Spock’s already-straight spine became even straighter if possible, as if the Vulcan were forcing himself to say nothing more.
After a few moments, Kirk couldn’t help himself. “That’s it?”
“Captain, you are the most important person on this ship. There is no logical argument you can make otherwise. Thus, there is nothing more to say in the matter.” Spock wiped his face with his towel.
“Nothing more to say because you agree with me? Or nothing more to say because I’m a bone-headed mule?”
Spock looked up from his towel as if tempted to say something other than what he eventually did. “I…do not agree with you.”
Kirk was surprised by how much he relished Spock’s discomfort. Not because Spock was discomfited, but because it was such an honest, emotional reaction. There was a real person under that blank facade after all, and Kirk was fulfilling his plan to reveal him.
“Which leaves…?” Kirk said as innocently as he could.
But Spock clearly was not foolish enough to be provoked into calling his commanding officer a “bone-headed mule,” no matter how accurate he might think the characterization.
“Which leaves the fact,” Spock said, “that you are an intelligent, capable commanding officer whose passion for his ship and crew deserves to be respected by all who serve upon her.”
“I admire your diplomacy, Mr. Spock.”
“Thank you, Captain.”
Spock refolded his towel, then looked toward the doors, as if subtly trying to remind Kirk that they had other duties to get to.
But Kirk hadn’t finished with Spock yet. “One more thing, Mr. Spock.”
“What is that, sir?”
“From everything we’ve just discussed, I feel I’d be justified in concluding that you believe I’m a good captain, worthy of respect from my crew.”
“Unquestionably.”
Kirk took a breath, then deliberately asked Spock a question whose answer he did not know. “So let’s go back to the discussion we were having earlier: Why do you want to leave my command?”
Spock’s answer was simple. And startling to Kirk.
“I do not want to leave, Captain.”
“Mr. Spock, you filled out a transfer request.”
“My asking for a transfer does not logically equate to my desire to leave this ship.”
“But you asked for a transfer?”
“Yes.”
Kirk gave up any thought of subtlety or strategy, and just laid his cards on the table. “Why?”
“According to my career plan, I have spent enough time serving on a starship.”
“Mr. Spock…what else is there for a science officer that could possibly be better?”
“For myself—transfer to a Starfleet research station on a genetically diverse planet for approximately four point five years. Followed by five years as an instructor at the Academy, then a posting to a Federation science-exchange mission for between ten to twenty years, depending on travel time to and from the culture selected. A professorship at an accredited combined research/learning institution such as Earth’s own Jet Propulsion Laboratory or the Cochrane Institute on Alpha Centauri for a period no longer than an additional twenty years. Followed by visiting instructor postings at a variety of colonial outposts until I am forced to retire for health reasons, or until I die.”
Kirk wasn’t sure if his reaction to that recitation was admiration or fear. How could anyone have planned his future in such detail? He himself was unable to even imagine the day he would leave the Enterprise. Let alone what he’d do the day after that.
“Mr. Spock,” he said, “I don’t understand you in the slightest.”
“No, sir, it appears you do not.”
Checkmate, Kirk decided.
Then General Quarters sounded and the contest began again.
Chapter Fourteen
BAJOR, STARDATE 55596.3
“YOU ACTUALLY HAD that argument with Spock?” Picard asked incredulously.
Kirk looked across the camp’s mess table at his friend. They were sitting under the awning near the cooking center. It was late afternoon, the camp was still deserted, but they had managed to find a few surplus ration packets and were enjoying, or at least eating, a biscuit-like thing that was a light golden color, and which tasted of…something salty.
“Spock and I have been arguing for years,” Kirk said.
“But that one? ‘Degrees of risk?’ It’s a staple of Vulcan forensics. The basis of Surak’s Irreducible Foundations of Logic.”
“Enlighten me,” Kirk said. He didn’t understand how Picard could claim to know more than he did about what he and Spock had argued about years ago.
“Jim, you were arguing whether the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
Kirk leaned back in his rickety camp chair, and the creaking sound it made seemed to match the stiffness that was creeping up his back. Picard was right. “Or of the one…” Kirk said slowly. Why had he never realized that before?
“You look surprised,” Picard observed.
Kirk tossed his half-eaten biscuit onto the crinkly wrapping of the ration package. “You know what Spock was doing back then?”
Picard shrugged. “Being a good first officer?”
“He was getting me to think like a Vulcan.”
“Is there something wrong with that?”
Kirk nodded emphatically. “Yes. I was trying to get him to be more human. I mean, I knew he had a human side buried away inside him, and I was trying to get him to express it.”
Picard folded his arms. “Which would have required Spock to turn his back on thousands of years of Vulcan heritage, and his own personal philosophy.”
Kirk frowned. “I know it was wrong, Jean-Luc. I abandoned the idea fairly early on, once I got to know Spock. Once…we became friends.”
“And you’re just now realizing that he was doing the same to you?”
Kirk shook his head. “I didn’t have a Vulcan side buried in me. But…all these years…I’d look back and think about how we used to argue. And when McCoy came aboard…Jean-Luc, we would be up half the night arguing, debating over…nothing…and we’d keep doing it. Night after night…”
“Jim,” Picard said quietly, “knowing Vulcans as I do, I guarantee you that from Spock’s perspective, you weren’t arguing over ‘nothing.’”
“That’s what I just realized. Spock was…” Kirk threw up his hands. “He was training me. That son of a—”
“Vulcan,” Picard said with a grin, “For what it’s worth, he seems to have done a commendable job. At least with you. I don’t know Admiral McCoy well enough to pass judgment on how well Spock’s ‘training’ of him turned out.”
Kirk laughed. “Oh, no. Spock wasn’t arguing with McCoy to teach him anything. That he did just for fun. McCoy always rose to the bait, and Spock always had a ready supply. They still do it.”
“But not you and Spock?”
Kirk shook his head, still astounded by his revelation. “Not the same way.” Kirk rubbed his hands over his face as if clearing whatever cobwebs had kept him blind all these years. “You’re right. He did do a good job on me.”
Picard contemplated what was left of his edible foodlike substance, tossed it down to join Kirk’s on the discarded wrappings. “How good a job did you do on him?”
Kirk thought about that for long moments. He looked away from Picard, out from the shade of the awning to the deserted camp beyond. The fabric of the bubble tents scarcely moved now. The afternoon winds had ceased with twilight coming near. It was quiet, broken only by the distant whisper surge of gentle waves on the unseen beach, the circling cries of the gulls.
“Spock found what he was looking for,” Kirk said at last. He remembered back to their long-ago encounter with V’Ger. Spock had stared into a mirror of total logic, and had discovered its reflection did not include him. It was at that moment he discovered the balance he had been seeking between his human and his Vulcan halves.
“Because of you?” Picard asked.
Kirk shook his head. “I was there for Spock. I gave him support. Friendship. But questions like that, I don’t think anyone else can give the answers to you. You have to discover them for yourself.”
Picard’s eyes seemed to light up, and Kirk didn’t know why.
“That sounds like another endorsement for the wisdom of the Prime Directive.”
Kirk rolled his eyes. “You never give up, do you?”
“Do you?”
“Occupational hazard.” Kirk had had enough of sitting down. His legs were as stiff as his back, but he forced himself to jump to his feet as if he were ready to throw himself from an orbiting shuttle all over again.
Picard was not to be outdone, and gracefully rose from his chair as well, even though Kirk knew he had to be in as painful a state as himself.
“So why did General Quarters sound?” Picard asked. “Had you emerged from the cloud?”
Kirk thought back to the mission. “We had, but that wasn’t the reason for the alert.”
Picard waited patiently.
“We made contact with our first competitors: the Tholians. At least, we made contact with what was left of their ship.”
“The subspace pulse affected them that disastrously?”
Kirk frowned, remembering the image on the viewscreen. The seed-shaped hull of the Tholian vessel spinning slowly against the distant backdrop of the rift cloud, trailing slow spirals of glittering wreckage. Even at the time, Kirk had known the debris that sparkled most brightly contained the shattered bodies of the crystalline Tholians who had crewed their ship. When Kirk and Spock had arrived on the bridge, Scott and Kelso were already scanning for any trace of survivors, but there were none.
“Not the subspace pulse,” Kirk said. “Impact.”
“With what?”
“At the time, we thought it was an asteroid. Right at the edge of the cloud. At the speed they were traveling, without subspace sensors, they never knew it was there…” Kirk sighed. Even in that day and age, to lose a ship to such a foolish, avoidable collision was a tragedy, no matter who the victims were.
“You ‘thought’ it was an asteroid?”
Kirk stood just at the edge of the awning’s shade. Already the western sky was beginning to change subtly from the deepest Bajoran blue to the soft rose of twilight. “It was an asteroid. It made no sense, being within the gas shell blown off by a nova. The space inside the rift cloud should have been clear of everything that used to exist within the Mandylion system. But there was an asteroid. And there were planets.”
Picard looked suitably amazed. “How incredible. I presume they were the remnant cores of planets destroyed by the nova that created the white dwarf star.”
“That’s what we thought,” Kirk agreed. “They were completely irradiated. But one did have an atmosphere.”
“I wouldn’t have thought that was possible.”
“At the time, Sulu thought it could have been a relatively new atmosphere, created after the nova blew away the original atmosphere. He speculated that gases released from the planet’s core could have become concentrated enough over time.”
Picard looked thoughtfully at Kirk. “You keep saying, ‘at the time.’ Does that mean your interpretation of what you found changed later?”
Kirk nodded, thinking not for the first time how perceptive Picard was. “Nothing in that system was what we thought it was.”
“Then what did happen to the Tholians?”
“Oh, they were destroyed by asteroid impact,” Kirk said. “It’s just that, at the time, we didn’t realize it was a deliberate attack, and not an accident.”
“The alien vessel attacked with an asteroid?”
“I’m getting ahead of myself,” Kirk said. After all these years, he still found it difficult to accept some of what he had experienced within the cloud. And as he thought about the rest of his story, he found himself staring at the cook’s tent, wondering about the little girl and what her chances—possibilities—were.
“We never did learn her name,” Picard said, startling him.
“Did Anij teach you how to read minds, as well?” Kirk asked.
“I could see where you were looking.”
“McCoy will be here in three days,” Kirk said. “Whatever’s wrong with her, I know he’ll be able to help.” Kirk saw Picard’s sudden, sorrowful expression. “I know he will,” Kirk said again.
“Jim, look at the supplies in this camp. Almost all of them are from Federation relief agencies. I guarantee that the child already has been examined by Federation doctors.”
Kirk refused to believe that. “And the best they could come up with was to have the mother anoint her child with seawater?”
“Perhaps the mother used up whatever medicine they gave her,” Picard said. “Perhaps the medicine or treatment conflicted with her religious beliefs. Or perhaps…there was nothing the doctors could do.”
Kirk could feel anger rise in himself, not directed at Picard, not directed at anything. It was what he felt when there was nothing else he could do, born of frustration. “If that’s the case, then there’s another example of your Prime Directive,” he said bitterly. “A child whose life could be saved by advanced medicine, being condemned to death because medical treatment might conflict with her mother’s beliefs.”
Picard looked shocked. “Jim, with all that you’ve seen in your career, with all that you know about Bajor and the Celestial Temple and the Prophets, are you willing to state absolutely that Bajoran religious beliefs are wrong?”
“Of course, I can’t.”
“Then we can’t force any help on the mother.”
Kirk realized at once that that was where his frustration, and his bitterness, sprang from. “No…not the mother. She’s responsible for herself. I have no trouble respecting her wishes and her beliefs as they affect her. But if her beliefs endanger her child…The child cannot make those decisions for herself, Jean-Luc. And that’s where the Prime Directive breaks down.”
Picard appeared ready to say something more, but changed his mind. “This is all hypothetical. We don’t really know what’s wrong with her.”
“But we’ll find out, won’t we?” Kirk asked.
“Count on it.”
Kirk stepped into the late-afternoon sunlight. “In fact, let’s check in on her again.”
“Good idea,” Picard said.
Halfway to the cook’s tent, they heard voices.
* * *
Picard whirled around, so accustomed to the stillness of the camp that the first sounds from the arriving archaeologists seemed to be arising from a galloping stampede.
But there were only nine people, all Bajoran. Three were very old men, including one stooped figure with a full white beard and the dusty robes of a Bajoran monk—a prylar, Picard thought. Of the other six, one was a stern-looking woman whom Picard took to be Dr. Rowhn. Two were appreciably younger, perhaps in their thirties, Picard guessed, with the bearing of men who had served in the Bajoran military.
One of the three elders gave a visible start as he saw Picard, then immediately grinned and waved, calling Picard by name.
“You know him?” Kirk asked.
“I don’t recall meeting him,” Picard said. But he and Kirk had been part of so many historic moments, it was not unusual for either to be recognized by people they had never met in person. So, Picard smiled in return and held out his hand in greeting as the old man approached, watched with apprehension by the prylar.
“Captain Jean-Luc Picard,” the old man said happily as he took Picard’s hand. Then his smile broadened even further, making his thick beard rise on his pronounced cheekbones. “You don’t know who I am, do you, young man?”
“It’s been quite some time since someone called me a young man,” Picard said graciously, “but you do have the advantage.”
“Professor Aku Sale,” the old man said.
Picard almost stammered in s
urprise. “Professor Aku! Oh, my…this is an honor indeed!” He took both of the venerable historian’s hands in his own and though he felt how thin and frail those hands were, Picard still grasped them strongly in delight.
“Jim, this is astounding! Professor Aku, please allow me to introduce my good friend, Jim Kirk.”
The old Bajoran beamed at Kirk. “Captain James Kirk…it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
Picard saw Kirk’s bemused expression as he shook hands with the professor. Kirk had no idea who Aku was.
“Jim,” Picard said, “I’ve been corresponding with Professor Aku for years, though we’ve never had the chance to meet before. We have the honor of being in the company of the man who singlehandedly saved Bajoran archaeology during the Occupation.”
Aku waved a hand as if erasing Picard’s words from the air. “Hmph. I did nothing of the kind. Hundreds helped me. Thousands supported me.” A shadow briefly darkened his eyes. “And too many died.” He released Kirk’s hand, smiled again at Picard, the effort conscious but sincere. “But that is all in the past. This is Bajor’s…what is that wonderful Earth word you used when we corresponded?”
Picard knew exactly which word the professor meant. “Bajor’s renaissance.”
“Yes! That’s it! Rebirth.” He spread out his thin arms. “A world once lost, and now being rediscovered, reborn, every day.”
The rest of the camp’s party had gathered around Picard, Kirk, and Aku, and Picard could see that they held the professor in the same high regard he did, for no one had attempted to interrupt the scholar’s greeting of the two humans.
But with the greeting over, the second older Bajoran stepped forward, and gently placed his hands on Aku’s shoulders. “It’s been a long day, Professor. Time to rest, I think.”
Picard noted that Aku didn’t protest. Instead, he patted the man’s hand. “My keeper,” he told Picard. “Sedge Nirra.”
Picard offered his hand and Sedge took it with a firm grip. The Bajoran’s hair, neatly trimmed, was almost entirely white, and he wore clothing in the style of all the others, though Picard could see it was as new as his own and Kirk’s. Sedge’s d’ja pagh gleamed in the way the others’ did not, and Picard recognized the earring and ornamental chain as pure gold-pressed latinum.“
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