The Captain's Oath

by Christopher L. Bennett

  The Vulcan raised a brow. “I do not consider it likely that you will, Captain Kirk. I have studied your record extensively. I have learned about your character from Doctor Sherev. And I have played thirty-four games of three-dimensional chess against you and won only nineteen. Therefore, logic tells me that I can rely upon you to devise a strategy for delaying the Aulacri’s bombardment, or, failing that, succeed in retrieving me before I am killed.

  “In human terms, Captain Kirk . . . you have my trust. What I request is that you trust me in turn when I say that I am capable of completing this work, and that it is important enough to be completed.”

  The silence from Kirk this time was the longest of all. At last: “All right, Spock. I’ll make sure you have the time you need. But send the others back.”

  “All but me,” Sherev said.

  “Rhen . . .”

  “Hey, if you trust Spock to take care of himself, you can trust him to drag me out at the last second too, right? And he’ll work faster if I’m here to help. It’s logical to let me stay too.” Spock lifted an eyebrow at her, and she shrugged.

  “All right, Rhen,” Kirk said through audibly clenched teeth. “You just couldn’t make this one easy for me, could you?”

  “If it were easy, Jim, they wouldn’t have sent you,” Sherev told her old friend. “Why do you think they gave you that ship in the first place . . . ?”

  SACAGAWEA

  2264

  Fourteen

  Excerpted from Sacagawea captain’s logs, March–September 2264:

  Stardate 1206.8: Despite our best efforts, we have been unable to determine what force or entity eradicated every speck of organic matter aboard the Anggitay. With no trace of escape pods after a week of searching, I must reluctantly declare Captain Angelo Sabatini and the ninety-two members of his crew missing and presumed dead. Commander Mitchell has requested to lead the memorial service for his former crewmates.

  . . .

  Stardate 1221.3: With the Skorr ambassadorial party now safely delivered to the conference with their Aurelian cousins, we have remanded the pirates who abducted them to the nearby Ixion II penal colony. Despite the prison’s past reputation, I am impressed by the humane conditions and advanced rehabilitation practices I observed during my tour, the result of reforms instituted in recent years by the noted penologist Dr. Tristan Adams. I am confident that the pirates will be treated better than they treated the ambassadors, and that Dr. Adams’s enlightened techniques can cure them of their criminal tendencies.

  . . .

  Stardate 1234.9: Now that the xenylon-eating parasites have been identified and purged from the ship, all charges of uniform code violations and indecent conduct have been dropped. The crew’s actions throughout this . . . revealing incident have proven that they are all a credit to the uniform, even in the absence of the uniform.

  First City, Ardana

  Jim Kirk shielded his eyes from the light of the star Rasalas as he gazed up at the city in the clouds, a tight cluster of boxy marble towers and cylindrical turrets whose numerous windows reflected the red-orange sky in which they floated. The atmospheric condensation that formed around the city’s base as a side effect of its antigravity engines’ emanations created the illusion that it sat upon a cloud—hence its name, which the humans who had contacted Ardana had chosen to translate as either “Cloud City” or . . .

  “Stratos,” Kirk announced to Gary Mitchell, grinning in wonder. “Isn’t it amazing? I can’t wait to get up there.” He and Gary stood in a plaza in First City, the older ground-level community positioned directly underneath the cloud city. The Ardanan City Dwellers preferred to regulate access to their skyborne capital in order to preserve its artistic and architectural treasures. If this were an official visit, Kirk could have beamed there directly, but as he was here on leave, he had chosen not to abuse his privileges. Ardana was still new to the Federation, contacted just a few years before and welcomed in with remarkable speed due to its mineral wealth and its artistic and cultural wonders, Stratos foremost among them. Normally there would have been a longer vetting period, but the continuing threat posed by the Klingons and other hostile powers made the Federation eager for new members, particularly those with strategic resources or locations such as Ardana. Both civilizations were still in the getting-acquainted phase with each other, and Kirk wanted to leave the Ardanans with a good impression of the Federation.

  Beside him, Mitchell gave an affected yawn. “Yeah . . . a living museum full of classical art and architecture and learning opportunities. Just your sort of vacation spot, Jim.”

  “I let you drag me to Argelius and Wrigley’s Pleasure Planet,” Kirk countered. “You owe me this.”

  “Yeah, but the difference is, you actually had fun on those worlds.”

  “Give it a try, Gary. You might actually enjoy expanding your mind a little.”

  “Tell you what,” the navigator replied as they moved into the line for the cylindrical teleport plinth that delivered tourists up to Stratos. “I’ll try expanding my mind if you try expanding your social calendar. You have your fun on shore leave, sure enough, but you always close up again as soon as you get back to the ship. Not everything that happens on Wrigley’s has to stay on Wrigley’s, you know. Like that lieutenant, Helen Jorgensson.”

  “Johansson.”

  “See? She left an impression on you.”

  “Gary, it might be a big deal for you to remember a woman’s name, but not me.”

  “My point is, you really clicked with her, but you refused to follow up on it. Keep this up, Jim, and you’re in danger of becoming an old maid.”

  “You know how I feel, Gary. Command and romance just don’t mix. Sooner or later, one of them has to suffer.”

  “I’m just worried you’re getting too emotionally isolated, Jim. You can’t be a great leader if you cut yourself off from basic human compassion.”

  Kirk frowned at him. “I think you’re exaggerating. I get along well with the crew.”

  “These past few months, Jim? Not so much. You’ve gotten more distant since Rhen and Len left.”

  Have I? Kirk was taken aback. Certainly it had been disappointing to lose two of his three closest friends on the crew within four months of each other. First Rhenas Sherev had retired from Starfleet after her extensive injuries on Chenar. Then, Leonard McCoy’s efforts assisting in the resettlement of the Chenari had imbued him with a desire to do more such work. After only fourteen months on the Sacagawea, McCoy had requested reassignment to a Starfleet Medical relief program providing care and assistance to other cultures that, for one reason or another, had become prematurely aware of alien life. Kirk had tried to convince him to stay, but McCoy had believed it was important to aid civilizations that lacked modern medicine, and that staying in touch with more traditional, hands-on medical techniques could be of great benefit to modern doctors. “I’ve always been just a country doctor, Jim,” he’d said. Though Kirk knew that to be untrue, he’d respected his friend’s wish and approved his transfer, promoting his assistant Liesa Wachs to CMO. He had consoled himself with the knowledge that he still had Gary Mitchell aboard, not to mention Eshu Adebayo, whose gentle wisdom and far-ranging experience he’d come to rely on greatly—though that was more an amiable professional relationship than the close friendship he had shared with the others.

  Kirk believed he’d been coping well with the readjustment. His duty had always come first to him, so while there had been a definite pleasure in getting to carry it out alongside several good friends, he had been confident that he had maintained a positive attitude toward his command responsibilities even in the wake of Sherev’s and McCoy’s departures. He had thrown himself fully into his assignments over the past seven months, from the turbulent first contact with the neighboring Dachlyd and Gemarian species to the exploration of the Ma-aira Thenn ruins to the treatment of the Akwood’s Syndrome outbreak on Kashdan IX. Throughout it all, his relations with the crew had remained productive,
enabling them to function as an effective, well-coordinated unit and achieve all their mission objectives with minimal . . .

  Kirk stopped when he realized where his thoughts were heading. Maybe Gary had a point about his emotional isolation.

  Before he could pursue the thought any further, Kirk’s communicator beeped. He drew it from his waist and flipped it open. “Kirk here.”

  “This is Ensign Chalan, sir. We’ve received an urgent hail from Commodore Wesley aboard the Lexington. He needs to speak with you immediately.”

  Kirk exchanged a look with Mitchell. They had almost made it to the teleport plinth. With a sigh, Kirk said, “I guess we’ll have to come back and look around some other time.”

  Mitchell shrugged. “I think I can live with the disappointment.”

  U.S.S. Sacagawea

  “Commodore Wesley,” Kirk said in greeting as his former squadron commander appeared on the bridge viewscreen. “Belated congratulations on the promotion, sir. And on getting the Lexington. Both well-deserved.”

  “Thanks, Jim. I wish this were a social call.” The commodore sighed. “It’s the Agni, Jim. They’re back.”

  Agni. The Vedic god of fire and sacrifice. The captain needed no reminder that Starfleet had provisionally assigned the name to the aliens who had attempted to invade the Adelphous and Bardeezi systems, once the Enterprise’s science officer had determined their N-Class origins. Kirk had been following every step of Starfleet’s investigative and defensive efforts in response to the looming threat, ever aware of the likelihood that they would one day return and try again. He had hoped that when that day came, he would be called on to serve. Now, it seemed, he had gotten his wish.

  “What’s their destination, sir?”

  “That’s just the problem, Captain. They arrived some time ago.”

  Kirk sat forward, clutching the arms of his command chair. “Commodore?”

  “You’re aware that they had some means of slipping past our border defenses. We assumed they’d still need to drop out of warp outside a system, as they did at Bardeezi. We were wrong. They’ve found a way to maintain stealth all the way to their target planets.”

  Kirk traded an alarmed look with Adebayo, who stood behind his right shoulder. “How many?”

  “Two N-Class planets that we know of have already been occupied. Their presence was first detected several days ago on the surface of Hearthside, the innermost planet of the Regulus system.”

  A sharp gasp sounded behind Kirk. He turned to the science station, where Kamisha Diaz was standing watch. She was wide-eyed with shock at the news that her home system had been invaded and occupied. But Adebayo was already moving toward her, talking softly to keep her focused. Kirk trusted him to handle it and turned back to the commodore. “Go on, sir.”

  “It was difficult to detect them on the surface, even in a system as busy as Regulus, because Hearthside’s cloud layers are so dense. But once we knew what to scan for, we detected another Agni settlement on the N-Class third planet of 88 Leonis, some eight parsecs from Regulus. There’s a Federation outpost on its fourth planet.”

  Kirk consulted his mental galaxy map. Rasalas, or Mu Leonis, was only about sixteen parsecs from Regulus, and not enormously far from Adelphous or Bardeezi. However, this system had no N-Class planets. “Do you think there may be other incursions we haven’t found yet? Is this the start of a larger invasion?” He was grateful that the surface of Venus was too hot for liquid sulfuric acid. At least the Sol system would be safe.

  “The Enterprise and the Sau Lan Wu have been assigned to that search already, Captain. Starfleet’s bringing in all available captains who have experience with the Agni. The Lexington is closest to 88 Leonis, so we’re heading there. So I need you and the Sacagawea to handle Regulus.”

  Kirk was surprised but gratified to be given such a crucial assignment. Regulus had no native civilization, but it was heavily colonized by multiple species; it had been a Vulcan protectorate for generations before the Federation was founded, and had accumulated a large human population in the century since—including Ensign Diaz, who seemed to have recovered her discipline but still listened with intense concern to the commodore’s every word. “What are our orders on arrival, sir?” Kirk asked.

  “Assess the situation and coordinate with the Regulan Defense Force. Deciding what to do about the Agni requires gathering more intelligence about their actions and intentions. With luck, maybe they’ll be more talkative now that they’ve reached their intended destinations.”

  “At the very least,” Adebayo suggested, “we can take more time to sort things out if we’re not in pitched battle.”

  “The situation on Hearthside is still fairly urgent, Commander. You see, the Regulans have built floating cities in the planet’s clouds.” Wesley stared at Kirk’s reflexive laugh. “Is something funny, Captain?”

  “Apologies, Commodore. It’s just . . . I was literally about to visit the Cloud City of Stratos when you called. I guess I’ll finally get to see a city in the sky after all.”

  “If I may, sir,” Diaz spoke up, then continued when Kirk nodded. “Hearthside’s aerial cities are very different from Stratos. They were built in the upper atmosphere, above the cloud layers, where the pressure and temperature match M-Class conditions—though still with an atmosphere of carbon dioxide and sulfur. A standard oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere mix is a lifting gas in that environment, so it’s easy to build floating cities there, as long as you don’t let the outside air in. There’s a rich ecosystem of acidophilic bacteria floating up there, and the cities were built to study and harvest them. They have all sorts of chemical and pharmaceutical applications—they’re a big part of the Regulan economy.”

  “Which makes this particularly urgent,” Wesley said. “The Agni bases on the surface have already fired projectile weapons near the floating cities that have come too close. The cities are maneuvering to keep their distance for now, but it looks like the Agni don’t want them there, and we don’t know how long they’ll tolerate their presence. Some members of the Regulan leadership are pushing for a military strike, but we’ve convinced them not to risk an escalation until we know more.” He smirked. “Which isn’t easy. The Regulan Defense Force is older than Starfleet. You’ll need to be at your most diplomatic with their people—whether or not you can find a way to open a diplomatic channel with the Agni.”

  A part of Kirk rebelled at the thought of trying to talk with the beings that had murdered so many of his former crew. He reminded himself that his anger and pride did not outweigh the lives that could be saved if a peaceful resolution was found. “Understood, sir. We’ll make best time to Regulus.”

  “Let’s bring this one home at last, Jim. Wesley out.”

  Kirk stood. “Mister Mitchell, you heard the commodore. Set course for the Alpha Leonis system.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Mitchell said. “From one cloud city to another.”

  Kirk smiled. “What are the odds?”

  Once the course was set, Kirk ordered the helm officer to engage at warp six, then rotated his seat to face the science station. Catching Ensign Diaz’s eye, he spoke softly. “I’ll be in my ready room if you’d like to talk.”

  Even after more than three years on the Sacagawea, Kirk still made relatively little use of the vessel’s ready room, preferring to remain in the thick of things on the bridge. But there were times when the privacy it offered was useful. Sure enough, it wasn’t long before Kamisha Diaz took him up on his offer. Gesturing her to the couch, he took the seat opposite her. “It must be frightening,” he said, “to learn your home system is under attack.”

  “Yes, sir. But it’s more than my system. I’ve been to Hearthside. I know people there. One of my best friends from college lives on Laputa, the main aerial city.”

  “I know this is difficult for you, Ensign,” Kirk said. “I’ve been in situations where friends were endangered too. More than anything else, I wanted to see them kept safe. But I learned over time
that the best thing I could do for them was to stay objective, focus on my duty, and trust the rest of my team to fulfill their own duties.” He let that sink in for a moment. “When we get to Regulus, I’m going to need to rely on you as part of my team, Ensign. Your knowledge of the system, particularly the aerial cities, will be of great help—if I can count on you to maintain your detachment.”

  The slim, dark young woman lowered her gaze. “I’ll try my best, sir. I . . . I often try to follow your example.”

  Kirk’s eyes widened. “My example?”

  “Your discipline, sir. Your focus, your self-control. You never show fear or doubt. I hope I can . . . find it in me to do the same.”

  He smiled at her. “I’ll let you in on a secret, Ensign. I often have fears and doubts, the same as everyone else. But I save them for when I’m off duty.”

  Diaz looked at him gratefully. “Any tips for how I can do the same?”

  He thought it over. “It helps to have the faith of a superior officer, like Commodore Wesley. He knows me well enough to know I have my doubts sometimes, but he still has enough faith in me to entrust me with a mission as important as this one. And that gives me faith in turn that I’m worthy of the responsibility.”

  He leaned in closer to the young science officer. “And I have faith in you, Ensign.”

  Diaz nodded gravely, understanding the message. “Aye, sir. Thank you, sir.”

  * * *

  “I’m so glad you’re finally going to visit Laputa! I’ve missed you so much, Meesh!” The image of H’Raal on Kamisha Diaz’s comm display squeezed her golden eyes shut and gave a little purr of pleasure as she ran a brush through her luxuriant black mane. The brush had been a birthday present from Diaz years ago, and the ensign was touched that her friend had brought it with her to Hearthside.