Star Trek: Vanguard 01: Harbinger

by David Mack

  “Today, I stand with you in grief. I mourn with you. Like many of you…perhaps all of you…I lost someone I knew aboard the Bombay…. A friend…. For five years, before she was the Bombay’s CO, Hallie Gannon was my first officer aboard the Starship Dauntless. From her first day aboard she was everything a captain could ask for in a number one; tireless, efficient, always ready to take on one more job. When she took command of the Bombay, I knew her crew had scored a lucky break.

  “Last week, they lost their lives serving one another, serving Starfleet, and serving the Federation. History will remember them as heroes. But I’m sure that many of you will remember them first as friends, and as loved ones. Some of you served with them on other ships, some of you attended Starfleet Academy or basic training together. You knew them in ways that others throughout the Federation could not. Feel honored that you had that chance, even though the pain you feel for their loss is heartbreaking.

  “I wish I could undo it, but I can’t…. My words must pale when compared to the tragedy that took their lives, shrink when measured against the vast emptiness their deaths have left in our lives. Some of us are in denial; we can’t believe they’re gone. Some of us are raging and desperate to strike back at someone, anyone, just so we can feel like we’re doing something to balance the scales.

  “Our anger is justified, but we must not let it consume us. We must not let our sorrow be turned to hatred. Justice is not vengeance, even if some want to believe otherwise. At times like this, it’s vital that we embrace the better angels of our nature, no matter how hard it is.

  “We also can’t let our loss paralyze us. Among the obligations of all those who wear the Starfleet uniform, one of the most sacred is our duty to one another. It is a commitment that does not end with the loss of one life, or one ship. The best way for us to honor the sacrifice of Captain Gannon and her crew is to continue their work, to finish what they started, and to make sure they didn’t die in vain.

  “There’s a poem, ‘The Young Dead Soldiers,’ by Archibald MacLeish of Earth, that honors those who’ve died in the service of their people. Speaking for the fallen, he wrote: ‘Our deaths are not ours; they are yours; they will mean what you make of them.’

  “That’s as true today as when he wrote it, more than three centuries ago. When Starfleet personnel give their lives in the line of duty, they know that it will fall to history—to the living—to judge whether their sacrifices were made in vain, or for a greater good and a better future.

  “Ultimately, the value of their lives depends upon how we honor them, and upon how faithfully we continue the work that they began.

  “Captain Gannon and her crew gave us their deaths; let us give them their meaning—of peace and wisdom, of service and freedom, of courage and hope.”

  Reyes paused. Reverent silence surrounded him like a bulwark. Scanning the crowd, he saw faces streaked with tears, heads bowed in grief, friends and shipmates clinging to one another for emotional support. “When I was a boy on Luna, my father and I planted a tree to honor my grandfather when he passed away.” He turned his head and looked toward Stars Landing and the far side of the enclosure. “In honor of the Bombay and her crew, a tree is being planted right now on Fontana Meadow—a Denevan dogwood. With its year-round flowers and solid roots, it’s a reminder of the lesson of the Psalms—that the life of a good person is like a tree whose leaf does not wither.

  “Trees take a long time to grow, and wounds take a long time to heal. But it’s time for us to begin. Great labors await us, but so do great wonders. Captain Gannon and her crew are taken from us, but our lives will be their legacy.

  “Thank you.”

  He gathered up his note cards and left the podium to strong applause. As soon as he had cleared the stairs, Commander Cooper was back at the lectern, providing instructions for those who wished to follow the clergy to religious memorials scheduled for 1200, and explaining how to find the grief counselors’ offices in Vanguard Hospital.

  Lost in his own thoughts, Reyes didn’t see Kirk until the young CO intercepted him on the edge of the dispersing crowd.

  “Commodore,” Kirk said, falling into step beside him.

  Reyes nodded politely. “Captain.”

  “Good speech,” Kirk said.

  “Thank you.”

  “I’m curious,” Kirk said. “That part about some of us wanting to strike back at anyone…was that meant just for me?”

  “Not just you, no.” The two officers stepped onto a flat, moving walkway that would carry them to a bank of turbolifts along the station’s core. “You aren’t the only one who feels a sense of duty to Starfleet personnel lost in action.”

  “I didn’t think that I was,” Kirk said. “But if you’re worried that I’m going to do something rash, you needn’t be. I’m still a Starfleet officer. Duty comes first, always.”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Reyes said. “And for what it’s worth, you did inspire at least one part of my speech.”

  “Dare I ask?”

  “The part about making certain they didn’t die in vain.” Reyes lowered his voice. “You and your crew did good work on Ravanar IV. How your chief engineer solved a riddle that’s baffled an entire team of R&D engineers for two years, I’ll never know…but I’m glad you came along when you did. Hallie and her crew are going to be missed around here, but thanks to you and your crew, their sacrifices weren’t empty ones. They owe you a debt of gratitude, Kirk…and so do I.”

  Kirk extended his hand to Reyes. “It’s an honor just to serve, Commodore.”

  Shaking Kirk’s hand, Reyes nodded with respect. “Likewise, Captain. Likewise.”

  Cervantes Quinn strolled past the athletic fields. Reyes’s speech had just ended. The crowd was beginning to disperse into clusters, which wandered off in seemingly random directions. Quinn was looking for Tim Pennington, who he knew would come here to listen to the memorial address if not to report on it.

  From the moment Pennington’s story had broken on FNS, Quinn had known that the data card he had planted and directed Pennington to find had been instrumental in exposing the truth of the Bombay’s destruction. When the story unraveled the following day, however, he had realized only then that he had been an unwitting accomplice to the ruination of Pennington himself.

  Though the litany of Quinn’s criminal misdeeds would have filled a book, the one principle that he clung to was that he never deliberately hurt anyone just to make a profit. Stealing a man’s property from a warehouse was one thing; violating that man’s home was going too far. Scamming a man who had decided to play cards was to be expected; cheating an honest man who never asked for trouble was just plain wrong.

  He had thought he was passing information to Pennington, doing the young reporter a favor. Instead, he’d handed the man the professional equivalent of hemlock.

  Pennington was sitting on the top row of the bleachers closest to the podium. He looked terrible; his hair was un-washed, stubble peppered his cheeks and chin, and his clothes were wrinkled and stained. Poor bastard, Quinn thought, he looks as bad as I do.

  Quinn climbed the bleachers to the top row and walked toward Pennington, who was busy composing text on his handheld recording device. The younger man looked up at Quinn as he sat down next to him. Pennington’s face registered recognition first, followed by dread.

  “Sorry I sucker-punched you the other day,” Quinn said.

  Still wary, Pennington pretended to resume working on his recorder. “No worries.”

  Unsure how to proceed, Quinn watched the crowd for a moment, then said, “How ’bout we do this over?”

  “Do what over?”

  Quinn held out his hand to Pennington. “Cervantes Quinn—have rustbucket, will travel.”

  Cautiously, as if he might be reaching toward a live wire, Pennington reached over and grasped Quinn’s hand. “Tim Pennington, public laughingstock.”

  “Glad to meet you.” Quinn reached inside his coat and produced a flask. He un
screwed the cap, downed a swig of booze, then offered it to Pennington. “Care for a drink?”

  Pennington gave the flask a suspicious look. “What is it?”

  “Green and foul.”

  He took the flask from Quinn’s hand. “Sounds perfect.” He helped himself to a long pull from the flask, then handed it back. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it.”

  While Quinn took another nip of the sour green stuff, Pennington put away his recording device. “I can’t place your accent,” the young man said. “Where are you from?”

  Quinn sleeved a small dribble from his chin. “All over.”

  “No,” Pennington said, “I meant, what’s your ancestry?”

  “Oh,” Quinn said, making a large nod of comprehension. “I’m a drunkard.”

  “A citizen of the galaxy, then.”

  “Precisely.”

  Pennington’s cynicism reasserted itself. “So what’s this all about? What do you want?”

  Quinn shrugged. “Like I said, I felt bad.”

  “About punching me in the bar.”

  “Yeah, that’s right.”

  The reporter shook his head. “That’s pretty thin, mate.”

  “Take it or leave it,” Quinn said.

  Pennington pondered that. “What’s in it for me?”

  “I travel a lot,” Quinn said. “Here and there, wherever. You can tag along, if you don’t mind tight quarters. Get out and see the galaxy a little. Who knows? You might learn something.”

  Nodding, Pennington volleyed back, “What’s in it for you?”

  “Someone to play cards with on long hauls.” Looking around at the now-empty bleachers and increasingly empty athletic fields, he added, “Unless you think your legion of friends and adoring fans wouldn’t approve.”

  “All right, I’ll take it,” Pennington said, then plucked the flask from Quinn’s hand and took another drink. The alcohol made his voice sound choked-off as he tried to pass the flask back to Quinn. “Cheers, mate.”

  “Finish it,” Quinn said. “We’ll get more later.”

  Pennington knocked back the last of the green hooch in the flask and winced. Quinn didn’t know what the young reporter had done to deserve what T’Prynn did to his career, or even if he had deserved it at all. What he did know was that the next time someone came looking to take a cheap shot at Pennington, he would be there to make sure they didn’t get the chance.

  I helped wreck this guy’s life, Quinn brooded behind his crooked smile. But I swear to God, I’m gonna help him fix it.

  Though Manón’s Cabaret would not officially open for a few more hours, its proprietress kindly admitted T’Prynn shortly after the end of Commodore Reyes’s address at the memorial. Taking her place at the piano, T’Prynn closed her eyes and railed against the katra of Sten, whose voice jabbed at her conscious and subconscious mind with his endless calls for her submission.

  Never.

  Her fingers found the right keys purely by muscle memory. Improvised notes of a somber tone flowed from her mind to her hands, giving vent to her sorrow. Her face remained stoic as she wept in chords and melodies, grieving in slow progressions of D-minor. By an infinitesimal degree, the psycho-emotional pressure battering her brittle mental shields abated, and for a brief time Sten’s harassing voice fell silent.

  A key change helped her find a roundabout passage into Paul Tillotson’s moody instrumental “Morphine.” It didn’t bother her to play without an audience; their applause was of no interest to her. She didn’t play for them.

  Minutes passed as she savored every subtle riff and turn in the centuries-old composition. She was uncertain which she admired more, its emotional complexity or its mathematical subtlety. As with most enduring musical forms, she concluded that the two were, in fact, inalienable.

  She finished the song and reveled in the silence.

  “Most skillfully executed,” Spock said.

  T’Prynn opened her eyes and turned her head. The first officer of the Enterprise stood at ease in front of the stage. His long face was stern and unyielding, in the finest Vulcan tradition. She nodded to him. “Most kind, Spock.” With a focus on embodying calm in her every word and gesture, she slowly rose from the bench, closed the keyboard cover, and stepped off the low stage. “Manón usually brings me tea after I play. Would you care to join me?”

  “My visit will be brief,” Spock said. “I must return to the Enterprise. We leave within the hour.”

  “I understand.” She gestured to a nearby table. “Sit down.”

  The two Vulcans took seats opposite each other. Manón emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray, on which rested a china teapot, two cups, and spoons. The supernaturally radiant woman set down the beverages on the table, between Spock and T’Prynn, then left the room without saying anything.

  T’Prynn poured herself a small cup of steaming-hot green tea. Still holding the pot, she cast an inquiring look at Spock. He declined with a small gesture of his hand. She set down the teapot. “Share your thoughts, Spock.”

  “You are most proficient in your art,” he said. “Though I suspect few Vulcans would approve of your techniques.”

  “Do you disapprove, Spock?”

  “I seek to understand.”

  Holding her cup in both hands, she sipped her tea. Its gentle bitterness was tempered with jasmine and peppermint. “It would be a privilege to share my art with you.”

  He lifted his chin, betraying a small glimmer of pride. “I think that our styles would not be compatible.”

  Despite her struggle for control, her left eyebrow lifted, betraying her annoyance. “Double-entendres do not become you, Spock. Speak plainly.”

  “The public disgrace of reporter Tim Pennington,” he said. “Evidence suggests it was your doing.”

  “Evidence can suggest many things.”

  “I submit that it is now you who is not speaking plainly.”

  T’Prynn set down her teacup. “For the sake of discussion, let us proceed on the assumption that Mr. Pennington’s disgrace was deliberately engineered. Does that offend you, Spock?”

  “I find lying offensive,” Spock said. “In particular when its effect is to inflict harm.”

  “What if its primary effect is to avert violence, or even a war? Does the pursuit of a noble aim make some lies permissible, even if collateral damage occurs as a result?”

  “Morality is not necessarily logical,” Spock said. “But logic’s foundation is truthfulness. A lie is its antithesis.”

  “Your analysis is narrow, Spock,” she said. “Under the correct circumstances, if enough lives—or perhaps the right lives—were at stake, you would understand the logical rationale for the tactical use of falsehood.” She picked up her teacup. “But you are young. Time is an excellent teacher.”

  “You are not that much older than I am—T’Prynn, daughter of Sivok and L’Nel.”

  Hearing her parents’ names gave her pause. Obviously, Spock had researched her past history and was attempting to provoke her, though to what end she wasn’t certain. Setting down her tea once more, she maintained eye contact with the half-Vulcan man. “I am more than twice your age, Spock—son of Sarek and Amanda.”

  A handful of dirt flung into my eyes.

  She tensed as Sten’s katra took advantage of her agitation to reassert its assault on her psyche. A non-Vulcan would not have detected the microexpressions that played across her features in moments like these. She hoped that Spock, being half-human, would lack the insight to notice.

  Concern hardened his features. “Your mind is troubled.”

  “It is a private matter.”

  I swing the rock and feel his pain as it gouges his chin.

  “I know that you have not returned to Vulcan for fifty-three years,” Spock said. “You live in exile. Why?”

  “Self-exile,” she said.

  “You were pledged to Sten, son of—”

  “I know his name.”

  Sten’s hands l
ock around my throat. I tighten my neck muscles to prevent him from crushing my trachea.

  “You slew him in the Koon-ut-kal-if-fee.”

  “Yes,” T’Prynn said softly.

  “Is that why you do not return?”

  “No.”

  Spock pondered that. “Please tell me why you choose exile.”

  “I prefer not to.”

  “As you wish,” he said, and rose from his chair. “Thank you for the music and the offer of tea.” He walked toward the exit.

  Sten’s agony is mine as the blade of my lirpa slams down on his foot, severing most of his toes.

  T’Prynn called out, in a voice just shy of a shout, “Spock.”

  He stopped and turned back toward her.

  Mustering her courage, she said simply, “I am a val’reth.”

  His curiosity visibly aroused, Spock lifted one eyebrow. He returned to her side and lowered his voice to a confidential hush. Like most Vulcans, he respected the delicacy of these matters. “You host another’s katra against your will?” She nodded, once, very slowly, and Spock understood. “Sten.”

  “Yes. He forced himself into my mind as I killed him.”

  “Logical,” Spock said. “Death was imminent, and you had physical contact because of the koon-ut-kal-if-fee.”

  “Indeed,” T’Prynn said. “Though I suspect his motives were driven more by spite than by logic.”

  “You climbed the steps of Mount Seleya?”

  “I did,” she said. “I passed through the Hall of Ancient Thought. But when the priestess tried to claim Sten’s katra…he would not leave.”

  “It is not logical,” Spock said, clearly surprised.

  “It is when one considers Sten’s principal objective at the time of death—to force me into submission. He projected his katra into me not for return to his ancestors, but to continue the fight until I surrender.”

  “Is there nothing that can be done?”

  “The Adepts consulted the ancient texts and melded with me far too many times for my comfort,” she confessed. “The consensus was always the same: They cannot force Sten’s katra from me without destroying it…and my own katra, as well.”

  Spock nodded gravely. Apparently, he understood the dire consequences of katra possession as well as she did. Until she was rid of Sten’s katra, she could not enjoy the release of Pon farr, would be denied the serenity of Kolinahr, and could not be assured that her own katra would find rest with those of her ancestors. In effect, she was condemned to do battle for her mind and soul every day, until her will faltered or Sten finally abandoned his mad onslaught.