STAR TREK: TOS - Final Frontier Read online

  “Exactly!” April insisted. “That’s what we have to make clear! That this vessel isn’t meant to take from others. She’s an empress of ideals, George. She’s our right, not our might.”

  “She’s both!” George snapped back, heading for the turbo-lift. “She has to be.”

  On the heels of his own words he whipped a gesture toward Drake. “Come on. Let’s look at this thing.”

  He stalked into the turbo-lift, followed quickly by Drake, who wasn’t about to argue with either of these men.

  When the lift doors breathed closed and silence fell on the bridge, Robert April folded his arms, shook his head, and sighed.

  “God, I’m glad I brought him.”

  Chapter Five

  “GO AHEAD, CLAW. Relay the message down here. On discreet, please.”

  “Relaying. Last message from S.S. Rosenberg, received at Starbase Two, one solar hour ago, sir.”

  Captain April tried to remain on his feet to hear the message, but found himself lowering into the desk chair in his quarters, unable to hide the effect that communicating with the disabled ship was having on him.

  Sitting in the other chair, George watched him as the click of communications circuits focused their attention on the words that would come any moment. It was a grinding feeling, like bones in teeth, this waiting to hear from dying people. George leaned forward, but said nothing.

  The message, when it finally came, was faint and crackling.

  “This is the resea— ... —S. Rosenberg.” The voice was a woman’s, chilling, distant, under great strain, and under great control. She went on without any dramatic pauses. “The ion duster is extending itself ... severity now at eight on the scale. Repeat: eight on the scale. It’s all around us now. Radiation leaks have contaminated ... bulk of supplies. We’re cannibalizing the ... —oolant system from the impulse drive ... engines aren’t ... —king anyway. Critical information: we’re trying to build ... —nough suspended animation units for the children under eight [55] years old. We’re just telling the kids they’ll be going to sleep. We hope there’ll be enough power to last ... rescue gets here. Do you understand, Starbase? You’ll ... be ready to help them understand why their parents aren’t alive when they wake up. We can only hope the radiation doesn’t affect the suspension chambers before you get here. We know ... can’t save most of us, but come anyway. Do you copy, Starbase? Don’t give up on our babies. No matter ... long it takes, just don’t give up on our kids.”

  There was a hesitation, even more cryptic than the silence that had overtaken the captain’s cabin. George felt his hands go cold.

  “This will ... final message unless you contact us. We are attempting to conserve power. Captain Anita Zagaroli, S.S. Rosenberg ... signing off.”

  April’s hand was pressed across his mouth. His eyes had grown vacant as he listened. The pain of courage had come across all too well in the woman’s voice. The courage of last hope.

  George suddenly felt as if the artificial gravity had been turned up too high. He was crushed to his chair. Unbidden thoughts of Iowa, of his two boys, assaulted him.

  He forced his voice out.

  “Tell them,” he rasped. “We’ve got to tell them we’re coming.”

  Several noticeable seconds went by before April moved, or even blinked.

  Finally, from behind his hand, the captain murmured, “I’ve been aching to tell them.” Now he gathered himself and slumped back in the chair. “I can’t. You heard ... what they’re doing is almost impossible with, the supplies and engineering aboard a ship of that type. They have nothing that can be realistically converted into suspended animation shells, George. And those people aren’t really engineers. They might succeed in building deep freezes of sorts, but the chances of our arriving and finding children alive in hypersleep ...” He shook his head slowly. “They’re just grasping at straws, trying to keep from going insane. Real engineers would know it’s nearly impossible. I suspect the engineer aboard the ship is deluding them on purpose.”

  “But ...”

  “George, I can’t tell them we’re going to be there in a week when I don’t know if it’s possible. I can’t even tell them we hope to be there at all. We’re just not that sure we can even make it through those ion storms, and I can’t—” Words suddenly failed him as he tried to express the torment he would cause by spreading his own faith in the starship. “I just can’t.”

  [56] George sat back, unable to argue. If it were he, what would he tell George Jr. and Jimmy? The prospect frightened him.

  Jimmy ... he never could lie to Jimmy and get away with it.

  Through his reverie he heard the click of the desk intercom and looked up to see April touching the unit.

  “Claw,” April addressed.

  “Bridge here. Sanawey.”

  “Contact Starbase Two. Ask them to acknowledge transmission from that ship on my personal behalf and assure them we’re not giving up and we’re not going to. Then repeat it. Make absolutely sure they understand. Make them feel they’re not alone.”

  When the communications officer replied, it was with a dubious tone, as though he wasn’t sure he could make that message ring true. “I’ll do my best, Captain. Sanawey out.”

  “I’ll have to ask you to wait until we’re under way before I can introduce you to the rest of the crew complement,” April said, still somewhat thoughtfully, trying to juggle too many responsibilities. Only then did he notice that George wasn’t listening, but instead had gotten up and was pacing the cabin, his arms and shoulders tensed. “George?”

  Turning from staring at a wall, George blinked. “Sorry. I’m just impatient to get under way.”

  “I know what you mean.”

  “Let’s go, then.” He leaned toward the door without actually taking a step.

  April countered the tension by gesturing George back to his chair. “No, no. Sit down for a few more minutes. The matter/antimatter intermix has just begun, and I’ve found the engineers feel obligated to explain things whenever I’m around at moments like that. It only slows the process. Sit down, George. Sit down and tell me what else is on your mind.”

  Brows lowered over George’s dark hazels. “What do you mean?”

  “Come now, George. Is something wrong?”

  “Is something wrong?” George repeated with a harshness he didn’t really intend. “After that message, you can ask if something’s wrong? Yes ... I guess something’s wrong.”

  “I’m listening.”

  George knew April was deliberately distracting him from tension about the Rosenberg, tension that could do no good at this moment. [57] Unable to hide his feelings, he clenched and unclenched his hands, then sat down again. A moment or two later, he found his voice.

  “I was ... just hoping to get leave in time for Jimmy’s birthday.” He waved his hand at the silent communications panel. “That just made me think of it.”

  “Things haven’t improved between you and your wife?”

  George leaned to one side and tried not to feel invaded. Did he want to get into this at all?

  “Pretty much the same. Stuck in idle.”

  “I’m sure that’s hard on the boys,” April said, with every bit as much empathy as he had displayed for the disabled ship.

  George ignored it. “They’re tough enough. I try to stay in their lives, in spite of the distance.”

  “Well, with a little luck and a miracle or two, you just might make it home for that birthday, eh?”

  A sheepish smile crept over George’s lips now. “Maybe. I hope. Well, I think I hope it. When he was seven, I made a promise I shouldn’t have made.”

  April perked up. “Really? What was it?”

  “I promised him that when he turned ten, I’d tell him why his middle name is Tiberius.”

  April tossed his head and chuckled. “Tiberius? You never told me that.”

  “I thought he’d forget.”

  “Jimmy? You were dreaming.”

  “I kn
ow that now, don’t I?”

  “So ... why is it?”

  “Why is what?”

  “Why is his middle name Tiberius? Wasn’t that a bit cumbersome for an infant?”

  With an embarrassed shrug, George said, “He’ll grow into it. When he was seven, he figured out that the T stood for something. I was on duty at Starbase Four, and Winn was afraid to tell him. After all, the kid slept with a handmade bow and arrow. You know Jimmy—that didn’t stop him. He looked around and decided it stood for Tank. Until I got home on leave, his name was Jimmy Tank Kirk. I couldn’t let that go on, could I?”

  “Hardly.” The hand was back in front of April’s mouth now, but for a different reason.

  “I taught him to say ‘James T. Kirk’ when people asked his name [58] and solemnly swore I’d tell him what it stood for when he turned ten. And here I am. The kid’s got a self-propelled memory.”

  April’s hand fell away. He laced his fingers on his chest and leaned back sagely. “Now you make me a promise.”

  George looked up. “What?”

  “If we reach the Rosenberg without killing ourselves first,” April said, “you tell me why his middle name is Tiberius.”

  For a long moment the two men gazed at each other.

  Conviction stood firm in George’s voice. “Deal.” He couldn’t quite keep the challenge out of his tone. Which brought forward another thought. “Robert,” he began, “what do you call this ship? It has a name, doesn’t it?”

  “No name yet, George. No identity at all. Very spooky and clandestine, isn’t it?”

  “So what do we call her? How do we identify ourselves when we meet other ships? We shouldn’t roll up to the Rosenberg and say, This is the Spaceship Anonymous calling.”

  April held up a corrective hand. “Starship. United Starship. The USS Anonymous.”

  “One straight answer, Robert.”

  April nodded his understanding. Obviously there wasn’t yet a straight answer for that question. “You must realize we’ve been drawing up plans for a while, and we had to call it something.”

  “Which is?”

  “Well, I had suggested calling her Constitution, It says everything I hope to communicate about her. A whole heritage of justice, unity, plurality, or at least opportunity.”

  “Is that definite?”

  With a shrug, April said, “No, I don’t suppose ‘definite’ is the word for it. There have been several notable alterations in design and power during the actual building of the ship that make her quite different from the original Constitution designs, I admit. She’s not quite the same ship as the one on the drawing boards, and her Naval Construction Contract number will be different, that’s true—”

  “Then it’s not really the same ship.”

  With a sigh, April opted to tell the whole story before George badgered it out of the crew. “The Constitution was actually put on the boards before all the technological breakthroughs of recent years. Before they even laid the keel, things had vastly changed, from duotronics to the warp navigational tie-in we’ve got on board this one. Faced [59] with virtually reengineering the whole heart of the ship, Starfleet just took out a new construction contract. On the drawing board, the ship is Number 1700. The actual vessel is 1701.”

  George nodded slowly. “Who makes the final decision?”

  April paused, his mouth hanging open. “I’m ... almost afraid to tell you,” he said with a little laugh.

  “You?”

  “Yes, guilty. They’ve given me the option. The Federation, I mean. They like me.”

  “Fools that they are.”

  “Why, George? Have you got another idea?”

  Put on the spot, George felt himself close up. He didn’t belong here at all, much less involved in the nomenclature of the vessel. But this ship ... he knew what April was feeling.

  “Let me think about it,” he said evasively.

  “All right. Take your time. Naming the ship is probably the only thing we’ve got to do that isn’t in a rush.” April got to his feet, taking a moment to tap the intercom. “Engineering, this is the captain. Status report, please?”

  “We’re ready to begin impulse drive ignition sequence, Captain, on your order.”

  “Wonderful! This is what we’ve all been waiting for. Begin power-up.”

  “Engineering, aye.”

  “Come help me usher in a new age, George.” Robert April gestured dramatically toward the door. “We’re going to start her engines. For the very first time.”

  The bridge was buzzing with activity when they arrived. Several engineering specialists were patching together unfinished control panels, and almost as soon as Kirk and April appeared, the specialists scurried off the bridge, heading back to posts not meant to be handled by so few people. Soon the only people besides the captain and first officer were Sanawey on communications and telemetry, Florida on helm, Drake helping Florida try to fit the helm plate into place, and a small birdlike woman at the subsystems monitor whom April introduced quickly as Bernice Hart; she evidently was one of the design engineers for the bridge tie-in consoles.

  “Ordinarily, we’ll have several more people on the bridge, you understand,” April said as he settled into his command chair.

  [60] “I would hope so,” George commented. He glanced around, feeling like an albatross among the specialists and geniuses, perceiving that the bridge seemed very empty for its size and for all those burtons and buzzers and panels that seemed to need watching. He flinched when the lights on those panels suddenly hummed to life as newborn power was fed through to the bridge, then blushed at his reaction and turned away so April wouldn’t see it. The whir of electronic life brought sudden color to the bridge—indicator lights flickered, then settled into bright reds, blues, and yellows, while monitors and dyno-scanners burst alive with diagrams and crosspatterns of color, very few of which George could interpret. Why am I here? I barely recognize half of this equipment. I’m a dinosaur around here. What if somebody asks me for something?

  His thoughts were jarred when the main viewscreen wavered from a board of flat gray and suddenly focused on the beautiful panorama of space outside the ship. The edge of spacedock poked into view at both sides, and beyond that—stars.

  Then ... April’s voice. A pleasant, gentle, English voice above the hum of bridge noise.

  “Engineering, this is the captain. We’re about to implement impulse power. Go ahead with implementation of the warp propulsion intermix formula. Remember to clear personnel out of the Jeffries tubes before we start up. I don’t want anyone in there, even when we’re only on impulse.”

  “Aye aye, sir. Standing by for impulse generation.”

  George stepped down to the captain’s chair. “What’s all that mean?”

  “Hmm? Oh—the engineers are up inside the support pylons, mother-henning the warp units. I don’t want anyone caught in there. If the warp engines aren’t working by now, we’re hopeless anyway. But we’re not hopeless. They’ll be all right.”

  “The warp engines won’t be used right away, will they?”

  “No, not immediately, but as soon as we clear the asteroids. We’re not out here to take our time, of course. I just want to be cautious. Those warp engines are warming up even now, and there are successive baffles that keep the matter/antimatter from flushing back into the ship as the power level heats up. A half hour or so from now, they’ll be fully ignited.”

  “Where’s the power been coming from up until now?”

  April smiled impishly. “You ask good questions, George.”

  [61] “Captain ...”

  “Yes, well, batteries. The batteries are chemical, and they’ve been drawing power from the spacedock. They’re energized quite fully by now. Of course, the ship itself will have vastly more power than the spacedock, once it’s humming. Don’t push yourself, George. It’ll all start to make sense as you go along.”

  George pressed his finger into April’s shoulder. “My ignorance about
this job is your fault, not mine.”

  With another grin, April nodded. “All right. Whatever makes you comfortable.” He turned to Sanawey then. “Claw, patch me through to the spacedock.”

  “Aye aye, sir. Tied in.”

  “Spacedock, this is April. Disconnect all external power sources, please.”

  “Acknowledged, starship. No more mother’s milk. Good luck.”

  “Thank you. April out.” Now he looked at the woman at the engineering station and cleared his throat before going on. “Bernice, divert battery power to impulse ignition.”

  “Diverting, sir,” she acknowledged. “We have impulse ignition. We’re alive, sir.”

  A shudder of anticipation moved across April’s shoulders. He glanced at George, but kept his command-level cool.

  “Seal all magnetic hatches.”

  “Hatches sealing, sir.”

  “Verify integrity of all safety and containment systems.”

  “Safety systems read green, sir.”

  “Carlos, establish helm control.”

  Carlos Florida gestured to Drake to sit down in the navigation chair—where Drake was completely useless but could probably not do much harm—and settled into his own post. He ran his hands over the control board, taking his time in spite of the obvious rush to get under way. “Helm answers, sir,” he said with a subdued pride.

  “Majestic,” April whispered. He gripped the arms of his command chair and beamed at George. “Well, First Officer ... go ahead. Move us out.”