The Entropy Effect

Contents

Prologue Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Epilogue

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1

Aleph Prime’s sun had grown large enough to appear in the viewscreen as a disc rather than a point. The crew stood at general quarters, waiting to face some danger as undefined as the singularity that now lay far behind them. The Enterprise approached the mining station with all shields up, phasers at ready, sensors extended to their limits. Kirk still had no more information than the simple implacable command, and he was still restricted by radio silence.

He glanced up at his science officer.

“The star doesn’t look like it’s in imminent danger of going nova,” he said. Incipient nova was one of the very few reasons an ultimate code could be sent out. “That’s some comfort.”

“Considering its position on the main sequence, Captain, this star is unlikely to go nova now or in the foreseeable future.”

“And the other two possibilities are invasion, or critical experimental failure,” Kirk said. “Not an inviting choice.”

“There is one final category,” Spock said.

“Yes,” Kirk said thoughtfully. The unclassified reason, unclassified because unclassifiable: danger never before encountered. “Could be interesting,” he said.

“Indeed, Captain.”

“Mr. Sulu, what are you getting on the sensors?”

“Nothing unusual, sir. A few ore-carriers in transit between asteroids and Aleph Prime, some sailboats—”

“Sailboats!” People out sailing the solar wind, tacking across magnetic fields, out for a quiet picnic—during such an emergency? Kirk found it hard to believe.

“Yes, sir. It looks like they’re having a race. But the course is well out of normal traffic patterns.”

“Thank heaven for small favors,” Kirk said with considerable sarcasm. Hundreds of years had not changed the tradition that an unpowered sailboat, however small, had right of way over a powered ship, though the pleasure boats drifting across the viewscreen would be like motes of dust compared to the Enterprise.

“Captain Kirk,” Sulu said, “we’re within sensor range of Aleph Prime.”

“Thank you, Mr. Sulu. Can we have it on the screen?”

Sulu touched controls and the jewel-like chaos of the station sprang up magnified before them. Its transparent and opaque sections glittered through a rainbow of starlight and refraction. Kirk had never visited Aleph Prime before; he had not expected it to be beautiful. Too many cities were not. But this one was like a congregation of delicate curving glass fibers, and the shells of radiolaria expanded millions of times, and bits of polished semiprecious stones, turquoise and opal, agate and amber.

“Captain, we’re receiving a transmission.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant Uhura. Let’s hear it.” Maybe now he would find out why they were needed. If the station had been under attack, it was infiltration rather than invasion, for Kirk could see no structural damage, nor any of the disruption and commotion he would expect after a fight. He did not know whether to be more worried, or less, but his curiosity was certainly piqued.

“It isn’t from Aleph Prime, sir,” Uhura said. “It’s from another starship.”

The second ship curved up from beneath the station, and with a sudden shock of perspective Kirk could see, by comparison with the tiny scarlet speck of the other craft, the sheer immense bulk of Aleph Prime. Of course the station was large, it had to be; it held half a million intelligent beings, human as well as other life-forms. Sulu magnified the approaching ship, and Kirk had a brief glimpse of a tantalizingly familiar shape, painted quite unmilitarily in the colors of a phoenix eagle, before the picture dissolved and the video portion of the communication appeared on the screen.

“Hunter!” Kirk said involuntarily.

“ Aerfen to Enterprise ,” said the other starship’s captain. “Come in, Jim, is that you?” She paused. “Captain?” Uhura asked.

“Maintain radio silence, Lieutenant,” Kirk said, with regret. “We’ll have to leave greetings for later.”

The starship captain paused a moment, gazing out of the screen. She had changed in the years since Kirk had seen her last. The lines at the corners of her clear gray eyes served only to add more character to her face, not to detract from its elegance. Her black hair was still long, and the lock that fell down her right cheek to her shoulder she still wore braided and tied with a leather thong and a scarlet feather. The black now was lightly scattered with gray, but that merely increased her dignity, her gravity.

Then she grinned, the grin like a child’s, and she took him back years in memory, back to the Academy, back to the rivalry, friendship, and passion. But he knew her well enough to detect the trace of reticence in her smile, the reticence he had caused.

“Aerfenwill be at Aleph for a few more days,” Hunter said. “Call me if you’ve got some time.”

The transmission faded. By now Hunter’s ship had swung far enough up the face of Aleph Prime to present its side to the Enterprise . Sulu magnified it again and gazed at it rapturously.

“Captain Hunter and Aerfen ,” he said in awe. He glanced back at Kirk. “You know her, Captain?”

“We . .. went to school together.” Kirk had never seen Sulu in quite such a state of hero-worship; Kirk did not think Sulu could have been more surprised if D’Artagnan himself, flexing his epee and twirling the end of his mustache, had appeared and spoken to him.

And far from being amused, Kirk understood completely how Mr. Sulu felt. He felt that way himself, and with far more reason.

Sulu moved the Enterprise expertly into a stable orbit around Aleph Prime. Relative to the plane of the star system, Aerfen circled Aleph in a polar orbit. Instead of choosing a vacant level and inserting the larger ship into equatorial orbit, Sulu used a bit of extra time and a bit of extra fuel to position his ship so that, from the bridge, Aerfen would remain in view as long as it kept to its present track. Sulu let its sleek lines fill his gaze. It was much smaller than the Enterprise , for it was a fighter. Its design presented the smallest possible cross-section to an enemy in head-on approach, so it appeared to be streamlined. It was painted a fierce scarlet, with points of black and silver. It looked like a swift, powerful avian predator.

As he put the finishing touches on the Enterprise’s orbit, the relative orientation of the fighter to the starship changed slightly, and he could see a long bright gash in Aerfen ’s side, where the paint had been vaporized by an enemy weapon.

“It’s seen some action,” he said softly. Recently, too, he thought. He knew intuitively that Hunter would not let her ship stay scarred any longer than she absolutely had to.

“Mr. Sulu!”

Sulu started. “Yes, Captain?” He wondered how many times Kirk had spoken to him before gaining his attention—and he wondered if the captain would chide him for the extra use of fuel.

Kirk smiled. “I only wanted to compliment you on the orbit.”

Mr. Sulu blushed, but then he realized that the amusement in Kirk’s tone was far outweighed by both understanding and approval.

“Thank you, Captain.”

Kirk smiled again as Sulu returned his full attention to the fast, powerful little fighter. Sulu was right: Aerfen had seen action, and not too long since. Could that be why the Enterprise had been brought here so precipitously? An attack on Aleph Prime, and his ship called in as reinforcement? But that made no sense; Hunter had not acted like a commander on alert, and the rest of her squadron was nowhere in range. Besides, the Enterprise had already circled the station once and Kirk had still seen no evidence of damage. The sensors revealed no other ships that could conceivably belong to an enemy.

Kirk glanced over at his science officer.

“Haveyou figured out what’s going on, Mr. Spock?”

“The evidence is contradictory, but I believe we will not immediately be involved in armed conflict. That is the only justifiable inference I can make with the available information.”

“Right,” Kirk said.

“Transmission from Aleph Prime, Captain,” Uhura said.

Aerfen dissolved from the screen. Sulu sat back, startled by the abrupt change, and his shoulders slumped in disappointment.

A thin young white-haired civilian appeared.

“Captain Kirk!” he said. “I can’t tell you how relieved I am that you’ve come. I’m Ian Braithewaite, Aleph’s prosecuting attorney. Can you beam in immediately?” The official spoke with energetic intensity.

“Mr. Braithewaite—” Kirk said.

“The transmitter’s still locked down, Captain,” Uhura said.

“Open the channel! He asked me a direct question, and I’ll be damned if I’ll beam anybody into Aleph till I know what’s wrong.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Mr. Braithewaite, can you hear me now?”

“Yes, Captain, of course. Are you having trouble with your transmitter?”

“Trouble with—! You sent us an ultimate override transmission, we’ve been under radio silence. Technically, I’m violating it right now. What’s going on down there?” “An ultimate?” Braithewaite shook his head in disbelief. “Captain, I’m very sorry, but I just can’t discuss this over unsecured channels. Would it be better if I came up there to talk to you?”

Kirk considered the possibility. Whatever was happening down inside Aleph Prime, it was clearly neither a system-wide emergency nor an enemy invasion. Still, he did not want to beam anyone, or anything, into the Enterprise till he knew for sure what was going on. He was beginning to believe that what it was was a tremendous mistake. He glanced at Spock, but the Vulcan showed no expression beyond a raised eyebrow. Kirk sighed.

“No, Mr. Braithewaite,” he said. “I’ll beam down in a few minutes.”

“Thank you, Captain,” the prosecutor said.

“Kirk out.”

The prosecutor’s image vanished. Sulu surreptitiously touched a control and the view in front of the Enterprise , including Aerfen , reappeared.

“Well,” Kirk said. “Mysteriouser and mysteriouser.” He glanced at Spock, expecting a questioning gaze in response to his poor grammar. Kirk did not feel up to trying to explain Lewis Carroll to a Vulcan, much less Lewis Carroll misquoted.

But then Spock said, straight-faced, “Curious, sir. Most curious, sir.”

Kirk laughed, surprise allowing him a sudden release of tension.

“Then shall we go find out what the bloody hell is going on?”

What Jim Kirk actually wanted to do, now that he was out from under the restrictive communications blackout, was call Hunter. But he could not yet justify taking the time. He and Spock beamed down to Ian Braithewaite’s office deep inside Aleph Prime.

The tall, slender man bounded forward and shook Kirk’s hand energetically. He loomed over the captain; he was half a head taller even than Mr. Spock.

“Captain Kirk, thank you again for coming.” He glanced at Spock. “And—we’ve met, haven’t we?”

“I do not believe so,” Spock said.

“This is Mr. Spock, my science officer, my second in command.”

Braithewaite grabbed Mr. Spock’s hand and shook it before Kirk could do anything to stop him. It was the poorest conceivable manners for a stranger to offer to shake hands with a Vulcan.

Spock noticed Kirk’s embarrassment, but he knew it would be a serious breach of protocol on his own part not to acknowledge the handshake, if the human were this ignorant. Spock endured the grasp. With a few seconds’ warning he could have prepared himself, but there were no extra seconds to be had. Braithewaite’s emotions and surface thoughts washed up against Spock in a wave: normal human thoughts, confused and powerful, with an overlay of unexplained grief. Just as preparing for telepathic communication required time and concentration and energy, so did setting one’s shields against the

echoes of such communication. Spock could not protect himself constantly against every random touch; he had learned to ignore such things, for the most part. But also, for the most part, his shipmates on the Enterprise knew better than to touch him.

Trying to return discourtesy with courtesy, Spock did his best not to notice the brief opening into Braithewaite’s thoughts, resisting the temptation to intrude directly and discover why the Enterprise had been called here. He did not seek out any information, and of the thoughts forced upon him, none was useful.

Spock drew back his hand as he succeeded in sealing his mental shields.

“Please come into the back office,” Braithewaite said. “It’s a little more secure.” He led the way into the next room.

“Sorry, Mr. Spock,” Kirk said under his breath. He had seen the muscles harden along Spock’s jaw, a faint change anyone who did not know Spock extremely well would be oblivious to.

“I will maintain my shields until we return to the ship, Captain,” Spock said tightly.

Braithewaite dragged an extra chair to the inner room so they could all sit down; the cubicle was furnished barely, but crammed with files, data banks, stacks of memory cassettes, transcripts, and the general detritus of an understaffed office. Braithewaite got Kirk a drink in a plastic cup (Spock declined); the prosecutor sat down, then stood up again; his energy-level fairly radiated around him. He paced a few steps one way, a few steps the other. He made Jim Kirk nervous.

“Ordinarily my job is fairly routine,” Braithewaite said. “But the last few weeks ...” He stopped and rubbed his face with both hands. “I’m sorry, gentlemen. A friend of mine died last night and I haven’t quite...”

Kirk stood up, took Ian by the elbow, led him to the chair, made him sit down, and handed him the plastic cup.

“Have some of that. Relax. Take your time, and tell me what happened.”

Braithewaite drew in a long breath and let it out slowly. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It hasn’t anything to do with why you’re here, I just can’t keep Lee out of my mind. She didn’t seem that sick, but when I stopped by the hospital this morning they said she’d had hypermorphic botulism, and ...”

“I understand, Mr. Braithewaite,” Kirk said. “I see why you’re so upset.”

“She was Aleph’s public defender. Most people expect defense counsel and prosecutor to be enemies, but that’s hardly ever true. There’s a certain amount of rivalry, but if there’s any respect, you can’t help but be friends.”

Kirk nodded. Spock watched the emotional outburst dispassionately.

“I think I can keep hold of myself now,” Braithewaite said. He managed a faint and shaky smile, but it faded immediately. He leaned forward, intense and somber. “You’re here to take charge of the case I just finished prosecuting. It’s like nothing I’ve ever faced before. It started out nasty enough—ten people disappeared and it looked like a murderous confidence game. But it was worse than that. It turned out to be unauthorized research on self-aware subjects.”

“What kind of research?” Spock asked.

“I’m not allowed to say, beyond proscribed weapons development. It doesn’t affect the case, it isn’t what the conviction was for. This way it caused less publicity. And publicity would have been awkward. Federation headquarters has classified everything to do with the case.” He smiled wryly. “They’re not too pleased that I know so much about it. I knew they were concerned, but I didn’t expect them to send a ship like the Enterprise to take the prisoner to Rehabilitation Colony Seven. It’s certainly a secure transport, though.”

“Wait a minute,” Kirk said. “Wait a minute!” All his sympathy for Ian Braithewaite fled. He was raising his voice but he did not care. “Do you mean to tell me,” he shouted, leaping to his feet, “that you diverted the Enterprise —you diverted a ship of the line, with a crew of four hundred thirty-five people—to ferry one man the width ofone star system?”

He was leaning over Braithewaite, shouting into his face. He straightened up and stepped back, stopping his outburst but not for an instant regretting it.

The empty plastic cup crumpled loudly in Braithewaite’s clenched fist. “I didn’t choose the ship, Captain Kirk,” he said. His face had turned nearly as pale as his colorless hair. “Federation HQ said they’d send a ship, and when the Enterprise howled in at warp nine I assumed you were it.”

“The transmission did not come from Federation Headquarters,” Spock said calmly. “Nor from Starfleet Command.” He had sat, unperturbed, through Braithewaite’s story and Kirk’s tantrum. “It did not even come from a Starbase. It came directly from Aleph Prime, with the ultimate override coding that has only been used five times, to my knowledge, in the past standard decade.”

“I honestly don’t know how that happened, Mr. Spock,” Braithewaite said.

“The override is reserved for planetary disasters, unprovoked enemy attack, or unforeseen occurrences in scientific investigation. It is not intended to help deal with petty criminals.”

Ian Braithewaite’s puppydog intensity vanished in stronger, angry determination. “Petty criminals! Aside from everything else the man’s a murderer!”

“I beg your pardon,” Spock said, in precisely the same tone he had used before. “Perhaps I misspoke myself.”

Braithewaite nodded sharply.

“It is not intended to deal with criminals at all,” Spock said. “In fact there are criminal penalties attached to its misuse—as you must know.”

Despite himself, Kirk grinned. Spock would deny it, but the science officer was inducing a far more emotional effect with cold facts than Kirk had got by shouting at the top of his lungs. Kirk hoped that somewhere, down in the repressed human half of himself, Spock was enjoying his revenge.

“But/ didn’t use the code,” Braithewaite said.

“The communication originated in your office and bore your signature.”

“If you’ve been diverted unnecessarily, I’m very sorry,” Braithewaite said with honest sincerity. “I’ll try to find out how it happened. Obviously, yes, you should never have been called on the override code.”

“Good,” Kirk said. “That’s that, then. We can be on our way.” He stood up.

Braithewaite jumped to his feet and loomed over them. “Captain, you don’t understand the problem. We’re isolated here, and official ships are few and far between. We simply haven’t got the facilities to detain anyone as ruthless and charismatic and intelligent as Georges Mordreaux. If he escaped, he could easily drop out of sight, he could even stow away on a commercial ship and get completely out of the system. There’d be nothing to stop his beginning all over again somewhere else. The man’s dangerous: he makes people believe he can fulfill their dreams! It’s essential that he be sent to the rehabilitation center before he gets a chance to deceive anyone else. If he gets away—”

“Your neck would be on the line, for one thing,” Kirk said.

Braithewaite slowly flushed. “That goes without saying.”

“Captain,” Spock said. “I believe we should accede to Mr. Braithewaite’s request.”

Astonished, Kirk faced his science officer.

“We should?”

“Yes, Captain. I believe it is vital that we do so.”

Kirk flung himself back into his chair.

“What the hell,” he said.

Ian Braithewaite wanted to bundle his prisoner off to the Enterprise immediately.

“Sorry, Mr. Braithewaite,” Kirk said. “Can’t be done. My ship isn’t any more fitted for handling dangerous criminals than Aleph is. We’ll have to make some preparations first.”

Kirk and Spock left the prosecutor’s officer and headed toward the central core of the station.

“ ‘Preparations,’ Captain? Security Commander Flynn is not likely to appreciate the critical implications of that statement.”

“Good Lord, don’t tell her I said that. It was just a convenient excuse.” He realized that he could hardly have chosen a less tactful excuse: if Flynn heard about it she would be offended, and justifiably so. Since her arrival, security had shaped up faster than Kirk would have believed possible. Kirk did not think that his status as Flynn’s commanding officer would protect him from her fierce loyalty to her people. Or from her brittle temper: it was so quick to snap that Kirk sometimes wondered if Flynn really were officer material.

“I have no reason to repeat imprudent remarks to Commander Flynn,” Spock said.

“Good,” Kirk said. “Well, I’ve never been to Aleph Prime before; I don’t see any great harm in staying for a little while, whatever the excuse.”

“You will find it most fascinating. There is a small research facility involved in growing bioelectronic crystals, which could revolutionize computer science.”

“I’ll definitely have to look into that,” Kirk said. “Mr. Spock ...”

“Yes, Captain?”

“Just exactly what’s going on? Braithwaite was ready to give up and call for another ship, obviously you realized that. I went along with you, but I’d like to know just what it is I’m going along with.”

“Indeed, Captain, I appreciate your trust.”

“Well,” Kirk said wryly, “what’s a captain for?”

“I apologize for my apparent lack of consistency. Until he mentioned the name of the ‘vicious criminal,’ I had no way of knowing that something far more complex than lawbreaking—however serious—is involved.”

Kirk frowned. “I don’t remember—Georges Mordreaux? Who is it, Spock? Do you know him?”

“I studied temporal physics under him many years ago. He is a brilliant physicist. In fact, when it became clear that we had not been diverted to deal with any sort of true emergency, the only benefit I could see from our being ordered to Aleph Prime was the possibility of discussing my observations with Dr. Mordreaux before I repeated them.”

“This must have been quite a shock to you.”

“Jim, the whole matter is absurd.” Spock collected himself instantly and continued, the model of Vulcan calm again. “Dr. Mordreaux is an ethical being. More than that, he is a theoretical scientist, not an experimental one. He was always more likely to work with pencil and paper, even in preference to a computer. Still, supposing he did branch off into experimental work, it is preposterous to think that he would endanger self-aware subjects of any species. I think it unlikely in the extreme that he has metamorphosed into an insane murderer.”

“Do you think you can prove him innocent?”

“I would like the chance to discover why he is about to be transported to a rehabilitation center with such dispatch and under such secrecy.”

Kirk did not much like the idea of meddling in the business of civilian authorities, but for one thing they had meddled with his ship and for another he was as aware as Spock that if Mordreaux entered a rehabilitation colony he would not emerge improved. He might be happier, he would certainly no longer be troublesome, but he would not be a brilliant physicist anymore, either.

“All right, Spock. There’s something weird about this whole business. Maybe your professor is being railroaded. At the very least we can nose around.”

“Thank you, Captain.”

Kirk stopped and pulled out his communicator.

“Kirk to Enterprise . Lieutenant Uhura, lift radio silence.”

“ Enterprise, Uhura here. Is everything all right, Captain?”

“I wouldn’t go so far as to say that, but there’s no emergency. Secure from general quarters. I’ll be staying down on Aleph for a while, but you can reach me if you need me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Kirk out.” He hesitated a moment, then thought better of broadcasting his message to the Enterprise’s security commander.

“Mr. Spock, please tell Commander Flynn to back us up if Mr. Braithewaite questions the reasons for our staying here. I think a day is about as long as I can justify, but arrange a rotating skeleton crew so everybody gets some time off. Including you. And particularly Mr. Scott; he’s not to spend the layover buried in the engines.”

“All right, Captain.”

“I assume a day on Aleph and a leisurely trip to Rehab Seven will suit your plans?”

“Admirably, Captain.”

The spacious plaza gave the illusion of being under an open sky. In reality it was deep beneath the surface of Aleph Prime. With its mild, random breezes, the scent of flowers in the air, grass a little shaggy, inviting strolls, it was so perfect that Jim Kirk knew he would not be able to tolerate it for long. But until the cliches became obtrusive, he could enjoy it for what it was, the re-creation of a planet’s surface by someone who had never walked in the open on a living world. Besides, if he decided he did not like it, he could always go to one of the other parks, one designed for the non-human inhabitants of the station. Jim Kirk glanced around at the nearly empty plaza and wondered if an inhabitant of Gamma Draconis VII would find the nearby tunnel-maze enjoyable for a while, then gradually come to the conclusion that it was just slightly too uniformly-dug, just triflingly too damp, and just faintly, barely perceptibly, too cleverly predictably complex.

Then he saw Hunter, walking out of the shadows of a small grove of trees, and he forgot about tunnel-mazes, about the inhabitants of 7 Draconis VH, and even about the balmy, erratic breezes.

Hunter waved, and continued on toward him.

They stopped a few paces apart and looked each other up and down.

Hunter wore black uniform pants and boots that were regulation enough, but she also had on a blue silk shirt and a silver mesh vest, and, of course, the red feather in her hair.

“Still collecting demerits, I see,” Jim said.

“And you’re still awfully regular navy, you know. Some things never change.” She paused. “And I guess I’m glad of it.”

They both laughed at the same time, then embraced, hugging for the simple pleasure of seeing each other again. It was not like the old days, and Jim regretted that. He wondered if she did, too. He was afraid to ask, afraid to chance hurting her, or himself, or to put more of the kind of strain on their friendship that had nearly ended it before.

They fell into old patterns with only a little awkwardness, in the way of old friends, with good times and bad times between them, and years to catch up on. They walked together in the park for hours: it came to about an hour per year, by the time they worked their way to the present.

“You didn’t get orders to come to Aleph, did you?” Jim asked.

“No. This is the only outpost in my sector that will paint Aerfen the way I want it, without throwing stupid regulations at me. And my crew likes it for liberty. Gods know they deserve some right now. How about you?”

“Weirdest thing that ever happened. This fellow, Ian Braithewaite—”

Hunter laughed. “Did he pounce on you, too? He wanted me to pack up some criminal and take him to Rehab Seven, in Aerfen !”

“What did you tell him?” Jim asked, as embarrassment colored his face.

“Where he could put his prisoner, for one thing,” Hunter said. “I guess I should have claimed Aerfen would practically fall out of orbit without a complete overhaul, but the truth is I was too damned mad to do any tactful dissembling.”

“So was I.”

“I wondered if he might go after you, too—but, Jim, a ship of the line flying a milk run? Don’t keep me in suspense, what did you say to him?”

“I told him I’d take the job.”

Hunter started to laugh, then saw that he meant it.

“Okay,” she said. “That’s got to be a better story than any amount of imaginative profanity. Let’s hear it.”

Jim told her what had happened, including Spock’s analysis. He was glad to have someone more objective to talk to.

“Have you ever heard of Georges Mordreaux?”

“Sure—good gods, you don’t mean he’s been on Aleph all this time?He’s the one you’re supposed to take off to have his brain drained?”

Jim nodded. “What do you know about him?”

Hunter had always had a serious talent for physics, and had considered specializing in the field. But the academic life was far too quiet for her, and her taste for excitement and adventure won out early on. Still, she kept track of major advances in research in the branches that interested her.

“Well,” she said. “There are two schools of thought, and hardly anybody in the middle. The first camp thought he was the finest physicist since Vekesh, if not Einstein. Listen, Jim, do you want to have dinner on Aerfen , or shall we find a place around here? I don’t know what schedule you’re working on, but it’s late for me and I’m starved.”

“I was hoping you’d come up to the Enterprise and let me show you around. What about the other camp?”

She glanced away. “I might have known a diversionary tactic wouldn’t work with you.” She shrugged. “No offense to your Mr. Spock—but the other camp, which is most people, thought Georges Mordreaux was a loon.”

Jim was silent for a moment. “That bad?”

“Afraid so.”

“Spock didn’t mention it.”

“That’s fair. I expect he has his own opinion and considers the opposing one scurrilous gossip. Which it surely fell to.”

“Why do you keep talking about Mordreaux in the past tense?”

“Oh. I think of him that way. He put out some papers a few years back, and the reaction to them was ...hm... negative, to put it mildly. He still publishes once in a while, but nobody knew where he was. I had no idea he was here .”

“Do you think it’s possible somebody’s arranged some kind of vendetta against him?”

“I can’t imagine why anybody would, or who would do it. He just isn’t a factor in academic circles anymore. Besides, criminal prosecution isn’t the way physics professors discredit their rivals, it hasn’t got the proper civilized flavor to it.”

“What do you think about him?”

“I’ve never met him; I can’t give you a personal opinion.”

“What about his work? Do you think he’s crazy?”

She toyed with the corner of her vest. “Jim ... the last time I studied physics formally was fifteen years ago. I still subscribe to a couple ofjournals, but I keep up a superficial competence at best. I’m far too out of date to even guess at an answer to the question you’re asking. The man did good work once, a long time ago. What he’s like now—who knows?”

They walked for a while in silence. Hunter shoved her hands in her pockets.

“Sorry I’m not more help. But you can’t tell much about anybody’s personality from their work, anyway.”

“I know. I guess I’m just grabbing at anything to try to figure out why the Enterprise got chosen for this

duty.” He had already told her about Mr. Spock’s ruined observations. “Well, Captain, can I offer you a tour of my ship, and some dinner?”

“Well, Captain, that sounds great.”

From across the park, Jim heard a faint voice.

“Hey, Jim!”

Leonard McCoy waved happily from the other side of the park, and, with his companion, came tramping across the grass toward Jim and Hunter.

“Who’s that?”

“That’s my ship’s doctor, Leonard McCoy.”

She watched him approach. “He’s feeling no pain.”

Jim laughed, and he and Hunter walked together through the field to greet McCoy and his friend.

Spock returned to the Enterprise , paged Lieutenant Commander Flynn, and started working out a schedule to give the maximum amount of liberty to the maximum number of people, as Captain Kirk had requested. Before he finished, the lift doors slid open and Flynn stepped out onto the bridge.

“Yes, Mr. Spock?”

He turned toward her. “Commander Flynn, our mission here involves your section. Tomorrow morning Dr. Georges Mordreaux will board and we will convey him to Rehabilitation Colony Seven.”

She frowned very slightly. Rehab Seven was in this system; it was in opposition to Aleph Prime right now, but still that meant it was only about two astronomical units away: a trivial distance for a starship, almost an insult, and she must realize that.

“If he were a V.I.P. you wouldn’t have called me,” Flynn said. “I take it that means he’ll be in custody.”

“That is correct.” He knew she was waiting for more information, but he had none to offer. However, Captain Kirk’s statement to Ian Braithewaite, that security would have to prepare for Dr. Mordreaux’s arrival, suited his plans, and he saw no reason not to make the statement true in retrospect. “We have our orders, Commander Flynn,” he said. “Please secure the V.I.P. cabin for Dr. Mordreaux’s use.”

Spock waited for the stream of questions and objections that would have come from the previous security commander, when he was asked for performance out of the ordinary, but the new commander behaved in quite a different manner.

“All right, Mr. Spock,” she said. “What’s Dr. Mordreaux been convicted of?”

Spock found it difficult to tell her, because he disbelieved the accusations so strongly. “Unethical research on self-aware subjects,” he finally said. “And ... murder.”

“Mr. Spock,” Flynn said carefully, in a tone that offered information rather than criticism, “the detention

cells are considerably more secure than my people can make a cabin by tomorrow. And the cells aren’t dungeons; they’re fairly comfortable.”

“I am aware of the security problem, Commander Flynn, as is Captain Kirk. I am putting my trust in your abilities. The prisoner will be confined in the V.I.P. cabin.”

“Then I will have the cabin secured, Mr. Spock.”

“I have posted a liberty schedule for all the crew except your section. I leave that arrangement to your judgment.”

She glanced at the terminal, where the screen held the security roster ready for assignment. She picked out several officers with electronics background: four people, as many as could work efficiently on the energy screens.

“Everyone else can go down to Aleph,” she said. “Since we aren’t responding to a system-wide emergency.”

“No, the orders are simply to transport Dr. Mordreaux. Thank you for your cooperation, Commander Flynn. If I can be of any help to you in making the preparations—”

“My people can handle it, Mr. Spock, but thanks.”

He nodded, and the security commander left the bridge.

By the time Mandala Flynn got off the turbo lift she could hear the whoops of delight as the liberty schedule went up on all the ship’s general communication terminals. She was as glad as the others that a call to a disaster had turned instead into a few hours of freedom. She had to admit, though, that in two months on the Enterprise she had sometimes wished for some incident, some conflict, that was real instead of only practice.

You could have stayed in the border patrol, she told herself, flying back and forth and up and down the same limiting plane of space, fighting the occasional skirmish, risking your life and getting shot up, until they retired you to a backwater Starbase somewhere.

Her ambitions aimed higher than that. She was not satisfied with what was known; the unknown fascinated her. That was one reason she had grabbed for the unexpected opportunity to transfer to the Enterprise : not for cross-system detours like the current bit of bureaucratic nonsense, but exploration, new worlds, the real thing. Even if once in a while it meant spending six weeks staring down into a naked singularity.

Flynn wanted experience on this ship because, in time, she intended to command it or one like it herself. The limits of Federation worlds were far too narrow for her. She was a child of interstellar space, comfortable with it, attuned to it. She belonged in the vanguard of discovery.

And if you ever find what you’re looking for, she thought, if you ever even figure out what it is you’re looking for—what will you do then?

She pushed her musings aside as she entered the security duty room, where the four officers she had chosen were already waiting for her.

When Spock was alone, he opened a communications channel to the station and began his real task, that of obtaining as much information about Dr. Mordreaux’s recent past as he could find.

First he requested the records on the professor’s trial from Aleph Prime’s housekeeping computer.

The request bounced back: NO INFORMATION. The tape should be a matter of public record.

Spock tried again, appending his security clearance, which should have been sufficient to overcome almost every level of classification. His request was refused.

He tried several other possible repositories of criminal records, and found nothing. The news services carried no notices whatever in their indices of Dr. Mordreaux’s arrest, conviction, or sentencing; he held no listing in the station directory. Spock pushed himself away from the information terminal and considered what to do next.

Perhaps the professor had been living under an alias, but that did not explain his disappearance from judicial records, which would have used his real name. Spock considered possibilities, made a decision, and proceeded to deceive the Aleph computers without mercy. Their defenses were adequate for normal purposes—they were not, after all, ordinarily concerned with any particularly sensitive matters—but insubstantial compared to Spock’s ability to break them.

And still he could find no useful information. The trial tapes simply did not exist, at least in the computer’s data banks. Whoever had classified Dr. Mordreaux’s case had done an extremely efficient job of it. Either the records had been wiped out—a breach of the constitution of the Federation—or they still existed but no longer interfaced with the information network at all.

Mandala met Hikaru in the gym. He smiled when he saw her, and sealed the collar and shoulder fastenings of his fencing jacket.

“I didn’t know if this lesson was still on,” she said.

“It’d take a lot more disruption of the schedule for me to cancel it,” Hikaru said. “But I didn’t know if you’d be able to come.”

“I have to check the new shields when they’re up,” she said, “but till then all I could do would be watch over everybody’s shoulders and make them nervous. They’ll be finished about the same time you and I are. Then we’re all going down to Aleph for some fun. It’s on my tab. Want to come?”

“Sure,” he said. “Thanks.”

Mandala tossed him a book. He caught the small cassette.

“What’s this?”

“What do you think of old Earth novels? Pre-spaceflight, I mean?”

“I love them,” he said. “I think The Three Musketeers is my favorite.”

“My favorite Dumas is The Count of Monte Cristo .” “Have you read The Virginian ?”

“Sure—it’s most fun in Ancient Modern English. How about The Time Machine ?”

“That’s a good one.Frankenstein ?”

“Sure.Islandia ?”

“Uh-huh. I read someplace they’re finally planning to bring out the unedited facsimile edition.”

Mandala laughed. “How long have they been saying that? I wish they would, though.”

Hikaru glanced curiously at the cassette she had given him; she gestured toward it with her foil.

“That one’s Babel-17,” she said. “It’s just about my favorite. Delany’s great.”

“I never heard of it. When was it published?”

“Old calendar, nineteen sixty-six.”

“That doesn’t count as pre-space-flight.”

“Sure it does.”

“Oh—you must start at the first moon landing. I start from Sputnik I.”

“Traditionalist. Hey—that means you haven’t read Sibyl Sue Blue , either. Are you going to turn down terrific books because we disagree about twelve years?”

“Not a chance,” Hikaru said. “Thanks very much.”

As they started toward the practice ground, Mandala impulsively put her arm around Hikaru’s waist and hugged him.

He did not pull away. Not quite. He was too polite for that. But his whole body stiffened. Surprised, hurt, trying to figure out how and where she had read things wrong, Mandala let him go and strode quickly to her end of the floor.

“Mandala—” He caught up with her; he knew better than to grab her, but he touched her elbow. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I... are you mad at me?”

“I misunderstood,” she said. “Let’s not talk about it. I don’t want to make a fool of myself twice in one day.”

“You haven’t,” he said softly.

“No?” She faced him. “I thought, yesterday ...” She shrugged. “I’m usually pretty good at taking hints. I’m sorry I pushed you. I can’t claim I didn’t mean it but I never meant to pressure you. I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.”

“You didn’t,” he said. “I’m flattered.”

“It’s okay, never mind. You were a lot more polite about it than I would have been to somebody I wasn’t interested in.”

“It isn’t that I’m not interested.”

She could not think of anything to say to that. She had not come out bluntly and told him he was the most attractive man she had ever met, but he had not, after all, been unaware of how she felt. If he found her attractive in turn—and after yesterday she thought he did—then she could not understand his behavior.

“I’ve been thinking about what happened,” he said, his voice strained. “I’m probably leaving. You know I’m thinking about a transfer, we’ve talked about it. You’re the only person I have talked about it with!”

“Sure,” she said. “So what? None of us really knows what they’re going to be doing next week, next month—”

“It wouldn’t be fair to you,” Hikaru said.

Mandala stared at him; she fought to keep pure astonishment from turning to anger. She flung down her foil. It clattered across the floor. “What the hell do you mean, fair to me ? Where do you get off, deciding that? You’ve been honest—what more do you think you could owe me?”

He stood before her, downcast. Mandala wanted to hug him, to take away some of that lost hurt look, but she knew she would not want to stop with a hug. Aside from the absurdity of trying to caress someone while they were both dressed in padded fencing jackets and standing in the middle of a public gym, she did not want to take the chance of embarrassing Hikaru again.

“I just don’t think ...” He paused, and started again. “It seemed so cold, to respond to you when the chances were I’d be taking off almost immediately.”

Mandala took his hand, and stroked the hollow of his palm. “It isn’t fair toyou,” she said. “Hikaru, nobody ever makes long-term commitments on the border patrol. It’s too chancy, and it’s too painful. We used to say to each other: for a little while. I’m not used to anything but that. But you ... I think you’d rather have something that lasted a long time.”

“Itis better,” he said tentatively.

“That’s up to you. It’s fine. I understand, now. You’ve been under one hell of a lot of stress these last few weeks, and you’re under more because of thinking about transferring off the Enterprise . I think you’re right not to want to make it any harder on yourself.”

“I guess that’s part of it.”

“Okay.”

“Thank you,” he said. He hugged her, and she returned the embrace until she was embarrassed herself, by her own response. She drew back, and picked up her foil.

“Come on—I want my lesson.”

They saluted each other with the foils. Hikaru put his mask on.

“Hikaru,” Mandala said, “if you change your mind, let me know.” She pulled her own mask down and slipped into a smooth en garde position.

After several hours of fruitless work, Mr. Spock finally broke the communications link to Aleph Prime. He had tried every conceivable route toward the information he wanted, and every conceivable route dead-ended. He could do nothing more on board the Enterprise .

Before closing down his terminal he pulled up the duty roster to find someone familiar with the bridge who was still on board. Mr. Sulu’s name was first on the list.

Paging the helm officer, Spock reached him in the gymnasium. Sulu appeared on the screen; he pushed his fencing mask to the top of his head. Sweat dripped down his face. Spock ordinarily found Sulu among the easiest of his colleagues to work with. But the other side of the lieutenant’s character, the one that emerged when he was in the grip of his very deep streak of romanticism, Spock found virtually incomprehensible.

Mr. Sulu wiped off the sweat, put down his foil, and became once more the epitome of a serious, no-nonsense, one-track-minded Starfleet junior officer.

“Yes, Mr. Spock?”

“Mr. Sulu, can you interrupt what you are doing?”

“I’ve just finished giving a lesson, sir.”

“I must return to Aleph Prime for a short while, and I do not wish to leave the bridge unattended.”

“I can be there in ten minutes, Mr. Spock.”

“Thank you, Mr. Sulu. Spock out.”

But as he reached for the controls he saw Sulu make an involuntary gesture toward him. Spock paused with his hand on the reset button.

“Yes, Mr. Sulu? Is there something else?”

“Mr. Spock—” Sulu hesitated, then spoke all in a rush. “Did the captain say—do you think it’s possible—will Captain Hunter come on board?”

Spock gazed impassively at Sulu for several moments.

Sulu would, at that juncture, have given almost anything to recall his outburst. Mr. Spock was perhaps the only person on the Enterprise who would not, or could not, understand why he had asked the question. As far as Sulu had ever observed, the most effusive reaction Spock ever offered anyone was respect, and that infrequently. He had certainly never shown any signs of hero-worship. Sulu was under no illusions concerning his own feelings about Hunter: they were hero-worship, pure, blazing, and undignified. Hunter had been one of Sulu’s heroes for half his life. Though he had been born on Earth, his

mother was a consulting agronomist and his father was a poet; Hikaru Sulu had spent his childhood and adolescence on the frontier, on a succession of colony planets. His longest stay anywhere was on Ganjitsu, a world far out on the border of a sector that had long been harassed by renegades—the Klingons claimed they were renegades, though of course no one ever believed them—and at the mercy of pirates who were all too human. The Ganjitsujin resisted with inadequate means; for a long time they wondered if they had been forgotten or abandoned. Then Hunter, a very young officer with her first command, swept in like a hunting hawk, beat the pirates back into the hands of the Klingons, and bested the Klingons themselves at their own game.

Sulu had seen things on Ganjitsu that he still had nightmares about, but Hunter had stopped the nightmare-reality. Sulu doubted he could make Mr. Spock understand how he felt about her, even if he had the opportunity to explain. No doubt he had lost the science officer’s confidence forever. Sulu wished mightily that he had waited to ask Captain Kirk about Hunter. The captain understood.

However, Spock was not looking at him with disapproval, or even with his eyebrows quizzically raised.

“I have no way of knowing Captain Hunter’s plans, Mr. Sulu,” he said. “However, the possibility is not beyond the bounds of reason. If she does pay the Enterprise the compliment of visiting it, I hope she will receive the reception due an officer with such an exceptional record. Spock out.”

Sulu watched the science officer’s expressionless, ascetic face fade from the screen. Sulu hoped his own astonishment had not shown too plainly: at least his mouth had not fallen open in surprise.

After all these years I should know better than to make assumptions about Mr. Spock, Sulu thought.

Spock never failed to amaze him—in quite logical and predictable ways, if one happened to look at them from exactly the right perspective—just at the point where Sulu thought he knew most precisely how the Vulcan would behave.

“Hey,” Mandala said from behind him, “you better get going, Hikaru—you promised him ten minutes.” She pulled off her fencing mask and they formally shook ungauntleted hands: she was left-handed so her right hand was ungloved.

“Do you think she’ll come on board?”

Mandala smiled. “I hope so, it would be great to see her again.” She wiped her sweaty face on her sleeve. “You know, if you do transfer, you couldn’t do any better than Hunter’s squadron.” They headed toward the locker room.

“Hunter’s squadron!” The possibility of serving with Hunter was so dreamlike that he could not make it sound real. “I wouldn’t have a chance!”

Mandala glanced over at him, with an unreadable expression. She quickened her pace and moved ahead of him. Surprised, Hikaru stopped, and, a few steps later, so did Mandala.

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

“Where, where in the freezing hell did you pick up such a load of doubt about yourself?”

“If I applied and she turned me down—”

“You have the background,” Mandala said. “You have the right specialties. And you have that Academy star.”

Hikaru grinned ruefully. “You never saw my grades.”

She spun back toward him, a quick fierce fury in her flame-green eyes. “Damn your grades! You got in and you got through, that’s all that counts! No low-level know-nothing bureaucrat can weed you off a transfer list on the grounds that you couldn’t possibly be qualified for anything you really want.”

Hikaru knew her well enough by now to hear the pain in her voice, underneath the anger.

“Did that happen to you?” he asked gently. But he already knew it must have; Mandala had never had the chance to attend the Academy. Both literally and figuratively, she had fought her way up from the ranks.

“It’s happened ... several times,” she said finally. “And every time it happens, it hurts more. You’re the only person I’ve ever admitted that to. I would not like it said to anyone else.”

He shook his head. “It won’t be.”

“This is the only first-class assignment I’ve ever had, Hikaru, and I know Kirk didn’t ask for me. He demanded the first person available who could replace my predecessor. He would have taken anybody.” She smiled grimly. “Sometimes I think that’s what he thinks he got. I have the job by pure chance. But you can bet I’m not going to waste it. I won’t let them stop me, Academy star or not—” She cut off her words, as if she had already revealed far more of herself than she ever meant to. She grasped his shoulders. “Hikaru, let me give you some advice. Nobody will believe in you for you.”

But do I dare believe in me enough to try to transfer to Hunter’s command? Hikaru wondered. Do I dare take the risk of being turned down?

Mr. Spock beamed back down to Aleph Prime. The city jail was in a short corridor near the government section; it showed evidence of hard use and neglect. The plastic walls were scarred and scratched; in places graffiti cut so deep that the asteroidal stone of the original station showed through from behind. The walls had been refinished again and again, in slightly different colors, leaving intricately layered patterns of chipped and worn and partially replaced surfaces.

A security guard lounged at the front desk. Spock made no comment when she quickly put aside her pocket computer; he had no interest in her activities on duty, whether it was to read some fictional nonsense of the sort humans spent so much time with, or to game with the machine.

“Can I help you?”

“I am Spock, first officer of the U.S.S. Enterprise . I have come to interview Dr. Georges Mordreaux before we take him on board.”

She frowned. “Mordreaux ...? The name sounds familiar but I don’t think we’ve got him here.” She glanced at the reception sensor and directed her voice toward it. “Is Georges Mordreaux in detention?”

“No such inmate,” the sensor said.

“Sorry,” the guard said. “I didn’t think we had anybody scheduled to go offstation. Just the usual collection of rowdies. Payday was yesterday.”

“Some error has been made,” Spock said. “Dr. Mordreaux’s trial tapes are not available from public records. Perhaps he is here but the documents have been lost.”

“I remember where I heard that name!” she said. “They arrested him for murder. But his lawyer invoked the privacy act so they shut down coverage. She was pleading insanity for him.”

“Then he is here.”

“No, if that’s how he was convicted he wouldn’t be here, he’d be at the hospital. But you can look for him if you like.” She gestured toward the bank of screens, one per cell, which gave her an overview of the entire jail wing. Spock saw no one who resembled his former teacher, so he took the guard’s advice and went looking at the hospital instead.

“Sure, he’s here,” the duty attendant said in response to Spock’s query. “But you’ll have a hard time interviewing him.”

“What is the difficulty?”

“Severe depression. They’ve got him on therapy but they haven’t got the dosage right yet. He’s not very coherent.”

“I wish to speak with him,” Spock said.

“I guess that’s okay. Try not to upset him, though.” The attendant verified Spock’s identity, then led him down the hall and unlocked the door. “I’ll keep an eye on the screen,” he said.

“That is unnecessary.”

“Maybe, but it’s my job.” He let Spock go inside.

The hospital cell looked like an inexpensive room at a medium-priced hotel on an out-of-the-way world. It had a bed, armchairs, meals dispenser, even a terminal, though on the latter the control keyboard was limited to the simplest commands for entertainment and information. Mordreaux’s jailers were taking no chances that he could work his way into the city’s computer programs and use his knowledge to free himself.

The professor lay on the bed, his arms by his sides and his eyes wide open. He was a man of medium height, and he was still spare; he still let his hair grow in a rumpled halo, but it had grayed. His luminous brown eyes no longer glowed with the excitement of discovery; now they revealed distress and despair.

“Dr. Mordreaux?”

The professor did not answer; he did not even blink.

Stress-induced catatonia? Spock wondered. Meditative trance? No, of course it must be the drugs. Spock had done some of his advanced work in physics at the Makropyrios, one of the finest universities

in the Federation. Dr. Mordreaux was a research professor there, but every year he taught a single very small and very concentrated seminar. The year Spock attended, Dr. Mordreaux accepted only fifteen students, and he stretched and challenged them all, even Spock, to their limits.

Dr. Mordreaux had early reached a pinnacle in his career, and what was more remained there; his papers frequently stunned his colleagues, and honors befell him with monotonous regularity.

“Professor Mordreaux, I must speak with you.”

For a long time Dr. Mordreaux did not reply, but, finally, he made a harsh, ugly noise that took Spock several seconds to identify as a laugh. He remembered Dr. Mordreaux’s laugh, from years ago: it had been full of pleasure and delight; it was almost enough to make a young Vulcan try to understand both humor and joy.

Like so much else, it had changed.

“Why did you come to Aleph Prime, Mr. Spock?”

Dr. Mordreaux pressed his hands flat against the bed and pushed himself to a sitting position.

“I did not think you would remember me, Professor.”

“I remember you.”

“The ship on which I serve was called to take you on board.”

Spock stopped, for large tears began to flow slowly down Dr. Mordreaux’s cheeks.

“To take me to prison,” he said. “To rehabilitate me.”

“What happened, Professor? I find the accusations against you unlikely at best.”

Mordreaux lay down on the bed again, curling up in fetal position, crying and laughing the strange harsh laugh, both at the same time.

“Go away,” he said. “Go away and leave me alone, I’ve told you before I only wanted to help people, I only did what they wanted.”

“Professor,” Spock said, “I have come here to try to help you. Please cooperate with me.”

“You want to betray me, like everybody else, you want to betray me, and you want me to betray my friends. I won’t, I tell you! Go away!”

The door slid open and the attendant hurried in. “The doctor’s on the way,” he said. “You’ll have to leave. I told you he wouldn’t be coherent.” He shooed Spock out of the room.

Spock did not protest, for he could do nothing more here. He left the hospital, carefully considering what the professor had said. It contained little enough information, but what was that about betraying his friends? Could it possibly be true that he had done research on intelligent subjects, and that they had been hurt, or even died? In his madness, could the professor be denying, in his own mind, events that had actually happened? What could he mean, he had only intended to help people?

Spock had no answers. He would have to wait until Dr. Mordreaux came on board the Enterprise ; he would have to hope the professor became more rational before it was too late.

The science officer drew out his communicator, then changed his mind about returning to the ship immediately. No logical reason demanded that this trip to Aleph Prime be completely wasted. He put his communicator away again and headed toward another part of the station.

As Jim Kirk prepared to call the Enterprise , the paging signal went off so unexpectedly that he nearly dropped his communicator.

“Good timing,” he said to Hunter with a grin. “And they’ve let me alone all afternoon, I’ll give them that.”

Hunter tensed automatically. Aerfen did not call her, when she was off the ship, except in a serious emergency: virtually everyone in her crew was capable of taking over when she was not there. She had made sure of that, for Aerfen ’s assignments left it exposed to the possibility of stunning casualties at any time. Hunter was always, on some level, aware of that fact, and, by extension, of her own mortality. For the good of her ship, she could not afford to be indispensable. She was secure enough in her ability to command to give all her people more responsibility than was strictly essential, or even strictly allowed. The last time Starfleet called her on the carpet, it was for teaching a new ensign, with talent but without the proper formal training credentials, how to pilot Aerfen in warp drive.

As a result, Hunter’s communicator seldom signalled for her when she was planetside; hearing Jim’s go off she unconsciously assumed the call was an emergency. He might need help: her reflexes prepared her for action.

“Kirk here,” he said.

Hunter remembered the first time they had met.

He was so spit-and-polish, she thought, and I—I practically still had dust between my toes.

They had regarded each other with equal disdain.

“Captain,” said a voice from Jim’s communicator, “I have some equipment for the Enterprise , but your signature is required before I may beam it on board.”

“What kind of equipment, Mr. Spock?”

“Bioelectronic, sir.”

“What for?”

“To incorporate into the apparatus for the singularity observations.”

“Oh,” Kirk said. “All right. Where are you?”

“At the crystal growth station in the zero-g section of Aleph Prime.”

“You really need me there right now, Spock?”

“It is quite important, Captain.”

Jim glanced at Hunter and grimaced. She shrugged, with understanding, and let herself relax again. No emergency.

“All right, Mr. Spock. I’ll meet you there in a few minutes.” He closed his communicator. “I’m sorry,” he said to Hunter. “Spock worked so hard on those blasted observations, just to have them jerked out from under him. The least I can do is humor him if he wants to put in more equipment.”

“I understand,” she said. “There’s no problem.”

“This shouldn’t take me too long ...”

“Jim, it’s okay,” she said. “I’ll go on up to Aerfen and take care of a couple of things, then beam directly over to the Enterprise .”

“All right,” he said. “I’ll see you there in a little while.”

She gave him directions for getting to where he was going—Aleph’s volumetric spherical grid pattern was not nearly as straightforward as it sounded; besides, she knew a good shortcut—and watched him walk away across the field.

Hunter took out her communicator. “Hunter to Aerfen . Please beam me up, Ilya.”

Waiting for the beam to track her, Hunter thought back over the afternoon. She was glad to see Jim Kirk again, though, as always, a bit surprised that their friendship endured despite their differences, differences that had been obvious from the moment of their acquaintance in the same first-year platoon at the Academy. Jim Kirk was a star student, fitting in with that cosmopolitan home-world flair; Hunter was in trouble even before she arrived, a colonist with proud, prickly, defensive arrogance, who went by a single name and refused to record any other.

Their commander, a senior-class student (whose name mutated instantly from Friendly, which was ridiculous, to Frenzy, which made a certain amount of sense), took exception to her family’s tradition of names, and, even more, to the feather Hunter always wore in her hair. By freedom of religion she was entitled to it, but he ordered her to remove it. She refused; he charged her with being out of uniform and with showing contempt for a superior officer.

She had been tempted to plead guilty to the second accusation.

Lawyers were not a custom among Hunter’s people, and she did not intend to involve anyone else in her difficulties with the hierarchy. But the court-martial would not convene without a defense counsel. To Hunter’s disgust, James T. Kirk volunteered.

Hunter had him firmly typed as the same sort of self-satisfied prig as the platoon commander; he upheld her judgment of him with the first words he spoke.

“I think you’re making a big mistake,” he said. “I think probably if you apologize to Frenzy he’ll cancel the trial.”

“Apologize! For what?”

He glanced at her braid of black hair, at the small blacktipped scarlet feather bound to its end. “Look,” he said, “if Frenzy adds lying to the charges, you’ll be finished.”

“Lying!” she shouted. She leapt out of her chair and faced him off across the table, pressing her hands flat on the surface so she would not clench them into fists.

“No one,” she said softly, “no one, in the entire world, in my entire life, has ever accused me of lying, and right now I need one good reason, very quick, not to throw you through the wall.”

He reached toward the feather. She pulled away, flinging her head back so the braid flipped over her shoulder.

“Don’t touch that!”

“I know you don’t believe I’m on your side,” he said. “But I am. I really am. I did some reading last night and I know what the feather is supposed to mean. It’s the last in a long series of tests that only a few people ever complete. I’m not saying you didn’t do it—but that feather isn’t the real thing. However important it is, it would be better to go without till you can get another real one, because if the board finds out you’ve made all this fuss over something that has in itself no intrinsic meaning, they’ll throw the book at you.”

Hunter frowned at him. “Wherever did you get the idea that it isn’t real?”

He pulled a text out of his briefcase, slid it into a reader, and keyed up a page. “There,” he said, pointing to a picture of a phoenix eagle gliding in the wind, so beautiful Hunter had to fight off a wave of homesickness. Jim Kirk’s forefinger touched the white tip of a wing feather. “And there.” He keyed up a photo of a young woman. Hunter blinked in surprise. It was her great-aunt, perfectly recognizable. She had been almost as elegant and dignified at that age as she had been well into her eighties, when Hunter first met her. Kirk touched the feather in the photograph: a long one, the span of a hand, with a white tip.

“You see what I mean,” he said, nodding toward Hunter’s feather, which, though red, was black-tipped, barely the length of her thumb, and far different in shape.

“Either you’ve got a crappy book, or you missed some spots,” she said. “Wearing one of the primaries just means the eagles have accepted you as a reasoning adult being.” She stabbed at the reader keyboard, brought back the first picture, and traced her finger along the eagle’s crest, which looked darker red through being formed of black-tipped plumage.

“What I wear is a crest feather. It means ... it’s too complicated to explain everything it means. The eagles accept me as a friend.”

Kirk looked at her. “One of the eagles gave you the feather?” He sounded rather stunned.

Hunter scowled again. “That’s right—good gods, what did you think it was? A trophy?” She was repelled by the idea of injuring one of the magnificent, totally alien, gentle, fierce beings. “They’re as intelligent as we are. Maybe more so.”

Kirk sat down slowly. “I think I understand now,” he said. “I apologize. I jumped to conclusions, and I was wrong. Will you accept my apology?”

Hunter nodded curtly. But her dislike began to ease, for she too had jumped to conclusions, and she too had been wrong.

The next day, at Hunter’s court-martial, the senior platoon commander slowly but surely and irrevocably destroyed his credibility with his superiors. Freedom of religion was a touchy subject with Starfleet. They were committed to it on a theoretical basis, but, practically, it was difficult to administer. Aside from the sheer number of belief systems, the rituals ranged from virtually nonexistent to thoroughly bizarre. So when a stiffnecked undergraduate with his first minor command proved himself guilty of harassing a pantheist whose disruption consisted of wearing a feather in her hair, they showed him very little sympathy at all.

Though she often could have got away with it, Hunter never claimed a religious exemption for her other nonconforming behavior. She succeeded in acting as she thought right, and as she wished, through a combination of fast moves, of giving not a damn about demerits, and of pure, solid, unimpeachable excellence in her performance.

She put aside old memories as she materialized on the transporter platform of her own ship. Her senior weapons officer nodded a greeting to her and tossed his long blond hair back off his forehead.

“Hi, Ilya,” Hunter said. “All quiet?”

“I have no complaints,” he said, in his clipped, controlled voice. But a moment later, when they passed the aft viewport, he added, “Except one.”

What?

“Hunter, I would like that damned monster ship off our tail. It makes me very nervous.”

Hunter glanced out the port at the Enterprise , orbiting behind and above them. She laughed. “Ilya Nikolaievich, they’re on our side.”

Mr. Sulu was not above imagining himself truly commanding the Enterprise , not merely the random high-ranking officer of a crew of all of twenty people. Mandala Flynn had beamed down with the last four security officers, to honor her promise to buy their dinner. Sulu hoped he could join her later.

On the darkened bridge, he slid into the captain’s seat and gazed out the viewscreen. The Enterprise was oriented so that, with respect to the ship’s gravitational field, Aleph Prime loomed overhead, a huge shining Christmas tree ornament set spinning, to Sulu’s eyes, by the ship’s motion around it; and then, framed by space and multicolored stars, Aerfen hung suspended. Aerfen, Minerva, grey-eyed Athene, defending battle-goddess.

“’In such likeness Pallas Athene swept flashing earthward,’” Sulu said aloud.

“Hunter toEnterprise , permission to beam aboard?”

Sulu started, feeling the blood rush to his face, but of course she could not have heard him quoting Homer aloud on the bridge of a starship, no one could have heard him; he was all alone.

“ Enterprise, Sulu here, permission granted, of course, Captain.” Sulu called for someone to relieve him, on the double, and hurried to the transporter room.

Hunter glittered into reality. Sulu knew instinctively that she would despise effusion. When she stepped down from the platform, he took her outstretched hand and said his name in response to her own introduction. But he bowed to her as well, just slightly, perhaps a breach of Starfleet protocol, but a gesture of respect in his family’s traditions. She was not as tall as he expected—he had put her in his mind as some overwhelming demigod or giant, and he was rather relieved that her physical presence was not quite what he had imagined. Her hand was hard and firm, with traces of callus on the palm, and a long angry scar that led up the back of her hand and disappeared beneath her shirt cuff at the wrist. Her silver vest made her shoulders gleam, as if she wore armor.

“Mr. Sulu,” she said. “I’m pleased to meet you. Jim spoke of you with a great deal of regard.”

Sulu could not think of anything to answer to that; he was too surprised and flattered. “Thank you,” he said, finally, lamely. “Captain Kirk hasn’t returned from Aleph Prime yet, Captain Hunter. May I show you to the officers’ lounge?”

“That would be fine, Mr. Sulu.”

They got into the lift, descended, and walked down a long corridor. The Enterprise seemed deserted, haunted, surreal, with its crew on liberty and its lights dimmed.

“It isn’t shown off at its best right now,” Sulu said apologetically.

“Never mind,” Hunter said. “A ship like this doesn’t need much showing off.”

They chatted about Aerfen and the Enterprise until they reached the lounge. Sulu offered her a drink, or a glass of wine, which she declined; they ended up both with coffee, sitting over a port with a view of deep space, still talking ships.

“That’s a nasty gash on Aerfen ’s side,” Sulu said. “I hope there wasn’t too much damage.”

Hunter looked away. “Not to the ship,” she said. “I lost two good people in that fight.”

“Captain—I’m sorry, I didn’t know ...”

“How could you? Mr. Sulu, no one volunteers for this particular assignment without knowing the risks.”

She appeared, suddenly, very human and very tired, and Sulu’s regard for her increased. To fill the silence, because he did not know what to say, he got up and refilled their cups.

“Where are you from, Mr. Sulu?” she asked when he returned. Only a hint of tightness in her voice betrayed her. “I feel like I should be able to place your accent, but it’s so faint I can’t.”

“It isn’t so much faint as a complete muddle. I lived in a lot of different places when I was a kid, but longest on Shinpai.” He used the colloquial name without even thinking.

“Shinpai!” Hunter said. “Ganjitsu? I’ve been there.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Sulu said. “I know. I remember. No one there will forget for a long time.” It was his turn to look away; he had not meant to tell her anything about himself or the debt he and a lot of other people owed her, and now he realized why.

I’m afraid she’ll say it was nothing, he thought. I’m afraid she’ll shrug it all off and laugh at me.

“Thank you, Mr. Sulu.”

He looked slowly back at her. Shadows across her face obscured her gray eyes.

“In this career—you must know—you sometimes come to feel like everything you do, the conflict, the friends you lose, it’s all for the glory of some faceless, meaningless set of rules and regulations. And that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter a damn. It only matters when you know it makes a difference to a person.”

“It made a difference,” Sulu said. “Never think it didn’t make a difference.”

Jim Kirk had to put down the awkward boxes of bioelectronic crystals before he could get out his communicator.

“Couldn’t you at least have had this stuff delivered, Mr. Spock?” he asked.

“Of course, Captain, but I thought you would not wish to stay at Aleph Prime for several more days.” Kirk grumbled something inarticulate and flipped open his communicator. “Kirk to Enterprise .”

“ Enterprise. Sulu here, Captain.”

“Mr. Spock and I are ready to beam up, Mr. Sulu.”

A few minutes later, Kirk, Spock, and the assorted boxes materialized on the transporter platform. Kirk stepped down to greet Hunter, who had accompanied Sulu to the transporter room.

“You’ve met Mr. Sulu, I see,” Jim said. “This is Mr. Spock, my first officer.”

“Mr. Spock,” she said, nodding to him. “It’s good to meet you after hearing about you for so many years.”

“I am honored,” Spock said.

Kirk noticed Sulu moving slowly, and, he thought, rather reluctantly, toward the door.

“Mr. Sulu,” he said on impulse, “have you had dinner?”

“Dinner?” Sulu asked, surprised by the unusual question. “Captain, I’m afraid my system lost track of time about when we went into the sixth week around the singularity. I wouldn’t know what to call the last meal I had.”

Kirk chuckled. “I know how you feel. I’m going to show Captain Hunter around the ship, and then she and I and Mr. Spock are going to dine on the observation deck. Hunter, I want you to meet my officers. Mr. Sulu, would you see who else is on board? And would you join us yourself?”

“I’d love to,” Sulu said. “Thank you, Captain.”

When Kirk and Hunter and Spock had taken the new equipment and left the transporter room, Sulu hurried to the console and opened a channel to Aleph Prime.

“Sulu to Flynn, come in, Commander.”

The pause dragged on so long he began to worry; he was about to try calling again when Mandala’s voice came through.

“Flynn here.”

“Mandala—”

“Hikaru, is anybody else with you?” she said before he could tell her about the invitation.

“No. I’m alone.”

“Good. Beam us up, I’ve got two of my people with me.”

He heard the urgency in her voice: he tracked them quickly and energized.

He watched in astonishment as three disheveled figures appeared on the platforms. Mandala was accompanied by two of the more startling members of the Enterprise’s security force. Snnanagfashtalli looked rather like a bipedal leopard with a pelt of maroon, scarlet, and cream. Everyone called her Snarl, but never to her face. She appeared, crouching down on all fours, her ruby fangs exposed, maroon eyes dilated and reflecting the light like a search beam. Her ears lay flat back against her skull and she had raised her hackles from the back of her neck to the tip of her long spotted tail, now bristling out like a brush. She growled.

“We should go back. I had my eyes on a tender throat!”

Mandala laughed. Her hair had fallen down in a tangled mane. Her red hair, her brilliant green eyes, and her light brown skin made her look as much a lithe, wild, fierce animal as Snarl.

“That tender throat had the bad manners to call for Aleph security, and that’s why we got out of there.” Mandala looked happier than Hikaru had ever seen her since she had come on board the Enterprise .

The third member of the party, Jenniver Aristeides, stood staring down at the floor, her shoulders slumped. She was two hundred fifty centimeters tall, her bones were thick and dense, and she seemed to have more layers of muscle than humans possess. That was quite possible. She was human, but she had been genetically engineered to live on a high-gravity planet.

Mandala went to her, and Snarl rubbed against her on the other side.

“Come on, Jenniver,” Mandala said gently. She reached up to take the massive woman’s hand; she led

her from the platform. Jenniver looked up, and against her steel-gray skin her silver eyes glistened with unshed tears.

“I did not want to fight,” Jenniver said.

“I know. It wasn’t your fault. They’d’ve deserved it if you’d smashed their heads or if Snnanagfashtalli had ripped away a couple of their faces.”

“I have no right to get angry if someone says I am ugly.”

“I do,” Snarl said.

“But I don’t want you to get in trouble.”

“I am friendly with trouble.” Snarl’s voice was a purr.

“She won’t, will she? You won’t, Commander? Will the captain be mad? It was my fault.”

“Jenniver, stop it! It’s all right. I was there, I saw what happened. Go get some sleep and don’t worry. Particularly don’t worry about Kirk.”

Snarl took Jenniver’s hand. “Come, my friend.” They left the transporter room.

Mandala stretched and shook back her hair.

“What happened?” Hikaru asked.

“Some creeps decided it would be a lot of fun to humiliate Jenniver, Snarl took exception to what they said, and about that time I came along,” Mandala said. “Thanks for beaming us up.”

“You got in a fight.”

“Hikaru,” Mandala said, laughing, “do I look like I’ve been out for a quiet stroll?”

“Are you hurt?”

“No, and we didn’t damage the other parties too much, either. That takes skill, I want you to know.”

He looked after the two security officers. “I wouldn’t want to be them when Captain Kirk hears about this, he’s going to blow his stack.”

Mandala looked at him sharply, narrowing her violent green eyes. “If Kirk has any problems with the way I act, he can take that up with me.” Fury came so close to the surface in her that Hikaru hardly recognized her. “But if there’s any discipline to be handed out in Security, that’s my job.” Abruptly, her anger vanished and she laughed again. She bunched her loose hair up at the back of her neck, and let it fall again. Hikaru shut his eyes for a moment, at the brink of calling himself a fool for refusing her, however short a time they might have had.

“Oh, gods,” Mandala said. “I did need that.” She looked after Snarl and Jenniver, with a thoughtful expression. “You know, despite what she looks like Jenniver is very sweet-tempered. I think she’s even a little timid. I wonder if she’s happy in security?”

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Yeah. Why did you call me, anyway? Are you finally off duty? Do you want to go back down to Aleph?”

“Have you had dinner?”

“No, I took my people out but I was waiting for you.”

“Good,” he said. “I have an even better offer.”

Jim Kirk would have preferred to welcome Hunter on board the Enterprise with a full officers’ reception; his own sense of fairness fought with his wish to show his ship and his people off at their best. Fairness finally won; he did not have any of the other Enterprise officers called back from Aleph. But when he and Hunter walked into the wide, deserted observation deck, darkened so the brilliant star-field glowed across the entire hundred eighty degrees of the port, he could not maintain his disappointment.

He and his old friend stood together looking out into the depths of stars, not talking, not needing to talk; but again, Jim thought of the things he wanted to say to Hunter, all the things he should say. He almost turned to her and spoke her name, her dream-name that only her family and he knew, the name he had not spoken since the last time they made love.

The door opened; Jim drew in a long breath and let it out slowly, feeling mixed regret and relief, as Spock came out onto the observation deck, followed by Mr. Sulu and Lieutenant Commander Flynn. The moment vanished.

“Mandala!” Hunter said. “I didn’t know you were on the Enterprise !”

“Hi, Hunter. Being here is kind of a surprise to me, too.”

“She says she wants my job,” Jim said, without thinking.

Color rose in Flynn’s face, but Hunter laughed, delighted.

“Then you’ll have to recommend her for a better one, if you want to keep this ship yourself.”

That was the first time Jim understood what Mandala Flynn had said to him, when he asked her about her career plans at the reception when she first came on board. She really had looked him straight in the eye and said, “I want your job.” She had been telling him she expected him to take her very seriously, however doubtful he might be that she had adequate background and education for the job. But he had misunderstood her completely.

Flynn smiled at Hunter.

That’s the first time I’ve seen her smile, Jim thought. A real smile, not an ironic grin. I think I had better reevaluate this officer.

Hunter and Mandala Flynn embraced with the easy familiarity of the less formal traditions of the border patrols.

“I see I don’t have any more introductions to make,” Jim said. “When did you serve together?”

Flynn’s smile vanished abruptly and her usual air of watchfulness returned. Jim wondered uneasily if his spur-of-the-moment excuse to Ian Braithewaite, that it would take security twenty-four hours to prepare for the prisoner, had made its way back to his new security commander. He knew it could not have come from Spock, but it might have reached her more circuitously via Braithewaite himself.

Give me another chance, Ms. Flynn, Kirk thought. I didn’t know if you were going to work out. You needed that undercurrent of ferocity to get as far as you have, from where you started, and I didn’t know if you could keep it under control. I still don’t. But you’re an able officer, security is shaping up for the first time in a year, and the last thing in the galaxy I want to do is antagonize you.

“My squadron and the fleet Mandala flew with merged for a while,” Hunter said. “Out by the Orion border.”

“That got sticky, by all reports,” Jim said.

From there, the conversation slipped straight into old times and reminiscences, and even Mr. Spock unbent enough to relate one strange tale from early in his Starfleet career. To Kirk’s surprise and relief, Mandala Flynn also began to relax her stiff reserve. Only Mr. Sulu remained on the fringe of the conversation, and he did not seem to feel left out. Rather, he appeared more than content merely to listen. Jim Kirk smiled to himself. He had experienced a few minutes of regret, rather selfish regret, after his impulsive invitation for the others to join him and Hunter, but now he was glad he had done it.

Later that night, Sulu sat in the dark in his small cabin, absently chewing on his thumbnail. He liked the Enterprise . His friends were here; his crewmates respected him and his superiors occasionally appreciated him; he admired his captain. And if he decided to stay, he could admit even to himself that he was desperately in love with Mandala Flynn.

Still, he thought, still—what about all those ambitions I used to have? Nothing I’ve been thinking about for the last six months has changed. My record so far isn’t good enough to give me a chance at a real command. I’m going to have to take more risks than I have so far in my life.

What about Mandala?

He knew that if he gave up his ambitions for her she would not understand, and she would begin to despise him. If they were friends, or lovers, it could not be on a basis of guilt or self-denial, not from either side.

If he followed through, he would be taking risks. Aside from the sheer physical danger he would be volunteering for, if he applied for a transfer to a fighter squadron—ideally, to Aerfen —Captain Kirk would not stand in his way. He was fairly sure of that. But he had no reason to believe Hunter would accept his application. If she did not, and if ultimately no squadron commander accepted him, and he stayed on the Enterprise , things would never be quite the same for him here again.

Jim and Hunter walked together to the transporter room.

“I enjoyed today, Jim,” she said. “It’s been good to see you again.”

“I’m sorry we have to leave so soon,” he said. “But there’s no reason we can’t swing past Aleph on the way back.”

“I’ll be gone by then,” she said. “The border’s unstable and my squadron is at low strength—I can’t afford to keep the flagship off the line any longer than I absolutely have to. As it is I’ll probably have to take Aerfen out shorthanded.” She shook her head, staring down at the floor. “I don’t see how I’ll replace those two people, Jim,” she said.

There was nothing he could say. He knew how it felt to lose crew members, friends, and there was nothing anyone could say.

They reached the transporter room, and Jim fed in the coordinates for Hunter’s ship.

“Well.”

The only real awkwardness came now, when they did not want to say goodbye. They hugged tightly. Jim had left too long the things he wanted to say. He was afraid it was far too late, not only by today, but by years, to say them. He buried his face against the curve of her neck and shoulder; the scent of her hair brought back memories so strong that he was afraid to look at her again, afraid to try to speak.

“Jim,” Hunter said, “don’t, please don’t.” She pulled gently away.

“Hunter—”

“Goodbye, Jim.” She stepped up onto the platform.

“Goodbye,” he whispered.

She nodded that she was ready. He touched the controls, and she flickered out of existence.

It took Jim Kirk some time to regain his composure. When he succeeded, he headed straight for his cabin, hoping he would not see anyone else. He felt both physically and emotionally drained. For the first time he felt resigned to the Enterprise’s carrier mission: nearly grateful for it.

Hunter was right, he thought. This will be a milk run. And maybe that’s what we all need right now.

He entered his dark, silent cabin. It was the only place on the ship where he could even begin to relax, and he had not been anywhere near it in over twenty-four hours. Exhaustion began to take him over. He stripped off his shirt and flung it inaccurately at the recycler.

The message light was glowing green on his communications terminal. He cursed softly. A green-coded message was never urgent, but he knew he would not be able to sleep till he had found out what it was. He pushed the accept key.

Mr. Sulu’s recorded voice requested a formal meeting.

That was strange. Kirk’s last formal meeting with anyone in the crew was so long ago that he could not recall when it had been. He had never had one with Sulu. He prided himself on being so accessible that formal meetings were unnecessary.

Out of curiosity he returned ’s call: if the helm officer were sleeping, Kirk would not override a privacy request. But, not entirely to the captain’s surprise, Sulu appeared on the screen immediately, wide awake, though looking tired and stressed. Now that Kirk thought of it, Sulu had not had any opportunity to take advantage of liberty on Aleph Prime. Through one circumstance or another he had been more or less on duty ever since they arrived, and he had stood an extra watch to maneuver the Enterprise away from the singularity.

I push him too hard, Kirk thought. His competence is so low-key, so overlaid with his sense of humor, that I don’t really acknowledge how hard he works or what a good job he does. Oh, lord—I wonder if he had other plans for tonight, but thought my invitation was an order?

“Yes, Mr. Sulu,” he said. “I got your message. Is everything all right? I think maybe I owe you an apology.”

Sulu’s expression turned to blank astonishment. “An apology, Captain? What for?”

“I didn’t intend this evening to be compulsory. I have a feeling you had other things to do and I threw a wrench into them.”

“No, sir!” Sulu said quickly. “I was afraid we’d all been selfish in accepting, if you and Captain Hunter preferred more privacy—”

“Not at all. Well, I’m glad we got that straightened out. See you in the morning.”

“Captain—”

“Yes, Mr. Sulu?”

“That wasn’t what I wanted to talk to you about.”

Kirk started to ask if whatever it was could wait till they had both had some sleep, but something about Sulu’s manner stopped him.

Besides, Kirk thought, isn’t this a perfect opportunity to let him know his value to the ship? And to me? That’s a good exchange for a little time. And he doesn’t look in any state for peaceful sleep; something’s really bothering him.

“Why don’t you come up to my cabin, Mr. Sulu? We can talk over some brandy.”

“Thank you, sir.”

This time it was Kirk’s turn for blank astonishment. “A transfer?” he asked. “Why? Where? What’s happened to make you unhappy on the Enterprise ?”

“I’m happy here, Captain!” Sulu cupped his hands around the brandy glass. Above all, he wanted Kirk to understand why he had to take this step. The scent of the brandy, almost as intoxicating as the liquor itself, curled up around his face. “Captain, I have an unexceptional record—”

“Your record’s exemplary, Mr. Sulu!”

Sulu began again. “Serving on the Enterprise is a bright mark on anyone’s record. It’s the only thing outstanding about mine—and I think I must have got it by sheer luck.”

“Oh?” Kirk asked. “Do you think I choose my crew at random?”

Sulu blushed, realizing the tactlessness of his remark. “No, sir, of course I don’t. But I don’t know why you did pick me. My marks at the Academy were dead average ...” He paused, for his own disappointment in himself and his performance at the Starfleet Academy was an ache that had never faded.

“I didn’t just look at your cumulative marks,” Kirk said. “Moving around the way your family did was bound to leave you less well-prepared than most cadets. So every time you encountered a new subject you started out pretty nearly at the bottom of the class.”

Sulu did not look up. He was embarrassed, for that was true.

“And then,” Kirk said, “you got better and better, until you mastered the subject completely. That’s my idea of a potentially fine officer, Mr. Sulu.”

“Thank you, Captain...”

“I haven’t convinced you, have I?”

“I have to live with my record, sir. Whatever you saw behind it...”

“Your next captain might not?”

Sulu nodded.

“I think you’re underestimating yourself.”

“No, sir! I’m sorry, sir, but maybe for once I’m not. I love this ship, and that’s the problem. It would be so easy to stay—but if my name comes up on a couple of promotion lists, I’ll be promoted right off it. Eventually I might get a command position. But unless I distinguish myself somehow, unless I get as much experience in as many branches of Starfleet as I can, I’ll never be able to hope for more than command of some supply-line barge, or a quiet little outpost somewhere.”

Kirk hesitated; Sulu wondered if the captain would try to reassure him, or try to convince him that he did not understand how Starfleet worked and in which direction his career was likely to proceed.

Kirk looked at his drink. “There’s no shame in a quiet command.”

Sulu took a sip of brandy to give himself some time. “Captain, living my life without shame is important to me. It’s necessary—but it isn’t sufficient. Watching the diplomacy has been an education in itself, and I wouldn’t have missed the exploration for anything. But without something more, my career dead-ends in another two steps.”

He watched Kirk’s face anxiously, trying to read his expression. Finally Kirk looked up, and his voice carried an edge of coldness.

“I never would have thought Hunter would shanghai my crew—it is Aerfen you want to transfer to?”

“Yes, sir—but Captain Hunter said nothing to me of this! I’ve been thinking about it for a long time. My very first duty preference was for assignment to a fighter squadron, and it was only because the Enterprise ’s requirements took precedence over everything else that I was assigned here.” He was not sure that was the right thing to admit to Captain Kirk, but it was true. “I’ve discussed the possibility with one friend on board, but otherwise you’re the only person I’ve spoken to.” It would have been unethical to apply to Hunter first, and Sulu was rather hurt that Kirk assumed he had done so. “I know she’s lost two people in her crew, but I’m not under any illusions: there’s got to be a waiting list of volunteers for Aerfen . I don’t even know what positions need to be filled or whether I’d be suited to fill one. I have no way of knowing how she’ll react to my application even if you approve it.” He leaned forward earnestly. “Sir, I’ve never lied to you before, and I’m not about to start now. You can ask Captain Hunter if I’ve talked to her about this—she doesn’t seem to me to be the sort of person who would lie, either.”

Sulu could not tell from the far-away, introspective look on Kirk’s face how the captain would react now. Perhaps he was only trying to keep anger in check.

“Mr. Sulu,” he said, “what happens if she doesn’t accept your application, or if Starfleet has already assigned new people?”

“Captain Kirk . .. this is something I’ve got to try to do, whether it’s Captain Hunter’s squadron or some other.”

For the first time since Sulu had come in, Kirk smiled. Sulu had never been quite so grateful to see that expression on anyone in his life.

“I don’t know how Hunter will respond to your application, either, Mr. Sulu,” Kirk said. “But if she refuses it she’ll be a long time looking for anyone half as good.”

The process went faster than Sulu ever imagined possible. He was granted an immediate temporary transfer to Aerfen . At first he wondered if perhaps he had been accepted out of desperation, because the fighter was so short-handed. It was possible that Hunter did not really want him on her ship. But Kirk assured him, and Captain Hunter reassured him by her manner, than he was accepted on his merits both past and potential, and that the transfer would be permanent as soon as the red tape threaded its convoluted way through the bureaucratic machinery. So at six hundred hours, barely five hours after he had spoken to Kirk, he stood in the middle of his emptied room, a full duffel bag and a small box of miscellaneous stuff at his feet, and his antique sabre in his hands.

Carrying it, he left his cabin, walked quietly down the corridor, and knocked softly on Mandala’s door. The answer was almost instantaneous.

“Come in!”

The lock clicked free; he went into the darkened cabin.

“What’s the matter?” Mandala had her uniform shirt half over her head already, assuming an emergency for which she would be needed.

“It’s all right,” Hikaru said. “It’s just me.”

She looked out at him from the tangle of her shirt. It covered the lower half of her face like a mask, and

pulled loose strands of her hair across her forehead.

“Oh, hi,” she said. “You don’t look like you’ve come to get me to help repel an invasion.” She pulled her shirt off again, tossed it on a chair with her pants, and waved the light to the next brightest setting. The gold highlights in her red hair gleamed. When she was on duty she never wore her hair down like this, in a mass that curled around her face and shoulders and all the way to the small of her back. In fact Hikaru supposed he was one of the few people on board who had ever seen it down.

Mandala’s smile faded. “On the other hand you look like something’s wrong. What is it, Hikaru? Sit down.”

He sat on the edge of her bunk. She drew up her knees, still under the blanket, and wrapped her arms around them.

“Come on,” she said gently. “What’s the matter?”

“I did it,” he said. “I applied for a transfer to Hunter’s squadron.”

“She accepted you!” Mandala said with delight.

He nodded.

“You ought to be turning cartwheels,” she said. “It’s just perfect for you.”

“I’m beginning to wonder if I made a mistake. I’m having second thoughts.”

“Hikaru, the Enterprise is a great assignment, but you haven’t been wrong in thinking you need wider experience.”

“I wasn’t thinking professionally. I was thinking personally.”

She glanced away, then back, looked straight into his eyes, and took his hand.

“You see what I meant,” she said. “About getting too attached to anybody.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know how you feel. I didn’t even mean to talk about that. I just came to say goodbye, and to give you my sabre. It takes me over the mass allowance.”

Mandala accepted the sabre with the dignity due to it: it was an old sword, and a finely-made one.

“Thank you,” she said. She bent her head down, resting her face against her knees, and he thought she was crying.

“Mandala, hey, I’m sorry—”

Shaking her head violently without looking up, she grabbed his wrist to stop the apology. When she did raise her head, he saw that she was laughing so hard she was in tears.

“No,” she said. “ I’m sorry. It’s beautiful, I’m not laughing at the sabre, only I am, sort of, if I were quick enough on my feet I’d give you—” She glanced around. “Ha, there!” She pulled the heavy ring off the middle finger of her right hand. It was a naturally-formed circle of a stone like ruby, very much the color

of her hair, even to the same golden highlights, at the facets. Except when she was practicing judo, she always wore it. She slipped it on his little finger.

In shooting for her promotion to lieutenant commander, one of the subjects Mandala studied was psychology, including its history. Smiling, she told Hikaru about another century’s theory of sex and symbols: swords and sheaths, locks and keys. When she was finished, he laughed with her at the quaint ideas of a different age.

They looked at each other soberly.

“Did you mean it, what you said before ...”

“I very seldom say anything I don’t mean,” Mandala said. “ Haveyou changed your mind?”

“I... I don’t know.”

“It won’t make things any easier for you, but I wish you would.”

“I’ve been falling in love with you ever since you came on board,” Hikaru said. “But I’m leaving —”

She put her hands on his shoulders. “If you do change your mind it won’t make things easier for me, either. I love you, too, Hikaru, as much as I’ve fought it, and I don’t know if we’re going to be sorrier if we do make love—or if we don’t.”

Mandala stroked his cheek, the corner of his jaw, the hollow of his throat. He leaned toward her and she responded, kissing him gently, her hands spread against his back.

“You can’t imagine how often I’ve wanted to do that,” she whispered. She unfastened his shirt and drew it up over his head, caressing his sides with her fingers. She watched him pull off his boots and his pants; again, she admired his compact athlete’s body. She lifted the bedclothes for him to get in beside her, and as he lay down and turned toward her she drew her hand up his thigh, to his hip, to his waist. Her fingers made slow swirling patterns on his skin, and he shivered. Hikaru kissed her face, all over, small warm kisses; he caressed her and stroked her hair and kissed the scar on her shoulder as if he wanted to take away all the pain it represented. Mandala bent over him and let her hair curl down to touch his shoulders. Cautiously at first, then playfully, then joyfully, they loved each other.

Jim Kirk sat in the officers’ lounge, his hands wrapped around a mug of hot coffee. He felt depressed. The door slid open and Dr. McCoy beetled in.

“Mornin’, Jim,” he said cheerfully, his southern accent strongly in evidence, as it always was when he was under the influence of several drinks, or of a hangover. Kirk could not tell which it was, and he was in no mood to put up with either.

“What a night,” McCoy said. He got himself a mug and sat down across from Kirk. “What a night. The same for you, too? You look like I feel.”

“Yes,” Kirk said, though he was not really listening. “It was quite a night.” He had spent most of it on the subspace communicator, trying to clear away the red tape for Sulu’s transfer, and now he was beginning to think he had made a serious mistake. Perhaps if he had not been so efficient, Mr. Sulu would have

changed his mind.

“I thought so,” McCoy said. “I sure hope you had as good a time as I did.”

“As good a time—?” Kirk went back in his memory over what McCoy had been saying, and realized that since the doctor had only just come back from Aleph, he had no way of knowing about Sulu. In fact, Kirk had seen neither hide nor hair of McCoy since meeting him and his veterinarian friend in the park the day before.

“Bones, what are you talking about?”

“Well—I admit I’d had a few when I ran into you yesterday, but you weren’t that subtle.”

Kirk just stared at him.

“Jim, boy, you really looked happy. I don’t know when I’ve seen you looking so good. Now, you know I think more constancy in some matters wouldn’t hurt you one bit—”

Kirk could not stand it when McCoy got avuncular, especially this early in the morning.

“—so it’s a real pleasure to see you with an old friend.”

Kirk realized what McCoy had inferred. For some reason it irritated him, though, to be fair, McCoy had no particular reason to think anything else. Besides, why should Kirk care what McCoy thought about his and Hunter’s friendship? The truth was no one’s business but their own.

“You’ve got the wrong idea, Bones,” Kirk said.

McCoy slid into the bantering tone by which, all too often, the two men avoided discussing anything that was really important.

“What, Don Juan T. Kirk, Casanova of the space-ways—”

“Shut up!”

McCoy looked at him, startled out of joking, realizing that everything he had said so far this morning was as close to perfectly wrong as an imperfect human could devise.

“Jim,” he said quietly, all traces of the good old boy abandoned, “I’m sorry. I knew you and she used to see a lot of each other, and I just assumed ... I didn’t mean to bring up anything painful.”

Kirk shook his head. “It isn’t your fault. It isn’t even an unfair assumption, given my usual behavior.”

“Do you want to talk about it? Or would you rather I slunk away, as best I can with my foot in my mouth?”

“Hunter and I are friends. She’s one of the best friends I have. We used to be lovers. We aren’t anymore. She’s a member of a partnership family—”

“Oh. Well. That explains it.” “No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t even begin to explain it.”

“Jim, now I am beginning to get confused.”

“Partnerships aren’t usually exclusive relationships. Hers certainly isn’t. There are nine people in it now, I think—nine adults, I mean. Four or five of them have careers like Hunter’s, that keep them away most of the time. But with the larger group, the kids have some stability. I met Hunter’s daughter a few years back...” At first they had not got along too well; he was not used to being around children. At least he had realized in time that his patronizing manner insulted her, and that she despised him for it. Once he started treating her as a reasoning human being, they began to work out a watchful friendship.

“Her daughter!” McCoy said, surprised. He had not considered Hunter in any but her Starfleet officer incarnation, and he was nearly as startled as he would have been if Jim Kirk himself had started telling stories of his kiddies back home.

“It isn’t that often that you meet someone whose father you almost had a chance to be,” Kirk said.

McCoy took a long swallow from his coffee mug and rather wished it had something stronger in it.

“I nearly joined Hunter’s group, Bones. After I met them the first few times, they invited me—they invited me three different times, over four years. I felt comfortable with them. I liked them all. I think ...

I think I could have loved them all.” He stopped and did not continue for several seconds. When he did, his voice grew very quiet. “I thought I wasn’t ready for such a big step. I kept turning them down. Maybe I wasn’t ready. Maybe I wouldn’t be ready even now. Maybe I made the right decision. But most of the time I think that saying no was the biggest mistake I ever made in my life.”

“It’s never too late to correct a mistake.”

“I don’t think I agree with you about that,” Kirk said. “But anyway they never asked me again after I started to wonder if I should have accepted.”

“You could ask them.”

Kirk shook his head. “It doesn’t work that way. It would be such bad manners that they’d almost have to say no.”

“But if the partnership isn’t exclusive, and you and she are still friends—”

“That’s what I thought, for a long while. After the first time they asked me, I thought nothing had changed. Hunter and I were so close for so long .. . But she was growing up and I was still treating everything as nothing more than play. Play is fine up to a point. Play is why the partnership isn’t exclusive. But for me and Hunter—especially after the second invitation into the partnership—it was like I was teasing her, all the time, as if I were willing to go just so far but no farther in trusting her, but expected her to trust me completely. She even told me her dream-name. Do you know what that means?”

“No, I guess I don’t.”

“Either did I, at the time. It’s hard to explain, but it’s something even deeper than trusting another person with your life.”

Kirk paused again, and McCoy waited for him to continue, knowing how hard it was for Jim to speak of such personal matters.

“We had a lot of serious misunderstandings,” Jim said. “So much so that when they offered me the invitation for the third time, I was surprised. And when I said no the third time, she was surprised. And hurt. I think she very nearly stopped trusting me at all, then. It’s probably a good thing that she got sent one direction and I got sent the other and we didn’t see each other again for a couple of years.”

McCoy listened to a side of his friend that he seldom saw, realizing that all too often he let the clear and hearty surface obscure the depths. Kirk almost never let anyone detect even a hint of private pain; and he had learned a few things from Spock about concealing it, even as he teased the Vulcan about really being human underneath. Truth to tell, Kirk himself was more deeply human underneath than he cared to admit. McCoy wished he could think of something to say that would help.

Kirk took a deep breath and let it out fast and hard. “Jim,” McCoy said carefully, hoping, as he did so, that he was not pushing even their friendship too far, “couldn’t you say to Hunter what you just said to me—about thinking you made a mistake? That wouldn’t be the same as asking to join the partnership, would it?”

“I don’t know. I’ve thought about it. But I don’t know anymore if she wants to hear that. Why should she? And even if she does, it would put her in an uncomfortable position. What if the rest of the group said no? Bones, what if they said yes and I got cold feet at the last minute? That would be nothing less than a deliberate insult. It’s the only strain I don’t think our friendship could survive. Not again.”

“You don’t ordinarily change your mind once you’ve made it up.”

“This is different.”

“Why?”

Kirk shrugged. “It just is.”

Ten hundred hours. Sulu set his duffel bag and his box of irregularly shaped oddments on one of the transporter platforms, then turned back to all his friends. Word of his transfer had spread almost instantaneously, it appeared, and for once he was glad of the highly efficient ship’s grapevine. He would never have had time to find all his friends, much less his acquaintances. But here they were, crowded into the transporter room to wish him well: the members of his beginning fencing class; Pavel Chekov and Janice Rand and Christine Chapel; the elderly yogi of the Enterprise , Beatrice Smith; Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy and Uhura. Even Mr. Spock was there. As Sulu bid them all goodbye, he had a sudden, frightening feeling of apprehension, the conviction that there was something very wrong with what was happening, even though he wanted it, and that the pendulum would swing back very soon, with force and speed enough to crush him. He shrugged off the experience as understandable anxiety; besides, he had never had a prophetic flash before, and his ESP rating was no better than average.

He did not shake hands with Mr. Spock, as he did with Captain Kirk, certainly did not embrace him, as he hugged Uhura, and, then, Dr. McCoy. Instead, Sulu bowed solemnly to the science officer. Spock raised his hand in the Vulcan equivalent.

“Live long and prosper, Mr. Sulu,” he said.

“Thank you, Mr. Spock.”

Sulu turned. “Mandala...”

She put her arms around him. “We were right, Hikaru,” she said, too softly for anyone else to hear. “But even that doesn’t make it any easier.”

“No,” he said. His vision blurred; he was embarrassed by the tears.

“Take care of yourself,” she said.

“You, too.”

He turned abruptly and bounded up onto the transporter platform. He could not stand to remain in Mandala’s arms in a place so public. They had said their goodbyes in private.

She raised her hand in a gesture of farewell. Sulu returned it, then glanced at Spock, behind the console, and nodded. The flickering coldness of the beam engulfed him, and he disappeared.

After Sulu had left, the transporter room slowly cleared out. The mood was one of general depression, to which Mandala Flynn was far more than ordinarily susceptible. She gave herself a good mental shake and forcibly turned her attention to her job. In a few minutes their prisoner would arrive. She felt uneasy about the whole assignment, and she knew something unusual was going on. The captain and the science officer knew what it was, but neither had taken her into his confidence.

‘Theirs not to make reply,/Theirs not to reason why,/ Theirs but to do and die’: Flynn thought the line in the same cynical tone in which Tennyson had written it, not with the nonsensical approval or unquestioning attention to obedience that had encrusted it more and more thickly as the centuries passed.

The more she knew about an assignment, the better she could carry it out: she had never encountered an exception to that proposition. But the senior officers of the Enterprise did not know her well enough to know how far they could trust her; she wondered if Captain Kirk would ever trust her. He had shown no sign of being willing to do so yet.

Without explanation, he had told her straight out that he did not expect their carrier’s mission to pose much challenge. But he had asked her to arrange an impressive security force. And there was clearly no arguing with Mr. Spock about the use of the guest cabin. So the inexplicable Mister Mordreaux would be hermetically secure from the transporter to his cabin—but after that, Flynn could not be so confident, even putting him under twenty-four-hour guard, even with the new security door on the cabin and the energy-screens around it.

Who, Flynn wondered, is putting on a show for whom? Who is fooling whom? And, more important, why?

Kirk glanced at her.

“We’re about ready to receive the prisoner, Commander Flynn.”

“Yes, sir. The guard detail is due here at 1015 hours, as you requested.” She could hear their footsteps in the corridor.

She could not repress a smile when the team came in. She hoped they did not feel ridiculous, but they knew why they had been chosen: she had thought it best to tell them what little she knew. Each of the five carried a phaser rifle, but the weapons paled before the physical presence of the security officers themselves.

Beranardi al Auriga, her second in command, stood over two meters tall and was as blocky and solid as collapsed matter, black-skinned, fire-eyed, with a bushy red beard and flame-colored hair in all shades of red and orange and blond.

Neon, despite iridescent scales and a long tail spiked like a stegosaurus’, most resembled an economy-sized Tyrannosaurus rex. Human beings often thought of her in dinosaur terms: strong and dangerous but slow and stupid. She was quick as electricity and the facets of her I.Q. that Starfleet could measure started at 200 and went up from there.

Snnanagfashtalli and Jenniver Aristeides had been obvious choices for the team. Jenniver towered over even Barry al Auriga. She was like a steel statue. Flynn had, at first, thought Aristeides the most grotesquely ugly human creature she had ever seen, but after a few weeks she began to feel that the quiet woman had a strange, stony, sculptural beauty.

Snnanagfashtalli was the only truly vicious member of the team. After seeing her in action the day before, Flynn had decided to use her only on assignments when she was sure nothing would happen, or when she was certain something would. Snarl did not attack for no reason, and she attacked ferociously when she had cause, but she was not good in the middle ground when restraint and discipline were called for. She possessed neither. Under stress she was more likely to use her ruby fangs than her phaser.

Maximo Alisaunder Arrunja, the last member of the team, had a talent for blending into crowds. He was a craggy-faced, graying, middle-aged man. When he decided not to blend, he emanated the most chillingly dangerous aura of anyone Flynn had ever met. She had seen him break up an incipient fistfight between two irritable crew members: he never had to lay a finger on either of them, he did not even have to threaten them. They surrendered out of pure irrational terror at what he might do.

Flynn glanced at Captain Kirk. “I hope the security force is adequate, sir.”

“Yes, Commander Flynn,” he said, so poker-faced that she knew her assessment of the situation was not far wrong.

Flynn glanced at al Auriga. “All set, Barry?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said softly.

Then, after half a beat, Jenniver Aristeides said, “If we’re waiting for a troop of Klingons.”

She just barely smiled. Max laughed, the sound like a growl, Neon made an eerie, tinkling, wind-chime noise, Barry giggled, and Snarl glanced from face to face, rumbling low in her throat, wondering if it were she who was being laughed at. Along with restraint and discipline, Snarl also lacked a sense of humor.

“I appreciate all of you a very great deal,” Flynn said. Snarl raised her ears and smoothed her hackles and glided silently to her position by the transporter.

“Captain Kirk,” Mr. Spock said, in a tone Flynn would have called very near distress, if anyone had asked her. “Captain Kirk, Dr. Mordreaux is an elderly academic. This . .. this .. . guerrilla strike force is

hardly necessary.”

“Come now, Mr. Spock—we want Ian Braithewaite to see that we’re taking him seriously, don’t we?”

Spock’s gaze moved from Kirk, to Flynn, and across the security group. He looked at the ceiling for a long moment.

“As you wish, Captain.”

The transporter signalled ready, and a moment later the prisoner and Aleph Prime’s chief prosecutor materialized. Flynn’s quintet put their phaser rifles at ready, and she rested her hand easily on the butt of her holstered phaser pistol.

Why—he’s drugged, Flynn thought, as soon as Mordreaux solidified. The blank expression and unfocussed gaze allowed no other interpretation. In addition, the prisoner wore energy-cuffs on his wrists, and a set of inertial-resistance leg restraints that would permit him to walk, but which would snap short and trip him if he overcame the drugs long enough to try to run. It was all as old-fashioned as a set of iron chains, as unnecessary and as humiliating. Mordreaux was in no shape to notice humiliation. Flynn glanced at Spock, but his face remained impassive; he had apparently expended any outburst on the guerrilla strike force.

Braithewaite bounded down from the platform, glanced briefly at the security team, and nodded to Kirk. “Great,” he said. “Where’s the detention cell?”

“Mr. Braithewaite,” Kirk said, “I’m taking the Enterprise out of orbit immediately. There’s no time for you to look around, nor any need.”

“But Captain—I’m going to Rehab Seven with you.”

‘That’s impossible.”

“It’s orders, Captain.” He handed Kirk a subspace transmission form. Kirk scanned it, frowning.

“You’ll be on your own getting back, and as you pointed out yourself there aren’t many official ships.”

“I know, Captain,” Ian Braithewaite said. His expression turned somber and thoughtful. “After what’s happened—this trial, and Lee, and . .. well, I need some time by myself. To think some things out. I’ve arranged for a single-ship; I’m going to sail back.” He glanced down at Kirk. “I’ll do my best to stay out of your hair till we get to Rehab Seven, and you won’t have to worry about me afterward.”

He hurried after the security team and his prisoner. Kirk paused a moment, feeling rather nonplussed at being told not to worry about someone who proposed to fly all the way across a star system, all alone, in a tiny, fragile, unpowered sailboat. Shaking his head, he followed the others out of the transporter room.

Jim Kirk returned to his cabin and collapsed in a chair, too tired to move even as far as his bunk. He had had no sleep in thirty-six hours; he had lost the best helm officer the ship ever had; his science officer, trying to salvage some results from his observations of the singularity, some possible explanation for its occurrence, had tied up most of the available computer time working out equations that no one else could even read, let alone understand; and Mr. Scott had just begun irritably demanding engineering’s share of the computer time. A brilliant lunatic or a slandered genius—possibly both—was under detention in the

V.I.P. cabin, and his unrelentingly energetic watchdog was quartered nearby. The ship flew creaking like a relic, the warp engines needed a complete overhaul, and even the impulse drive was working none too dependably.

One of the reasons Kirk felt so exhausted was that Ian Braithewaite’s animation never let up. It would have been far easier to deal with him if he were despicable, but he was only young, inexperienced, likeable ... and ambitious.

Kirk regretted, now, that he had not explained to Commander Flynn just exactly what was going on—though she obviously knew it was something not quite completely above board. When Kirk pled the press of work and tried to persuade Ian to get settled in, the prosecutor waylaid Flynn for a tour of the security precautions. Kirk hoped she was perceptive enough to continue the show they had set up. He believed she was; now he would find out.

Kirk could not keep his thoughts away from his conversation that morning with Dr. McCoy. Part of him wished it had never happened; he did not often go in for soulbaring, and on the rare occasion that he did, he always felt embarrassed afterward.

Damn, he thought, but that’s just what we were talking about. Leonard McCoy and Hunter are the two best friends I’ve got, and I can’t even open up to either of them.

It’s absurd. I’ve been trading my life for a fa9ade of total independence that I know is full of holes even when I’m holding it up in front of me. It isn’t worth it anymore—if it ever was.

If Spock succeeds in clearing Mordreaux, we’ll have to bring him back to Aleph Prime. Even if he doesn’t, the Enterprise needs a lot of work before we can even think of restarting Spock’s observations, and the nearest repair yards are at Aleph. If Hunter has already left, I can hire a racer and fly out to wherever she’s got her squadron based. I need to see her again. I need to talk to her—really talk to her this time. Bones was right: even if it doesn’t change anything, I’ve got to tell her I was wrong.

Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott tramped down the corridor, muttering curses in an obscure Scots dialect. Six weeks’ work for nothing, six weeks’ work that would have to be done all over again, or more likely abandoned if it were so trivial that it could be interrupted only two days from completion—and for such a foolish reason. Ever since the mysterious emergency message came and they had been diverted, all he had heard was Poor Mr. Spock, poor Mr. Spock, all his work for nothing.

And what, Scott wondered, about poor Mr. Scott? Keeping a starship’s engines steady in the proximity of a naked singularity was no picnic, and he had been at it just as long as Spock had been at his task.

The engines had been under a terrific strain, and it was Scott’s job to be sure they did not fail: if they had given out during a correction of the orbit, the mission would have ended instantly—or it would have lasted a lot longer than six weeks, depending on where one looked at it from. From outside, the Enterprise would have fallen toward the deranged metric, growing fainter and fuzzier, till it vanished. From inside the ship, the crew would have seen space itself vanish, then reappear—assuming the ship made the transit whole, rather than in pieces—but it would have been space in some other place, and

some other time, and the Enterprise ’s chances of getting home again would have been so close to zero as to be unmeasurable.

The engines were much of the cause of Scott’s foul mood. While everyone on the ship, or so many as made no never-mind, received a day’s liberty on Aleph Prime, Scott—rather than relaxing in the best place in this octant to spend liberty—had used every minute hunting up parts and getting them back to the ship. That was only the beginning of the work: he still had to install the new equipment in the disconnected warp engines. He felt far from comfortable, with impulse engines, alone, available to power the Enterprise . But they could not dock at Aleph Prime: no, they had to carry out their mission. Mission, hah.

Then there was the matter of Sulu. True, Scott and Sulu were not particularly close, but he had known the helm officer for years and it was downright embarrassing to resurface after six hours fighting energy pods, to find not only that he had left, without so much as a good-to-know-you, but also that virtually everyone except Scott knew he had gone.

He passed the transporter room, then stopped. He thought he saw a flicker of light, as if someone were using the unit. Of course that was impossible: they were too far from anywhere to beam anyone on board. Nevertheless, Scott backtracked.

Mr. Spock stood in the middle of the room, as if he had just materialized on the platform, stepped down, and walked two or three steps before halting: his shoulders were slumped and he looked ready to fall.

“Mr. Spock?”

Spock froze for no more than a second, then straightened up and turned calmly toward the chief engineer.

“Mr. Scott. I should have ... expected you.”

“Did ye page me? Are ye all right? Is something wrong wi’ the transporter?” No doubt someone had neglected to ask him to fix it, though that was one of his responsibilities: it seemed as though no one thought Scott worth telling anything to, these days.

“I simply noticed some minor power fluctuations, Mr. Scott,” the science officer said. “They could become reason for complaint.”

“I can come back and help ye,” Scott said, “as soon as I’ve reported to Captain Kirk about the engines.” He frowned. Spock, who never showed any reaction to stress, looked drawn and tired—,far more tired even than Scott felt. So everyone—human, superhuman, Vulcan, and even Mr. Spock—had limits after all.

“That is unnecessary,” Spock said. “The work is almost complete.” He did not move. Scott remained in the doorway a moment longer, then turned on his heel and left Spock alone. After all these years, he should no longer be offended if Spock did not say thank you for an offer of help he had not asked for and did not need. But today Scott was of a mind to be offended by nearly anything.

As the chief engineer approached the turbo lift, a tall thin civilian hurried up: no doubt he was one of the people they had collected on Aleph. When Kirk had not taken Scott into his confidence about the reason for the change in plans, Scott had assumed some essential, vitally secret task had been assigned to them.

He had assumed they were working on a strictly need-to-know basis. The assumptions were false, the message was trivial, and Scott had been left in the dark simply because, as usual, no one had troubled to let him know what was going on.

Scott nodded to the civilian as they got into the lift; he wished he were alone because he felt more like being grumpy in private than churlish in public.

“Hold the lift!”

Scott pushed the doors open again and the captain came in. He looked rested; his uniform was fresh: Scott, on the other hand, had spent the six hours since leaving Aleph in the engine room, and he felt grubby.

“Hello, Scotty,” Captain Kirk said.

“Captain,” Scott replied shortly. It occurred to him suddenly that the civilian must be nearly the last one to have used the transporter, the person Spock implied had complained.

“Sir,” Scott said abruptly, “could ye describe to me how ye felt, when ye arrived on the transporter? It would help track down the difficulty.”

The civilian looked startled.

“Sorry, sir,” Scott said. “I’m the chief engineer, my name is Scott.”

“Good lord, Scotty,” Kirk said, “is the transporter on the blink too?”

“Your transporter worked fine as far as I could tell,” the civilian said. He grinned. “I thought it was supposed to shake you up a little.”

The doors opened and they all stepped out onto the bridge.

“I don’t know what’s wrong wi’ it, Captain,” Scott said. “Mr. Spock just this moment told me—”

Scott stopped short, and his voice failed him as he stared in astonishment at the science officer’s station. There, in his usual place, Spock bent over his computer terminal.

Captain Kirk and the civilian went down to the lower level of the bridge, where Commander Flynn leaned against the railing waiting for them. Scott followed, but he could not drag his gaze away from Spock, and he stumbled on the stairs. Flynn grabbed his arm to steady him.

“You okay?”

“Aye,” he said, irked; he pulled away from her.

Kirk took his seat and turned back toward Scott.

“What’s the bad news on the engines, Scotty?”

“The engines are no’ in very good shape, Captain. I got most of the parts we needed on Aleph, and I can keep things together to do what’s needed as long as the warp drive isna pushed, once i’ is on line

again. ‘Twould be better to stay at sublight, till we’ve had a thorough overhaul...”

His voice trailed off as Spock came down to listen.

“What’s wrong, Scotty?” Kirk asked.

“Well, nae a thing, really, Captain—but, Mr. Spock, how did ye beat me to the bridge? I came here direct from the transporter room.”

Spock cocked one eyebrow. “The transporter room, Mr. Scott? I have been on the bridge since Mr. Sulu left; I have not been near the transporter room for several hours.”

“But you said there was something wrong wi’ it.”

“I am unaware of any malfunction.”

“Ye said it had power fluctuations, Mr. Spock, and that i’ was nearly fixed. But what I dinna understand is how you got up here before I did.” Among the junior officers were one or two inveterate practical jokers, but Spock would never engage in such frivolity, nor cooperate with it. Scott shook his head, as if that would disperse the fog of exhaustion and confusion that surrounded him. Everything would be so much clearer if only he did not feel so tired.

“Mr. Scott, I have been here on the bridge for some time.”

“But I just saw ye—I just spoke wi’ ye!”

Spock said nothing, but he raised his eyebrow again.

“Idid see ye!”

“Scotty,” Kirk said, “how late did you stay out last night?”

Scott turned toward his captain. “Captain, that isna fair! I took no liberty—I did naught but work on the engines!”

“You were supposed to take liberty,” Kirk said, in a much more placating tone. “Scotty, we’re all tired, we’ve all been under a lot of stress for a long time. I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for what you saw—”

“You’re saying I’m hallucinating, Captain! I dinna hallucinate Mr. Spock in the transporter room any more than I’m hallucinating him now!”

“I’m saying no such thing. I’m saying I want you to get some rest. We’ll talk about this later, if we need to.”

Kirk’s expression forbade more comment. Scott hesitated, but clearly he was to be excluded from any further conversation. Spock regarded him quizzically, but failed to offer any explanation for his peculiar behavior.

Well, then, Scott thought, with the irritation of generations of lower officers kept in the dark by red tape, high brass, and their own immediate superiors: Well then, so there is something unusual going on, after all;

this isna a foul-up; this isna a mere courier run. Doubtless I’ll find out all abou’ it eventually. And perhaps I’ll even learn the truth for mysel’ wi’out waiting for anyone to deign to say what it may be.

He left the bridge, knowing that the science officer was following him with his gaze, assuming Kirk was even now saying privately to Spock, with admiration and respect, “Well, we can’t keep anything from Scotty very long, can we?” and Spock replying, “No, Captain; he has deductive faculties of a power unusual in human beings.” Scott entered the lift to return to his quarters, looking forward to a shower—a water shower, hot water, too—and to the quick drink he had denied himself earlier. Then he intended to take a long nap.

He still could not figure out how Spock had got past him from the transporter room to the bridge. For that was what he had done, whether he was admitting it or not.

Back on the bridge, Kirk would have liked to ask Spock what that scene with Scotty had been all about, but he had to turn his attention immediately to Ian Braithewaite.

“Captain Kirk— arewe travelling at sublight speed?”

Kirk sighed. “Mr. Braithewaite, Rehab Seven is so close to Aleph Prime—relatively speaking—that if we tried to reach it at warp speed, we’d overshoot. We’d strain the engines far past the danger point with such rapid acceleration and deceleration.”

“Wait, Captain, I wasn’t objecting—I’ve never been on a starship before, I’m glad to have the chance to look around. I kind of hoped I’d experience warp speed once in my life, though,” he said wistfully.

Kirk began to find it extremely difficult to maintain his irritation at Ian Braithewaite.

“Well, you never know what opportunities will come up,” he said. “But you asked to discuss security. I thought Commander Flynn should be here, too.”

Flynn had kept her silence; now she stepped forward to join them.

Ian pulled a folded slip of paper from his pocket. “This came while you were asleep, Captain.” He handed it over.

Kirk read it: another Aleph citizen had come down with hypermorphic botulism.

“Do you think Aleph will need my ship’s medical facilities as backup? Are you worried about an epidemic?”

“I almost wish I were,” Ian said. “But since my friend Lee was Dr. Mordreaux’s defense counsel, and Judge Desmoulins heard the case, I have to think it could be deliberate.”

“Someonepoisoned them?”

“I have no proof. But I think it’s at least possible.”

“Why?”

“At this point I could only speculate. But the coincidence makes me very uncomfortable. And scared.

The possibility that troubles me most is that someone might be trying to free Dr. Mordreaux. I think we should intensify security.”

“Ian,” Kirk said tolerantly, “I can certainly understand why you’re upset. But you’re perfectly safe on the Enterprise , and Commander Flynn has Dr. Mordreaux’s security well in hand.” He glanced at Flynn for confirmation, but she avoided his eyes. “Commander Flynn?”

She looked at him straight on, with her crystalline green gaze. “I’d prefer to discuss security less publicly, Captain.”

“Oh,” said Kirk, and he understood that she expected him to take a hint—that she was not happy with the security arrangements—just as he had counted on her to take hints since this assignment started. “Well. All right. But after all Dr. Mordreaux is an elderly man—”

“Commander Flynn,” Braithewaite said, “Dr. Mordreaux is my responsibility as much as yours, and I don’t think it’s fair to exclude me from discussions about him. Captain Kirk—”

“Kirk!”

Braithewaite spoke at the same moment as the shriek: for an instant Flynn thought it was he who had screamed Kirk’s name.

“You destroyed me, Kirk! You deserve to die!”

In shock, everyone turned.

Dr. Mordreaux, wild-eyed, stood at the entrance to the bridge. He thrust out an ugly, heavy pistol, and gestured to Flynn and Braithewaite with its muzzle. “You two, out of the way.”

“Dr. Mordreaux,” Braithewaite said, “don’t make things worse for yourself—”

In the hypersensitivity of a rush of adrenaline, Flynn saw the pistol steady as Braithewaite started toward Mordreaux. She thought, Wrong, wrong, that is just the wrong thing to do, brave but stupid, damn all amateurs; as the hammer cocked she had already flung herself forward. Her momentum rammed Braithewaite out of the line of fire and carried her to the upper level of the bridge. One more second’s hesitation in Mordreaux and her hand would clamp around his wrist, one more second—Damn Kirk for not telling her what was going on, damn him for making this sound trivial, if he had not she would have kept her phaser on and to hell with general regulations. Another instant—

The gun went off.

The explosion of sound surprised her more than the crushing jolt that hurled her to the deck.

Jim Kirk leaped to his feet. The gun went off a second time, the sound cutting through the cacophonous disorder on the bridge. The bullet smashed into him, engulfing him in a nova-bright haze of pain.

Mordreaux stepped backwards into the lift and the doors closed, a moment before Spock reached them. The science officer did not waste time trying to force them open. He leaped back down the stairs, past Commander Flynn struggling to her feet, and slapped the paging switch.

“Dr. McCoy to the bridge immediately! Trauma team, emergency nine!”

Spock knelt beside Jim Kirk.

“Jim...”

The bridge was in chaos around them. Blood spattered deck and bulkheads and glistened on the illuminated data screens. The security commander, her hand clamped over the wound in her shoulder, gave orders crisply over the intercom, deploying her forces to apprehend Mordreaux. Blood dripped between her fingers and sprinkled the floor beside Spock, like rain.

The second bullet had taken Kirk full in the chest. His blood gushed fresh with each beat of his heart. That meant at least that his heart was still beating.

“Spock...” Jim fought his way up through massive scarlet light, until he forced enough of it away to see beyond it.

“Lie still, Jim. Dr. McCoy is on his way.”

Spock tried to stop the bleeding. Jim cried out and fumbled for Spock’s wrist. “Don’t,” he said.

“Please...” He felt the blood bubbling up in his lungs.

The wound was too deep, too bad, to quell by direct pressure. Spock ceased the futile effort that only caused pain. Jim felt himself gently lifted, gently supported, and the sensation of drowning eased just perceptibly.

“Is anyone else hurt? Mandala...?”

“I’m all right, Captain.” She started up the stairs again.

“Commander Flynn!” Spock said without glancing back.

“What?”

“Do not summon the lift—Dr. McCoy must not be delayed.”

She needed to get below to help her people: she needed to, it was like an instinct. But Spock was right. She waited, swaying unsteadily.

“Mandala, let me help you.” Uhura’s gentle hands guided her around and a few steps forward before she balked.

“No, I can’t.”

“Mandala—”

“Uhura,” she whispered, “Uhura, if I sit down I don’t know if I’ll be able to get back up.”

“Lieutenant Uhura,” Spock snapped, “page Dr. McCoy again.”

Spock did not want to move Jim without a stretcher, but if it and Dr. McCoy did not arrive in another thirty seconds he was going to carry Jim Kirk to sick bay himself.

“What happened, Spock?” Jim whispered. “This was supposed to be... a milk run.” A light pink froth formed on his lips. The bullet had punctured his lungs. His breathing was irregular, and when he tried to draw breath, pain racked him.

“I don’t know, Jim. Please be quiet.”

Jim was slipping down into shock, and there was no more time to lose.

The doors opened and McCoy rushed onto the bridge.

“What happened? Oh, my god—” He saw Flynn first and started toward her.

“Not me,” she said. “It’s the captain.”

He hesitated only a moment, but saw that the blood covering her uniform shirt and spattering her face and hands and hair concealed a high and non-critical shoulder wound; he hurried to Kirk’s side.

Flynn walked into the lift and the doors closed behind her.

McCoy knelt beside Jim.

“Take it easy, Jim, boy,” he said. “We’ll have you in sick bay so fast—”

Kirk had never been so aware of his own pulse, throbbing like a thunderstorm through his body.

“Bones... I...”

“Quiet!”

“You were right. What we talked about... I was going to tell Hunter...”

“You’ll still be able to. Shut up, what kind of talk is this?” McCoy waved the tricorder across Kirk’s body. Jim’s heart was undamaged, but the artery was half severed. The sensor showed a pierced lung, but that was obvious without any mechanical information. The essential thing was to get him on oxygen as fast as possible, then hook him up to a fluid replacer, a heme carrier: he was bleeding so badly that oxygen starvation was the biggest danger.

“Where is the trauma unit?” Spock said, his voice tight.

“On its way,” McCoy said, defending his people though he was angry himself that they were not yet here. But he knew he could save Jim Kirk.

“You’ll be okay, Jim,” he said, and this time he meant it.

But there was something else, a danger signal from the tricorder. McCoy thought immediately of poison, but the readings were in the wrong range. He had never seen anything like this signal before. “What the devil...”

Jim thought he had blood in his eyes. A shimmering cloud passed across his vision.

“I can’t see,” he said. He reached blindly out.

Spock grasped his hand, holding him strongly, deliberately leaving open all the mental and emotional shields he had built during his long association with human beings.

“You will be all right, Jim,” Spock said. He put his right hand to Jim’s temple, completing the telepathic, mystical circuit linking him with his friend. Pain, fear, and regret welled out into him. He accepted it willingly, and felt it ease in Jim. “My strength to yours,” he whispered, too softly for anyone to hear, the words a hypnotic reminder of the techniques he was using. “My strength to yours, my will to yours.”

McCoy saw Spock’s eyelids lower and his eyes roll back till only a crescent of the whites still showed. But he could not pay any attention to what the Vulcan was doing. The lift doors opened and the trauma team rushed in with the support equipment.

“Get down here!” McCoy shouted. They hurried to obey.

They hooked up the trauma unit and oxygen flooded Jim’s body. His starving nerves spread new agony through him. He gasped, and blood choked him. Spock’s long fingers clasped his hand. The pain eased infinitesimally, but Jim’s sight faded almost to pure darkness.

“Spock?”

“I am here, Jim.”

His friend’s hand pressed gently against his temple and the side of his face. Jim felt the closeness, the strength that was keeping him alive. He could no longer see, even in his mind, but in some other, unnamed way he sensed the precision of Spock’s thoughts, their order twisted by Jim’s own pain and fear.

Jim Kirk knew that he was going to die, and that Spock would follow him down the accelerating spiral until he had fallen too deep to return. He would willingly choose death to try to save Kirk’s life.

James Kirk, too, had one choice left.

“Spock ...” he whispered, “take good care ... of my ship.”

He feared he had waited too long, but that terror gave him the strength he needed. He wrenched away from Spock, breaking their contact, forsaking Spock’s strength and will, and giving himself up alone to agony, despair, and death.

The physical resonance of emotional force flung Spock backward. His body thudded against the railing, and he slumped to the floor. He lay still, gathering his strength. The deck felt cool against the side of his face and his outflung hands. The echoes of Jim Kirk’s wounds slowly ebbed. Spock opened his eyes to a gray haze. He blinked, and blinked again: the nictitating membrane swept across the irises, and finally he could see. Spock pushed himself to his feet, fighting to hide his reactions.

Jim’s body now lay on the stretcher of the trauma unit, hooked up to fluid and respirator, breathing but otherwise motionless. His eyes—his eyes, wide open, had clouded over with silver-gray.

“Dr. McCoy—”

“Not now, Spock.”

Spock felt himself trembling. He clenched his fists.

McCoy and part of his medical team floated the trauma unit into the lift, while two of the paramedics stayed behind to take Braithewaite, knocked unconscious in his fall, down to sick bay.

The captain’s body was alive; it could be kept alive indefinitely now.

But Spock had felt Jim Kirk die.

Mandala Flynn leaned against the back bulkhead of the turbo lift, closing her eyes and seeking out the damage to her body in her mind. The bullet tracked diagonally from her collarbone in front on the left, across her back and down, and lodged against her lower ribs like a molten bit of lead. As far as she could tell, it had cut through without doing critical damage. But her collarbone was shattered, again: she knew what that felt like.

She cursed. The bullet had entered almost exactly where the shrapnel had got her two years before. Now she would have to waste a month in therapy; the jigsawpuzzle of bone would never return to its original strength.

Her blood pressure was way down: she had to will herself not to go into shock. The biofeedback techniques were working. So far she had even succeeded in holding the pain, most of it, back one level short of consciousness.

She was well aware that she could not stay on her feet much longer. She had lost too much blood, and even with biocontrol, the human body has limits which she had nearly reached.

The lift doors slid open onto an empty corridor.

There should be guards at every level! Fury rose in her, fury and shame, because however badly or insignificantly Captain Kirk was hurt, the responsibility was hers alone. Even if no one at all had been hurt, the prisoner had escaped. There was no excuse for that: she had thought her command of the security force was competent, even outstanding. She had watched morale rise from nothing, but here she was, revealed as a sham.

Face it, Flynn, she told herself savagely, they could have replaced your predecessor with a rock, and morale would have gone up. That doesn’t make you adequate to lead. They ought to bust you back to ensign, that’s where you belong. They were right all the time.

A lunatic wth a pistol was running around loose in the ship, and not so much as a single guard stood at the bloody-bedamned lift doors.

She stepped out into the hallway. Her feet were numb, as if they had fallen asleep, and her knees felt wobbly and funny.

Is this shock? she wondered. This isn’t a symptom of shock. What’s going on?

She took a few steps forward. Mordreaux’s cabin was right around the corner. Cliches about locking barns after horses got loose crept through her mind along with her usual uncertainty about what a horse actually looked like ... or a barn ... she forcibly pulled her attention back. If her people were not at the

lift, Mordreaux’s cabin was as good a place as any to begin looking for them. And him.

Could this be a planned assault? she wondered. Was Braithewaite right? All the security people taken on and eliminated, silently, one by one, in an attempt to free Mordreaux? In logistical terms it made no sense to assault a starship instead of the negligible security of Aleph Prime. Here, an attack force would have to get undetected through the ship’s sensors; the force would have to board the Enterprise through warning systems that included several layers of redundancy, and it would have had to do its work too swiftly, too perfectly, for anyone to be left to set off an alarm.

Mandala stumbled and fell to her knees, but felt nothing. Her legs were numb almost all the way to the hips. She looked stupidly down. That was no help. Somehow she managed to get back to her feet.

An assault made no sense in human terms; in human terms, it was impossible. But she had learned—one of the first lessons she had learned in her life—that the human consciousness was in the minority, and that limiting oneself to thinking in human terms was the quickest way to prove oneself a fool.

Still she had seen no one. She could call them on her communicator, but she was too angry to speak to any of her people any way but face to face. And, truth to tell, she did not think she could lift her left hand. All the strength and feeling had vanished from that arm.

She turned the corer.

There, in front of Mordreaux’s cabin, several security people gathered, milling in confusion.

“What the hell is going on?” she said, just loud enough for them to hear. “Mordreaux is loose and you’re all standing around like—like—”

Beranardi al Auriga, stooping to peer through the observation port of the V.I.P. cabin’s new security door, straightened up. He was head and shoulders taller than his superior. He saw the blood spreading between her fingers and down her arm and side.

“Mandala—Commander, what—? Let me help you—”

“Answer my questions” Flynn could just barely feel the heat of her own blood. The pain had gone.

“Mordreaux is right here, Commander,” al Auriga said. He unlocked the cabin so she could see. She looked inside.

Lying on his bunk, braced on his elbow as if he had just been awakened, Mordreaux gazed blearily out at them.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. “What’s all the commotion?”

“Neon,” Mandala said, “lift, portal, guards?”

“Commander,” Neon said in her silvery voice, “prisoner, cell, Neon, intersection; alarm.”

“What...?” Flynn’s confusion was not because she did not understand Neon’s unusual English. Neon had said not only that Mordreaux was in his cell, but that Neon had been guarding him when the alarm sounded.

“Prisoner, bridge, separation,” Neon said.

Flynn shook her head, trying to clear her mind of an encroaching grogginess. Any number of possibilities spun through her consciousness. An android duplicate. Clones. Clones, hell, maybe he had a twin brother.

“Barry, get everybody— everybody, roust the night watch out of bed—and search this ship. Double the guard here, and put a watch on the shuttlecraft and the airlocks and dammit even the transporter.” She gasped: she felt short of breath and dizzy. “Mordreaux just shot Captain Kirk on the bridge—or if it wasn’t Mordreaux it was somebody doing a damned good impression. Be sure to warn them that he’s armed.”

“Aye, Commander.”

“Where’s Jenniver?” Flynn said. That should have been her first question: she must be going into shock. Her vision blurred for a moment. She closed her eyes and held them shut. “Jenniver’s supposed to be on duty this watch, where is she?” She opened her eyes again, but her vision had not cleared.

“Sickbay,” Neon said.

“I’m all right,” Flynn snapped, knowing that was not true.

“Jenniver, sickbay, illness, intersection,” Neon said patiently. “Mandala, sickbay, intersection; instant.”

Flynn nodded. Neon spoke precisely, even though the only part of speech that matched between her language and English was the noun. If Jenniver had been hurt in an escape attempt that is what Neon would have said. But Jenniver had taken ill, and was in sick bay. Neon thought Flynn should be there, too, quickly. She was right.

“Jiffy,” Neon said.

Flynn closed her eyes again. She felt herself losing her balance and tried to catch herself. She flung out her left arm but it moved only weakly; her hand would not work at all. Pain shot across her shoulders and back and vanished into the numbness in her chest and belly; she staggered against the wall with another jolt, and began to slide toward the ground.

Need both hands, she thought dully. That’s it.

Her right hand would not move.

Startled, she opened her eyes and looked down, blinking to try to see clearly.

She moaned.

Delicate silver fibrils, glittering through the gray fog, entwined her fingers like silk, binding them to her shoulder. In a panic she ripped her hand away. The fibrils stretched and popped and twanged, like the strings of a musical instrument. The broken ends writhed across her shirt, and the free strands tightened around her hand.

Neon came toward her, making a high, questioning noise.

“Stay back” Flynn could feel the tendrils growing and twisting inside her, spinning themselves like webs around her spinal cord. Neon and Barry came toward her, trying to. help her. “Neon, Mandala, separation, separation! Barry, don’t let anybody touch me without a quarantine unit!” Her jaw and tongue began to grow numb, as the threads crept up into her brain. She struggled to get a few words out. Her knees collapsed and she fell forward and sideways, hardly aware of the impact. A film of fast-growing tendrils blinded her.

Now she knew what kind of gun Mordreaux had used.

“Hurry,” she whispered. “Barry . . . tell McCoy . . . spiderweb . . . Captain Kirk ...”

The tendrils reached Mandala Flynn’s consciousness and crushed it out.

Spock forced himself not to submit to his body’s reactions to what had just happened. Though he understood the human concept of soul, and spirit, his perception of what made a living creature intelligent and self-aware was wholly Vulcan, too subtle and complex to explain in human terms or any human language. But he had contacted that concept, more deeply and intimately than he had ever probed a mind before, and he had watched, no, felt all but the last glimmer of it die. If Jim had not broken the hypnotic connection, giving Spock back his will and all the strength he had tried to channel into his friend, Spock too would now be comatose and brain-damaged under the tender, brutal ministrations of Dr. McCoy’s lifesaving machines.

“Mr. Spock, what happened? Please let me help you.” Uhura came toward him, not reaching out to him, but offering her hand half-raised. Spock knew she would not touch him without his permission.

Pavel Chekov leaned over his console, crying uncontrollably with shock and relief, for like the other humans on the bridge he too thought Captain Kirk was going to live.

The emotions raging around Spock were so strong that he could sense them without the aid of touch, and in his weakened state he needed to get away from them. He could not think logically under these conditions and it was essential that someone do so now. A great deal needed to be done.

Though tears flowed slowly and regularly down Uhura’s face, she seemed unaware of their presence; outwardly she looked calmer than Spock himself felt.

“Lieutenant—” He stopped. His voice was as hoarse as if he had been screaming. He began again. “I do need your help. Page Commander Flynn and order her to sick bay immediately on my authority. There is reason to think she has been wounded far more seriously than she believes. She must not delay.”

“Aye, sir,” she said. As the channels signalled ready, she glanced at Spock again. “But you, Mr.

Spock?”

“I am not physically damaged,” Spock said. It took every bit of strength he had left to walk steadily up the stairs. Behind him he heard Uhura page Mandala Flynn. “Lieutenant, she’s down here.” Beranardi al Auriga’s voice crept close to the edge of hysteria. “At Mordreaux’s cell. She collapsed, but she ordered us not to touch her. She’s been shot with a web-slug, dammit, Uhura, she thinks Captain Kirk was, tool”

Spock slammed his hand against the turbo lift controls. As the doors slid closed, every crew member on the bridge looked up at him in shock and horror and terror-stricken surprise.

The lift fell, shutting them away. Spock sagged against the wall, fighting for control of his shaking body.

A spiderweb: he should have realized it from the first, but it was so peculiarly human in its brutality that he could never have conceived of anyone’s using it.

Away from the other members of the crew, he succeeded finally in calming himself. When the doors of the lift opened again, he walked out as steadily as if he had not been an instant from oblivion.

As Spock turned the corner and approached Dr. Mordreaux’s cabin, Beranardi al Auriga punched the controls of an intercom.

“Where the hell’s the med tech”

By now the medical section must know about the spiderweb, Spock thought. Sick bay would be in chaos.

Light shimmering on her scales, Neon crouched over Mandala Flynn as if she could protect her with ferocity. Spock knelt beside the security commander’s crumpled body. Alive, she had given the impression of complete physical competence and power. It was an accurate impression, but it was the result of her skill and self-confidence, not her size. She was a small and slender woman; life had seeped out of her, revealing the delicacy of her bones and the translucence of her light brown skin. She looked very frail.

“Don’t—” al Auriga said as Spock reached toward her. “She said not to touch her.”

“I am not under Commander Flynn’s authority,” Spock said. He reached toward her, but hesitated. His hands were covered with Jim Kirk’s blood. Spock brushed his fingertips across Flynn’s temple. The wound in her shoulder still bled slowly; the individual cells of her body still maintained a semblance of life. But she had no pulse, and he sensed not the faintest response from her brain.

Her eyes, which had been an unusually intense shade of green, had turned silky gray. Spock had seen the same film begin to thicken over Jim Kirk’s eyes as they carried him off the bridge.

“The danger is past,” Spock said. He looked up, and met the gaze of each security officer. “The web has ceased to grow. Commander Flynn is dead.”

al Auriga turned away; Neon snarled low in her throat. Spock wondered if he would have to defend Mordreaux.

Neon settled back on her haunches. “Revenge,” she whispered wistfully, then, in a stronger voice, “duty. Faithfulness, oath, duty.”

Spock stood up. “Where did you capture Dr. Mordreaux?” he asked Flynn’s second in command.

“We didn’t,” al Auriga said dully. Slowly, reluctantly, he faced Mr. Spock again. “He was here. He was locked in. Mandala—Commander Flynn ordered me to have the ship searched. For a double.”

Spock raised one eyebrow. “A double.” Before he considered that unlikely possibility he had to explore the probability that security had slipped up. “Who was on guard?”

“Neon. It was Jenniver Aristeides’ watch, but she’s in sick bay—Mr. Spock, I’m sorry, I don’t really know what happened yet. I just found out she was ill and I thought it more important to start the search.”

“Indeed. What other orders have you given?”

al Auriga took a deep breath. “The guard’s to be doubled. What I want is what Commander Flynn wanted all along—to move the prisoner to a security cell. Do the orders to keep him here still stand? Is the captain capable of giving orders?”

“No, Lieutenant, he is not. But those are my orders, and they still stand.”

“After what’s happened—” The resentment burst out in al Auriga’s voice.

“The captain understood my reasoning,” Spock said, all too aware that somehow his reasoning had proved faulty.

“This is crazy, Mr. Spock. He got out before. Even with a doubled guard, maybe he could do it again. He could retrieve his gun from wherever he hid it. The description we got was a twelve-shot semi-automatic, so he’s got ten more of those damned slugs ... somewhere.”

“The orders stand, Mr. al Auriga.”

He heard footsteps and glanced over his shoulder before the sound came within the range of human hearing. A medical technician came pounding around the corner. He looked harried and stunned. Blood smeared his tunic.

He fumbled his medical kit open even before he slid to a stop beside Mandala Flynn’s body. Kneeling, he felt for a pulse and looked up in shock.

“For gods’ sakes, don’t just stand there!” He jerked a heart stimulant out of his bag, to begin resuscitation.

Spock drew him gently but insistently away from Flynn.

“There is no need,” he said. “There is no reason. She is dead.”

“Mr. Spock—!”

“Look at her eyes,” Spock said.

The tech glanced down. It was al Auriga who gasped.

“That’s the way ...” The technician met Spock’s gaze. “That’s the way the captain’s eyes look. Dr. McCoy is operating on him now.”

Spock deliberately turned his back on the technician. He would not think of Jim Kirk’s being mutilated further in a useless attempt to save his life.

A thumping noise startled them all.

“Let me out, do you hear?” Dr. Mordreaux shouted, banging on the door again. “I didn’t do anything! What am I being accused of this time? I tell you I’ve been right here since you brought me onto this damned ship!” al Auriga turned slowly toward the closed door, his body tense with anger. Spock waited to see what the security officer would do; he waited to see if the scarlet-eyed man could control himself sufficiently to take Mandala Flynn’s place. al Auriga suddenly shuddered, his hands clenching into fists, and then gradually he relaxed. He turned to the med tech, who was still standing helplessly beside Flynn’s body.

“Do you have a sedative you can give him?”

“No!” Spock said sharply.

The two other men stared at him. Neon, ignoring them all, slid the stretcher from its compartment in the abandoned medical kit and began to unfold it.

“Mr. Spock,” al Auriga said, “I can’t question him when he’s hysterical.”

“Dr. Mordreaux has been under the influence of far too many drugs administered for far too little reason since before this trip began,” Spock said. “Unless he is permitted to recover from their actions we will never hear a coherent story from him. Commander Flynn ordered a search of the ship, did she not?”

“Yes,” al Auriga said.

“In that case perhaps you should proceed.”

“It’s begun,” the security officer said. Then he cursed very softly. “And we’ve got to find that damned gun.”

“You have, of course, searched Dr. Mordreaux?”

al Auriga froze. “Oh, my gods,” he said. “I don’t think anybody has. Neon—?”

“Prisoner, securities, separation,” Neon said. She smoothed the rippling stretcher into a flat silver sheet and pushed it down till it nearly touched the deck. “Corridor, cabin, separation.”

“None of us has been near him. Commander Flynn was going to search him, I think, but...”

“We had better do so now,” Spock said. “Unlock the door, and stand away from it.”

As al Auriga unlocked the door, Neon lifted Mandala Flynn onto the stretcher, then floated it, and its burden, to waist height. She moved it nearer the med tech, who took hold of the guiding end of the stretcher and stood looking blankly down at it.

“Take her to stasis until after the viewing of her will,” Spock said. “Neon: Neon, doorway, offset.”

The med tech got out of the way; Neon inclined her head in acquiescence and moved to one side of the door, ready to spring in and help if necessary.

“Dr. Mordreaux,” Spock said, loudly enough for the professor to hear, “please calm yourself. I am coming in to speak to you.”

The pounding subsided. “Mr. Spock? Is that you, Mr. Spock? Thank gods, a rational person instead of these military-bureaucratic idiots!”

Spock pushed the door open. He was prepared to move with every fiber of strength and speed he possessed to prevent another spiderweb bullet’s being fired. But Dr. Mordreaux stood stock-still in the center of his cabin, his arms spread stiffly. When he saw Spock his eyes widened, but he did not move. “Mr. Spock, what happened?”

Spock glanced down at his blood-stained shirt and hands, but did not answer. “I must search you, Dr. Mordreaux.”

“Go ahead,” Mordreaux said with resignation, and some appreciation of irony. “I’m getting quite good at following the protocol.”

Spock searched him swiftly. “He is unarmed.”

al Auriga scanned the cabin with his tricorder.

“Mr. Spock, what is it I’m supposed to have done?”

“Captain Kirk has just been shot, Dr. Mordreaux.”

“What? And you suspect me?”

“There were several witnesses.”

“They’re lying. They’re lying just like everyone else has lied about me. I haven’t hurt anyone, I haven’t done anything. All I ever did was help my friends fulfill their dreams.”

However damning the truth might be, if Spock withheld it now, the professor would never have reason to trust him again.

“Sir... I am one of the witnesses to the assault.” He held out his bloody hands.

Mordreaux stared at him, stunned. “You—! Mr. Spock, how can you believe this of me?”

“There’s no gun in here,” al Auriga said, shutting off his tricorder. “He must have ditched it. I’ve got to help search, Mr. Spock. I think you’d better come out of here till I can spare another guard.”

“You need not be concerned about my safety.”

“Mr. Spock—”

“If necessary I will make that an order, Mr. al Auriga.”

The security officer glared at him a moment, then, abruptly, shrugged. “Whatever you say.” He left Spock alone with Dr. Mordreaux.

“I do find it difficult to believe you murdered my captain,” Spock said. “However, I have the evidence of my own eyes.”

“It wasn’t me,” Dr. Mordreaux said. “It must have been—an impostor. Someone trying to frame me.”

“Dr. Mordreaux, what point would there be to anyone’s trying to contrive evidence against you? You are already sentenced to a rehabilitation colony. There is no more severe penalty.”

“Only death,” Mordreaux said, and began to giggle. “There’s nothing left but death, and that’s what they have planned for me.” From hysterical laughter he dissolved into tears, and collapsed crying on his bunk.

“Dr. Mordreaux!” Spock said. He grabbed Mordreaux’s shirt front and dragged him to his feet.

Spock’s other hand clenched into a fist.

Mordreaux sobbed into his hands. “I can’t help it, I’m sorry, I can’t help it.”

Spock unclenched his fingers, shocked by his own actions. He had come within a nerve-impulse of striking the professor.

“Dr. Mordreaux, I cannot stay here any longer right now. Please try to calm yourself.”

“It isn’t me,” Mordreaux said. through tears. “It isn’t me, it’s the drugs, please don’t drug me anymore.”

“No,” Spock said. “No more drugs.” He gazed down at the man he had respected for so long, now shuddering and sobbing and out of control. “I will come back when I can.”

He left Mordreaux behind in his cabin and relocked the door securely behind him. Neon reactivated the power shields.