The Cry of the Onlies

by Judy Klass

  He rose from his seat, paced the room rapidly.

  "Well. It would seem that we have a pretty good idea of the causes of the trouble. Now, if we can only get the details—"

  As if on cue, the doors slid open, and Spock entered, a tape in his hand. "I have the information here, Captain. Do you wish me to feed it through the computer, or communicate the body of the report to you directly?"

  "Blast the computer and all the red tape, Spock!" McCoy said. "Just tell us."

  Kirk gave an affirmative nod.

  Spock lowered himself into a chair, and steepled his long fingers before him.

  "The Federation report is unclear on the exact sequence of events. But it appears that the causes of the disturbance were two of the older children. One was the boy Jahn, who in terms of physical aging is now nearly seventeen. The other was a girl named Rhea, who is now fourteen, in medical terms.

  "Both children had proved apt students in some respects, and absorbed a great deal of information on the program. Rhea showed an aptitude for math and the applied sciences. Jahn was taken with engineering and spent a great deal of time learning about Starfleet, its procedures and protocol. Both were encouraged to pursue their interests, and made great use of the tapes in their school library. Yet both were also often discipline problems and proved most uncooperative in … tests they were asked to participate in.

  "Apparently, these children, all the children, had developed with curious irregularity. Emotionally immature"—Spock seemed to use these words guardedly, grudgingly—"they had acquired surprising pockets of information from books, and experience over the centuries. At any rate, it seems it was possible for these two children to commandeer the class five vessel in question, a ship called the Sparrow."

  Kirk swallowed. Hard. "So it was two of the children, then, who stole the craft. And who destroyed …"

  Spock nodded. "It appears so, Captain. Who destroyed the two ships of the Boacan system. And severely crippled a Federation ore freighter, although its two pilots have survived." He seemed to hesitate for a second. "There is more, sir."

  "Yes, Mr. Spock?"

  "The vessel is meant to be manned by nine, but can be piloted by two, with difficulty. It was bringing dilithium crystals to resupply the power generators of the program complex, and most of the crew came planetside. The children were able to stow away, and then knock the rest of the crew out with sedatives, and beam them down.

  "But apparently, Jahn decided to try to influence the other Onlies to come with them. He beamed back to the surface, to the children's recreation room, and was accosted by both security guards from the Sparrow and program staff, who tried to reason with him, to induce him to relinquish the ship. Several children became physically violent; Jahn was armed, and in the scuffle several of the adults and several of the children were killed. Rhea beamed Jahn back up to the ship, and a smaller child, a boy named Pal, physically nine years old, either went willingly or was abducted by them. It would seem that the violence and the killings utterly panicked the runaways, pushed them over the edge to complete instability. Hence their refusal to answer all hails and communication, and their completely unprovoked attacks on the ore freighter and the ships from the Boaco system."

  As Spock paused, a heavy silence filled the room. He knew what his captain was thinking, what he would ask next. If only I could tell Jim later, in private …

  "Mr. Spock," Kirk said quietly. "You say several of the children were killed in the skirmish on the planet. Did the report happen to mention—"

  "It listed their names, Captain." Was there a gentleness moderating the Vulcan's speech? "Miri was one of them. She was killed by a stray phaser blast."

  Captain James T. Kirk was no Vulcan. He felt it unhealthy, unnecessary to deny or suppress his emotional responses. He sank heavily back into his seat. The pain he was feeling flashed across his face for a moment.

  But he was a commander. With responsibilities. Personal sorrows would have to wait. "You bring us harsh news, Mr. Spock. What a waste," he added, almost in a whisper. "Well! There still is that ship to be recovered." He flicked on the switch of the triangular viewscreen at the center of the briefing-room table. The face of Mr. Sulu, up on the bridge, filled the three screens.

  "Any luck, Helmsman? Have you been able to track the Sparrow?"

  Sulu's usually lighthearted face showed perplexity. "I'm not sure, sir."

  "You're not sure? Either you have or you haven't," Kirk snapped. Easy, he told himself. The pain is yours. Don't take it out on the crew.

  "Well, we've been getting traces of something, Captain. Could be a small ship. But they're occasional, spotty. They blink in and out. Appear and disappear all over the quadrant. If it's the same ship, it's following an awfully erratic course and traveling very fast. And ion storms simply don't account for the readings coming and going like this. Pavel says … that is, the only thing Chekov and I can figure is that they're using some kind of cloaking device."

  Spock nodded. "I was getting to that, Captain. As you know, we have already penetrated the Romulan cloaking device, and so have the Romulans themselves; the technology in that field seems to have rendered itself obsolete. But the Federation, it appears, has been secretly experimenting with a new kind of cloaking device, which confuses, misinforms a ship's sensors rather than jamming them. The Flint device, as it is called, has proved most successful and difficult to thwart in tests. Too successful, perhaps."

  "Flint device?" McCoy said, and frowned. "What's a name like that supposed to signify?"

  Spock went on quickly. "What is relevant to our mission is that the Sparrow was equipped with just this device. Which is what makes the ship's recovery of even greater importance to the Federation. Its theft was a minor disaster."

  Kirk moved to switch off the viewer. He said as he did so, "Mr. Sulu, continue your sweep. The next time you pick up sensor traces of the Sparrow, plot a course for it at maximum warp, and calculate as best you can its probable heading."

  "Aye, aye, sir," Sulu said, and vanished from the screen.

  Kirk felt very tired. I like your name, Jim. I've sharpened some more pencils for you. Killed by a stray phaser blast …

  He shook himself. "Lieutenant Uhura. You were able to monitor the attack on the Boacan ships when the Enterprise was still orbiting Boaco Six. You intercepted Irina's message to the Council of Youngers. Was that all you picked up?"

  "No, Captain. There were bits of … something else. It was fragmentary, crazy … I thought it might have been stray panicked signals from one of the ships under attack. Now, I think it must have been coming from the Sparrow."

  "What were these 'fragments' like, Lieutenant?"

  "Gibberish. Phrases like 'Crush, crash, crush' and 'Police! Police under fire!' And 'See how bad, how bad, how bad I am.' Really strange to listen to."

  Kirk thought of children in trouble. In so deep they knew they could never get out, could never go back. Who had done something too horrible to face up to with an adult's understanding.

  He felt no anger at what had taken place. Only a feeling of sadness which swallowed him whole.

  Chapter Fourteen

  RHEA GAZED NERVOUSLY at the generator room's viewer, at the diagram of planets and constellations that glowed ghostly on its screen. She hit the border of the screen with impatience. She must chart a course for them to follow. They were going nowhere, going round and round. Even if she charted a new course, Jahn might ignore it, might refuse to lay it in. Jahn was acting crazy. Ever since they left Juram Five, the Home World. She still couldn't get Jahn to tell her what happened down there. Which of the Onlies had gotten hurt. If any of the teachers were in the slambang phaser show. Little Pal wouldn't really tell her about it, either. She wasn't so sure she wanted to know.

  The fight with the big, slow, Federation cargo ship had taken her by surprise. She had stood still-rock, when Jahn opened fire, unable to grasp what was going on. And the destruction of the two primitive ships had been scary and awf
ul. She couldn't talk to Jahn when he got like that, couldn't shake him from the ship's controls. He seemed crazy sure, and all she felt was confused. No matter what they did now, they couldn't make it better. So she had crouched down beside Jahn's swiveling seat, scrunched closed her eyes, and covered her ears with her hands. When she looked around again, the screen wasn't full of the disintegrating ships anymore; it was all stars again. The airwaves weren't full of the Grups' pleas and questions, the main cabin was silent. And Jahn no longer seemed certain, in control. He stared at her blankly, helplessly.

  She did not know how to help him. They had planned the escape together, prepared for it, studied for it. But it had just seemed like a foolie, a game. Even when they were carrying it out, it was too easy, it didn't seem real. And now they couldn't go back. And she felt afraid of Jahn in lots of different ways. She didn't think she could do any of the things he might expect from her.

  So when he looked at her that way, she had directed his attention back to the control panel. He was supposed to be the engineering expert, but he seemed to keep forgetting how to run the ship. She had to tell him again how to run the device that made the ship invisible—he kept forgetting all about it. She had seen little Pal curled up under a panel in the corner, whimpering, and reminded Jahn that they had to take care of him.

  She had been a little Only, once. Then things had changed, fast, fast, fast! Grups had come back. The nice Grup man with yellow hair, and the devil, and the doctor. The pretty Grup lady. And Grups were good again, everyone said, they wouldn't hit and hurt. She couldn't remember that so well, the bad time, and the Grups that had belonged to her and gone bad, but the others did, some of them, but they said that these new Grups were all right.

  And then came the Program. And the shots in your arm, that didn't hurt the way Onlies said shots in your arm hurt in the hospital foolie; but these shots felt funny, and you heard a hiss when the doctor injected you. And then time became fast. You felt more tired, more sleepy at night. You couldn't keep the new fancy clothes the Grups gave you—-they got tight under your arms, at your waist; you had to keep getting bigger ones. The nurse would check you, see how you were growing, and then Dr. Voltmer and his esteemed colleagues would interview you …

  Escape! Now that it had happened, there were some really good things about it. She liked the quiet on board the Sparrow. The darkened corners. After the bells and tones that punctuated the passage of time in the schoolroom and cafeteria, and the dorm. Onlies were smart. Onlies were feather-foot, Onlies could melt into a building or an alley when they wanted to. And that was what she and Jahn were doing now, melting away. The whole concept of the cloaking device appealed to her. It was Only-spirited.

  Sometimes on the Program you could run and hide. But the Grups made you feel foolish. Took disciplinary action. "Go without dinner." Of course, an Only could go easily for a week hungry-belly, without food. But disciplinary action didn't feel good. And it was harder to go without food now that time was fast and her body was changing so fast. And thoughts changed; she changed, the way she felt about Jahn … no! Mustn't think about that. Change the subject. Think about …

  When she was a little Only. That was nice. That wasn't bad. Then Jahn was always a lot older, a leader, and he and Louise and Miri and also all those others who had gone bad and rotten, gotten the disease when they got too old, they took care of her and the rest of the little ones. Told you if you were being a bad citizen. Told you what Grups were like. Told you what foolies you were going to play.

  Nothing made sense now. All her books and algebra and calculus could not make sense like a circle of Onlies, passing soup, or sharpening stick-knives out of old planks. Or a nestle of Onlies curled up for the night in a roof-cave.

  They asked you how you felt. The Grup scientists. Them and their pills and things. They invented Grup evil long-ago. Miri had told her.

  They'd put you in a white, white room, and there was just you, leaning back in the chair, there wasn't anyone else. They put phones on your ears and disappeared into another room with a big glass wall, except they could see you but you couldn't see them. They'd ask you questions. What was it like to be an Only? What was it like to live so long? How could you answer? It was what it was. How could you explain Onlies to a Grup? They made you feel little, they made you feel ashamed …

  With their soapy water, and ear inspections. Shoes that pinched. Some were nice; Mrs. File was big and warm and shuffled about, and Rhea had built that small flying machine for her, spent all her free periods doing it, and when she turned it on and it flew around the classroom, and when she explained how she had built the gravity-antigravity component, Mrs. File had called her a very clever girl and given her a pretzel. In front of all the other Onlies. Mrs. File had a blue dress. And a red one with gold trim.

  But what was bad, what was really bad was the room with the chair. The lights were too bright. And Dr. Voltmer would turn on the bending noise, sonic waves it was called, and sometimes your mind would go a glaring white as the walls, you would go blank, you wouldn't know what you said. And sometimes he would ask you personal questions. Like, "How does it feel to suddenly be maturing at such an accelerated rate. Rhea? How are you coping?" Or he'd ask, did you feel anything about boys? What would you say to him? Tell him about when you and Jahn went walking down by the pool and you felt, no! Crazy, bad, a very bad citizen. Plot a course and we'll cut straight through the heart of the galaxy; they'll never catch us. Maybe if we stop getting the shots, we'll stop changing. We'll slow down and live like Onlies again. We don't need the Grups.

  With the precise fingers of a skilled technician, Rhea plotted a course for the Sparrow to follow. It arced cleanly out of its original quadrant.

  She did not know, nor would she have cared if she did, that it led into Klingon space.

  Chapter Fifteen

  KIRK LAY ON HIS BED,cool fingertips pressed against his temples. Now that the search for the Sparrow was under way, he knew he should give some thought to Boaco Six and Boaco Eight and the strain on their relations the children's attack on their ships had caused. The death of the ministers had thrown relations between the two worlds into turmoil.

  But his mind was filled only with memories of Miri's planet. He reviewed over and over the series of events that had taken place there. No … there was no way he could have acted differently. They were working so hard, so fast to cure the virus before it killed them, and attempting to win the trust of the children … There was no way that a different approach on his part would have made a damn bit of difference. The mistakes, the difficulties in handling the children came after the Enterprise had sailed on toward her next mission.

  He felt only pain, and a kind of regret, when he thought of the peace and sense of well-being with which he had withdrawn from the case, left it behind him. The children would be fine, he had thought; they're in capable hands; things can only get better for them. Perhaps he should have visited … but when, how? Too many missions, too many planets where he had left a piece of himself behind; were they all, thereafter, his responsibility?

  Don't you know why you don't want to play the same games you used to, Miri? And why you don't see your friends the same way as you once did? It's because you're becoming a young woman …

  All right, he shouldn't have left with such a feeling of complacency, should have been more aware that the bumps and jolts of the teenage years, as well as all the good things, lay before her and the others, in an even more concentrated form than for most youngsters. Oh, but she would have pulled through … He remembered Charlie X, the chance lost, but Miri had been saved, she would have been all right. Good God, the awful waste of it …

  Kirk did not respond immediately when his door buzzer sounded. "Come," he sighed finally.

  The doors flew open and McCoy stepped into the captain's cabin.

  "Jim, Spock said you were off duty. But known' you, I figured you wouldn't be sleeping. Would you like me to give you a shot of something to help you rest?"


  "No, that's all right, Bones." Kirk turned on the netted glittering sheen of the bed covers, lay on his back, and looked at the doctor through the half-light in which he had left his room. "Is it all coming back to you?" He smiled weakly. "Quite a mission, wasn't it?"

  "Of course it's all coming back to me. But you've got to try not to think about it."

  Kirk sat upright. "You know what must have happened? They've been mishandled because no one gave a damn about them. They weren't anybody's kids. No one could even identify with their strange situation. That's why they got turned over to some hacks."

  "Well, Voltmer is respected by some. But I've never thought much of him," McCoy said drily. "But Jim! You've got to stop thinking about Miri, stop blaming yourself …"

  Kirk sprang off the bed, a nervous mass, and moved to open the cabinet which held his Starfleet medals and decorations. "You know, she gave me something just before we left, as a … keepsake," he said, rummaging. "Here it is! Look." He held up in his hand a grubby, crudely carved wooden doll. At the sight of it, he could feel the back of his eyes sting with potential tears. He quickly replaced the doll in the cabinet and closed the door.

  Spock's eyebrow shot up as his captain reentered the bridge. "Captain. You are surely not thinking of returning to duty?"

  Kirk, with a jerk of his head, indicated that Spock should vacate the commander's chair and return to his science station. "Yes, Mr. Spock. Starfleet may send us an update on the Boacan situation, soon. And when we home in on the Sparrow, I want to make contact with the children. Under no circumstances can we fight them."