Federation

by Judith Reeves-Stevens

  “Bridge, sir. This is where the doctor said you were to report.’

  Something flew at Cochrane. He whirled in time to see—

  “Zefram!”

  —the Companion.

  All thought left Cochrane as he embraced her. The attack at home, the interrogation, the imprisonment, conversion to energy —all of it left him as if the universe itself no longer mattered. He held the Companion in his arms. He had been afraid to even think of what had happened to her, had not dared to hope of being reunited, until Kirk had said she would be here.

  “Oh, Zefram, we were so frightened,” she whispered into his chest.

  “Shh,” he comforted her. He placed his hand to her head, wincing as he felt the bandage there. “What’s happened to you? How long have you been away from our home?”

  She gazed up at him with one luminous eye, the other hidden beneath the sparkling fabric that wrapped her head. “Nothing’s wrong, Zefram,” she said. “And we have not been gone long. Dr. McCoy said we’re strong, getting better. And we are, now that you’re with us.”

  Then Cochrane was aware of someone standing outside the turbolift—the Vulcan who had accompanied Kirk.

  “Mr. Spock,” Cochrane said. “Is the captain here?”

  “This way, please,” Spock said. The ensign remained in the turbolift, most likely to return to sickbay.

  Cochrane stepped forward, his arm securely around the Companion’s frail shoulder, and his mouth opened in shock.

  The bridge of Kirk’s ship was larger than the total living area had been on the Bonaventure. He gazed at it with delight. Beside him, above a dedication plaque, there was a schematic of a vessel. He recognized the twin nacelles as a classic continuum-distortion configuration, but the rest of the clean design was a revelation. So many problems of distortion-field stability were solved just by comparing the proportions of the lead saucer to the secondary hull from which the superimpellor nacelles sprang. He wanted to reach out and touch the image. Could it really be he was aboard this vessel?

  “Mr. Cochrane, if you please,” the Vulcan insisted.

  Cochrane moved forward, his fingers just brushing the image of the ship. Then the stairs took him by surprise. He nearly lost his footing when he reached them, so intent was his gaze at the viewscreen before him. There was some kind of wreckage displayed on it, rotating in microgravity—what had been another spaceship, he decided. Beyond the wreckage, three other ships hung poised in space, a different design from any other he had seen so far. But if the level of continuum-distortion propulsion today had been properly represented by the schematic back by the elevator, then the only reason the three ships on the screen looked the way they did—stretched out in two dimensions with a precariously long forward section—was that they were warships. That inefficient design could only be acceptable in order to provide a smaller target silhouette in head-on attacks, Cochrane had no idea about the politics of this era, but physics were physics.

  With the Companion still nestled close at his side, Cochrane saw Kirk in the center chair. He realized he would have expected to see him nowhere else.

  “Captain Kirk?” he said.

  Kirk glanced at him, then moved his eyes back to the screen. “Glad to have you aboard, Mr. Cochrane. My apologies for the rough ride.” He leaned forward. “Mr. Sulu, status on the shields on the number-three ship?”

  An Asian human at the center console replied, “Eighty-seven percent, Captain. We won’t be able to touch them if they try it again.”

  Kirk bit his lip, deep in thought. But for all the confusion Cochrane had seen so far, the captain was an oasis of calm and the bridge and its crew were a natural extension of him.

  “Are those … Klingons?” Cochrane asked.

  “They’re Klingon ships,” Kirk answered. “But since they don’t appear interested in communicating with us, I can’t tell you who’s on board.”

  “What are they after?”

  Kirk looked at Cochrane again. “They’re after you.”

  Cochrane swayed, but the Companion steadied him. He closed his eyes. He had wanted this all behind him.

  When Monica had died, he, too, had wanted to die, rather than continue the fight. It had cost him too much already. But then, when the Companion had found him, rescued him, he had allowed himself to believe that the battle that had consumed his life might, in fact, be over. The time spent with the Companion, even in the strangely appealing energy pattern in which she had originally appeared to him, had been like a second life, a dream filled with a contentment and satisfaction he had never thought possible; a sharing of thoughts and ideas and emotions so healing, he had been freed from his past, missing only, ironically, the rituals of conversation and social interaction that he had always avoided before.

  Thus, when she had brought Kirk and the others to him, and the Companion had miraculously become flesh and blood in the form of Commissioner Nancy Hedford, Cochrane had felt his life move toward true completeness.

  Finally holding the Companion in his arms, knowing that the pure mind that had captivated and delighted him was encased in a physical body that entranced him … he was overcome.

  There was nothing more that he had wanted, nothing more that he—the scientist who had never felt there would be time enough to do and learn all that he might—felt compelled to do. Whatever name the poets wished to give the feeling that had come upon him then, it was to him one thing and one thing only—

  Zefram Cochrane was at peace.

  Once, as a child, he had dreamed of a bubble twisting within a bubble so that both twisted up together somewhere else. From that dream he had given humanity the stars.

  But there had been another dream in Cochrane, a dream encoded in his cells, perhaps in the very structure of the universe that had caused him to come into being.

  In the Companion he had found that dream made real.

  But now his past was reaching out once more to steal that dream from him, as it had stolen the lives of his wife and his friends a century and a half before.

  “They’re not Klingons,” Cochrane said with inexpressible sadness.

  “Indeed,” Spock said beside him.

  Cochrane opened his eyes. An old woman stepped up to him. She was dressed in a gold-shirted uniform like Kirk’s, but the decorations on her sleeves were different, and the emblem on her chest was a rainbow-hued starburst, not the asymmetric field-distortion symbol Kirk and his crew wore.

  “Am I to take it you know who’s after you, Mr. Cochrane?” the old woman asked imperiously, as if she were used to being answered.

  Cochrane looked at Kirk, seeking direction.

  “This is Fleet Admiral Quarlo Kabreigny,” Kirk said. Cochrane supposed he should be surprised, but the surprises of the twenty-third century were beginning to wear him down. He knew that in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, women had literally fought to be in the military. But after the nightmare of World War III, with the preservation of the species at the forefront of everyone’s minds, the conservative influence of the colony worlds had placed females back in a protected category. At the time, Cochrane had read that it was all part of some grand sociological cycle in gender roles, and he wondered now if the abbreviated uniform he had seen on the ensign was an indication of another move toward greater independence for women in this era. Still, for someone of his time period, he found it difficult to truly accept that this older woman was in a position to give orders to Kirk.

  “The admiral has taken quite an interest in your career, after your disappearance,” Kirk continued. “If you can clear up any of her questions, it will probably help all of us.”

  “Should I repeat the question?” the admiral said pointedly. Now Cochrane definitely had the feeling that the old woman was not used to having to repeat herself.

  “That’s not necessary,” Cochrane said. “I had hoped that the Optimum Movement would have died out by now. That we would have grown smarter, stronger than that.”

  �
��The Optimum Movement?” Kirk said.

  Spock placed his hands behind his back and began to recite historical facts. “The name given to a collection of loosely affiliated fascist political organizations that sprang up on Earth in the early to mid-twenty-first century,” Spock said. “Among its adherents were the infamous Colonel Green—”

  But Kirk stopped him. “I know what the Optimum Movement is, Spock.”

  Cochrane was puzzled that an alien would know so much about Earth history. Kirk had an equally puzzled expression. “Mr. Cochrane, the Optimum Movement’s takeover of certain countries is widely considered to be a contributing cause of World War III. At the beginning of the reconstruction, the movement was thoroughly discredited. Its leaders captured and tried. It’s dead and gone.”

  “It was still alive in 2117, Captain. They killed my wife and students on Centauri B II. I was supposed to be next.”

  “That’s why you disappeared? To die in space?”

  Cochrane felt his body tremble as the old sense of futility hit him again. He felt the Companion draw closer to him, wanting to protect him from all that was bad in this universe, in whatever time. It was unbearable to him that she, in turn, should be placed at risk, because of him.

  “Keptin.” A young Russian officer at the center console spoke up. “The enemy wessels are changing formation.”

  As Kirk glanced at the screen, Cochrane saw two of the three battleships change position. In the same instant, he suddenly realized that the wreckage on the screen was what was left of the spaceship he had just been on.

  “Keep watch on their weapons readiness,” Kirk said calmly. “Uhura, keep trying with all hailing frequencies.” He looked back to the Vulcan. “Spock? Did you know that? That the Optimum Movement survived into the early twenty-second century?”

  Cochrane was impressed with Kirk’s ability to keep track of so many situations at once, much as Dr. McCoy had managed in sickbay. He wondered if all people of this time were equally capable, or if by some coincidence two of the best had ended up on the same ship.

  “Records show,” Spock began, “that the original Optimum Movement was destroyed during the postatomic horror. However, it would not be impossible for splinter organizations to have sprung up, much as neo-Nazi groups continued to arise for more than six decades after Earth’s second world war. That likelihood is increased if we accept that some Optimum leaders were able to escape to the colony worlds, as the popular entertainment of the time repeatedly proposed.”

  Kirk looked back at the screen, keeping track of the warships. “What about the chances of the Optimum Movement surviving till today?”

  “I would suggest that was highly improbable, Captain. There is not a world in the Federation where such a political movement would be tolerated. The Klingons, for all their barbarity, would find the Optimum ideals abhorrent for their lack of honor. And the Romulans would never support any political organization that did not originate with them.”

  “Which leaves us with our opening question,” Kirk said. “Who’s in those ships?”

  “Sir,” the Asian officer said, “we’re being scanned again.”

  “Shields to full power,” Kirk ordered. “Give them some feedback to confuse their readings.”

  The admiral ignored Cochrane for a moment. “How long are we going to hang here doing nothing?” she asked Kirk irritably.

  Kirk shifted in his chair, and Cochrane was surprised yet again at the familiarity with which the captain addressed his commanding officer. Whatever organization ran this ship, it was unlike any military group he had ever encountered back in his time.

  “Admiral, we’ve got a cracked dilithium crystal, damage to the port nacelle strut, thirty crew injured, and weapons capability less than sixty percent. Ten kilometers out there are three top-of-the-line D7 battle cruisers. Two are untouched, the other has shields at eighty-seven percent, and they’re jamming every subspace frequency in the spectrum so we can’t call for help. The only reason we’re not in pieces like that spaceliner is that we backed away from the wreckage so they could scan it. My guess is that the only reason they didn’t press the attack is that they don’t know if we have Cochrane on board or not. Right now, I’m betting they’re asking for additional orders from wherever their command center is. And each minute they wait before they come at us is another minute my engineer has to try and get us back into fighting condition.”

  Kirk turned back to Cochrane, apparently not concerned that if he had spoken to a commanding officer that way in Cochrane’s time he would have been court-martialed. If anything, Cochrane thought, the ship ran along the same lines he had run his research facility on Centauri B II: he had been in charge, but everyone was free to question him, provided the work proceeded responsibly and on schedule.

  “Now, Mr. Cochrane,” Kirk said, “forget everything we’ve just told you about how history deals with the Optimum Movement. Who kidnapped you from the Companion’s planetoid? What did they do to you on board the Planitia? And who the hell do you think is commanding those cruisers?”

  Cochrane sighed. He directed the Companion to a seat on the upper level behind Kirk. He was grateful that she was content to remain a silent comfort to him as he struggled to interact with others of his kind in this new time. He knew, however, that she would be at his side the moment he faltered. As Cochrane turned to face Kirk, he felt more tired than he ever had when his body had been eighty-seven. “On the planetoid where you found me, I was attacked by humanoids with green skin. I had run up to their ship. It was small, like your shuttlecraft. I thought it might be you again. One of them had some kind of rifle. That’s the last I remember of that night.”

  “Those men were Orion pirates,” Kirk told him. The captain kept his eyes riveted on the screen. “The rifle was either a phaser or disruptor. Either way, it would shock your nervous system, knock you out. What happened next?”

  “I woke up, sore, sick, on a large spaceship.” Remembering what had happened was almost as unpleasant as what he had actually experienced. “I could hear people shouting, crying. The humanoids with green skins told me the others were hostages. To make sure nothing happened until … until some kind of trade was arranged.”

  “Who told you about a trade?” Kirk asked.

  “A different type of humanoid. Definitely alien. Oily skin, black beard and mustache.”

  “That was a Klingon,” Spock said.

  “They’re the enemy?” Cochrane asked. He could believe it. The alien had been objectionable from the moment he had stormed into Cochrane’s stateroom and offered him a plate of still-wriggling worms. When Cochrane had refused, the alien had acted outraged, as if eating live worms was a great honor where he came from.

  But the admiral apparently didn’t agree with Cochrane’s assessment. She interjected swiftly, “Let’s just say that, so far, the Federation and the Klingon Empire have yet to discover common ground. At the moment, we’re finishing negotiations—among the Klingon and Romulan Empires, and the Federation—to establish a joint colony on Nimbus III. It will become the Planet of Galactic Peace—a crowning achievement for interplanetary diplomacy at the highest level,”

  Kirk rolled his eyes at that; then he asked Cochrane to continue. “What else did the Klingon tell you? What kind of trade was he expecting?”

  Cochrane shrugged. “At the time, he didn’t say. I thought it was some kind of hostage situation, a mass kidnapping.”

  “Did they ever ask you your name?” Spock asked.

  Cochrane shook his head. “No. That’s why I thought I was just a random victim. Until Captain Kirk said those ships were after me.”

  Spock looked at Kirk. “Captain, we have yet to hear an explicit mention of Cochrane, or a specific demand for him. There is a slight chance this could all be a coincidence.”

  Kirk laughed. “Don’t let McCoy hear you say that.” He took on a thoughtful expression. “Mr. Cochrane, why was the Optimum Movement so eager to hunt you down in your own time? And how coul
d that same reason possibly be valid today, one hundred and fifty years later?”

  Cochrane hesitated, trying to think of the simplest way to tell Kirk what people had once thought the continuum-distortion field capable of. But before he could answer, the admiral stepped in front of him.

  “Mr. Cochrane, the answer to that question is classified, and I insist you do not answer it.”

  Cochrane and Kirk both objected at the same time. Spock raised an eyebrow.

  “Nothing is classified after a century and a half,” Kirk said testily. He looked angry, and unlike the doctor’s earlier mood, Cochrane could see that this anger was real.

  “I am not a part of whatever organization you represent,” Cochrane told the admiral. He could feel himself grow upset as well. “I can say whatever I want about my work.” The military had not been able to restrain him back in his own time, and he was not about to allow them to begin now.

  But the admiral was unlike any older woman from Cochrane’s day. She stepped closer to him. She was a foot and a half shorter than he, but still she tried to stare him down. “The ’organization’ I represent is called Starfleet, Mr. Cochrane, and this is a Starfleet vessel. By being present on it, sir, you are compelled to obey my orders. You will not answer Captain Kirk’s question.”

  Cochrane glared down at the woman, forgetting her age. Arrogance, it seemed, had not gone out of fashion.

  Kirk tried to reason with her. “What work could Cochrane possibly have done so long ago that it’s still classified today?”

  The admiral turned her fury on Kirk. “I’ve had enough of your interference, Captain. You will not—”

  Cochrane had had enough. “The warp bomb,” he said, and before anyone else could react, the admiral slapped him.

  The Companion gasped and with surprising swiftness moved to Cochrane’s side, pulled him back, inserting herself as a shield before him. She was half-crouched, hands out as if ready to physically attack the admiral. Kirk jumped out of his chair in the same instant. The entire bridge crew turned to see what had happened. Spock stepped to the admiral’s side, ready to intervene from that position. The admiral herself stood with her hand still upraised, quivering with fury.