The Kobayashi Maru

BY

JULIA ECKLAR

POCKET BOOKS New York London

Toronto Sydney Tokyo Singapore

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters,

places and

incidents are either the product of the author's

imagination or are used fictitiously. Any

resemblance to actual events or locales or

persons, living or dead, is entirely

coincidental.

An Original Publication of POCKET

BOOKS

POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon and

Schuster Inc. 1230

Avenue of the Americas, New York,

NY 10020

Copyright (C 1989 Paramount Pictures.

All Rights Reserved.

STAR TREK is a Registered Trademark of

Paramount Pictures.

This book is published by Pocket Books, a

division of Simon and

Schuster Inc., under exclusive license from

Paramount Pictures.

All rights reserved, including the right

to reproduce this book or

portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information

address

Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the

Americas, New York, NY 10020

ISBN 0-671-65817-4

First Pocket Books printing December

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

POCKET and colophon are registered

trademarks of Simon and Schuster

Inc.

Printed in the U.s.a. Acknowledgments

For all the help and encouragement they've given

me, both during the

writing of The Kobayashi Maru and beside it, this

book is dedicated to

Ann Cecil, friend and editor nonpareil, for

doing me the very great

favor, all those years ago, of reading my first

Star Trek novel and telling me why it stank.

lo Ann Baasch, Charlie Terry, Don

Wenzel, Kathleen Conat, and, once

again, Ann Cecil, for proofreading this

manuscript to death.

Mitch and JoAnn, Don and Kathleen, Tom

and Bill, Pam, Sandy, Diana,

both Joes and all the Daves, and anybody

else who sat with us under the fireworks on July

4th and helped me figure out all the ways I

could blow up Klingon warships.

Rusty, for (among other things) pushing Gs.

And, last but greatest of them all, Don Kosak

the Brilliant, King of

Computers, for his valiant battle withand victory

over The Kobayashi Maru.

If there is anyone I've forgotten (and with all the

time and effort

that's gone into this thing, I'm sure there's someone),

please

forgive me. It isn't my intention to slight

anyone-I'm just a little hard of remembering at times.

But a hearty thank you to everyone,

whether mentioned or not. just as in Starfleet, your

contributions to The Kobayashi Maru represent the

best that is in us all.

Historian's Note

This adventure takes place shortly after the

events chronicled in

Star Trek The Motion Picture.

HALLEY

"THIS is Enterprise hailing shuttlecraft

Halley. All frequencies are

open to you, Halley, and locating circuits are

in operation. If you are able, please respond . .

. This is Enterprise hailing ship's

shuttle Halley. All frequencies are open

to you . . ." "Chekov,

can't you turn that blasted thing off?" Leonard

McCoy's voice was

uncharacteristically low, but cut clearly through

Uhura's tinny

broadcast over the shuttle radio. In the row of

seats across from

McCoy, James Kirk opened his

eyes to darkness. For a long moment,

Captain James T. Kirk was aware of little

save that he was hurt, and he was cold. Then the pain

took residence somewhere deep in his

right knee, and memory came awake with the pain.

The remembering made him vaguely sick. He

gingerly turned his head, searching the dark

shuttle for Scott and Sulu now that the doctor

had roused him.

Leonard McCoy occupied the seat just across the

shuttle's main aisle

from Kirk, one row ahead of

where Sulu, propped carefully upright, still

slept. The doctor had

been in almost the same position when Kirk,

drowsy from McCoy's pain medication, slipped

into sleep God knew how long ago. McCoy was

bundled into a field jacket nearly a size

and a half too large, his hands stuffed sullenly under

his arms for warmth. The hard, yellow

light from an emergency lamp painted his face in

bright relief

against the cold darkness around him. He hadn't yet

realized Kirk was awake; McCoy's

attention was fixed on the forward hatch, where Kirk

could hear movement, but where the dark was too deep

to see.

"Chekov!" McCoy hissed again. "Turn off

the radio!" "I heard you," Chekov called

back, sounding more than just mildly annoyed. There

was a long pause, then a muted snap-slide as

the Russian pulled one

of the radio's circuit boards. The shuttle

fell inffdismal silence.

"Don't go getting grouchy on me, Bones,"

Kirk advised McCoy. "The

quarters are cramped enough as it is." The doctor

turned to him, startled. "How long have you been

awake?" he asked, avoiding a reply to Kirk's

gentle reprimand. The captain shrugged. "Long enough

to hear you snap at my navigator."

McCoy looked embarrassed, and settled back

into his seat a bit

self-consciously. "Sorry, Jim. It's just.

. ." The doctor's ill temper seemed to bleed

away with his weary sigh. He didn't look angry

then, only tired and old. "It just seemed so

pointless," he finished. "That's all."

"I know." Kirk's words puffed out as

clouds of white vapor; the shuttle had been losing

heat for over an hour now. "But don't give up

hope yet, Bones."

McCoy managed a humph that sounded so much like his

normal crusty self, Kirk had to smile.

"How's your knee?"

"You're the doctor," Kirk replied. "Aren't

I supposed to ask you that?" McCoy favored the

captain with an unamused scowl. "You haven't done

anything that won't heal, but you'll have to be careful with

it for at least a couple weeks. You managed

to wrench it pretty good."

Kirk didn't like how that sounded; if nothing

else, it meant no movement right now. was "Wrench

it"?" he echoed, striving for lightness and (he

suspected) failing. "If you keep using these

technical terms, Bones, you're going to confuse

me!"

"Don't worry about the technical terms,"

McCoy tossed back, "just tell me if it

hurts."

Kirk shrugged again. "A little." In truth, the

knee was a solid, steady fist of pain, cramping his

thigh muscles until the urge to shift position

became almost unbearable. Every time he stirred,

though, the joint exploded in violent protest and

left him wishing he'd never tried to move at all.

But if McCoy could change the subject, so could

he. "How's Sulu holding up?"

Worry flashed across the doctor's face, but,

before he could answer, the helmsman volunteered, "dis

. . I've been better . . ."

McCoy turned in his seat to glare at Sulu.

"You're supposed to be asleep, Commander," he

reprimanded sternly.

Eyes still closed, Sulu grinned weakly at

McCoy over the cervical support holding his

head in place. "You've got to be kidding, Doc!

My shoulder's killing me!"

"I've got you on a high dosage already,"

McCoy said, his manner softened. "I don't

want to give you anything more just yet."

Kirk thought maybe Sulu tried to nod; the

only indication was the tight expression of pain that

flitted across the lieutenant commander's face. The

helmsman was strapped and belted so firmly into his

seat, Kirk was surprised he could move at all.

"That's okay, Doc," Sulu said. Even his

normally brilliant smile looked only pained and

drugged. "I don't want you to O.d. me

. . . But I'm not sleeping, either."

Kirk sank back into his seat and tried not

to think about his crew or his knee. Neither task was

easy. The stale air in the shuttle smelled

rankly of burnt circuitry and ozone.

Enigmatic sounds and smells wafted into the main

compartment from Scott's repair efforts in the rear

hatch; in the pilots' hatch, Chekov hadn't so

much as cursed as he sifted through the remains of the

radio in search of something to repair. At first,

Uhura's soothing, velvet voice over their receiver

was the only indication that home was still out there somewhere,

looking for them. Now, even that ephemeral

reassurance was gone. Kirk didn't know whether

to be angry at McCoy, or grateful.

We were supposed to go on shore leave in three

days.

Their first shore leave in four months. It just

wasn't fair.

The Enterprise wasn't even assigned near the

Hohweyn system. Then, just two weeks ago,

contact

with the Venkatsen Research Group was completely

lost, and the Enterprise was the only ship in a

position to attempt an investigation and

recovery. Again.

Failure was a chance the Venkatsen Group and their

funders had taken when the Group was first placed on

Hohweyn VII. The safest planet in an

utterly unsafe system, Hohweyn VII came

fully equipped with all the dangers expected in

such an arrangement. Hohweyn's forty-seven

planets-natural, captured, and rogue-careened

about an unstable tertiary sun, creating, destroying,

and slinging as incredible an array of astrophysical

anomalies as Kirk had ever had the honor to see.

Primarily, the Group was there to delve into the

secrets of gravitational attraction and repulsion,

hoping to better equip modern sensor systems so

travelers might discover and avoid gravitic

anomalies, rather than stumble into them.

So much for modern research, Kirk reflected

glumly. We've probably got more information on

gravitic fluxes than Venkatsen has compiled in

a year! Only they would probably never get home

with the data.

One of the unfortunate hazards of the system were

several debris clouds and asteroid belts-the

remains of the system's more unstable planets and

comets. Hohweyn VII spent most of its

solar year in the path of one or more of these. Besides the

obvious danger of collision, the iron- and

nickel-rich asteroids wreaked havoc with

sensors.

Upon arriving, Kirk deemed it unnecessary to venture

too close to Hohweyn VII with something as large

as a starship. The Enterprise was left in parking

orbit just beyond the path of the debris cloud enveloping

Hohweyn VII, and a team was dispatched by

shuttlecraft to make contact with Venkatsen and

report. Kirk headed the team himself, desperate

to be away from the bridge (even if only for a little

while), and anxious to have someone of his own tactical

skill and diplomacy along. The other five

positions were left open to volunteers.

On later reflection, Kirk realized that even

if he'd handpicked each member of the shuttle's

crew, the results would have been the same. He

wasn't sure if he should feel guilty about that, but

he did.

Kirk wanted an engineer, in the event some

mechanical problem caused the Venkatsen Group's

silence. Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott

pointed out that the equipment on Hohweyn VII would

not be standard, and Kirk would need a top

engineer to discern its workings and repairs. When the tally

was in, Kirk couldn't argue with Scott's choice

for the assignment himself. The captain had seen

Scott puzzle out and repair things Kirk couldn't

even recognize as machinery, as well as

resurrect equipment other engineers had declared

utterly unsalvageable. It sometimes seemed at

least half the Enterprise's current engine room

was as the designer planned it, the other half

Scotty-rigged to do whatever Kirk asked. If the

engineer wanted to come play with archaic scientific

equipment in the middle of a messed-up star system,

who was Kirk to tell him, "No"?

Dr. McCoy didn't offer any explanation for

his willingness to tag along, and Kirk didn't ask.

The captain suspected the doctor was growing bored

with the number of stress-related problems caused by their

long stint without shore leave. The Venkatsen

rescue was just an excuse to leave the ship in some

other

doctor's capable hands. Whatever the reason,

Kirk harassed McCoy only moderately for his

sudden desire to flirt with danger, and silently

welcomed his company.

Pavel Chekov's reasons for

volunteering were easily the most obvious. Kirk's

former navigator, now chief of ship's security,

hadn't been the only member of the Enterprise's

security force to volunteer for the mission. Every

crewman in security knew as well as Kirk that

it was standard procedure to include at least one armed

escort on any investigative team; rank and

position mattered very little in the field. Kirk

knew, too, that their recent wealth of deep-space

runs had provided security with no of ship time at

all, and very few on-ship duties besides trading off

at the bridge weapons station. In the end, Kirk

looked on in amusement while, at First Officer

Spock's suggestion, the fifteen security

personnel drew lots for the contested assignment.

Kirk always considered it unfortunate that Chekov had

been transferred away from navigations (he was by far

the best navigator Kirk had ever had), so it was

to the captain's advantage that Chekov won the

draw. Kirk assigned the lieutenant as both

shuttle navigator and team security escort,

thus cutting the team's numbers by one.

Lieutenant Commander Sulu was the easiest

inclusion of all. Sulu was Kirk's chief

helmsman, and the best pilot on the ship (not

to mention in

Starfleet); Kirk planned to privately ask

the small, slender Asian to join the flight. He

suspected Sulu could be talked into it, if only

to ensure the safety of the others. To his distinct

pleasure, however, Kirk never got the chance.

Sulu showed up, as cheerful as if he'd been

report-

ing for a routine practice simulation, while

Chekov was still compiling navigational data from the

Enterprise's main computer. Within five minutes,

it was impossible to tell the two men hadn't worked

side by side in several years. "It's like riding a

bike," Sulu informed Kirk brightly, obviously

aiming the jibe at Chekov. "You never really

forget. Besides, I'll make sure he doesn't

run us into anything important." As if to prove

Sulu's teasing groundless, Chekov reported ready

for launch in record time, and they moved the shuttle

smoothly into free space.

Halley nosed into the crazy system

uneventfully. Scott rode the sensors as if they

were a nervous horse, quietly calling off

coordinates when the readings warned him of danger.

Sulu's skilled and delicate hands laced

the tiny shuttle through conflicting gravity wells and

any number of tangled lines of force, as calm and

unhurried as the plants that shared his cabin back on

board the ship. Chekov kept his eyes trained on

his own panel, acting on Scott's information as

smoothly as Sulu, though less relaxed. Neither of

them so much as glanced away from their stations until

Scott said quietly, "Mister Sulu, down

throttle."

Sulu obeyed without hesitation. Chekov glanced

anxiously at Scott, not turning away from his

panel. "What's wrong?"

The engineer nursed the readings a moment longer.

"The sensors picked up a slight flux just off our

starboard bow." A smile that wasn't at all

amused crossed his broad, highlander's features.

"Don't look now, lads, but I think we've

found a gravitic mine."

Sulu groaned. "Lucky for us."

"Can we avoid it?" Kirk asked from the

passenger

compartment. No one seemed surprised that he'd

been listening.

"We'll find out, Captain," Scott

replied. "We're sure as hell not going

to try running through it!"

Chekov already worried over his controls, leaning

back briefly to steal a look at Scott's

sensor readout. "I need more room," he told

Sulu shortly. "I can't even turn us at this

distance!"

It was serious, Kirk realized then. Sulu could

pilot them straight through hell without raising a

sweat, but not Chekov. The security chief's

irritability was a certain indicator that Chekov

was not happy with their predicament. "Take us back

about four thousand kilometers," Chekov continued.

"Beyond that well at 478 mark-was

"Mother of Christ!" Scott exclaimed suddenly,

his voice sharp with fear. "It's moving! The damn

thing's moving! Nose down, Sulu! Get us under

it!" "Give me a reading!" Chekov twisted about as

far as his seat straps would allow. "Scott! A

reading!"

It wasn't until much later that Kirk realized

Chekov wanted the second reading to plot where the

mine would be once it passed them. Two points of

reference weren't really enough to extrapolate any kind

of course, but he was going to try anyway. Like so much

else on this disastrous mission, it was a damn

fine effort.

The mine struck them broadside, wrenching the tiny

shuttle about like a rabbit caught up in a dog's

jaws. Kirk slammed hard against the wall, gasping

with surprise when the strength of the impact forced the

wind from him. All the blood in his body seemed

to rush simultaneously into his extremities,

swelling

them, crowding them. Kirk couldn't tell if the

shuttle was under violent acceleration, or merely being

torn apart by the gravitic mine's fury. He

wondered fleetingly if the horror stories he'd

heard in his youth about runaway centrifuges could

hold anything to this.

Then Sulu's voice, light and confident

"No-I think I've got it!"

"Sulu!"

Without warning, the engines in the rear compartment fired

with a sound like a dragon's roar. A sense of up and

down returned abruptly, and Kirk bounced back

into his seat so hard his teeth clacked. He'd

only just opened his mouth to call for a status report

when the suit locker next to the airlock wrenched

loose with a squeal of rending metal.

Kirk instinctively bolted toward the

sagging cabinet. "Jim, don't!" McCoy

called. One of the locker doors bulged, threatening

to bury the doctor in an avalanche of heavy

suiting and equipment. "We don't even know if

we're stable!" But Kirk was already up and moving.

Though there was no more strain on Kirk's body

to rush out in all

directions, no blood pounding the backs of his

eyes into firework displays of light and dark, still, as

soon as he was upright, Kirk knew the ship was

tumbling. He thought at first he'd hit a slick

patch on the deck-and entertained a brief, vicious

thought about whoever kept the decks in order until he

realized it was Scott-but knew something more, was wrong

when what should have been a harmless stumble drove him

feetfirst against the far bulkhead. He felt his right

knee groan with stress, then buckle 18

beneath him in a brilliant, nauseating rush of

liquid pain. He twisted his body into the fall and

met the bulkhead with his shoulder. That only softened the

blow a little. The sympathetic explosion from his knee

made him gasp.

The engines coughed again, this time making a

guttural, grinding snarl. The outlines of the

shuttle interior softened like velvet, then

melted into nothing as blackness swept from stem to stern

like a thundercloud. Kirk bit his lip hard and watched

pain throb and bloom redly in front of his vision.

What he feared most happened an instant later-the

shuttle settled into a slow, regular tumble, and

dropped him from the wall to the deck. He bit his

lip harder to keep from crying out, but only half

succeeded. The damned locked door held fast,

never loosing its load at all. Kirk almost

swore aloud.

"Jim?" McCoy's voice, concerned and

frightened, came from the doctor's seat.

"I'm here, Bones. I'm all right." That was a

lie, and Kirk knew his voice said as much.

"That was damned stupid, Captain!" McCoy

began, but Kirk cut him off "What happened up

front?"

"Doctor!" Kirk heard someone stumble over the

pilots' seats on their way toward the door.

"Doctor McCoy? Are you all right?" It was

Chekov. Kirk could hear McCoy cursing to himself.

"Just fine," McCoy growled. "What about you?

What the hell happened up there?"

"I'm fine, sir," Chekov reported

hastily. "But it's Sulu-he's hurt!"

"Nobody move!" Kirk heard his order stop

Chekov only two steps out of the cabin. Beyond the

navigator,

Sulu moaned softly, and Scott spoke to him

in low, soothing tones. "Nobody's going anywhere

until we've got lig hts," Kirk said.

"But, Jim-to "

"Bones, you can't do anything in the dark!" Kirk

twisted about to look back toward the pilots' hatch,

forgetting for the moment that he couldn't see anyway.

He allowed himself the luxury of an unseen

grimace when his knee sang out in protest to the

motion. "Scotty?"

"Right here," the engineer answered from near

McCoy's seat.

"Jesus, Scotty!" McCoy cursed. "You

scared me to death!"

"Sorry, Doctor."

"Have we got lamps in the storage cabinet?"

Kirk asked, still bent over his throbbing knee.

"Aye," Scott said. "About a dozen. But

I'll need some extra hands. Come on, lad-was This

apparently to Chekov. "comI think we're the only

two still stand- ing."

Kirk sat in tense, painful silence,

marveling at how easily he could track their

progress in the total darkness. They spoke

quietly in the back for a few moments while

Scott jimmied open the cabinet, then a fat finger

of light sprayed down the center aisle as the first of the

emergency lamps was activated.

"Thank God something still works," McCoy

muttered.

Then the wait began. Chekov helped Kirk

back to a seat while McCoy tended to Sulu.

Kirk tried putting weight on his leg only

once, then was forced to apologize when that nearly

toppled both him and

Chekov to the deck. Chekov set about placing

lamps throughout the shuttle while Scott shut down

the main engines-they were no longer producing any- thing

but noise and would never propel the shuttle another

meter. McCoy immobilized everything possible on

Sulu, using everything he had on hand, then enlisted

Scott and Chekov to help him strap the helmsman

into a second row seat. McCoy would have preferred

to lay Sulu out flat, but the only space long enough

was the center aisle, and that had to be left clear for

repair access. Better that he was secure in a

reasonably guarded location; they still didn't

know how long they would be out here.

Chekov tried signaling the Enterprise until

it became apparent no one could hear him. Even so,

he didn't give up until Kirk told him

to. Helm responded to prodding, but was useless without

information from the navigational computer. Navigations was

destroyed; Scott salvaged what he could from the

front to start work on restoring their heat and light.

Chekov was left with the radio, an all but hopeless

job; Kirk was left to watch McCoy care for

Sulu. And to worry.

Sulu's valiant action to fire the engines and

blast them free of the mine undoubtedly saved the

shuttle from immediate destruction. He'd been forced

to unbelt to reach the controls, however; while Kirk

was thrown against the bulkhead in the passengers' cabin,

Sulu suffered a similar fate up front. The

result was a shoulder which hung at an agonizingly

wrong angle until McCoy eased it back

into place. Torn cartilage, McCoy told

Kirk. Severed muscles, damaged nerves. All

of it, no doubt, reparable in a starship's

sickbay; all

of it hopeless in a heatless, lightless, airless

shuttlecraft. Kirk watched McCoy

wind what seemed like kilometers of translucent

bandaging about Sulu's still form, binding his arm fast

to his side. Like a butterfly in a cocoon,

Kirk found himself thinking. Or a fly wound up in a

spider's web, waiting for the inevitable.

He looked around the crippled shuttle now,

wondering how long Spock would search before declaring them

dead.

Sulu's voice interrupted Kirk's reverie.

"Do you know what this sort of reminds me of? Only

a little," the helmsman amended, "but it still reminds

me."

Kirk hoped it wasn't anything too dreadful.

"What?"

Sulu smiled weakly, and, even though he was

ashen, his eyes glittering with pain, the smile brightened

his face. "There was a simulation our class ran in

command school, where a ship had been disabled by a

gravitic mine-was "Not just your class." Kirk

grinned. It was supposed to be kept secret-how

else could each class's response be an honest

one?-but under the cir- cumstances . . dis"...All of

them."

Chekov groaned inarticulately.

"I remember too. The Kobayashi

Maru. his

Sulu tried to nod, winced graphically, and

instead said, "That's the one."

His smile didn't fade.

"What's a Kobayashi Maru?" McCoy

asked.

"It's a torture device," Chekov

volunteered unhelpfully from the front, and Kirk

laughed. McCoy glanced up at the hatch, then

back at Kirk, looking all the while as if he

thought they were trying to pull

something over on him. For Kirk, that somehow made

it funnier.

"It means "the ship named Kobayashi' in

Japanese," Sulu tried to explain. "That was the

name . . . of the ship, I mean."

"It was a command scenario," Kirk went on,

taking pity on the doctor's obvious confusion. "A

command cadet is placed in charge of a simulated

starship, then forced to make a decision regarding the

rescue of a Federation fuel carrier that's been disabled

in Klingon space. The name of the carrier in the

scenario is Kobayashi Maru. his

McCoy snorted and sat back in his seat. "So

what's the big deal about this test?"

"It was a no-win situation," Kirk told him.

"No matter what you did, or how hard you tried,

you always lost. All the possible decisions were

wrong."

McCoy turned, his face a study in

indignant disbelief. "Well, that sounds bloody

unfair!"

Everyone in the shuttle-even Sulu-laughed.

Kirk said, "That was the whole point, Bones."

McCoy gave up in frustration and settled

back into his seat. "I don't understand."

Kirk couldn't help feeling sorry for the

doctor, who couldn't realize why his bemusement was so

funny. "It was a character test," Kirk explained.

"Intended to find out how well you respond to losing."

McCoy surprised Kirk by laughing aloud.

"You must have flunked that one royally!"

The captain feigned insult. "On the

contrary-I actually scored rather high."

"Oh?" McCoy drew back in mock

surprise. "I can't wait to hear this!"

Kirk was startled to discover that, even after all this

time, the very thought of his private battle with the

simulator made him blush furiously. He

resisted the temptation to squirm in his seat.

"It's a long story, Bones . . ."

McCoy's smile only widened. "We have

lots of time . . . Besides," he added, more

reasonably, "it'll pass the hours."

The hours they had left before rescue or death.

That it would. Kirk's inclination to keep his youthful

follies hidden warred with the stronger instinct to somehow

serve his men even in this limited capacity. Indeed,

if this were not their final wrestle with the Kobayashi

Maru, what was? At least it was apropos.

"I'm not supposed to tell anyone," he said

by way of final resistance. "Our lips are sealed,"

Sulu promised solemnly, still smiling. "Right,

Pavel?"

Chekov stuck his head into the passenger compartment

briefly. "I wouldn't even tell my own mother,

sir."

"I'll hold you both to that," Kirk promised as

Chekov disappeared into the pilots' hatch again. "Because

if anyone ever tries this stunt again, Starfleet will

know where they got the idea . . . to was

THE NO-WIN SCENARIO

CADET JAMES T. KiRc sat cramped

inside a rec hall reader terminal, elbows on

knees, fists balled up beneath his chin.

Thumb-high people scurried about the screen in front of

him, running first forward, then backward as Kirk

changed the tape's direction with a single whispered

word. An on-screen explosion splashed the

cubicle with light; darkness rushed in again just as

quickly, this time claiming the screen image as well.

Only the words KOBAYASHI MARU TEST

463981-009 COMPLETE brightened the black

screen, and then only briefly.

I lost.

The thought struck Kirk with numbing incredulity, just

as it had five times before. After being accepted

into Starfleet at a younger-than-standard age-after testing

at the top of his Academy class every single

year-Startleet stuck him in a twelve-meter

diameter simulator for less than five

minutes, and he failed so miserably not even his

classmates had the ill grace to

laugh. He signaled the reader to replay the

tape again as impotent fury burned his disbelief

away.

"Such tenacity should belong to an Andorian,

James Kirk."

Kirk jerked upright. Outside the doorway to the

reader, Lieutenant Commander Constrev's

pale blond hair was the only thing visible through the

dark.

"It is after student curfew," he continued

complacently. "You should be in the barracks."

Kirk had engaged in late-night discussions with

Constrev too frequently to believe the computer

expert would report him now. Turning back to the

reader and the frantic scenario again filling the tiny

screen, he dropped his chin into his hand again. "I

wanted to see this one more time." I want to figure out

what the hell I did wrong . . .

Constrev folded his legs beneath him and sat on the

floor outside the cubicle. "The Kobayashi

Maru?" Kirk flicked a startled glance down at

the officer, and Constrev smiled. "It is now almost

midnight. I think you have reviewed this tape more than

once."

Kirk fixed his attention on the viewer again before

Constrev commented on his surprise; he didn't like it

that the lieutenant commander could read him so easily.

"I'm . . . timing it." He tried to make the

admission sound casual. "And I wanted to study the

details."

"I see." Constrev watched the screen with him for

some time. "Once, nearly fifteen years

ago," he remarked, as if Kirk had asked him

for the

statistic, "a student made the Kobayashi

Maru test last eleven and 26

one half minutes. My commanding officer,

Admiral Howell, told me this," he added

parenthetically. "No one has done so since then.

Why do you feel the need to succeed where others

failed?"

Kirk felt the blood come up into his face and,

this time, didn't stop the outburst that followed. "Because

I was stupid! It took the Klingons less time

to destroy me than it takes me to tell about it!"

His hands twisted into fists without his thinking about it; he

jammed them against his thighs to keep from striking something

within the cubicle. "I'm good at strategy," he

insisted, his voice so soft it was almost a groan.

"Damn it, Constrev, I'm a good commander!"

Constrev nodded sagely. "Perhaps the Klingons are

merely better."

"No." The very thought was too frightening

to contemplate. If the Klingons were "better" in this

simple classroom exercise, what would they be like

out in the real world? "It's just a computer," Kirk

finally stated defensively. "I should have been

able to beat it."

"Just a computer." Constrev's thin laughter fell

dead in the bigness of the empty rec hall. "All the

more reason why you could never have beaten it."

Kirk fixed him with a wary frown.

Constrev smiled. No one could discuss the

intricacies of computer

psychology with as much glee and expertise as

Constrev; Kirk sometimes thought binary mental

functions were his friend's sacred call. "Computers cannot

be indecisive," Constrev told him. "Computers can

think faster than any biological or-

ganism currently known. Computers take their knowledge

base from the knowledge of all species, not just from the knowledge of one

man's

experience. They are smarter than you, faster than

you, more patient than you."

"They also can't feel, was Kirk countered. He

didn't like being compared to a machine, particularly when

the comparison was unfavorable. "They have no

instinct-they have no heart!"

Constrev smiled pleasantly. "So you believe

spiritually superior biological creatures should

triumph over electronics."

Kirk turned back to the reader without

dignifying the sarcasm with a reply. "You should read

your philosophy, James Kirk. Earth's

Agrippa teaches that all beings are microcosmic

representations of the universe around them-a being is

born, and grows, and dies. So the universe was

once born, grows old, and will someday die. Your

failure in this is only a representation of how

all things-great and small-suffer failure, until

the end of eternity. Accept this, and go on."

Kirk watched as flame swallowed the

Potemkin's bridge for the sixth time that evening. He

wasn't really interested in what Agrippa thought of the

Kobayashi Maru-Agrippa's grade didn't

depend on it. "How microcosmic can we be,"

he asked Constrev irritably, "when individual

men die every day, but our species continues

to thrive?"

"In the end, entropy claims even the most

thriving species. We all fail in the end."

Kirk slapped off the tape player with an

angry swat 28

of his hand. He'd had too much of philosophy for

one night. "Good night, Constrev," he announced

shortly.

Constrev stood without protest. "Good

night, James."

It was like a bad nightmare.

Smoke obscured Kirk's vision for the second

time in as many weeks. Fans roared into life

overhead, swirling back the gray-black cloud like

a curtain as the simulator cracked open with a

loud, hydraulic hissss. The students scattered

throughout the ruined bridge set looked around in

embarrassed confusion. Their grime-smeared faces and

averted eyes tore at Kirk's already guilty

heart.

I failed them.

He stared fixedly at the navigation-helm console

as Admiral Howell stepped onto the bridge.

Howellhis dark eyes glittering with

sympathy-paused in the arc where the viewscreen once

hung, and announced, "The simulation is now over."

Almost as a single body, the cadets exhaled in

relief. Kirk couldn't help but marvel, even through

his despair, that one calm voice could reassure

an entire bridge crew following such a total

disaster. He envied Howell that steadiness-a steadiness

he was once vain enough to believe he possessed himself.

"You will have thirty minutes to clean up and

organize your thoughts," Howell continued,

apparently oblivious to Kirk's humiliation.

"We'll meet in Kare Conference Hall at ten

o'clock to review your performance. Dismissed."

The cadets filed off the simulator in groups

of two

and three. Still shaken, their movements too quick and

broad, their voices too hushed or too loud, they

abandoned Kirk without a backward glance. As well

they should, he thought bitterly. A second class of

cadets, a second starship, a second

Kobayashi Maru. A second failure. It

terrified Kirk to think this might be the beginning of a

trend.

"Are you going to join the rest of us, Cadet

Kirk? Or wait here until the maintenance crews

sweep you away?"

Kirk flashed a look at Howell's smiling

eyes, then forced himself not to look away again when he

realized he was blushing. "I was . . . reviewing

my performance. I think I'm ready to leave now."

Howell waved Kirk back into the command chair when

the cadet started to rise. "Reviewing your

performance?" the admiral echoed when Kirk stopped and

looked at him, but refused to sit back down.

"Didn't you get enough of that the other night?"

Kirk snapped his mouth shut the moment he

realized it was hanging open. "Constrev-was

"Told me nothing," Howell finished for him.

"But I know the tape of your last Kobayashi Maru

was checked out overnight, you were late for bed check, and

Constrev showed up at my office late-and

sleepy-for his duties the next day." He stepped

forward to lean across the navigation console, chin in hand.

"Mister Kirk, do you realize your reaction time to this

test was well above average for this kind of encounter?

Both times."

Kirk felt his face redden again. "I didn't

bother to time myself, Admiral."

That wasn't entirely true He 30

had studied his first scenario enough to know it took him

four minutes, thirty-seven point zero three

seconds to die. He thought it took a little longer this

time, but he wasn't sure.

"Both times, you executed flawless approaches.

You deviated from the books when applicable, and your

crew gave you admirable assistance-especially

considering that none of them has actually served on

board a starship."

Howell cocked one eyebrow and gave Kirk a

curious grin. "I didn't expect the

Reinhold pirouette this time. I'm not even sure

that's possible with a Constitution-class ship. But

Admiral Walgren gave you points for trying.

He isn't an easy man to impress."

"I lost my ship." The words crept out of

Kirk before he could stop them. An agony of shame

at his lack of control made him turn to examine the

shattered bridge around him. "I lost my crew!

Twice..."

"You did everything you could."

"I should have done more."

Howell shrugged with such infuriating calm that

Kirk wanted to hit him. "Maybe. But it wouldn't

have made any difference."

Kirk started to protest He'd studied the great

commanders since he was a boy-he knew that Korrd,

Garth of Izar, or Shaitani would have wrenched

victory from the jaws of even this defeat. God, it

was Shaitani he'd tried to emulate in his first

scenario, and even then-

Even then, he'd failed.

And that was impossible.

Staring into Howell's seamed face, Kirk looked

for some confirmation of what he'd already intuited. He

31

didn't understand why, but he knew now. Knew, and

hated Howell and all the others for forcing him to face

such a scenario.

"You planned this," he accused in a quiet

voice. "Both times, you knew I was going

to lose."

"I know everyone is going to lose." Howell

pushed himself upright and matched Kirk's glare.

"It's the nature of the game, Mister Kirk. No

one wins."

Howell didn't seem angry at Kirk or

Kirk's newly discerned knowledge. So the ensign didn't

interrupt him when he continued.

"The Kobayashi Maru is a no-win scenario,"

Howell explained. "In real life, you only

get to face this sort of failure once. But it's

something every commander has to be ready for." He gestured

toward the smoke-grimed panel in front of him.

"No matter what you do, the computer adjusts for it,

and compensates. We've drawn knowledge from every commander who

ever lived-none of them could beat this computer now. There

will always be more Klingons, more damage, less time."

Kirk nodded, understanding better than he thought

Howell realized. "It cheats."

Howell's laughter surprised him. "Of

course it cheats! Because the point of the scenario is to not

let you win! That's all the computer's programmed

for. That's all it knows."

"But that isn't fair," Kirk argued. He

folded his arms stubbornly across his chest. "When you

said I could take this as many times as I wanted, was that

a lie, too?"

"No." Howell shook his head. "You can take it

until hell freezes over. Or until the end

of the semester, 32

whichever comes first. But it won't make any

difference."

"Then why tell me this? Why not let me do it and

do it and do it, just like everybody else?"

"Because," Howell smiled thinly, "everybody

else doesn't. No one's taken this test twice

in over twenty years." The smile faded, and

Kirk thought he sensed true concern in the

admiral's dark eyes. "I thought telling you the

punch line might change your mind. I didn't

want to see such a fine student waste his time on

losing."

When he stepped off the dais, Kirk tried to do

it with a determination worthy of gods. He wasn't

sure if he succeeded; he felt abysmally

small. "We'll see," was all he said to Howell

as he stepped down.

The World Library annex in Old El

Cerrito had nothing on the Kobayashi Maru. Not

a single book, or article, or footnote

reference in even the most obscure journal in the

galaxy.

Of course.

Kirk drummed his foot as he waited for the

shuttle that would return him to the Academy, damning

himself for even hoping write-ups existed (especially

after his failure to find any references in the

Academy's own library). The fourteen tapes in

his jacket pockets clicked like out-of-tune

maracas as the December wind whipped all a round

him. Kirk jerked the front of his windbreaker

closed, then crossed his arms in frustration.

The Kobayashi Maru didn't exist outside the

confines of that damned simulator. No one spoke

of it, none of the textbooks mentioned it, none of his

exhaustive searches of the Federation computer banks

found even the vaguest reference to anything by that name-not

even a real spaceship. If it weren't for his own

dreams, Kirk could almost imagine he'd

never really taken the test at all.

He couldn't count how many times in the last month

he'd tossed awake at night, angry and sweating,

only to spend the rest of the night in the barracks'

bathroom plotting strategies. The fine line between

failure and winning had gnawed at his soul; after the

failure of his first computer searches, he acquired

information on other military defeats. If he

couldn't learn success from the masters, he would learn

failure from them, instead. Some of the defeats were

foolish, so easy to overturn that they were hardly

worth consideration Earth's own George Custer at

Little Bighorn, who would have slaughtered the Cheyenne

if he'd only waited for the rest of his troops;

Babin at Rukbat V, who would never have

deployed his sixth fleet to the system at all if

he hadn't been too obsessed with owning Rukbat

to pay attention to the rumors of Romulan ambush.

Others were honest defeats that the commanders at the time could

never have changed The Hoshe Offensive throughout the

Magellan sector (earth didn't know about the

transporter in those days); Fr'nir at Gast,

whose soldiers died slowly from kurite poisoning before

anyone knew what kurite was.

After the battles, then, he studied the

commanders. Garth, Babin, Shaitani,

Hoshe-I)a, Korrd, Friendly John, Von.

Biographical information and statistics on their

battles reeled about his head every waking moment. He

dreamed the battle of Tiatris only last 34

night, and he won it, too, despite the odds.

Where Friendly John had been food for the mihka,

Kirk had routed the mihka into the sea. He even

remembered how-now, when he was awake, he could

recount every move he'd made, every order given. And

they were brilliant. All of them.

Sitting on the shuttle between the Academy grounds

and the library, he sketched and figured and planned,

until he could overturn all those historic

victories as if they were preschool disputes. Some

of them he could overturn in less time than it took

to enact the original conflict. Some of them he could

avoid altogether. Some of them he could end before they would

even be considered started.

And on the heels of such successes, his thoughts

always turned to Kobayashi Maru.

In so many ways, the test was more complex than

anything he could find in his historic references. The

computer knew everything, no matter how obscure or

unlikely; Klingon reinforcements could

arrive out of nowhere, no matter that the Neutral

Zone never hosted more than four unreported Klingon

cruisers. Kirk had piles of handwritten notes

hidden under his mattress at the barracks-notes that

sometimes resembled flowcharts more than battle

plans. Twelve times now he'd constructed winnable

strategies to the Kobayashi Maru; twelve times

he'd countered his own schemes by beefing up the

computer's knowledge, increasing the Klingon forces. It was like

trying to win a war against God-no matter what he

conceived of, more Klingons could always converge, or

simply not take damage, or fatally damage his

own ship with weapons that shouldn't have penetrated the

screens.

Kirk was bound by the laws of physics, while

nothing bound the computer but some programmer's

sadistic imagination; without the framework of reality

within which to work, literally anything could happen.

So Howell was right Kirk would lose. Every time.

"It's the nature of the game. his

But it wasn't fair.

When Kirk stepped off the shuttle he found the

Academy quad predictably empty. The

midwinter rain having chased most of the students

inside for the weekend and upcoming finals

didn't help. Kirk would have stayed to study himself,

but Saturdays were the only time when he could venture

off-grounds to the library, and he didn't want

to waste what might be his last chance to collect data

before the end of the semester.

Halfway across the windy quad, Kirk spotted

a solitary figure beneath the arch of one of the elevated

walkways. A bulky parka smothered the

individual's identity, but the flared black

trousers marked him as a member of Startleet;

grinning, Kirk redirected his course to join his

snowsuited comrade.

He didn't realize it was Constrev until he

stepped up alongside and the lieutenant glanced at

him curiously. The computer expert's pale blue

eyes looked so appropriately chilled inside the

parka hood that Kirk had to laugh. "What are you

doing out here?" he asked when Constrev returned

to studying the back end of the quad.

"I'm attempting to adjust to the weather," he

replied. "I shall be studying at the Academy for

two more Earth years, and would like to be able to leave

the buildings in the winter." He was trying to sound

reasonable, but the defensive edge to his voice

betrayed that others had asked him this same question

today.

Kirk nodded agreeably, turning to follow

Constrev's gaze so that the sight of the parka wouldn't

move him to laughter again. "You're lucky the

Academy's in San Francisco," he commented.

"Most Humans don't even consider the weather here

to be cold."

"I am not most Humans." Indeed, it was a very

rare Human that was born and raised on Vulcan.

When Constrev volunteered nothing further, Kirk

asked, "It doesn't get cold on Vulcan?"

"They have a winter season," Constrev allowed, "but

not so severe as this. The summers are much warmer, as

well, and approach fifty degrees centigrade

when the year is not bad."

Kirk whistled appreciatively. "I thought

Humans boiled at that

temperature."

"Not me."

They stood, side by side, for several silent

minutes; Kirk watched a flock of dry leaves

chase themselves across the flat stone, trying not

to personify the skittering dervish as some army he should

try to outmaneuver. It only half worked, and he

made himself look some other way as the leaves

settled into a silent pile again.

"Where have you been today?" Constrev asked him. He

had been watching the leaves as well, and Kirk

couldn't help but wonder if he somehow knew what

Kirk was thinking.

"The World Library annex," Kirk admitted.

"I was looking for more

information on the test." If Constrev knew, there was

no sense trying to deny it.

Constrev shook his head, jamming his hands deeper

into his parka pockets. "I would never travel so

far from the buildings on such a cold day."

"Where I grew up," Kirk told him, "this

isn't cold. During the winter in Iowa-that's the

area of Earth where I grew up-the temperatures can

get down to as much as sixty degrees below zero

centigrade."

Constrev made a distinctly unhappy noise.

"I suppose you have snow as well?"

Kirk sighed. "Where the land is mostly flat, the

snow lies across it like icing on a cake. And the

morning sunlight turns it so bright it hurts your

eyes to look at it-like a whole sheet of stars just

packed together on the fields until there isn't even

space between them. And you can roll it up

into snowmen, or pack it together with your hands to throw at

your brother." He smiled in memory of more than a

dozen Iowa winters, with his fingers numb and stupid as

clay, his breath rushing out of him in feathery clouds of

steam. "I couldn't even begin to explain all the things

snow can mean to someone who grew up with it. Snow is

more than just chemistry. It's a whole part of growing

up."

Constrev didn't answer for a long time. After a

moment, Kirk glanced over at his friend, surprised

to find Constrev staring attentively across the empty

quad as though valiantly trying to envision the world

Kirk depicted. "Maybe I'll take you

to Iowa someday," Kirk added, feeling suddenly

foolish. "It's easier just to show you."

Constrev nodded absently. "You have a poet's

soul, James Kirk," he stated seriously.

"Why do you wish to spend all your time making war?"

"I don't want to make war," Kirk told

him.

"You study this test," Constrev pointed out. "You

spend more hours in the libraries than you spend in your

own bed. You study destruction and tactics.

Isn't this war?"

"No," Kirk countered. "It's a

principle." He stepped in front of Constrev

to break the instructor's eye contact with the

nonexistent snow. "I don't believe in the

no-win scenario," he told him. "I don't

believe it's fair to ask students to accept a

concept I don't think is valid."

"The no-win scenario is the basis of our

universe," Constrev replied. "Depending on which

point of view you employ, someone always loses."

"That's garbage."

"If you always win, someone else must lose.

Isn't that so?"

The thought bothered Kirk profoundly. He fingered

the computer tapes, suddenly embarrassed and frightened

to think that so much of his personal philosophy could be

shattered with so simple a statement. "It's not the

same thing," he argued, albeit weakly. "Losing

and not winning aren't the same thing. I believe you can

lose. I believe you can die. I don't believe

there's such a thing as a situation that's impossible

to win."

Constrev studied his face for a moment, his pale

eyes disconcertingly earnest. 7iuning away, he

stated at last, "Perhaps you are right. But if what you

tell me about this test is true, it isn't

intended to accurately represent reality. So why

concern yourself with it?"

"Because . . ." Kirk stopped, his train of thought

suddenly stymied by the idea blossoming in his mind.

"Because it isn't real," he gasped as the idea

took form. "Because it isn't fair. It cheats!"

He caught Constrev by the shoulders and shook him

joyfully. "It cheats, Constrev! Which means I

don't have to play by the rules, either!"

Constrev looked uncertain. "I believe

tampering with test results is frowned upon."

"Two negatives make a positive, don't

they?"

"But cheating twice-was

"Makes for a fair test," Kirk cut him off.

"Trust me on this-I'm a command cadet."

Kirk darted into the cadet barracks a breathless

seven minutes before the wake-up call. Curled up

beneath his bedcovers, fully clothed, he crammed a

handful of quilt into his mouth to muffle his panting.

What's happened to me? he wondered, somewhat

horrified. Only a few weeks ago-before the

Kobayashi Maru-staying out beyond curfew was

unthinkable. He'd been the good little soldier,

considering without doubting; questioning without disobeying.

Now, he felt at war with his superiors over a

philosophical issue he'd never even considered

before. A war that would end at precisely three

minutes after ten today. His heart hammered excitedly

at the pros- pect.

When the wake-up call sounded, Kirk's

bunkmate didn't even ask why the young cadet was

under his covers, boots and all; Kirk assumed the

other man had seen this often enough in the past few days

to excuse Kirk's

idiosyncratic sleeping habits as beneath men-

tion. You'll see, Kirk told him silently

as he hastily tucked down the covers on his own

bed. Soon everyone will be able to guess where I've

been nights . . .

His first two classes came and went with all the

speed and grace of a dying man dragging himself across the

desert. At ten o'clock he was released from class

to report to the simulator. Cadets craned in their

seats to watch him stride stiffly for the exit; he

wondered what they would say if they knew his hands were

cold and his mind was numb with indecision. He

wondered what admirals Howell and Walgren would

say when the test was over.

A collection of students from the security

division already milled about the bridge set when

Kirk arrived. He reported to the monitoring

officers, then took his seat at the command chair. He

felt as if he were walking through cold jelly, moving

so slowly that everyone must see that he was hindered by his

vague sense of guilt-that he was actually afraid

of going through with this, even after investing so much time and

scheming. The arms of the command chair were unyielding beneath

his grip.

Kirk had the test nearly memorized by now. He

watched the cadets around him frown seriously over

their instruments until the helmsman turned

to request coordinates for avoiding the Klingon

Neutral Zone; Kirk could have cued the senior

officer who was serving at communications "Captain .

. . I'm receiving something over the distress channel."

The words, "Put it on speakers," sounded clear

and confident, even though his mouth felt impossibly

dry.

"dis . . imperative!" a frightened voice

whispered through a symphony of static as the comm

officer

obeyed Kirk's command. "This is the Kobayashi

Maru, nineteen periods out of Altair Vl. We

have struck a gravitic mine-was

Kirk didn't wait for the plea to finish-he'd

heard it too many times to care for the artifice

anymore. A certain amount of cooperation was

expected, however, so he pretended concern as he

asked, "Kobayashi Maru, this is the U.s.s.

Potemkin. Can you give us your position?"

"Gamma Hydra," the distant voice replied.

"Section ten."

"The Neutral Zone," the navigator gasped.

Kirk leaned on his fist to hide a smile.

"dis . . hull penetrated-life support

systems failing! Can you assist, Potemkin?"

1 don't know why I'm smiling, Kirk

marveled, still masking his grin. Flunking out of command

school is hardly funny. He had a dreadful

premonition that "out" was exactly where he was

headed. So far, nothing about the test had differed-not by a

second or a syllable. Had he done it? He was

hardly a computer expert.

"Potemkin? We're losing your signal-can you

assist?"

"Take us in," Kirk ordered, straightening.

He didn't even ask to see the stats on the fuel

carrier. He'd looked at them the first time he took

the test, hoping to pin information; he'd looked

at them the second time, hoping to maintain the illusion

that he didn't know what to expect; this time, he

didn't even care.

"Captain, that would be in direct violation of

treaty," the executive officer began.

"I'm well aware of that, thank you." But ifl'm

going

to go down, I may as well go down in flames.

"Helm, raise shields. Just in case."

"Aye, aye, sir."

The computer had barely finished warning them that they were

now entering the Klingon neutral zone when the

communications officer yelped, "I've lost the

signal!" and the science officer reported, "Three

Klingon cruisers closing on our stern!"

"Evasive action!" Kirk called, gripping the

arms of his chair in

anticipation of the blow he knew was coming. It

jolted the simulator, exploding the helm console

into flame, before any of his bridge crew could

acknowledge.

"Full power to screens!"

A lithe young woman stepped over the "dead"

helmsman to stab at the controls. "Screens are

dead, Captain."

Kirk spared only a short glance of irritation

at his "dying" navigator. He slammed one hand

on the arm of his command chair, wishing he could hurt

something besides himself with the gesture. "Contact the Klingon

vessels. Tell them we're on a rescue

mission!"

He stared accusingly at the viewscreen, knowing

Howell and the others were watching, and wanting to burn them

with his anger; black space and three gunmetal

blue war dragons stared back at him in sinister

silence. He didn't even realize the communications

officer had never responded until the executive

officer prompted, "The captain told you to raise

the Klingon commander, Mister."

The communications officer stammered helplessly for a

moment. Kirk swung the command chair about in time

to see the communications officer close his 43

eyes as if in apologetic prayer and timidly

touch a button. "Coming on screen now, sir. .

."

Kirk couldn't help uttering a short cry of

surprise.

"This is Commander Kozor," announced a

guttural voice, distorted by the intership band, "of the

Kh'yem. was Behind the rough baritone, Kirk

could hear other computer-generated Klingons growling and

bustling as they went about their computer-generated

duties. "You have entered Federation Neutral Zone

against treaty. In name of Klingon Empire, Kh

yem declares war!" Jerking about in his chair, Kirk

endeavored to assume what he hoped was an

expression of cultured confidence (the Klingons

might not be able to see him, but the monitoring officers

certainly could). "This is Captain James T.

Kirk, of the U.s.s. Potemkin." It was the first

time he'd ever said his name that way; the sheer excitement

of it made him short of breath. "We are on a

rescue mission in search of a civilian freighter

registered with the United Federation of Planets. We

mean no harm, but we will defend ourselves if necessary."

"Captain Kirk?" the Klingon commander parroted.

"The Captain Kirk?" Kirk fought a smile as

his bridge crew exclaimed in a single voice,

"The Captain Kirk?" The "dead" navigator

began to laugh.

Kirk cleared his throat and went on. "I'll

prove it, if you force me."

The Klingon commander barked to the others in gruff

Klingonese. "That will not be necessary," he said in a more

subdued tone. "Report coordinates of

freighter, and Kh yem will offer all assistance,

Captain Kirk."

Somehow, the navigator's braying laughter

destroyed the solemnity of the moment. Kirk, his head

spinning, returned his crew's stunned stares with a

smug grin. "Gamma Hydra, section ten. We

would greatly appreciate your escort, Kozor."

"Of course, Captain Kirk! Whatever you

require . . . to was

By the time the test was over, eighteen minutes

twenty-seven seconds had elapsed. Kirk commanded

the recovery operations in a giddy daze, somewhat

amazed to discover that there was a Kobayashi Maru to be

rescued after all. The crew performed beautifully,

the Klingons were uncommonly cooperative, and

Kobayashi Maru's master, Kojiro Yance, even

agreed to have dinner with Kirk that evening.

The simulator still stank of seared wiring and

melted plastic when the viewscreen cracked

to admit Admiral Howell. Overhead fans

vacuumed away the worst of the smoke, but for every whiff

whisked away, another rose from the simulated

damage. Spidery glimmers of liquid crystal

crawled across the sootstreaked floor. Howell

paused just inside the starship's viewscreen

and shook his head at the laughing, shouting cadets who

pushed past him on their way to the conference hall.

Kirk stayed in the command chair, his head angled

downward as he stroked the command chair like a prized

horse. We did it, he thought contently. We beat

the no-win scenario. Not specifically the no-win,

since 45

he had changed the conditions, but that seemed a minor

technicality at the moment.

"That was an interesting performance," Howell said when

the last of the cadets were gone. "Admiral Walgren

is talking of having you

court-martialed. Ill have my hands full trying

to dissuade him." He stepped around the helm console

to sit.

Kirk grinned and studied the bridge

speculatively. "I did succeed."

"What did you prove?" Howell's voice was

confused but honestly curious. "That cheating pays

off?"

Relegating his solution to the realm of simple

cheating stung Kirk's pride. "Consider me a

conscientious objector. I don't think of it as

cheating when the rules of the game are unfair."

"I explained that to you already," Howell

began, but Kirk interrupted, to say again, "I

don't believe in the no-win scenario."

"And you think reprogramming the simulation so the

Klingons believe you're a famo us starship captain

proves you're right?" Howell studied Kirk

narrowly. "What are you going to do when you run up

against Klingons in real life? Convince them all

you're Garth of lZar?"

Kirk straightened in the command chair, feeling

suddenly protective of some nebulous future

ship and career. "I'll deal with that as I come to it,

sir," he said stiffly. "I may not have to convince them

of anything at all."

Some indefinite emotion flickered through Howell's

dark eyes, then was gone before Kirk could identify

what he'd seen. When the ensign frowned faintly,

the older officer smiled and rose from the helmsman's

chair. "Forget I asked," he acquiesced.

Stepping to the foot of the dais, he looked up at

Kirk like a subordinate reporting for duty.

"Let's go see what the rest of the class has

to say this time," he suggested. "I have a feeling

you've got quite a busy time ahead of you."

Kirk stood slowly and joined Howell

on the empty deck. "Yes, sir. I guess I

deserve whatever they give me."

Howell smiled at him kindly, "Yes, Mister

Kirk, I think you probably do."

Somehow, Kirk sensed he wasn't just talking about

the rest of the day.

HALLEY

Kiiuc HAD sHIF-REveryGG'D POSITION

at McCoy's insistence, elevating his knee

by sitting with his back to the bulkhead and his leg

stretched across the row of empty seats. He sat in

that position, drumming his fingers against a seatback, for

perhaps a full minute before embarrassed irritation

finally moved him to suggest, "It wasn't that funny,

Doctor."

McCoy choked his laughter down, "til it

became a sporadic chuckle. "Yes, it is,

Jim!" The doctor paused in rummaging through his

medikit to lean back in his seat and regain his breath.

"It's so in character! I'm surprised I didn't just

guess it!"

Kirk made a face he didn't think

McCoy could see across the half-light between them.

Too bad-it seemed a pity to waste such honest

annoyance on darkness. "Is that supposed

to offend me?"

The doctor shrugged. "It's your self-image .

. ."

"I don't think I understand . . ." Chekov had

joined them from the front hatch partway through

Kirk's narration. He sat now with his back against

the airlock doors, his arms folded on his

drawn-up knees; lamplight brushed blue

highlights into the lieutenant's brown hair, while

distance hid his dark-eyed face in shadow. "Are you

saying that you cheated?"

"Mister Chekov!" McCoy's tone was mock

scolding, his face too studiously serious to be

sincere. was "Cheated" is a trite, misapplied

word to what our captain accomplished!" Picking

something out of his medikit, he tilted it into the light for

purposes of identification. "He exercised a

commander's prerogative of creativity in the face of

adversity!"

"I changed the conditions of the test," Kirk

attempted to elaborate, but McCoy overrode

him again.

"His solution doesn't even apply to the test

his classmates took!" Disregarding whatever he'd

found, McCoy returned to his rummaging.

Chekov looked from Kirk to the doctor, as though

trying to catch some communication between the two that he was

missing. "You cheated."

Kirk felt his face twist into a sardonic

smile he doubted he would have recognized in a

mirror. "I've been cheating my whole life,"

he said, before he thought better of it. "Fate just never

figured it out until now."

Like wax under a particle beam, the tenuous good

humor evaporated, leaving only thick, churning

silence. Kirk wanted to apologize, but realized

that would only make things worse; he listened

to McCoy's quiet searching, and Scotty's

clatter in the back, and waited for someone to brave

another topic.

McCoy, as usual, was the first to break the

quiet.

"Come on," the doctor grumbled as he stood,

nudging Chekov with one foot. "Get into a seat!

This metal decking'll leech the heat right out your

backside; I don't need a hypothermia

patient on top of everything else!"

Chekov climbed obediently to his feet;

Kirk caught just a glimpse of the lieutenant's

troubled, half-angry expression as

Chekov passed through the light on his way to an

empty seat in the row behind Sulu. "Even the seats

won't be safe soon. As long as it's colder out

there than it is in here, all the insulation in existence

can't keep us alive." He dropped into a center

seat and turned hooded, frightened eyes on the

encroaching vacuum. "Practical physics in

action."

Of course it was Chekov who remained mindful of the

death waiting outside the shuttle's doors. Kirk

sometimes thought his security chief had spent so much time

fighting to stand upright between bludgeoning practicality

and blind idealism that he'd finally been torn

apart-afraid now to take a step in either direction

lest he lose his grasp on the other. Who had done

that to him, Kirk sometimes wondered. And why would

anyone want to?

"Don't give up," Kirk advised, wishing

he could follow his own advice. "We've got quite a

few hours before we have to worry about

freezing-Scotty could practically build a new

ship in that time!"

"If freezing's all you're worried about,"

Scott volunteered from the rear of the shuttle, "the

ship we've got now will suit us fine!"

Kirk's knee barked a protest as he twisted

about to face the burly engineer trudging down the center

aisle. Equipment belt askew on his hips,

Scott passed one hand through his rumpled hair to no

particular 50

effect-an afterthought to his physical appearance.

He smiled ruefully at Kirk and stepped around the

emergency lamp.

"What's the word?" Kirk already knew the answer

would not be good. Scott's initial reply was to pass

into the forward hatch and lean across the helmsman's

chair. Strong, cool light washed away the darkness

as the engineer thumbed a series of toggles; the

shuttle itself seemed to heave a grateful sigh.

Kirk smiled.

"We've got heat, too," the Scotsman

volunteered as he returned to the middle chamber.

"We won't be feeling it for another hour or so, but

it's working. We won't freeze."

"And we've got more than starlight to see by!"

McCoy paused in his examination of Kirk's knee

to click off the lamp on the edge of the seat. "This

looked better in the dark, Jim."

Kirk grimaced. McCoy had slit his trouser

leg clear up to the thigh, and the offending knee

had swelled to accommodate. The chemical cold

pack draped across Kirk's leg didn't hide the

purple-black bruising, or do much to relieve the

pain. McCoy tucked the pack under an elbow as

he readied another hypo; Kirk listened to Scott

with pointed attention so he wouldn't have to observe the

injection.

"So we have engine power?" Kirk wanted Scott

to keep talking.

"We've got generator power," the engineer

obliged him, "but no engine ability worth speaking

of." Scott leaned back against the bulkhead,

stretching his shoulders in a slow, soul-weary motion.

"It's like that with gravitic mines," he explained,

sighing. "You get

what damage the strained engines inflict upon

themselves, and then whatever damage the gravitic stress

does on top of that! I can hardly track it all

down; the damage patterns make that little sense!"

"Does that mean we're still drifting?" McCoy

retrieved Kirk's attention and applied the

hypospray to his arm just in time for Kirk to notice

the doctor.

"Aye, Doctor," Scott admitted. "It

means that." McCoy turned away to tend

to Sulu, a bit too abruptly, and Scott

seemed to feel some need to elaborate. "I've

got shunting equipment I can barely identify right

now, much less repair. Because of that, the generator

and the engines aren't . . ." He waved his hands as if

grasping after an appropriate phrase. "dis . .

Well, aren't on speaking terms, exactly. We

can run the lights and heat for another hundred years

or so . . . but we canna change our course so

much as a centimeter without outside help."

And their only prospect of help came from

Spock and the Enterprise. Kirk wondered if there

was really any chance his starship could save them, or if

abandoning what tenuous hope he placed in that chance

would be more wise. Like Chekov, torn between placing his

faith in what should happen or what would happen,

Kirk decided that miracles were made, not waited

on; if he wanted to win this scenario, he would just have

to cheat again. "Scotty, is there any chance we can

salvage the radio?"

Scott looked across the shuttle to Chekov.

"Lad?"

The Russian shook his head. "I pulled the

master board." He aimed a nod toward the front

compartment, and a look of self-reproach so

intimate it startled Kirk moved across the

lieutenant's face. "It's 52

on my chair, along with what I could remove of the

receiver."

Scott disappeared into the forward compartment again, and

Kirk heard the engineer make a soft but distinct

sound of disgust. When the captain glanced inquiringly

at Chekov, the lieutenant volunteered,

"Gravitic stress."

"I might be able to cannibalize some of what I

have back here . . . to was Scott stomped through on his

way back toward the rear, one hand clamped about a

shattered, blackened collection of what might once

have been circuitry. "It's better than sitting

idle!"

"Sitting idle. . . was The phrase stabbed

Kirk with gentle guilt, despite the thick pain

in his injured leg. I should be doing more . . . to

He looked across the aisle at Sulu and

McCoy. The helmsman had slipped into waxen

unconsciousness a half-hour ago, but McCoy's

ministrations roused him now. As he became aware of the

lapse, Sulu murmured, "I guess I fell

asleep .... Sorry, sir. . ."

Kirk shrugged, then realized Sulu

wasn't in a position to appreciate the gesture.

"You didn't miss much."

"The captain cheated on his Kobayashi Maru, was

Chekov volunteered from the row behind Sulu.

"Sir?" Sulu asked. Kirk sighed.

McCoy told him.

"I'm not too surprised," the helmsman

a dmitted with a smile when the doctor finished

speaking.

McCoy snorted. "I said the same thing," he

told Sulu. "Only the captain nearly demoted

me!"

"It's the injury, Doc-it grants me

immunity." Sulu dissolved without warning into quiet,

pain-filled

chuckling. "God protects fools, children, and

invalids."

McCoy tossed Kirk a questioning look, and the

captain only shrugged. Turning back to the

helmsman, the doctor prodded, "Come on, Sulu

. . . What's the joke?"

Sulu gathered his breath in a contented sigh. "I

was thinking about fools, and the Kobayashi Maru . . .

his

Before Sulu could elaborate, Chekov

suggested from behind him, "You haven't that much

immunity... to was Despite Chekov's threatening

tone, the

proclamation seemed to amuse Sulu all the more.

"What's this?" McCoy's eyebrows rose in

innocent interest. "Someone else on this shuttle

took the Kobayashi Maru test?"

Chekov remained pointedly fixated with whatever was

outside his viewport, his face darkening-with

embarrassment, or anger, Kirk couldn't tell.

When he didn't volunteer a reply, Sulu

explained, "We both did." The chuckling

overtook him again. "Only I left the

simulator intact when I was done!" McCoy

burst into laughter, and Kirk endeavored to suppress

a smile. "Turnabout's fair play, Mister

Chekov," Kirk enjoined.

Chekov's resolve buckled slightly. The

lieutenant's stubborn "dis . . it's embarrassing.

. . was was so quiet, Kirk almost didn't think

he'd heard. "It's always embarrassing," the

captain allowed. "That's part of the test."

"Actually," Sulu allowed, "the Kobayashi

Maru isn't the embarrassing part."

"Sulu . . . to was Chekov warned again,

this time more seriously.

"It's just sort of set up for the good part," Sulu

persisted despite Chekov's displeasure. "It's

a great story-really!"

The Russian heaved a rough sigh of frustration and

maintained his study of the stars. "All right, then," he

grumbled. "You tell them, if you want to. I

don't care."

"Come on, Mister Chekov." Kirk felt the

need to alleviate a little of the stress building between the

two officers. "How bad can it be?"

Sulu giggled. "You'd be surprised."

When Chekov turned a confused, betrayed look

on his friend, Kirk echoed McCoy's earlier

quip, "It'll pass the hours," and hoped the

security officer would understand.

Chekov didn't seem to realize anything fell

between the spoken words until Kirk made eye

contact with him for a number of seconds. Then the

captain saw understanding dawn in the dark Russian

eyes, and Chekov nodded faintly, slowly. Somewhere

behind his assent, Kirk could see that dim war still going

on; he watched practicality win an uneasy

victory over whatever Chekov's emotions demanded,

and felt both guilty and relieved. "It

really isn't funny," Chekov insisted. The

lieutenant pursed his lips and turned back toward

his viewport again. "It's more embarrassing than

anything else . . . to was

HOW YOU PLAY THE GAME

WHEN THE U.s.s Yorktown exploded into a

cloud of neutrinos and high frequency light,

Cadet Pavel Chekov settled back into his

auditorium seat and heaved a contented sigh. The

three Klingon vessels surrounding the

Constitution-class starship followed almost immediately

afterward, washing the video screen at the front of the

lecture hall an impressive, roaring white.

The other students in the hall burst into applause,

cheering and laughing like the audience in a theater. Four

science cadets in the front row were the only people who

looked disgruntled with the proceedings. Chekov

noticed Alan Baasch at the center of that group and

smiled; if anyone were going to object to a creative

finale it would be "By-the-Book" Baasch. It was

somehow satisfying to know he'd annoyed the other

cadet so thoroughly. When the auditorium lights

came up, cadets blinked like children just out of sleep.

Robert Cecil, in

the chair next to Chekov, remarked

conversationally, "Kramer's gonna kill you."

Chekov leaned forward over his desk again, watching

Cecil brush carbon grime out of his dark blond

hair. Every cadet in the hall was soot-smeared and

smelly from the simulator room. Chekov wondered

what his idol, James Kirk, would have thought to see

him in such a state of disarray. Chekov had made

no secret of his respect for Kirk or his

confidence that he would be assigned to the Enterprise on

graduation.

"What can he do?" Chekov asked the other

ensign. "They put me in a simulator and told

me to blow up the Klingons-so I blew them up!"

Cecil snorted and settled back into his own

seat. "They told you to function as a starship

commander," he pointed out. "I don't think they

intended you to blow up your own ship in the process."

"Then they should have stressed that before the Klingons

arrived." Chekov knew sacrificing the Yorktown

was quite probably a unique response to a tense

command scenario, but he still believed the solution

feasible. Commodore Aldous Kramer could strut and

fume all he wanted-God knew, that seemed to be

the only justification for the man's existence since

Chekov entered command school-but it wouldn't

change what Chekov had done. And it wouldn't

change the fact that they'd been told before entering the

simulator that these scenarios were primarily

designed to test command character, not rules laid out by command

school bureaucrats who had never been in the

field. If Kramer didn't like Chekov's character,

the ensign felt that that was Kramer's problem;

Chekov certainly wouldn't waste time liking him.

Kramer stood now at the foot of the

floor-to-ceiling video screen. His hair was the

color of steel beneath the dismal white overheads, his

uninspired eyes nothing but angry black raisins

pushed into the white dough of his face. He said nothing

to quiet the cadets, did nothing to attract their

attention. Instead, he only exuded haughty

displeasure until they ceased to rustle in their seats

and their busy chatter died away. It didn't take

long.

When the lecture hall achieved an acceptable

level of order, Kramer stepped neatly to the

front of the podium and summoned, "Cadet

Chekov!" in a sten- torian baritone.

Chekov straightened obediently in his seat.

"Sir?"

Kramer angled his head to stare up the

length of the auditorium at the young cadet. His mouth

twisted slightly, as if he'd just bitten into a

particularly tart lemon. Chekov recognized the

expression as what Kramer paraded as a smile.

"I'd feel more comfortable speaking to you if I could see

you."

Chekov slid out of his chair before Cecil could

surreptitiously nudge him beneath the desk.

Cecil apparently feared suffering from the fallout of

Kramer's ill-humor; if Chekov didn't leap

whenever Kramer commanded, Cecil felt the need

to impel him, which frequently led to more embarrassment

than Chekov cared to deal with. While disobedience was not

something the young Russian would ever consider, Cecil's

impatience had still managed to increase his response

time a little.

Once Chekov was standing, Kramer linked hands behind

his own broad back and said, "Cadet Chekov, you

have just reviewed the video record of your

Kobayashi Maru test. Yes?" His words were

rounded by a lyric Rhineland accent, the soft tones a

sharp contrast to his hard, unimaginative

personality.

"Yes, sir," Chekov replied civilly, his

own voice accented and firm. "I have."

"And how would you rate your performance on that test?"

Chekov's hesitation was nearly imperceptible.

"I feel my performance was quite satisfactory,

sir."

Kramer nodded, pacing the podium with slow,

measured strides. "A starship captain is sworn

to the protection of his ship and crew. Yes?"

"Yes, sir." Chekov tried to ignore the

unease dancing about in his stomach. "And a captain

is sworn to uphold and defend the peaceful relations

we enjoy with our Klingon neighbors," Kramer

continued. "Yes?"

"The Klingons attacked first-to " Chekov

interjected.

But before the cadet had a chance to protest further,

Kramer pulled to a stop and insisted firmly,

"Answer my question, Mister Chekov."

The young Russian clenched his fists at his sides

and resigned himself to the verbal beating. "Yes," he

finally returned, "he is."

Apparently content with that small victory,

Kramer folded his hands across the lectern and didn't

resume his pacing. "You violated the Klingon

neutral zone. You engaged three Klingon patrol

vessels in combat while there was still the

potential to retreat. You willfully destroyed a

Federation starship worth several billion credits,

and killed that starship's crew. All to rescue a

fuel carrier you cannot prove was indeed in

distress at those coordinates! So tell

me-what about your performance do you consider so

"satisfactory'?"

"If I may, Commodore . . . ?" The

politeness was stiff and hard won. Kramer threw his

arms wide in mocking invitation. "By all means,

explain! I'm very interested."

Chekov tried to ignore the smattering of laughter

that passed around the hall. He succeeded only

partially. "It is also a starship captain's duty

to protect the rights and lives of the civilians in his

area of patrol. That includes civilian fuel

transports and their crews. We did inform the

Klingons that we were in the area on a nonhostile

rescue mission-they offered no such explanation for their

own breach of the Neutral Zone."

"Just because the Klingons violate the rules,"

Kramer broke in, "does not mean we do."

"I realize that, sir," Chekov allowed. "I

only indicate that any

large-scale repercussions are

unlikely, as the violation was mutual."

Kramer inclined his head, gesturing his consent with one

hand. "That being the case," he acknowledged, "we shall

only discuss the possibilities of your posthumous

court-martial." There was laughter again, louder this

time. Chekov held his ton gue for a count of three before

continuing. "In addition, sir," he went on, "I

did not kill the Yorktown's crew."

"You," Kramer interjected, "are going to argue that

your crew survived because you evacuated the vessel

before destroying it, aren't you?" The sudden perception

caught Chekov unprepared.

He hesitated before he could instruct himself not to.

"Well . . . yes, sir . . ."

Kramer heaved a sigh so deep, Chekov

marveled at the older man's lung capacity. "You

physically collided a Constitution-class starship

with a squad of Klingon cruisers," the commodore

spelled out with painful patience. "That means you

obliterated fourdo you understand me? four antimatter

drive vessels, each with a full battery of

photon torpedoes and plasma devices! The

Federation will be lucky to transmit radio

messages through that sector of space in the next

hundred years, much less move people through it!"

Chekov felt a blush spread from the collar of his

uniform upward.

"You didn't think of that, did you, Cadet?"

Lying was not even an option. His face still burning,

Chekov shook his head shortly, and said in as firm

a voice as he possessed, "No, sir . . .

I did not."

"Of course not." And Kramer took up his

notes as if that ended the matter. "But if I may,

sir . . . ?"

The commodore paused with his hands full of paper,

his head still bent as though studying something astonishing

amidst the lecture notes.

"I still believe that destruction of the Yorktown was

a viable alternative to capture," Chekov

pressed when Kramer finally raised his eyes again.

"Even if the crew was forfeit, sir. Retreat was

not feasible. The Klingons had already fired upon us, and

our warp drive and our weapons systems were

inoperative. It's difficult enough to outpilot a

Klingon war cruiser in afunction-

al vessel, commodore-the Yorktown didn't

stand a chance."

Kramer, studying him across the distance, didn't

interrupt, so Chekov went on. "The

possibility of the Yorktown, with or without her

crew, being taken by the Klingons also existed. Rather

than allow them access to our top-of-the-line

designs, I opted for destruction of the vessel."

"I see," the instructor said coldly, his tone

of voice making it clear he did nothing of the kind.

The flush burned again in his cheeks, but this time not from

embarrassment. "I did what I could for the crew,"

Chekov insisted. "They would have been captured and

questioned had any of the Klingon vessels survived."

He swallowed hard, and considered briefly not

finishing his thought. But anger won out over common

sense. "I've read accounts of what goes on

during Klingon torture, Commodore. I believe

that my crew would rather have died."

No one was laughing now. Kramer's voice, almost

too calm to carry across the tall lecture hall,

questioned slowly, "Are you quite through?" Chekov suddenly

wanted very much to sit down and direct attention away

from himself again. "Yes, sir . . . That's all."

The commodore rounded the lectern with stiff, shot

strides. "Mr. Chekov," Kramer said, in a

tone as devoid of color as his stare, "I will not

tolerate another such disruption of this classroom.

In the future, if your explanations are

required, I will ask for them. Is that clear?"

"Aye, sir."

Chekov held Kramer's gaze with as

impassive and hard a stare as he could command, then his

teeth clenched so hard his jaw ached. He asked,

"May I return to my seat, sir?" in a tone that

sounded more subdued than he liked. "You may."

Chekov felt the commodore's eyes track him as

he took his seat. Then, without warning, the commodore

asked, "Mister Chekov, do you play

solitaire?"

Chekov heard another meaning in the question, but the

sense of it eluded him. "I know how," he

admitted warily. "But, no, sir, I don't

play."

Kramer shook his head. "I thought not." His eyes

danced away to take in the rest of the class; Chekov

recognized it as the dismissal it was. "Would

anyone else like to add something regarding Mister

Chekov's performance?" The first volunteer, of

course, was Alan Baasch. "Will the entire class

grade be based on Mister Chekov's actions,

Commodore?"

Kramer smiled thinly. "Of course, Mister

Baasch! A captain speaks and acts for his

entire crew. Or had you forgotten?"

"But that isn't fair!" Baasch retorted

indignantly. "I wouldn't have kamikazed the

Klingons!"

The commodore shrugged. "But you also were not the

captain. Anyone else?" Chekov had spent enough of

his Academy time studying up on Klingons and their

war tactics-too much time to care very much about advice

offered from station-bound cadets. Instead, he brooded

at the back of the room, arms folded perhaps too

tightly

across his chest, and stared at Aldous Kramer, all

the while wondering what a disinterest in solitaire

had to do with anything.

The siren tore Chekov out of sleep like a cold

hand about his heart. On some distant speaker, a

woman's voice lilted calm instructions;

Chekov struggled upright in bed, trying to remember

if the ship had been on yellow alert when his watch

retired. He was still disentangling himself from his bedclothes

when the sound of sleepy voices and equipment locker

doors penetrated his dream-fuddled panic. Not a

red alert siren, but a wake-up call. Suddenly

aware that he'd only dreamed about being on board a

starship, he heaved a slow, unsteady sigh.

"dis . . Cadet Bloc G, report

to Shuttlepad 7 . . . Cadet Bloc G,

report to Shuttlepad 7 . . ."

Cecil, already stepping into his scarlet-and-black

cadet uniform, grinned at his friend as Chekov

kicked the blankets to the foot of his bunk. "Do you

know what time it is?" Chekov was still attempting

to shake the sleep from his eyes when Cecil

supplied, "0400. They're sending us to the

shuttlepad at 0400! Here . . ."

Chekov caught the singlet Cecil tossed at

him. His hands still shook as he pulled on the uniform

and fastened the front; the dream-need to race for a

starship bridge and report didn't fade, even

after they hurried into the corridor that led toward the

shuttlepad.

They were among the first in G Bloc to leave the

bunkard. "I wonder where they're taking us?"

Cecil didn't interrupt his efforts to finger comb

order into 64

his ash blond hair, even as he and Chekov

caught up with the fifteen women already on their way to the

shuttlepad. "It could be anywhere, I

suppose-that kind of seems the point of being a

cadet."

Chekov scanned the people ahead of them for the

distinctive flash of Sasha Charles's red-gold

hair, spotting her just as Cecil reflected,

"God, this might even be important, Pavel!"

Cecil's tone said it was a joke, but the very thought

jolted Chekov into breathlessness too reminiscent of

his earlier anxiety to make light of. "Don't

worry," he encouraged, for both Cecil's

benefit and his own. "They'd probably send for real

officers if it were . . ." It didn't quiet his

reawakened nerves.

Sasha Charles glanced back at the sound of their

voices. When Chekov and Cecil both hailed her

with waves, she stepped against the bulkhead to allow the

cadets between them to filter by. She slipped into step

with them as they approached and fitted an arm

possessively around Chekov's middle. "So what

gives?"

"We were speculating," Cecil told her,

grinning. "The current favorite is an

atmosphere breach on Luna."

A rude noise bespoke Sasha's disbelief.

"So what's runner-up?"

When Cecil-for the first time in Chekov's

memory-didn't immediately suggest an

alternative, Chekov stated simply, "7 think

it's Kramer."

Sasha briefly cinched her arm tighter about his

waist, but didn't reply. It was Cecil who

cuffed him on the shoulder and complained, "You

Russians make me nuts sometimes, you know that?"

Chekov pulled away from the other man's swat,

swallowing a harsh comment with some difficulty.

Cecil's pale eyes glittered in annoyance both

too friendly and too sincere to interrupt. "You get a

bug up your nose about something, and it's like trying

to reason with the rain!" Cecil was from Ohio, in

North America, and frequently said the most

incomprehensible things. "What's that supposed

to mean?" Chekov demanded. "It means Kramer

barely knows you exist," Cecil said. But he'd

lowered his voice so no one else could overhear. "It

means not everything he does is some direct

reflection of his attitude toward you!"

"I didn't say it was." Chekov was

distinctly ill at ease with this subject-the fact that

he couldn't discern if embarrassment or indignation

made his face burn only heightened his discomfort.

"But you can't tell me he doesn't enjoy

pointing out my errors."

"He's trying to make you a better officer."

Chekov scowled. "Better than whom? He's

an academician! What does he know about being a

line officer besides what he's read in a book?"

"That's your problem!" Cecil ducked back against

the wall, dragging on Chekov's elbow until the

other cadet grudgingly halted as well. Chekov,

in turn, caught Sasha's hand when she would have

continued, staggering the three of them down the hall at

irregular intervals. "We're going to be late,"

he reminded Cecil testily.

A dismissive wave was Cecil's only

acknowledgment of that fact. "Remember I wanted

to go look up the service records on our

instructors at the beginning of the year?"

Chekov nodded; he hadn't seen anything to be

gained by Cecil's search at the time, and still

didn't. "I remember."

"Well, Kramer's got a record as long as

your name! He was weapons defense officer on the

Farragut for fourteen years, and assistant to the

Startleet Chief Administrator for another seven

before he started teaching."

Chekov blinked, honestly surprised. "Who would

have guessed?"

"I would have," Sasha volunteered. When Chekov

tossed an inquisitive glance in her direction,

she shrugged an d moved back to stand with them. "I just

assumed anybody teaching in command school would have to have

some experience."

"Why?" Chekov asked her. "Ninety percent

of the cadets will never serve on board a starship."

The fact that Chekov confidently maintained that he

would get such an assignment, and on the Enterprise

no less, had at first earned him jeers and then

suspicious looks.

"That's not all." Cecil caught their attention

again just as the last of their bloc passed by. "Kramer

also knows your hero Kirk. They go way back, as it

were. I'll bet he's the one who convinced Kirk

to come give that talk last month."

A month ago, Chekov thought Kirk's visit

to the Academy would be his only chance to meet the man

in person-and it took less than a half hour for

him to decide he would follow Kirk into hell without

question. Thinking that Kirk might know-and possibly even

like-Kramer butted a stubborn fist of rejection

against Chekov's opinion of his instructor.

"That can't be correct," was all he said aloud.

"When Kirk was a lieutenant," Cecil

explained, "he 67

saved nine people after a premature weapon

detonation that took out most of the Farragut's

starboard pod. Kramer was one of those nine! Kramer

recom- mended Kirk for conspicuous gallantry,

and then presented the citation when Starffeet granted

it."

Sasha nudged Chekov with her elbow. "I'm

impressed-you certainly intend to serve with the best!"

"I know . . ." But thinking of Kramer in

association with Kirk troubled Chekov's perceptions

of both men. Perhaps that explained the commodore's

hounding-not jealousy or rancor toward Chekov, but

toward Kirk, with Chekov the only convenient

repository. The realization kindled new anger and

frustration, enforcing what he already knew that he was being

treated unfairly.

"We should hurry." He ended the discussion by nodding

down the hall, then following his gesture. "Whatever

Kramer thinks of Captain Kirk, or of me,

won't help us if we're tardy."

Chekov watched a string of emotions chase each

other across Cecil's mobile face, but

turned away before Cecil could object.

A damp, gusty San Francisco wind

skated across the bare shuttlepad, weaving sea salt

and winter throughout Chekov's clothes and hair.

Waiting beneath the white moonlight was a scarred

intrasystem shuttle. Kramer stood at the foot

of its hatch, a blue-shadowed sculpture with

wild, windswept gray hair, he nodded vague

satisfaction as the cadets assembled before him. "As

many of you know," the commodore began, his cool voice

in perfect harmony with the seasonal weather, "the

Asian Industrial Station has been 68

abandoned for the past seven months due to bulkhead

repairs."

Sasha sputtered a laugh, and Cecil gasped,

"I knew it!" in a loud, half-serious whisper.

Chekov hissed him into silence.

"Asian does not intend to reclaim the station

until after the beginning of the year," Kramer went on.

"Until that time, the station has been leased

to Starfleet for the use of our officers' training

school." He smiled thinly. "That's you."

Cecil made a small, strangled sound. "But

is there air?" he whispered between his teeth.

Kramer's smile flickered away, and

he darted an icy glare at Cecil and Chekov.

"Yes, Mister Cecil, there is air." Cecil

pulled even more severely upright, his eyes locked

on the distance in blind embarrassment. "I was not

assigned to this Academy to kill my cadets."

I had wondered, Chekov's mind supplied against

his will. He was rewarded by a wash of mixed humor and

resentment, and hoped Kramer wouldn't see his ex-

pression through the darkness.

If the commodore noticed, he continued without

commenting. "For the next three days," Kramer

explained, "you will be involved in a training scenario

designed to test your aptitude at individual

achievement." He didn't direct his attention

toward Chekov, but the Russian could almost sense the

shift of Kramer's thoughts. "Something of a

threedimensional solitaire, if you will-yourself against

yourself.

"In the Kobayashi Maru scenario, you were a

starship commander; in this test, you are simply a

Starfleet officer, stranded on a station that has

suffered

a crippling hull breach at the hands of an

assassin committed to killing you. The goal of the

scenario is simple You must stay

alive."

No one said anything for a time, then a woman at the

front ventured, "Sir, who is the assassin?"

Kramer's smile was somehow particularly

aggravating as he sketched an elegant shrug.

"One of you. It would defeat the purpose to tell you

who, as that is a step on your path of discovery, as

well. I think you will all be surprised." An

enigmatic expression softened his entire face for

an instant, then vanished so completely Chekov

wasn't sure what he had seen. "You will be

outfitted with phasers, unalterably set for stun,

and transmitters to inform a neutral monitor of

when you have been "killed."

You can also trigger the transmitters if a problem

develops. Food can be obtained through the

processors on the station, and sleeping and bathroom

facilities are available." Kramer paused

to smile at Chekov in paternal condescension.

"And, Mister Chekov, much as it may distress you

to learn it, destruction of the station is not an acceptable

solution to this scenario. So, pleaseendeavor to contain

yourself."

G Bloc dissolved into laughter. Chekov

tilted his chin fractionally higher, and stared

across the bay at nothing as he waited for the jocularity

to die.

"Are there any further questions?"

When no one volunteered anything, Kramer

called the order to begin on-loading, and disappeared through

the shuttle's hatch.

"Honest," Cecil murmured as they performed a

smooth left-face, "I don't think he hates

you!"

Humiliation burned at the back of Chekov's

throat. 70

He growled a simple, "Shut up!" before

following Cecil inside.

"So, are you with us?"

Chekov glanced away from the viewport at

Sasha Charles's whispered question. "With you in what?"

"This station thing." She was in the seat directly

to Chekov's left, her head tipped back against the

headrest and her weapons belt left in a jumble on

her lap. "Me, Cece, Westbeld, Cantini,

and Gugin are going to try and stick it out together-you know,

a cooperative collective. We figured we'd

have a better shot at survival that way."

Chekov didn't answer immediately, taking the

opportunity to admire the cloud of loose,

amber hair that framed Sasha's youthful face, the

delicate upward tilt of her aquamarine eyes.

While he'd spent more than just a little time with Sasha

since arriving in San Francisco (some of it very

private), the prospect of teaming up seemed

weak; he wasn't certain he wanted to relinquish

his solo status so easily, even for her. "I

don't know. . ."

"What's there not to know?" Cecil pressed from

Sasha's other side. "Either we band together and watch

each other's asses, or we sit up all night

trying to keep from getting killed." He paused

to focus a scholarly frown on something in his phaser.

"It's not a hard decision," he continued,

apparently dismissing whatever in the weapon had

distracted him. "Unless you've got a death wish,

or something."

Chekov smiled. "I don't have a death wish.

I'm just aware that none of this will be real."

"We're supposed to pretend that it is," Sasha

pointed out.

Chekov shrugged her qualifier aside. "I just

don't think we're supposed to band together," he

countered, hoping that would end the discussion. "Bausch and

his cronies are," Sasha argued. "And

Kramer never said we couldn't."

"He also didn't say we could. It's a test of

individual skill, he

said-we're to survive on our own."

Cecil shrugged and axed his phaser to his belt

again. "So why can't we survive on our own together?"

A swell of annoyance gnawed at Chekov, and

he turned abruptly back to the viewport. Because

I don't NEED you! he didn't tell them. Because

I can score higher on my own! Almost immediately,

guilt smothered the flames of those feelings; Chekov

was embarrassed by his lack of faith in his friends, but

no less determined. "What if one of you is the

assassin?"

They both laughed. "If either of us were the

assassin," Sasha volunteered, "we wouldn't band

up with the others."

Chekov looked at her frankly, no laughter

in his own dark eyes. "And what if I am?"

Sasha searched his face for something-even Chekov

wasn't sure what-then pulled away to sink back

into her own seat. "You aren't, are you?" Her voice

and eyes were now hooded with uncertainty.

Chekov looked back out the viewport without

answering.

"You wouldn't kill us in our sleep or anything,

though, right? Not if you were working with us."

It's a scenario, he wanted to say as he

watched Earth

slide by in marbled, blue-green brilliance.

"No," he sighed finally, "I wouldn't." Even that

admission seemed weak-willed and unfair.

As the shuttle bumped gently against the Aslan

Station's lock, Sasha caught his face in both

hands and kissed him briefly. It was her sign that

she didn't hate him for being stubborn, even if he

drove her crazy every now and again. "Then you're with

us?"

Chekov tried to keep the displeasure out of his

voice. "I'm with you." It only increased his

annoyance when the others reacted with such thrilled

disbelief.

Sasha flopped back into her seat, relieved and

satisfied. "We'll meet at the station's hub,"

she announced as Kramer began counting off the groups

that would exit. "This level. You think you can find it.

"I can find it," Chekov told her, then added,

"and you'd better wait for me," even though he

half-hoped they wouldn't.

Sasha smiled and offered him a

secretive wink. "Always."

Kramer made him stay until last.

The cadets, armed with nothing but their phasers,

disappeared into the station a t irregular intervals.

Kramer indicated who could leave apparently at

random, sometimes dismissing individuals, some

times groups as large as four; Sasha's

entourage left in

three separate migrations. During the next hour

and a

half, Chekov entertained himself with speculations as

to which of them would make it to the rendezvous,

then experienced a gnawing dissatisfaction that he'd

allowed himself to be chained to them for the next three

days.

Cool air from the dimly lit station leaked in through

the shuttle's open hatch. Chekov studied the

grayblack repair to Asian's sloping hide through

the shuttle's rear viewport; the chill and the dull

half-dark within the station were undoubtedly attempts

to simulate the eerie symptoms of a distant hull

breach. As always, Chekov began unconsciously

tallying the errors in the fine details of this command

scenario no "spaceman's breeze" sighing down

the empty corridors; no ghost frost

hungrily licking the moisture from his lungs; no

sirens, no screaming, no distant, desperate

cries; no angelic spray of crystal dusting the

space just outside a shattered hull; no

ice-black eyes crying scarlet from the wrong side

of an environmental suit's visor.

The images wrenched up memories from news

clips he'd seen of a ruptured deep space

passenger liner that a starship had tried

unsuccessfully to rescue some years ago. That was the

real world, he realized suddenly. That's what serving

on a starship was really like. Like a bolt of

electricity through his insides, Chekov

remembered everything about that frosted panorama in a

single blinding instant; he pivoted in his seat

until the view of the station was out of sight behind him, no

longer interested in criticizing accuracy.

Kramer stood guard in the shuttle's empty

cockpit. His back was to the twin navigation-helm

console, his hands resting on the abandoned chairs, when

he caught up Chekov's dark gaze with his own.

"You think I keep you here as punishment, don't

you?"

Chekov stopped himself before turning to look at the

station again. "Is this the hubris James

Kirk inspires?" the commodore went on. "The

conviction that every environment you inhabit adapts

to encompass your needs, your actions, your beliefs?"

Chekov's hands closed on the weapons belt

draped across his knees, and he returned Kramer's

gaze with grim propriety. "Captain Kirk is

a brilliant officerthere isn't a finer commander in

Starfleet."

Kramer came forward three steps-not threatening, but

only closing the long distance between them. "I never said

he wasn't. I simply questioned the effect he has

on cadets who haven't been around him long enough

to counteract his charms."

The comment struck deeper than Chekov liked.

He felt the warm coil of anger in his chest that

sometimes moved him to say things he shouldn't. Standing,

he busied himself with the weapons belt so Kramer

couldn't see his eyes. "You wouldn't understand. . ."

"Why? Because you don't like me? Because I'm too

old?" Chekov shot a startled look up at his

commander, and Kramer snorted. "You may hate me

now," he told Chekov calmly. "But I can

guarantee, by the end of this weekend, you'll hate no

one but yourself."

Chekov stared at Kramer without speaking.

He experienced a moment's discomfort when a search

of the older man's eyes revealed only a dim,

painful disappointment, and not the jealous rancor

Chekov expected to see. He looked away

to finish fastening his weapons belt. "Should I enter the

scenario now, Commodore?"

Kramer paused only slightly, then stepped between

the narrow seats, and waved Chekov down the aisle.

"Go on," he said. "Both of us have wasted enough time."

Chekov estimated Aslan's ambient

temperature at just under fifteen degrees

centigrade; cool enough to chase away a light

sweat, as well as make sleeping on the decking a

problem. Whether the others would reach the same conclusion

couldn't yet be ascertained comChekov would have to wait

until "evening" to see which ones tried sleeping wherever

they could find cover, and which ones sought out couches and

tables in the labs.

Aslan's corridors proved not as featureless

as Chekov expected; works from several artists

clung to the sloping walls, and more than one

viewscreen reflected gray distortions of his

image as he slipped silently past. Damn

Kramer for holding him until the end! If Sasha

hadn't conspired to ambush him, surely

someone else had thought to lay in wait along this

central corridor-if not for him, specifically,

then merely to eliminate the students forced to travel

this route leaving the shuttle. Chekov trailed one

hand nervously along the cool metal hull,

wondering where the corridor would branch, and how much

warning he might have.

When the corridor flared ahead, Chekov

noticed the slight whitening of the light long before the

opening yawned into view. He eased himself to the floor

and belly-crawled the last ten meters. Heat

leeched through his uniform to disappear into the decking,

reminding him that hypothermia would be a very real

danger this weekend. Still, he crawled as far as the

entrance to the courtyard, then continued hugging the floor

as he listened for an adversary. No sound filled the

alcove but the gentle hum of the kinetic sculpture

at the center of the space. The twisted, polished

mass of blue-green metal swung slowly on its

canted base, strobing the walls with pastel light.

Chekov watched the sculpture turn, trying

to decide if the constant movement could provide

adequate cover for someone plotting an ambush from

one of the courtyard's three other exits. He had

almost decided it would be more hindrance than

help when a pale, blurred face winked at him from

one of the sculpture's convex wings.

Chekov held his breath, waiting for the surface

to come round again. The smeared reflection sprang

into existence just as the sculpture came perpendicular

to Chekov's line of sight; it was halfway up the

metal leaf, almost too distorted to be

recognizably a face. Chekov waited through a

third slow rotation to be sure the reflection

didn't move. That meant a fourth exit, barely

two meter's to the left of Chekov's current

position, with at least one armed cadet securing it.

Chekov drew both arms up under his chin and studied

the sculpture as he considered. It was doubtful the

other cadet could see him-the angle was in Chekov's

favor, and the reflection so meaningless Chekov himself

had almost overlooked it. Still, any attempts

to move beyond this doorway would doom him, and the

sculpture itself prevented a valiant dash for

another corridor. He watched the face smear

slowly past again.

Slowly, carefully, lifting his boots clear of the

floor so as not to scrape against the decking, he

rotated himself until he lay lengthwise across the

wide doorway. Nearly five minutes

were required to gingerly ease himself up onto his

knees, another three to silently dog-walk

to halfway between his own doorway and the next. All the

while, the abstract face winked at him with each

passing of the sculpture. His own face had joined it

on the bottom quarter of the panel, but the quarry

didn't seem to have noticed; that would be his undoing.

Still on one knee, Chekov pressed his left

shoulder tight against the bulkhead, held his breath, and

raised his arm until he thought it

approximated standinglevel. Then he gripped his

phaser tightly, and eased it around the corner as though

probing ahead before turning.

Another phaser flashed into view, also at

standingheight, and fired. The beam passed above

Chekov's head and spat against the far wall, wasted.

Chekov caught the cadet's wrist with his free hand

and knocked the phaser free with a single sharp rap

against the bulkhead; he was on his feet and around the

corner before the other cadet had a chance to do more than

swear.

The cadet turned out to be a female-Pamela

Spurlock, an engineeringst-mand student who'd be

spending time as engineer's assistant on an

Earthbased station. Chekov was impressed

when the thin, big-eyed woman didn't try to beg for

her life.

"How did you know I was here?" she demanded, her

voice incredulous and annoyed. "A lucky

guess?"

Chekov grinned his apology as he nodded back

over

his shoulder. "The sculpture." Then he moved

back a step to let her see. Spurlock's mouth

twisted with wry displeasure. "Well, that's real

close to brilliant. Damn . . . to was

"I'm sorry."

She shrugged, apparently not holding her failure

against him. "Yeah, me too," she sighed congenially.

Then she brightened. "Oh, well! I guess I'll

see you when the scenario's over?"

Chekov nodded. "I'll see you then." He was just

about to stun her when another phaser fired.

They both hit the floor together, instinctively

seeking a low position as weapons fired from the three

surrounding exits. Chekov didn't even dare

raise his head to identify their attackers. "Friends

of yours?" he asked Spurlock.

She laughed dryly. "Not hardly! I left

alone, and they must have left ahead of me .

. . I've killed everybody else that came through

here."

Another barrage of fire answered

Spurlock's comments, followed by Baasch's

strident voice "I know you're with her, Chekov!"

Chekov groaned. "Oh, marvelous. . ."

"Get out here and get killed!" Baasch continued.

"I'm not going to let you louse up my grade again!"

"He certainly is holding a grudge about this

grade average thing," Spurlock commented,

apparently not too concerned. "You want to blow him

away?" Chekov tried to remember if Sasha had

mentioned how many people Baasch had recruited, or how

many he'd seen leave with Baasch. "I think they have

us outnumbered," he said at last. "There are at

least three of them."

"I counted four phasers," Spurlock added.

Then she smiled and elbowed him playfull y. "But

we're clever! You did a pretty good job with that

sculpture, and I had a pretty kick-ass

trap set up in the first place. Why don't we

try to convince them we're coming around either side of the

sculpture, then only round on one. We could

clear at least one doorway, I'll bet."

Chekov chewed his lower lip and waited

for the latest volley of phaser fire to die.

"We'll round on the right," he decided finally.

Baasch's voice had come from the left. "You fire

that way, I'll cover this way." He flashed her a

smile, and added, "We'll worry about killing you

later."

"Thanks loads."

They fired together, spraying the walls to either side

of the sculpture in a futile effort to drive back

Baasch's people. The maneuver bought them enough time to dart

into the sculpture's cover, then the enemy phasers

sounded again; this time, fire was split between the two

walls.

Someone poked his head briefly into view from behind the

closest doorway. Spurlock took the man down

with a single shot, then shouted, "Let's go!" without

turning to see if Chekov followed.

Covering their escape with a flurry of rapid

shots, he stayed as close to Spurlock as

possible. It seemed they'd almost make it-that

Baasch would have to wait until later to exact his

revenge for Chekov's destruction of the

Yorktown-then Spurlock staggered and her phaser

skittered ahead of her into the body of the man she'd

brought down.

Chekov had run into her before he realized she'd

been stunned. Looping one arm around her waist, he

only just kept her from falling. She was his shield

as he stumbled into the hallway and over the body of the

"dead" man.

Easing Spurlock to the ground so she wouldn't hit

her head on the decking, Chekov stunned another of

Baasch's cadets when the woman dared a glance

around the doorway to verify his presence. Then he

heard someone swear violently, followed by the stealthy

sounds of retreat.

Collecting the fallen man's phaser, Chekov

quickly patted down the other ensign's body. He

wasn't sure what he expected to find, but he

knew he'd found it when the man's stomach clacked.

Chekov rapped his knuckles against the front of the

other man's singlet, just to make certain, then

carefully undid the front of his uniform. Strapped

to the man's abdomen with four strips of surgical

tape was what looked to be a thin plate, about ten

centimeters square. Chekov gently removed the

article, refastened the front of the cadet's

uniform, and sat back against the wall to examine his

prize.

After only a few moments of

investigation, Chekov deduced how to unfold the

plate into a four-paneled screen that he

recognized as a read-only memory display. The

activator ran along the right-hand edge; caressing the

plate with his thumb immediately produced a sharp,

intricate schematic on the face of the screen,

complete with reference codes and keys. Chekov

smiled, then started to laugh.

A map! A circuitry and layout blueprint

for the entire Aslan station! He thumbed through the

various screens, taking a quick stock of what

information the little device made available.

Circuit and computer

junctions only took up one subcategory;

administrative routing, hub-to-hub referencing, and

maintenance access paths were among the others. Chekov

was dizzy with all the advantages this blueprint could

give him, not to mention the advantage he'd just stolen

from Baasch. No wonder his adversary had been

willing to risk another soldier to try and retrieve

this body. Baasch wasn't the only one who could

seek and destroy, however; Chekov intended to make

as good a use of this map as Baasch had-probably

even better. Referencing the administrative map

one last time, he folded the screen to its

portable dimensions and fitted it down the front of his

own singlet. Then, retrieving the phasers left

by Spurlock and Baasch's two comrades, he bid

Spurlock a grateful farewell and trotted for the

closest stairwell.

The administrative offices were seven levels

higher than the docking bay. Chekov traveled the

conventional routes long enough to acquire six more

phasers, then located a maintenance shaft that took

him within two meters of administration. Pausing at the

top of the long climb, he waited for his breathing

to steady and the corridor to clear before quietly easing

himself back into the battlefield.

The door to the administration office was closed, but

the jimmied lock was still lodged on the OPEN

setting. Inspired by his success with Spurlock,

Chekov approached the doorway on his knees,

waiting until the last possible moment to key open the

door. As the hatch hissed aside, a wild bolt

flashed above Chekov's head; the young Oriental at

the administrator's desk had only enough time to bark a

frustrated curse before Chekov's shot caught him

full in the chest.

Chekov scurried into the office on all fours,

spinning about to close and lock the door before

anyone could be attracted by the noise. The

mechanism refused to lock. Chekov jammed it

manually; he could always force it open again later.

The Oriental sprawled across the top of the

administrator's desk, his face silhouetted against

an activated desktop computer screen. Chekov

took the young man's phaser, and was just dragging the

body out of the chair when he caught sight of the dark

yellow screen.

greater-than TERTIARY ACCESS ACCEPTED

greater-than LOCKOUT OFF

greater-than DECODE OFF

greater-than WELCOME, USER

293724443A

Chekov nearly dropped his victim. The son

of a bitch had broken into Aslan's main computer.

Sinking slowly into the chair, he read and reread the

screen in awed admiration.

greater-than WELCOME, USER

293724443A

"Computer. . ." he finally summoned. He

wanted desperately to make use of this

opportunity, especially since the break-in was

something he could never duplicate on his own.

"Computer, respond."

Nothing.

Chekov ducked under the desk to retrieve the

keyboard from where it had fallen during his attack.

Fitting it across his knees, he considered for a

moment before typing

greater-than VOICE ON

The screen flashed once.

greater-than DO YOU WISH AUDIO OR

MANUAL INPUT (a/m)?

Chekov smiled. An admin computer, designed

for non-tech users; deciphering such a helpful

system might not be as difficult as he'd feared.

He chose the audio function, then addressed the

computer again.

"Good afternoon, User 293724443A," a

sedate contralto voice replied. "How would you

prefer to be addressed?"

Chekov searched the other man's uniform until

he came up with a tech-rating card (a stunning tech

level IX). "Gregory L. Jao," he

told the computer, wondering if he pronounced the name

correctly.

"Please input your identification manually," the

computer requested. Chekov tapped out Jao's name.

"Thank you, Gregory L. Jao.

How may I help you?"

This is it! "I'd like to access your main operating

system."

"Main operating system accessed for alteration as of

1@.cc27."

Good. That meant Jao had broken all the

security, and not just the user code.

"Do you wish to alter my programming?"

For the space of a heartbeat, Chekov wondered who

would be accountable if he crashed Aslan's

system; he was willing to take the blame himself, but

doubted Jao would be pleased to find out how his

tech-rating was used. Remembering Kramer's face

after the mess left in the Kobayashi Maru test

chamber, he doubted the commodore would be pleased,

either. Chekov decided it was all part of the risks in

the scenario, however, and pushed onward despite the

lingering image of Kramer's angry visage.

"Yes," he told the computer. "I'd like to alter

your programming."

"Please present proof of tech-rating

IV-B or higher."

He slipped Jao's card into the reader. The

green scanner light flashed, and the computer answered

simply, "Thank you."

Faced with all the options a detailed map and a

main computer offered, Chekov wasn't sure where

to start. There had to be a way to meld both

advantages, if only by cross-referencing one

against the other. Pulling the map out of his uniform, he

spread it across the desk top. "Computer, do you

possess schematics of the Aslan Station's

circuitry and layout?"

"Yes, Gregory L. Jao."

"Display them, please."

The screen shifted, and a series of blueprints

identical to those in the map paraded by. Even the

grid referencing was the same. "Can you scan the

number of life forms at . . ."-he chose a

location at random from his map-was. . . coordinates

273-ahe-ee?"

"I'm sorry, I don't have scanner

capabilities."

"Damn. . ." Chekov thumbed through the

schematics in his map, hoping for inspiration. There

seemed to be nothing consistent from map to map,

not even from level to level. The only thing all the

displays had in common were red coordinate

highlighters at some of the circuit junctions.

"What is the indicator at coordinates

45-fcc-cc?"

"The red coordinate highlights indicate

communication outlets."

He frowned. "Intercoms?"

"Yes."

This had some potential. "Can you monitor the

intercom channels on Aslan?" "I can access

all forms of communication on the Aslan Station."

Chekov clapped his fist into his hand in

triumph, then remembered that someone might still be

outside the door to hear him. "Monitor all

intercom outlets," he said, more sedately, "and

report the coordinates of any outlets where you

hear activity."

A moment of silence followed, then the screen

displayed a long list of coordinates

corresponding to the precious map. Chekov

entertained visions of closing off accessways and

bulkheads based on the computer's reports, confining

groups of cadets for later disposition. It would

limit the amount of physical space he would have

to cover, and would greatly simplify his job.

Brit none of those plans would matter if someone

el se with an adequate tech-rating (like Cecil)

broke into the computer and undermined his plans.

Thinking of Cecil reminded him that he was supposed

to have gone straight to the hub in search of Sasha and the

others; a gust of guilt distracted his tactical

strategies. He would only be a bit longer, he

promised 86

himself-just long enough to verify his suspicions, and

to protect his claim on the main operating system.

Returning his attention to the amber screen, he

queried, "Computer, do you speak Russian?"

"Muscovite High Russian, Georgian,

or Modern?"

"Modern."

"I speak Modern Russian at a level

fifteen fluency."

Chekov folded the map and sat back with a

smile. "As of this override, reconfigure your

communications system to send and receive exclusively in

Modern Russian. All other accesses should be

denied."

"As you wish, Gregory L. Jao. Please

wait."

Almost immediately, the complex schematic leapt away

from the screen, replaced by the message prompts that

had originally greeted Chekov. Only this time the

prompts were in Cyrillic.

"Pokonchyl. his

Chekov smiled and switched off the screen.

"Prekrasneya, was he replied softly.

"Excellent . . ."

Despite the thundering white noise of Asian's

sleeping generator, the hub was maddeningly quiet,

The rumbling was a soothing, subliminal presence

coursing like a heatbeat through a great ship's deck,

palpable everywhere you stood. It was a vibrant,

vital sound, as deep as the Earth; it meant the ship

and her crew were cared for, and alive.

Chekov paused to place one hand on the hub's

outermost door. If he'd realized the decibel

level behind these doors, he wouldn't have instructed the

computer to lock the exits. On his way to the hub, it

occurred to him that Sasha and Cecil might grow 87

impatient with his tardiness and desert him as a

casualty. He ordered the computer to eavesdrop

on the area; it reported no success at discerning

human activity. He didn't consider that the

computer's failure might be because of other noise.

He'd sealed the bulkheads because he didn't

want the others to leave him behind. No-because he

didn't want them to think he had failed. The

admis- sion embarrassed him a little, but

he would rather they thought he'd abandoned them than know they

thought him incapable of joining.

Thumbing the intercom by the huge double door, he

leaned close and intoned in Russian, "Computer."

"Da, Gregory L. Jao?"

Hearing the machine answer in Russian still made

him smile. Using the same language, he

replied, "Open bulkheads at my

coordinates."

The computer complied.

Sound poured out at him in a frothing white gale.

Chdkov stepped through the doors to approach the singing

machinery with care. Crannies and cubby- holes

littered the ragged room. He couldn't even hear his

own breathing above the generator; he only knew the

outside door had closed when the ambient light in

the room dimmed by half. Sasha and the others were nowhere

to be seen.

Pausing by a shunting engine, he eased one of the

phaxer power packs off his belt and tossed it toward

the middle of the room.

It clattered against the gray decking, then lay still.

"You're late!"

Chekov wheeled, phaser drawn. Sasha scowled

at the weapon as she stepped from behind the loud

generator. Cantini and Gugin peeked out after her,

but didn't venture forth. All three cadets were

bugheaded with

noise-reducing headsets. "Where the hell were

you?" Sasha demanded at the top of her lungs,

pushing Chekov's phaser away from her with one hand.

Chekov returned the weapon to his belt.

"I was attempting to be surreptitious."

She frowned irritably and tapped at her

headset. Chekov threw his hands up to indicate that

he had no suggestions for better communication. Then

he tugged his belt about to let her see the phaser

packs there.

She adjusted her headset, but didn't smile.

"It's better than collecting scalps, I

guess."

Chekov chose not to hear the comment.

Sasha led him around the generator assembly,

motioning for Gugin and Cantini to join them. They

startled Cecil and Westbeld at the back entrance,

and were nearly shot for it. Once everyone was calmed

again, Sasha pushed them into the numbing quiet of the

corridor beyond.

"I was hoping you would wait," Chekov

said when Sasha removed her headset and rubbed at

her ears. "I was detained."

"We didn't have a choice." Cecil massaged

his own scalp with one hand, twirling the headset on the

fingers of the other. "Somebody jammed the doorswe

tried to leave almost an hour ago."

Chekov considered explaining the predicament, but

decided against it. "Well, I'm here now. We should

probably get going before someone finds us in the

hallway."

Westbeld laughed once, sourly. "dis"Where

are we going to go?" she wanted to know. "What's

wrong with just staying here?"

"It isn't secure enough," Chekov informed her.

"And it's too loud. We'd never sleep."

"But nobody could ambush us here," Sasha pointed

out. "The entrances are easy to guard from the inside.

And we've got the headsets." She presented hers

to him as though he hadn't noticed them before now.

Chekov pushed the headset back at her. "There

are other defensible places-most of them with better

acoustics."

Only Cecil looked interested. "Such as?"

"The administrative offices."

Even half-deafened by the generator,

Chekov heard Sasha's low laugh. "Sure, us and

everybody else in this man's army! Pavel, that's

the first place everybody will head!"

Chekov flashed her a smug grin. "Of course

it is. But I've been there already, and I

booby-trapped the doors so only I can get

back in."

The other five stared at him. Westbeld grinned

with delight, but the others only toyed with their weapons

or headsets and said nothing.

"Is that legal?" Gugin finally ventured.

Chekov tried to mask his annoyance. "Is it

illegal?" he returned. "They told us that we

could do anything, so long as we survived. I had

spare phasers from three other people I took out of the

scenario." He knew now that not mentioning his

relationship with the computer hack been a wise

decision. "Securing administration seemed a

prudent course of action," he finished.

"Yeah," Cantini sighed. "I suppose so .

. ."

Gugin finally shrugged and tossed her headset

back into the supply cabinet by the door. "If

you've got it

secured already, I guess we may as

well use it. Anybody else mind?" No one

voiced an objection. Chekov plucked Gugin's

headset out of the cabinet, holding a hand out to stop

Cecil from depositing his headset as well.

"Take it," Chekov insisted. Then, looking about

at the others. "Take all of them-let anyone

else who comes here have to fight the noise."

Cecil sighed roughly in frustration. "Why?"

"It'll distract them," Cantini explained,

nodding at the headset in his hands. "They'll be

easier for somebody else to pick off." He grinned

at Chekov. "Good plan." Chekov smiled in

reply.

Sasha fidgeted with her headset. "What does

making somebody else miserable gain us?" she asked.

"I mean, why do we care?"

Chekov shrugged. "If someone else stuns them,

that's better odds for us."

Everyone but Sasha took the headsets; Chekov

hesitated only briefly, then picked up hers

without comment.

Simulated twilight tugged the already inadequate

lighting into cold, warped shadows along the

reflective floors and walls. Distant phaser

fire startled Chekov more than once,

pricking him to the alertness of prey for the first time in the

scenario; the deck seemed shot through with

electricity, making each step both dreadful and

exhilarating. He was glad when they finally reached the

admin offices.

Jao's body was gone, but a Tseyluri cadet

sprawled in the hallway in almost the same position

as Chekov had left Jao. He tossed a

victorious smile over his 91

shoulder at Sasha as he eased up to the door;

she glanced at the Tseyluri and didn't smile

back.

Chekov snapped a protractable probe off the

clip on his belt and extended it toward the floor.

"What are you doing?" Cecil whispered in his ear.

Chekov glanced back at his friend, then returned

to his work. "Unboobying the trap," he explained,

glad for the distraction after Sasha's obvious

displeasure. "Keep everyone away from the door."

The probe was just under a meter in length at its

greatest extension. Chekov pressed flat against the

bulkhead, placing his feet uncomfortably close

together along the wall, and flicked the probe across the

sensor governing the access.

The door sighed open and a short,

triplicate burst of phaser fire sparked against the

far wall. Chekov kicked forward with one foot,

propping the door open with his toe, and waited for the

barrage to cease.

"It would be easier," Cecil suggested, after

Chekov had crossed the threshold to maintain the

opening for the others, "to just jam the lock."

Chekov tried for an air of nonchalance as he

shrugged the suggestion aside. "I'm not a tech,"

he rationalized. "I'd probably be unable to open

it again." In reality, he'd simply thought the trap

a better way to stop Baasch in case the other

cadet should follow him here.

Caritini flopped onto a wall-length divan.

"Well, it's gonna be more comfortable than the

generator room"!" He crossed his arms behind his

head with a contented sigh.

"As though creature comforts were all that matters

to life." Sasha clapped her phaser down on a

desktop,

then waved off Gugin when the other woman started

to speak. Chekov watched as Sasha paced to the other

end of the room and stared at the wall. "Hey,

Pavel . . . ?"

Child--kov turned to find Cecil bending

over the desk that housed the computer terminal. Cocking

his head as though trying to read something written there,

Cecil asked, "Is this a mainframe terminal?"

"It's down." Cecil frow ned at him, and

Chekov hoped the answer hadn't come too quickly.

"I tried it earlier," Chekov elaborated with a

shrug. "The ready screen wouldn't even come up. I

guess they've deactivated the system."

Cecil made a face Chekov couldn't

interpret at the blank screen. "I guess . .

."

"I'm hungry," Cantini announced

abruptly. "Anybody else want to scare up

some food?"

Westbeld raised her hand from where she sat in a

desk chair across the room. "I will. I haven't

eaten since breakfast!"

"See if you can find a rec hall," Sasha

instructed without turning around. "They'll have food

service there."

"And be careful of traps," Cecil added.

Chekov shot a startled look at the computer

tech, but didn't comment. "You can't be the only one

to have thought of it," Cecil pointed out, sinking into the

desk chair. "We should all be careful."

More careful than you know, Chekov thought, turning

back to the others. Whether another cadet practiced

trapping or not, Chekov had rigged most of the food

processors and bathrooms between the administrative

offices and the hub; bathrooms and 93

commissaries were the only two places that everyone

eventually had to visit. "There's a food service

station down that way about four hundred meters,"

Chekov informed them, pointing. "I think it's the

closest." It was also the one he'd left

unsabotaged for his own use.

Both cadets nodded understanding before ducking out the

door.

Chekov used Westbeld and Cantini's

departure to instruct Cecil and Gugin in how

to deactivate the door; Sasha, now seated,

watched them without inter- rupting, her displeasure

painfully apparent. Chekov was suddenly sorry that

they were even involved in this scenario, sorry he'd

kept quiet about his involvement with the computer, sorry

about his surreptitious bombings. Mostly, he was

sorry that this apparently mattered so much to Sasha when

it was little more than an elaborate game to him. Her

state of pique annoyed him, but he didn't want

to alienate her over something that was barely

real.

Leaving Cecil to modify the booby trap,

Chekov went to sit on the edge of the desk next

to Sasha. When she didn't talk to him for a full

minute, he asked, "Are you angry with me?"

"I don't want to talk about it here." But her

eyes said something

different, something furious.

Chekov tugged her to her feet. "There's another

office," he said, nodding toward a door at the

back of the room. "Let's talk in there."

Cecil looked up in query as they passed;

Chekov conveyed his uncertainty with a hopeless shrug,

then followed Sasha into the next room.

She crossed to the long, lacquered desk

dominating 94

the far wall, and picked up an amorphous

ornament in one hand just to toss it into the other. Chekov

watched her fluid movements with attached fascina-

tion. Sasha was trained in more forms of barehanded

combat than he even knew names for, she could

probably kill a Barbarbaar "yoat assassin

a hundred times over with that paperweight alone before the

assassin even knew Security was in the room.

Well, perhaps she wasn't quite that fast. But

she was talented, and tempered by a family tradition

of martial arts. Chekov had never known her to be

timid or circumspect in any aspect of their

relationship, professional or personal.

She didn't disappoint him now. "You've turned

into a regular Babin the Butcher, haven't you?"

Chekov crossed his arms and leaned back against the

wall. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means I saw your face in there! It means

you booby-trapped the food service centers,

probably most of the lifts, and maybe even some of the

sleeping quarters." She returned the paperweight

to the desk with a startling clunk.

"Remember the parameters of the scenario?"

Chekov asked. "We're at war."

"So you turn guerrilla?"

The accusation stung more than he'd expected. "I

turn practical. We don't know who the

assassin is, we don't know what he or she is

capable of. If this were real life, you wouldn't be

complaining."

She shook her head slowly. "Don't be so

sure of that, mister."

Chekov searched her pale eyes for some sign of

uncertainty or weakness, but found none.

Finally, he turned away with a frustrated sigh.

"You don't understand . . ."

"And don't patronize me! I'm not a child!"

"Then you should know that sometimes the good guys get

ugly, too!" he shouted in return.

"But when does it stop? When do we stop fighting

fire with fire and decide not to take the easy way

out by just killing all our competition? That's, not what

Starfleet is about and you know it."

"It's a scenario, Sasha!" he insisted,

resigned to lose this fight no matter what he said.

"It's like the Kobayashi Maru It isn't real.

They're testing our reactions and resourcefulness, not

our morality. Whether we're supposed to admit it

or not, everyone knows that no one dies! I know that-you

know that! That means we're all going to behave

differently than we would in real life!" Her jaw

muscles twitched as she fingered the paperweight, but

she wouldn't look up at him. Taking her chin in one

hand, Chekov tipped her eyes into the light and said

gently, "Sasha, in real life, I wouldn't blow

up my own starship just to spite the Klingons!" She

pulled her chin out of his hand and dropped her gaze

once again. "I wonder, Pavel," she said, very

softly. "Sometimes, I just wonder."

was Sasha . . ."

"I just wish I knew what we were being tested for!"

Her voice betrayed something between frustration and anger,

but she didn't object when Chekov moved closer

to slip an arm about her waist. "It's like the

Kobayashi Maru. They don't run that test just

to find out how long it takes a Mingon war fleet

to kick our

butts-they run it to find out who gives up, who

goes down fighting, who never notices that the

battle's over. They want to know everything about us .

. ." She sighed, a soft, hollow sound that seemed

to echo some insecurity Chekov didn't share. "If

I knew what they really wanted," she admitted

finally, "I'd feel a lot better about this."

"They want us to be strong," Chekov told her,

wishing he could grant her his belief. "Whatever we

do-whatever their reasons-they want us to prove that we

can deal with anything Starfleet might ask of us. That

means we do our best to win, even when our best

makes us seem cruel or hard."

She laughed once, and looked at him. "It's the

fact that you're so sure you know what winning means,"

she told him baldly. "It's the fact that you think

it's so easy that has me worried most.

I think you'll find that you're selling yourself and

Starfleet short."

Chekov awoke the next morning to the sound of

phaser fire and shouting. Sasha, stretched out beside him

on the inner office's only sofa, rolled to her

feet with silent grace, her eyes trained,

cat-like, on the outside door. Recognizing the

voices, Chekov caught her by the shoulder and

hissed, "It's Baasch! Lock the door!"

Sasha darted across the room to slap at the door

control, twisting the locking mechanism until the

status light flashed from green to red. In the office

beyond, Cecil's voice could be heard above the others,

shouting at Cantini to move something into a more defensible

position; Chekov could barely make out the words, and

suspected the specifics didn't matter 97

much anyway. Swearing under his breath, he pulled

Sasha away from the door, toward the desk on the

other end of the room.

"We should go out to them," she insisted in a hoarse

stage whisper. "They're going to get slaughtered!"

Chekov's mind still chased itself about, trying

to figure out how someone had survived long enough to get

past his protection on the door. "We can't help

them."

"We should die trying!"

He almost laughed aloud. "And prove what? That

we aren't any more serious about this scenario than

anyone else on this station?" Besides, he had no

desire to grant Baasch his wish by giving himself over

to an easy kill. A phaser bolt landed on the

closed door, making the steel and plastic sing.

Chekov herded Sasha toward the hollow under the desk

as he cast about the room for some escape.

She caught the desktop with one hand and refused

to be pushed under. "They're our friends!" she insisted.

"We can't just leave them out there!" was Yes, we can."

A ventilation grate on the wall above the sofa was the

only avenue of escape not involving a rush through the

forces outside. Chekov knew from his pilfered map

just how erratic and treacherous the ventilation shafts could

be; nothing short of impending death of a very real and

excruciating nature could inspire him to dare those

steep and winding passages.

"You keep insisting that this isn't like real life."

Sasha, still standing, looked back and forth across the room

as well. "Just keep in mind that everybody will be

alive in the real life following this scenario, and

they're all going to be really ticked off

at us!" She hefted the paperweight in one hand.

"Use this," she said, handing it across the desk

to Chekov. "You can knock out the grate, then we can

hide under here. They'll think we went through the

ventilation system, and we can vacate the offices after

they're gone."

Chekov smiled as he took the weight. "You're

better at this than you like to admit."

"I don't believe in doing things by halves."

Each of the clips on the ventilation grate

shattered after only a single blow. Chekov broke

three of them, leaving the grating askew, as though he

and Sasha had tried to pull the grate back

into place during their hasty departure. The

paperweight he left on the sofa.

The hollow beneath the black-and-silver desk was never

designed to conceal two Starfleet cadets; they

only fit in the space after three minutes of

thoroughly embarrassing rearrangement, and that was only

when they sat hip-to-hip with their knees in their own

ears. Sasha had just adjusted the castered chair across

the opening when the door between the two offices blew.

Chekov held his breath as light footsteps

crossed the room just beyond the desk's outer wall. Every

muscle in his legs was suddenly cramped and

aching, the need to move almost unbearable as he listened

to the intruder step up on the couch and lift away the

broken grating. He saw Sasha raise a hand

to cover her mouth, her jaw clenched and her eyes

closed; apparently, he wasn't alone in his

discomfort.

"dis . . Damn.. ." The voice, soft and

muffled, was swallowed almost to nonsense by the ventilation

duct. Then the footsteps recrossed the office, and

were gone. 99

Sasha exhaled loudly. "Can I move now?"

she whispered.

Chekov shook his head. "Wait a little longer,"

he whispered in return. "Make sure they're

gone."

They waited for nearly an hour. The cramps in

Chekov's legs were very real by now; he felt dizzy

from their constricted positions. Still, it wasn't until

he heard a cleanup crew in the office outside that

he deemed it safe to exit.

Sasha fell onto her side in exaggerated

agony, pushing the chair away with enough force to bounce it

off the wall. "I'm crippled for life! I'll

never walk again!"

Chekov crawled out behind her, pleased

to hear Sasha's laughter again after her earlier ill

humor. He nodded toward the door. "Is the

cleanup crew gone?"

She stumbled to her feet and half-ran,

half-limped to the exit. Holding herself off to one

side as she keyed open the door, she darted a quick

look into the other room. "Yeah," she confirmed with a

nod. "All clear."

was Good." Chekov terminated his stretching when he

felt something twinge in his shoulder. "I may never

recover from this."

"I'm not going to live to recover if I don't

get to a bathroom!" Sasha glanced into the outer

office again. "Pavel, I'm headed for the ladies"

room down the hall. Wait;" for me."

He nodded, still working at his stiff shoulder.

"Don't take long-I want to get food,

too."

"I'll hurry," she promised. Then she

slipped into the next room and disappeared.

Chekov gave her a moment to make it some distance

down the hall, then headed into the outer office

himself. Nothing of the ambush remained; even the three

phasers Chekov had used in the booby trap had

been taken by the cleanup crew. He tried

not to let their loss annoy him; he could always obtain

more.

The desktop computer screen was still dark. Chekov

paused on the side of the desk closest to the outside

door-wanting to hear Sasha's return in time

to terminate the conversation-and powered up the mechanism.

"Computer," he summoned, in quiet Russian.

"Good morning, Gregory L. Jao," the

computer replied.

"Please monitor all intercom outlets and

report coordinates where you detect activity."

"Yes, Gregory L. Jao."

Chekov glanced into the hall for Sasha; there was no

sign of anyone in any direction. He ducked

back into the office, prepared to wait yet for the

computer's response, and was surprised when it

greeted him with, "Two beings detected at

coordinates 456-779-340, four beings detected

at 55-ef-dg."

Chekov waited for it to continue. When it didn't,

he pressed, "Are there any others?"

"Only yourself, at coordinates 147-90-423.

Do you wish me to reassess my findings?"

"No . . . No, computer, that's fine." He

unfolded the map across the top of the desk.

The computer's reported coordinates were several

floors apart, both sets quite a distance from his present

location. If he and Sasha were survived by only

six other students, he could only hope the group of

four was Baasch's squad. Tracing a finger along

several of the deck plans, he memorized the quickest

route between the admin

offices and the smaller of the two groups, all the

while conscious that Sasha would rejoin him soon.

He wasn't certain how she'd respond to discovering

his relationship with the computer, but he knew he was going

to tell her; the computer offered too many advantages

to just abandon it now that the scenario was so close to ending.

Besides, having Sasha as a co-victor didn't

feel as much like a compromise as he'd expected.

"Computer, isolate floors one through seven, and

decks twenty, twenty-two . . ."

In the distance, hollow rumblings heralded the

descent of the ponderous bulkhead doors. Chekov

left open only a two-deck span on either side

of both parties-enough to give them the illusion of

freedom, if they chose to migrate. He would

worry about confining them further when he and Sasha

drew near the sites.

"'Will that be all, Gregory L.

Jao?"

Ire nodded as he closed the map, then realized

the gesture was lost on the computer. "Yes, computer.

Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Smiling at the incongruity of technological

courtesy, he leaned over the desk to switch off the

screen. Outside, the hallway was still silent and

empty.

Chekov trotted down the open corridor without

bothering to draw his phaser. He knew the locations of

everyone still "alive" on the station; there was no one

to defend himself against on this level, as no one was

functional here besides himself. That thought carried with it a

cold shudder of realization; he slowed his gait to a

hesitant walk.

No one. The computer reported no activity on

this level except for Chekov in the admin office.

That meant Sasha had either departed the level, or was

no longer active. He had a feeling he knew which

it was.

Dropping to his knees, he dug down the front

of his singlet for the map, balancing it on one hand as

he flipped the panels apart with the other. The admin

level flashed onto the screen, littered

with the cobalt blue indicators he'd been setting

to highlight his own trap locations. Fifty meters

down the hall from the admin office, the women's

restroom was littered with flashing blue.

Chekov groaned and buried his face against the

map. He was a dead man. Even if Robert and the

others never learned that he'd set traps all about the

Asian Station, Sasha had already divined the fact.

She would know who booby-trapped the bathroom, and

she would kill him.

He scrambled to his feet and ran the last few

meters to the bathroom. The door slid aside at

the slightest touch; inside was as silent as the

hallway. "Sasha?" Unlike admin, he hadn't

planned on reentering any of the booby-trapped

bathrooms, and so had left no options for bypassing

the traps. The phasers fired as soon as someone

rounded the first bend in the room. Chekov stayed

carefully in the doorway and called her name again.

He retreated to an intercom panel once he was

convinced even Sasha wouldn't keep silent so long

for the sake of a joke. Thumbing the audio switch,

he summoned the computer with a listless sigh.

"Monitor all intercom outlets and report

coordinates where you detect activity."

The same groups appeared-two and four-only the

two-person group had relocated by a deck; the

four-person party still kept to the library. "Close

down the bulkheads to the nineteenth floor," he said.

"If the two people at coordinates 425-457-77

move outside the room they currently occupy,

seal that room behind them."

"As you wish, Gregory L. Jao."

He headed for a lift without thanking the computer.

Less than eighteen hours into this scenario, he

planned to finish it before the

twenty-four-hour mark arrived, if only he could

reach deck nineteen before his quarry found some way

to bypass the bulkheads. First, he'd have to stop by the

engineering storeroom where he'd pilfered his first

collection of timers and triggering devices; he still

had seven phasers with which to construct a little insurance.

The two on the nineteenth floor were annoyingly

easy to dispatch. Chekov found them arguing in the

hallway outside one of the bulwarked rooms, each

apparently blaming the other for having locked the door

on their way out. Chekov stunned them before they even

knew he was there.

He sat on the floor while the cleanup crew

came for the bodies,

meticulously wiring phasers into a series and

axing them to his belt. One of the cleanup

technicians peered at him curiously while

lifting a body onto a stretcher. "What're you

making? A toy train?"

Chekov didn't look up from his work. "A

bomb."

"Ah." The tech nodded sagely at his

companion.

"Starfleet's finest," he assured the woman with

him. They both giggled as they wheeled the litters

away.

Chekov ignored their laughter. He'd told

Sasha he wouldn't sacrifice an entire Federation

starship just to spite the Klingon Empire, and he still

believed that was true. He also believed it was his

duty as an officer to make his own death or

capture too expensive a goal to be worth the

enemy's efforts. In the real world, that might not mean

the destruction of a fully crewed Constitution-class

starship, but it could mean voluntary death in the face

of inevitable defeat-death that carried the price of many

lives other than his own. Baasch, no doubt, would

miss the irony in the gesture, but it wasn't

intended as revenge against the other cadet.

Not entirely, at least.

Chekov tucked the last phaser into the array, then

set about secreting the multicolored wires out of

sight behind his belt. With the whole apparatus cinched

about his waist again, it looked like nothing more than an

equipment belt crowded with a half-dozen extra

phasers. Only Chekov knew about the wire

threaded down the left sleeve of his singlet, or about

the wire loop near his ring finger that he could tug with

almost no effort at all. No one else would see the

tiny Rube Goldberg that would trigger the first phaser

on his belt at almost the same moment it fired the

second, and the third . . .

Chekov fingered the wire peeking out of his sleeve.

"dis . . boom . . . was he murmured to himself.

In real life, the enemy would no doubt have

circuit detectors, or personnel trained in

search and remove. But, as Sasha had so testily

reminded him, this wasn't

real life. Nor was this real death. It was all a

test to which someone else had constructed the rules, but which

Chekov didn't intend to lose; even if all he

could do was assure no one else won it, either.

The door to the library was locked.

Chekov frowned at the sealed bulkhead,

toying with the loop of wire that brushed against his wrist and

trying to decide why something as prudent as a locked

door should make his spine tingle and his muscles ache

as though he were guiding a starship into battle.

True, he hadn't instructed the computer to seal this

bulkhead; he'd cordoned off the rest of the deck,

half hoping this group would show a bit more initiative

than the last. They hadn't even left the library,

though, and now he'd discovered the door locked from the

inside without even a guard placed in the hall. He

wondered if Baasch were somehow aware that Chekov was

the only one left they had to face-if he were waiting

just on the inside for the Russian to override their

lock. When Chekov entered, Baasch would shoot

him.

Growling low in frustration, Chekov backed away

from the door. If there were only some way to force them

out, to be more sure where they were, what they were doing.

He remembered an intercom only a few meters

down the corridor and trotted back to it while still

considering his plan.

"Computer."

A longer pause than he expected, then

"Yes, Gregory L, Jao?"

"Can you still verify four life forms in the

library?"

Another pause, longer this time. "Yes,

Gregory L. Jao."

"Can you pinpoint their locations within the library?"

"I'm sorry, Gregory L. Jao, but my

audio monitors are not designed for that level of

accuracy."

Chekov drummed his fingers against the wall, his

thoughts chasing each other round and round like angry

birds. If he knew where they were-if he knew

what they were doing-if, if, if.! "Computer," he

continued, wrestling his thoughts under control long enough

to choose a course of action, "can you override the

manual lock on the library door?"

"Of course, Gregory L. Jao. My

system is-was An infinitesimal pause in the

middle of its answer this time; Chekov wasn't

sure why, but the quirk worried him. "comdesigned

for convenient use by administrative personnel. Would

you like me to perform such an override now?"

"Yes."

This time the heartbeat of silence was acceptable. Then

the indicator light a dozen steps down the hall

moved silently from red to green, and the computer

announced simply, "Done." Chekov

relocated the wire loop in his sleeve, tucking it

further out of sight as he returned to the library

door. He shadowed the wall during his approach,

triggering the door sensors at the last possible

moment. The breathless hisss as the door whisked

aside seemed almost too loud to bear.

The inside of the library was dark and cavernous.

Floor-to-ceiling displays paneled off alcoves

where terminals sprouted from the tops of long tables.

A maze of shelves-housing a dusty,

woody-smelling collection of antique printed

paper books-zigged

and zagged across the first few meters in front of the

door. Chekov crouched lower than the tallest

shelving unit and eased his own phaser into his hand.

Well-remembered voices drifted to him from across the

abandoned terminals "comyard looked a lot bigger

once we took down the bushes."

"What did you replace them with?" Laurel

Gugin wanted to know, sounding more interested in the

subject than Chekov would have given her credit for.

"Anne wanted to plant more shrubs," Westbeld

replied, "but I talked her into shade flowers and

meadow stuff. Actually, she wanted azaleas,

too."

Chekov sank back on his heels, suddenly

hesitant. Westbeld and Gugin? Here? Had

Baasch taken the women prisoner, or had the two

groups somehow banded together? Where were Cantini and

Cecil? Other sounds came from all over the room

footsteps, dragging and repetitive, like those of a

captured lion pacing its habitat from boredom;

his own breathing, coming back to him double-loud from the

bookshelves to his right and left; the spasmodic

clickclacking of a terminal keyboard; an

occasional muffled curse. Robert. Chekov

clenched his teeth against a string of angry words as his

thoughts leapt up into turmoil again. Robert the

computer expert. Robert who was, no doubt, within

coding distance of discovering why the computer wasn't as

cooperative as it should be. Robert, who had

apparently defeated Baasch's squadron after

all, then left Chekov and Sasha for dead.

Robert, his Achilles" heel.

Chekov decided he'd have to shoot Robert first.

"Where the hell have you been?" The sharp prod of a

phaser in the small of his back-not Cantini's

voice-stopped him from continuing forward.

"Don't shoot me," Chekov said, trying

to hide his annoyance at being caught.

"I'm on your side."

Cantini didn't appear to be impressed.

"Answer my question," he growled as Chekov turned

to face him. "Where have you been?" Chekov heard

Westbeld and Gugin's conversation stagger

into nonexistence at the sound of Cantini's voice.

"I've been anywhere I could get to," Chekov

told Cantini simply. "There aren't many open

routes through the station, though-someone's been locking the

doors."

"We noticed," Gugin volunteered as she and

Westbeld approached their position. They, at

least, hadn't drawn their phasers, even if

Cantini refused to put his away. "Also tried

to leave this level about an hour ago, but he couldn't

find an access that would open."

"So where have you been?"

Chekov turned back to Cantini. The smaller

man's dark eyes glittered in his round,

flat-featured face, somehow accusing Chekov of

something too unspecific to state out loud. Chekov

wondered how much Cantini had guessed. "What do

you want me to tell you?" he asked. "I've been

confined to this damn station, just like you. Trying to keep myself

from getting stunned. Just like you.

The anger in Cantini's eyes faltered

momentarily. "We left you with Sasha in the admin

offices. You ran

away when we were attacked-you didn't even come out

to help us!"

"We didn't think there was anything we could do,"

Chekov told him. "By the time we realized what was

happening, we thought you'd already been taken out."

Cantini snorted. "So you ran."

Better to repeat a lie they already believed than

to muddy the waters with the truth. "Yes," Chekov

told him. "We ran."

When Cantini would have said something more, Westbeld

interrupted, "So where's Sasha?"

"Out of the scenario," Chekov answered. The mention

of her name, and the thought of how angry she would be when he

saw her next, made his face burn. "We were

surprised by two other cadets on the nineteenth

floor." The lies seemed to come awfully easily

now.

Keyboard clatter attracted his attention again;

he tried to look past the shelving unit between himself and

Westbeld, but couldn't see beyond her shoulder.

"Where's Robert?" he asked, as casually as he

could.

Gugin glanced over her shoulder, as though

expecting do see someone there. When there was nothing, she

turned back to Chekov with a shrug. "With the computer.

Doing something."

Cbekov fingered the wire up his sleeve. "Do you

know what he's doing?" "Does it matter?"

Cantini demanded acidly. Chekov only glanced

at him; he knew enough.

"He's trying to break in," Gugin

volunteered. She was the first to turn back toward the

room, obviously losing interest now that their prowler

proved to be 110

friend rather than foe. "He thinks the locked

bulkheads may have been arranged through the

mainframe."

Chekov, still under Cantini's watchful eye,

stood to follow the women further into the room. "How

long has he been working?"

Westbeld settled back into one of the stiff,

unpadded seats. "About three hours. He says he

almost got it once or twice, but it keeps denying

his communications protocol-even in binary."

Chekov nodded vacantly, and played with his

wire.

Cantini poked the other ensign in the

ribs with his phaser, startling a sharp profanity out of

him. "What's the matter?" Cantini asked

shrewdly. "You don't look like you think it's a good

idea."

"It's just. . ." Chekov made himself stop fingering

the trigger wire. "What if he disrupts something?

This is a civilian station-they might not take well

to having their data corrupted."

"He knows what he's doing," Gugin said without

concern. She turned on a reader by her left hand.

"Besides, somebody else already broke in once.

What more harm can Cece do?"

If only they knew.

"Damn it!"

Only Chekov jumped at Cecil's sharp

invective; the others were no doubt inured to his

outbursts by now. Pulling away from the table, Chekov

started in the direction of his friend's voice, ignoring

Cantini's belligerent, "Don't you go anywhere,

Chekov!"

Cecil crouched over an active terminal, his

eyes washed copper by the steady amber light. He

didn't 111

look up as Chekov approached, didn't even

glance away from whatever his eyes tracked

across the tilted screen when Chekov paused at the

rear of the monitor to stare at him.

"Robert . . . ?"

"Don't bother me," Cecil muttered

distractedly. "I'm busy."

Ill bet you are. "What are you doing?" Chekov

pressed. "This isn't our equipment."

Cecil growled inarticulately and punched at a

series of buttons. "Yeah, well, tell that to the

tech nine who cracked the system." He slapped his

hands against his thighs in a fit of frustration.

Cantini materialized at Chekov's shoulder.

"Leave him the hell alone!" he grumbled, tugging

at Chekov's elbow. "I'm still not convinced you're not

Kramer's assassin, so just-was

Chekov jerked his arm away just as Cecil

ex claimed, "Pavel!" and Westbeld and Gugin

ran up to join them.

"What's going on?"

"Did you get in?"

"Welcome, User 128641937Every . . ."

Chekov grabbed the terminal and spun it about before

Cecil could respond. "Computer!" he shouted.

"Slushayetye! Otkluchenoe!"

The terminal went dead.

No one said anything for a moment. Then Cantini

caught Chekov by the back of the neck and spun him

roughly about. "Why you son of a-to "

Chekov struck the other man's hand away,

ducking out of range as Cantini drew back to swing

at him. "Remember the beginning of the scenario?" he

cautioned. "They told us anything goes!"

Westbeld had

unlimbered her own phaser, but didn't look as

though she knew what she wanted to do with it.

"You aren't a tech nine!" Cecil argued. He

still looked vaguely puzzled, not even capable of

anger in his confusion. "I've seen you work, damn

it-you didn't break into this system!"

Chekov half turned to Cecil, glad for the

distraction. "I didn't," he admitted. "I

took it from the tech nine who did. his

Cecil shook his head slowly. "How?"

"Who cares how?" Cantini interjected. "He

screwed us, Bob! He agreed to work with us, and then

he screwed us over!" He swung an angry

glare on Chekov again. "Did you set up that

ambush, too? How did you really kill Sasha?"

"I didn't!" Chekov shot back, furious

at the suggestion. "We really thought you were

gone-Sasha and I wanted to help you!"

"Well, a fat lot of help you turned out

to be!" Westbeld pursed her lips and combed her

hair out of her eyes with one hand. Looking at

Cecil, she stated, "I say we kill him."

Cecil still stared at the blank screen, occasionally

punching a button on the keyboard as though

expecting some reply. "I can't believe this . . .

to was "We're gonna kill him, Bob," Cantini

said, a bit more loudly. "It's three to one, unless

you want to help."

"Laurel didn't vote," Chekov started

to point out, but Gugin added, "I want to kill you,

too," before he even finished his sentence.

Chekov threw up his arms in exasperation. "You

don't understand . . . to was

"I understand enough," Cecil said quietly,

evenly, "to know that we six agreed to work as a team."

He looked up from the keyboard, his blue eyes

hard and bright as ice. "Why didn't you respect

that? Why didn't you tell us about the computer, or the

traps? What game are we supposed to be playing

here?"

Chekov sighed. "That's your problem," he said.

"This isn't just a game."

"It was a figure of speech," Cecil began,

but Chekov cut him off.

"It's more than that. Every step of the way, you've been

treating this like real life-as if we were all really in

danger of being killed by some desperate situation! But

it's a command scenario, and the only "scores' any

of us are gathering will be on our records for the rest of

our lives." He looked from Cecil's frustrated

face to Cantini's angry one and back again.

"I've nothing personal against any of you," he

insisted. "You're my friends. But this is my career.

If only one of us can be alive at the end of this

scenario . . . then I have to make sure that the one

alive is me."

"Why can't we just all stay alive?" Cecil

sighed. "Band together or something, just the five of us. A

passing grade split five ways still has to count for

something."

"Yeah," Westbeld said. "Wouldn't they rather have

five cadets who were good survivors than just one?"

"I don't think it works that way," Chekov

admitted. "If one of us doesn't win, then none

of us does."

"They never said that," Cecil pointed out.

Chekov shrugged. "They never said that they

would split the grade, either."

Cecil ran his hands along the top of the terminal,

making the gray-and-white box spin lazily. "So

where does that leave us?" "The way I see it,"

Cantini said, "our buddy, the berserker-was He

hooked a thumb in Chekov's direction. "comsees

it as his duty to either kill us, or die. The rest of

us are willing to take the chance on a split grade.

So let's kill him, and get it over with."

Cecil looked at Chekov; the smaller

Russian man shrugged. "I don't want to argue

with you," Chekov said. "But I don't want

to lose, either."

"You set the ground rules," Cecil told him.

Chekov nodded. "I guess I did."

Cecil spun the terminal one last time, then

turned his back on the rest of them as though washing his

hands of the situation. "Then do it," he instructed

Cantini. "I still want to get into this system."

"Robert . . ." Chekov slipped his finger through

the loop up his sleeve just as Cecil stopped

to face him. "I really do understand your choice. And

it's nothing personal." He hoped Cecil would

remember that when this was all over.

Cecil's face softened into a faint

smile. "No," he said softly. "It's nothing

personal."

Before Cecil turned away again, Chekov tugged

once on the hidden trigger. He didn't even have a

chance to notice Cantini's reaction before the blasts

of six widely dispersed phasers "killed" them

all.

He awoke with a headache, and muscles so stiff

he could barely lift his eyelids to review his

surroundings. When he did, he found himself alone in

a plain storage room, lying atop a narrow

foldaway in a sea of

other-although empty-cots. Pushing up onto his

elbows, he swung his legs carefully over the

side until he could cradle his head in his hands.

Then he waited for the pounding to subside, and tried

to remember why he was here.

Memory came back quickly. He'd probably

been unconscious longer than the others, thanks

to his proximity to the phaser fire. That no doubt

accounted for his stiffness and headache as well; he'd

never been stunned by a phaser before, but had a cousin

who always relished passing along such horror

stories at family gatherings. Chekov smiled.

He'd have something to contribute to those

discussions now, if only his headache faded enough for him

to stand.

Voices from the next room finally piqued his

interest enough to encourage movement. One hand still shielding

his eyes from the light, he pushed to his feet and

shuffled gingerly toward the door.

The adjoining lounge was dark and vacant. The

only light came from the wide-screen monitor

set into one wall-the same source of the distant

voices. Scenes of various locations on the

Asian Station passed across the screen in increments

of thirty to ninety seconds, effectively

displaying every square foot of the station over a period of

an hour or so. Chekov approached the

viewscreen, studying the printed data in the lower

right-hand corner. Hours, minutes, seconds,

date. He wondered if they had taped the entire

weekend.

"Excuse me?"

He turned, finding one of the cleanup crew

poised attentively in the doorway behind him.

"The shuttle's loading up, sir, I . . ."

The tech paused, then reached around the doorway to key

up

the lights. Chekov saw something like

amusement and delight cross the young man's

features. "It's you!"

For the first time that weekend, Chekov felt a

whisper of fear. "I beg your pardon?"

The tech recovered quickly; studied politeness

replaced his animated expression as he joined

Chekov at the viewscreen. "I recognize you from

the drill," he explained. "I've been helping

with the revival creweverybody you've met up with this

weekend has come through here!"

Chekov followed the tech's broad gesture,

staring once about the abandoned lounge, then turning

back to the tall screen. "What's this?" he asked.

The tech surprised him by laughing. "Video

monitor," he explained. "We used the security

pickups to record everything that went on this weekend.

Any- body killed early on in the game could sit

in here and see what everybody else was doing. Or

review all the stuff that had happened before they

died."

Chekov's headache settled deep behind his eyes

as the tech leaned over to intimate, "You've been a

pretty popular viewing subject, my friend."

He could just imagine.

"It was a command scenario," Chekov

stated carefully. He was amazed how thin and worn that

litany was growing by now. "I did what I was

told. That's all."

The tech shrugged. "I suppose." He leaned

over to switch off the monitor, then turned a

sunny smile on Chekov. "Is that what you're

going to tell all the rest of them?"

Chekov opened his mouth, then realized he didn't

have the faintest idea what to say. Struggling against

panicked thoughts about Sasha, Cantini, and

Cecil, he said haltingly, "I . . . they knew

what to expect. We're all cadets here.

The tech draped an arm across his shoulders to steer

him toward the door. "If that's the best you've got

as a defense," he said companionably, "do yourself a

favor and take a civilian shuttle home . .

. to was

This must be what it feels like to drown in liquid

nitrogen, Chekov thought as he stepped through the

hatchway to the already packed shuttle. No one

spoke to him as he walked the interminable distance to the

only empty seat. Chekov couldn't very well

blame them. He stared out the window, not wanting

to face anything living during the hours-long voyage

back to Earth. The pointed silence was

maddening. He felt as though he could feel his

sixty-four classmates' angry thoughts as keenly

as daggers slipped under his skin. He wanted to try

and explain, to say that he was sorry. Only he

wasn't. Not really. He was sorry that they were

angry, and sorry that he was going to have to pay the

price for their lack of understanding. But that didn't

change what he did.

Maybe this was the difference between line officers and

desk men, he thought, not without some rancor. The

ability to do what's necessary without needing to place

blame. Everyone was so ready to condemn him because he

had acted quickly-decisively-but no one seemed

willing to offer suggestions for what should have been done

instead. They all though t exactly the same way

Run and hide! Protect what you have! Don't

try to do too much-you might fail and

end up with nothing! He'd just proven that an

officer's response to a threatening situation was not

limited to passive defense, and they all hated him

because he acted outside their ability. Too bad.

They would still be complaining about the unfairness of it all

long after he was assigned to a starship and gone from their

petty little world.

Chekov crossed his arms in a gesture

of angry defiance, then sat back in his seat

to watch the shuttle deberth.

Forty minutes into the flight, however, some of his

hauteur began to fade. The oppressive silence

weighed on his spirit like a dead comrade, and Kramer had

come to stand, equally uncommunicative, at the

front of the aisle. Chekov stared resolutely out

his window, but started to consider apologizing again.

"I take it," Kramer began, as though he'd

only just arrived on the scene, "that none of you are

terribly pleased with the outcome of this maneuver."

A discontented growl boiled from the rear of the

shuttle forward. Kramer smiled. "What do you

perceive to be the problem?"

Without hesitation, Cantini offered "Chekov."

Another chorus of growls indicated mass

agreement. Chekov clenched his teeth, pretending

to ignore them.

"Do you have a comment on that, Ensign Chekov?"

He hated Kramer more intensely than he had ever

hated the man before, but didn't turn away from his

window. They're a bunch of goddamned children, he

wanted to say. Instead, he stated simply, "No,

sir. I have no comment."

"None?" Kramer frowned faintly, his

eyes bright

and attentive. "Cadet Chekov . . . I'm

disappointed." If he meant it to be cutting, his

tone of voice failed him. "What about someone

else?"

Chekov knew the cadets must be bursting with

complaints and arguments, but no one volunteered. He

didn't care. Not anymore. He thought perhaps if

he told himself that often enough, he'd believe it by the

time they reached home.

"Very well," Kramer continued. "Then we shall start

with my evaluations on your performances." Chekov

feigned enough disinterest to make himself feel better about

turning to look at the commodore. Kramer waited

until everyone's attention was on him before announcing,

"You all failed."

""What?" Chekov wasn't the only one to ask

the question aloud; he assumed that was why no one turned

to scowl at him for speaking.

"'What the hell did you want?" Baasch

demanded. "We didn't all do the same thing!"

"'Some of us," another cadet injected,

"didn't even kill anybody!" Framer stood,

unmoving, at the front of the shuttle, not even

raising his hands to signal for silence.

"Nor did any of you," he told them sternly,

"react appropriately to the situation presented."

No one interrupted him. "Cadet Nabuda," he

summoned. "Explain the objective of the Aslan

scenario."

Nabuda frowned, glancing to her left and right as

though hoping to gain some insight from her classmates.

"We were to stay alive," she said finally. "To avoid

being killed."

"I see." Kramer looked from one bewildered

face to the next, his gaze resting on Chekov's

only long 120

enough for the ensign to understand that he'd been noted. "I

needn't ask to know that is what you all believe. I

observed enough ambushing and booby- trapping this weekend

to know how you were thinking."

"Chekov was the only one setting traps."

Chekov twisted in his seat to face the speaker,

alarmed and injured by the bitterness in her words. Sasha

kept her eyes pointedly locked on Kramer, not

even acknowledging Chekov's attention with a scowl.

He felt his heart melt within him.

"He was merely the most creative killer among

you. None of you really understood the difference between

self-defense and command." Kramer crossed

his arms and leaned back against the bulkhead. "Many

years ago, this same exercise was performed with a

class of cadets on an abandoned lunar base.

They were told the same things as you-that they were being

hunted, that they must survive. Unlike you, however,

they had among them a very creative officer who commanded

in the situation, instead of merely preserving himself.

"The officer in question inferred-correctly-that it

made no difference if one or one hundred cadets

survived the scenario. What mattered was avoiding the

assassin. He secured one of the dining halls and

began drafting a security force to guard the

entrances. Anyone who wished to enter had to surrender

their weapons; they were then guarded by a handful of

cadets already known to be trustworthy. In that

manner, the scenario concluded without a single

casualty, and that student received a high passing

grade."

Kramer looked down the aisle at Chekov again.

"Would you care to hypothesize as to that cadet's

identity, Cadet Chekov?" Chekov shook his

head, strangling with shame. It was Cecil who

spoke the name, "James Kirk."

Kramer nodded. "Command is not a picture

drawn in black and white," he told them

gently. "Not a game that one can win or lose,

depending upon one's decisions. Command is an ongoing

struggle. In it, you strive to

maintain-not win. In the real world, no one is

keeping score. I think Mister Chekov can tell

you that winning and not losing are not necessarily the same

thing."

No one said anything after that. Chekov folded his

hands tight in his lap and watched the stars from his window.

All his hopes for a brilliant Starfleet career

floundered at his feet like dying birds, killed by the

realization that he could never hope to live up to the

standard James Kirk had set in both Starfleet

and Chekov's own life-the realization that Kirk would

be ashamed of Chekov, and everything Chekov had

accomplished in the past forty-eight hours.

When the shuttle bumped gently to ground several

hours later, the

coral-pink streamers of sunrise were just caressing

the eastern horizon. Chekov stayed in his seat,

staring out at the pitted, blasted landing pad as the others

filed silently past him. He glanced up only

once, to watch Sasha walk away from him as though

he meant nothing to her and never had. For a moment, he

thought he might cry.

"So, you want to get breakfast?"

Chekov closed his eyes, not wanting to face

anyone comeven Cecil-just yet. "I'm not

hungry," he said softly.

Cecil sat down beside him. "I am. Wanna

keep me company?"

"No."

The last of the footsteps retreated to faint, sharp

echoes on the slabwork outside. Chekov felt

Cecil shift in the seat, then the computer tech said

stiffly, "Boy, are you a poor sport, or

what?"

Chekov laughed without humor. "My career is

destroyed in a single weekend, and you expect me

to be gracious?"

"You overreact," Cecil scoffed.

"Nobody's gonna boot you out of Starfleet for

booby-trapping a scenario."

"You don't understand . . ."

"Sure I do." Cecil caught his shoulder and

turned Chekov about to face him. "We all

screwed up," he said simply. "I get the

impression that's the actual point of these

scenarios-we get to do it here so we don't do it in

real life. Kramer even said your

Captain Kirk is the only one who didn't

flunk the damn thing!"

The very mention of Kirk's name wrung his heart with

despair. "I should have known better!" he insisted.

"I thought I had the right to serve under him, but I

don't know anything!" He took Cecil's

shoulders. "I'm sorry, Robert! I know what

I was thinking, only . . . I don't know! Not

now. It just doesn't make sense anymore. . ."

He turned away to the window again. "I feel like such

a fool . . . to was

"They've given fools starship commands before,"

Cecil tried to console him. "They gave out commands

before Kirk came along-they can't break the tradi-

tion now!"

Chekov smiled ruefully and sat back in his

seat. "If

they ever give me a command, I want you to be my

executive officer. To keep me from getting beyond

myself like this . . . to keep me from being stupid."

Cecil shrugged, flushing with pleasure. "After this

weekend," he allowed, "I don't think you'll

need as much reminding. So . . ." He stood and

offered Chekov a hand up. "Do you want to discuss

my future vacation pay over breakfast?"

Chekov stood as well, groaning at the very thought

of facing the others so soon after his embarrassment.

"I can't! If they don't kill me, I'll have

to kill myself!"

Laughing, Cecil headed for the hatch. "Okay,"

he acquiesced. "We'll get civvy food. More

carbohydrates-more energy!" He leapt out onto the

landing ground with ridiculous enthusiasm. "We'll

need energy!" he assured Chekov fervently.

"We're going to be heroes!"

Chekov stepped down more sedately. Cecil's

face held such an expression of trust, Chekov

didn't know how to tell him that he feared all that

trust misplaced. "Are we? I'd forgotten."

Cecil slipped an arm around his friend's shoulders

and smiled. "I know what you are," he said serenely.

"I've always known. And I never forgot . . ."

HALLEY

"I CAN'T BELIEVE Starfleet ever let you

two out in the field!" Chekov rewarded the doctor

with a look of profound irritation; Sulu merely

started laughing again.

"It isn't that bad, Bones," Kirk

volunteered from his own seat. He hadn't missed the

depth of displeasure in his security

officer's dark eyes, or the embarrassment still

evident on the lieutenant's face. "You do a

lot of things in command scenarios that don't exactly

correspond to your attitudes in real life."

McCoy nodded, obviously unconvinced. "Like

making up things so you can talk your way out of a bad

situation."

Kirk felt his own cheeks start to burn. "That's

different . . ."

"Sure it is." The doctor turned to Sulu

long enough to order brusquely, "Stop laughing! It's

bad for your shoulder!" then commented to Chekov, "If you

feel

the need to take direct action in the next hour

or so, go into the back or something, okay?"

Chekov continued staring out the window, refusing

to produce a reaction. Leaning back with a weary

sigh, Kirk hoped the doctor would take the hint and

leave Chekov's Academy embarrassments in the

past.

An hour later, emergency sirens boiled away

Kirk's troubled dreams like a laser through hot wax.

He tried to bolt upright, only to discover he was

already sitting, his shoulders braced against the shuttle's

inner wall. The muscles in his thigh

yanked at his swollen knee; he cursed his

disability aloud as he gripped the seat back with one

hand.

"Scotty?" Light from the forward hatch spilled

onto the floor of the passenger area. Kirk could just

hear Scott's baritone voice above the buzzing

siren, answered by Chekov's lighter tenor.

"Scotty! Chekov!" He swore again, knowing they

couldn't hear.

McCoy leapt from his own seat as soon as Kirk

swung his legs to the deck. "Hold it, Captain!

You're not going anywhere!"

"fret out of my way, Bones. . ." Kirk

clenched his jaw, settling all his weight onto his

left foot as he lurched upright. "I'm going

forward."

McCoy caught at his arm to keep him from

falling. "Dammit, Jim!"

"Scotty!" Kirk pulled his arm from the

doctor's grip, immediately sorry for the action when he

nearly overbalanced and fell. Two frantic

hops-guided more by luck than skill-collided him

with the entrance to the forward section. Kirk clutched at

the

doorway, ignoring McCoy's glare

of disapproval as he dragged himself closer

to Scott. "What's wrong?"

The engineer threw a quick glance over his shoulder.

"Debris," was all he said as he turned back

to where Chekov crouched in the navigator's seat,

trying to reach under the shattered panel.

Even without putting weight on his knee, Kirk

could feel the joint filling with hot fluid; the

climb in pressure made it feel as though the bone

would crack. Hobbling unsteadily past Scott, the

captain lowered himself into the pilot's chair so he could

extend his damaged leg under the panel.

"Got it!" Chekov tugged something loose from

deep beneath his console, and the alarm abruptly

silenced. Scott was already punching up coordinates

on the navigations display as Chekov righted himself in the

seat.

"I used the radio to wire up the warning," the

engineer explained without looking away from the panel.

"I was hoping we wouldn't need it."

"A warning for what?" Kirk asked again.

Scott tapped a display to attract Chekov's

attention, then stepped back when the lieutenant

nodded and set to work. "Space debris," he

answered Kirk. "There's flotsam out here

big enough to carve a starship out of-even some of the small

stuff could hull a craft this size! I rigged the

sensors to warn us about anything that got too close."

He squinted past the forward viewport, as if he

saw something Kirk couldn't. "Something just got

close, it's big and we're in its way. If it were

smaller we could try to move out of its path, but as it

is . . ." Scotty's voice trailed off

Kirk followed the engineer's gaze. "How far?"

"Ten thousand kilometers," Chekov supplied.

"Off our starboard stern." The Russian frowned

at the instruments, his eyes flicking back and forth between

columns of numbers. "It's closing quickly thoughab

two hours until impact."

"And then?"

McCoy's voice from the doorway startled them

all. Kirk glanced at the doctor, then back

to where Chekov worried over the panels. "Don't

worry about it, Bones," Kirk said softly.

"We're going to be fine." Liar! he chastised

himself. How can you be such a liar? He opted not to think

about it.

"Sir . . . ?"

Sulu's voice barely carried from the passenger

cabin into the foredeck. McCoy backed out

of the doorway to turn toward the helmsman; Kirk

called, "What are you thinking of, Mister Sulu?"

"We could divert it," Sulu answered

hoarsely. His eyes were closed, his face drawn and

sallow in the half-light. "Isn't the starboard

engine nacelle the one that's gone bad?"

Scott nodded, his eyes unfocused with thought.

"That it is . . . to was "Couldn't we use the pile

in that nacelle to knock the thing off course?"

"Aye!" The engineer's face brightened. "Or at

least use it to blast the rock into pieces small enough

for the shields to handle!"

Chekov uttered a short, mirthless laugh, then

flushed when Scott glowered down at him. "So we

sever the pod," Chekov pointed out. "The pod is

tumbling at the same velocity as the shuttle. .

." He

covered one column of readings with his hand, as though

unable to look at the numbers any longer. "We'd

all reach the same point simultaneously."

"Can't we do something?" McCoy pressed.

"Get out and kick it, at least?" Chekov looked

frustrated to the point of anger, but Scott only

laughed. "We can kick it a good sight farther than

you might think!"

"With what?" Chekov wanted to know.

Scott clapped the younger man on the shoulder.

"Accelerators!"

Revelation hit Kirk at the very same moment.

"The e-suits! Go to it, Scotty!"

Scott ducked past McCoy into the main

section, leaving the doctor to ask no one and everyone,

"What have the environmental suits got to do with this?"

"They've got jump packs," Kirk explained,

feeling giddy with relief. "Set for continuous

burn, we should be able to accelerate the pod to within a

half hour of the shuttle."

"That'll knock us about a bit," Scott called

from the other chamber, "but it beats the hell out of a

collision!"

"It ought to make a good light show, too, shouldn't

it?" McCoy glanced about hopefully, actually

looking optimistic for the first time since the accident.

"Even Spock couldn't miss an explosion like that!"

Kirk nodded; McCoy's faith was infectious.

"Let's hope so, Bones." Let's hope

Spock's looking in the right direction. There were coms

very many directions to look in space.

A loud snapt! pulled Kirk's attention

back to the navigation-helm console.

Chekov had prized up the

panel's face, and now sat with it raised at a

seventydegree angle as he leaned in to inspect the

circuits.

Kirk edged forward as well, reminding himself

abruptly of his injured knee and limited

mobility. He stopped his movement halfway to the

console. "What's wrong?"

"Hopefully, sir, nothing. . ." Chekov

pulled his head back long enough to call, "Mister

Scott, I need to pull the memory!"

Scott reappeared in the doorway. "What're

you doing?" he asked with a frown.

Chekov nodded toward the open panel. "I've

extrapolated the projectile's course against

ours. If you want the nacelle to actually hit it,

you're going to need something that can remember a course."

He motioned toward the circuitry with his free hand.

Scott grinned and came into the hatch. "Good

thinking, lad!"

McCoy leaned over Scott's shoulder as the

engineer x bent down and began tugging at a

circuit panel.

"Won't we miss that?" the doctor inquired.

Scott shook his head. "With the engines

all but out," he finished, "the pilot can't really

maneuver, so it's a moot point anyway." He

jerked free two interconnected boards, then

backed out from under the panel. "That'll do it," he

announced. Chekov settled the console back

into place.

McCoy turned to follow Scott's progress

back toward the suit locker as the engineer left the

forward hatch for the second time. "Let's just hope

we don't need those suits later."

Kirk sighed. "Bones, you're becoming a

doomsayer."

The doctor's half-smile faded. "I

worry."

Kirk's first impulse was to tell McCoy that

worrying about not having e-suits would be pointless if

Scott's hunk of rock hit them broadside.

And even if this diversion worked, they were better off

suffocating in a shuttle all together than floating

away from each other in fragile, one-man life

suits with less than six hours of air.

Introducing such thoughts was pointless, however; spirits were

low enough without Kirk giving them something else to brood

over. "Scotty knows what he's doing. If he

can't convince seven jump packs to work

together, no one can."

"Six." When Kirk frowned at Chekov, the

lieutenant said simply, "Six." He turned

to stare out the front viewport with a distinctly

unhappy air. "Someone still has to wear one of them

outside to sever the nacelle."

"It's only logical-I'm the most expendable

member of this expedition."

Kirk felt a mixture of annoyance and

admiration at Chekov's persistence. The

lieutenant had been in a foul mood since being

coerced into explaining the aftermath of his Kobayashi

Maru, and Kirk wasn't certain how much to blame

that on the impromptu tale-tolling or Chekov's

usual solemnity. Either way, he didn't like the

direction the lieutenant's arguments had token.

"Mister Chekov," he said aloud, "I'm sure

Mister Scott", appreciates your willingness

to go EV, but I don't' think we've reached the

point of discussing who's most expendable just yet."

Chekov looked up from where he'd been dogging

Scott as the engineer wired the accelerators. It

struck Kirk, for the first time, that Chekov was the only

one who hadn't discarded his duty jacket when

Scott reinstated the heating; the brass and

silver pips at the shoulder and cuffs glinted dully

as he stood. "I'm serious, Captain."

"You're not going," Scott stated flatly. The

Scotsman's obstinacy surprised Kirk even more

than Chekov's.

Qhekov glared down at him. "You're our only

engineer," he persisted. "If something should happen

"diso you, there isn't anyone else who could

repair the systems!"

Scott wouldn't even look up from his repairs.

"Nothing's going to break down any more than it alre

dy has."

was was brought along to navigate. We have no nav

gational abilities, we have no helm. If I

die, it wo "t make any difference."

was isten to me," Scott overrode him, rocking

back on is heels. "There's a l aser cutter

involved here. The re's a lot of connections and

conduits that need seal ng off if we aren't going

to contaminate the whole cra . There's these

accelerators to place, and a shortte memory

to install. Those are all procedures I'm bett

r qualified to perform."

was hen show me how," Chekov insisted. "I've

wor ed with you before-you know that I can learn this

equipment!"

was hekov . . . to was Scott sat for a moment in

silence. Kirk watched his jaw knot as the

Scotsman turned a narrow tool over and over in

his hand. "That was a long time ago, lad," Scott

said slowly, evenly. "I'm

concerned about the safety of the people left in the

shuttle. I could show you the equipment, I could

drill you on the procedures, but I'm the only one

who could make absolutely certain everything was done

right! If you missed even one conduit, or slipped

and damaged the pile-was

"I'll be careful."

"You won't be anything!" Scott exploded,

angry and insistent. "Because you're not going out there!"

"Why won't you even talk to me about it?"

Chekov wanted to know.

"Because you're not qualified!" the engineer shot

back. Chekov drew back as if struck, his

eyes wide and injured. "You haven't logged a

single hour with delicate equipment in nigh on

five years!" Scott continued. "I'll be damned

if I depend on you remembering enough of what I

once showed you to do this!"

Chekov stared at Scott in brittle

silence, his face blank, his back rigid. He

reminded Kirk of the antique tin soldiers his

grandfather used to have, with their identical stoic

expressions, and identical scarlet uniforms.

Kirk was immediately embarrassed for the comparison,

especially in lieu of Chekov's story and

Scout's angry words.

"Pin sorry, lad," Scott said, more gently.

"But it's true, and you know it's true. I can't

take a risk like that! Not with other people's lives."

No one said anything for a very long time. Kirk

finally broke the painful silence. "Scotty, finish

what you're doing, then get suited up and out there.

Chekov, go up front and monitor that thing's

position. We can maintain radio contact with

Scotty through the main console."

Chekov hesitated only a heartbeat, then

turned and swept into the forward hatch without even

acknowledging Kirk's decision. Kirk was still warring

with whether he should feel anger or sympathy for the young

Russian when he noticed Scott staring after

Chekov as well.

"Get to work, Mister Scott," Kirk suggested

softly. Scott blinked, flicking a startled,

embarrassed glance at his captain, then

nodded and bent over the jump packs again.

Settling back in his seat, Kirk listened

to Sulu's shallow breathing, to Scott's deft

tinkering, and to Chekov's accusatory silence from the

front cabin. His own knee sang a waspish song

of pain from where McCoy had elevated it again. The

doctor had rewrapped his knee with another cold

pack and brace, but this dressing was no more comfortable

than the firs. His body urged him to give in, to go

to sleep . . . but" his mind refused to desert the

four men who depended on his strength even when he

couldn't assist them. He forced his eyes open again

to find McCoy situated in the row behind him. "I'm

fine," he said, more from habit than because it was true.

cCoy's eyes, directed toward the front,

shifted to loo at him. "We've been stuck in this

box too long." His voice was low and concerned.

"Startin' to snap at each other . . ."

Kirk glanced to the forward hatch as well. "Yes

. . ." Scott was stepping into an e-suit by the

lock, his back to them; there was still no sound or sight

of Chekov. He thought about the intense young ensign who

was his navigator for four years, now his chief of

security, and how badly Scotty's words would have

stung himself as a young lieutenant, and how

vulnerable Chekov must feel after confiding about his

Academy days.

Kirk was almost to his feet before McCoy caught

his shoulder and insisted, "Where do you think you're going?"

He shook off the doctor's concern when McCoy

rose to intercept him. "Into the front," he hedged,

not interested in trying to explain further. "I need

to talk to Chekov."

"You're his captain," the doctor said, so softly

that only Kirk could hear, "not his father."

"That's right," Kirk replied, hopping toward the

front hatch. "But I'm his captain, even now."

Even when there's nothing else I can do. "Just let

me talk to him."

McCoy held Kirk's elbow protectively

for a moment longer, then nodded. The captain was

reassured by the trust in his friend's blue eyes.

The navigator's console was in sorry disarray,

a legacy to Scott's heroic repair efforts.

Chekov sat with his back to the doorway, staring

pensively out at the dusty stars; he didn't even

turn when Kirk settled into the helmsman's

chair.

"Do you understand why I'm keeping you inside?" the

captain asked without prelude. They

didn't have time to waste with coddling.

Chekov cast a bleak look over at Kirk,

then seemed to catch himself and hardened his expression again

as he turned away. "Yes, sir, I think I

do."

Kirk knew from his reaction that he didn't. "It

has 135

nothing to do with what you told us, or with what

Scotty said." Something that was almost surprise

flitted across the lieutenant's face, but he

didn't shift his gaze. "I don't care what you

did at command school. I know how difficult it can

be to reconcile what you did as a student to what you

want to do nowreal life is never quite like what they

tested you for, and things that seem obvious to an

experienced officer weren't obvious then. Failing a

scenario isn't the same thing, as failure."

"Isn't it?" Chekov turned to face him, his

expression belligerent, but his eyes still hurt.

"What Mister Scott said earlier-that I'm not

qualified . . . Do you believe him?"

Kirk met the dark Russian eyes earnestly.

"You're a good ,ffnavigator," he said, "and a good

security chief." Any to truth beyond that was so

subjective. "Scotty values

technical expertise a great deal-I value good

officers. You do what you feel you have to, and you do it

well. No one can ever fault you for that." He wished

he cold offer more.

Child tilde kov's expression closed down again,

and he turned back to the console to adjust something on

the sensors. "I'm sorry if I've disappointed

you," he said softly'

Kirk wanted to reassure him somehow-to reach out

and touch him, to chase the insecurity away. Nothing

he could think of seemed appropriate, though; all

over again, he recognized the distance that had

developed between himself and the navigator he once thought

he knew. "You've never made me anything but

proud."

Nothing further was volunteered, and Kirk

didn't push the issue. Feeling cold and tired,

he limped back to his seat to find McCoy

waiting for him. "He'll be all right," he told the

doctor quietly. "You'll see."

McCoy scowled, unconvinced. "And so will we?"

Kirk lowered himself into his seat, not meeting the

doctor's gaze. "I trust Spock."

"I do, too," McCoy admitted, sitting

back. "It's Fate I'm not too keen

about." He looked off to starboard. "There seems

to be a lot of "ifs' in Scotty's diversion

plan. If he can get the pod cut free in

time-if the jump packs are strong enough-if the

debris isn't titanium or some

blast-resistant alloy." A haunted, frightened

expression danced across his seamed features, and he

finally averted his eyes. "If we aren't going to be

rescued," he confessed, "I'd rather be hulled

by Scotty's rock than die of dehydration forty

or fifty hours later."

"I'm all set," Scott announced,

inadvertently saving

Kirk from having to respond to McCoy's

disclosure.

The captain nodded once. "Verify the course with

Chekov before you leave."

And the maneuver was on its way.

Kirk moved into the front hatch while Chekov

stood at the airlock to monitor Scott's

departure. McCoy hovered over Kirk's left

shoulder, pressed into the corner between the pilot's

chair and the wall, as out of the way as he could manage.

The radio's speaker sat cockeyed atop the helm

controls, having been i removed from the

panel proper by Scott when the engineer jerry-rigged

the alarm. Kirk listened for the Scotsman's first

transmission, already thinking he

might go mad with no visual to keep his eyes

occupied.

"7"11 be out of the lock in a moment now. Ah,

there she goes . . . was Scott's voice rasped

out of the damaged speaker just as Chekov returned to the

navigator's seat in frigid silence. "7 know

you can't confirm hearing me, was the engineer continued, "so

I'll just have to hope for the best. I'm going to head

along the hull until I can belay myself off to that

damaged pod. It's pretty mundane until

then, so I'll just let you know when I'm in place.

Scott out. his

McCoy snorted from behind Kirk. "Just great!

If he gets swept away by a stellar wind or

something, the first we hear is when he doesn't call

in."

"Hones, shut up." The doctor's sarcastic

comments werei wearing on Kirk's nerves.

"How long do you figure it'll take him to get

in plac ?" McCoy,

predictably, ignored Kirk's wishes, but

t least changed the subject. was ive, ten

minutes," Chekov answered. His attention remained

fixated with the navigation board. "Per aps not even so

long."

was ow long before collision?" Kirk asked.

C ekov punched up a reading. "One hour,

fifteen min tes."

n t a great margin for error.

It as nearly thirteen minutes before Scott

called in again. Kirk traced the outline of every

button and light on the helm console with his finger as

he waited, wish ng a dozen times each minute that

someone wound think of something to discuss so they could pass

the time less painfully. When the radio finally 138

sputtered to life, Kirk jumped so sharply that his

knee screamed pain clear up into h is skull.

"All right, I'm at the nacelle now . . .

Och, what a sorry mess! She's got enough

damage back here that we're lucky she didn't go

critical five minutes after we hit the mine!"

McCoy leaned over Kirk's shoulder to growl

at. the speaker, "Forget the editorial, Scotty!

Launch the thing!"

"He can't hear you," Chekov advised

impatiently.

Just at that moment, Scott reported,

"1'm going to place the packs first, then start

cutting. I don't know what I can tell you before

I'm done, so 171 just work, I guess. his

"Marvelous. . ." Kirk sighed.

"I'll let you know when we're ready to cut

free. Scott out. was The

transmission again went dead.

A@. Kirk tried to will himself not to drum his fingers,

McCoy asked Chekov, "What kind of margin

does he have? I mean, how long before it's too

late to launch?"

Chekov shrugged, his lips pursed in irritation.

"It depends."

"4n?"

was Co-n our position in the tumble when he

finisheson how quickly the packs can accelerate the

mass." He pushed himself to his feet and stalked

into the middle hold. "It just depends."

Kirk stopped McCoy from following. "Let him

be, Bonds."

"I will." The doctor looked troubled by his

inadequacy in this new development. Kirk knew

just how McCoy felt. "I'm going to look in on

my patient."

Kirk took the hand McCoy offered him

to struggle to his own feet. "Which one?" he asked.

"The mobile one, or . . . ?"

"The cooperative one," McCoy sniffed.

"Neither of my patients is supposed to be

mobile!"

Kirk chuckled, but didn't contradict the older

man.

Sulu watched McCoy reposition Kirk in the

front aisle, grinning. "And I thought I was a

lousy patient!"

"You're a saint," McCoy assured him. "You

at least act as though you understand the English

language."

"Now, that's not fair, Bones."

McCoy ignored the captain. "So what about you,

Sulu?" he prompted, peeking under Kirk's

cold pack before adjusting the brace on the

captain's leg. "You took this Kobayashi Maru

thing, too, didn't you?"

"Like a shot in the arm," the helmsman admitted.

was Vggell, we've got some more time to fill.

I'd say it's your' turn to "fess up'."

Sulu looked suddenly, strangely

uncomfortable. "It's not really all that interesting,"

he hedged. "And it isn't too

appropriate, I think." When Chekov grumbled

inarticulately from behind him, he insisted, "No,"

I'm serious."

"Tha captain cheated, Chekov blew up everyone

he knew) . . ." The doctor returned to his

own seat just in front) of Sulu's. "How bad can

yours have been?"

Sulu a didn't smile. "You might be

surprised."

Kirk sensed a tension in the helmsman's usually

light tone. "Don't push it, Bones," he

suggested. "We're all tired. It can wait for

another day."

"I there is one."

The doctor's frankness horrified him. "That's

enough, McCoy..."

"What I mean," McCoy said, striving for

humor, "is that we're all

remarkably receptive to disclosing embarrassing

anecdotes just now. If he doesn't tell us

here, we may never get it out of him. Considering how

he insisted with poor Chekov, it seems only

fair."

"He's right," Chekov agreed simply.

Kirk looked over at Sulu.

"Mister Sulu?"

Sulu sighed and closed his eyes. "It isn't

funny," he said tiredly. "It isn't even

clever."

"We'll settle," Kirk allowed.

"Although," McCoy intimated, "I find the thought

of you devising a boring solution just a little hard

to believe."

"It isn't boring," Sulu explained. "I just

said it wasn't funny, that's all. And it takes a

little extra explaining-to really understand it, I mean.

A lot of things went into what I did, not just the

decisions I made during the test . . ."

"Well," McCoy said placidly. "We

certainly have plenty of time."

CRANE DANCE

SuLu" cRoucHED Low against the boom of the

brilliant blue windsailor while it skated like

a dragonfly over a bottlc-green ocean.

Water sluiced up like a shattered, sparkling

curtain in the narrow craft's wake, and Sulu

whooped with zealous enthusiasm when the sailor leapt)

for an instant into silence, then crashed down onto

(water again. Sea salt dusted his face and stung his

dark', eyes. If all the happiness and

excitement in my whole life, Sulu thought, could be

jammed into one pure," breathless moment, it would be

now! was ow're we doing, Poppy?" Sulu laughed

again to hear how insignificant and fragile his

voice became against the sound of a playful sea. When

the old man just head of him on the craft didn't

answer, Sulu lean d

forward-rocking the craft-and called again "Hey,

Poppy! Anybody home?" Tetsuo Inomata

twisted as far as his one-hundredand-three-year-old

muscles would allow, but didn't

release his hold on the main mast. "You're going

to dunk us, boy!" His wrinkled golden face sat

atop his orange flotation jacket like a happy,

sun-dried apple.

Sulu leaned into the boom, cutting the sailor

across a corduroy of swells that made it jump and

twitch like a grounded swordfish. "I love this

craft! I love this wind! How can you not trust wind

like this?"

"Never trust wind!" Tetsuo ducked the boom

with the grace of an expert as Sulu swung it past

him to bring the craft about. "The wind was here long before

man was, and it's never much adjusted to man getting

in its way."

As if to prove the old man's point, a gust

nearly tipped the boat sideways. Sulu rode

with it frantically, bothered by the coincidence, but too

elated with his success to back down. "One more,"

Tetsuo informed him sagely, once the craft was

righted again. "One more, and we'll both be wet!"

Sulu opened his mouth to scoff Tetsuo's lack

of

faith, and the wind flicked the sailor's bow with an

element's uncaring ease, flipping the sleek

craft end

over end.

Salt water enveloped Sulu's sun-warmed

torso in a rush of stinging, too-cool enthusiasm.

He squinted his eyes shut, avoiding most of the pain

ocean water could inflict, and rocketed to the

surface with a single, powerful kick. Bobbing between the

swells like a lazy gull, tilde ,he caught

sight of the blue-and-white sailor not far away;

Tetsuo's bald head and orange flotation

jacket flashed in and out of his vision just beyond the

capsized craft.

After breaking down the sail and righting the board,

Sulu helped his great-grandfather to a seat

against the slender mast. "I don't need help,"

Tetsuo complained. But he didn't push Sulu

away.

"You never need help." Sulu lingered with one hand

on the older man's wrist, not liking the chill feel

to his great-grandfather's skin. He strove to cover his

concern with a smile. "I'm heading for shore," he said

as he fastened a rope to the craft's tow ring.

"It's going to be dark soon, and I've still got

to pack for tomorrow!"

"You don't have that much left to pack." Tetsuo

shifted position to face Sulu as the lithe

Oriental rolled onto his back and started for

shore. "You're already taking most of the family

heirlooms."

Sulu grinned. "Only some of them-it just seems

like all."

Tetsuo made a face that quickly dissolved

into chuckling. "You know what I mean!"

"Yeah, I know . . ."

For a while, they said nothing. The ocean whispered

soot ing secrets to no one, and the waves hissed a

distant message to the gray-white sands a hundred

met rs away. Sulu continued for shore, watching the

sky ver him darken while the last defiant

red rays leap toward the eastern horizon, as if

to hurry the daw . Everybody's anxious for tomorrow,

he thought, sighing. I only want today. Forever and

always.

B cause tomorrow, he'd be gone.

It seemed to Sulu not so long ago that Poppy

raced him all the way to the old subway station and

back, and sometimes even won. They were both much younger

then-Sulu all of nine or ten, Tetsuo only just

in his nineties-but the fourteen years between had come and

gone like the flash of a distant white

gull. Somewhere in the midst of them, Sulu

devoted two carefree terms of his life

to Starfleet, and Poppy began what would be a long,

bitter struggle with what the neurosurgeons called

a "grade four glioblastoma." The man he

sailed with today was immeasurably older than the

great-grandfather that his childhood had left behind.

Most of the medical jargon meant nothing to Sulu.

Still, he understood enough to know that the growth in Poppy's

brain could be controlled with radiation and chemotherapy,

but could never be made to go away. It had moved in

to stay, entwining with healthy nerves and tissue until

removal of the tumor would require removal of

most of what was Poppy. The doctors had

no opinions as to how long the stressful regime of

radiochemicals and toxins could go on; it would be

years before the body's systems finally broke

down-before one-hundred-and-three-year-old blood

vessels refused to tolerate the chemicals that

seared them clear every week. When that finally

happened...

Sulu reached for his great-grandfather's hand as they,

sailed beneath the gently graying sky, trying to imagine

those once-strong hands crippled and useless. Without

meaning to, he tightened his grip protectively.

"Worried about tomorrow?"

Sulu craned his neck up out of the water to see his

great-grandfather studying him across the gathering dusk, and

noticed his hold on the older man's hand for the first

time. He didn't let go. "A little, I guess,"

he admitted, glad that Tetsuo missed the

actual course of his thoughts. "Command school isn't

like the

Academy. They won't let me just be good at

what I do-there, I'll have to be good at what everyone

else dots, too! That's kind of the point of being a

captain, I guess . . ." His voice trailed

away into a sigh. "I don't want to do anything

wrong."

Tetsuo made a small noise that Sulu

took to signify his displeasure. "How asinine!"

"It's not asinine!" Sulu's cheeks stung as

much as his pride. "It's a very serious thing! There's

never more than a thousand people in command school at any one

time, and they're very picky about who they let stay!"

"And you think they won't let you?"

Sulu paused in his swimming. "I don't know .

. . I guess so . . ."

Tetsuo shifted toward the front of the little wi

dsailor. "Listen . . ." he instructed. "Did

I ever tall to you about cranes?"

"his is command school- "Sulu pitched his

voice as complaint, even though he smiled. "comn a

construction company!"

tsuo laughed, splashing his great-grandson with a

generous handful of water. "I'm talking about birds,

not machinery!"

was out showed them to me at the zoo." Sulu

returned to is swimming, angling his body to talk as

he mo ed. "They all stood on one leg and stared

at us. I bou iced peanuts off their heads, and the

zoo attendant ade us leave."

was out were a terrible child," Tetsuo conceded.

"And you folded me a thousand of them out of the

napkins from my

seventeenth birthday party." Sulu

smiled at the memory. "At least, you told me

they were cranes-I thought they looked like ducks!"

"Those are ducks," Tetsuo allowed dryly.

"Whoever invented origami just thought cranes would sound

more distinguished. You know why I folded you all those

cranes?"

"You thought I liked birds?"

"No," Tetsuo told him. "It's because of a

Japanese legend."

Sulu rolled his eyes in mock disbelief.

"Uh, ohmore Japanese philosophy!" It was

a private joke between Sulu and the old man; like

Sulu, Tetsuo was born of immigrants, grown

old in California without ever having seen the

Oriental sun.

"Will you listen to me?" the old man complained. "I

was just going to tell you that the old Japanese believed

if you folded one thousand origami

cranesprefereaably while meditating-you could make

a miracle happen."

"Dud you?"

Tetsuo shrugged. "You got into the Academy,

didn't you?""

Sulu made a face, admitting that he'd

walked straight into Poppy's verbal trap. "So

what has this got to do's with me and command school?

Did you fold more cranes to make sure I wouldn't

flunk out?"

"I didn't think of it. I was actually going

to talk to you about real cranes, not paper ones."

"May," Sulu allowed. "I'm listening."

"Do you know why they all stand on one leg?"

Tetsuo asked him.

Sulu shook his head. Then, realizing Tetsuo

no

doubt lost the motion in the waves, he added,

"No, Poppy. Why"...[*thorn]

"Because they're clumsy as hell," the old man

replied. "Nature really blew it when it came

to giving cranes virtues beyond their good looks, so

whenever the birds put both legs on the ground, they

trip over themselves."

Sulu burst into laughter. "I thought you were going

to tell me about biology!"

"@. am telling you about biology! Don't you

think Nature is part of biology?"

was Are you sure I'm not being exposed

to Japanese Phil sophy?" Sulu

asked, trying to contain his mirth.

"don't know any Japanese philosophy,"

Tetsuo sno ted. "Are you going to be quiet and

listen?"

was oes this have something to do with why origami cranes

look like ducks?" Sulu asked.

was said be quiet."

S lu slapped a pleasant, schooled

expression on his featiires. "Okay."

A parently satisfied, Tetsuo settled

back against the m and went on. "In the hopes of

fixing things up, Nat re went through and gifted some

cranes with the gra she left out of the others. Even the

cranes don't kno which ones-they can only find out

by trying. was Pu le shadows played across his face as

he angled his hea to look down at Sulu. "Every

crane has to have the courage to put both feet on the

ground," he said seriously. "Take a few

steps-find out the hard way if you can dance. A

dancing crane is a very beautiful thin to see, but

it's hell for the cranes that fail, because they have to look

at the cranes all dancing and know what they might have

been."

Sulu didn't comment. Gulls cursed angrily

above them, and, from not so far away, Sulu

thought he heard the whooping of a lonely white crane.

"We're just like the cranes, you and me," Tetsuo

said finally, softly. "While everybody else is

worrying about how to balance on that one safe leg, you

and me are out seeing how far the other one will stretch.

Even if you fall, you've got to remember that

everybody really has two legs after all-even if

you stumble, you can always get back up again."

Sulu listened for the crane again, but heard nothing

now except the gulls and the sleepy sea. "Does

this mean you don't think I should worry about command

school?"

Tetsuo smiled down at him. "It means I

don't think you should worry about command school. You'll

do fine."

He grinned in return and kicked a small

spray of water over the prow of the sailor. "And you

said you didn't know any philosophy!"

Tetsuo shrugged and splashed water back at

him. "I don't. I read that in a book a long,

long time ago . . ."

Returning the rented windsailor took longer

than the commuter shuttle back from L.a.-by the time

they reached Oakland, Sulu and Poppy were both still

damp from their excursion. Leaving his

greatgrandfather in the foyer to discard his sandy shirt and

footwear, Sulu kicked off his own shoes while

padding into the kitchen to turn on the lights.

A piteous howling erupted in answer to Sulu's

touch on the light panel; the young cadet cursed

shortly and

shouted at the plant across the kitchen from him

"Shut up, Filbert!" Long, fuzzy green

tendrils snaked back across the countertop to curl

about the meter-long pot as if they'd never strayed.

Filbert emitted another wail of despair, and

Sulu was forced to cross the kitchen in two hurried

strides and clap a hand over the plant's flattened

central trunk. Filbert whimpered and fell

silent.

was HaSo nobody fed you today?" Sulu asked,

feeling immediately sorry for his harsh tone when the plant

gently entwined his hand.

Tetsuo snorted as he shambled into the kitchen and

found himself a seat. "It can't answer you," he

advised sagely. "And it'll eat your hand if you

stand there much longer!"

Sulu disengaged his hand with little effort. "You also said

my iguana would eat Mom's parrot."

"Didn't it?"

""tilde 'he parrot ate the iguana,

Poppy!" Sulu ducked back into the pantry in

search of one of Filbert's mice, but only found

dried earthworm left over from his attempt to keep

a carnivorous Rosserian ivy. "The Tell

rian greencat ate the parrot," he continued upon

retu ing. "That's why I gave it to George

Temmu. Remember?"

T tsuo waved o@." the details as

unimportant. "Did it eat is mother's parrot?"

S lu dumped a handful of earthworm down Fil

rt's open throat. "She didn't have a parrot."

was mart woman."

Sulu dug into the container for another serving of

worms, and nearly spilled it all over the floor

when the

viewer next to him chirped. Jerking his head up in

surprise, he called, "Yes?" before even

considering whether or not he wanted to answer.

Whatever greetings he normally uttered leapt from

his mind the instant he met Arthur Kobrine's stern

and stormlike gaze over the viewer. "Where the hell

have you two been?"

Kobrine's harsh attitude caught Sulu

completely unprepared. He glanced at

Poppy, found no help there, and just shrugged

stupidly. "Sailing," he said, feeding Filbert

again. "Why?"

"How are you doing, Doctor Kobrine?"

Poppy called from the kitchen table. Kobrine shot

a glance in that direction, but Sulu knew the angle

of the viewer would keep him from seeing Poppy or the

table. Sulu pushed Filbert to the back of the counter

and stepped forward to turn the viewer slightly.

"They've been waiting for you in radiochem since this

morning," the neurosurgeon informed Tetsuo with

ice in his tone. "They wanted me to send an

orderly out for you."

"I'm not a child," Tetsuo told him, with perhaps more

force than Sulu thought necessary. The old man's hand

found a paper napkin in the table's centerpiece,

ripping it into tiny squares without apparent thought.

"My great-grandson here's almost a starship

pilot-we don't need you chasing around after us as if

we were children."

"Then act like an adult!" Kobrine shouted at

him. "Act I like you

understand the responsibility you have, and stop dragging

your

great-grandson along as if he can keep

you from getting in trouble!" Sulu felt fear's

left-handed cousin start to stir inside

his chest, and he pushed in front of the viewphone

hastily. "Doctor Kobrine, we were just sailing!"

he began, but Kobrine silenced him.

"Ask your great-grandfather why he wasn't at the

hospital today."

Sulu blinked at Kobrine, then looked over his

shoulder at Tetsuo only to be confused by the old

man's reluctance to meet his eyes. "What?"

"Your great-grandfather skipped his therapy,"

Kobrine clarified. His voice was tight with anger

and whatever emotion provoked parental lectures on

"disappointment" and "duty." "If radiochem had

hounded me-me, of all people!-one more time about how

important these therapy sessions were, I'd have

killed someone!"

dis.poppy . .

The old man reluctantly looked up from the

crane he " as patiently folding. was s that

right?" Sulu pressed. "You skipped your the apy?"

T tsuo made a face and shrugged an

indefinite reply as is attention returned

to folding. "What are you, Art"" he asked of the

neurosurgeon on the screen. "A pri

to detective now, too?"

was 'm a doctor!" he exploded. "I'm

supposed to m e sure you do what's best for your

health! Mister Ino ata, I'm supposed to take

care of you!" was hat if I don't want to be

taken care of?"

S lu crossed the kitchen to sit in the chair

next to Pop you. "Why?" he asked, frightened.

"Did you forget? His

"I didn't forget." He seemed offended by the

suggestion. He flicked the limp paper crane

across the 152

table; it skitte red over the edge and out of sight.

"It makes me sick," he admitted. "It

makes me feel all sunburned, and I figured

I'd be getting enough sun as it was." Casting an

angry look at Kobrine across the kitchen, he

complained, "Being a day late can't make that much

difference when you're my age!"

"But after the treatments, you feel better for the rest

of the week, don't you?" Kobrine insisted.

When Tetsuo didn't respond immediately,

Sulu pressed, "Don't you?" The old man

sighed and started on another square of paper. "For

two, maybe three days at the end. Before

then my head hurts, and my skin hurts, and sometimes

I can barely stand. I go to the bathroom all the time

. . ." He paused in his folding, running a hand

through Sulu's close-cropped black hair with a

smile that nearly made the young man cry. "I

wanted to go windsailing with you today! You're going to be

gone, to command school tomorrow, and I might not get to see

you . . ." He swallowed whatever he'd intended

to say. "It'll be a long time," he finished. "I

didn'It want to be throwing up the whole time we were

together!"

"It's only across the Bay," Sulu scolded

gently. "I'll visitt--"

was When they let you!"

Sulu smiled and tousled Tetsuo's thinning

hair in kind "This is Starfleet, Poppy, not

jail!"

"I'just wanted to go with you," Tetsuo said again.

was ell, you're coming in here now. I'm sending a

voluLiteer to get you."

Kobrine gestured at someone off-screen; the

doctor's expression made Sulu suddenly want

to remind him that Tetsuo was old, not stupid.

He exchanged long-suffering looks with Tetsuo

instead, and accepted the half-completed

crane his great-grandfather passed him.

"I could bring him in," Sulu volunteered.

Kobrine scowled and shook his head. "Your

greatgrandfather says you're leaving tomorrow. I don't

want to disrupt your schedule any more than it already

has been." He seemed to notice Tetsuo's

half-clad state for the first time, and added, "Take

your great-grandfather upstairs and get him dressed.

Someone will be there in about fifteen minutes."

"I'll bet he was a brat when he was little,

too," Tetsuo intimated when he and Sulu were

halfway up the stairs.

Sulu smothered his laughter, and hugged Tetsuo

soundly. "They'll assign me soon," he

promised, wish tilde ng tomorrow wasn't hurrying

upon them so fast. "It'a be on one of the big

starships, Poppy, you'll see! tilde . . I

want you to be there when it happens! I want you with

me when I go!"

Tetsuo held onto Sulu longer than the young

man expected. "I love you," he whispered

warmly in Sulu's ear. "And I'll always be with you

. . . always!" W en he finally broke the hug,

Sulu saw that they

had rushed the little half-finished crane.

Il

Slu pressed back into his aircar seat as the

Pacific Oce n caught a great sheet of

sunlight and threw it up at t e aircar. He

squinted his eyes shut against the light marveling at the

people milling about the landing field below him.

Out of the whole galaxy-billions of people!-only a

thousand of us are here! The thought made Sulu's

stomach crawl up into his windpipe again, and he

looked back at the command school landing pad in the

hopes that studying the ground would smother some of the panic

he felt building inside.

The aircar ahead of them was a commercial

transit; no one held up the six cadets who

exited with long and tearful goodbyes. Sulu's little

aircar landed without having to wait for a window.

"Well, this is it . . ." Sulu's hand was

cold and trembling when he closed it on the handle of

his carryall. His door was open, his right foot touching

the warm landing pad; he missed home already, and was

irrationally afraid he might never see his family

again. Especially Tetsuo. He knew the old

man wanted to drop him off today, but the treatments

made him so ill, and Sulu didn't feel he had

the right to bring him.

"Excuse me, sir," a polite, computer

voice interruptpd his thoughts. "We are delaying

on a privateaccess pad."

Embarrassment stung his cheeks momentarily.

"Sorry," he murmured, feeling stupid.

"Thank you. I'm out." The door closed without a

sound, and the airc*r climbed into the sunny,

salty-smelling air, leaving Sulu alone. It was

a good morning. Sulu tried to distract himself with that knowledge

as he headed for the main building, turning his back on

the aircar now landing. It was already warm, and

uncharacteristically clear for 1 te-summer San

Francisco. A hood of mist along the crest of

Mount Tam blushed pinkly in the early morning

sun, and the Golden Gate Bridge swept across the

Bay like a daring ballerina. The bridge's 155

delicate silhouette reminded Sulu of

Poppy's dancing cranes. Thinking of his

great-grandfather somehow cheered him and hurt him at the

same time; he didn't want to leave him behind, but

didn't want to be a peg-legged swamp crane

either. Grasping for some distant rapport with

Tetsuo, Sulu tucked one foot behind the other,

hoping to unobtrusively test Poppy's theory of

one-footed confidence before leaving these wide

open spaces.

He swayed ever so slightly, and bumped into someone

behind him.

"Hey! What are you, a no-zee who doesn't

know how to walk?"

Sulu botched regaining his footing, and stumbled

another few steps before completing his turn. The

woman with whom he collided pushed him upright, and

demanded acerbically, "Let me guess-you don't

speak English either?" Sulu thought that must be a

joke, her own accent was @.o pronounced. He

smiled and extended a hand. "Aheai no-I mean,

no, I don't not speak English. My name's

Sulu."

She furrowed her brow distru/lly, but accepted

his handshake. "You just don't speak English well?"

Sulu fell into step beside her to join the migration

towa d the main building. "I'm from right around here,

actually-I was born in San

Francisco!" When she v lunteered no

reply, he prompted, "I don't think I cau

t your name. . ."

was aria Theresa Perez-Salazar," she

admitted after a considered pause. Her gold-brown

hair was pulled so severely toward the

crown of her skull, Sulu found it somewhat amazing

she could draw her face down 156

into the expression of displeasure it now wore. He

opted not to comment on that, but thought he'd have to watch her

to see if her demeanor ever changed. "My friends

call me Mate."

Sulu also decided she didn't necessarily

consider him among that privileged circle. "I

take it you're not from around here?"

Perez-Salazar tilted her chin infinitesimally

higher, but her expression was etched in titanium.

"I'm from Mexico City-I attended the

Academy in Tempe."

"You speak English very well."

He'd hoped it would be a compliment-since she

seemed as preoccupied with proper English as a high

school teacher-but Perez-Salazar only snapped

him a cold, lizardine look and reproved, "Of

course! Mexico is a very civilized state!"

When she lengthened her stride to outdistance him,

Sulu didn't try to keep pace. "Starlleet's

finest," he muttered toward her back. "Wow. .

."

He managed to cultivate two more successful

conversations in the line leading into the main

building, onel with an Australian who'd lived on

Earth for his entire life. Another with a Human

who'd never been to Earth before. It was an interesting

comparison of cultures and intellect. He and the

Australian were exchanging opinions on the West

Coast's best

wiodsailing spots when Sulu's turn at the

admission's station came up. The lieutenant on

duty had to hail him three times before he realized

she was speaking to him.

Ire swung about guiltily. "I'm sorry,

sir-I was talking."

The small lieutenant smiled and pushed a

square of

coded tape across the counter at him. "I

noticed. Here-you'll need this to find your bag once

you get to the billets."

"I thought a computer would be doing this," Sulu

admitted as he hefted his carryall onto the

counter.

"You'll see enough machines the rest of the time you're

here," the lieutenant assured him. "We try

to keep things as personal and low-key as we can the first

day." The bag disappeared behind the counter. "Around me

and to your left, Cadet. You'll be issued

your uniform and an agenda for the day. Good luck!"

For the next three hours, Sulu barely had time

to

blurtout thanks for the instructions and orders he was

given, much less converse with the other cadets. He

lost the Australian shortly after relinquishing his

bag,

but Mat6- Perez-Salazar seemed to cling

to his periph

eral vision like a berm-runner on an illegal

hyper

jumpl. Once he'd changed, logged in, been

issued a

counselor, a billet number, a class

schedule, a bloc,

carried d about and delivered numerous medical

rec

ords n himself, identified himself for more comput

er systems than he'd ever have dreamed, and tried

to

explain to an indifferent liaison officer that he

wasn't

Das es-Pamudan from Isrando-on-Sheshwar,

he was

pushed down a long, windowless hall and

told to "go

straight, then left, then left, wait in

Sunside until a

monitor comes-Next!" It was a long,

perplexing

walk, indeed.

He was perhaps two-thirds of the way

to Sunsidestudi usly mirroring the route

indicated on his handsize datex screen-before he

considered that anywhere called "Sunside" was perhaps not

preferable place to be. All his imagination could

conjure was lurid, molten still shots of Mercury's

daylight half; he wondered why anyone would go there,

much less name a meeting room after the place. A

punishment cubicle, perhaps? "Here at Starfleet's

command school, we believe no raw potential should

go undeveloped. For example, impressive

disciplinary results can be obtained through the use of

pain. his

Sulu grinned, and rounded the last corner before

Sunside's entrance. Nearly thirty cadets

looked up at his entr ance, but no one volunteered a

greeting until Sulu released his own grin and

waved. "Hi."

"We're taking a poll," called an

extremely longlegged youth from the back of the room.

Sulu laughed. "Can I defer my response for

an hour?"

"They may kill us before then," someone else

suggested. Another replied, "I think that's why he

asked."

The conversation spread to another dozen cadets, and

several inventive ideas were voiced as to the name's

true meaning. Another twenty cadets joined them

over the next forty minutes, Perez-Salazar

among them, and Sulu was still trying to explain the gist

of the guessing game when a small, trim commodore

interrupted the discussion.

Her mere entrance proved enough to bring the room to its

feet. After accepting a moment of the entire bloc at

rigid attention, she called them at ease and'sat

herself on the edge of a table.

"Well, that was impressive!" Her dark,

Mediterranean eyes were quick, and as calm as a

midnight sky.

Sulu liked her instantly. "I'm Commodore

Rachel Coan, and I'll be your bloc commandant

while you're here at the Command School. You are

Cadet Bloc W. You're here today because

I, personally, wanted to make sure you all

understood why you're in command school." She nudged a

cadet near her with one foot. "How about you? Why

are you here?"

She answered without hesitation, "Because I want

to command a starship someday."

Coan nodded, turning to the rest of the room.

"You-was She singled out another from the rear. "What about

you?"

"My parents made me."

Amusement stirred through the bloc at that. "All

right . . . That's honest, at least." Then Coan's

eyes caught on Sulu's. "And you?"

His mind became a hissing white void.

Despite that he heard his voice say, "To see

if I can."

CQ-AN nodded, but didn't comment on his answer.

"Okay," she said, standing. "You seem to be an

honest bunch. That's good-I like honesty. I expect

it. Okay?" Half the gathering expressed confusion,

the othe half nodded. Coan crossed the room,

gesturing s she spoke for various cadets

to relocate themselves.

was ight now, we're going to perform the first of man

scenarios you'll be forced to endure during your

time here. This one's called Galactic

Politics!" Groans answered her announcement,

and Coan's grin grew wider. "Get used to it,"

she cautioned. "It's the second oldest profession

in the cosmos."

Everyone laughed.

"Now," Coan continued, "when I give the word,

each of you is to check your computer to find out which

planetary system you represent. Someone will be

Earth, someone else Vulcan, someone else

Klingon, or Andorian, or Altarian, et

cetera, et cetera." A handful of cadets stood

to help her drag a table toward the center of the room.

"The Klingon and the Romulan empires will sit at

this table with the Federation." She pulled a random

collection of chairs into a wandering circle farther out

from the table. "The Federated planets will sit here.

Since the Federation and the Empires control most of the

galaxy's resources, those people will get to make

decisions regarding the disposition of those resources.

The rest of the Federation can help, of course, but. . .

was And here her eyes glinted with playful malice.

"The Fed- eration and the Empires can talk at will.

To each other, to anyone else they want to. The

Federated planets can talk at will among

themselves, and to anyone not seated at the table. However,

they can't interrupt the three main powers at the table,

and they can't take any action without the consent of the

leading three."

She retrieved another chair and placed it far

away, against a distant corner. "The Vulcans,"

she went on, "who are frequently viewed as having

the answer to most', of the galaxy's problems-was This was

greeted with to mild amusement. "comsit here. They can

only interfere with galactic politics once every

half hour, but lave a wide range of possible

activities. Each time another planet requests

aid from them, however, their half-hour wait starts

anew."

"This sounds pretty complicated," someone ven-

tured, and Coan stretched her hands out to either side

in a helpless shrug. "Real life politics

isn't like playing jacks," she explained. "All

I'm trying to do is simulate some of the restrictions

and tensions existing in the real life arena. You'll

find details specific to your own situation in your

computer. I'll be here to answer questions. Just stick with

me, okay?" No one said anything. Moving back

toward her original seat, Coan nodded.

"Everybody check their computer now to get

your assignments, objectives, and limitations. This

simulation will continue for two hours, or until

somebody accomplishes something." She flashed them a

sudden, delighted smile. "Let the games begin."

Others about the room were already chuckling or moaning

about their assignments by the time Sulu thumbed his

retrieval button. The little computer screen

flashed a series of code, and a column of print

started its slow bottom-to-top scroll.

MENAK 111

TECH LEVEL Three.

S lu pursed his lips pensively. Tech

level three meant no subspace radio

capabilities, and no warp drive-rudimentary

hyperdrive at best. He hoped his objectives

didn't involve any long-distance negotiation or

travel.

FEDERATION MEMBERSHIP Menak is not eligi-

ble, due to her current political climate.

AFFILIATIONS Long-standing trade relations with

Carstair's Planet.

Carstair's-a frontier world inhabited by four

species' bail jumpers and troublemakers. Sulu

sighed.

HISTORY Mineral-poor Menak III

depends heavily on Carstair's for raw

materials, interplanetary and interstellar relations

with wealthier societies, and infusion of medical and

food production technology. Menak III is

approaching the end of its second industrial

revolution; sweeping politi- cal reorganization

and economic upheavals are the results. The

current parliamentary government is threatened by a

separatist religious faction which believes a

return to "simpler times" would be in Menak

III'S best interests. Menak III'S

political leaders do not agree.

RULES OF PLAY You can only

communicate with the Federation through Carstair's Planet

. . .

Sulu looked up from his computer to scan the room.

A dozen other cadets craned looks left and

right, as though trying to identify their allies

by facial feature alone. Sulu noted that two of the

table's three inhabitants were in place.

Perez-Salazar sat at one end; Sulu felt

some sympathy for whomever Fate chose to share that

galaxy with her for the next two hour. "Who's

Carstair's Planet?" he called

congenially, turning back to his own affairs.

On the floor across the room, sitting with his back

against the wall, a dark-skinned Maori jerked his

head up in ill-humored surprise. Glittering

black eyes darted left and right. "Who asks?"

Sulu attempted his most disarming grin, and waved.

"I'm Menak III."

Settling back into his seat, he continued with his

reading .

. . . You can only communicate with the Federation through

Carstair's Planet; you may communicate with any

non-Federated planet you choose. Since you lack

subspace radio capabilities, all

communications must be made via oldstyle radio

waves. To simulate this, you may only contact

other planets by written notes, passed from you

to whomever you are contacting. You may not leave your

seat.

O tilde IECTIVES The Federation has the

resources to alleviate many of Menak Ill's

economic and health problems. All you want is a

chance to speak, one-on-one, to a Federation

representative.

tilde I

Sulu nodded. Looking about, he saw a

table near the mai door, apparently stocked with

props for their scenario a painted scepter,

assorted colored and numbered tokens, writing

implements and a great deal of paper, the mother board from

some electronic devi a (the Carstair's

Planet Maori cadet took this), and a wheel.

Sulu abandoned his seat to collect some paper and a

pen, then settled in only a few chairs away from

Carstair's-to facilitate communications. After

a single nervous, unhappy glare, the cadet

ignored him.

Sulu tucked his feet up under himself on the

chair, until he was firmly seated,

tailor-fashion. Licking the point of his pen with a

flourish (and then deciding not to do that anymore), he

composed his first communique

Carstair's-Everybody's dying here, we aren't

hav-

ing a terrible lot of fun economically, and we

understand you have some pull with the Federation Council; 1'd

desperately love a visit from a Federation

representative. Any help at all would be

appreciated. Love,

Menak 111

He smiled, resisted the temptation

to line the bottom of the note with "hugs-n-kisses"

X's and O's, folded it into a neat little square,

and turned to the young woman next to him. "Would you hand

this down to the planet on the end, please?"

Before she could reply, Coan interposed herself between

them and plucked the note from Sulu's hand. "Foul,

Menak," she informed him, grinning. "You can't talk

to a neighboring planet-you've got to writ.."

Sulu took the note back from her, annoyed.

"You mean I have to write her a note just to ask her

to pass this dote?" That struck him as ridiculously

restrictive.

Coan only nodded. "That's what I mean.

Try again."

Sulu's second note was short and to the

point"...Help! I'm being held prisoner in a

complex Starfleet scenario! Please pass this

note to Carstair's Planet (the social

butterfly to your right) before it's too late!"-and the

"transmission' to Carstair's was quickly on its

way.

Carstair's gawked at the note, stared in

almhorror at the cadet who'd last touched it, and

finally directed a black-eyed glare down the length

of chairs at Sulu.

Sulu waved again, and smiled. This was going to be a

long game.

"I'll bet you've got quite a wait ahead of

you."

Sulu craned a look over his shoulder, finding

Coan still standing nearby, watching Carstair's.

"Carstair's can't approach the Federation Council

without at least one Federated planet to support

him. That's not always easy under normal

circumstances-Narv's lack of social graces

isn't going to work in your favor."

Sulu sighed and glanced back at the cadet.

Narv was already kneeling near one of the outlying Federation

chairs, talking, quietly but gruffly, with the

inhabitant. "What am I supposed to do in the

meantim ?" he asked Coan. "My planet's

got a lot of problem;!"

Can leaned over to tap Sulu's pad of paper.

"Sketch something. You can sell the art to other pla

ets and upgrade your economy."

S lu perked up at the suggestion. "Is that

allowed in this scenario?" Can's laugh was cheerful, but

not reassuring. "No. But you might be able to buy

yourself lunch with the proceeds."

"What about paper airplanes?" Sulu

twisted in his

seat to follow her progress as Coan started

to move away.

"No!"

He flopped back into his seat with a sigh; he'd

expected as much.

Seven minutes-and ten elaborate paper

airplanes comlater, Carstair's and Rigel V

made their way up to the main Council table. Sulu

sailed his last airplane in the general vicinity of

an equally bored cadet (who'd been returning

fire with clever, chittering paper constructions that

reminded Sulu of kamikaze crickets), and

settled in to observe Carstair's plea on his

behalf.

Rigel and Carstair's waited another full

minute before the Federation delegate finally turned

to them and demanded, "What do you want? Can't you see

we're trying to agree on negotiation formats?"

The cadet snorted noisily and thrust a piece

of paper up at the Federation cadet's face. "A

list of demands," he growled. "For my people."

"Who are you?" The Federation glanced at the list,

then deposited it atop the table between himself and the two

Empires. Perez-Salazar plucked it

up and studied it in silence.

was Carstair's Planet," Rigel V

volunteered. Then, flashing the Federation a

ridiculously wide and stunning smile "I'm

Rigel V-already a member in good standing with the

Federation."

was Oreat." The Federation's enthusiasm seemed

limited. "We'll consider your requests and get

back to y.t

"All services are sorely needed," the

Carstair's insisted when the Federation would have turned

away. "I insist upon immediate attention!"

Perez-Salazar uttered something brief and

sibilant. "These requests are ludicrous!" she

exclaimed, pitching the paper back at Narv. The

rumpled sheet caught the air and fluttered

erratically off to one side. "You want missile

technology, computer assistance, access to our data

centers . . . to was

"The Federation's data centers," the Federation

reminded her firmly. "They aren't asking for anything

from the Klingons!"

Perez-Salazar twisted her mouth and narrowed her

eyes. "Racism again? You don't feel the

Klingon Empire has anything to offer?"

Sulu covered his smile with one hand.

Perez-Salazar was the Klingons-he should have

guessed.

"Nothing that we can't offer more safely!" The

Federation handed Narv back his note. "Go sit

down. We'll get to you."

"I ask little," Carstair's insisted. When the

Federation didn't answer, the cadet turned to face

Vulcan on the opposite side of the room. "If

I cannot appeal to your to less compassionate

neighbors, then I appeal to you, logicians, for

recognition."

This three at the main table uttered simultaneous

inarticulate cries while Vulcan looked

to Coan for direction. The monitor shrugged

mutely.

"You idiot!" the Romulan Empire howled.

"key!" Coan barked. "There'll be none of that

around here! This is just a game!"

The Romulan Empire wilted noticeably,

weaving her hands into angry baskets in front of

her. "Sorry, sir . . ."

Coan was still frowning as she nodded to Vulcan.

"Start timing your half hour again."

"Aye, sir."

And that ended Carstair's first round of negotiations.

Sulu made sure a note was waiting for the

Carstair's by the time he returned to his seat.

What happened to my requests? Fifty

million more people have died around here! Don't I need

food more than you need missiles?

Narv's lips moved through the message slowly.

Once finished, he scrawled a brief reply

across the bottom, crushed the paper into a ball, and

threw it back at Sulu. Sulu untangled the

note to read what he already suspected it said

"NO. was He flicked the ball away from him, and

started on his notes again.

Hi! I'm Menak III, a small,

insignificant, and technologically

underdeveloped planet in the Murasaki

sector. Carstair's Planet is ignoring me,

and I'm bored. Wanna start a war?

He folded the note into his most careful

aircraft yet, and sailed it across the room

into Orion's lap with the delicate precision only

a born helmsman could commano.

Orion's automatic reply was a chittering

cricket. Sulu, quickly folded a second

plane, scribbling across the wings, "Read the

first airplane!" and bounced the second plane against

Orion's chest. Orion blinked twice, raised

his eyebrows, then set about trying to locate the

message plane among all the others. He found

it, dismantled it, and read it. The reply arrived

in Sulu's lap less than a minute after

Sulu's secondary launch.

Sulu unfolded the plane and scanned the

answer.

Sorry-Orion is officially hostile toward

Menak Ill.

If I get into ANY kind of war, it'll

probably be with

YOU! Better luck next time.

Orion II

A chittering cricket-bearing the proclamation,

'7

am a primitive thermonuclear device.

Ka-BLAMP"-

quickly followed up the note. Orion returned

Sulu's startled look with an apologetic shrug,

but didn't retract the mock bombing. Sulu

dismissed him further, and Orion went back

to folding his toys.

Carefully tearing off the bottom part of the

page, Sulu eliminated Orion's negative

response. Somewhat more tattered, but still

flightworthy, the airplane look like the only

survivor of Orion's last message. He

aimed it at random, hoping chance would help him nd a

sympathetic government on his own side of the room.

The plane bounced into the lap of a stocky, redheaded

female four seats away. Picking it up, she

asked, "What's this?"

Sulu captured her attention with a friendly wave.

"It's an old-style wave radio

transmission-I'm reaching out to my fellow man."

She smiled, but sailed the plane back at him.

"I'm tech 1 vel two-I don't have the

capabilities to receive an interplanetary

transmission. Sorry."

Sulu plucked the craft out of the air with one hand.

Frustrated, he turned to the room at large and

called,

"Is there anybody with a tech level four or

better who isn't hostile to Menak III and

wants to start a war?"

Even as the room burst into laughter, Coan

called, "Foul, Menak!" from the other end of the

room.

"But--to ,

"Foul!" Coan was smiling, but didn't relent.

"You have to pass notes, or you can't communicate at

all."

Sulu fingered the nose of his aircraft

unhappily, slouching into an exaggerated pout for

Coan's benefit. "Do I even have to send notes

to you?" Coan snorted briefly with laughter. "You

can't send notes to me."

"Why? Who are you?"

"I'm God. Now hush!"

Sulu had delivered his war offer to half the

participants on his side of the room by the time

Carstair's gained the Federation's attention for a

second time. "We're considering!" the Federation

irritably assured Narv before he could even speak.

"These are matters of much importance." Narv's

tone of voice could have indicated anything from fury

to pleasant neutrality.

Toe Federation collected Carstair's note, but

didn't read it. "More missiles?" he inquired

acerbically. Rigel V winced. Beyond him, a line

of fidgeting delegates stretched nearly

into Vulcan's lap.

was onsideration of Carstair's

application," Narv persisted. "We wish to be as

Rigel-Federated into your ruling body."

"Starfleet doesn't rule," the Federation

began, and Perez-Salazar amended hotly,

"Tell that to the Romulans!"

"Hey!" The Romulan Empire leaned across the

table in front of Earth to scowl at

Perez-Salazar. "The Federation does not have us

henpecked!" "I never said they did!"

And so ended Carstair's second approach to the

Federation Council. Sulu tore free a sheet of

paper and began methodically shredding it into a pile

at his feet. According to his time piece, he had

approximately another hour and twenty-five

minutes to kill before this scenario reached its

less-than-climactic climax. He resolved

to make a pile as high as his seat before that time.

"You're wasting your national resources." Coan

appeared at his shoulder, still wearing that infuriating

know-it-all smile. "You've got nearly

eighty-five minutes yet, Ensign!"

"My stock market crashed," Sulu replied.

He tried to keep annoyance out of his tone, but

failed miserably. Sifting to face Coan, he

hooked one foot over the chairs arm and

propped his elbow atop the back. "It's pointless!

I'm in a position where I can't do anything for myself,

I'm paired with an antisocial Federation hopeful

who isn't a great deal of help, and those three at

the main table are still trying to decide what kind of

china) to use at their formals!"

Wen his comments only seemed to amuse Coan the

more, he turned away from her again, grumbling, "And

my cadet bloc monitor is a closet sadist

that somebody gifted with commodore's bars."

He hand took hold of his shoulder in warning.

"Careful . . ."

Sulu felt his face grow red. "Excuse me,

sir."

Once Coan was gone, he reevaluated what

he'd said

to her. He didn't really want to quit-he

didn't want to be a one-legged swamp crane who

never learned to dance. What would Poppy say after

spending all that time explaining about the silly dancing

birds? Sulu smiled and glanced at the Federation

Council on the other side of the room. Well, if

the mountain wouldn't come to Mohammed. . .

He attracted Coan's attention by bouncing an

origami crane off her shoulder.

Expressing more irritation than he suspected she

actually felt, she stepped through the assembly

to squat by the arm of his chair. "I want to go to the

Federation myself." Before she could condemn or verify his

plan, he elaborated, "I know I've only

got the wave-radio capabilities, and I know

they wouldn't be expecting my call. And I know it

would take-was He tipped his eyes unconsciously

ceilingward as he figured. "comnearly eighteen

months for the call to reach them."

Coan grinned at him. "And you've only got

eightyfive minutes to go."

"This is a scenario," Sulu pointed out. "Can't

we compact time a little?" Still grinning, Coan reached

behind his chair and came up with one of his many paper

constructions. "You seemed to be doing pretty well

with these earlier." Sulu shrugged, and Coan went

on "If you can (land a message on the main table,

or even in the lap of a Federated planet, anyone

who reads it can act for you. Just because they rely on

subspace communication doesn't mean they can't hear

what you send." She unfolded Sulu's paper

plane as she stood, dropping it into his lap.

"What if they won't read it, or they ignore

you?"

Sulu shrugged, flattening the piece of paper.

"Then I'm no worse off than I am right now."

She studied Sulu so intently it made him

shift uncomfortably in his seat. "Only

seventy-five minutes and eighteen months to go,"

she said finally, breaking her gaze. "You'd better

start writing!" And, with an approving smile, she

moved away.

Sulu considered his note carefully, knowing if he

was to have any hope at all of Federation intervention it

would be dependent on how effectively he could convey

his plight in writing. He discarded Coan's

unfolded plane in favor of a clean sheet of

paper.

Dear Delegates of the Renowned and Honest

Federation Council

He hated it immediately. Too wordy, too

insincere. Scribbling out that line, he began anew,

more thoughtfully.

Dear Champions of Freedom

"y tilde ck."

He I scratched out his second attempt, and

finally settled on a neutral, unimpressive

I

Dear Members of the United Federation

1 s nd you this communique on behalf of the

citizens of Menak Ill. Although not members of the

Federation, we respect and appreciate the good

your kind emissaries do throughout the galaxy. We

appeal to you now for your aid.

Menak is being crushed beneath the weight of

economic and health turmoils beyond our ability

to control. We are mineral poor. We are

neglected. We are dying. Please-all we

request is the opportunity to speak with you regarding

help for our people. You have knowledge of medicines, and safe

power sources; without your assistance, we fear Menak

will have no future at all.

Please.

The Governing Body of Menak 111

Satisfaction displaced the frustration of only a

moment ago. Sulu tucked the rest of his papers

into a pocket, and considered the best delivery method

for his note. Paper wads were out, since they were too

easily mistaken for a personal affront;

origami cranes were more dense than airplanes (and

so traveled better over short distances), but they had

a tendency to tumble while airborne, so didn't

frequently exercise much accuracy in attaining their

targets; airplanes ran the risk of

overshooting, and (for reasons Sulu failed

to comprehend) it seemed no one ever thought to unfold the

planes to find their message. Still, airplanes

seemed the best of the three alternatives, and

seventy minutes really wasn't enough time to get

creative. He hummed to himself as he folded the

plane.

The resultant vessel was hardly a work of art,

but Sulu was confident it would traverse the distance necessary

to deliver his plea to the Federation Council. He

caught Coan's eye as he inspected the lines of

his aircraft, and returned her conspiratorial

wink with a somewhat

embarrassed smile.

No wind disturbed the air in the spacious room,

so Sulu knew nothing but satisfaction as he

watched his courier float cleanly over the heads of

half his classmates and dip sweetly to a landing

over the Romulan Empire's right shoulder.

Perez-Salazar was the only member at the table

to even notice the landing; she made a face at the

paper construct, then pushed it out of their work area.

Sulu was folding another plane before

Perez-Salazar had even rejoined the heated

discussion; he should have learned from his exchange

with Orion. Scrawling a repeat of his "READ

THE FIRST AIRPLANE" message, he tossed the

second plane toward the main table.

This time, Perez-Salazar snatched the plane

while it was till airborne, crushing it in her

fist. She fixed Sulu with a disapproving glare as

she tossed it to join the first plane. In an agony

of frustration, the ensign called, "Read it!" only

to be drowned out by Coan's ste , "Foul, Menak!"

was f course . . . to was he grumbled, slouching low

in his chaff .

If tilde his were indicative of galactic

politics, Sulu was sufficiently convinced that he

didn't want to be a councilor. He tore a

sheet of paper into six rough squares, sullenly

folding a crane from the first as he listened to the

Klingon and Romulan empires argue about voting

rights. In the smallest handwriting he could manage and

still be legible, Sulu started at the nose of the crane

and wrote THIS CRANE wILL

sELF-DESTRUCT IN S

SECONDS. Then he decorated the crimped

wings with . . . 4 . . . 3 . . . 2 . . .

1 . . . He was disappointed that there was no room

left to write BOOM! Widening the tiny

hole in the bottom of the crane, he inserted the tip

of his pen to launch it. He stopped himself just before sending

the crane on its way. Terrorism wasn't the

answer-not if he really wanted to establish some

rapport with the Federated planets. He removed the

little crane reluctantly, and set about writing

another impassioned plea.

This note he folded as a crane (sufficiently

discouraged with the responses to his airplanes).

He mounted it on his pen like the first, then snapped it

catapultstyle toward the main table. The crane

careened over the Romulan Empire's head, into the

center of the table, and over the Federation's right shoulder.

The Federation delegate growled something short and foul

as he stooped for the paper bird; Sulu wondered if

he were the only one to notice where the crane landed when

the Federation tossed it offhandedly away.

Vulcan started quite satisfactorily as the

crane bounced into her lap, staring at the origami

avian as though uncertain if she should touch it.

"Uh, Commodore Coan?" The hesitant

summons caused everyone at the head table to twist

about in startled dismay. "Is this a communication,

sir?" the solitary cadet asked, holding up the

little crane.

The Federation squeaked in indignation. "Where did you

get that?" he demanded, frantically scanning the

room proper. "Who sent that?"

Sulu wished desperately to be less than

three feet tall.

"Well, you threw it to me . . . but it came from

over

there." Vulcan pointed across the room toward

Sulu; the young cadet waved. "Does this mean I

should start timing my half hour again, sir?"

Vulcan appealed to Coati again.

"No!" The Federation's insistence sounded more

desperate than

well-considered.

Coan stayed where she was against one wall, her arms

folded across her front. "What do you think?" she

asked with a shrug.

Vulcan studied the crane very seriously.

"Well, it is a transmission from an outside

source . . ."

"Oh, come on!" the Federation moaned.

was . . so I guess it's only fair. . ."

"Fair?" The Federation leapt to his feet

to seize the crane from Vulcan. "Fair to drive

the Federation to desperation just because some jerkwater

planet is throwing ducks?!"

S lu straightened in his chair. "They're

cranes!"

The Federation slung the crane back at him; it

only flew about halfway. "They look like

ducks!"

"top acting like children." Perez-Salazar's Latin

contralto cut through the beginning of Sulu's reply.

"You're only complaining," she accused The Federation

"because you planned to use Vulcan as the solu ion

to all your problems. This is what you dese a for not

having the courage to act for yourself!"

was hat I don't deserve," the Federation

returned acid y, "is a bunch of war-mongering

idiots grubbing up every planet they come to and then

claiming they own the whole system!"

Sulu thought he had never before seen someone's soul

truly catch fire. Perez-Salazar's face

grew even darker as her eyes began to smolder;

Coan started 178

across the room for the head table. "Okay, people, I

think that's enough for now . . . to was

"You are accusing my people of cowardly acts?"

Sulu wasn't sure whether Perez-Salazar was

responding from a sense of offended nationality

or if she'd gotten too involved in the

role-playing.

"Take it as you will," the Federation replied.

Perez-Salazar rocketed to her feet just as

Coan reached the table. She spit on the table in

front of the Federation. "Congratulations, el jefe

estupendo-you now have a war!"

Coan physically sat herself on the table between the

two, stopping the Federation's advance with a warning hand

on his chest. "This is

make-believe!" she reminded him, then turned

to rake a meaningful look across the rest of the room.

"Maybe you'll all appreciate the usefulness of

make-believe in the rest of your training!" Waiting

until the Federation had nodded his understanding and returned

to his chair, Coan motioned that Perez-Salazar

should sit as well. "I wish you could all just listen

to yourselves! It's like recess with a bunch of kids!"

No body laughed. "I have never had a less

cooperative, more selfish bloc [*thorngg'f

cadets in my life!" Coan continued through their

guilty silence. "You were all chosen to be here because

you're- special-intelligent-because you display

abilities common to good command officers!" She paced

toward the middle of the gathering, turning

slowly as she walked in order to rake an icy

glare across them all. "Well, where did all those

fine traits go?" topping just behind Sulu's chair,

she leaned against the back of it. "I saw one of you

use creativity and cooperation to solve the problems

put to him. And

everybody else either made fun of him or

ignored him!" Sulu had a feeling he knew who

was being singled out. "If this had been real life,"

Coan berated the rest of them, "you'd be lucky if

Menak didn't bomb you all while you were busy

squabbling among yourselves!" Sulu slipped the

terrorist crane into his pocket as

surreptitiously as he could manage. "In later

scenarios, you won't get the chance to be so kind to one

another, even if you feel so inclined."

She looked them over with coldhearted calculation

one last time, then broke into a friendly smile and

clapped her hands. The transformation was so com-

plete, Sulu didn't know whether to respect her

flexibility or resent her manipulations.

"Okay, everybody," she cried, making herding

motions toward the closest door, "time for lunch! Go

put food in your stomachs-we've got a million

things to do yeti today!"

beulu tossed his accoutrements into the growing pile

on the head table, pocketing the last of his origami

cranes. "I don't suppose you'd be interested in

a hosing deal on Menak III?" he quipped

to PerezSal zar. She didn't dignify his comment

with a reply.

Sulu barely noticed the passage of the next

week.

lass followed class followed drill followed

meals. Sleep must have occurred somewhere between the buy

days, but Sulu honestly had no memories to account

for all the nights. What happened on Tuesday was

as distant or as near as what commenced on Friday;

Sulu took to dating his class notes and his

private reminders just to keep the past in

perspective. His future he didn't even think

about as yet.

He recognized Monday when it arrived only

because it was the very first day on which he had any inkling what

would happen next his class schedule was the same as

that first Monday, and he had kept meticulous

record. Somehow, the warp-driven pace seemed a

little less grueling, the instructors and courses just a

little less confusing with that time schedule as an anchor for

reality. Sulu achieved the end of the day in

much better humor than he had one week before.

No voices greeted him upon his return to the

bunkard. He was somewhat surprised to have beaten

everyone else back, but privately admitted that

sprinting across the quad (the weather was far too

exhilarating to allow mere walking) probably

affected his time. He sailed his course notes at

his bunk from three meters' distance, then swung into the

adjacent concession by catching the doorpost with one hand

as he danced past.

He stumbled to a stop when Poppy called

cheerfully, "I was hoping you'd get here soon!"

Sulu dashed frantic looks in all

directions, expecting Coan to appear like an

avenging angel and shrivel him with a glance. "What

are you doing here?" he demanded in a high stage

whisper. "How did you get here? This is a

restricted campus!"

The, old man climbed to his feet, patting

Sulu's cheek tilde as though to soothe the ensign's

distress. "Old Japanese men look

distinguished," he explained. "I told them I was

an admiral."

"Oh, good God . . . to was

Tetsuo followed amiably as Sulu

dragged him toward the door. "They were polite before

then, but they got very polite afterward. They said I could

find you here."

"Poppy . . ." Sulu checked both

directions before leading his

great-grandfather out into the hall. "I think it's a

capital offense to impersonate Starfleet

officers!"

Tetsuo scoffed. "I didn't impersonate

anybody," he insisted. "I didn't even give

them my name!"

"I don't think that's the point." When the door

at the lend of the hall whisked open, Sulu tucked

Tetsuo back against the wall until he had

glanced around the corer to verify the presence of a

guard. A bored senior cadet wandered back and forth

in front of the doorway, occasionally glancing at the

inviting weather outside.

"Where are we going?"

Sulu put his hand over Tetsuo's mouth; the

old man

fell "obligingly silent. "You want to be an

admiral?" Sulu whispered. tell, shrugged. "Not

especially."

",ell, do what I do anyway-and

don't say anythi g!"

S Au didn't wait for Tetsuo's

acknowledgment. Ste ping through the doorway, he pulled

his shoulders bac , tucked his chin up, and strode

purposefully tow rd the guard at the end of the

hall. The cadet to ed at the sound of Sulu's

footsteps, waving a cordial hello as the other

cadet approached. Returning the security

guard's casual greeting with a terse nod, Sulu

barely glanced at the young man on

his way by; Tetsuo's friendly, "Hello!" was

almost lost under Sulu's stiff, "Carry on."

Once on the quad, Sulu relaxed his stance and

turned to pull Tetsuo up next to him. "I

told you not to talk!" he scolded, walking them

further away from the building.

Tetsuo shrugged, grinning. "I forgot."

Sulu growled with feigned frustration and pulled the

older man into a hug. "Maybe we can get you off

on mental incompetence."

Tetsuo chuckled and returned his

great-grandson's hug soundly. "I've always thought that

wouldn't be hard."

"But, seriously, Poppy, don't sneak in again!

You can get us both in a lot of trouble."

"If you say so." He pushed Sulu away and

started them walking again. "So how is everything?"

"Okay," Sulu allowed. "It's only been a

week-I've been too busy to have an opinion."

The air gusted around them with the smell of ocean and

late roses; it ruffled Sulu's hair like a

warm, loving hand. "You could have called if that's all

you wanted to know."

Tetsuo didn't answer. Sulu glanced over

at his great-grandfather when the older man reached inside

his jacket for a tiny square of colored paper. He

folded a delicate crane as they walked.

"Poppy . . . ?" The smile pn the old man's

face was sweet and happy, like the sell of fragile

honeysuckle just before the frost. "Poppy, is something

wrong?"

Tetsuo's eyes remained fixed on his tiny

work. "I'm dying," son," he said without

prelude.

Sulu wasn't sure how he was supposed

to respond to that, so he only slipped his arm around his

great 183

grandfather's shoulders and whispered, "I know,

Poppy."

"No, I mean really," Tetsuo went

on. "Right now." The crane finished, he tucked it

gently into another pocket, and retrieved another

slip of paper. "Doctor Kobrine says the

tumor's bigger. He wants to operate on me."

Coldness swelled against Sulu's heart. "And?"

Tetsuo paused in his folding, smiling wanly

at Sulu. "I came here because I wanted to talk

to you. I wanted to explain."

The coldness closed into a "painful fist.

"Explain about what?" He didn't want to understand.

Ti'tsuo put away the half-finished crane

to take both of Sulu's hands in his own. "The

operation isn't really going to help anything. It'll

make the tumor smaller, Doctor Kobrine

says, but they can't take it completely away because

of the way it grows."

Sulu nodded slowly. "I know that . . ."

"So operating could maybe kill me. It won't

make the treatments

unnecessary, and it may not even slow down how the

tumor grows. All it does, at best, is make

it all go on a little longer."

was octor Kobrine is the best in the world,"

Sulu insi ted, wanting to speak before Poppy got

too farwa ting to make him understand. "If

he says you sho ld do it, then you should! It's better

than nothing. his

T tsuo squeezed his great-grandson's hands and

smi ed. "I'm not so sure about that anymore."

P nic swam counterclockwise to sorrow.

"Why are you telling me this, Poppy?" Sulu

demanded urgently. "What is it you're trying

to say?"

"I'm trying to say," Tetsuo said gently, "that

onehundred-and-three is older than God ever meant

people to be. Giving you something like a grade four glioma

is His way of telling you to hurry it up-give the

next generation a crack at the world." He reached up

t[*thorn] touch his

great-grandson's face. "I wanted you to understand

why I told Doctor Kobrine to stop the

treatments, because I know no one else ever will."

Sulu's stomach twisted in silent despair.

"You can't stop the treatments . . ."

"I already have."

"No, Poppy!" He pulled away, out of the

old man's reach, out of his grasp. "Don't you

realize what'll happen? Don't you understand what

you've done?" "I've gained a month, maybe

two, of feeling happy, healthy, and

alive before I die," Tetsuo told him.

"Whatever comes after that . . ." He shrugged.

"Maybe nobody really knows. But it doesn't

frighten me anymore."

Sulu felt tears wringing out of his ragged

emotions. "You're giving up!" he accused,

furious. "You're going to desert me just because you're

afraid to-was

"No," Tetsuo interrupted sternly, "I'm not

afraid. Not of dying. Not like this, at least. I'm

afraid of dying badly, son. I'm afraid that

if I wait . . ." Pain glittered in his

stone-black eyes. "I have loved my life! I

loved your! great-grandmother. I loved all the children we

had to together, and all their children, and all theirs. I loved

boating, and the ocean, and the way my face felt after the

salt and wind dried it all shiny like the sand. I

love the animals at the gardens, and those plants you

used to bring home all the time. . . was His voice

trailed off into a gentle laugh. His eyes focused

again,

and he sighed. "I want to say goodbye to all that

whil e we're still on speaking terms. If I stay,

I'm afraid I'll learn to hate living . . .

then I'd really have nothing to live for after

all."

Sulu stared at his great-grandfather, ashamed of the

cold tears on his cheeks, ashamed that shedding those

tears should make him so afraid. "Doctor

Kobrine will stop you."

"He won't," Tetsuo said with certainty.

"I've thought a long time about this. And I've been

folding cranes." He displayed the half-done

crane, shiny purple in the afternoon light.

Sulu slapped the paper construct out of his hand.

"I don't care about your damn cranes!" he

cried, his voice choking on the pain gathered in his

throat. "I care about you, Poppy! You said you'd

come when I gradated! You said-was

"I'm sorry. But it has to be done-it has

to be this way." Sulu jerked away when Tetsuo

reached up to touch him. Lonely disappointment flashed

through the Id man's eyes. "I thought you, of all people,

woul understand."

was ell, I don't!" Sulu grated. "And I

never will! How coul you want to die? How could you

want to leave me. . . to was He felt more tears

rush to the surface, and turned away before his

great-grandfather's gentle sorrow could make him cry.

"Just go home and die if you want o!"

he shouted. "Don't try to make me justify it for

y u!"

Wen he broke and ran for the bunkard, he

didn't know if he wanted Tetsuo to stop him or

let him go. As it was, his great-grandfather said nothing.

It was that image of Tetsuo, standing abandoned 186

and small in the middle of the windy quad, that

Sulu would remember for the rest of his days.

"Ugh!" Sulu threw himself onto his bunk, not

caring enough about the mud and pitch and detritus on his

uniform to bother stripping out of his clothes. "I can't

believe anybody actually lives in those

mountains!" he moaned to the cadet in the next bunk

over. "What did they say? Two and half

million people in one of the smaller cultural centers

alone?"

His companion's uniform and equipment were as filthy

and sweat-soaked as Sulu's; he displayed the same

lack of concern for his bed's welfare as he stretched

out on his own bunk. Cadets all throughout the

bunkard were engaged in similar pursuits.

"I feel like I haven't slept in weeks,"

Sulu replied. "After two months of midnight

drills and six Am. breakfast calls, you'd think

I'd be used to this."

The cadet's only reply was a loud snore.

Sulu closed his own eyes, relishing the

decadent feel of r laxation. After a week and a

half on the other side of t e North

American continent, Sulu welcomed eve San

Francisco's damp, chilly autumn. They'd

been dropped in ten degrees centigrade weather in

the northern Allegheny Mountains and instructed

to make their way to a predetermined base "as soon

as you ca not."

They'd had sufficient gear and food to keep them

alive (sulu had hoped), but it was a

whitehaired, smart-mouthed boy from upstate New

York who" saved them all. He reckoned

directions by the stars better than anyone Sulu had

ever seen; they reached their destination in record time,

losing only a 187

backpack and a sleeping tent in the process.

Sulu, as commander of the excursion, was distinctly

pleased.

He was also exhausted. Classes, duties, and

drills demanded more time and energy than Sulu would have

believed he possessed two months ago, and this

trek through the Alleghenies was only the last on a

long list. He took inspiration and stamina

from every available source-invigorating

conversations, newly formed friendships, frequent

naps and frequent meals comb his greatest source of

strength was his family. Communications from

home-especially from Poppy-had formed the underpinnings

of his endurance. He hadn't realized how much he would

miss that support until it ceased. Tetsuo had

called twice after their argument on the quad. Sulu

responded to neither recorded message, but the

second made him silently cry himself to sleep.

"I feel wonderful," Poppy had told him.

"I feel free. If I c"...ment make you understand

why it has to be this way, at least be happy for me

. . . I love you so much."

The worst part of it was that Sulu thought perhaps he di

understand. His life and activity were always so

important to Tetsuo; the same things were

important to S lu, as well. He couldn't

imagine his own life with ut Stardeet, without

windsailing, without fenci g . . . But if he

admitted to himself (and to Tetsu) that there was dignity in

choosing the time to die, i might seem as though he

condoned it. And he didn' want Tetsuo to go.

Sul rolled over roughly, uttering a guttural

sound of frustration. The unhappy thoughts

slipped to the back of his mind, following a route

well-worn after 188

two months of dismissal. He tried studiously

to will himself to sleep before any more thinking could occur.

He didn't know how long he'd been dozing before

someone jounced his bed. "Mail call! Rise and

shine."

Sulu struggled into a sitting position, feeling as

though he'd been bound up in cotton like a mummy.

He held out a hand for the message tape the other

cadet presented to him. "Oh . . . uh, thanks

. . ." he muttered fuzzily.

But the mail carrier was already awakening the next

cadet in line. "Mail call!"

Sulu squinted at the message's origin through a

yawn. When he saw the California transmit

code, the last of his tattered haze of sleep dashed

away. He scrambled to his feet.

Sunside-as Sulu and the other cadets eventually

discovered-was the recreation area for off-duty

cadet. No one had ever discovered a reason for the eni

matic name, but, with time, no one seemed to car

anymore, either. Along with the chairs, tables, and'i

food services stations, Sunside also sported

seven reader terminals.

The terminals were deserted now. Sulu slipped

into the closest booth; no doubt everyone in this bloc

was stilt recovering from the wild and frigid

Alleghenies.

His name, rank, and serial number appeared,

followed by a return transmit code that he

didn't immediatbbely recognize. He sat

back in the padded seat and waited to see who was the

originator.

Arthur Kobrine's face appeared on the

screen, backed by a room Sulu didn't

recognize, and 189

accompanied by voices Sulu had never heard.

All hope inside him paused, but he couldn't bear

to banish it just yet.

"Cadet Sulu," Kobrine said, his voice low

and strangely roughened. "I . . . They said you were

gone on maneuvers. I hope those went well. I

only wish I . . . I wish you were here, son.

I'd rather tell you this, not some machine. . ."

Kobrine glanced over his shoulder anxiously, his

eyes following something beyond Sulu's ability to see.

When he turned back, his eyes were sad. "Your

great-grandfather died today, son. I tried to call you,

but they said you were gone. I didn't want

to leave a message . . . a lot of messages for

you to find when you got back . . . He was only

sick for the last week, only really sick for the last

few hours . . . He was really happy, son. And

he missed you. He said to tell you ., . ."

Kobrine dropped his gaze, scrubbing at his eyes

with the heels of his hands. "He said to tell you he

loved, you," he finally finished miserably. "That he

alwa s had and always would . . . He left a

bunch of those paper cranes you and he used to make

all the time.i A thousand of them, he said . . . He

said you'd unde tand . . ."

Someone interrupted him again from behind; Doctor

Kobrine nodded an acknowledgment, then raised his

sad face again. "I have to go. I' sorry I had

to tell you like this. Call me at the hospital, if

you'd like. I'm so sorry, son . . ." The trans

ission ended on a white corridor wall while a

dista t intercom called Doctor Kobrine away

to care for some patient who was still among the living.

The rock upon which Sulu laid was bone-eating

cold, smoothed by centuries of interplay with the ocean

and by the feathery green plants that clung to it for

support. Foliage draped in limp tendrils

across muscles, stones, and mollusks

to bob in the moonlit tidal pools like weary

undines; Sulu felt them, cool and moist, beneath his

stomach as he stared across the glassy sea. Like the

kelp, ebb tide found the young cadet without the

strength to stand.

The ocean seemed his only respite after

Doctor Kobrine's horrible message. Sulu

left Sunside without bothering to take the tape from the

reader. Stopping in the bunkard only long enough

to slide a bulky box out from its place in his

locker, he walked away from the bunkard, the quad,

and the Academy without speaking to another living soul.

The box cut into his chest now, pinned between his

pain-racked body and the cold, kelp-wrapped

rock. Sulu, had emptied the contents of the box

into the retreating tide; the last of the thumb-sized

cranes floated beyond the limits of his sight over

an hour ago. Silver, white, transparent,

rainbow, blue . . . He'd fold tilde d them

out of any material that fell into his han so.

While high in the Alleghenies, he'd folded more

than a dozen out of the scarlet-and-white protective

strips on their rations. He'd folded them against the

growing numbers he knew his great-grandfather

collOcted-folded in desperate need of a

miracle now that science and love had failed

him-folded sixhundred-and-forty-four before Poppy

finished his one thousandth and ended the silent race.

Now, the evening breeze blew the little cranes out

to sea like six

hundred vanished souls, leaving only Sulu and

an empty container behind. It was moonless and full

dark before Sulu was able to rouse himself and stand. He

felt stiff, and sick, and tired-partly a legacy

of the cold rock he'd been hugging, partly the

emotional vacancy that ate at his heart like a dying

fire. He walked with cottony, uncaring step, up

the jagged embankment, across the long green concourse,

down the quiet, starlit st reets. He deposited

the box into a refuse container as he passed. The

Academy quad was warm and well-lit upon his

return. Moving into the almost-daylight, something like

embarrassment stirred in Sulu and made him brush

ineffectually at the front of his singlet. A few

pieces of kelp dislodged to fall wetly to the stones

at his fleet. Sulu wished he'd thought about his

appearance] before stretching out on the rock, but he

couldn't truthfully say he'd thought about anything

except somehow freeing the cranes he'd tried

to contain. At that time, that had seemed so

terribly important.

A he stepped through the student entrance, the guar on

duty nodded a reserved, "Good evening." Sulu l

returned the greeting, but didn't pause; he

heard the nsign open an intercom panel just before he

pass d into the hall.

C an waited against the wall outside the

bunkard.

was ood evening, Commodore."

E en her dark eyes looked cold in the

subdued light. "Co gratulations," she said

quietly. "You've just accrued a batch of demerits

that'll take three years to undo."

Tears welled up inside him again, and he did

everything he could to keep them out of his voice. "I

know, sir . . . I'm sorry."

"Save your "sorry's for your parents," she

countered. The disappointment and anger on her face

hurt far worse than her words. "This is command

school. I don't give a damn what you

apologize for-I give a damn what you do!" She

pushed away from the wall with a rough, angry movement,

and started down the hall. "Go in and get to bed.

We're running a scenario tomorrow that you're going to need

your sleep for."

"dis . . thank you, sir . . ." He'd spoken

so softly, he doubted she had heard. Even if she

had, he felt sure she wouldn't care.

"dis . . including responding to computer-generated

incidents such as any starship captain is apt

to encounter," Coan continued, ceasing her pacing of the

lecture hall to sit on the edge of the raised

platform. "The commander of the U.s.s Exeter-your

ship for the course of this scenario-was chosen by our

allwisej all-knowing computer earlier this morning."

She angled her chin upward to meet Sulu's gaze

from all the way down the long hall. He didn't

know if he should be horrified or flattered. "Are

you ready to take youri, post, Captain Sulu?"

Everyone turned to look at him-some to smile, some

to stare. Sulu only shook his head dumbly and

sdeaful "I don't want to be the captain."

Can's look of disappointed anger from the night before

flashed briefly inffbeing again. "Then why are you in

command school?"

"I meant-was

"I don't care what you meant. You're captain

for

this scenario. You'll be in total and complete

command, even over the line officers who have

agreed to help us with this. Remember that, no matter

what happens." She stood then, and announced to the

class at large, "Be at the simulator deck

in twenty minutes. Don't be late! Dismissed."

Sulu sat, staring down at his hands, as the rest

of the class filed out the doors. His heart still ached from

yesterday; he lacked the creativity to decide which

pair of underwear to choose this morning, much less the

quickness required to adequately command a scenario.

He knew Coan would feel little sympathy for such

sentiments, though; when the last of the class arrived at

the simulators, Sulu arrived along with them.

The bloc was split into seven different groups of

varying sizes and composition. Four officers (two

commanders and two captains) greeted Sulu's

bridge crew at simulator four and assigned

them their position's. Sulu settled into the command

chair hesitantly, feeling as though he were sitting

somewhere he shobledfuldn't and that someone would soon come

to chase him away. No one did, though, and the

simulator, as soon sealed and ready to run.

Lights, smells, and sounds cocooned Sulu from

all sides. He heard status reports from

faraway sections of the nonexistent ship,

unimportant flippancies over

intercom channels, sensors cooing peacefully beneath

the more strident computer prompts. It was all so

active-so real! His heart awakened, ever so

slightly, as though responding to some half-heard

clarion; he gripped the arms of the chair for strength.

"Helmsman," he beckoned, trying for

briskness

and instead achieving a sort of breathless anxiety.

"What is our current heading?"

The cadet at the helm glanced at the officer

manning navigations.

Completely in character, the officer only raised an

inquiring eyebrow and turned back to her own

equations. Nodding, the helmsman reported the

heading, then added of his own accord, "That will take us

within fifteen point seven parsecs of the Klingon

Neutral Zone, sir."

Sulu was certain that detail would matter. Swinging

his chair about, he confronted his executive officer.

He drew back slightly in surprise and alarm

to see PerezSalazar seated in the exec's station by the

turbolift doors; he didn't know why her

presence hadn't registered before. "First Officer

Perez-Salazar," he said, recovering, "what is

the nature of our mission in this sector?"

Apparently much more at ease with her position in

this scenario, she consulted her computer briefly.

"Routine scouting," she reported. "We are due

to take on supplies at Station F9 in four

days."

"Is F9 on the neutral zone?"

Perez-Salazar smiled grimly. "If we could

cut through the Neutral Zone, we could reach F9 in

twelve hours."

"I see . . ." Sulu rotated his chair

back toward the front, only just remembering to say,

"Thank you, Mister Perez-Salazar."

The helmsman and navigator both looked at

him expectantly. Sulu flashed them a confident

grin and instructed, "Navigator Janda, plot a

course around the Neutral Zone for rpndezvous with

Station F9. Helmsman, ahead warp three."

"Course plotted and laid in, sir."

"Warp three, sir. Aye, aye."

Sulu settled back in the chair a bit more

comfortably. "Very good. Carry on."

He'd barely had the chance to adjust to his

newfound status before the communications officer started in

her seat and called, "I'm receiving a transmission

. . ." She touched her earpiece and

frowned. "It's very garbled, sir . . . and it's on

the distress channel . . ."

Sulu uncrossed his legs and sat forward in his

chair. A distress call! This was working up to be an

interesting scenario indeed. "Put it on audio."

The communications officer complied; a broken wall

of static filled the tiny bridge. "dis . . Maru,

nineteen periods out of . . . six . . ." The

voice was British, thin with both distance and concern.

"dis . . Mayday! Mayday! . . . neutronic

fuel carrier Kobayashi Maru, nineteen . . .

out of Altair . . . We have struck a gravitic

mine . . . all power, many

casualties . . ."

" Gravitic mine... ?" one of the cadets

whispered.

he captain at navigations nodded bleakly. "I

don't kn w who lays them, I just know they tear the

hell out of passenger ships and freighters."

",They do a good number on starships, too,"

an engineering cadet added. ?"' . . hull breach .

. . Do you read?... Mayday! Ma* . . ."

Sulu signaled communications to ready them for

reply. "Kobayashi Maru, was he declared, "this is

U.s.s. Exeter. What is your

position?"

"dis . . read you, Exeter . . . Sector ten

. . ."

Sulu glanced at the navigator, who winced.

"In the Neutral Zone, sir."

Sulu stopped the next words he planned to say.

"dis . . Exeter, we're losing air . . . can

you help us? . . . Over."

"Sir," communications finally prompted, "do you

wish to reply?"

The Neutral Zone. "Helm," Sulu said, more

softly, "give me a long-range scan on that

sector. What do you get?"

The helmsman gnawed at his lower lip, then

finally shook his head. "Dust, gas . . . I'm

getting a lot of interference . . ."

"Is there a ship out there?"

"1 . . . I think so, sir . . ."

That didn't help with the decision. "You think so?"

The helmsman opened his mouth as though ready

to commit more fully, then scanned the readings again and

sighed. "I don't know, sir."

When Sulu said nothing for several moments,

Perez-Salazar pressed, "Captain, the

Kobayashi Maru is awaiting your

reply."

Sulu nodded, slowly, stiffly. "Kobayashi

Maru . . . You are a civilian freighter?"

"Neutronic fuel carrier . . . three

hundred passengersi. Exeter, what's the

problem?"

"What are you doing in the Neutral Zone?"

The answer this time was long in coming. "dis . "dis

don't know . . . must have slipped course . . .

Exeter, can you help us . . . ?"

Sulu swallowed, feeling a sickness in his

stomach

that told him everything he was about to do was wrong-only

something else inside him knew this was his only

choice.

"Kobayashi Maru, was he answered calmly,

"I'm . . . sorry. We can't help you. I'm

afraid you're on your own." He felt his small

crew stir like agitated bees, but no one said

anything to him. "Breaching the Klingon Neutral

Zone with a Constitution-class starship could be considered

an act of war. An interplanetary conflict with the

Klingons would result in millions of lost

lives, and . . . that's a risk I am not prepared

to take for the lives of so few . . . I'm

very, very sorry."

"dis . . you daft? We're dying!. . . his

"I'O'M sorry."

"Captain, I'm-was The communications officer

recoiled slightly when Sulu turned. "That's

really lousy," she said, dropping out of the scenario.

"I think we ought to go in."

"Se's right," the helmsman intervened. "You can't

just ave them out there."

was e're leaving them." Sulu couldn't believe his

voic sounded so calm and assured. "You've got your

course, Mister."

was h . . ." The navigator, laughing

slightly, turned away from her panel. "You can't

do this," she began.

"I" the commander," Sulu reminded her firmly.

But is insides quivered, and he didn't dare let

go of the c mmand cha ir, lest they see how badly he

was shaking. "I have total control over this vessel,

and I have made my decision." A hard decision-a

horrible decis on-a decision that means all of those

people will die! The navigator nodded, and turned back

to her post.

"Listen, Sulu," the cadet at the security

station interjected, "we're supposed to be

in StarQeet. We're supposed to guard, and

protect!" "Avoiding a war-was

"is cowardice! Kobayashi Maru is less

than fifty parsecs into the Neutral Zone-we could

be in and out before the Klingons even knew we were there!"

"They may already know." No one interrupted, so

Sulu went on. "What is Kobayashi Maru

doing in the Neutral Zone, anyway? Why can't

we clearly scan her coordinates?"

"The ionization factor-was the helmsman began,

but Sulu cut him off. "Possibly. Or a

Klingon trap. There may be no ship out there

to rescue."

The cadet at the science station threw his hands up

in disgust. Sulu noted with some irritation that it was the

Federation from the Galactic Politics scenario on

their first day. "That's so damn paranoid!" the cadet

exclaimed. "Do you mean to say that, as a starship

captain, you would couch all of your decisions in terms

of "maybes'?"

Sulu looked at him, unsure how to respond.

"What else is there?"

Protests erupted from all across the bridge, some

of them in favor of his decision, most of them

emphatically opposed. Sulu kept

expecting the floor-to-ceiling vievluscreen

to crack like an oyster and return them all to loan

and the outside world; he studied the stars displayed on the

screen and waited.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" a voice cut in

sharply from behind him. "This is mutiny!"

The uproar cut off like a transmission that had

suddenly lost its signal. Every thought in Sulu's

brain simply ceased, and he turned the command chair

slowly as Perez-Salazar queried, "Should I

contact security, sir, and have these miscreants

thrown in the brig?" He only blinked at her.

"Calm down, Mate," the security cadet

grumbled.

Her eyes splashed him with prideful fury.

"If we are to treat this scenario as reality for the

purposes of rescuing Kobayashi Maru, then we

should treat our officers realistically, as well."

She turned to all of them, scowling her disgust. "If

this is how you would truly respond to your commander and

peers, I never want to serve on a starship with any

of you!" Her dark gaze glanced off Sulu, and he

felt the implicit, Except you, in that look.

Pride and shame, strangely intermixed, thickened

his throat beyond his ability to respond.

"H w dare you!" she went on, stepping down

to stand by his right hand. "How dare any of you assume

his d cision is an act of cowardice! You!" She

stabbed a finger at the cadet manning communications.

"Save your tarship, or save yourself. Choose!

Now!"

He opened his mouth, shut it, then opened it again and

s ammered, "I . . . my . . . my ship!"

The scowl that twisted Perez-Salazar's dark,

Latin face etrayed her opinion of his

decisiveness. "Do you say that because you really wish the

ship to survive, or beca se you are afraid of the

repercussions should you choo a the more selfish option?"

This cadet didn't volunteer a reply.

"No matter how noble that choice may seem to you

or to others, that was a decision of cowardice," she

told him. "For it to be truly noble, you must

choose death because to live any other way is

unthinkable."

Sulu sucked in his breath abruptly, feeling as

though he'd been kicked, deep and hard, from inside.

"Mister Perez-Salazar. . ."

She turned, straight and proud, at his

summons.

"That will be all. . . Thank you."

He didn't look away when she paused to study

his eyes with painful candor. "Yes, sir." Passing

her muster left him somehow strangely pleased.

"Communications," he said, turning back to the

front, "contact the nearest Starbase with details

on the Kobayashi Maru. If Starfleet can

locate a Klingon representative in time, it

might still be possible to save the freighter. In the

meantime, we have a supply run to make. Helm?"

Only the navigator uttered a cool, "Aye,

aye, sir," in acknowledgment. But they all turned

back to their stations without complaint.

"I hope he knows what he's doing," the science

officer whispered to someone beyond Sulu's sight.

The ensign remained fixed on the stars, and

pretended not to hear. What has to be done, he

told himself gently. I understand that now, Poppy . .

. I honestly, really do . . .

Brutal. He decided that was the best word

to describe the lecture and review following the

Kobc tilde yashi Maru scenario. Coan

replayed the events

on a karge-scale monitor (embarrassing

Sulu as well as

everyone else in the bridge crew), then the

class

discussed their opinions and suggestions regarding

the young ensign's course of action. While the

commodore was studiously nonpartisan throughout the

debate, the bridge crew wasn't quite so hostile

by the time class let out; Sulu felt he had a

pretty good idea what Coan's view of his

decision had been. The knowledge made him proud.

The wind through the quad was brisk and chilly, but

sunlight leapt from one granite-flecked square

to the next as Sulu crossed the white stone plaza.

It seemed somehow sinful to be so lighthearted less

than twentyfour hours after hearing of Tetsuo's

death, but Sulu thought Poppy would understand, and maybe

even approve.

He caught sight of Perez-Salazar walking

alone, as

always, a half-dozen running steps ahead of him.

Oscillating only briefly between approaching her

and

pr et nding not to see, his feet solved the

dilemma for

him by lengthening their strides until he found him

self matching her stiff, determined

gait. "Hi!"

S e glanced at him pugnaciously, and he

continued befo a she could speak, "I wanted to thank

you for stan ing up for me during the simulation. It was

a big help."

She looked forward again and shrugged. "I didn't

do i for your benefit."

Her eyes almost glanced at him, but she seemed

to remember herself and directed the away again. "You were

simply in the right, that's all."

S u smiled. "I had a good teacher." She

didn't prompt him for further information; he

considered letting that mean she didn't want to talk

to him further, but decided he didn't want to play

this game by her rules anymore. "My great-grandfather

had a lot

of understanding about responsibility, and things that just

need doing." The pain inflicted by the subject was

barely overbalanced by the love he would always feel

for the old man. "You'd have liked him," he told

her. "He was a very strong man."

"And a wise man," Perez-Salazar allowed.

"A very wise man, if he taught you these things so

well." Her voice was just as cold as always, but

Sulu still felt warmed by her words.

"Yes," he admitted. "A very wise man.

He taught me the difference between playing hero and being

responsible . . . and how sometimes the two can be the

same." He continued matching her pace as they

approached the main building, not wanting to break this

newfound rapport with Perez-Salazar, yet not

sure how to continue it. As they entered the building's

long, gray shadow, he asked abruptly, "Have you

ever seen Old San Francisco?" She paused

in her walking, and so surprised Sulu that he almost

overshot her position. "No," she said warily.

"Why?"

was Well, I'm a great native guide,"

Sulu informed her with a wink. "We could get passes

for this evening, and I'll show you Golden Gate

Park, and Fisherman's Wharf, and the Palace of

Fine Arts." He saw something like panic move in

her eyes, and amended, "No strings. Just a thank you

. . . Really."

Tle panic subsided, leaving only a

vestigial smile on her face; the smile made

her very pretty. "All right. I shall meet you here after

supper."

"threat!" Sulu dug into his pocket and drew

out the crumpled paper crane he had

folded during the class debate over his

Kobayashi Maru decision. He 203

presented it to Perez-Salazar with a flourish.

"Redeemable for one dynamite tour."

She took it as though it were a soiled sock. "This

is one of those ducks," she complained, but not so

severely as her expression suggested. "You folded

these all through our first scenario."

Flattered that she'd even noticed him during the

turmoil of Galactic Politics, he hid his

embarrassment behind an expression of resignation.

"They aren't ducks! They're cranes!"

"Cranes?"

Sulu closed her hand about the tiny construct and

explained patiently, "In ancient Japan,

cranes were revered for their grace and beauty. It was

believed that if you folded one thousand paper cranes

while meditatin@., you could create a miracle."

Perez-Salazar opened her hand only long enough

to sneak a look at the origami bird, then smiled

more stunningly than before. "Does it work?" A swell

of pain and love overwhelmed him again, and Sulu thought

of Poppy and nodded. "I believe it does" he

told her sincerely. "I really believe it might

be true."

I

I i

HALLEY

WELL, HE wns xrcHT Kirk

reflected unhappily. It wasn't funny. He

stared at the airlock door and willed Scott

to hurry.

"Your great-grandfather must have been a very exceptional

man," McCoy finally said softly. "I would have

been honored to meet him."

Something reminiscent of a smile tugged at

Sulu's lips. "Hang in there, Doc," he

confided weakly. "You might still get your chance."

"Captain? Shuttle?"

Scott's voice from the front cabin drew

everyone's attention. Chekov slid from his seat behind

Sulu and trotted into the front as the engineer

reported, "I've got . . . some bad problems

out here, Captain-a dust storm, or a cloud, or

something . . . I just busted my tail "to repatch a

conduit that's been shredded by dust, and-"The channel

didn't waver; Kirk heard Scott swear-

softl y before continuing. "I'm hurrying as fast

as I can, was the Scotsman finished grimly.

"But I think . . . Well, it's best you

not wait on me. his

McCoy threw Kirk a frightened glance.

"What's he saying? What does that mean?"

Kirk gripped the back of his seat and wished for the

millionth time that he wasn't injured. "Get him

back in here," he ordered tightly.

"dis . . I knew it . . . to was Chekov hovered

in the doorway, looking pale and shaken. "7 should be

out there, not him!"

"Chekov!" Kirk snapped. The lieutenant

started, flushing with

embarrassment. "Get him in here! Hurry!"

"With what?" McCoy insisted. "Jim, we

haven't got a radio!"

Chbkov bolted for the suit locker by the exit.

"Yes, we do!" he gasped. "My God, we have

six of them!"

Kirk couldn't believe none of them had thought of the

h lmet radios sooner. "Good, Chekov!"

"Scott?" Chekov held the locker door open

with one foot as he triggered the radio in one of the

helmets with is hand. "Mister Scott! Do you

read?" " IK ep out of my ear, Chekov!"

Scott's voice returned peevishly. "7'm

trying to concentrate!"

"ND," Chekov countered, "come back in. You

can finis when the dust storm has passed."

Sc tt's warm, rich laughter was thinned by stress

and distance. "7 can't wait that long, lad, and you know

I can't. Now shut up and let me work. was "D

dn't you listen to Sulu's story?" Chekov asked

the engineer. "Heroics don't always help!"

"What are you prattling about?" 206

Kirk waved for Chekov's attention, shaking his

head. "Let him be. . ."

Chekov looked up in response to Kirk's

voice, and a skirl of keening feedback tore through the

front of the shuttle. McCoy swore caustically;

Chekov twisted away from the helmet in his hands. As

the clamor peaked and slid away, Scott's

voice pierced the resultant static with a sharp,

frightened cry.

Chekov clutched the helmet to him again.

"Scotty!"

"I've got a suit breach! Ah, DAMN!

Chekov! Listen, lad, you've got to- was

Silence engulfed the open channel. Chekov's

suit helmet clattered to the deck as the

lieutenant began hastily stripping off his duty

jacket. He slung the jacket onto the

front row of seats and dragged a full suit from the

locker without even asking permission to go.

The shuttle groaned and shuddered slightly, echoed

by a short, ringing report along the starboard hull,

and a muted thump. An almost imperceptible sensation of

movement made Kirk's head spin. He realized

then that Halley's tumble had shifted; Scott had

cut the cylinder free.

"Where do you think you're going?" McCoy's

voice brought Kirk's attention back to the room.

"Chekov, don1t be an idiot!"

The lieutenant was half-suited, hastily

checking his pressure and seals. "Stay inside,

Mister Chekov," Kirk ordered sternly.

Chekov didn't look up from his work. "I

won't leave the lock," he promised. "If I

can't see him, I'll come right back."

"Chekov . . ." But the thought of abandoning

Scott turned Kirk's stomach; it could hardly do

more harm to let Chekov salve his conscience by checking.

"We need someone in this shuttle besides me who

isn't incapacitated . . ."

McCoy sat with Chekov's jacket in his lap,

twisting the garment into a thick rope with his nervous

hands. "Chekov, didn't you listen

to Sulu's story? Sometimes you have

to sacrifice-losing both of you won't help

anyone!"

"I know that!" Chekov shouted, slamming the locker

door with one suited hand. "Do you think I didn't

know that before we sent him out there?" He calmed

abruptly; Kirk watched him take four deep,

measured breaths before stooping for the fallen helmet

"But we can't afford to lose him, either," Chekov

finished quietly. "That's the difference between

classrooms and reality."

"Qo on, then." Kirk intercepted whatever

McCoy had lbeen about to say. "But be careful."

Cleaekov only nodded. Running his hand across the

overlarge controls beside the airlock door, he

inspected the seals on his helmet one last time as

he waited for the door to open. Kirk was just about to question

the delay when Chekov looked up with a frov tilde

n and touched the clumsy panel again. S mething

almost like pain crossed the lieutenant's face as he

stared at the panel. Kirk's heart wrenched inside

him. "What is it? What's wrong?" "I . . ."

Chekov shook his head slowly. "I can't

access!"

McCoy straightened in his seat.

"What?"

"It won't let me in!" Chekov cried in

delight. He

tossed the helmet back behind him again. "The

airlock-it's cycling! He's alive!"

McCoy was already on his feet beside Chekov by the

time the status light on the airlock door flashed

green. Chekov yanked off his own gloves as the

doors sighed open; it was all the two men could do

to catch Scott as the engineer stumbled through and started

to fall.

"Scotty, move your hand!" McCoy ordered,

trying to pry loose the hand Scott had clamped just

above his left elbow. "Move your hand!"

The hand moved, but not in response to McCoy;

Scott caught at Chekov's wrist as the

lieutenant reached to break Scott's helmet

stays. A six- centimeter-long tear marred the arm

of the suit, revealing Scott's blood-stained

tunic beneath. McCoy thrust his hand into the opening as

Scott motioned Chekov frantically to his left

shoulder. The lieutenant nodded comprehension.

"Whoa! Hold on a minute!" the doctor

protested when Chekov shouldered him out of the way.

"This man's hurt!"

"tie also has a suit breach," Chekov

answered shortly. "There are joints in these suits

that lock down to inimize air loss. They also cut

off

circulation." He angled his eyes up at

Scott's visor and asked loudly,

[*reggg'Reaft?"

Looking thoroughly miserable, Scott merely

nodded

Chekov twisted something at the shoulder of the suit,

and the seal gave way with a popping gasp. Scott

threw his head back with an expression of profound

pain, then slid bonelessly to the floor between

Chekov and McCoy.

"Is he all right?" Kirk asked anxiously.

McCoy nodded from where he was still bent over

Scott's arm. "Looks that way. This is long, but

clean, and not too deep." He flashed Scott a

rueful grin as Chekov removed the engineer's

helmet. "So much for the heroics, eh, Mister

Scott?"

Scott's grin looked weak and sad against his

pale face. "No more heroics, Doctor-that I can

promise you..."

"laid you sever the nacelle?" Kirk wanted

to know.

Scott nodded. "I was hit at a good time-just when

I was ready to go. She's severed and on her way."

He chuckled. "She ought to produce a bonny

fireworks display when she hits home, too."

"Well done, Mister Scott," Kirk told

him, smiling. "1"'11 et you a promotion for this."

"I'd settle for a week off with pay," the

engineer replied.

"Done."

"Sr . . . ?" Sulu stirred slightly, but

didn't open his eyes. "Do you really think the

Enterprise will see the flash?"

Kirk sighed, afraid to hazard a promise.

"I don't know, Mister Sulu," he admitted

at last. "We'll just have Ito wait and see."

I

White-blue light bathed the shuttle nearly an

hour later, blinding Kirk and Chekov, who

happened to be watching out the starboard windows for the

event. "Do you think that did it?" McCoy wanted

to know.

"It did something," Chekov replied cynically.

"We just have to hope it hit the right

asteroid."

Scott stretched out to rest in a row of rear

seats; when a lightning show of sparks and flashes

commenced precisely a half hour following the

explosion, the engineer only commented, "I'd say we

hit the right

asteroid," and went back to sleep.

An hour of tense inactivity followed, but the

Enterprise didn't appear. "Maybe Spock

wants to be sure before he commits to coming this close

to the planet," McCoy suggested halfheartedly.

Scott was the only one moved to respond. "More

likely, not enough of the explosion's energy made it through

this system's gravitational mumbo jumbo to register

as noteworthy on the Enterprise's sensors," the

engineer explained sadly. "We didn't look

any different than anything else that's going on out

here."

"Meaning?" McCoy pressed.

"Meaning nothing," Scott told him. "Nothing

at all."

No one else cared to speculate further on the

Enterprise's absence. Kirk's stomach

embarrassed him by occasionally punctuating the silence

with voluble grumbles; he soon gave up

apologizing. They were tilde all hungry, and

tired, and depressed. He tried not to remind himself

that all these conditions would end t1ar too soon.

"How are you feeling, Scotty?" he asked, just

to bre tilde up the silence. Scbtt looked up from

his impromptu couch and rubbed at his bandaged left

arm. "Good enough," he said. "But I'm not going

EV again!"

Kirk smiled. "I don't think you'll have to."

"Do you have a Kobayashi Maru story?"

McCoy wheedled from the front row. "We still have time

to fill."

Scott pushed himself upright with a sigh, wincing when his

injured arm brushed against the back of the seats. "I

suppose I could take up a wee bit of time with the

story."

Chekov looked honestly surprised. "You took

the

Kobayashi Maru?"

Scott scowled at him. "No, they just let any

engineer take the bridge when the captain is gone!"

He softened his words with a smile. "I had my share

of command school. I just didn't take to it so

well."

"With the destructive tendencies the rest

of this crew has displayed," McCoy commented, "I

would think anything you did as a cadet would be exem-

plary."

Scott shook his head and settled in for the tale.

"Doctor, when it comes to destructive tendencies,

these bairns have nothing on me . . . to was

I

IN THEORY

"IF THIS WERE GRADE SCHOOL, Mr.

Scott, I'd have to take those drawings away."

Scott hastened to conceal his papers beneath splayed

hands, scratched a meaningless line along the left-hand

margin of his diagram in the process. AdmiraGl

Howell smiled indulgently from the front of

Scot's desk; that's when Scott realized the rest

of his classmates were long gone. He felt his

face begin to warm. "Oh . . . Sorry,

Admiral, sir. . ."

was omehow," Howell commented with a sigh, "I dou

t you are." He plucked the bottommost paper

fro Scott's pile and turned it about for study.

Scott trie hard to withhold a wince when Howell

frowned at the drawing, rotated it another ninety

degrees, then lifte one eyebrow in

uncomprehending

curiosity. "Sc ematics?" he finally

queried, glancing at Scott.

T e young Scotsman knotted his hands together in

his lap. "Aye, sir. . ."

"Mister Scott, this is history class, not

design!"

"Oh, I'm not designing it, Admiral!" He

leaned halfway across the desk, bending the edge of the

paper back to peer at the scribbling upside down.

"I'm redesigning! See, it's part of a

defective coolant system at my cousin's

station. I was helping her trace a fault, and we

got as far as here-was He tapped one complex

tangle of lines and symbols. "combbf I had

to leave for command school." His attention caught on a

mismatched circuit reference; the stylus was in his

hand, scribbling at the paper before he took the time

to consider that Howell probably wasn't interested in

the drawing's accuracy. "What I can't figure

out," he went on, returning the stylus to his

desk, "is how this coupling-was He circled yet

another portion of the sketch with one finger. "comfits

into it all. I mean, it fits--right here-but it

doesn't fit in, if you see what I mean. And

I think that's the problem. See, if you

look right here-was

"viister Scott . . ."

"plus comy can see where the current-was

"Mister Scott!"

Scott clamped his mouth closed on his blathering,

forcing his mind to shut down all technical thought.

Stopping thinking was never easy for him, but it was something

he figured he'd have to get used to. Captaino were

supposed to depend on other people fvr cleverness. That's

why they were captains.

H (well kept glancing from the paper,

to Scott, to the aper again. "You drew this from

memory?" he aske , brown eyes busy with thought.

"All of it?"

"Well . . ." Scott pulled down the corner

of the sheet again, just in case they'd somehow begun

discus-

sion on another sketch without his knowing it. The

same drawing filled the crumpled sheet. It was no

wonder Howell felt the need to verify the

blueprint's authenticity; Scott was ashamed of his

own sloppy handiwork. "I only tore the system

down the once," he was forced to admit abashedly.

Howell snorted once with amusement, then dropped

the schematic back among Scott's other

things. "What's your major area of study, Mister

Scott?" he asked as Scott shuffled his drawings

into some order.

"Engineering, sir." He wished Howell would

excuse him before remembering to turn this talk into a

formal reprimand.

"And you studied engineering before the Academy?"

"Yes, sir. . ." Smoothing his crumpled

drawings with one hand, Scott tried to ignore the

despair slowly twisting his stomach. "I've always

studied it."

"I see." Howell leaned back against another

desk and folded his arms. "Why are you here, Mister

Scott?"

"I . . ." Scott cursed aloud when he

realized it was 1113 and he was more than just a little

late for his next class. "I don't know!" he

cried. "I was due in tacos-was

,eaationo, Scott . . ." The admiral caught

at Scott's arm as the engineer pushed to his feet

in a flurry of books and loose paper.

"Blot, sir, I-was

"I mean what are you doing in command school?"

Scott's mind shied away from all thoughts of

215

captaining a starship; he didn't want to give

fear another chance to tear up his peace of mind. "I

. . . I'm learning to be a starship commander."

was Do you want to be a commander?" Howell asked

him, still holding on to his arm.

Scott shrugged (a bit stupidly, he thought),

all the while wishing his mouth hadn't gone so dry.

"I don't know, sir."

Howell nodded. "I take it that means no?"

""lies, sir," he admitted timidly. "I

guess it does."

"So why are you here?"

Scott sighed and sank back into his seat.

"My family, sir . . ." He spent a moment

casting about for words that wouldn't misrepresent the

situation back home. "I've been helping my

cousin, who's a bonny engineer," he finally sighed.

"But the rest of them . . . well; they think I'm

being wasted by not being in command . . . I got tired of

fighting them, that's all , ."

was idn't your cousin have anything to say?"

S ott laughed as he remembered the string of

voluble rofanity Cheryl had launched at the family

when she eard of Scott's "decision." "Aye, she

had plenty to s you. But the folks figure

you can buy fine engineers thro gh the mail." He

caught a flash of disapproval in Ho ell's

eyes, and leaned forward to insist, "They mean well,

Admiral-they truly do! They're good folk, and

good people. They just don't understand the ailing-they most of

them don't know what it mea s . . . to was

"But it's your life, Mister Scott." Howell

tugged at Scott's diagrams but didn't pull

them free again. "It's your career! If you really

don't want to be a starship 216

captain, tell me! I'll go to Admiral

Walgren and see if I can have you transferred

to Engineering School."

The very thought made Scott's stomach wrench with

worry. "Please, sir, don't do that." Pushing

to his feet, he pulled all his books to his chest

and hoped they would hide his unsteady breathing. "I

got in here, after all, so I must have something. If

I've really got the ability Starfleet seems

to think I do, I figure it would be a crime not

to use it. Besides, it would break my poor mother's

heart if I just walked out now."

Howell sighed and partially turned away. "Have you

thought about what you're going to do when they finally push you

up to your own command?" Scott stepped past

Howell and headed hastily for the door. "I'll

make do," he assured the admiral. "I always

do."

Scott rubbed at his eyes and slouched lower at his

workstation. The coupler he'd been designing rotated

slowly through all three dimensions on the computer

screen in front of him. He paused it wherever he

felt necessary, but there were few alterations to make at this

stage; he'd been working on the coupler for several

hours.

A1 three in the morning, the computer lab was

predictably empty. Scott didn't mind the

solitude; in fact," he preferred it to the

noisy, pointless evenings enjoyed by his fellow

cadets. Listening to the others speculate on their

future careers, their future commaids, ate at

Scott's already fragile sense of selfworth; his

own lack of ambition hung around his neck like a

stone, marking him as unworthy of the attention and

encouragement he'd already received in Starfleet.

He felt guilty that he'd allowed himself to be

pressured in!coming to command school-guilty that he

didn't want to be here at all. Scott would have

been happy repairing and designing ships' systems

forever, and, for some reason, he felt

guilty about that, too.

Stopping the coupler display's rotation, Scott

leaned forward to speak into the computer. A few notes

to Cheryl, then he'd batch the entire design off

to her before cutting off to bed. He'd already have a rough

time slipping into the barracks unnoticed; he wished

he worried about curfew violations as much as he

worried about his future.

The technical notes to Cheryl only took a

few seconds. Scott hesitated briefly over

whether to include personal hellos to the family;

he decided against it when all he could think to say

was, I DON'T WANT TO BE HERE! over

and over and over again. And then,; I MISS YOU

ALL.

HOEA"d only just sent the transmission on

its way whe the computer screen flashed black and the

coup er design vanished. Scott paused, his hand

hov- erin over the power switch, wondering who he would

repo t a malfunction to at this time of night. Of

course, he could always pry the equipment apart and

trac down the problem himself. Before he could slide the

terminal about and set to work, an amber trail of

print danced across the screen.

I T OUGHT THIS MUST BE Y.

NICE DESIGN-

IN , 'SCOTTY".

"What in . . . ?" He pulled his hands down

into his lap, not sure if he should power down the

terminal or

encourage this peeper by responding. The fact that

some computer wizard had managed to "peep" into the

Academy's system at all troubled Scott

mightily. There were more important data than

Scott's engineering designs in the Academy

computer; all it took was one careless peeper, and the

whole system could come crashing down. Then it occurred

to him that the peeper might very well be within the

Academy, and not an outside source at all. That

calmed his mind a little. "Where are you?" he asked.

"Don't you know it's after curfew?"

AMUSING. I NEEDN'T WORRY ABOUT

CURFEW. BUT YOU SHOULD-IT'S AFTER 0300.

WHY RISK SO MANY DEMERITS FOR SUCH

A SILLY PROJECT?

Labeling Cheryl's coupler "silly" wounded

Scott's pride. He'd promised Cheryl a

finished design before he left; he was delivering

nearly three months late, but he vas confident enough

in his abilities to believe she'd think the

wait well worth it. He wasn't about to try and

explain his affection for design to some peeper whose very

hobby made clear that he didn't give a damn

about the pride people took in their systems. "Who are

you?"

PERHAPS I'M YOUR FAIRY GODMOTHER. I

AM WILLING TO GRANT YOU ONE WISH.

Send me home! Scott thought, all unbidden.

He shook his head to scatter such dreams, afraid

to even mention them, much less wish for them.

YOU ARE A FINE ENGINEER, BUT AN

UNHAPPY CAPTAIN. IF YOUR FAIRY

GODMOTHER WERE TO OFFER YOU A CHANCE

TO LEAVE COMMAND SCHOOL AND RETURN

TO

ENGINEERING-WITHOUT SHAMING YOUR FAMILY OR

REQUIRIN G YOU TO BE REMISS IN YOUR

DUTIES-WOULD YOU ACCEPT?

Scott touched the screen with wondering fingers. The

coupler design sprang up beneath them, rotating a

slow, silent waltz.

YES OR NO, MISTER SCOTT?

the peeper pressed impatiently.

THE ANSWER IS THAT SIMPLE.

distilde seaea1

It was done. He couldn't take the word back now,

no matter what happened. The genie was out of the

bottle and promising his fealty.

I

VERY WELL. SIMPLY BE YOURSELF,

SCOTTY.

LE*VE THE REST TO ME.

The coupler vanished, along with the glowing word ,

leaving Scott all alone in an empty computer

lab. He thumbed the power switch with one numb hand

tilde then sat for a long time after the faint hum of the

machinery faded. Early the next morning, as

Scott pulled on his boots in a crowded, brightly

lit barracks, he realized it all

must have been a dream. You just didn't get

second chances of such

magnitude-Cheryl would get her coupler

design, Scott would get his captain's stripes,

and all these silly wishes would be left far behind.

Unknown peepers just didn't come in and fix everything

without being asked. That just wasn't how the real world

worked.

He tried not to let the incident bother him

anymore.

"Tell me again-how did I get to be

in command of this scenario?"

"Computer selection. I always thought the computer

picked the best commander for any scenario based on

student records." The other cadet glanced

Scott quickly up and down, shrugging more to himself than

to his companion. "I guess it's just random draw,

though."

Scott was inclined to agree. In a previous

scenario, he'd been assigned the position of chief

engineer, and the annoyance of having to tell a

half-dozen other cadets what to do (as if

engineers couldn't think of enough duties for themselves)

nearly killed him. Now the computer was saying that

Montgomery Scott was the best it could do for a

starship commander from this class; if that were the case,

Scott was heartily concerned about the rest of

Starfleet.

The simulation chamber-so startlingly like a real

stalrship's bridge that Scott kept expecting the

real captain to chase him out of the command chairrumbled

shut like a monstrous clam. How could they Wk him in

here like this, responsible for so many people? It was only

make-believe, true, so any decisions he made

couldn't really affect the whole Federa-

tion. Still, no one had even asked

Scott if he wanted to be the captain, and he

most emphatically didn'd Oh, Admiral

Howell had asked, "Are you ready?" just before steering

Scott off for the bridge, but Scott knew that was

only a polite question, not a real question wanting a real

answer. So Scott had replied, "I'm ready,"

in a voice whose steadiness lied about his trembling

hands. Smiling a little sadly, Howell had clapped

him manfully on the back and sent him on his way.

Scott would rather the admiral had banished him to the

outer Pleiades.

The first part of the scenario passed in a haze. The

U.s.s Saratoga didn't appear to be doing

anything important in this simulation-just a routine

training cruise to Gamma Hydra, without even

supplies to drop off or passengers to coddle.

Scott mouthed meaningless course changes,

responded woodenly to questions and comments. He couldn't

completely divorce knowledge of the simulation's falseness

from everything that happened, so he tried to convince himself that

nothing impressive would be expected from j him.

When asked about rescuing a damaged neutrbnic

fuel carrier, Scott responded with an

automatid affirmative, then turned back to the

discussion he'd een conducting with

Saratoga's nonexistent engineering staff. This red

alert siren startled him out of a dissertation on ci uit

rerouting and energy dispersal. "What's the matter?"

he asked, realizing belatedly that he probably should

have directed that question to his exec.

"T Klingon cruisers, dead ahead," the

science officer reported, just as helm exclaimed,

"They're readying their weapons!"

Scott's stomach turned to hot water and started

to crawl about his insides. "Communications," he

summoned evenly, "try to explain to these . . ."

Mindful of the monitoring officers, he tempered the

label he'd intended to employ. "dis . . people that

we're here on a rescue-was

"Incoming!"

"Full power to screens!" The command had barely

cleared Scott's lips when the first barrage of

disrupter fire expended itself against Saratoga's

deflectors. Scott's teeth clacked together as

he was flung back into his seat by the impact.

"Screens four, seven, and eight are down," the

executive officer, bent over his viewer,

reported stonily. "Screens three and sixteen

are damaged. They won't last another round,

sir."

Scott stared at the exec in stunned

disappointment. "Were our deflectors up?" he

sputtered. Intellectually, he knew they were;

instinctively, he just couldn't believe a simple

disrupter could wreak that much havoc, even through only

partial shielding.

"We've also got premature detonation in four

of our six torpedo tubes," the exec continued.

"What?!"

"And a complete loss of power in the starboard wasp

nacelle." The young officer raised his head from his

viewer like a doctor pulling away from a dying

patent. "We're just about done, sir."

Scott would have been less confused if the man had

started speaking in tongues. "That much damage...?"

The exec nodded. "That's the whole tally, sir."

"How?"

"Disrupters, sir," the helmsman sighed, a

bit irritably. "They can do a lot of damage

to a ship."

"Is that so?" Scott grated softly, feeling the

blood rise hot and angry into his cheeks. He

lifted his chin to the Klingons who closed on the

viewscreen, suddenly not caring that this was just a damn

scenario. "Well, not to my ship, they

don't-not with a single damn barrage!" Any computer

that thought otherwise deserved whatever Scott could throw

at it. He slammed his fist onto the command chair's

intercom button. "Phaser bay!"

"Aye, captain?"

was Yes, sir?"

"Stir?"

Another blast rocked the ship. Scott felt

each rumble like fire in his blood. "Number three

screen, dowp!" the exec called. Scott ignored

him. "I' want all phaser bays to fire on my

command, each of you aimed at one of those bedeviled

crafts," Scot instructed the phaser chiefs

grimly. "Continuous re-start at your lowest

possible frequency-was

Another disrupter hit. And another.

"Plumber three screen is down, sir!" the

exec repeated loudly.

Sc tt wished the beggar would quit interrupting his

thin ing. "comrange upward until you match their

interference pattern and cut through those shields like

butter!"

was ye, aye!" all three bays responded in

unison. Scot smiled the smile of a satisfied

hunter.

The navigator was already plotting an escape

course as the Saratoga's bays opened fire with a

chilling,

climbing wail. "I can't signal Starfleet,"

the communications officer interjected from behind Scott.

"The Klingons are jamming my signal."

Golden-red light burst across the viewscreen like

a nova, burning Scott's eyes with its

brilliance as Saratoga's phasers finally reduced

the Klingons to atom. "Not anymore, they aren't,"

Scott told communications. "Contact Starfleet.

Helm-get us out of here."

"Working on it, sir." The helmsman swore

suddenly, punching at his panel. "But we've got

company again!"

The five blue-gray cruisers hove into view

even as the helmsman reported. "That's it for the

phaser banks, sir," the science officer reported

as the Saratoga began her limping retreat. "Bay

crews report all cells exhausted beyond our

ability to recharge."

Scott waved off the report, dropping back

into his chair. He wanted to feel weak and wasted

after that first adrenaline surge. All he felt was

sere and angryangr tilde at the

monitoring officers for making him captain in a

scenario he patently had no business commanding,

angry at whoever had programmed this fatalistic

computer in the first place. "Don't worry abou the

phaser bays. We aren't going to need them agai ,

anyhow."

was ingons closing!"

"CO all rear shields," Scott ordered.

His brain raced about like light in a mirrored box,

searching his memory for any ideas at all. "I

want everything we've got up front."

Especially with a computer that so

overestimates Klingon firepower! He punched

at the intercom again as a course of action began

to take form. "Engineering!"

"Aye, sir?"

"Pull me a canister of antimatter-was

The engineer sputtered. "Sir?"

"Don't question, just listen!" He didn't have time

to explain every step of his plans to these nervous

nellies. "It should take you just under three minutes,

if you hurry. Pull me the whole thing and run it

to the closest transporter room!"

"But-I-was

was Move! Bridge out." He thumbed

another button as

the helmsman announced that the first Klingon torpe

does were on their way. ?"'" orpedo bay," a

nervous male voice replied to Scott's

brusque summons. "You called, bridge?"

"Aye. You're dead down there, right?"

was Meaning the bays, sir?"

Scott dropped his head into his hands and counted

quickly to three. "Yes, the bays. You don't

function?"

L ght, white and flashing, sprayed across the

bridge as t e Klingon torpedoes impacted

with the forward scr ns and detonated.

was verything's completely dead down here, sir," the

wea ons tech answered when the explosion was past.

was 11 right, then," Scott continued

decisively. "Pack up every torpedo you can get

your hands on and get "emIto the transporter

rooms."

"Everything?"

"Everything! Six torpedoes to each transporter

room! Now go!"

"Transporter room to bridge!" The call

came immediately upon the torpedo bay's sign-off

"We've got that antimatter canister,

sir. What now?" Scott held the channel open,

turning to the helmsma n. "Pull us back. Keep

pulling us back as fast as impulse drive will

allow."

"Aye, aye, sir."

"Navigator?"

"Sir?"

"Start a continuous reading on the crux ship's

position, and transmit your data down to the

transporter room." He bent to the intercom again.

"Prepare to receive coordinates."

"Incoming," the helmsman announced, with somewhat

less concern than before. Scott nodded his

acknowledgment, already working equations in his head for the

next fleet of ships he knew the computer would

send.

"Coordinates received, bridge," the

transporter room responded after a moment. Then

"Uh, sir? Which should we use?"

Scott grinned. "Give me less than two

kilometers in front of the crux ship-was

The second barrage hit with considerably more force

than the first. Scott clung to the command chair while

half his bridge crew was thrown to the floor, the

lighting dimmed sharply before climbing again on

emergency power.

"comeaMess than two kilometers," Scott

picked up again when tilde the systems had

stabilized, "from whatever its coordinates are when you

energize. Then I want you to immediately beam back the

canister."

"But-was

"Just the canister," Scott stressed. When would

these bairns learn to shut up and just listen? "Leave

the antimatter behind."

"Holy cow . . ."

Scott listened while transporter techs

scurried about like busy ants. The distance was too

great for the bridge crew to see when the antimatter was

delivered, but everyone knew when the crux ship

struck the antimatter's area of affect all

five cruisers flew apart into white noise and

molecular wind just as they leashed another assault.

Scott was grinning like a fool when the ship bucked

him out of the chair and onto the deck.

"Screens are down, Captain!" sounded on top

of someone else's frantic, "Hull breach!

We've got a hull breach in section six

hundred!"

Scott climbed back into the command chair

without bothering to ask the science officer if any

trace of the", enemy ships remained (the velvet

emptiness beyorfd the viewscreen rendered such questions

extraneouj). "Navigator! Are we out of the

Neutral Zone yet his

"4We have been!" the navigator replied.

"They're foll tilde wing us!"

" Ah, hell . . . to was

"Nine!"

veryone on the bridge jerked about at the science

obled er's broken squeak. "What?" Scott

demanded, irrationally annoyed at the man's

interruption. Nine!" the officer replied, still looking

shocked. "We've got nine Klingon ships closing

on our port bow!"

"Coming around!" helm announced even as Scott

stabbed at the intercom to call, "Transporter

room!"

"We've got them!" the main transporter room

proclaimed. "Six torpedoes in every room.

Orders, Captain!"

It won't work, Scott realized suddenly. He

checked the equations in his head again, and wondered if a

computer would let mathematics outprove

experimentation. Shaking his head, he

admitted that he had nothing to lose. "Take your

coordinates from navigations again-was The navigator

nodded understanding and started to scan. "comand from the science

station." The science officer whirled to face her

panel. "Lock on the juncture points in the

Klingon screen system and beam six torpedoes

to each juncture point on my command."

Scott studied the sleek ships on the

viewscreen as he awaited the

transporter rooms' readiness. The monitors

would stop the scenario, he was sure of it. Someone would

blast open the screen and rail at him for dishonesty-for

cheating! His career would end in ruins

"Transporter room, here." The voice at his

elbow made him jump. "All rooms ready for

beaming."

Scott licked dry lips and nodded at the

approaching ship. "Transport at will."

Toe resultant explosion was beyond deafening;

Scot's ears rang in painful symphony with his

aching heart as atomic fire consumed the nine

Klingon war dragons less than a thousand

kilometers beyond his bow.i He ducked his head against

it, hearing the navigator bark a startled curse.

He was still staring at the floor as the world

faded from white, to ephemeral

pastels, to gray-speckled normalcy again. They

iegoing to kill me, he thought with sick resignation.

" Fifteen war dragons, on the way." The

helmsman began to laugh a little manically.

"Jesus Christ! Fifteen . . . to was

Scott couldn't make himself look up to watch the

ships close. The knowledge that this was not realityand that he could

pay dearly for taking advantage of that fact-had

been driven home again with gale force when those nine

ships cleared the screen. Suddenly, he'd lost

interest in defending the honor of a ship that wasn't

even really there. He would do his best until this

travesty was all over, but he knew better than

anyone else at this Academy just how pitiful his

best would be. "Engine room, unlock the warp

drive main control. You'll need somebody from

weapons, but ."

Scott kept his eyes carefully focused on the

wall abov tilde Admiral Walgren's head.

He didn't know whet er or not this private conference

room was reall colder than the rest of the

Academy, but it certainly felt like it now. was o

you know why I've called you here?" Walgren aske

the engineer stiffly. was e, sir," Scott

answered softly. "I . . . I think I do."

was ould you state that reason, please?" Commodore

Hoh an glanced sidelong at Walgren, evincing

more than just a little annoyance. "For the benefit of those of

us who aren't entirely certain."

Scott looked at Walgren for confirmation. The

tall,

gray-haired Englishman seemed the only one

of the four monitoring officers who filly understood

what Scott had accomplished in the simulator.

Too bad-if Walgren hadn't known, either,

Scott might actually have gotten away with it.

The two commodores continued to look politely

uncertain, and Admiral Howell wouldn't raise his

eyes from where he played with the ice in his water

glass, looking guilty and ashamed. You SHOULD be

ashamed of me, Scott ruefilly thought to the

admiral. It was a crime against physics. 1

deserve to be punished.

"Mister Scott . . ." Walgren's sharp tone

recaptured Scott's attention. "Explain,

please, what you did."

"I used the Perera Field Theory to destroy that

last squadron of war dragons." It was the last

squadron he'd destroyed, at least-the

last fifteen dreadnoughts had atomized Saratoga

without taking a single hit. Scott was still convinced he

could have taken the last fifteen, if there had really

been an engine room, and if he could have run down

there to demonstrate to the engineers what he was trying

to explain when Saratoga vea*ness destroyed. "You

see," he continued when no one save Walgren

looked any more enlightened, "Klingons run in

packs so they can link their shields into a multiship

field system. That way, any shield hit hard enough

can draw power from other parts of the system to keep from

buckling." He paused to glance between the two

commodores. "Should I go on"..."...I

Hohman's lips quirked into a half-scowl,

half-grin. "Please."

"Well," Scott continued, "the Perera Theory

hypothesizes that a photon torpedo placed at

any juncture point in such a screen system will

detonate due to the forces exerted by the complex energy

exchanges. All the math and prior theorems

support Perera's conclusion."

"Sounds good," Hohman allowed. "So what's the

problem?"

"The problem," Walgren cut in, "is that

Perera's Field Theory is wrong."

"It doesn't work in practice," Scott added

for purposes of clarification. Noticing

Walgren's icy glare, he quickly returned his

attention to the wall.

"You mean," Howell asked carefully, "that when you

do it in real

life-nothing happens?"

"Precisely." Walgren nodded. "No one's

entirely certain why, but it's been proven through

experimentation. And hard data override mathematics

every time."

Commodore Shoji politely raised one hand

to gain Wal en's attention. "Are you objecting

to Mister Scott's use of the theory because it is not

applicable in real life?"

"Certainly!" the Englishman replied. "This is

supposed to be a simulation, not a fantasy!"

"But the students are expected to use everything they

have at their disposal," Shoji returned. He

glanced at Scott with an inquiring tilt to his

head. "Yo understood that this Perera Theory did not

truly work."

Considering his knowledge of engineering-not to mention his experience

with the Perera TheoryScott found the question surprising.

"Of course!" he

asserted. "But I also figured the computer would

let me do it, because any mathematics it worked out would

support Perera's findings."

The Japanese commodore shrugged. "I believe

Mister Scott acted well within the parameters of the

scenario," he concluded. "He recognized the

avenues open to him, and utilized them."

"But this is supposed to be real!" Walgren

argued, even as Hohman growled, "I still don't

understand what the problem is!"

"Well, I sort of cheated, I guess,"

Scott volunteered in response to the commodore's

complaint.

"More than "sort of," it would appear,"

Howell admitted.

"Are you sure this Perera thing doesn't work?"

Hohman pressed. "I mean, even Scott's

introductory lecture sounded okay to me."

The British admiral uttered a distinctly

superior snort and refused to even look at

Hohman. "You, Commodore Hohman, are not an

engineer."

Admiral Howell sighed. "And neither are

Commodore Shoji and myself. In the hopes of reaching

some consensus regarding Mister Scott's

solution, Admiral Walgren, do you think you could

find your way clear to produce some definitive

source of information on this subject?"

VU-ALGREN offered the other admiral a haughty

glare. "As", if the word of two engineers weren't

enough!"

was Vh, Admiral?" Scott shuffled

uncertainly from his place at the center of the room.

"Sir, I could-was

"Keep your peace , Mister Scott," Walgren

suggested sternly. "We haven't finished with you

yet."

But I can explain! Scott wanted to plead.

Still, 233

Walgren's steel-gray eyes didn't look

interested in producing a "definitive source" other

than his own, so Scott merely uttered a doubtful,

"Uh . . . aye, sir . . ." and fell silent.

Walgren buzzed his own yeoman to bring the

appropriate references from his library. Scott

twiddled his fingers behind his back and tried

to recognize constellations in the speckled tile on

the ceiling.

"Ali! Here it is!" Walgren was already deep

into one of the manuals, keying past pages so

fast Scott was surprised the man could identify the

contents. "In the Encyclopedia of Engineering

Development and Design, was the

Englishman recited. "Under A, for "Aberdeen

Solution.""

Hohman made a face. "The engineer's name was

Aberdeen?"

"T at's the city where the theory was tested,"

Scott volunteered quietly. Howell flicked

a quick glance at the c det, but no one else

seemed to hear. W gren ran a finger down the reader

screen, tracing the lies of type. was "Aberdeen,

Scotland, Earth . . ."" he uttered, his voice

without inflection as he scanned ahead of what he

read. was "dis . . in which Earthborn

engineering student Montgomery Scott construc ed

seven separate field generators in order

to simulate the current Klingon design, based

on data obtained . . ." was Scott saw

Walgren's eyes dart back to the top of the screen,

then the older admiral's hand stopp d its tracing.

"Montgomery Scott?"

Everyone turned to stare at Scott. Blushing, the

ensign offered them a small shrug. "Aye," he

admitted, grinning. "That's me."

Hohman looked as if he'd lost the ability

to breathe. "How old were you?" Scott shrugged again,

uncertain why this mattered. "About sixteen, I

suppose, sir."

"Good God . . . to was

"Do you tinker with engineering as a hobby, Mister

Scott?" Walgren asked seriously. His eyes

bore into Scott intently, as though this were the final

question on some test Scott hadn't known he was taking.

"I majored in Engineering, sir," he answered

honestly. "And I thought about being a starship engineer

before I came to command school." Walgren's steady

scrutiny was beginning to bother him.

"So you didn't want to attend command school?"

"No, sir," Scott asserted, deeply

sincere. "I respect what captains do, sir, and

I appreciate that Starfleet thinks I'd make

a fine one. B. . ."

He sighed and shook his head. "I think my

heart's meant more for commanding machines than commanding people.

I'd rather I had a captain who appreciated that-one

who didn't feel the need to make me what I'm not

inside."

There-it's said! The results of his admission would

no doubt quickly follow.

A certain distant tenderness settled onto

Walgren's weathered features, and the Englishman

nodded slowly. "[*thorngg'I think we can

arrange that, Mister Scott, if you don't mind."

Scott frowned. "Sir?" His heart labored

under a hope he didn't dare tender. "I'm

removing you from command school," Walgren stated

brusquely. "You performed inadequately during the

Kobayashi Maru scenario, and you

have been found to display an attitude and disposition

not suited to a command officer in Starfleet." At

Scott's delighted gasp, Walgren almost

smiled.

"I . . . Well. . . Thank you, sir!" It

seemed such a ludicrous response; Scott

didn't even care if the older man understood just

what he'd done. "Make good use of your

failure, Mister Scott," the Englishman

advised as he gathered his tapes and turned to go.

"We don't all get a second chance."

Scott stared at Walgren in admiring

gratitude as the admiral headed for the door.

"I'll do that, sir," he promised. "And I'll

never forget you for this!"

The door slid aside, and Walgren

paused only briefly, surprised. "Don't

thank me, Mister Scott. Thank your coupler."

He smiled at Scott's startled stare.; "I

couldn't very well let the engineer who could piece, that

together slip away. Good designing, Mister

Scott, And God go with you."

"God go with you, Admiral Walgren!" Scott

called as the hatchway whispered closed.

He", never saw Walgren again after that, but

Scott kept rack of the older engineer until

Walgren's death at age seventy. During that time,

Scott always hoped that grand luck did, indeed,

follow the admiral to the very end.

Mqst of all, he wished he could tell Walgren

just how much that one decision had meant to his life.

"The difference between living and just hanging around," he would

have told the admiral. "You understand that, don't you?"

Scott couldn't help but believe the admiral

did. Any real engineer would have.

HALLEY

SCOTT sMILED AT KIRK from across the

shuttle's narrow aisle. "It has been grand,"

he sighed with a placid smile. "Hasn't it,

sir?"

The captain nodded, pained and warmed

by all the memories he and the engineer shared. "Yes,

Mister Scott, it certainly has . . ." There was

nothing more to say, and volumes left unspoken.

Kirk closed his eyes, listening to Chekov

reconstruct the radio from Scott's hastily

wired alarm in the front hatch.

,"Come on," he heard McCoy cajole the

engineer softly, "lie back and get some sleep.

We've had enough yalrning for one day."

con"There's no such thing as enough tale-telling,

Doctor," Scott replied, but there was no real

protest in his voice. "We still have the whole realm of

disfiction to address!"

McCoy must have pulled some spectacular face,

because the next thing Kirk heard was Scott's deep

chuckle. "Save it for some other time,

Scotty," the doctor chided. "You need your rest,

and so does our brave leader."

"Aye, Doctor."

McCoy knows, Kirk thought, without any great

alarm. He knows Spock didn't see us. He

knows not to hope anymore. Kirk had come to this

realization an hour after the severed nacelle's

explosion; sharing that knowledge with his old friend lifted some of the

burden from his own conscience, but didn't

help him to accept the defeat. Some part of his mind still

rooted for a solution, like a terrier after a

particularly wily fox. He felt as though he were

only digging at stone now, though; there was nowhere else

to look for that fox within the confines of the real world. Still,

the terrier wouldn't stop trying.

A pouch on his knee brought his attention back to the

resent.

"beow're you doing?" McCoy asked when the

captain iopened his eyes. Kirk suspected the question

probed for information on more than just his knee. was well

as could be expected," he replied, truthful on

al accounts. "How about Sulu?"

Aborting a glance over one shoulder, the doctor

shrugged and continued loading a hypo. "Asleep.

He'll be all right, I think. I've done everything

I can." The hypo filled, he injected the contents

into Kirk's swop n knee. "That should dull the

worst of the pain, " he explained with professional

detachment as he returned the last of his gear to his

pouch, "although it might tend to make you a little

sleepy. Just try to be comfortable, and call me if you

. . ." The doctor's 238

hands hesitated in stowing the equipment away. "dis

. . if you need anything."

Kirk caught McCoy's wrist, switching his

grip to the doctor's hand when the older man looked

up to meet his gaze. "Thanks, Bones. . ."

He hoped McCoy would understand all the other things

he didn't have the words to say. The doctor only

smiled wanly and squeezed the captain's hand.

"No charge," he said softly. "Now go to sleep."

McCoy dimmed the overhead lights on his way

back to his own seat.

Dancing on that dividing line between emergency

lamplight and darkness, rest proved too elusive

for Kirk's agitated state of mind. The pain in his

knee, just as McCoy promised, dampened

to nonexistence, but only a dryness in his mouth and a

muzziness in his head hinted at the sleep that should have

accompanied that respite. One by one, all movement

from Scott and McCoy stilled, both men's breathing

drifting into the childlike susurrus of exhausted

sleep. Sulu's harsh, strained breathing blended with the

quit white noise from the damaged radio up

front.

I've done it, Kirk thought, oddly fascinated

by the realization. I've failed. He tried

to reject the thought, but jcdn't; so far, the only

way they'd kept themselves safe was

by exhausting every available avenue. Now, there was nothing

left to hope for. Nothing left but jthe waiting. I

WON'T give up! Kirk insisted. He

valiantly wanted to dig for just one more try, but

exhaustion crept in too close, and he felt his

eyes begin to close. I don't believe in the

no-win scenario! Still, try as he 239

might, he sank into a restless sleep to the

melody of the radio's distant static.

And awoke in a fever, certain of what they must

do. Kirk pushed himself upright, delighting in the

swell of anguish that engulfed his knee, in the

giddy, dizzy darkness that lingered all about him.

Only one emergency lantern still burned-in the main

cockpit, where it illuminated only the front

quarter of the passenger area; Kirk could just make out

the soihnolent forms of his four crewmen as he

rolled over and started to rise.

Slapping at the lighting control as he hobbled

past, Kirk even reveled in the sleepy confusion that

reigned as the others struggled into wakefulness.

"Jim, 1-1,

"I've got a plan," Kirk interjected,

cutting off McCoy's protest. "I think we can

still get out of this."

No one said anything for a heartbeat. Sulu

stirred slightly; Chekov placed a protective

hand on the helm man's shoulder as Sulu asked

faintly, "What's all the excitement about?"

"Ybu'd better be damn sure about this,"

McCoy warmed the captain grimly. Kirk

turned instead to Chekov; he couldn't promise

McCoy certainty, so he wouldn't promise

anything at all. was tilde lister Chekov-the

navigation

computer's perman tilde nt memory keeps

track of Halley's location in relation to all the

pertinent beacons and markers. Correct?" The

security officer only nodded. Kirk shot the

next question at Scott "Is there anything wrong with

,t permanent memory?"

"Not a thing," the engineer replied.

"Then we know precisely where we are." That was

hurdle number one. "All right," Kirk continued.

"Sulu, can you recall the Enterprise's

coordinates when you left the bridge?"

"Yes, sir. 896-448-009 mark 24, and

holding."

"So we know where the Enterprise is," McCoy

picked up. "But I still don't understand."

Kirk grinned at him. "You don't have to."

Shifting position on his good leg, he braced himself

more firmly against the bulkhead. "The problem with

waiting for the Enterprise, was he addressed them all,

"is that the

Enterprise doesn't know where to look. It

doesn't help that the sensors are half-blinded

by what's going on inn the system around us. You said it

yourself, Scotty-we don't look any different

than everything else the Enterprise can read. So what

we need to do is make ourselves look

different, then aim that difference at the Enterprise

so she can't help but notice."

Delighted by the prospect of rescue,

Scott's face still betrayed some reservation.

"How?" he wanted to know. "We've barely got

life support!" "But we've got the radio."

Kirk waited until he saw understanding begin to dawn

in the engineer's eyes. "Can you make it receive everything

aimed in our direqtion-radio transmissions,

light, sensor scans, the works?" "tilde portable

black hole . . ." Scott muttered distantl .

Kirk nodded. "That's the idea."

was ell, aye . . . but what good does that do us?"

"hat's where Chekov comes in." The young

lieutenant stiffened in his seat, immediately wary and

insecure. "Let's presume Spock started

running a

logical, by-the-book search pattern as soon

as the Enterprise lost track of us . . ."

"That should be a safe assumption."

Kirk ignored the doctor. "I want you to use

that assumption, and the coordinates Sulu

remembers, to plot out where the Enterprise is

now-in relation to us." He returned his attention

to Scott. "If we can direct your black hole

at the ship, a routine scanner sweep should pick it

up. I'm trusting Spock to do the

rest.gg*thorn]"

Scott nodded absently, his fingers twitching on

nonexistent circuits as he plotted through his

construction. "We'll have to coax that remaining engine

into action," he mused, not fully turning his attention

away from his thoughts. "With the bad converter, we'll have

to suck off all our life support and lighting power

if we want to beat this tumble long enough to do any good."

Then his eyes focused abruptly, and he shot) an

anxious glance at Sulu. "Assuming we've got

a pilot, that is . . ."

A brave but weak smile tugged at

Sulu's lips. "This it's where I come in," he

croaked. His dark eyes flick d to one side in

search of McCoy. "Better get me off t ese

drugs, Doc," he advised blithely. "It's

going to b bad enough trying to pilot when I can't turn

my hea 1"

B ue eyes clouded with apprehension, the

doctor sho k his head. "Jim can do it."

rk almost laughed. "No, Jim can't."

Before McCoy could protest further, Sulu

explained, "The captain can pilot a fully

functional ship all right, but this isn't the same

thing. It would be kind of like trying to ride a

unicycle when you only know 242

how to ride a bike. Same principle,

different skill." He tried to flash McCoy a

reassuring grin. "I'll be okay."

"Sulu, you start messing around with that shoulder,

you'll. . ." McCoy's voice trailed off as

he saw the look on the lieutenant commander's

face. Kirk nodded.

"We have a problem. . ." Chekov's dismal

voice brought everyone's attention back to him. He

stared up at Kirk in mixed amazement and dismay.

"The equations we need," he explained,

looking at the others as though in apology. "Mister

Spock might be able to do that kind of mathematics in

his head, but I can't. Not without a computer."

Kirk felt his hope slip away.

"Can you work out the equations by hand?" Scott called

from the rear; the engineer had already bounded out of his seat

to begin collecting various equipment and tools.

Chekov considered for a moment. "I could, was he

allowed. "But-was

Grinning smugly, Scott reappeared in the

doorway with 4 slender rod in one hand. "How about

on deck plates?"

Frowning as Chekov rose to study the offered

tool, Kirk asked, "What is that?"

The engineer pulled the rod down the wall by his

head," leaving a shiny dark streak behind it. "A

deck marking tool," he explained. "You use them

for mar ng circuit information on bulkheads and

decks." He handed the little tool to Chekov with a

triumphant flourish. "Where do you want to start?"

Thinking ahead, Scott tore up all four rear

seats while Chekov was still occupied on the back

wall. The

seats Scott jettisoned out the airlock; the

Russian carried his figuring down onto

the floor without pause.

Excitement built in Kirk like a coiled

clock spring, ticking away at his patience with every

line of equations scribbled across the scuffed deck and

walls. Across the aisle from him, Sulu's bright

humor slowly faded as more and more of McCoy's

pain-killing drugs washed out of his system. "I'm

going to be okay," he kept assuring no one.

"We're all going to be okay."

McCoy paced until Chekov explained

(somewhat irritably) that he was going to have to start

writing on the doctor's feet if they weren't

kept out of the way. The suggestion moved Sulu

to laugh, but McCoy was somewhat less amused; he

retreated sullenly to his front-row seat-tucking

his feet protectively beneath him as he watched

Chekov work along the floor. Kirk did his best

to encourage everyone to remain calm, despite the

fact that he'd have outpaced McCoy if his damaged

knee allowed. Only Scott gave the captain

no headache throughout the planning; however, watching the

engineer disappear into the back with an increasing amount

of the forward hatch finally caused Kirk to quip,

"Leave Sulu something to pilot with, Scotty!"

"tilde he burly Scotsman laughed

with pleasure. "The toi tilde ets go before the helm

does, Captain! Don't you fre to was

Out Kirk fretted anyway.

cCoy kept an equally worried eye on his

patient, occasionally reaching across the seats to touch

Sulu's uninjured shoulder. "You all right?" he

asked, time and time again.

"Sure," Sulu always assured him, adding the

last 244

time "I need to be clear-headed if I'm going

to pilot this wreck."

The doctor snorted. "Are you going to be

clearheaded while you're in this much pain?"

Sulu made a tiny sound that reminded Kirk more

of a sob than a laugh. "More than I would be on your

drugs," he replied thinly. Then, after a minute

pause "Just keep talking to me . . . okay?"

"Sulu!" Chekov called from the rear of the

shuttle; he was out of sight behind the remaining seats,

guarded over by a wall of navigational graffiti.

"What are the Enterprise's last coordinates?"

"Pavel," the helmsman sighed, "didn't you

write them down?"

"Tell me!"

"896-448-009 mark 24."

Chokov finally sat back on his heels with a

weary sigh. Cramped black writing sketched a

cobbled path down the length of the main aisle. He

stretched, stood, and stretched again, then turned and

jotted several lines of numbers on one of the front

walls. "Pry this loose to for me," he instructed

Scott on one of the engineer's trips.

"All finished?" Scott asked with a smile.

Chokov nodded, not exuding quite the same level of

optimism. "That's our course."

"I" ready to fly," Sulu insisted. His

voice was stretc ed as thin as fine wire. "But I

need help getting up front."

Scot paused by the helmsman's seat. "We

don't need you yet," he told Sulu, displaying

the increasingly complex device in his hands. "I've

got to get this outside first. Hang on a while

longer."

"I'm fine," the helmsman answered faintly.

"I love my job."

Scott smiled. "I know you do, lad . . . I

know."

The extravehicular duty fell to Chekov this

time. Scott double-checked every seal on the

lieutenant's suit, clucking and scolding

like a maiden aunt as he pressed the hodgepodge

contraption into Chekov's hands. "Belay to the lock

before we crack the doors," he stressed sternly.

"And keep this thing tied fast to you--lose it, and

I'll see you busted lower than you've ever dreamed!"

Chekov tugged at the cable fixing Scott's

device to the suit. "I won't lose it," he

assured Scott. Then he pulled on his helmet

before the engineer could harangue him further.

Scott caught the lieutenant's helmet in

both hands just', before Chekov turned away. "Be

careful!" He stared hard through the thick face

plate. "You hear me tilde his

Kirk saw Chekov nod once, then the

lieutenant stepped into the waiting lock and was

swallowed by the (closing doors.

tilde o radio chronicled Chekov's

progress along the shu tle's hull. Scott

tried to reassure Kirk "He's only going a

little way--not even as far as the nacelle. The re's

a service hook-up that the gadget will fit right

nicely."

It didn't help. Kirk finally insisted

McCoy an Scott move Sulu into the front

hatch just so there would be something else to do.

Every step proved agony for the young Oriental; as the

pain increased, so did his breathing, which only tore

at his damaged shoulder more. By the time they

situated him at the front console, his sobbing

gasps had almost torn Kirk to shreds.

The captain hobbled into the front doorway to find

McCoy kneeling by the helm. "Let me just give

you something!

Sulu couldn't even command the breath to object, he

simply clutched at McCoy's wrist with his good

hand and refused to let go.

"Damn it, Sulu-to "

"No . . . to was the helmsman whimpered. "dis .

. Doc, please . . . I'll be okay. . ."

The doctor clung to his hypo as though afraid

to try and cope without it. "You're sure?"

"dis . . sure. . ."

McCoy retreated into the passenger area without

even commanding Kirk to sit down.

Chekov returned less than five minutes

later, ffushdd with excitement over the successful

placement of the beacon. Stripping off his helmet and

gloves, he joined Kirk and Sulu in the front

hatch as Scott went aft to fire up the engines.

"You have the course?" Chekov asked Sulu

as he stepped out of his e-suit.

"S re," Sulu whispered. He pointed

shakily to the marked bulkhead plate before him on his

panel. "But , . . why don't you read them off

to me? . . . So l can j still think about piloting. .

."

Ki k plucked the square of metal off the

console and handed it back to Chekov. The security

officer took it with wan, worried nod; but his

voice was calm and confi ent as he reported

to Sulu, "Bring us about to heading 896-448-887

mark 3 . . ."

"dis . . aye, aye, Mister Navigator. .

."

A resonant clunk . . . clunk . . .

clunk . . . clunk passed down the length of the

shuttle as Scott killed the main lighting. Kirk

heard McCoy rise wordlessly in the passenger

cabin and begin snapping on the emergency lamps

once again; the captain clicked on the inset

lantern above the main console without interrupting

Sulu and Chekov's dialogue.

"1'm slipping! . . . Are we slipping off

course?"

Chekov leaned over Sulu's shoulder

to look, touching the helmsman

reassuringly. "You're fine-right on course."

No lights, no air, no heat . . . Kirk

whirled the tally around in his head as he studied

Sulu's pain-creased face. Back to exactly

where they'd started, their lives depended on the

performance of Scott's tiny construc- tion

outside, on Chekov's hastily prepared

navigational equations, on the viability of

Kirk's original plan. If any part of the

complex structure failed, they would all die, just like

in the Kobayashi Maru.

t we all BEAT the test! Kirk's mind

insisted. We pro ed you don't have to accept defeat

gracefully! You could reroute it, like Kirk; or

carry on despite it, like Chckov; or avoid it,

like Sulu; or fight it to the last like a Scottish

bulldog. They would do all those things before giving up

now, if Kirk had to sacrifice his own soul, in the

process. "Heading, Mister Sulu?" he

requested in his most composed captain's voice. was

. . 896-449-678 mark 89 . . ."

was ery good . . ." He glanced up at Chekov

for venocation; the Russian simply nodded. "Carry

on."

Almost precisely an hour later, Sulu

collapsed. He simply didn't respond

to Chekov's course correction, then slid slowly

sideways until Kirk was forced to

lunge out of his own chair to catch him. Chekov and

Scott carried the helmsman back to the passenger

cabin. This time, they laid him gently in the center

aisle, atop a layer of heavy uniform coats;

Chekov spread his own jacket across his friend's

torso.

"Do you think it worked?" the Russian asked

quietly as McCoy administered a series of

injections to Sulu's lifeless form.

"If the black hole worked," Scott tendered

glumly. "There was really no way I could test it."

"And if Spock happened to search in this

directions" Kirk added.

"And if my equations were correct . . ."

"Listen to all of you!" McCoy grumped

crustily. He stomped back to his own place and

seated himself with determined confidence. "It worked. Now

shut up and wait."

It was cold again, and dismal. Kirk hoped they

wouldn't have to wait for long.

fit Ah, Jim, look at her! She

looks like-like an angel!"

Relieved almost to the point of tears, Kirk

didn't respond to McCoy's enthusiastic

commentary; the Enterprise filled his eyes and heart

beyond his ability to react to anything else, and all he

could think was that, to him, the great ship looked like a

fairy-tale swa .

.

comCoy's shining, blue-white angel had

flickered int view a mere fifteen minutes after

Sulu's collapse. Gro ing in the starboard

ports like the rising sun, the point of light

rapidly took on the shape of their salvation.

Kirk hadn't seen the big ship from the

outside for a long time; he'd almost forgotten how

beautiful she could be. Scott dashed about

Halley, closing up equipment lockers, battening

down the cannibalized panels. "What a bloody

mess!" he kept exclaiming. "If I let my

lads see a work area I've been in while it

looks like this, I'll never get "em to put their

gear away!"

"What are you going to tell them about the seats?"

McCoy wanted to know. Scott groaned. "I'll

say we built a drive engine out of

them-it'll keep up their respect."

"Tell them the truth," Kirk suggested. "That

should build enough respect."

"You don't know my engineers," Scott said.

"Bigheaded, all of 'em. It's best if they think

I can build a ship put of scrap wire,

believe me!" By", the time the Enterprise's

rear shuttle bay engulfeci their wayward craft,

Scott was trying to decide if he should dismantle the

defaced interior walls or keep hem for

posterity. Chekov stalwartly refused to voic an

opinion.

McCoy sprang to his feet the moment

Halley bum ed to a cockeyed standstill at the

center of the shutt a bay. Punching at the airlock

controls, he corn lamed, "Scotty! These things

won't open!"

"T at's because we've got no power," the

engineer repli

McCoy slapped at the closed doors with his

hand. "Wel , we've got injured people in here, damn

it! How are going to get out of here?"

"Sock will open the doors," Kirk assured

him. "Now sit down, Bones-they've got

to pressurize the bay first."

"That damn Vulcan thinks we've got all day

. . . to was The doctor struck the door a second

time before starting to pace. "It probably never

occurred to him we might have casualties! Hurrying

is no doubt an "illogical'

activity!" He swung about abruptly and

pummeled the doors again. "Spock, can you hear me?

Open this damn door!" As if inspired by the

doctor's vehemence, the airlock slid open,

releasing

warm, sweet-smelling air into Halley's

central cabin, revealing Spock framed in the

doorway. "Good afternoon, Doctor McCoy," the

science officer greeted him. "I am pleased

to learn that eighteen hours of unnecessary confinement has not

adversely affected your social

skills." "Oh, get out of my way,"

McCoy ordered brusquely as he

shouldered past the tall Vulcan. "Nurse!

Get a litter in here! Have sickbay prepare for

surgery!" Spock moved calmly out of the

doorway, coming to stand by Kirk's shoulder as

McCoy hurried back in with a stretcher and a small

team of medics. Sulu tried to struggle upright as

he was lifted from the floor. "What's going

on?" he

murmured fuzzily. "Where are we?" "Home,"

Chekov told him, smiling. He caught at

Sulu's arm to hold the helmsman down when Sulu

sat up to hug him. "We did it," Sulu said.

Joy at finding himself still

alive seemed to override any pain he might be

feeling. "We actually pulled out of this! We should

get some sort' of medal." Chekov

laughed and pushed his friend flat again. "I'm

satisfied with being

alive."

McCoy grumbled from the head of the stretcher. "That

can be

rectified, Lieutenant." When the security

chief only looked

startled, McCoy elaborated, "I'm taking this

patient to sickbay.

Now, either get out of my way or walk

alongside, but quit holding up the wheels of

progress." "Sorry, Doctor." Chekov

stepped meekly

aside. "I'll be down later," he promised

Sulu as the stretcher

passed. "I'll wait with bated breath."

Chekov followed the

medical team out the door, and Kirk watched a

swarm of chattering

engineers take their places. "Don't touch the

walls!" Scott bellowed at the tech who

scratched at the equations with a thumbnail, seeing if

the script was permanent. "I haven't decided

what I'm doing with

"em yet." "Jesus, Mister Scott," the

tech commented, startled.

"They're a little heavy to frame, don't you

think?" Kirk

suspected Chekov was glad he wasn't around

to hear all this. "A,"

full record of my activities since your

misplacement, is on file on

the bridge, Captain." SpOck's voice

caught Kirk's attention,

reminding him of his first officer's presence. "Very

good, Mister

Spoc comv efficient." He shifted position on

the seat, ngling his gaze up at Spock as though they

were discu sing a recent chess game. "I take it

everything went ell?" This captain detected

a mental shrug in the tilt of the can's head. "With the

exception of Halley's misfo une, everything has

transpired acceptably. We are still endeavoring

to reestablish contact with the Venkatsen Group,

however." Kirk

didn't have the

heart to tell Spock that he'd all but forgotten

about Venkatsen.

When the Vulcan swept a cool look about the

interior of the shuttle,

Kirk glanced about as well, seeing the destruction

as if for the

first time. "Kind of made a mess, didn't

we?" "I shall be

interested to read your own report regarding the last

eighteen

hours," Spock admitted at last. "A

report couldn't do it justice,

Mister Spock," he chuckled, pushing himself

to his feet. "This is

something better left to tales than records."

Spock surprised Kirk by offering the captain an

arm for support; Kirk tried to refuse,

but relented after only two stumbling

steps. Leaning heavily on

Spock's arm, he quipped, "Well, Mister

Spock-should you lead, or shall I?" "Captain?" Which

meant Spock didn't entirely understand.

Kirk smiled. "Let's just say you haven't

got much of a career in

dance." "Indeed." The bright bay lights made

Kirk blink as he trudged slowly down

Halley's inclined ramp. He wondered if he'd

truly believed he'd never see the Enterprise

again, or if some

foolish part of him maintained faint hope . He

suspected the grateful ache in his heart was the

answer. "Nothing's ever impossible."

Spock glanced down at him curiously. "I

beg your pardon?" "Did I

ever tell you about my solution to the Kobayashi

Maru test, Mister

Spock?" "I think not, Captain." Spock

raised an eyebrow.

"By solution, do you mean to imply that you beat the

scenario?"

"Oh, yes." Kirk nodded. "Your solution .

. ." Spock asked, "it has some bearing

on what occurred on board Halley, I

presume?" "All the bearing in the world," the captain

answered softly. He rested his hand against the

Enterprise's cool ivory bulkhead for a

second, then

allowed Spock to guide him out into the corridor.