Star Trek: The Original Series - 161 - Savage Trade

by Tony Daniel

  “If I’m right, they won’t pose any threat to the crew,” McCoy said. “If they lived very long away from their original host, half the personnel on this outpost would be infected by now. I haven’t seen many people scratching their heads around here—except in befuddlement.”

  “All right, then, as for the rest of us, Mister Scott, the planetoid defenses need upgrading, and I can’t help but think our James Watt Excalbian might make—”

  A greeting whistled from nearby the door. “Visitor at entrance,” said the voice of the outpost computer.

  “Identify,” Kirk said.

  “Federation Special Representative Valek requests permission to enter and speak with Captain James T. Kirk,” said the computer.

  Kirk gazed around at his officers. “Well, let’s hear her out. Admit the representative, computer.”

  With a pneumatic chuff, the door slid open.

  Kirk stood. “Please come in, Valek.”

  Valek nodded and entered. She did not seem surprised to see the others gathered in the briefing area. “Greetings,” she said to the others, then turned immediately to Kirk. “Captain, it occurs to me that we should engage in a thorough debriefing following our discussion with Yarnek.” She glanced at the others. “I would also be very pleased if your senior staff took part.”

  “Certainly, Valek,” he replied. “How about now?”

  “That would be quite satisfactory,” she said with the raise of one of her curved Vulcan eyebrows. “May I sit down?”

  “Of course.”

  Valek took a seat, as did Kirk. She brought her hands together and templed her fingers on the table. “I take it that you have observed that Commander Contreras is perhaps overly in awe of her guests. I am no expert on humans, but I believe she has, in effect, accepted a subordinate role to the Excalbian leader.”

  “Perhaps,” Kirk acknowledged with a smile. “He is, in her eyes, President George Washington, a revered figure from our past. He represents not only steady leadership, but one of the founders of democratic governance.”

  “Explain?”

  “After America won its Revolutionary War—”

  “With the aid of the country called France, as I recall.”

  “True, Valek, as far as it goes,” put in Spock. “Yet this, too, was an event created almost single-handedly by the efforts of an American. One man: Benjamin Franklin, who was then serving as a commissioner to France.”

  Kirk nodded. “Franklin convinced the French to come in, and, more specifically, to commit the French navy. After that was accomplished, the British were defeated. After the formation of a federal government, Washington was elected president, an office that was held for four years at a time. There were no term limits, Washington could have served for the remainder of his life, had he chosen. In fact, he was so revered by the populace that he could have declared himself king and they would likely have gone along with it.”

  “That is illogical,” Valek said. “The Americans had just fought to rid themselves of royal governance.”

  “True,” Kirk said. “Being a logical man and, more importantly, a humble and strong-willed man who knew how to resist temptation, Washington reasoned that two terms were enough. He stepped down and returned to private life. In this way, he set a precedent for all those who followed. In many ways, his actions influenced the Federation Council practice of rotating, democratic leadership. Others had the idea of what it meant to be a democratic leader; Washington lived it.”

  “But this is contradictory. If he was the most logical person to lead the newly formed United States, he should not have resigned his position.”

  “He didn’t resign his position,” Kirk replied. “He decided not to run for a third term.”

  “It would seem to me,” said Spock, “that the point was to set an example.”

  “That’s right,” said Kirk. “Eight years was enough. He went back to his estate at Mount Vernon, and he pointedly declined any further attempts to reelect him to the presidency or elect him to any other office.”

  “Are you saying that Commander Contreras is displacing her regard for the historical figure of Washington upon this Washington analog?”

  “I don’t entirely blame her,” said Kirk. “The man bears a striking resemblance to George Washington, both in appearance and in what we imagine his demeanor to be from the histories. There was a reason the Continental Congress made him general.”

  “Yet you understand that this is an Excalbian replica, do you not?”

  “Oh yes,” Kirk replied. “I have a personal history with that particular Excalbian.”

  Valek nodded. “That is mostly what I have come to speak with you about, Captain.” She allowed her palms to spread away from their templed position, with her palms up in a gesture of goodwill and inclusion. It seemed to Kirk a very un-Vulcan motion.

  “How can I help, Representative Valek?”

  “Assuming I make the decision to grant the Excalbians political asylum within the Federation, there is much they will have to assimilate. For instance, you will have noticed their anachronistic garb.”

  “Apparently perpetually regenerating.”

  “It is a firm reminder that these people are not, at foundation, humanoids.”

  “Agreed.”

  “This regeneration is a special study of Commander Contreras, and I plan to closely question her on the matter. I will, of course, share any information I glean with you.”

  “I would appreciate that.”

  Valek brought her hands back together in the familiar Vulcan templing position, which, Kirk knew, was an indicator of deep thought, contemplation, and, occasionally, Vulcan scheming—although they would never call it that.

  “The Federation Council—Ambassador Sarek in particular—seems convinced there is something else behind the Excalbian explanation of their escape from the planet. That is partly the reason the ambassador chose me in particular, since I count myself a protégé of his.”

  “Sarek had an intuition?” Kirk said, amused.

  “No,” Valek replied. “It is comparable to seeing a puzzle mostly assembled and yet finding one piece missing—a piece that is crucial to the correct interpretation of that puzzle.”

  “Okay,” Kirk said. “Not an intuition.”

  “To bend the metaphor, we have, I believe, shaken the Excalbian Washington with our conversation,” Valek said. “Perhaps that missing puzzle piece will now fall out of one of his many pockets.”

  Kirk nodded. “Agreed.”

  She nodded toward the Enterprise officers present. “Captain, I believe it would be prudent for you to use your presence here to continue our effort to discover if the Excalbians’ underlying motivation differs from that which they’ve stated.”

  “You mean find out if they’ve been lying to us?”

  “Or telling us only part of the truth,” Valek said. “You are a human with strategic and tactical experience, perhaps the closest thing Washington-Yarnek has as a counterpart in this facility. I would like you to try to win the confidence of Washington-Yarnek in order to attempt to . . . I search for the proper idiom . . .”

  “Try to get him to open up to me?” Kirk asked with a smile.

  “I would expect a report after each encounter,” Valek said.

  “I’ll file a report when I have something to report,” Kirk shot back.

  “I will expect a verbal report,” she said. “The outpost computer system is not secure, and these are extremely delicate matters.”

  “Very well,” Kirk said. “Where do we conduct this . . . briefing.”

  “My quarters,” Valek answered. “I have the means to adequately shield it from any eavesdropping measures likely to be employed.” She cocked her head sideways. “In fact, it is likely the most private area on the outpost.”

  Kirk glanced over to see McCoy smiling like an amused wolf at Valek’s inadvertent double entendre, and Scott blushing nearly as red as his shirt. Uhura covered her mouth with a hand to hide her
smile. Only Spock seemed unaffected.

  Maybe you should have studied human behavior a little bit harder, Valek, Kirk thought. If you had, you’d know how that sounded.

  Then again, Kirk considered, maybe she knows exactly how that sounded.

  Kirk found himself half hoping that such was the case.

  He nodded. “All right, Representative, you’ve got yourself a deal.”

  * * *

  “She’s quite the intelligent woman, Captain Kirk?” Washington-Yarnek asked Kirk. They were in the outpost lounge. Across the room, Spock and Benjamin Franklin were engaged in what was shaping up to be an epic game of three-dimensional chess.

  Kirk had entered alone, and settled down to read an analysis of the L’rah’hane ship sent to him by Sulu, when Washington-Yarnek had taken the bait and asked if he could join him.

  “Please have a seat, Mister President,” Kirk said.

  “You may call me Yarnek if it makes you more comfortable,” said the other.

  “Well, sir, it . . . pleases me in some way to continue you to call you Mister President. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all, Captain,” replied the Excalbian. “I hope I am not interrupting your work?”

  “I don’t mind a little interruption. Just looking over a couple of reports.”

  Washington-Yarnek nodded. “Ah, the endless trail of paper—or nowadays, electrons—that follow a commander about,” he said. “Perhaps a short break would help your concentration. I know it often did my own. I was on my way to the biolab to have a look at my experiments with a kind of winter corn that just might survive on the planet surface here at Zeta Gibraltar. Would you care to join me?”

  Kirk glanced down at the ship specifications he was reading. “As a matter of fact, I would love to join you, sir. You’re right. My eyes were starting to glaze over.”

  Washington-Yarnek pointed toward the data slate.

  “Specifications for the L’rah’hane ship?”

  “Yes,” Kirk said. “My people have thoroughly crawled all over it and scanned it.”

  And found something very interesting in the process. Which I don’t plan to mention to you at present, until—

  “Then they no doubt came across the interesting quantum-field device in use by the L’rah’hane.”

  Kirk made an expression of surprise. “You know about that?”

  “Mister Watt described the item to me on our voyage back,” said Yarnek. “Doctor Franklin conjectured that it was some sort of information transceiver. He believed it may well be a method for communication faster than your own subspace transmissions.”

  “ ‘Your’ own?”

  “I mean the Federation’s standard method, of course,” Yarnek replied with a smile, though again carefully not opening his mouth to expose Washington’s legendary bad teeth. “One day I hope to be able to include myself among its citizens.’’

  “Perhaps you will, Mister President,” Kirk said. “Shall we visit the biolab?”

  They exited together, Washington-Yarnek busily describing his selection criteria for breeding wheat and corn analogs for growing during what passed on Zeta Gibraltar for spring and summer.

  * * *

  Chekov piloted the shuttlecraft Kepler as expertly as he performed his navigation tasks on the Enterprise. Sulu, in command of the mission, had taken over navigation and sensors and left the driving to Chekov for once. He occasionally served at the helm of the Enterprise when Sulu was away or their duty watches did not coincide. That was enjoyable. But the Kepler, he had to admit, was a great deal more exciting to pilot moment to moment, especially now that he and Sulu were making their way through the dense clouds and hidden pockets of solid matter inside the Vara Nebula.

  Serving as the navigator of the Enterprise was, of course, ultimately more satisfying. To have the responsibility of plotting the course of a ship containing over four hundred people was a heady experience. But in the shuttlecraft, there was the actual experience of acceleration, deceleration, and vector changes that was lacking except in the most dire of conditions aboard the Enterprise. The shuttlecraft had artificial gravity built in, but this, even combined with the inertial compensators, could only dampen, but not erase, the effect of banking, turning, and racing thousands of kilometers per second through one of the universe’s most challenging regions—an early-stage nebular cloud.

  Chekov and Sulu were acting under orders of their captain. They were allegedly visiting a moon of the Gibraltar system gas giant Upsilon Gibraltar in order to determine if that moon was a good place for a defensive base.

  They were, in fact, nowhere near Upsilon Gibraltar. Instead, they were engaged in a covert scouting and surveillance mission to determine the full extent of the L’rah’hane menace lurking within the nebula. Chekov didn’t know if the scientists on Zeta Gibraltar or the Federation civilian representative that had recently arrived knew that the mission was taking place, but he figured he would let the captain worry about that.

  Above my grade, Chekov thought. And a good thing at that. Sulu and I don’t have to worry about convoluted strictures, but only about Starfleet regulations when it comes to encounters with potential hostile forces. That’s enough on our plate.

  Those regulations were clear: do not engage unless a threat to life and limb is imminent. Furthermore, if they got into a firefight with the L’rah’hane, that would mean he and Sulu weren’t doing their job of observation and reporting.

  He was flying mostly by instruments. The view out the shuttlecraft portal was similar to that of a Moscow street in a winter fog. Sulu was navigating with what information they had, and both he and Chekov were keeping their eyes on the sensors.

  “I have a faint subspace signature from section 2.4, arc 247,” Sulu said. “Not much to go on, but let’s head that direction.”

  “I will bring us in slowly,” Chekov replied. “We don’t want to alert our quarry before we have a chance to make an inspection.”

  “Excellent,” said Sulu.

  Chekov adjusted the appropriate guidance controls, and the shuttlecraft banked behind a screen of matter—sensors showed it to be mostly ice and silicates. There was a similar field of floating debris above and to galactic west of his position. In the brief window of exposure zooming between the two hiding spots, Chekov and Sulu trained every detection device at their disposal toward the spot where the subspace signal had originated.

  Safely concealed behind the second matter field, they examined the data.

  Svyatoye der’mo, Chekov thought. It was a L’rah’hane vessel, all right, trailing a propulsion plume.

  He looked closer. A smeared electromagnetic signal, all over the spectrum.

  Primitive, he thought. Which provided the perfect opportunity for a bit of subterfuge.

  “What do you think? We move in directly behind him, remain in the propulsion plume, and his aft sensors will be of no use.”

  “It will be tricky,” Sulu replied. “That plume is going to bounce us around a good bit. Fortunately we have an Academy Double Windstar Award winner piloting the ship.”

  Chekov suppressed a smile. He hadn’t known Sulu was aware of his record as the top navigation and flight student in his graduating class at the Academy, a distinction that included possessing the reflexes necessary to work at a helm as well as the brains to navigate. Granted, helming a deep spacecraft was nothing like flying around the Academy flitters, but Academy instructors are the best—creating starship pilots with sterling records and incredible feats under their belts.

  The shuttlecraft was buffeted about, but remaining in the plume was no problem for Chekov, who had once snuck up on one of the Academy “top guns” using a similar tactic.

  He’d then been rather handily “killed” by the embarrassed instructor in the ensuing dogfight—but not before he’d gotten in the first hit.

  Deeper into the Vara Nebula they traveled. It was only after the L’rah’hane vessel rendezvoused with another that Chekov pulled back and found m
ore debris cover. By this time, the L’rah’hane vessel had slowed.

  It was approaching its destination.

  Chekov followed at a distance, yet always kept the quarry, and now its twin vessel, in sensor range for Sulu.

  “Bingo,” Sulu said as his short-range sensors lit up. “Highly active subspace chatter and multiple bogeys. Analyzing trajectory convergences. I’ll have visual in a moment.”

  Chekov held his position and waited. Sulu’s hands flew across the sensor controls. Then he sat back and let out a low whistle. “There’s something out there. Something massive.”

  Chekov looked down at his own instrument readouts. There was a narrow gap in the debris field to starboard at two o’clock high, as the old-school pilots would say. It looked just about shuttlecraft-sized. The fit would be narrow, but . . .

  “I think I can get us a better look,” he said.

  Carefully using side thrusters and impulse power on its lowest setting, he eased the shuttlecraft through the window—more of a narrow crack—in the thick debris cloud in which they were embedded.

  As the bow of the shuttlecraft emerged into the relatively empty space beyond, Chekov fired a brief burst of aft thrusters, then shut down all accelerators.

  It would take an extraordinarily accurate sensor sweep to see the shuttlecraft slightly protruding from the debris, and the searcher would likely have to know exactly what he, she, or it was looking for.

  “Polarizing fields,” Sulu said. “Should give us the clearest view possible.”

  It took a moment for the scene before them to emerge in their vision, but when it did, the sight was astounding.

  They’d emerged into what was perhaps a half million kilometers of clear space.

  Probably deliberately cleared, Chekov thought. The edges of the space, a decahedron, were quite exact. The kind of technology that could accomplish such a task was at least the equal to the Federation’s capabilities and perhaps beyond.

  No worries about violating the Prime Directive here, Chekov thought.

  What occupied the cleared space within the nebula was equally impressive. There were at least ten L’rah’hane ships—and other undefined varieties of vessels with different propulsion signatures—orbiting a massive central object.