Kirk wanted to see whatever it was she was reading, but the special agent had angled her screen away from him. “Why would I?”
“Someone who can build an override like that, you’d think he’d be smart enough to go after civilian cars.”
“Well, there you go. I’m not smart enough to build the override—that Vulcan obviously is. And since I haven’t stolen any cars before, why would I be dumb enough to start now, with a Starfleet staff car?”
“Your brother, on the other hand—George Kirk.”
“Sam,” Kirk said. He kept his tone as unrevealing as he could.
Gilfillan looked up from the padd. “I’m sorry?”
“He prefers Sam.”
Gilfillan looked back at the padd. “He has got a record.”
“Not his fault. He was set up.”
“Seven times?”
Kirk forced himself to speak without emotion.
“He made mistakes. He knows it. He doesn’t make them anymore.”
Gilfillan nodded as if she didn’t care one way or the other. She touched the padd’s screen. “Now you, as far as I can tell, you’re a good kid. A bit of…oh, rowdiness, shall we call it, back in Riverside. ‘Borrowing’ a flyer. A few unsanctioned trips with school friends. Just a farm kid letting off some steam. Nothing noteworthy there. Plus, it’s clear you care about your brother. Strong family connection. I’d say your parents raised you right. Good early experiences in responsibility.”
Kirk looked down at his hands on the desk. Bare feet slipping on frozen mud, thousands of corpses, charred, bloated, a cloying sweet odor so thick that—
“Kirk?” Gilfillan’s question brought him out of it. “You heard what I said?”
“So?”
“So you’re a decent kid. A decent human being.”
“And…?” Kirk prompted the special agent to continue.
“And any decent person would realize the consequence of convincing the authorities that an innocent person committed a crime when he didn’t: That innocent person would be unfairly punished.”
Kirk met her piercing gaze. “How’s that my problem?”
Gilfillan switched off the padd, laid it on the table. “You tell me.”
She sat back, arms folded, waiting.
Kirk matched her, move for move, determined to beat the special agent at her game.
In silence, they both waited.
In the observation room, Eugene Mallory watched the feed from the interrogation room and tapped his finger on the table.
“He’s pretty sharp.”
The observation came from Special Agent in Charge Luis Hamer, the SCIS agent responsible for Starfleet North American operations. He was a tall man with a precisely trimmed beard and an ill-fitting suit, and clearly not pleased with being rousted from bed to liaise with Mallory on such a seemingly petty investigation.
“Not that sharp,” Mallory said. “He’s definitely hiding something.”
“Yes. He stole the staff car.”
“That’s a foregone conclusion.” Mallory picked up the small, cylindrical override device that SCIS had found on the Vulcan. “His DNA confirms it.”
“Kirk doesn’t deny touching it when the Vulcan tried to palm it off on him.”
Mallory looked thoughtful. “There’s something else, though.”
Hamer took another swallow from his coffee mug, stared at the small display screen that showed Kirk and Special Agent Gilfillan in the interrogation room, staring at each other in silence. “The only reason I can think of to explain why the director told me to get over here is because you think one of these kids broke into the Academy lab, too, and stole that dilithium.”
Mallory reexamined the override. “Forensics says a different transmitter was used. But both crimes used the same quantum code-breaking technique.”
Hamer yawned, apparently still waking up. “So you’re not convinced?”
Mallory waved the device at the small display screen. “On the one hand, your agent in there makes a good point. If Kirk’s smart enough to make this kind of an override, why not use it to steal civilian cars? Much easier to get away with.”
“And on the other hand?”
“If he’s smart enough to make an override that lets him steal dilithium from a Starfleet facility undetected, then why risk everything two weeks later by stealing something as relatively valueless as a staff car?”
“If we’re talking smarts, Mr. Mallory, I suggest we take a closer look at the Vulcan.”
“His parents are on staff at the Vulcan Embassy.”
“Good. That means he could smuggle the stolen dilithium off-planet in the diplomatic pouch.”
Mallory gave the SCIS agent a skeptical look.
But Hamer had an answer for him. “Look, I deal with this kind of thing every day, and let me tell you, crimes committed by Earth residents aren’t much more than background noise to the overall statistics. No one who lives here steals because of want or need anymore. In fact, when it comes to real crime, the kind we read about in the history books, more than eighty percent of what SCIS deals with—and the local protectors—can be traced to offworlders: human colonists, aliens, makes no difference.”
The agent nodded to the screen. “Given a choice between suspecting an Earth-born human or a Vulcan, if you want to play the odds, go with the alien every time.”
Mallory hefted the override in his open palm. “Maybe some aliens. But have you ever heard of a Vulcan committing a crime?”
“You’re forgetting something, Mr. Mallory. He’s not just a Vulcan—he’s a teenager.” Hamer pointed at the override in Mallory’s hand. “And his DNA is also all over that override, and on the six-thousand-credit currency wafer we found on him.”
Mallory frowned, still trying to figure out what the connection could be between the dilithium and the staff car and the two teenagers in custody. He hated mysteries.
“Look at it this way, then,” Hamer said wearily. “Technically, you’re right—Vulcans don’t break the law. But do you really think they never make mistakes? And isn’t that pretty much what being a teenager is all about?”
Mallory put the override back on the table. “I agree, for now. We can’t rule out anything.” On the display, Kirk and Gilfillan hadn’t moved. Mallory decided he at least had to give Kirk credit for being so self-assured. Unusual in a seventeen-year-old. “Let’s see how Special Agent Rickard is doing.”
Hamer leaned forward to tap a control, and the display switched to the second interrogation room.
“Interesting thing about human-Vulcan relations,” Special Agent Rickard said conversationally to Spock. She pointed to the paragraph on her padd, not that the Vulcan could see it. “No extradition treaty.”
Across the table from her, his hands folded in a contemplative pose in his lap, the tall Vulcan teenager said nothing.
“Apparently,” Rickard continued, “it’s never been a priority because there’s never been a need. If you were Andorian, or Denobulan, we could find you guilty here and then off you’d go to serve your sentence on your own planet with your own people. But since you’re Vulcan, nineteen, first offense, I’m going to guess you’ll end up in rehabilitation in New Zealand. Starfleet’s just opened a penal settlement there. Minimum security. Based on the Stockholm protocols. You’d be the only nonhuman in custody, so far.”
Spock’s mind filled with russet deserts, dry winds, the skies of home. The images and sensations calmed him.
“Actually,” Rickard said, “it might be easier for you to serve your time here, rather than on Vulcan. I understand there’s no crime on your planet, since crime’s not logical. You’d be the first Vulcan to be convicted. Ever. Will there be repercussions for your family?”
Spock concentrated on the flow of air through his nostrils, into his lungs. He breathed deeply, pictured the intricate chemistry by which oxygen molecules transfused through his alveoli into his bloodstream to be captured by the copper molecules of his Vulcan metalloprotein
s, which then responded by turning green.
Rikard continued, undeterred by his silence. “I understand the Klingons were known to execute whole families if even one member committed a crime against the Empire. Maybe they still do. In a way, such action would be logical. After several generations, perhaps, one could eliminate criminal genes from the population. Did something like that happen on Vulcan?”
Spock recreated the taste of plomeek soup in his mind—specifically, the recipe his mother would make after the meditation festivals every fall. He began to analyze each aromatic component by class, ordering them by number of carbon rings.
“You know,” Rickard said, “I’m beginning to think that’s exactly what makes you people special.” She lifted her right hand to rub the back of her neck. “I mean, how else to explain this unique emotional control you all have. This perfect focus. I have never heard of any humans that can—”
Mid-sentence she slammed her open hand down on the table, making a thunderclap in the small room, making her padd jump, and making Spock jerk up from his chair, wide-eyed and startled.
Rickard nodded. “I’m a lot better at this than you are, smart guy. So don’t think you can play any of your alien games with me.”
Spock felt angry at this human woman for abruptly shaking him from his meditative state. Then his anger doubled back on himself for even feeling anger. He forced his body to remain still, but failed to slow his pounding heartbeat and to stop a small muscle twitching in his jaw.
Even worse, he could see from the human’s smug expression that she had detected the glaring evidence of his raw emotions.
“As I was saying…now that you’re listening…I’ve never taken a Vulcan into custody. Matter of fact, there’s no record of any Vulcan on Earth ever being taken into custody, let alone being charged with a crime.”
Insultingly, Rickard was regarding him with curiosity, like a specimen. “There’s a bit of history being made here, and I want to know why.”
Before Spock could attempt reimmersion in meditation, he saw the agent shoot a glance at one of the optical imagers on the wall. Her expression changed to sharp annoyance.
An inner wave of elation swept over Spock. He knew that human expression. She had given up! He had successfully outlasted her primitive and emotionally manipulative interrogation techniques. The superiority of Vulcan mental discipline had triumphed. He felt the calm of the desert return to him, as if he himself walked in Surak’s footsteps. It was wrong to do so, he knew, but he felt pride in his accomplishment.
Rickard’s communicator chimed and she flipped it open. “Rickard.”
A man’s voice spoke. “Hamer here. We’re going to call it a day for now, Agent Rickard. Escort the young man to detention room B. We’ve called the Vulcan Embassy to let his parents know their son’s been taken into custody, so they’ll be coming by soon.”
Spock’s face went slack with shock and once again the human noticed.
She deftly flipped her communicator shut, slipped it back inside her open jacket. “The Vulcan Embassy is right across the street. You won’t have to wait long.”
“On the contrary,” Spock said stiffly, all emotional masking momentarily beyond his powers of self-control. “My parents might have been called, but I assure you they will not come for me.”
Rickard stood, gestured for Spock to do the same. “Don’t be so sure. Vulcans love their children, too.”
“There is no reason to insult me further.”
The agent’s expression changed again and Spock recognized this one, also. Pity.
“No,” the human woman said. “I suppose not.”
Mallory watched as Rickard escorted the Vulcan youth from the interrogation room.
“You certainly called that one,” Hamer said. “His reaction when I mentioned his parents was priceless.” His eyebrows lifted. “I thought they didn’t have emotions.”
“They have them. They just don’t express them the way we do. Maybe that kid missed a few lessons.” Mallory stared at the display, even though all it showed now was the empty room.
Hamer cleared his throat. “You going to leave this to us, now, Mr. Mallory? I figure you’ve got to have more important things to deal with than a local theft.”
Mallory did have other pressing matters. He knew the after-action report from Helstrom III would be coming in any moment, and that he’d have to process it for the meeting of his DGS steering committee. He closed his eyes, rubbed them, still seeing the captain’s haggard face, the still bodies of the children. But still…there was something about this apparently minor case…
“The Vulcan didn’t steal the staff car,” Mallory said. “It’s as you said, his reaction when he heard his parents had been notified…any teenager that concerned about what his parents think about him, he’s not about to steal any kind of car.”
“So the Vulcan wouldn’t steal it, and the Kirk boy is too clever to steal it,” Hamer said. “That leaves us with two teenagers with no motives to commit the crime, enough DNA evidence to find them both guilty, and a six-thousand-credit wafer that suggests someone sold something to a third party, further explaining why the staff car is still missing.”
The SCIS agent regarded Mallory with annoyance, clearly losing interest in hiding his irritation at being ordered to let a Starfleet bureaucrat from a low-level planning office interfere in his case.
“Trust me, Mr. Mallory, those dots aren’t hard to connect. So shouldn’t you just leave this one to SCIS?”
“Not till I know what the connection is between those two kids and the Academy theft.”
“You honestly think there is one?”
“We’ll know when the parents get here.”
11
“He’s your son,” Amanda said. “Our son. And we will go.”
Sarek, son of Skon, Vulcan diplomatic attaché for scientific outreach and the development of unaligned worlds, kept his expression in serene and neutral repose.
His wife, however, narrowed her own eyes as her human anger grew. “Don’t give me that look.”
“What look, my wife?”
“The public look. The ambassadorial candidate look. The Vulcan look.”
“Given that I am a Vulcan, logically I have no choice in the matter.”
“And don’t change the subject.”
Sarek decided it was time to study anew the tapestry on the wall of their private quarters. It was an exquisite piece of early Sharielian impressionism, dating back fifteen hundred years on Vulcan, showing the dawn breaking over Mount Seleya.
Amanda could see that her husband was about to retreat into private meditation—his traditional method of dealing with their “discussions” concerning their son—but she wasn’t about to allow that today.
She stepped in front of the tapestry. “Sarek…Spock’s in trouble.”
“He cannot be.”
“Starfleet has him in custody. For stealing.”
“Precisely. No Vulcan has cause to steal; therefore, the Earth authorities have made an error which they will in time realize and rectify. Spock will be released soon enough.”
“They’ll release him sooner if we go to Starfleet Headquarters and you explain that to them. Sarek, do you know how embarrassing this must be for Spock?”
“Embarrassment is a human emotion. Spock will feel no such thing.”
“Ohhh…” Amanda stamped her foot on the hard red tiles of the central room. She had been married to Sarek for more than twenty years—half her life. She knew the Vulcan way of logic and emotional control was a better way than the hedonistic philosophies of Earth and so many other worlds. But still…when Sarek used Vulcan logic as a barrier to their emotional attachment instead of as an exquisitely precise enhancement of it…
She stormed to the hallway to get her cloak. “All right, I’ll go!”
She wrapped the rose-colored fabric around her slight shoulders, checked her auburn hair in the dressing mirror. Despite her love of all things Vulcan, she kept
it long and swept up in a human style. Aesthetically, Sarek found it “exotic,” he said.
She saw him step behind her in the mirror. She lowered her eyes, not in submission but because, at the moment, she knew she could only glare at him.
“My wife,” Sarek said, so calmly and so reasonably, “please reconsider what you are about to do.”
“Why should I?”
“Because of our agreement.”
That prompted Amanda to look up and into the reflection of her husband’s dark eyes.
“Regarding Spock,” Sarek added.
“We’ve gone past that.”
“No, we have not.”
Amanda sighed. She relaxed to let her mind fill with the simple Vulcan meditative rhythms she had mastered, dutifully concentrated on her breathing, turned to face Sarek.
“I am not unaware of our son’s difficulties,” he said. “I know what he faced on Vulcan. I know the taunts and torments he received from the other children when he was a child.” Sarek raised his eyebrows in an expression of apology—a display of emotion that Amanda understood would have been shocking in any other circumstance than a private discussion between husband and wife. “I understand how that interrupted his concentration, slowed his studies.”
But Amanda couldn’t let anyone cast aspersions on her son, no matter how gently, not even Sarek. “Spock is an exceptional student. You know he’s brilliant. Even by Vulcan standards.”
“Of course,” Sarek agreed quietly. “But the proper studies of a youth of his age involve more than a simple mastery of multiphysics and rote memorization of history. There is the matter of emotional control, and there, we must both admit, our son’s abilities are not as certain as they should be.”
“All the more reason we should go to him now.”
“No. All the more reason we must abide by our agreement.”
Amanda lost the threads of her meditation, forgot about her breathing. She was a mother who loved her son. She had to do something.
Sarek held up his hand, two fingers extended, a sweet gesture of consolation.
Amanda had never been able to resist Sarek’s charm and his love. Nor did she now. She held her two fingers to his in the ancient ritual by which two separate beings formed the sign of long life and prosperity, showing how their lives were entwined.
Collision Course Page 6