Strange New Worlds VIII

by Dean Wesley Smith

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  Contents

  Introduction

  Dean Wesley Smith

  Shanghaied

  Alan James Garbers

  Assignment: One

  Kevin Lauderdale

  Demon

  Kevin Andrew Hosey

  Don’t Call Me Tiny

  Paul C. Tseng

  Morning Bells Are Ringing

  Kevin G. Summers

  Passages of Deceit

  Sarah A. Seaborne

  Final Flight [Third Prize]

  John Takis

  Trek

  Dan C. Duval

  Gumbo

  Amy Vincent

  Promises Made

  David DeLee

  Always a Price

  Muri McCage

  Transfiguration

  Susan S. McCrackin

  This Drone

  M. C. DeMarco

  Once Upon a Tribble

  Annie Reed

  You May Kiss the Bride

  Amy Sisson

  Coffee with a Friend

  J.B. Stevens

  Egg Drop Soup

  Robert Burke Richardson

  Hero

  Lorraine Anderson

  Insanity

  A. Rhea King

  “A & Ω” (Alpha & Omega) [Grand Prize]

  Derek Tyler Attico

  “Concurrence” [Second Prize]

  Geoffrey Thorne

  “Dawn”

  Paul J. Kaplan

  About the Contributors

  Introduction

  Dean Wesley Smith

  Every year you, the fans, take me on a pleasure ride into the amazing past of the Star Trek® universe.

  Now, granted, I am a story junkie. I’m a person who loves reading Star Trek more than anything else I can think of doing (except writing Star Trek). Every October, boxes and boxes of great stories arrive at my doorstep, and every year those stories usher me into the Star Trek universe, in ways, and to places, I would have never thought to go by myself.

  But besides that, your stories take me into my own past.

  The original Star Trek series premiered in September of 1966 and was aired on Friday nights in Boise, Idaho. I remember how I would rush home from high school to watch it. I never missed an episode back in the days before videotape machines. I didn’t dare—there was the awful chance that the episode might not air again. (Yes, I realize that I just dated myself and told you how old I really am.)

  The superb Star Trek stories you send in to the contest take me back to my high school days. They remind me of my friends and take me back to the nights of worrying about being drafted and the uncertainty of life—deciding if I should go to college or just go skiing.

  I did both, didn’t get drafted, and years went by. When Star Trek: The Next Generation® started, a group of us, all hopeful writers, would gather at Nina Kiriki Hoffman’s house to watch it every week. We would talk about the episode that we had just seen, talk about writing, and simply enjoy each other’s company. If someone had told me that I would be writing Star Trek professionally, I would have just laughed. And wonderful anthologies like this weren’t even distant thoughts. Every one of the Next Generation stories we receive reminds me of those delightful “Trek parties” we used to love so much.

  Star Trek: Deep Space Nine® broadcast its first show via satellite, ahead of when it aired on regular local channels. My wife, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, and I lived in the country and had a satellite dish. We had just finished watching the very first show, about three days before almost anyone else in our area would see it, when John Ordover called. At the time, Kris was editing The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and I was editing Pulphouse Magazine. Before John started at Pocket Books for the Star Trek program, I had bought a story from him, so it wasn’t such a surprise to receive his call.

  We ended up talking about the new series and how cool it was. The conversation progressed and he asked if Kris and I would be interested in writing one of the first Deep Space Nine novels. Well, duh. What a silly question. It came out a year later under our Sandy Schofield name. These are the memories that the Deep Space Nine entries trigger in my mind. They remind me of those days out in the country, watching shows ahead of everyone else, and getting the first chance at doing something I couldn’t even have dreamed of doing ten years earlier.

  Star Trek: Voyager® and Star Trek: Enterprise™ both have a similar feeling for me; they lead me to the same place in my memory, even though their starts are years apart. Besides the fact that I love the shows, they bring on a faint recollection of worry and panic, as well as a satisfying feeling of success.

  Okay, why such a mix of emotions? Well, Kris and I were hired, for both series, to do the very first original books. When we wrote those books, it was months before the shows aired. We had only a trailer, some still pictures, and a few scripts for guidance. By then, we knew how important getting the characters in Star Trek dead-on was for the fans. And we had never seen the characters, heard them speak. Nor had we experienced the life an actor gives to each of the people that we were writing about. Trust me, that sets off a real fear for a Trek fan like me—and a lot of pleasure when we realized that we didn’t miss by too much.

  Now do you see why your stories are like traveling in time for me? My life, especially my adult life, has been tied in and around Star Trek. And I consider myself the luckiest person alive for that.

  So, send in more stories for the next contest so that I can take new thrilling rides through the history of Star Trek, and take everyone else down their own Memory Lane.

  Remember, read the rules in the back of this book, read the stories in this book, read previous volumes to really understand what types of stories we are choosing. Then sit down and write a story (or two, or three). Have fun. Take us all to new corners of this vast universe. And send them all in.

  Then maybe, just maybe, you’ll get a phone call saying we would like to include your story in the next volume of Strange New Worlds. Trust me, this is one phone call that will be a unique memory to attach to this great universe.

  I hope you enjoy these stories. I sure did.

  Shanghaied

  Alan James Garbers

  September 14, 1863

  The C.S.S. Raleigh was two days west of Liverpool. The blockade runner was headed full sail for Richmond. The sleek cruiser carried enough coal to last eighteen days of steaming, and enough sailcloth to run fifteen knots, fast enough to outrun anything the Yankees had afloat. She was the pride of the Confederacy and a thorn in the side of the Union navy.

  Captain Patterson felt like a mother hen on the back of a thoroughbred stallion. Below him was a hold packed with much-needed supplies and, more important, gold headed for the coffers of the Confederate government. While he knew that his ship was the fastest in the Atlantic, he also knew that overconfidence had been the downfall of many of his fellow captains, and when the gold was safe in Richmond he would rest much easier.

  It was on the second night that the lights appeared. One moment the Raleigh was alone; the next the lights were hovering next to them. Within moments the crew scrambled to their stations to combat this unknown foe. Cannons were rolled out; rifles were pulled from racks and loaded. Captain Patterson commanded the helmsman to bring the rudder hard to port in an effort to lose the bothersome spectacle, but it was to no avail; the lights remained steadf
ast. Minutes went by. No shots were fired. No boarding party swarmed aboard. Then, as it had appeared, so it vanished.

  Captain Patterson was not a superstitious man, nor did he believe in witchcraft, but he was at a loss to explain the phenomenon. The salty captain had seen Saint Elmo’s fire dancing from the spars. He had seen glowing swamp gases in his native Louisiana. He had even seen the beautiful dance of the northern lights, but none of them had been as unrelenting as the lights he had just seen.

  As he started forward from the helm, Gunner’s Mate Vincent McCoy came clambering up the ladder.

  “Suh! Gun crew six is missin’.”

  The captain turned. “Missing? What do you mean missing? Weren’t they at their station?”

  “Yes, suh.” McCoy nodded. “They were . . . and then they wasn’t.”

  The captain scowled. He didn’t like cowards. The men on his ship had been handpicked for their bravery and fighting ability. “Find them and bring them to the mast. I don’t abide men who leave their posts.”

  McCoy nodded, then shook his head. “I’m sorry, suh. I’m not explainin’ myself rightly. They vanished . . . I saw, uh, it with my own eyes.”

  The captain looked into the mate’s eyes for the first time. Even in the darkness he could see the fear there. “What are you babbling about?”

  “God as my witness, suh! The light shone in on them, and then they were gone. It was like the rapture in the Bible.”

  The captain’s scowl deepened. “It wasn’t the rapture! It was some damn Yankee trick! A hot-air balloon!”

  McCoy cocked his head in confusion. “Suh?”

  “An observation balloon,” the captain explained gruffly. “The Yankees have used them before to spy on our camps. No doubt there’s a Union ship nearby. They landed on our ship and captured those men in the confusion.”

  The fear in the man’s face vanished. A rational explanation of an attack was much better than the unknown.

  “Yes, suh!”

  “Keep the gun crews ready,” the captain spat. “If they come back we’ll show them some lights.”

  The gunner’s mate snapped to attention and saluted. “Yes, suh!”

  * * *

  On the third night the lights returned. The sharpshooters that Captain Patterson had stationed in the crow’s nests put up a blistering barrage of rifle fire. Momentarily the gunfire stopped and the rifles tumbled down to the deck. The lights once again vanished, and with them went seven of the Confederate’s finest.

  On the fourth night they were ready. Other than the rushing of the waves and slapping of canvas, a ghostly silence hung over the ship as each man wondered if he would be next to disappear. They didn’t have to wait long. The watch had just changed when the lights appeared, hanging just off the starboard spar. With grim excitement Captain Patterson swung his sword into the light. “Now, boys! Take that monster down!”

  The helmsman gave the wheel a hard spin toward starboard. In response the C.S.S. Raleigh bit hard into the sea and lay over so that the port deck was almost awash. The gun crews were ready as the maneuver gave them the elevation they needed. Almost as one the cannons belched flames and smoke. The effect was immediate. The lights went out with a thumping ring. A high-pitched whine started and rose in volume and then ended as the specter crashed into the sea.

  A cheer rose from the decks as the Raleigh righted itself. “Good work, boys!” shouted the captain. “That’ll show them damn blue bellies.” He turned back to the helmsman. “Bring us about.”

  Minutes later the Raleigh drifted next to the specter as it bobbed in the cold Atlantic waters. Hissing and clinking sounded above the slap of the small waves. The crew hung lanterns over the side to get a better view. The yellow light gleamed like gold off the shiny metal. The crew murmured among themselves, speculating on what it might be. After a moment Captain Patterson motioned to his officers. “Get that thing on board. As soon as it’s lashed down, set sail for Richmond, best speed.”

  “Sir?” questioned a young ensign. “Why do we want that Yankee trash?”

  The captain turned slightly. “That trash took a dozen of my best men. Maybe we can see fit to return the favor.”

  The ensign smiled. “Yes, sir!”

  * * *

  The fifth day brought a change to the weather. At the beginning of the first watch the seas were running five to seven feet and a fresh breeze hastened the C.S.S. Raleigh on her way. By noon the seas were eighteen feet with gale-force winds. During the evening mess, the word came down to stow the sails and prepare for heavy seas. By the midwatch the seas were tossing the C.S.S. Raleigh about like a piece of driftwood. The fireman poured coal into the boilers but the ship’s screw was chopping air as much as it was cutting the foamy sea.

  * * *

  By dawn of the sixth day the seas were rolling. As the bow plunged into a wave, the crew would pray that the ship would come out on the other side. Waves crashed over the deck faster than the water could drain out the scuppers. Seawater filled the bilges faster than the pumps could clear it. The wind and waves gave the ship a hard list. In desperation, Captain Patterson ordered the masts cut away, hoping the lessened weight would right the ship. Gunner’s Mate McCoy and a few others headed topside with axes.

  The plan was sound, but too late. With a sickening lurch the C.S.S. Raleigh lay over. The cold Atlantic flooded through hatches and doors that were never meant to be under water. Within moments the pride of the Confederate Navy slipped beneath the waves forever. Gunner’s Mate Vincent McCoy found himself clinging to a powder keg, alone in an angry sea.

  * * *

  Captain’s Log. Stardate 3163.2 We are in orbit over Earth. Starfleet has requested two of my senior officers to help with a classified mission. I don’t know what it entails, but we are to meet with a Doctor Bancroft, one of the top archaeologists at the Foundation for Earth Studies. It is rumored that they want my men to investigate the remains of a nineteenth-century sailing vessel that was found off the Avalon Peninsula in Nova Scotia. This is highly irregular, but Scotty and Spock are eager to get a glimpse of history. Doctor McCoy and I are tagging along to keep them out of trouble.

  * * *

  Doctor Bancroft banked the shuttle hard against the ever-present coastal winds and landed on the cracked and weed-infested tarmac. Bancroft tugged his coat tighter and gave them a sheepish grin. “I have to warn you. Winter is coming up here.” He passed each of the four guests a coat from a locker and flicked the release on the door. As the shuttle door opened, the bitter cold swept into the cabin and caught the foursome unprepared.

  McCoy glared at Kirk. “This is the last time I let you pick my shore excursions.” He donned the coat with a grunt. The others followed his lead. When all were bundled up, they followed the archaeologist out into the cold. A large, battered hangar sat on the edge of the field that looked to be a leftover from the Eugenics Wars. Doctor Bancroft must have noticed his guests’ expressions as they made for the derelict building.

  “The foundation gets very little funding, so we take what we can get . . . ”

  McCoy gave another grunt. “The next time you call us, make it a Spanish galleon in the tropics.”

  “Doctor, the foundation didn’t call you at all,” corrected Spock. “It was the aid of Commander Scott and myself that he requested.”

  McCoy glared at Spock for a moment. “Just get me somewhere warm.”

  “I’m sorry, Doctor McCoy,” Doctor Bancroft offered. “The hangar does have heat. At least, part of it does.” With that he pulled a small side door open and ushered the foursome in.

  Doctor Bancroft flipped a breaker on. With a slam the lights snapped on, flooding the hangar bay with warm yellow lighting. For a moment no one said anything as all eyes fell upon the shiny craft suspended in front of them.

  “Would ye look at that.” Scotty whistled. He forgot about the cold and crossed to the artifact. Ancient compartment doors hung open with cables and components hanging from them like the bowels of a de
ad animal.

  Kirk glanced at McCoy and smiled. “I haven’t seen Scotty this happy since the last time the Enterprise had an engine rebuild.”

  Spock adjusted his tricorder and slowly inspected the object. “Where did you find this craft?”

  Doctor Bancroft gave a sheepish grin as he glanced from Kirk to Spock. “That’s the kicker . . . . We found it about thirty miles off the coast, with the remains of a Civil War blockade runner.”

  “Which one?” Kirk asked as he glanced about the hangar. “The Eugenics Wars?”

  Spock turned to Kirk. “Captain, I believe he is referring to the Civil War of the United States, in the nineteenth century—1861 through 1865, to be exact.”

  “Very good, Mister Spock!” Bancroft agreed. “You know Earth history very well!”

  “But they didn’t have this kind of technology then,” argued Kirk.

  “Could it be a coincidence that the two ships were found together?” Spock asked.

  Bancroft shook his head. “It would be so much easier if that were the case, but we found the spacecraft lashed to the remains of the deck. The hawser dates to the same time as the ship timbers.”

  McCoy pulled the hood of his coat back as he slowly walked over to the craft. “It was the Raleigh, wasn’t it?”

  Doctor Bancroft’s jaw dropped. “How did you know that?”

  “My great-great-great-something-grandfather was aboard her,” McCoy replied.

  Bancroft slowly shook his head. “I saw a McCoy on the crew roster when I was researching her, but I never made the connection.”

  “I was told stories about it as a child. I think he even wrote a journal about his adventure.”

  “Do you still have it?” Bancroft pleaded.

  McCoy shrugged. “Don’t know. I’ll have to check with some of my relatives.”

  “The craft has been badly damaged,” Scott commented. “It looks like someone took a giant hammer to it.”

  McCoy smiled. “I think you’ll find those dents match the size of a Confederate cannonball.”