Lesser Evil

by Robert Simpson

  T’Prynn swiveled her cockpit chair in order to face the transporter pads at the rear of the craft. Regarding the group impassively, she said, “It’s good to have you back, Commander Vaughn. I have already laid in and executed a course back to Federation space.”

  Omiturin responded before Vaughn could get his mouth open. “Good work, Commander T’Prynn,” she said. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to escort Dr. Veruda aft. He needs to rest. We can debrief later.” The two Cardassians disappeared behind the scout vessel’s aft partition, leaving Vaughn standing on the transporter pad, scowling.

  T’Prynn rose and approached him. “You appear to have something to say.”

  “You knew about this, didn’t you?” Vaughn said, hiking a thumb aftward.

  “I was aware that a surgically disguised Starfleet operative had infiltrated the Kora II facility’s security contingent. Yes.”

  Vaughn decided that Vulcan Starfleet officers must have to take classes in Exasperating Behavior before receiving their commissions. It just couldn’t be a natural talent.

  “And you didn’t see fit to reveal that fact to me?” he said.

  “We both knew that there was a significant nonzero probability that you would be captured. Had you been told of the presence of a third operative, you might have been made to reveal that knowledge under interrogation.”

  Vaughn’s pique began to recede, at least where his Vulcan associate was concerned. “You wound me, T’Prynn. Do you really think I’d crack so easily?”

  “You are only human.” T’Prynn wore the only expression in her repertoire that even vaguely resembled a smile.

  Vaughn ignored the good-natured jab. “You and I have worked together on and off for, what, thirty years now?”

  “It has been twenty-eight years, nine months, and sixteen days since our first covert mission together.”

  Vaughn offered her an I’ll-take-your-word-for-it nod. “I can understand why my lack of a ‘need to know’ might be mission critical. What I don’t understand is why the brass hats in Command sent her of all people.” He gestured toward the aft compartment.

  T’Prynn raised a quizzical eyebrow. “I don’t understand.”

  “‘Kree Omiturin,’” Vaughn said. “Come on, T’Prynn. Don’t tell me you haven’t figured it out. It’s an anagram for Ruriko Tenmei.”

  T’Prynn nodded. “Ah. Your nemesis.”

  “Please. She’s a colleague. I’ve made a habit of keeping up with her missions over the last few years. And she’s sent me messages now and then assuring me that she’s been returning the favor.”

  “But you had never actually met her before today.”

  Vaughn nodded.

  “Then I believe I understand your frustration, Elias,” T’Prynn said, folding her arms. “At least in part.”

  Vaughn saw that she was still puzzling over something. “Which part isn’t clear?”

  “The source of your anger. Are you upset with Starfleet for assigning Lieutenant Commander Tenmei to this mission without your prior knowledge? Or do you resent being rescued by your biggest rival within the bureau—and on your very first meeting?”

  He turned those notions over and over for a protracted moment before answering. “Those are excellent questions,” he said at length.

  T’Prynn was clearly not finished making probing observations. “She infuriates you.”

  “Yes.”

  “Irritates you.”

  “Yes.”

  “Exasperates you.”

  “Yes!”

  “You are attracted to her.”

  “Is it that obvious?”

  U.S.S. T’Plana-Hath

  2349 Old Calendar

  The Ktarian freebooter vessel had already exploded, vaporized as though plunged into the heart of a sun. Vaughn couldn’t spare a moment to admire the spectacular blast.

  He still had to make sure that T’Prynn got back aboard the T’Plana-Hath safely.

  Why did T’Prynn always insist on cutting her escapes so fine? Vaughn thought it was a positively non-Vulcan characteristic. But she always gets the job done, he reminded himself as he extended the console’s buffer memory and attempted once again to energize the transporter.

  “Her pattern has degraded by sixty-two percent,” Ruriko said. She stood at his side, her hands steadier than her voice as she bridged emergency power to the targeting scanners.

  Had anybody ever survived such massive signal degradation during transport? Vaughn wasn’t sure. He had to count on hope—and on the system’s multiply-redundant holographic memory matrices.

  “Again.” They both touched buttons in a flurry of motion. Indicators and telltales flashed. The console whined. The transporter cycled.

  Again, nothing.

  We’re not giving up on you, T’Prynn.

  The transporter made strained noises that Vaughn had rarely heard before. A film of greenish organic residue fell from a dissipating column of light, splashing across four of the pads.

  Vaughn froze, gazing in Ruriko’s direction. Her huge eyes held the thought that he couldn’t give voice to.

  T’Prynn was gone.

  Mount Selaya, Vulcan

  2349 Old Calendar

  Conducted by several robed masters under the watchful eye of T’Rukh, Vulcan’s barren co-orbital world, the internment ceremony had been befittingly solemn. Vaughn also found the entire affair to be parsimonious and efficient. T’Prynn would have been pleased. Judging from the stoic expressions borne by the dozens of assembled family members and colleagues, it was easy to believe that Vulcans entirely lacked the concept of mourning.

  Thanks to his long association with T’Prynn, Vaughn knew better.

  Ruriko squeezed his hand tightly throughout the brief ceremony. She looked diminished, smaller in some way. Vaughn didn’t try to restrain the tears that rolled down his cheeks as the vial that contained T’Prynn’s mortal remains was interred in a family crypt beneath the ruddy, sunbaked sands of Gol.

  After the funeral party and the guests had dispersed, Vaughn and Ruriko walked along a flat expanse of red-and-ocher Vulcan desert, watching the sun grow huge and orange as it began to sink over the horizon. The sunset painted the sky with every color on the pallet from scarlet to salmon to deep purple.

  It wasn’t until an hour after the planet had slipped into night’s embrace that Vaughn noticed that he and Ruriko were still holding hands.

  Together, they looked up at the eternal stars. In his mind’s eye Vaughn saw T’Prynn raise an ironic eyebrow. Had she been standing here, Vaughn thought, she might be tempted to comment that he and Ruriko would make a lovely couple.

  Vaughn turned from the stars and looked into Ruriko’s eyes. She was watching him expectantly. Damn, Vaughn thought. It’s always the one you didn’t see that gets you.

  San Francisco, Earth

  2349 Calendar

  Vaughn and Ruriko returned to Starfleet Headquarters for a day-long debriefing session immediately after their return from the Monac System. They had delivered Veruda’s computer worm, on target and on schedule. The countermeasure program—three years in the making, following the defection of Dr. Cren Veruda to the Federation—had entered the Cardassian grid at the Monac shipbuilding facility and had propagated itself via subspace relays before anyone detected it. As far as Starfleet’s premiere A.I. experts could determine, the artificial intelligence with which the Cardassian Union had been tying together its offensive and defensive capabilities was now completely inert.

  Three years fraught with a series of difficult assignments now culminated in this balmy San Francisco Sunday afternoon. And Vaughn found himself—astonishingly—with nothing to do except stroll through the Golden Gate Park Arboretum, Ruriko at his side.

  Ruriko paused to admire a rhododendron nearly as large as her head. She closed her eyes as she inhaled the flower’s fragrance. Vaughn smiled, admiring her long black hair, her delicate porcelain complexion. It was hard to believe that the first time he had met her she
had been surgically altered to pass as a Cardassian torturer.

  How things change.

  Ruriko straightened and gazed deeply into his eyes. As though she’d read his mind, she said, “I’ve come to a decision, Elias. I’m not taking any more field assignments. At least for a while. I want to get back into nanotech research full time.”

  She regarded him expectantly. Did she hope he might drop out of the field as well? It certainly would make sense; he was nearly twice her age, after all. But Vaughn wasn’t certain he knew how to quit.

  “Is this about what happened to T’Prynn on the Ktarian mission?” Vaughn asked.

  She nodded. “It’s sobering to get a demonstration about how vulnerable we all are. That even Vulcans aren’t immortal.”

  “She knew the risks. We all do, or else we wouldn’t sign on.”

  “But nobody can count on luck, Elias,” she said with a rueful smile. “Your ass-brained philosophy notwithstanding.”

  He took a deep breath, sensing what was to come. “Is this about settling down? Getting married?”

  Her laugh reminded him of the serene fountain that burbled quietly in the arboretum’s center. “I know you too well to ask you to do that, Elias. Besides, I didn’t say I wanted to retire permanently. I just need a few years away from the job.”

  He frowned, suddenly worried that she was slipping away from him. Or vice versa. “A few years away. To do what?”

  “I want to have a child,” she said, taking his hand. “With you.”

  Vaughn was poleaxed. He nearly fell over.

  Then he thought about it. A child. Their child. What an affirmation of life creating and raising a child would be. For the first time he could recall in decades, he felt tongue-tied.

  “Let’s talk,” he said, even though he knew that words were no longer necessary.

  Toscana, Earth

  2355 Old Calendar

  “How’s my birthday girl?”

  “Daddy!”

  The late Commander T’Prynn’s namesake launched herself at Vaughn’s legs, grabbing hold with a strength that nearly sent both father and daughter sprawling across the lawn. The air was redolent with marigolds, zinnias, and fruit punch, the sounds of happy children aloft on a gentle breeze. Five candles burned on the cake on the backyard picnic table.

  Little Prynn disengaged herself from Vaughn to chase Danilo, the neighbor boy. Ruriko approached Vaughn, greeting him with a wide smile, though she couldn’t conceal her curiosity about his most recent assignment, out among the Orion crimelords. He smiled. There would be plenty of time to bring her up to date later.

  Right now, whatever he could spare of himself belonged to little Prynn. Vaughn was delighted to see that he had beamed in soon enough to catch the bulk of the proceedings. Although the piñata was already spent and in pieces, candles remained to be blown out, yellow cake had yet to be served, and a goodly heap of ribbon-bedecked gifts remained tightly wrapped.

  An urgent hail came in on Vaughn’s combadge. He breathed a silent curse. Why didn’t I just ditch the thing?

  Ruriko noticed, scowling. But he knew she understood. He stepped away from the children to answer the call.

  He braced himself to tell them that he couldn’t interrupt little Prynn’s special day.

  But the call was from Admiral Presley’s office. There was a coup brewing on the Elaysian homeworld.

  But it’s Prynn’s special day.

  The planet faced imminent political upheaval, a threat to the lives of tens of thousands of people, with the potential of spilling over into adjacent sectors. Countless people were in jeopardy.

  Countless strangers. Prynn is my flesh and blood. And she needs me.

  According to Admiral Presley, the mission couldn’t wait. Starfleet’s brass were counting on Vaughn’s expertise. Once more unto the breach, dear friend….

  He glanced at Ruriko. How he envied her ability to simply walk away from it all. He watched Prynn, still chasing Danilo through the yard, the epicenter of a sudden squall of childish laughter.

  Prynn. On her special day.

  Duty. Indispensability. The lives of complete strangers.

  He sighed and signaled that he’d be ready to beam out in five minutes. Long enough to explain, at least a little bit, about what he had to do. And where he had to be for the next few weeks.

  Prynn will understand, he told himself. Just as Ruriko had understood half a decade earlier, when duty had placed parsecs between them on the very day little Prynn had come into the world.

  U.S.S. T’Plana-Hath

  2369 Old Calendar

  Commander Vaughn sat alone in his quarters. Before him on the desk the images of Prynn and Ruriko smiled at him from a holocube. Ruriko’s hair was streaked with gray now, but she’d lost none of her beauty, her smile had lost none of its wattage. And Prynn, now a grown woman, was definitely favoring her mother.

  And she was wearing a Starfleet cadet’s uniform. Today, Vaughn recalled, was to be her first day at Starfleet Academy. Searching his soul, Vaughn realized that he felt somewhat ambivalent about his daughter’s career choice. Was she flattering him? Trying to emulate him? Or was he simply upset by yet another reminder that his inability to say no to Starfleet had made him an absentee father? Vaughn never had any doubt that Ruriko understood him, or had at least learned to love him in spite of whatever grave character flaw kept returning him to the field.

  Vaughn reached out and touched the image of his daughter. How he longed to talk to her. To congratulate her for passing the Academy’s stringent entrance exams. To offer her periodic encouragement and sympathy over the next four grueling years.

  If only this mission didn’t require subspace radio silence.

  Ruriko, who had always been more than just the job, had been able to walk away from the field. Vaughn knew that he could not, at least not until death or senescence made the question moot.

  He sincerely hoped that Prynn would take after her mother in that regard as well.

  Uridi’si,

  2369 Old Calendar

  Vaughn stood on the bridge of the U.S.S. T’Plana-Hath, beside the captain’s chair—the chair that his departed friend T’Prynn might have occupied by this point in her career, had she lived. On the viewer, Uridi’si’s two suns had just risen above the planet’s limb, painting the oceans every imaginable shade of green and blue.

  Captain Sotak turned his chair toward the tactical officer. “Is the A.I. still contained within the planet’s magnetosphere?”

  The young woman at the tactical station displayed the no-nonsense attitude Vaughn had come to regard as typical of Vulcans who’d had little experience around humans. “The subspace jamming satellites are functioning normally, Captain. The U.S.S. Valkyrie, orbiting at antipodes, confirms this as well. The cyberentity cannot leave the planet’s magnetic field lines. At least, not via subspace channels.”

  “Very good,” Sotak said, swiveling his chair toward Vaughn. “Commander, this is your mission. How would you like to proceed?”

  “We need to destroy the physical substrate the A.I. is using to run its computational cycles,” Vaughn said. “Have your engineers found a way around the force field the thing has thrown up around itself?”

  “Negative,” Sotak said. “Not without compromising the safety of the several hundred people who are trapped inside the mining station dome.”

  Vaughn silently cursed the mining station’s force fields, though he understood well the need for such strong defenses so close to the Cardassian border. Orion pirate raids were also a recurring problem in this sector.

  But he also knew that the situation was far from hopeless. “Commander Tenmei has been working on an alternative way around the A.I.’s defenses, Captain.”

  The turbolift whooshed open at that moment, depositing Ruriko onto the bridge. She was back in uniform for the first time in two decades, now that Prynn had emptied the nest by enrolling at Starfleet Academy. Vaughn could see that the job and its accoutrements still f
it her well. Except for the gray in her hair and the stiff-collar design of her uniform, it was as though the intervening years had never occurred.

  Ruriko took her place beside Vaughn and the captain. “After all these years it’s hard to believe that we’ve got to take down Cren Veruda’s A.I. all over again.”

  “I still have to wonder why it’s reconstituted itself only now,” Vaughn said.

  “I suspect we’re dealing with a single rogue copy of the software matrix,” Ruriko said, “which has been contained in an isolated system until very recently. Something must have changed that, and now it’s growing again like kudzu. And since it’s essentially an artificial life-form, it has an instinct for survival. It’ll seize control of every computer it can reach if we let it.”

  Vaughn scowled. “When we didn’t hear from the thing for thirty years after the first time we disabled it, I sort of assumed we’d seen the last of it.”

  “Obviously not,” Sotak said.

  Ruriko nodded. “An artificial intelligence capable of networking itself across the subspace bands is also capable of secreting copies of itself in unexpected places. Say, within the computer of a freighter on its way to the mining station down there.”

  It could spread itself across the universe like dandelion seeds on the wind, Vaughn thought. If we’re careless. Or unlucky.

  Vaughn noticed a look of surprise on the tactical officer’s face, which she promptly hid behind a wall of Vulcan calm. “I’m detecting a significant fluctuation in the local subspace fields. The disturbance is localized less than fifty thousand kilometers from the planet.”

  Sotak’s brows rose in curiosity. “On the screen, Lieutenant.”

  The blue-green world vanished from the viewer, replaced by an image of an irregularly shaped vessel which the tactical overlay revealed to be more than twice the length of the T’Plana-Hath. And it was heading toward the planet. A chill seized Vaughn’s soul the moment he saw the alien ship. Beside him, Ruriko stifled a gasp.

  “Analysis?” Sotak said.