Being Human

by Peter David

  “I . . . don’t know what that means,” admitted Robin.

  “It means that enough is enough, dear. Either you care about Si Cwan, you tell him how you feel, and you take what comes. Or you decide once and for all that it’s never going to happen and you just move on.”

  “I tried moving on,” Robin reminded her. “I wound up getting involved with a clone of a murderer.”

  “No one ever said the course of love was smooth.”

  “Mother, for God’s sake!” exclaimed Robin. She bounced off the bed, landed on her feet, and nearly twisted her ankle when she did it. She leaned on a chair for support. “I know it doesn’t have to be smooth, but for most people, at least it doesn’t involve felons!”

  “Robin, it’s time—as my long-departed mother used to say—to fish or cut bait.”

  “Mother, you’re nearly invulnerable. You probably will be around forever, or close to it, remember?”

  She waved her hands impatiently. “Whatever you say, Robin. Just get your life in order, all right? You’re a Starfleet officer, for heaven’s sake. Make a damned decision and stick to it. This endless vacillation . . . it’s unseemly. All right?”

  “All right, Mother. Whatever you say,” said Robin, trying not to be upset. She knew her mother meant well.

  “Good,” Morgan said. “Mark my words, Robin: You go through life thinking that you have all the time in the world, and then you suddenly find that it’s used up. Tomorrow becomes yesterday before you know it, and if you don’t plan for those tomorrows, you wind up mourning a hell of a lot of yesterdays.”

  “I’ll remember that.”

  “Good.”

  Robin smiled. “Good night, Mother,”

  “Good night, Robin,” said Morgan, and the screen blinked off.

  EXCALIBUR

  i.

  SOLETA, THE VULCAN SCIENCE OFFICER of the Excalibur, walked briskly into the conference lounge, slowed, and then stopped. She looked around, as if concerned that she’d walked into the wrong room. The only individual sitting there was Zak Kebron. He was as immobile as the statues he resembled, his hands resting one atop the other on the table, sitting perfectly upright in the chair that had been specially designed to accommodate his size. “Am I early?” she inquired. “My understanding is that there was to be a meeting here . . .”

  “Yes.”

  She pointed at herself and then at Kebron. “You and I . . . and who else? You informed me that I was needed up here . . .”

  “Yes.”

  “Kebron, I was off duty. My assumption was that this was a matter of some urgency.”

  “Yes.”

  She folded her arms and sat in a chair near him, crossing her legs at the knees and adopting one of the more severe looks in her repertoire. She was not the least bit pleased at this current state of affairs, nor was she at all amused over Kebron’s one-word answers. She had certainly grown used to them, but that didn’t necessarily make them any easier to take. And they were certainly ill timed. “Is anyone else coming to this little get-together?”

  “No.”

  “So you, unilaterally, decided to call a conference here in the conference lounge, the subject of which is apparently known only to you, and the only other individual to be part of this conference is me. Does that about sum it up?”

  He pondered it a moment. “Yes,” he decided.

  She uncrossed her legs and stood. Since she had come quickly at his summons, she had not taken the time to put her hair up in its usual chignon, held in place by the IDIC pin she’d had since her youth. Instead her long hair was down around her shoulders, and some of it was getting in her face. She pushed it back, covering her irritation with her customary ease, and announced, “I am going to bed now. That is not an invitation. That is simply a statement of fact. Good night, Kebron.”

  “Aren’t you curious?”

  “No,” she said flatly. “Curiosity is for when I am on duty. When I am off duty, I don’t give a damn. I said good ni—”

  “Sit.”

  Although he had not measurably raised his voice, there was something in his tone that brought her up short.

  It was at that moment that Soleta came as close to panicking as she had ever had in her life. For she was suddenly certain that Zak Kebron, security chief of the Excalibur, knew the truth about her. Knew that she was actually half-Romulan, and had hidden that fact from Starfleet. Knew that she was inadvertently involved with an act of sabotage upon the Romulan homeworld that had left them in disarray. This was probably going to be an initial interrogation, conducted by Kebron in the line of duty. Even though she had known Zak Kebron her entire adult life, suddenly she was looking at him as if he were a total stranger. He represented everything that she was afraid of, every secret she kept hidden away that would probably put an end to life as she knew it and her career as she had built it. He was the enemy. He was the end of everything for her, all incarnated in one inscrutable, daunting Brikar package.

  She sat. There really wasn’t much choice; she suddenly had no strength in her knees. It was everything she could do, it took every ounce of willpower she could muster, to keep her attention focused on Kebron.

  “We’ve known each other since the Academy, Soleta. You, McHenry, and I . . . we came up together.”

  Her lips were absolutely dry. She felt as if there were no moisture in her body at all. She nodded. For once, it was Kebron who was speaking, and Soleta who was the taciturn one.

  He leaned forward. She dreaded the next words from his mouth.

  “Have you ever wondered about McHenry?” he asked.

  She kept her demeanor utter calm. “McHenry.”

  “Yes.”

  “Mark McHenry?”

  He looked at her curiously. “Are you . . . all right?”

  “Yes. Why do you ask?”

  “Well,” he said uncertainly, “you look as if you want to . . . laugh.”

  “Do not be ridiculous,” replied Soleta archly. “Why are you asking about McHenry?”

  “Doesn’t he seem,” and Kebron tapped one large finger on the table, “odd?”

  Soleta stared at him. “Is this,” she asked at last, “part of a bet to see if you can actually get me to laugh.”

  “No. Not at all.”

  “Then you could have fooled me,” she said. “Asking me if I’ve noticed that McHenry is odd is like asking if I’ve noticed that it’s cold outside.”

  “That isn’t what I mean. Soleta . . . there are many things about McHenry that we simply . . . accept.”

  “What would you suggest we do, Kebron? Reject them?”

  Undaunted, Kebron continued, “His location abilities. His navigational abilities.”

  “They’re above the norm,” she admitted.

  “No. They are abnormal. They are impossible. No one can do the things McHenry can do. These . . . skills . . . have only become more pronounced over the years. Would you not say that is correct?”

  “I . . . I suppose . . .”

  “You are a scientist, Soleta. You have an inquisitive mind. All these years you have known McHenry, known him to do such impossible things,” and he lowered his voice even more than it already was, “and you have never . . . ever . . . questioned him? Is that not, in and of itself . . . extremely strange?”

  Her mouth moved but no words came out. She was having trouble processing the switch in her priorities. Soleta had been so worried that she was the subject of inquiry that she had to fight past her surging relief and bring her focus onto McHenry. Once she reached that point, she had to bring herself to acknowledge that Kebron might have a point. She just . . . wasn’t sure what it was

  “What is your point, Kebron?” she asked impatiently.

  “I looked up McHenry’s psych profile. His charts. His psi scores. Nothing tested out of the ordinary.”

  “It . . . didn’t?”

  “No.”

  “That . . . ” Now the part of her personality dedicated to scientific curiosity began to
stir as she rubbed her chin thoughtfully. “That . . . should not be the case. I mean . . . when one considers the things of which McHenry is capable . . . one would think certainly there is some degree of psionic ability present. Psychic or parapsychic tendencies, at the least.”

  “Yes,” agreed Kebron.

  “But there was . . . nothing, you say?”

  “And you have never questioned McHenry’s abilities.”

  “No. Never.”

  Kebron leaned forward. “Soleta . . . you should have. And I say that not to condemn you. I say that to indicate that something is wrong because you did not.”

  There was a long silence then. Soleta looked around as if she was suddenly concerned that there was some invisible presence in the room, watching, considering her next words. “Are you . . . suggesting,” she said slowly, “that McHenry, somehow, on some level . . . prevented me from wondering? ‘Prevented’ anyone in Starfleet from looking too closely? That he . . . suppressed any desire that anyone would have to look too closely at what he was able to do?”

  “Yes,” Kebron said.

  “Kebron,” Soleta told him, “you’re implying that McHenry is somehow . . . I don’t know . . . more than human. That he’s capable of shaping reality somehow, like a Q or similar being. That . . . that . . .”

  “That what we are seeing when we see Mark McHenry . . . has never been what we thought it was,” said Kebron. “And to realize that . . . is to do so . . . with the air of one waking from a dream.”

  She felt a chill working its way down her spine as she looked back on a lifetime of service, side by side with someone whom she suddenly wasn’t sure she knew at all.

  “I . . . don’t know what to say at this moment, Kebron. I truly don’t.”

  He leaned back in his chair, now drumming all his fingers on the table. “Neither do I,” he admitted. “It is as if we must . . . reorient our thinking.”

  “Have you brought this to the captain?”

  “No.”

  “Will you?”

  “There is nothing yet to bring. Vague suspicions that I cannot prove. Once I know what to say . . . I will say something. I was actually hoping that you might come up with some way to approach it . . .”

  He waited.

  She said nothing.

  “Soleta?” he asked finally. “Are you . . . ?”

  “I am fine,” she assured him, snapping herself back to the matter at hand. “I was just . . . considering options. To be honest, Kebron . . . I think we may not have to do anything.”

  “Why?” He seemed rather surprised, perhaps even a bit suspicious, at her assessment.

  “Because,” she said, “the fact that you’re inquiring at all . . . the fact that you’re wondering about him . . . may indicate that whatever it is that’s happening . . . is starting to fall apart. That we’re seeing a sort of . . . natural entropy unfolding in regards to McHenry’s personal situation. It may all be unraveling on its own. If that is the case . . . then all you have to do is stand back and be prepared to pick up the pieces when it does.”

  “The question is,” he said with concern, “if and when it does all fall apart . . . is it going to take all of us with it?”

  She had absolutely no answer for that, except to look at Kebron askance and suddenly ask, “Is your skin peeling?”

  “No,” he said quickly, and discussed it no further.

  ii.

  By the time Burgoyne arrived at the scene of the problem, there was already a small crowd gathered at the bottom of the Jefferies tube. An apologetic-looking Lieutenant Beth was standing there, glancing up the tube and back at Burgoyne as s/he approached. “Could we move aside, people?” asked Burgoyne with obvious irritation. “You must all have somewhere else you could be. And if not, I can certainly find places.” The crowd melted before him. “Thank you,” s/he said. S/he stood next to Beth, peering up the Jefferies tube. “Care to tell me how this happened?”

  “I have no idea, Commander.”

  “Well, good,” said Burgoyne, making no attempt to hide hir sarcasm. “It’s nice to know that the engineering department remains on top of things.”

  Beth lowered her voice, glancing around at the others standing near with obvious self-consciousness. “ Commander, that isn’t exactly fair. Do you know how many Jefferies tubes there are on this ship?”

  “Forty-two,” Burgoyne said promptly.

  Beth rolled her eyes. Her curly brown hair was tied back tightly, and he saw that there were smudges of dirt on her face and under her fingernails. Clearly she’d been climbing around in the tube. “Okay, fine, you would know. But that being the case,” she quickly rallied, “you’d have to admit that we couldn’t conceivably watch every tube in the ship.”

  The thing was, Burgoyne knew she was correct. But s/he was in no mood to back down, and disliked hirself for saying it even as s/he snapped, “I’m not concerned with every tube, Lieutenant. Right now I’m just concerned with this one.” S/he leaned in and called up the tube, “Xyon! Xyon, can you hear me?” No reply came. S/he withdrew and looked back at Beth. “Are we sure he’s still up there?”

  Beth produced a tricorder and aimed it up the tube. After a moment, she nodded. “Definitely. Got his life readings.”

  “Lock on to him. Let’s beam him out of there.”

  “That could be problematic,” Beth told hir. “He’s in a high energy flux area. He’s not in any danger,” she added quickly when she saw Burgoyne’s face. “But it would interfere with a transport lock. And I would hate for anything to go wrong. I mean, we could try to beam him out, but under the circumstances we could wind up getting him one piece at a time. I don’t think that would sit well with his mother.”

  “I tend to agree,” came a familiar, clipped voice from behind them. Burgoyne winced, knowing perfectly well who was going to be standing behind hir when s/he turned. And sure enough, there she was: Selar, her arms folded and her expression one of barely contained annoyance. And to make matters worse, Captain Calhoun was standing right behind her.

  “Captain, what are you doing here?” asked Burgoyne.

  Calhoun chucked a thumb down the hallway. “My quarters are right down there. I couldn’t help but overhear the turmoil. Someone want to fill me in?”

  Several people began talking at once, and Calhoun put up his hands to shush them. It was Lieutenant Beth who spoke: “Xyon crawled up this Jefferies tube. One of our tech people spotted him going up, tried to crawl in after him. But he’s managed to wedge himself up in the crawlways, up near the sixth intersect, we think.”

  “We think. We don’t know?”

  “We think we know,” said an uncomfortable Beth. “The problem is that the space is much too narrow for any of us to fit up there.”

  “Are you saying he’s stuck?” asked Selar. As always, she maintained her Vulcan demeanor of stoicism, but it was plain to anyone that she was concerned.

  “No, not at all. We don’t think he’s stuck. He’s just . . .” She sighed deeply. “Apparently he thinks it’s all a game.”

  “Wonderful,” grunted Selar.

  “I’m very sorry about this, Captain,” said Burgoyne.

  But Calhoun simply shrugged. “Apologies aren’t necessary, Commander. These things happen. And figuring out who’s to blame is just a waste of time and energy.” This helped Burgoyne feel some measure of relief, but even so, hir child was still stuck up there. Just because the captain wasn’t condemning anyone didn’t change that fact.

  Calhoun scratched his beard thoughtfully for a moment. Then he tapped his com badge. “Calhoun to Dreyfuss.”

  “Dreyfuss here,” came a worried voice from the children’s recreation center. “Uhm, Captain, if this is about Xyon going missing again . . . I’m sorry, I turned away for just a minute . . .”

  “That is what this is about, but there’s no harm done . . . hopefully,” he said with a cautious glance up the Jefferies tube. “Mr. Dreyfuss, I’m on deck five, section 23-A. Would you be so kind as t
o send Moke down here?”

  “Of course, Captain.”

  Within minutes, Moke came running up to Calhoun. Starship life had agreed with the boy. He had grown an inch taller, and his dark hair was neatly trimmed as opposed to the unruly mess it had been when he’d first arrived. He had filled out nicely, gotten far more substantial, while retaining that lean and athletic look from his homeworld of Yakaba. “You needed me, Dad?”

  Burgoyne couldn’t help but smile at that. The child wasn’t truly Calhoun’s son. Calhoun had adopted the boy after his mother had died on Yakaba. And most of the time, Moke addressed the captain as “Mac.” But Burgoyne had noticed that, when there were a few people around and a situation seemed more formal, or at least more serious, Moke always called him “Dad” or “Daddy.” Burgoyne wasn’t sure whether it was out of respect, or out of desire to prove to anyone nearby that he, Moke, had a right and reason for being there.

  “You remember Xyon? Burgoyne’s and Selar’s son?” asked Calhoun, indicating each of them respectively with a nod of his head. “Well, he’s up there, and he doesn’t seem to show any interest in coming down. I was hoping you might attend to it. You see, you can fit up there and we can’t.”

  “Okay,” Moke said without hesitation.

  “Captain,” Selar said with clear uneasiness. “Are you quite certain this is the right thing to—”

  But by the time she had gotten halfway through the sentence, Moke had already gone up the Jefferies tube. He scampered up the interior, disappearing from sight in no time. They heard a bit of clattering from within, and then the sound of something breaking. A moment later a data disk fell out. “Sorry,” Moke’s voice floated down.

  “Don’t concern yourself,” said Calhoun, picking up the disk and glancing at it. “All you did was take every lavatory facility from here to deck ten off line. Other than that, no problem.”