leave, I will come back. If you leave... you must never come back." The faucet dripped, the computer clicked, and with a palpa- ble crack Eric Stiles's heart broke in half for the second time in his life. In Zevon's angular features he saw the blurred echo of the face of Ambassador Spock, calling him from the distant past, beckoning one more act of Starfleet honor from the carved-out gourd of failure.

 

 

Zevon squeezed Stiles' hand again and thumped it placidly against the edge of the cot in punctuation, as if instructing a child about something which must, absolutely must, be the choice of the day.

 

 

"Go home, Eric," he summoned. "Go home, and live."

 

 

Chapter Eight

 

 

"THAT'S NOT A STARFLEET SHIP. What is this? Who in hetl's coming for me?" Stiles wrestled back against the grip of Orsova and one of the prison guards. They had him by the elbows, and there was no breaking away. He was too weak to do more than protest with anger and suspicion in his voice.

 

 

Orsova clapped a wide hand to Stiles's chest and said, "Stand still or I'll be happy to take you back to your cell." '"Fake me back, then! Fine!" "Stand still." There was no chance to run, even if he could. The landing field was dotted with Pojjana soldiers, their red-and-brown jackets flashing in the landing lights, their coppery faces flinching at the approach of the unwelcome craft. Alien space- craft hardly ever landed on the planet anymore. They just weren't welcome. This was a bizarre occasion and Stiles still didn't know what he was watching.

 

 

His head swimming with regrets, fears, and rough-edged anguish, Stiles begged the stars to put things back the way they'd been this morning, but no miracle came his way. The clanky-looking merchant trader, bulbous and utilitarian, with its exhaust hatches flapping and its hull plates chattering, con- tinued its inartistic approach.

 

 

"If that's a Federation ship, it's second-hand," he comment- ed. "No Federation spaceport ever built anything like that." Unable to wrestle Orsova or the other guard, Stiles con- demned himself to watch the landing. Port fin was high... too much pitch... not squared on the strip markings... lateral thrusters going too long.

 

 

Ah, the echoes 'almost hurt, echoes of another landing, not so far from here. He'd come to this planet an outclassed hot- foot who let haste get the better of him, overwhelmed by prox- imity to greatness, the approval of his hero, whose face he'd seen in the back of his mind all these many, many months, urg- ing him to rise above the mangled messes he'd made. His life had imploded, his preconceptions defoliated, his internal forti- tude hammered to a fine edge by circumstances he'd never anticipated, and he'd been preparing himself for a long time to die. Now living was a lot more scary than dying of whatever was eating his muscles. Strange... he and Zevon didn't really even know what illness Stiles had. The Pojjana doctors hadn't been able to identify it. Of course, since the patient was a pris- oner and an alien, they hadn't tried all that hard.

 

 

So Stiles had gotten ready, over the months, to pass away.

 

 

Now he was suddenly afraid not to go. Today, once again, the universe turned on its edge for him. He stood now at the municipal landing field, barely an echo of that reckless and slapdash boy, but he was still trembling like a kid, so fiercely that Orsova and the other guard had to hold him up. Would Ambassador Spock himself step down the black ramp of the unfamiliar vessel landing out there?

 

 

"I don't want to go," he muttered in his throat.

 

 

Beside him, Orsova watched the ship settle. "I'11 miss you, tOO." This time there was no Zevon to talk sense into him. Zevon was back in the prison. For him, nothing had changed. Except, now, he would be alone.

 

 

Terrible guilt racked Stiles's chest. All the words of sense and reason from the lab suddenly seemed to leak like cheese- cloth. How could he leave Zevon like this? Here in this dump, alien and hated, alone, powerless, with another Constrictor coming mid nobody to Believe him about it? Before this, they'd at least always had each other.

 

 

"Who's doing this?" he demanded as the ship settled and its thrusters shut down with a wheeze. "Who're you giving me to, Orsova? This is your doing, isn't it? You weren't getting any- thing out of watching Zevon while you tortured me anymore, so now you're up to something else, aren't you?" "You're going home" Orsova drably said. "I would enjoy keeping you, but you're going." "Why?" Stiles glared at him. "Why would you let anybody shove you around? Who are you afraid of?." "You're an alien. Your own filthy kind have come to get you.

 

 

Shut your mouth and go with them." "what about Zevon?" "He's mine from now on" Summoning his last threads of energy, Stiles raised his elbow and rammed it laterally into Orsova's round face. The big guard staggered, but never let go of Stiles' arm. Before even regaining his balance, Orsova shoved Stiles viciously sideways, into the rocky substance of the other guard, who pivoted to provide a backboard for whatever Orsova wanted to do.

 

 

Stiles tried to brace himself, but he might as well be skinned alive as drum up a vestige of physical superiority--hell, he could barely keep standing. Orsova reeled back a thick arm like a cannon, poised to turn Stiles into mashed oats.

 

 

Refusing to close his eyes, Stiles winced and prepared for pain and flash. "Stop!" Though he attempted to turn toward the sound, Stiles found his head reeling and comprehended that somehow Orsova had gotten a lick in there someplace. He shook his head, squeezed his eyes shut briefly, and fought to focus.

 

 

When he could see again, he frowned at a clutch of odd- looking aliens he didn't recognize, yellow in the face with some kind of green growth on their heads that might be their idea of hair. Their cheeks were smooth as babies' butts, they had no recognizable nose, and two eyes pretty far apart. Their clothing was a mishmash, obviously not uniform in any way, so this wasn't anybody's military unit, just a ship's crew from some ungodly where. Sure wasn't Starfleet. Why were yellow aliens coming for him?

 

 

From the middle of the clutch came the sharp voice again.

 

 

"Stop that. Get away from that man." Abruptly--and that was the shock--Orsova flinched back, and so did the other guard.

 

 

And so did about a dozen other Pojjana soldiers who were standing within flinching distance. What?

 

 

Stiles found himself struggling to stand up all alone, without even the assistance of his daily tormenter to help.

 

 

An old man strode bonily up to him, right up until there wasn't even a foot between them. Human. Old, darn old. Over a hundred, maybe, with a full head of frost-white hair, a simple flight suit framing his narrow body. The old man flicked a medical scanner between them. Pieming blue eyes watched the instrument's indicator lights.

 

 

"You Eric Stiles?" "Who wants to know?" "I'm your new grandad, son. Grew a beard, huh? I had one of those once. Itched." The ancient man turned to the yellow aliens who flanked him and said, "Get him aboard, boys." Stiles backed up a clumsy step as two of the yellow aliens stepped toward him. "Who are you? Where are you taking me?

 

 

You're not Starfleet. There's nobody like them in the Federa- tion-what do you want?" From behind, Orsova and two other Pojjana guards shoved him forward again roughly, but the narrow old man snapped his fingers and his blue eyes flashed with confidence and barked, "Hands off him!" So abruptly that Stiles almost collapsed between them, the guards--even Orsova--relaxed their threat.

 

 

The old man approached and leered at Orsova. "Don't get any ideas, hutch. I'm old, but I'm ornery" Amazing! The burly Pojjana all backed away again, so fast that the suction almost dragged Stiles off his feet.

 

 

"What the hell--" Stiles glanced at them, then glared at the frail white-haired codger. "Who are you that you can make them flinch like quail?" The old man was completely unimpressed by the lines of Poijana soldiers, and indeed they shied away from him. "Let's just say that once upon a time I removed a thorn from the lion's paw. Now the lion thinks I'm powerful. Of course, he's right." Weird--somehow this old man's voice... it sounded famil- iar. The way he snapped at those men-- "What's all that mean?" he asked. "What thom?" But the codger, without taking his eyes off Stiles, waved at the yellow guys, who moved forward again. "Don't look back, son," he said. "It doesn't pay." As the yellow aliens pressed toward him, Stiles stumbled back. "You keep your alien paws off me!" He slapped at them as they attempted to get a grip on him. "I don't want to go without Zevon! Orsova, I'll get you for this someday! All of you get away from me!" "Hypo." "I don't want to go! I don't want to go... I don't. want.... "

 

 

Familiar voices. How secure they sounded, how wondrous!

 

 

The anchorage of life, those voices. All the hours upon hours, watching historic mission tapes, memorizing the fiery defiance of Captain James Kirk during the M5 experiments, the Nomad occurrence, the incident at Memory Alpha, sinking into Mr.

 

 

Spock's baritone warble explaining where the probe came from, listening to the counterpoint of Dr. McCoy's perplexed and concerned protests, the voice less of an officer than a humanitarian trying to expand his humanity beyond natural limits... those men, they always pushed themselves, teased every limit, never backed away.

 

 

Wish I'd been there, with those men in those times, taking those orders. I could're followed those orders and given them ten cents change! Just imagine--First Officer Spock saying, "These are your orders, Ensign Stiles." Imagine.

 

 

Their voices were more familiar than his own family's, more familiar than Travis Perraton's calming tone behind him mak- ing sure he didn't make quite as much a fool of himself as he otherwise might, or Jeremy White taunting him while the oth- ers laughed. But it had been a good laugh... he hadn't appre- ciated it back then. They were having fun, enjoying themselves all because he was with them. That was worth being laughed at. It never hurt so much, except that he let it hurt. If they were enjoying themselves, then the existence of Eric SOles was doing some good.

 

 

He wanted to wake up. Usually he could will himself out of unconsciousness after a short struggle. Orsova commonly knocked him into a dither, and he had learned to claw his way out of the tunnel to the light place where Zevon would be waiting for him, usually stitching a cut or stanching a nosebleed. Wounds could actually heal without a tissue- bonding beam.

 

 

That medical scanner, it looked like a super satellite to him after four years in a culture backed off a hundred fifty years from what he'd grown up with. Funny how quickly he'd gotten used to the downteching. Before, he'd never thought a person could get through a day without Federation flash and spark.

 

 

He'd gotten through a day. "At a time:' Oh--his own voice this time. Didn't sound so bad. Come on, fight out of the hole. Zevon would be at the top of the tun- nel, pressing a wet cloth to Stiles's head. "Mmmm..." "That's it, son, wake up. You're bound to have a headache, Don't fight it." Stiles fought anyway. He defied the thrum in his skull and finally found the power to force his eyes open when he sensed there was some kind of light on the other side of the lids.

 

 

Zevon would be there when he got them open.

 

 

Red lights? Familiar too... shipboard lights in an alert situ- ation. Red, so the eyes could s011 adjust. Most eyes, anyway.

 

 

Human eyes.

 

 

"Let me get the lights." That gravelly, homespun voice again. The codger.

 

 

"Where's Zevon?" Stiles registered his own voice and clung to the sound, which brought him all the way up to consciousness. When he could see, he realized the lights weren't red anymore, but were a soft golden light, shining in small, obviously ship-built quar- ters rigged as some kind of sickbay. He saw a shelf with rows of bottles, piles of folded cloth, several pieces of medical scan- ning equipment, hyposprays, and a dozen other recognizable and somehow foreign contraptions. He knew what they all were, yet they were foreign to him, and unwelcome.

 

 

"So I'm out," he managed.

 

 

"You are," the old man said.

 

 

Forgetting himself for just a moment, SOles fixed upon the old man's face and tried to register that voice. He felt like a computer with a new search order--identij% identify.

 

 

"Who are these people running this ship?" "Smugglers." "Why would a human ride with them? And why'd you come into Red Sector? Are you an expatriate or something?" The old man's icy blue eyes flickered and one brow arched.

 

 

"I came because of typical pointed-eared hardheadedness, that's why." "Huh?" "And once in a while a man's got to slip into forbidden terri- tory. Inoculations, contraband chemicals, antitoxins... makes the stars spin." "But... if you... why would they...." "Why don't you just relax, Ensign?" "Ensign... haven't heard that in a while. You better call me something else." The doctor tilted his snowy head. "why should I? You haven't surrendered your commission, have you?" "It got surrendered for me. I'm not that kid anymore.

 

 

Starfleet gave up on me. I gave up on them." "You're here, aren't you?" "Look, don't you think I know pity when I see it? Guilt? It's not Eric SOles they came after. It's their own reputation for not leaving a man behind." Stiles huffed. "I grew up back there. I did leave Startleet behind. I could handle myself. I didn't want to be rescued. Starfleet can't just fly in and order me to leave when I don't want to go."

 

 

"Well, actually, Ensign, they can. You're still on the duty roster" "What do I care? And I told you not to call me ensign. All this is just a joke on you anyway. I don't care how many famous people they send after me, Starfleet's not getting its pound of flesh out of Eric Stiles. I'll never make it home." "Oh? Why not?

 

 

"Because I'm dying. There's hardly a pound of flesh left.

 

 

Can this boat turn around? Do these yellow guys have a reverse button?" The old man wiped his pale, gnarled hands on a blue towel.

 

 

"You're not dying, boy. I just cured you." Stiles rolled his head on the pillow and challenged the codger with a glower. "I'm too far gone for that." "Not too far for me. You had a viral infection of operational tissue. Your heart, your muscles, intestinal walls, a few internal organs... it's just something that hits humans on that planet.

 

 

We had to watch out for it back when we maintained an embassy. To the Pojjana, it's barely a common cold, but to humans, it eats muscle. In five or six months, with some physi- cal therapy, your tissues will be rebuild. You'll be young again, kid. Just call me the fountain of youth." "Starfleet sent us on a mission to a planet with a human- killer virus?" "They had a vaccine, but didn't bother to vaccinate the evac- uation team. You boys weren't supposed to come in contact with any native Pojjana during the evac mission, and that virus requires twelve weeks of repeated exposure. Nobody expected any of Oak Squad to stay there for four years. You probably got it from the food supply at the prison." Stiles stared at him. "How do you know so much about me?" "Ambassador Spock sent me. Ring a bell?" Taken unaware by the dropping of that name, Stiles heaved up on his elbows--and then the second shock came. He was up on his own elbows!

 

 

"What's wrong?" the old man asked.

 

 

"I haven't been able to sit up by myself for..." All at once Stiles dropped back on his pillow, but not from weakness. He stared at the old man and watched decades peel away before his eyes as he suddenly realized-- "Ambassador Spock sent you...of course! You're-- you're--my God, you're--" "Yes, that's who I am. The Supreme Surgeon. The Mighty Medicine Man. The Hypo-Hero. The Real----" "McCoy ! Doctor McCoy !" "You can have an autograph later." The elderly man snapped the top back onto a bottle and placed it back on the nearest shelf. "Now relax before you have a bacterial flareup. Where'd I put that sedative?" "Are you Doctor Leonard McCoy? The Doctor McCoy?" "Betcha?' "Then it is' an official rescue?" "No. I convinced the consul general to remand you into my custody. When we cross into Federation territory, you'll be officially handed over to Starfleet." "You gave the Pojjana some kind of medical help?" "That's the short version, yes." "Then you broke the Prime Directive?" "Sure did" the esteemed elder proudly confirmed. "You would've too. The P.D.'s been through so many incarnations and reinterpretations in my lifetime you'd think the thing was written on rubber. In a changing galaxy, you've got to have that." "But you're a Starfleet surgeon--" "Retired. If I come into Red Sector, it's my own affair. I'm a free agent. Took me a year and a half to get the Pojjana to owe me enough to get you out. It's a damned shame what happens to you kids who get caught in the crossfire--" "I'm not that kid anymore," Stiles bristled. "I'm an old man now. I can stick up for myself." Leonard McCoy lasered him a scolding glower that cut him off in mid-thought. "Boy" the doctor said, "I got socks older than you." Perfectly intimidated, Stiles settled back and shut his mouth.

 

 

He'd have to keep it shut until he figured things out. How much had changed out there? Four years in prison was an eter- nity. Stiles knew he'd broken Federation rules by helping Zevon try to learn how to predict the Constrictor. And he'd have done more to help those people, done anything he could to curb the results of all-encompassing natural disaster. Plain decency didn't allow a man to sit by and watch. What other rules had he broken in his distance and ignorance?

 

 

He didn't care. Even after a lifetime of family conditioning, Starfleet had been surprisingly easy to leave behind. Now, this force in his life that had faded to an echo, something he could ignore and forget, now it held ultimate sway over him. Four years ago, though restricted in a jail, Stiles had taken control over his own life. That control was about to be wrested from him again. He was an ensign again, a man in uniform. Today he was free--but more imprisoned than ever.

 

 

Then he thought of something else and pushed himself up again. "Can you get Zevon out?" "Who?" "Another prisoner. We were together the whole time. We kept each other alive." "Not another Starfleet man. I'd have known about that." "No, he's... he.... " As the doctor waited for the word Stiles was about to unthinkingly spit, Stiles held himself back. For four years he'd said whatever popped into his mind, careless of consequences because there weren't any consequences, heedless of hurt feel- ings because he and Zevon endured so much hurt that feelings stopped making any difference a long time ago.

 

 

He'd made a promise to Zevon to inform the Romulan Empire that their prince was a captive, not dead as they proba- bly suspected. Was it a good idea to tell anybody else Zevon was Romulan? l'll get the message to them myself, somehow. l'll figure out a way.

 

 

"One miracle at a time," McCoy told him. "We can make a report on your friend, see if Command has a process " 'Tll take care of it." Stiles lay back again, enjoying the sen- sation of getting a lungful of air without pain, entertaining thoughts of breaking away and running back to the Pojjana and continuing his work with Zevon now that he was cured. Cured ú.. the idea of dying was easier to grasp.

 

 

But how would that be? The sector was still red. Zevon was right--he'd be better served to tell the Romulans and let them get Zevon out, then let Zevon pressure his own people into helping the Po'[jana. It's the least they owed... and the Poj- jana still saw both Stiles and Zevon as evil aliens. They might have to be forced to accept help.

 

 

The Constrictor was coming, he was sure of it. Zevon would be caught in the middle of it, maybe even killed if the Pojjana wouldn't listen to him.

 

 

"I've got to fight my way to somebody with influence" Stiles grumbled aloud, gazing at the scratched brown wall of the small quarters. When he realized he'd spoken aloud, he turned to the elderly surgeon, but the famous old man was busy with something medical and apparently hadn't heard him or didn't care.

 

 

"They're going to court-martial me, aren't they?" "Hmm?" McCoy glanced at him. "I wouldn't know. Why would they?" "I botched a critical mission." "Did you?" "I thought i knew everything." "Show me a twenty-one-year-old who doesn't." McCoy pulled a hypo off his shelf and fitted it with a newly load~--- whatever that thing was called that held the medicine. "I'11 give you something to make you sleep. Tomorrow we'll start your physical therapy. You might as well relax for a while. It's a long ride back from Red Sector to whatever Starfieet's got waiting for you."

 

 

Chapter Nine

 

 

"ORsovA." "Mffbuh... muh?" "You're not unconscious. Stand up." "Huh? Stand up?" "You're not dead. Stand up and shake off the daze. Find your feet." "Who... who... r'you?" "This mechanism distorts my voice. Forget trying to recog- nize me. You will never know me." "Where is this? Where have you brought me to?" "You're on a space vessel." "Space7 Space!... Prove it." "Look out that portal. See your planet, your moons." Disoriented, nauseated, Orsova tripped over his bootlace and stumbled from the cool floorspace to a carpeted area where there was a hole in the wall. There he fingered the port- hole ledge and peered out three layers of thick window.

 

 

Breath stuck in his throat. He choked and wobbled. There, before him, near enough to touch, hung planetary bodies he had seen hanging in the distant night since he was a child. He had seen them as egg-sized etemalities, and today they were in his lap. Crisp sunlight and shadows like hats rode the bold sandy satellites.

 

 

"Oh!" he gasped. "Oh--moons! Too close! How did you make me come here! How did I come here! Oh... those moons are close...." "Beautiful, aren't they? You were transported here with an energy beam." "A beam... through space..." He tried to remember, but there was only the hazy idea of being trapped in his tracks, of looking down to see his knees dissolving and his boots disappearing. He had heard of those trailsport beams, but thought they inight be myths.

 

 

But he was here, and he had not walked or flown here.

 

 

Something had flickered and brought him here. He accepted that.

 

 

The buzzing mechanical voice spoke again.

 

 

"Now you know you are really in space." Where was the buzzing voice coming fi'om? It was speaking fluent enough Pojjana, but with an accent. Machines didn't have accents. Somewhere, there was a person talking.

 

 

Nothing familiar in the voice. No accent he'd heard before.

 

 

"Who are you?" "These are the conditions. You will not try to look at me. We will speak through this device." "Where are you? Are you in this ship with me?" "Nearby. Stop trying to find me. Take your hand from that latch or you die here.t... Yes, back away. Remain in that chamber." Orsova chose silence for a moment, to think. Failing that, he asked, "Why do you come here? And why now?" "The Federation has come here," it went on. "Why did they come ?" "To get their man," Orsova told it. "How did you know they callle?" "l foUow the medical trail," the voice said. 'The old doctor came here. I kept watch." "Why would you keep watch on doctors?" Stepping foot by foot, toe by toe around the dim cabin, Orsova looked at every panel of the glossy interior plating.

 

 

Was the metallic surface thin? Was he seeing shadows of a liv- ing form? Just a haze? Or were these echoes of his own reflec- tion deep in the polished surface?

 

 

As he moved around, pressing his fingers to each panel, leaving prints on the sheen, he asked, "What do you want?" "1 want to help you." "We accept no help from aliens. How did you get past our mountain defense?" "We are nowhere near your defenses. We have beamed you far out. You can see how far." The strange mechanically disguised voice reminded Orsova of the growling of awakened rezzimults in the swamps near the capitol city.

 

 

"What do you want?" he asked, abruptly nervous, as if someone had turned off the heat. "Why did you bring me to space? What do you need me for?" "Tell no one that I spoke to you, and you will have greatness beyond your dreams. I will help you gain influence, become powerful. You will find my friendship wondrous. When I need you, you will be here." "I don't even know who you are." "You will never know me. I must not be known. You are one of many pawns throughout the galaxy. 1 tend many fronts, light many candles. Do as 1 say, and we will see what the years may bring."

 

 

Chapter Ten

 

 

SEVEntEEN WEEKS LATER, after a blur of physical therapy, drug treatments, rebreaking and re-fusion of his old fractures--so they'd be somewhat recognizable as human bones to the archaeologists of the distant future--and a flurry of puzzling comments from Dr. McCoy, Eric Stiles stood in the loading area of a smelly livestock transport ship that stocked colonies with cows or sheep or something. After weeks of treatment, a trim of the beard he couldn't quite yet bear to shave off, and fresh clothing--blessedly not a uniform--he felt as if someone had cut off his head and spliced it onto a new body. He could stand here by himself for a long time before even feeling the first shivers of weakness. He was far from rosy health yet, but a lot farther from the death he'd been passively anticipating.

 

 

He and McCoy had transferred nine times in the past seven- teen weeks, in a flurry of passage notices, manifests, bribes, seamy personages, and shady deals. Stiles scarcely had an idea of what ship he was on, except that this one had obvious Fed- eration markings-and stank. Generally the ships were hardly distinguishable one from the other, and he and the doctor had remained relatively confined, to keep from "seeing" anything, whatever that meant.

 

 

Seventeen weeks of physical therapy and quaint tales. No matter how many times Stiles asked what was going to happen to him, Dr. McCoy always played old and swerved into some tall story about the glorious past, or the irritating past, or the past that could're been done better if only so-and-so had lis- tened to him. Stiles got the idea. The doctor didn't want to be the one to tell him what was coming.

 

 

Now they were about to rendezvous with the first Starfleet ship Stiles had seen since he'd been dragged out of his tighter.

 

 

On one of the courtesy screens, he and Dr. McCoy watched the brand new Galaxy-class Starship Lexington pull up to docking range. Then a transport pod came out of the starship and made its way toward the livestock transport.

 

 

"Why don't they just get it over with and beam us over?" Stiles complained. "The sooner this is done, the better for me.

 

 

I can take my dishonorable discharge and vmfish." "Discharge?" Mceoy didn't look at him. The lights of the airlock flashed on his papery face.

 

 

"It's the only way to get out of a long, drawn-out court- martial. I don't care if they put me on trial, but I don't have the time to waste. I've got a message to deliver. They'll offer me a deal. Dishonorable discharge. And I'll take it" "Don't blame you" The vessel around them endured a slight physical bump, and a moment later the nearest airlock clacked and rolled open.

 

 

Two Starfleet security men stepped out, with holstered phasers and full helmets. One of them stepped forward.

 

 

"Dr. Leonard McCoy and Ensign Eric Stiles?" McCoy stepped forward. "That's us, son." "Ensign Pridemore, sir, and Ensign Moytulix, here to escort you to the starship. If you don't mind my saying so, sir, I'm honored to have this duty." "Thank you, Ensign," McCoy allowed with a practiced nod.

 

 

"Carry on." "Yes, sir. If you'll both follow me--" The security officers parted, and Pridemore led the way back into the pod. Stiles let McCoy go first, though he was feeling the bristling power of strong legs again and nearly plowed into the pod just on the hope of getting this misery over with sooner. There was no getting around the next few days. He'd have to face the music, take the stain on his record, plead guilty to whatever they threw at him, and get out so he could find a way to notify the empire about Zevon. That was everything, Zevon was everything, and Stiles was in a perfect panic of worry for him.

 

 

His head was swimming. Yes sir, no sir, carry on... all the common phrases he'd abandoned so easily... they spun him like coins on a table. He felt as if he were reliving somebody else's life, detached from any real involvement of his own.

 

 

"Right over here, sir." Ensign Pridemore gestured Stiles to a seat in the cramped back of the transport pod.

 

 

"I'd rather stand and look out the viewport." "Sorry, sir. Regulations." Stiles stepped to the seat. "You don't have to 'sir' me. I don't outrank you." "It's my honor, sir." Pridemore took off his helmet, hung it on the bulkhead hook, and turned toward the piloting console.

 

 

"Yeah, year." Stiles dropped into his seat and slumped into the cushions.

 

 

McCoy sat across from him. The other security ensign, his helmet obscuring his face, stood at the aifiock hatch at full attention. Seemed kind of silly.

 

 

Within twelve minutes, they were landing in the bay of the starship. The pattern of approach and responses from the bay- master seemed like echoes of his past, as Stiles eavesdropped on the cockpit action and imagined himself in the pilot's seat.

 

 

As the interior lights of the starship's hangar bay flooded the pod, Dr. McCoy clapped his 'knees with those gnarled white hands and said, "Ready to get this over with?" Stiles sighed.

 

 

"Do elephants have four 'knees?" McCoy stepped over and helped Stiles to his feet, which seemed bizarre and distorted. Being helped by a man well over a hundred--and needing it--reminded Stiles that he had a few months of recovery yet to go.

 

 

Ensign hidemore got up and stepped to the hatch. "This way, gentlemen," the young man said.

 

 

Young... yes, Pridemore seemed young to Stiles. A long time since he'd seen a person younger than himself in any authority. He felt a sudden pang of sympathy for the two ensigns here with him today. So much was expected of them-- "If you'll stand here, Mr. Stiles," Pridemore said, motioning him to the middle of the hatch entrance, only then motioning to McCoy. "Doctor? Here, sir." Without comment the old surgeon came to stand beside Stiles. The staging was mysterious, but Stiles assumed a secu- rity team was stationed outside the door and would be escort- ing him to quarters under guard. The brig? Probably not. He wasn't a criminal, after all. Just a turkey being led to the slaughter.

 

 

"Ready, sir?" Pridemore asked.

 

 

"We're ready," the doctor confirmed. "Open'er up" Pridemore, curiously, stepped aside then instead of leading them down the ramp that must be out there, and punched the hatch controls.

 

 

The hatch swung open and for a moment Stiles was blinded, after weeks of dim smugglers and tramp ships, by an unfortu- nately placed spotlight somewhere in the hangar bay that plunged instantly into his eyes and made him blink.

 

 

Then a sound rushed up the ramp and engulfed him. Was something exploding?

 

 

He moved slightly to one side, enough to get out of the direct beam of that one culprit light, and let his eyes adjust. As he blinked, he identified that unfamiliar sound. Applause.

 

 

He stepped forward to see what was happening, and saw sprawled out before him a field of Starfleet crewmen, officers, civilian guests and dignitaries, all knocking their hands togeth- er and looking up the ramp at him and McCoy.

 

 

"Sorry!" Stiles gasped. He was standing right in the way.

 

 

Careful of his new physical coordination, he stepped quickly to one side, faced the famous Leonard McCoy, and began to politely applaud also.

 

 

"What're you doing?" Dr. McCoy asked.

 

 

Stiles kept applauding. "I was in the way" The doctor's leathery face crumpled in disapproval and he grasped Stiles by the arm and pulled him back to the middle of the ramp. "They're not applauding me, hammerhead?

 

 

"Honor Guard! Atten-HUT!"

 

 

The sharp disembodied order echoed in the huge hangar bay, answered by the crack of heels on the deck as a tunnel of uniformed men and women came abruptly to attention, flank- ing the red carpet which stretched out from the end of the ramp to the edge of the crowd.

 

 

"What?" Stiles stumbled a few steps down the ramp, baubling drunkenly as he realized Dr. McCoy wasn't following him down the ramp. He stopped in the middle of the slope and stared at the throng of people applauding before him.

 

 

And there was music--trumpet fanfare in vaulting military tradition. He hadn't heard music in years.

 

 

A stimulating cheer rose now above the continuing ap- plause, and some of the people in the crowd were jumping and waving, calling, "Eric ! Eric ! Eric !" Stiles turned halfway around and looked back up the ramp at Leonard Mceoy. The doctor wagged a scolding hand at him, waving him the rest of the way down the ramp.

 

 

Spreading his hands perplexedly, Stiles complained, "I don't get this..." But he barely heard Iris own voice over the cheering. As he turned back to the crowd, confused and overwhelmed, a flicker of sense carne into the picture Ambassador Spock now stood at the end of the tunnel of uniforms. The senior Vulcan now looked more ambassadorial than the one time Stiles had met him. That day four years ago, the ambassador had been wear~ lug a jacket and slacks. Today he wore a ceremonial robe of glossy purple quilted fabric and a royal blue velvet cowl.

 

 

Apparently this was some kind of ceremony. With him stood a captain and some officers and a couple of dignitaries. They continued applauding as Stiles meandered down the red carpet, entertaining ideas of slipping between a couple of these guards at attention and maybe getting out of here somehow without anybody noticing.

 

 

He stopped five feet short of the end of the runway, staring like a jerk at the ambassador and the captain and all those other spiffy dressers.

 

 

The ambassador waited a few seconds, then came forward into the honor guard tunnel. The other dignitaries just followed him in there.

 

 

Ambassador Spock's weathered face shone every crease in the harsh hangar bay lights, but under the Vulcan reserve there was an unmistakable sheen of pride and delight. In fact, a hint of a grin tugged at his bracketed mouth and his slashed brows were slightly raised. As he stood flanked by the captain and the dignitaries, all facing Stiles like a vast wall of phaser stun, the applause tapered off and then suddenly stopped in deference and respect.

 

 

"Welcome home, ensign," the ambassador said warmly. The soft knell of victory rang in his words and triggered a whole new wave of applause and cheering. As he turned toward the captain beside him, the applause almost instantly fell off again.

 

 

"I am honored to present Captain James Turner of the U.S.S.

 

 

Lexington." "Ensign Stiles, I'm pleased to finally meet you in person," the thin officer said, smiling broadly and pumping Stiles's hand. "I first heard about you when I was in command of the Whisperwood. Your story was very compelling to me, and I used it to train my fighter squadrons. 1 admit to pulling some strings so the Lexington could be the ship to meet you today." "Oh... I... thanks." Stiles leaned closer and urgently told him, "This is some kind of mistake!" The captain grinned again and took Stiles's elbow and turned him slightly. "My first officer, Commander Auch'ey." "Welcome aboard, Ensign," the smiling woman said, "and welcome home." The captain turned him a little more, while Ambassador Spock watched in passive approval despite the desperate glance Stiles tossed him. In a whirl he was introduced to a half dozen other people.

 

 

"Federation Ambassador Whitehead... Provincial Ambas- sador Oleneva... Chief Adjutant Kuy, representing Admiral Ulvit... Governor Ned Clory from your home state of Flori- da... Port Canaveral's Mayor Tino Griffith, Princess Marina from the Kingdom of Paln,s on our host planet here in this star system.... " They each greeted him and pumped his hand and patted his arms, some even hugged him,, but he scarcely caught a sylla- ble, registering only the mention of an honors breakfast in the ward room.

 

 

"You've--got the wrong guy," he protested again as Captain Turner steered him back to Ambassador Spock. By now, Dr.

 

 

McCoy had shuttled down the ramp and was standing beside Spock, and for an instant as Stiles turned the years peeled back and he saw them as they had been so many decades ago.

 

 

Spock, streamlined and subdued in his blue Science Division tunic, his black hair glossily reflecting a single horizontal band of light from the hangar ceiling. Leonard McCoy, in a short- sleeved medical smock, strong arms casually folded, his thick brown hair glistening in a much more raucous way, his supremely human expression enjoying a proud and friendly grin, cirrus-blue eyes set in a square face now famous through- out the settled galaxy. Two legends, standing together, for Eric Stiles.

 

 

This couldn't be happening. They had something so wn)ng.

 

 

He was whisked to a podium mounted at the far end of the hangar bay while a team taxied the pod into its cubicle and the crowd closed in on the hole it made. Somebody ushered him to a row of chairs and put him between Ambassador Spock and Dr. McCoy--good thing, too, because then he had a buffer from those adoring grins. As Captain Turner and those other ambassadors stood up to make speeches--heroism, selfless- ness, sacrifice, fortitude, survival, strength, pride of Starfleet, son of Federation dynamism--Stiles caught only the odd word or phrase, none of which struck him as applying to himself, and he leaned slightly toward Dr. McCoy. Through his teeth he implored, "Will you please tell them?" "Just smile and nod a lot," McCoy wryly advised. "Let 'em have their ceremony. Next week the president's giving you the Federation Medal of Valor." Stiles stared at him briefly. How could anybody be so casual with a sentence like that coming out of his mouth?

 

 

"The m--" Nope, couldn't get it out of his own. "God... I don't get it... I just don't get this at all...." "Indeed?" Ambassador Spock offered a solemn gaze. He did look amused! "A hero's welcome is a mystery to you after your Meat sacrifice, Ensign?" "I didn't sacrifice anything," Stiles argued, keeping his voice way down while the speaker's boomed over the P.A. sys- tem. "I crashed into a mountain, and sat there about to wet my pants because I was afraid of the big bad aliens. I must're looked like a kid to you !" "You were a kid," the ambassador blithely told him, star- tlingly familiar with the vernacular.

 

 

Dr. McCoy leaned forward a little. "My eighth psychology textbook, Spock," he explained, speaking from the comer of his mouth. "Chapter Four." The ambassador looked past Stiles to the doctor, and they communicated with a few eye movements.

 

 

After a moment of this, Spock leaned back. "I see." They were both silent for several minutes while listening-- or pretending to listen---to the princess of somewhere happily welcoming the famous survivor Ensign Stiles and all the vari- ous dignitaries to her star system. Stiles heard part of her words as if listening to a training tape. The words bore no attachment to himself, except that he had the feeling he was getting into deeper and deeper trouble. When they found out what really happen~--- "Stiles." Maybe he should stand up and just explain what occurred and the mistakes he made and then offer to quietly retreat while they went on with their party. Would it be a good idea to compromise Starfleet's perception, point out this big mistake, right here in front of all these people? He'd hardly spoken to anybody but Zevon for so long... get up and talk to this crowd? His knees started shaking.

 

 

"Kid. Psst." "Huh?" McCoy still didn't turn to speak to him, and kept his voice barely above a whisper. "Now, listen and listen good. You did all right four years ago. Some deskbound paperpusher sent a bunch of kids into a tricky, dangerous political powderkeg without an experienced senior officer " "Without briefing them about what they could be facing," Spock took over, very quietly, "to rescue some very important personnel--"

 

 

"With Romulans all over the place and riots going on," McCoy interrupted. "They took a pack of untried kids barely out of officer school, with no black space experience at all, and sent you into a civil war and said, 'Go, do.'" "Without a second thought," Spock added, "you took the initiative, sacrificed yourself, and allowed everyone else to get out alive. Then you kept yourself alive in an untenable situa- tion long enough to be rescued. You are a hero, young man, by any measure." Stiles felt his legs quiver, his hands grow cold as they spoke to him of these indigestibles as if telling tales of some uncon- tinned legend. The crowd of dress uniforms, court gowns, and Sunday best shifted before his eyes and swam with applause as the speaker handed over the podium to the next one.

 

 

"Twenty-one-year-olds fail to see themselves as young," the ambassador explained, able to speak up now in the cover of the applause. "They lack the perspective of experience. In Starfleet, they are frequently older than everyone else around them. That is the curse of being a 'senior in high school,' if you will." "You're one of the older kids," Dr. McCoy said, "so you fig- ure you're not a kid at all. I'm bigger than everybody, so I'm big. Kids feel as if they should know everything. Starfleet handed you a situation that should've gone to a lieutenant. You improvised. You did what you thought was right. We don't damn people for inexperience." "To you," Spock added, "your mistakes looked like crashing failures. To me, they simply looked like inexperience." Now the ambassador did turn and fix him with those eyes nobody could look away from. "All these people are proud of you." "And you deserve it," the doctor finished. "So shut up." Another round of applause. Another speech, more apprecia- tion, more applause, cheering. They were as insubstantial as dust. All he heard was the ambassador's words and the doc- tor's over and over in his head, like some musical echo or siren song drawing him along. His memories were of a butter- fingered ensign crowing his own authority and trying to win his spurs, fumbling every ball and landing ass-backward in a flat failure. He balked at any other explanation. They were being kind to him, he knew, and to themselves for their part of the mistake. Starfleet was better at admitting its errors than Eric Stiles ever had been.

 

 

He had been young then, too young to know it was okay not to already have all the experience of life. It was all right not to know everything. Or much of anything. It was okay... it was okay. l'm okay, Zevon. Don't worry.

 

 

In a flush of emotion and self~examination he endured the next half hour of applause and honors without really register- ing much of it. By the time Spock took his arm and drew him to his feet, Stiles was humbled beyond description. He collect- ed his only pleasure from knowing his survival was making so many people feel good about themselves. That was pretty good, really. When they teased him and spoke poorly, he'd at least been giving them something to converse about. Today he was doing the same sort of thing, deserve it or not. He shook hands and denied his way across the platform, then down to the crowd as the people smiled and then left him alone. They seemed to understand that he was overwhelmed, and the crowd funneled politely to the exits, heading for the ship's mess and ward rooms where the banquets were waiting. Music played again over the PA, and everyone was laughing and cheery, all because of him. On this astonishing day, he had everything he'd once thought he ever wanted. And now he didn't want it.

 

 

"If you'll come this way," Ambassador Spock was saying, "there are some other people who're been waiting a long time to meet you." "Not more," Stiles moaned. He lowered his eyes. Maybe whoever it was would just get the idea he'd had too much and leave him alone. The ship's captain had gotten the message and corralled the princess and the mayor and governor and were waiting with them about halfway to the exit, giving Stiles a few minutes to breathe. They were conversing with each other, obviously waiting for him, but also deliberately not looking at him.

 

 

He needed the time too. He stood at the side of the slowly emptying hangar bay, with Spock and McCoy providing a wel- come buffer between himself and the throng.

 

 

"Eric !" "Hey, Eric!" With a notable wince, he turned away from the sound. If he kept his back to the masses, maybe they'd think he just didn't hear.

 

 

"Lightfoot!" Something sparked in his head. Now he turned toward the calls. Not twenty steps away, held back by a couple pillars of meat in security uniforms, were the last people in the universe he had expected to see alive, never mind here.

 

 

"Travis?" Stiles's voice caught in his throat.

 

 

At his side, McCoy gave him a little push. "Go ahead, son.

 

 

Go see 'em." Behind Travis Perraton, also crowding the guards, were Jeremy White, Matt Gitvan, Greg Blake, Dan Moose, and both the Bolt twins. At the front of the group, Travis Perraton's dark hair was grown out from the Starfleet junior-officer close-clip, and his blue eyes gleamed and bright smile flashed like a star as he reached between the guards and said, "They won't let us through !" "Security guard," Ambassador Spock smartly ordered, "stand down." In unison the four guards snapped, "Aye, sir? and came to at-ease, allowing Perraton, White, Blake, Girvan, Moose, and the Bolts to flood into the reception area. All at once Stiles was engulfed in a coil of embraces, until finally he was clinging to Travis Perraton and getting his back slapped by everybody else.

 

 

Spock and McCoy graciously moved away, leaving the young men together without interference. The row of guards between them and everyone else would assure that the former evac team would have a few private moments before all the ringing and tickertaping started again.

 

 

Stiles shook like a scarecrow as he clutched at the physical reality of Travis and Jeremy and the Bolts.

 

 

'q'hought you were all dead!" he gasped, tears flowing freely down his balanced face.

 

 

"Dead?' Jeremy White repeated. "Where'd you get that idea?" "You showed up in the... I heard you... you said... the anti-aircraft guns--" "We got clear, Eric," Travis said. "You gave us the extra sec- onds we needed to get away." "You gotta be kidding," Matt Girvan protested. "He knows.

 

 

He's just making us say it over and over" Zack Bolt laughed. "And he'll never let us forget it. Wait and see." "What is this?" Jason Bolt reached out and grasped Stiles' beard and shook it warmly. "Nonregulation Stiles! Since when!" Dan Moose poked at Stiles's ribs. "And he's skinnier than Jeremy?

 

 

His eyes blurring as he shuddered under the coil of Travis's arm, Stiles blinked from one face to the other, then ran the route again. Without a bit of the shame he would've once felt, he wiped tears from his cheeks. "Where... where are.. ?' Typically, Jeremy took over with a clinical explanation.

 

 

"Well, Beret and Andrea left Starfleet and went back to Hol- land, but they send their good wishes and denland a crew reunion as soon as you feel up to it. Bill Foster got promoted, and he's stationed on Alpha Zebra Outpost. Brad Carter's a civilian now too, and he's coming in tomorrow. He's just fin- ishing exam week at college, so he couldn't be here today" Only now did Stiles register that Travis, Greg, and Matt were not wearing Starfleet uniforms. Civilians?

 

 

Jason held up a stern finger. "But they're all waiting for a communique on when and where we're having a crew reunion.

 

 

Those of us still in the service have been given special dispen- sation from our current duties just so we can attend. The dope civvies among us, who shall remain rankless, are being offered free transportation and hotel, as if they deserve it." "Troublemaker," Travis said with a laugh.

 

 

Greg Blake shrugged. "So I'll re-enlist;' he tossed off.

 

 

"Eric's bound to need a new wing leader. Can't do without me, Call yOU?"

 

 

"He can't do without any of us," Zack said. "Who'd pick him up when he trips?" Matt laughed. "Who'd stop him from putting his hand in front of a phaser?" "Who'd he have to shout at when things didn't happen fast enough?" "You need us, Lightfoot," Jeremy punctuated.

 

 

"Not so fast." Travis protected Stiles from them and held up his free hand judiciously. "Don't be a tidal wave. Eric made it through four years in prison on a hostile planet without any- body to help him keep from making a jerk of himself. Maybe he doesn't need our help for that anymore." Stiles laughed with them. The ribbing that would've unset- fled him once today felt like cool pond water.

 

 

Travis gave him a comradety squeeze. "Maybe he doesn't even want to stay in Starfleet." "I sure wouldn't," Jason commented.

 

 

The other twin added, "He's done his duty." "Twice over" Matt agreed. "They owe him now." "What a life," Travis went on. "Speaking engagements all over the Federation--" "Scholarships," Dan Moose said.

 

 

Blake made an exaggerated bow. "Honorary degrees--" "Ceremonial dinners" Matt fed in.

 

 

"Starring in training films, have books written about you-- hell, write your own book! Any idiot with a pen can do that!" Perraton looked at him admiringly. "You're gonna get rich and fat, Eric. Wish to the devil it could're been me!" Until this moment Stiles had been lost in a daze, but Travis's latest sentence snapped him into biting clarity. He straightened his shoulders--a miracle in itself--and slipped abruptly back in command. Escaping from Travis's cordial embrace, be took hold of his friend's arm and control over the moment.

 

 

"No, you don't," he said. "I'm glad it wasn't you and you're glad too, and don't forget it, Travis. I'm so happy I could cry to see all of you, but I'm not the kid you knew" Theft faces changed, subtly, though even after all this time he could still read them. Perhaps even better than before. Some were arguing with him in their minds. Others were realizing they may have made a mistake to say what they'd been saying, perhaps even to be here today.

 

 

From the captain's group nearby, Ambassador Spock and Dr. McCoy finally breached the bubble of intimacy encircling Stiles and his crewmates.

 

 

"Mr. Stiles," the ambassador began, "excuse me. As soon as you're ready, the captain and dignitaries are ready to go to the wardroom for the honors banquet. We have a table set aside for you and your friends?' "Yes!" Travis beamed, and shook hands victoriously with one of the Bolts.

 

 

"You're most welcome, gentlemen," Spock allowed. "And Dr. McCoy has something for Mr. Stiles." "Me?" Stiles rubbed his clammy hands on his thighs as Dr.

 

 

McCoy stepped past Spock.

 

 

"Here you go, son." The doctor handed him a leatherbound packet with a Starfleet seal.

 

 

"What is it?" Stiles asked, as he took the plush folder with its satin ribbon and official wax seal.

 

 

"It's your way out," the doctor said. "Clean and legal. A medical discharge, issued directly from the surgeon general, with a retroactive field promotion. You'll go out as a full lieu- tenant, with commensurate pension." Stiles looked up. "But you cured me. I don't have a legiti- mate medical claim." "I cured your body" McCoy told him. Those active and ancient blue eyes flared. "Your soul is still scarred." As the moment turned suddenly solemn beneath the doctor's prophetic words, the men around Stiles fell silent and stopped shifting. Their hands fell away from him and they made clear by their demeanor that he was once again in charge, once more the man who would make the important decision of the moment for them all.

 

 

A man, making decisions.

 

 

He glanced at thein, saw the civilian clothes on some of them, Starfleet uniforms on others, and his two worlds sudden- ly collided. They looked young to him, young and unscarred and inexperienced.

 

 

"Thank you, sir." He handed the pouch back to Dr. McCoy and straightened his shoulders. "But I've got too much to do.

 

 

My soul's just gonna have to heal." His friends erupted into silly cheers around him, as if they understood something he wasn't registering at all. Over there Captain Turner, the princess, the governor and mayor were all looking at him, and now they had started applauding politely.

 

 

Not the cheers of the huge crowd this time, but something much more substantial and wise.

 

 

How come everybody knew what he had just thought of.

 

 

Ambassador Spock reached out and took Stiles's hand.

 

 

"Congratulations, Lieutenant. And welcome back to Starfleet."

 

 

Chapter Eleven

 

 

Eleven Years Later...

 

 

U.S.S. Enterprise, Starfleet Registry NCC1 701 -D

 

 

"T}m~ ~vE BE~ over fifty major outbreaks of raids or attacks on the Neutral Zone by angry Romulan commanders who before this made no violent overtures at all--and with no apparent reason. We've got to get some better intelligence." Captain Jean-Luc Picard's comment would generally not have traveled beyond the ears of his first officer and the physi- cian who stood at his side on the command deck, but Ambas- sador Spock's Vulcan hearing brought the private conversation to him as he stepped from the turbolift. These were troubled times. Despite them, reverie clouded his thoughts.

 

 

To step from a turbolift, to hear the sibilance of the door and sense anticipation, the murmur of a starship's bridge electrical systems softly working--these were mighty memories.

 

 

For a brief moment in a frozen pocket of his mind, the car- pet changed texture, the bulkheads drained from tan to blue- gay, the rail turned glossy red, lights dimmed, and there were crisp shadows over his head. More blue, more black, and at the center that oasis of mesa-gold. The center of his universe, that dot of gold.

 

 

Memories only. He dismissed them, but they pursued.

 

 

He failed to escape them, as he stepped down to the corn- mand deck, also failing to understand--until his foot struck the lower carpet--that he was treading the sacred ground of offi- cers aboard a starship, of the captain and his chosen few: and that he was no longer among them. For decades he had not been among them. How swiftly these automatic impulses flooded back! Perhaps this was why he spent so little time aboard ships anymore.

 

 

He nearly stepped back and waited to be invited, but by now Captain Picard had risen and turned to greet him.

 

 

"Ambassador, welcome aboard," the captain began, his deep theatrical voice communicating undisguised delight, and he even smiled.

 

 

Spock took his hand, a gesture he had come over the years to find suspiciously comforting, and thus held it longer than necessary for courtesy. When embarking on difficult missions, especially those couched in mystery, he had come to depend upon the sustenance of the human tendency to get to know one another quickly and with a speck of intimacy. Few races in the galaxy had that talent. He had come to cherish it.

 

 

"You know Mr. Riker," the captain invited pleasantly.

 

 

"Ambassador, hello!" William Riker, yes the ship's first officer. A bright smile, and no attempt to subdue his pride that a distinguished Federation identity had come aboard his star- ship.

 

 

"Good evening, Mr. Riker" Spock offered, and also took Riker's hand.

 

 

"And Dr. Crusher, of course," the captain added, turning.

 

 

Only the ship's doctor, Beverly Crusher (in fact the person he had come here to meet), restrained herself from offering to shake a Vulcan's hand.

 

 

She was a stately woman, tall, reedy, and red-haired, with a sculpted face that echoed a Renaissance painting Spock had once seen in the Manhattan Museum of Art. He found it a credit to Dr. Crusher that he remembered the painting now for the first time in nearly nine decades, but recalled also his thoughts at the time that the woman in the picture was pale and too thin. Understanding that humans' emotional condition fre- quently communicated itself to their physical appearance, he surmised that the doctor was strained and troubled. She did not smile as did her captain and first officer, and that he also found suggestive.

 

 

"Good evening, Doctor. I'm gratified to have you involved." "Now you'll get some answers, Beverly," Captain Picard told her with a placating smile.

 

 

She glanced at him, then stepped closer to Spock.

 

 

"I'd like to say it's my pleasure, Ambassador" the woman said, "but unfortunately I doubt any of us will enjoy the next few weeks." "That will depend upon the outcome, as always:' Spock slipped his traveling cloak from his shoulders and let his attending yeoman take it from him, leaving his arms a little cool with unencumberment. Though he felt obliged by tradition to wear the Vulcan robes and plastiformed emblems when moving among the public or visiting Starfleet locali- ties, such dress aboard a ship seemed provincial. Among these men and women, he could feel comfortable in simple black slacks and his cowlnecked daywear tunic. The cobalt- and-purple quilted strips running from his shoulders to his thighs were the only jewel-tones on the bright tan bridge, excepting only the shoulder yoke of medical blue on Beverly Crusher's uniform.

 

 

Again, he found himself wading in memories unbidden.

 

 

And a few he had dismissed freely--the officers here on this bridge were people he knew, had encountered in a previous mission, and since allowed to fade from his mind. He had learned long ago to remember the names of ships, captains, and some officers---but that cluttering one's mind with lieu- tenants, yeomen, and others tended only to inaccuracy. Eventu- ally those crewmen and officers either disappeared into the mists of service or civilian life, or became commanders and captains themselves, in which case their names and ranks and ships turned into a long roster he would just have to amend later.

 

 

He remembered Captain Picard's senior security officer, the noted Klingon who defied so much to be here, but he could not summon the name. The android at the science station, howev- er, had a name that no mathematician could forget--Data.

 

 

"There're been two more skirmishos this mortting, Ambas- sador," Captain Picard reported. "The Starfleet ships Ranger and Griffith were set upon just outside the Crystal Ball Nebula, and the Ranger was actually boarded." "Is everyone all right?" Spock asked.

 

 

"No fatalities, sixteen casualties, and apparently one of their passengers was kidnapped. The details are hazy so far." Troubled by these unpredictable rashes, so obviously driven by emotion rather than by tactical plans, Spock paused a moment to gather his thoughts.

 

 

"Unfortunately, events are moving forward with the rapidity typical of a national crisis. We can now officially call the dis- ease an epidemic." Spock lowered his voice and significantly added, "Captain, the proconsul of the Senate died yesterday." "Uh----oh," Riker opined.

 

 

Picard grimaced. "That means instability at the top of the empire." "Dr. McCoy should be arriving soon," Spock told them, "with current information about the medical aspects of the Romulan crisis. You should shortly be receiving a signal from a Tellarite grain ship upon which he's traveling at the moment." "Leonard McCoy" Dr. Crusher observed, "is the only man I've ever known who can shuttle in and out of nontreaty cul- tures as easily as the rest of us visit the stores in a shopping promenade. He can charm his way past border guards and squirm past warrants like some kind of spirit." "Hardly charm;' Spock commented. "In any case, we should shortly have fresh information. The massive sickness is causing havoc throughout the empire." "We've been feeling the effect." Captain Picard validated.

 

 

"These border eruptions are like wildcat strikes. Isolated lead- ers are finding excuses to attack Federation outposts and ships, staging incidents on purpose, hoping one of them will flame into all-out conflict. Nothing that smacks of coordination. however, not so far." "They are not coordinated attacks at all," Spock concurred.

 

 

"As certain members of the royal family die, their followers-- and sometimes the fanfily members themselves--are flaring up in frustration and anger."

 

 

"And fear" Crusher added. "The royal fmnily is spread all over, and they're all in charge. And they're all terrified.

 

 

They're not only dying themselves, but also watching their children die. It's not a gentle disease, Ambassador... it attacks quickly, painfully, then inflicts a stow death. It behaves like a curse. Some people think that's what it is. Terrified peo- ple do terrible things." "We've got a reason to be terrified too," her captain said.

 

 

"As more and more of the royal family die, others who have had no chance for power are seeing an opportunity for upheaval. The Federation's managing to handle these spurts without considering any one of them an act of war, but how long can we hold out? If the structure breaks down too much " "Could that happen?" Dr. Crasher asked. "Could the empress really be deposed because she and her whole family are sick?" Riker looked at Crusher. "If the empress dies, all the hungry near-orbiters who never had a shot at the throne will start smelling velvet." "With too many decisive defeats of Romulan flare-ups by Starfleet crews," Picard added, "the empress cotfid be deposed very quickly and someone more hungry for war could take over` No matter how you look at it politically, there's every reason to stir up trouble and virtually no reason not to. So our goal in these skirmishes is to prevail, but not so decisively that the Romulan commanders are deeply humiliated or destroyed.

 

 

We try to push them back without squashing them, stalling for time, seeking a biological solution. If the empress falls and her relatives are all infected too, there could be decades of instabil- ity on one of the Federation's longest borders. We have a stake in restoring the status quo." "True;' Spock agreed, relieved that they shared his hopes.

 

 

"Better to have a stable empire as a neighbor than anarchy at our gates." "Well, we've done a good job so far," Will Riker injected, "of keeping these flare-up attacks from turning into acts of war" "As the family breaks down," Spock said, "some dissident elements are striking out at the Federation, even though the core of the royal family is not yet ready to do that. Some of these elements are in control of ships." Spock turned a fraction toward him, careful not to mm his back on the captain. "Those closest to power--the empress, her immediate relatives, and their immediate relatives--seem more concerued about stopping this biological attack than using it as leverage to foment trouble." "Wouldn't you, sir? They see a chance that they nfight not have to die." "Not everyone craves havoc, Mr. Riker. As Dr. Crusher pointed out, many of these victims wish only to live and see their children live, and to do so in a fairly stable civilization.

 

 

Unfortunately, the empress must walk a very thin tightrope.

 

 

For her own survival as a ruler, after nearly two hundred years of anti-Federation propaganda, she must not be seen as cow- ardly or complacent toward the Federation. The Romulan peo- ple on the outskirts, including those in command of ships, have been told all their lives to distrust the Federation. Now all the Romulan leadership is suddenly dying. What would you expect them to think?" "Yes..." Riker's eyes widened. "How much of a leap would it be to assume the Federation is doing this?" Spock rewarded him with a nod. "The propaganda is turning on them." "And now they need our help," Dr. Crusher folded her long am~s. "It figures. Has it occurred to anyone that this may be a genetic anomaly?" "Isolated to the royal familyT' Picard protested. "How likely is that?" "Pretty damned likely, Jean-Luc." Crusher held out a hand.

 

 

"The Ronmlans used to do genetic experiments--about a cen- tury ago, a little more. Those experiments could just now have incubated to mutancy and be coming back to bite them. It could be completely incurable. tn that case, are we getting involved just to prove we didn't do it? I'm not sure I can prove a negative that big. If that's what the Federation expects, I've got an impossible mission here." Wondering if indeed all physicians were necessarily cantan- kerous, Spock found himself sympathetic to her dilemma. The ball she had been cast was a familiar one to medical specialists with deep-space exploration, for they had the most experience dealing with the unknown, the foreign, and the unheard-of as commonplace. He had in his long life seen this first-hand, seen that expression in the eyes of many doctors into whose hands a monumental task had been shoved.

 

 

"Like myself, Doctor," he placated, "I know you prefer clar- ity to choices. However, choices are the more frequent curse of authority. The Romulans are advanced, but the Federation is much more advanced in the medical field. We've had to deal with so wide an array of alien members." Will Riker cocked a hip and leaned against the navigation station, drawing a glance from the crewman manning the helm.

 

 

"They might as well accept our help. They can always kill us tomorrow." "Whatever the sociopolitical ramifications," Spock added, "they simply need our help" "Captain, short-range emergency sensors," the fierce voice of Picard's Klingon officer erupted suddenly. As they all turned to look up at him, towering there over the tactical sta- tion at the back of the wide bridge, the surly lieutenant raised his eyes from the board and glared at the forward screen. "A Romulan Scoutship just decloaked off our bow!" "Shields up, Mr. Worf. Red alert. Battle stations. Helm, hold position." Lieutenant Worf watched the incoming angular feather- painted Romulan wing on the wide forward screen. "Should I arm photon torpedoes also, sir, considering their duophasic shields?" "Ah, certainly:' Spock turned. "Captain, may I suggest " "I understand, Ambassador, but no Romulan commander expects less and I don't intend to show squeamishness." Retreating, and somewhat embarrassed at this change in himself, Spock instantly acceded, "Forgive me." "Captain, they are hailing," Data reported.

 

 

"Ship to ship, Mr. Data"

 

 

"Frequencies open, sir." 'Whis is Captain Jean-Luc Picard, U.S.& Enterprise, Star- fleet. Identify yourself, please." "Subcommander Cul, Captain, Imperial Reconnaissance Scout Tdal." "You're in violation of the Neutral Zone treaty by several light-years, Subcommander. Explain your presence here." "Our weapons are cold, Captain. We have a passenger" Picard paused, then glanced at Spock.

 

 

Spock was careful to keep his expression subdued, although this was probably a fruitless attempt, for even that subtle effort belied involvement.

 

 

"Yes" Picard drawled. "Mr. Worf, shields down. Subcoman- der, prepare for beaming." "We are prepared." Impressed, Spock once again looked at Picard. "How did you know, Captain? Even I was not sure." ~Because it's logical, Ambassador" the captain responded, his dark eyes glinting. "Mr. Data, please scan for human physi- ology and beam their passenger directly to the bridge." "Understood, captain. Transporter room, this is the bridge." The android relayed the captain's orders, and in 4ø9 seconds the shaft of glittering energy appeared as expected on the port- side deck ramp leading to the captain's ready room. Spock noted the angle of the n~np and hoped it would cause no trou- ble or surprise.

 

 

As the colunto of lights coagulated into familiar form, he stepped toward it, then again restrained himself, not wishing to appear too custodial. He was relieved when Mr. Riker stepped to the ramp and put out an assisting hand in anticipation.

 

 

Another two seconds brought the white-haired, pin-thin form of Leonard McCoy fully onto the bridge, shouldering a simple canvas satchel. The work of the Romulan wing was done.

 

 

"Sir, the Tdal is bearing off;' Worf reported immediately.

 

 

"They are vectoring back toward Romulan space at emergency high warp." "Very good--and I don't blame them," Picard said. "Stand down from general quarters. Welcome to the Enterprise, Dr. McCoy." "Captain Picard, nice to be aboard" the doctor's elderly voice scratched. "Can you turn the heat up in here? That Romulan shoebox was cold as a coffin nail. Hi, Spock:' "Doctor." "You're looking stiff?' 'Whank you" "Back trouble?" "ff you like." "I brought a big hypodermic needle from my medical antiques collection:' "A display which ideally fits your personality, I have always reflected." "I... all... all right, I owe you one. Morning, Beverly" "Leonard" the other physician chuckled. "And it's evening here" "Dammit. Why can't the galaxy just go to Federation Stan- dard Time?" William Riker smiled again and took McCoy's sticklike ann in his to escort him down the ramp. Spock resisted the urge to reach out and stop Riker's robust gril>---McCoy's spi- dery limbs seemed so frail then chided himself for his absurdity.

 

 

"That was hardly a Tellmite grain ship, Doctor," he com- mented instead.

 

 

"So I lied. It was the only way I could get a ship with high warp to bring me all the way back. Anything else would've taken ten weeks. We don't have ten weeks." "No, we don't," Crusher endorsed. "The Romutan royal family is not a dozen people. It's over a thousand, installed in positions of power all over the empire. How close you are to the current ruler causes a lot of jockeying and marrying and even assassinations, but there's never been anything like this.

 

 

This certainly isn't just some jealous cousin maneuvering for the crown." She turned specifically to McCoy. "What have you concluded?" "Concluded? Oh, I did say that in my message yesterday, didn't I? What I came up with is that the Romulans are right.

 

 

The infection is definitely man-made. Not an accident." "How did you come to this?" Spock asked, careful to phrase the question in a way that would dodge McCoy's still-youthful barbed humor.

 

 

"I've made some progress. What else do you expect from a man old enough to call Moses by his first name? Anyway, that's why I need Beverly's help." "You need my help?" Dr. Crusher asked.

 

 

"Hell, yes, I need help. I'm old, all right? Besides, you're the one who worked on this mess before." She regarded him with a gaze startlingly similar to the way Captain Kirk used to regard McCoy. "You mean this Romulan disease is the same multiprion nightmare,--?" "That's right. The same thing you and Dr. Spencer of the Constitution encountered back on Archaria m. It's mutated or been artificially mutated. That's why you haven't recognized it. It's been targeted to the genetics of the Romulan royal fami- ly." Clearly irritated that her victory was being compromised, Crusher scowled. "How did you recognize it if it's mutated?" McCoy's white head bobbed in a nod. "My dear, you remember the line 'Methinks he doth protest too much'? Well, me have begun to think this infection doth show up too much.

 

 

Prion-based infections just don't appear randomly this often, and certainly not in a pattern that leaps from one planet to another, infecting a vastly different DNA makeup. Somebody's forcing mutations, combining prions that would never hook up naturally, then targeting whole races for infection. This biolog- ical terrorism smacks to me of experimentation" "My God!" Riker blurted.

 

 

Spock heard the exclamation, but was himself focused on the doctor's unexpected declaration. "Someone is working toward a larger go'd? The Romulan royal family is not the tar- get?" "I don't think so;' McCoy said. "I don't think the goal is to kill off the royal family at all. I think they're being used as an incubation test site. I think the goal is to develop a bioagent that can be neither cured nor treated." "Upon what do you base this?" The doctor's gravelly voice took on a surge of confidence.

 

 

"On the same multiprion sickness popping up all over the place, sometimes in isolation, other times in populated areas, but each time with some new aberration. A plague here, a flu there, an infection yonder, a couple of them leaping racial boundaries... until now, nobody's tied the incidents together; but I've seen this kind of thing before on a smaller scale, and I got suspicious. So I started ordering some quiet information gathering about three years ago. And, folks, this isn't just an epidemic. It's a pandemic." The word sent a chill through the bridge that Spock found nearly palpable. Even he discovered his hands suddenly clenched and forced himself to control his reaction. Ever since the first armies began forming and moving in the first civiliza- tions on the earliest planets, pandemics had been a far more insidious scourge than any war.

 

 

Dr. McCoy paused long enough to see his revelation run its course of shock and nervousness, then enjoyed center stage again.

 

 

"When the Romulan royal family popped up with this dead- ly strain," he went on, "I started gathering the results of tests all over the quadrant, and sure enough they've got enough common characteristics to eliminate either the idea of coinci- dence or the idea of any other cause. These aren't dozens of isolated biological occurrences--they're all mutations of a sin- gle strain." "So it couldn't be remnants of genetic testing?" Riker jabbed, leaning a little toward Dr. Crusher.

 

 

McCoy swiveled to him. "Genetics? Whoever said that?" "Nobody said that," Crusher injected quickly. Her face masked a cold and bottled fury, as a knight's who had just been told the dragon is still alive. "Did you bring the results of all these tests? I'd like to examine them." He patted his satchel. "Along with a cache of Scaffold Mints for the wardroom." "As ever" Spock commented, "you keep your eye on the future ?' "Watch it, pal, or I'll sit on you and give you a lecture on how long two cockroaches can live off the glue on the back of a postage stamp." Dr. Crusher clasped her hands in a manner of controlled anxiety. "Who ever heard of 'two cockroaches'? Doctor, have you isolated the matrix on this Romulan mutation?" McCoy's ancient blue eyes fixed on hers with the zeal of youth. "First thing. And, bless us all, it's a DNA strain, not RNA, which mans we can beat it with one medication if we can come up with the right one. Healthy blood cells can replace the atrophied cells. All I need is a continuing source of uninfected royal blood for about a week to generate healthy plasma. But first, we've got to keep the members of the royal family who're still alive from dying. That's going to be your job. Keep them alive long enough to throw the infection off or for me to synthesize a cure." "Treat the symptoms." "But treat them in the right order. It might not be the right thing to do to lower a fever. The fever's something that I think helps. You're going to be treating the empress herself and over twenty of her family members on the home planet. You'll be communicating with physicians all over the empire, telling them how to treat the family members they've got. Meanwhile, I'll be trying to find a cure for the mutation. I've had my network of spies quietly sifting through information on the whole empire and the Federation---even through the Klingon Empire----for weeks now. So far, we haven't found a single family member who's not infected." "Ripple-effect contamination," Crusher breathed. "God, that's a new twist...." "What's that mean?" Riker asked.

 

 

Spock almost answered, but restrained himself. He was curi- ous to hear Dr. McCoy's analysis of what was happening to the Romulans, and forced himself to remember that his role on a starship was no longer to provide information and move events along.

 

 

"Means we can't synthesize a cure without an uncontami- nated family member. I need clear blood, and I can't find any- body. Also means this is no accident. Somebody's doing this on purpose. Somebody planned this plague in such a way as to make sure it can't be cured. That's why;' McCoy added, now turning to Picard, "I arranged to have this rendezvous on board the Enterprise?' "I beg your pardon?" Picard asked.

 

 

"Three years ago, Captain, you picked up a Romulan defec- tor. He left the empire in disgrace after leading a coup against the empress. When that failed, he fled to the Federation and you offered sanctuary. Correct?" "Oh... yes, a minor incident for us. We gave him sanctuary and resisted the extradition police on the planet where we found him. What was his name, Mr. Riker, do you remember?" "Uh... believe it was Renn something, wasn't it, sir?" "Check on the man, would you, please?" "Aye, sir." Riker moved to the science station and looked over the android's shoulder. "Check ship's log and all ancillary documentations for Stardates 41099.1 through the ensuing six months. It's in there somewhere." "Checking, sir" "Then link into the archivist's computer at Starbase Ten.

 

 

We're still in range, aren't we?" While they worked, McCoy said, "Disgraced blood's as good as any. This defector's the third cousin to the empress on her mother's side, so it'll be undiluted blood and give us a strong base for immunological work." "That must be what the message means," Picard said, glanc- ing at Spock. "The admiralty gave me orders to cooperate with you both and transport you to any location in Federation space that you specified. They must mean for us to take you to this Rekk person, once we find where he is." Spock nodded. "Rather than risk transpolting him from sta- tion to station, we hoped to use the starship, for safety and security reasons." "We're at your disposal, of course," Picard assured.

 

 

"If I can't find any uncontaminated plasma," MeCoy con- templated, "then it's all over. Ninety-five percent of the infect- ed people are going to die and there's no way to stop it. You get this thing, you are dead." His flat statement had a chilling effect.

 

 

"The next trick," McCoy added, "is getting us in there." "What?" Crusher asked. "Why don't we just go in? They know why we're coming, right?" 'øThey'll give special access to Dr. McCoy and to you," Riker told her, "but not to the starship. Medical access is a lit- tle different from military access." "CorrecC' Spock said. "If any starship moves through the Neutral Zone and into Romulan space, the imperial leadership will be forced to act against us. Their own people will stand for nothing less. The empress knows Federation medical sci- ence may be their only chance, no matter who concocted this attack, but she would be forced to respond against a ship of the line or she could lose power before she loses her life." "That's why we're not going" Picard explained. "At least, we are not." And he looked worriedly at Beverly Crusher.

 

 

"Arrangements will be made" Spock assured her, and felt suddenly remiss in having delayed securing passage. In fact, permission for passage into Romulan space had been secured, but not the method of passage.

 

 

"It's a problem;' Captain Picard said. From the captain's expression, Spock could tell that the blueblooded commander of this Enterprise thoroughly understood the ramifications of secured space, and when a starship could and could not be of service.

 

 

"Yes," Spock reluctantly admitted. "Even the UFP diplo- matic corp cannot breach imperial space. This time, the royal family wants us in, but no one else does. Perhaps. secrecy required concessions I should not have made this time." "Sir?" Riker straightened at Data's side. "We've got some- thing here" The android touched his controls and read off, 'øI'he Romu- lan defector Rekk Devra Kilmne is no longer living in the Fed- eration" "Where is he, then?" Picard asked. "We'll go get him." Data swiveled around in his chair, his expression particular- ly childlike. "No, sir... he is no longer living in the Federa- tion." Riker held out a hand that stopped what seemed to be turn- ing into a debate of unclarity, and looked at his captain. "Rekk Devra was murdered, Captain... fifteen months ago, during a visit to Deep Space Nine." A mantle of chill descended upon the bridge, as winter cloaks northern hills. Spock felt it, and saw that all the others also felt it. Shoulders tightened, pensive glances traveled, fists clenched, lips pressed, Strange how a revelation could be so tangible, so very present.

 

 

The last living uncontaminated royal fanlily member, dead.

 

 

Whoever was driving the force of this plague was a critical step ahead.

 

 

And now... what?

 

 

Chapter Twelve

 

 

Combat Support Tender Saskatoon, Starfleet Registry CST 2601

 

 

"DAMAGE COntROL, TOP DECK!" "Take some of the new midshipmen up there with you." "Right. You and you, and your friend over there, come with me." "And this one." On the severely angled bridge deck of the Saskatoon, Eric Stiles hooked the nearest midshipman and handed him to Jere- my White as Jeremy rushed past him, dragging the other three kids.

 

 

"Did it hit us or just skin us?" Stiles tossed as an after- thought as he brushed hot bits of plastic from his shoulders.

 

 

"Mr. Perraton, have somebody trim the deck gravitational compensators, please. Rafting hands, man umbilicals one, two, and four." "Direct hit, midships upper quadrant, lateral shield, port side." "Did you say upper quadrant?" "Upper. At least I think it's there--" Jeremy's words became garbled as he disappeared into the bulky body of the CST, jumping through hatch after hatch until he got to the tubular companionway that would take him to file operational deck above the middle of the ship. Smoke rolled freely from cham- ber to chamber through the body of the CST, a ship built on lateral lines to avoid transfer of equipment up and down ladder wells. Despite its 200-meter LOA, the tender only had three decks. Factories didn't need stairways.

 

 

"Rats," Stiles muttered, surveying the shattered trnnk hous- ing that had just been blown all over the deck. "Ship to ship." To his right, at the comm station, Midshipman Zelasko con- trolled a cough and squeaked, "Ship to ship, sir." Nearly choking on the acrid smoke from fried circuits in the deck and sparks on the smoldering carpet, Stiles held onto the helm stanchion as the CST rolled noticeably under him. "Cap- tain Sattier, I've got to be able to get closer than this. If both our ships can't move off as a unit, you've got to kick those fighters off harder when they come into range. I know you've never done this before, but--" "Sorry, Commander--Fire!" The captain's voice from the Destroyer Lafayette crackled back at him through the electrical charges of phaser and disruptor fire in open space. "Sorry again. Two units got past us. I can't move off with a kinked nacelle, not even on impulse, without knowing what else is damaged up there." "The arbitrariness of battle is for you to worry about, Cap- tain, thank the god of problems." "He said cheerily" Travis Perraton edited from the other side of the narrow horseshoe-shaped bridge, where he was dodging from station to station coordinating the next few moves. To somebody on the upper deck, he spoke into a corem unit. "Just control the damage, Adams, don't repak it yet. We don't come first out here, remember?" Spitting dust from his neatly trimmed moustache, Stiles turned forward again and wrapped up his communication with the destroyer. "We'll have your external diagnostic in a minute, Captain." "Are you damaged? You're venting something off your upper hull." "Yes, we've got some damage, but we'll repair it later. Your ship comes first. Keep the corem lines open if possible. You'll have to drop your shields while we raft up and do the work.

 

 

That'll be the tricky part. You'll want to have one of the other Starfleet ships run a cover grid." "I'll contact the Majestic and--tactical, broad on the bow-- fire! Deflectors, shift double starboard! Hail the Majestic-- fire at will, Samuels! Majestic, Sattler here--" "She's got her hands full." Stiles turned and called back into the scoped hatchways, not bothering with the comm. "Tell me when you know something, Jeremy! Those Ronmlans can see we're vulnerable, so work faster." Jeremy's disembodied voice trailed back through three sec- tions. "Scanning... naceUe hasn't been breached... not on the outside, anyway... couM be internal feedback from a hit someplace else, though. The main injector's secure... there's a crack in the sliding bulkhead. Let me follow it down... I got it, Eric', i see a fractured buckler. It's not the naceUe. It's the struL " "Great!" Stiles clapped his hands once, and startled the socks off his new hehi~sman. "That's a relief. Ship to ship--- Captain Sattier, good news. It's not the nacelle that's kinked.

 

 

It's only the strut. We'll raft up right here and square it, but you've got to keep those stingers off us for a solid fifteen min- utes. I have to put extravehicular crew on the skin of your ship and I don't want anybody barbecued on your hull." "Commander, you fix my nacelle in fifteen minutes in the middle of this mess' and I'll owe you a big soppy kiss and a crystal decanter of your favorite. We'll put out the warning pennant and anybody who comes near your workers will feel the heat. There's nothing like a movable starbase when we need one!" The charming---oh, yes--and sultry voice of the destroy- er's captain made Stiles smile again. For a moment, he had trouble imagining her in a uniform. "I'll take the kiss and send the decanter to my grandfather. Maintain standby com- munications and let us handle the rafting. Drop your shields on our mark." "Pennant%' flashing. Standing by for rafting approach. Do you intend to use tractors or umbilicals?" "Both," Stiles told her.

 

 

"Aren't tractors faster?" "Usually, but if we get hit and there's a power failure, our ships would just drift away from each other and we couldn't help each other. With umbilicals, we'll be netted together no matter what happens," "Good thinking. Ready when you are." "Three... two... one... mark." "Affirmative, shields down. Approach when ready." Glancing at his bridge crew, Stiles said, "Okay, boys, we've got fifteen minutes! That's two to raft up and thirteen to effect repair. Let's clone that destroyer a new nacelle strut. Sound off." From deep through the body of the combat support tender, team leaders and section masters called off.

 

 

"Internal repair squad ready, sir!" "Rafting hands ready. Umbilicals one, two, and four manned, magnetic tethers hot." "Rivet squad suited and ready, sir" "Caissons ready." "Gun team?" "Weapons armed and ready!" "Where are the evil twins?" "Already in the airlock, Eric." "Beautifulø Lateral thrusters one half. Let's move in." "All hands, brace for action rafting! Shields down!" Ah, the chatter of activity. What a good noise.

 

 

Out there, not far away on the cosmic scale, a half dozen Romulan fighters darted around two Starfleet destroyers, one patrol cutter, and three merchant ships caught in the crossfire.

 

 

Bursts of phaser fire, disruptor streams, glancing hits and direct detonations lit the fabric of black space like flashing jewels. There was a startling beauty about it, stitched firmly into the crazy quilt of hazard and excitement.

 

 

"Okay, you lot---tea time! Battle Cook Woody reportin' f'duty, sah !" Stiles rolled his eyes and groaned. What timing.

 

 

At the port entryway, Ship's Mess Officer Alan Wood came rolling in as he always seemed to in moments of critical action, or did critical action always happen at teatime?

 

 

Stiles didn't argue, as their in-house real-live London butch- er distributed cookies, tea, and coffee to an obviously busy crew.

 

 

"Them y'go. Two sugars, Tray. Told y'I wouldn't f'get.

 

 

Eric, sir, no caffeine for you, double cream, honey, and ye olde ginger snaps." "You always know what calms me down, Alan. And don't call me 'honey.'" "Aye aye, dear" "Put the tray down and take over Jason's driver coil balance, Battle Cook." "You got it." They were completely vulnerable now. Both the CST and the destroyer were shields down. These were the crucial min- utes during which any enemy shot could cut all the way through any bulkhead or hull plate and take out anything inside, man or machine.

 

 

He glanced around at the bridge crew, peeked back through the infinity mirror of hatchways leading into the depths of the Saskatoon and its work areas, saw the unit leaders looking back at him from their various places, and satisfied himself that all segments were ready to work. He turned now to watch the two main screens, one always viewing forward, one always aft, and the sixteen auxiliary screens around the horseshoe. On the screens, shown from a dozen different angles, there was a hot battle going on at this edge of a small solar system. He stood beside the command chair, so seldom used that it held parts and charts and anything else they needed handy at any given time. He almost never sat in it. Should have it removed altogether.

 

 

"Watch your aft swing;' he told the helmsman. "There's a solar current here." "! can do it manually, i think" the helmsman boldly claimed.

 

 

"You think, sir." Travis turned at the brash helmsman's statement, reached across the auxiliary board on the upper controls, and tapped one of the pads. "I've got it. Stabilizers on." The young helmsman fumed, but said nothing.