STAR TREK: TOS - The Eugenics Wars, Volume Two

by Greg Cox

  “You said you agreed with Dr. McCoy,” he stated, wondering just how long Seven had been eavesdropping on their conversation. “Does this mean that you disapprove of accepting the Paragon Colony into the Federation?”

  “Very much so,” Seven said gravely. “Despite all the truly commendable progress humanity has made since the 1990s, we are not yet ready to take our genetic destiny into our own hands.”

  Kirk could not help noticing that, somewhere along the way, Seven had lost his occasionally annoying habit of referring to the human race as something different from himself. Nice to know he’s joined the club at last, he mused, and that people can change for the better.

  “I need more than that,” he told Seven, not too harshly. “An explanation, not just a blanket statement. Give me a reason to believe you.”

  Seven’s eyes were full of hard-won experience. “The greatest danger of eugenics, Captain, is not the enhanced abilities of people like Khan; it’s the assumption that those enhancements somehow make certain people intrinsically superior to others, on the most fundamental level conceivable.”

  He glanced at the coral-shell computer terminal where Kirk had recently studied the unsettling annals of the past. “You’ve seen what happens next. Once you accept that assumption, that certain people are intrinsically more advanced than others, then you end up with megalomaniacs at one end of the spectrum and dangerously frightened people at the other. Look at what Khan became. Look at the violent [420] backlash of General Morrison’s militia. Eugenics programs, no matter how well-intentioned, invariably become just another way of turning ‘Us’ against ‘Them.’ ”

  Kirk found himself playing devil’s advocate again. “But maybe it doesn’t have to be that way anymore. The Federation already embraces scores of diverse alien races and life-forms. Why not two separate strains of humanity?”

  “Sometimes it is easier to accept diversity among aliens than among our own kind. It’s not necessarily logical, but it’s true nonetheless.” Seven spoke as though he’d seen a great deal of illogic in his time, whenever that was. “Genetic engineering is not like warp technology or even artificial intelligence. When you talk about DNA, Captain, you’re provoking a very powerful emotional response, one that hits people at the very core of their identities, no matter how civilized they might otherwise be.” He gave Kirk a pointed look. “Even in the enlightened world of the twenty-third century.”

  Part of Kirk, whose lungs still ached from the memory of Khan’s torture, wanted to agree with Seven, to have a good excuse for banning forever the technology that created Khan, but another part—less fearful, more optimistic—felt compelled to defend the people of his own era.

  “I’m not sure I accept your premise: that modern humans would react the same way people did back in the 1990s. You may be underestimating us, just like Khan did.” Crossing the room, he peered out a window at the streets and gardens of the thriving colony; everything certainly seemed harmless enough. “Give [421] me one good reason why human genetic engineering would be a terrible mistake.”

  “Because what truly matters can’t be found in the genes,” Seven said forcefully, as if he couldn’t stress the point strongly enough. “Superior strength. Superior intelligence. These are all useful traits, but, in the end, they don’t necessarily make superior people. Character. Compassion. Courage. Those are learned qualities, not encoded on any chromosome, but, ultimately, they are what will truly advance the human race.”

  His gray eyes turned inward as he looked back across the gulf of time. “Khan thought that he was more than human, but, over the years, his arrogance and lack of empathy ate away at his humanity, turning him into the monster you encountered. Roberta Lincoln. Shannon O’Donnell. Those were the truly superior humans, and what made them special did not come out of a test tube.” Returning to the present, he leaned forward in his chair. “Trust me on this, Captain. If humanity goes looking for its future in strands of altered DNA, it will be heading in the wrong direction.”

  The captain nodded, paying close attention both to Seven’s words and the obvious passion behind them. “And what about the Klingons?” he asked.

  Seven sighed wearily. “For better or for worse, I suspect the essence of the Klingon soul will remain the same, no matter what genetic bells and whistles they may or may not add to their DNA. In any event, don’t let an unreasoning fear of the Klingons, or any other alien adversaries, scare mankind away from its own humanity.”

  Because if we abandon that, Kirk realized, then we’ll have already lost the most important battle of all. [422] Remembering how he and his crew had just foiled Koloth’s genocidal schemes, and without any augmented DNA, he felt much more confident about the human race’s ability to take on even genetically engineered Klingons or Romulans. “Thank you, Mr. Seven,” Kirk said sincerely. “You’ve given me a lot to think about.”

  He helped the older man out of the easy chair, then watched as Seven walked back toward the open doorway, where a shimmering cloud of blue plasma awaited him. “Good luck tomorrow, Captain,” he said. “I know you’ll make the right decision.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  Gary Seven just smiled as he stepped into the fog.

  The next day, in Masako Clarke’s office, Kirk wasted no time informing the regent of his decision.

  “The good news is that I intend to strongly recommend that the Federation place the Paragon Colony under Starfleet protection, thus deterring any further assaults by the Klingons and other hostile parties. Starfleet engineers can help you upgrade your planetary defenses, and we may even decide to establish a military outpost in orbit around Sycorax, enforcing the quarantine.”

  “Quarantine?” Clarke asked. The regent sat behind a coral desk while her top advisors, including a grim-faced Gregor Lozin, listened to Kirk from their own chairs flanking their chief executive’s desk. Chartreuse sunlight, filtered through the restored chlorodome, entered the office from a balcony to the left of where Kirk now stood, delivering his final verdict on Sycorax and all it represented.

  “Yes, Madame Regent,” he said. “Beyond the [423] protection I spoke of, I am also advising the Federation to have nothing more to do with the Paragon Colony. Full membership in the Federation will be denied, the planet declared off-limits, and the ban on human genetic engineering will remain intact.”

  McCoy and Lerner waited at the back of the room, ready to accompany Kirk to the shuttle that would return them to the Enterprise. Kirk suspected that McCoy was considerably relieved and gratified by his decision, just as Gary Seven would be, wherever and whenever he was now.

  “I’m sorry, Regent Clarke,” the captain declared. “I wish you and your colony continued health and prosperity, but, after much consideration, of the past, the present, and the future, I do not believe that it is in the Federation’s best interests to re-embark on a perilous course that once nearly destroyed humanity. The Romulans and the Klingons are a serious threat, yes, but even more dangerous than alien competitors is the possibility of a second Eugenics War.”

  Never again, Kirk vowed, fervently hoping that the foreboding specter of Khan Noonien Singh had been laid to rest at last.

  AFTERWORD

  Historical Notes on The Eugenics Wars, Volume Two

  Unlike the world wars of the past, the Eugenics Wars were shadowy conflicts, fought behind the scenes of current events, against elusive, conspiratorial enemies whose genetically engineered origins remained largely unknown to the general public. Although the existence of the Eugenics Wars was well-known by the twenty-third century, most citizens of the late twentieth century were not even aware of the global struggle against Khan and his fellow supermen, seeing only scattered brushfire wars and random acts of terrorism.

  Due to the covert nature of the Eugenics Wars, trying to find accurate contemporary accounts of the events described in this volume is like searching for a pacifist Klingon. Nonetheless, certain facts and references in this volume are corroborated by the “offici
al” records of the era ...

  [426] Chapter One: Roberta is not exaggerating when she frets about the civil wars and unrest plaguing the world in 1992. By that summer, war was raging in Liberia, Peru, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Somalia, Sudan, and elsewhere. There had been food riots in Albania, race riots in Los Angeles, and ongoing chaos in the former Soviet Union. In hindsight, it’s difficult to determine just how much of this global turmoil was caused and/or exacerbated by Khan and his genetically engineered confreres, but Mr. Spock was also on the money when he described the 1990s as “a strange, violent time” in Earth’s history.

  On the brighter side, France did suspend nuclear testing in April 1992, shortly before Khan secretly took possession of the Centre d’Experimentation du Pacifique. The French government had fought a running battle with environmentalists over their South Pacific bomb tests, which may explain the Greenpeace logo Roberta found carved into that detention cell on Muroroa.

  Chapter Two: A twenty percent increase in the size of the Antarctic ozone hole was indeed noted in the summer of 1992. Officially, the expansion was blamed on the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines the summer before, but this was obviously just a cover story, intended to keep the general public from guessing the existence of Khan’s ozone destroyer.

  Meanwhile, a United Nations peacekeeping force was definitely stationed in Bosnia that summer. Undermanned and overwhelmed, they were certainly in harm’s way, even if Khan hadn’t instigated a plot against them to keep Seven and Roberta busy.

  [427] The European Remote Sensing Satellite (ERS-1), Europe’s first environmental satellite, went into orbit in 1991. ERS-2, launched three years later, was capable of charting Earth’s ozone layer every seventy-two hours, thus allowing those nations to watch out for any sign of Morning Star at work.

  Chapter Three: Roberta’s efforts to protect Windsor Castle were only partially successful. On November 20, 1992, less than a month after Khan’s commandos raided Gary Seven’s headquarters in London, a portion of the castle did catch fire, causing nearly sixty million dollars in damage. An overheated spotlight was blamed for the disaster, no doubt to avoid alarming the British public. We can perhaps thank Roberta that the entire edifice did not go up in flames.

  Chapter Four: It is unsurprising that the destruction of Seven’s bookshop was blamed on the Irish Republican Army. IRA bombings were sadly common in London during the early nineties.

  Likewise, the intercaste conflict that Khan notes in India was very much an issue at the time, costing the lives of several suicidal upper-caste protesters.

  Chapter Five: Amidst much hype, the Biosphere II experiment, mentioned by Shannon O’Donnell, began in October 1991. Although not entirely successful, this ambitious attempt to create a sealed, self-sustainable living environment provided data on artificial habitats that no doubt influenced the construction and cargo of the S.S. Botany Bay.

  The existence of Area 51, as well as the details of the infamous Roswell incident, have been well-documented elsewhere, including Volume One of this history.

  [428] Chapter Six: The attendees at Khan’s superhuman summit are all too typical of the various revolutionaries, gurus, terrorists, and warlords who made the nineties such an interesting and tumultuous era.

  Chapter Seven: Although it has nothing to do with the Eugenics Wars, Spock’s innovative battle strategy was, as he admits, inspired by the actual historical exploits of Jasper Maskelyne, a noted British stage magician who used his skills as an illusionist to assist the Allied cause in World War II. The searchlight trick he used to defend the Suez Canal in 1941 was just one of several bits of wartime prestidigitation carried out by Maskelyne and his notorious “magic gang.”

  Chapter Ten: The catastrophic earthquake that struck Maharashtra early in the morning of September 30, 1993, came as something of a surprise given that the region had previously been considered aseismic. Speculation afterward focused on the Lower Tirna Reservoir, approximately ten kilometers from the center of the quake, where it was theorized that the reservoir’s contents exerted too much loading on an underlying fault. (Only Khan and his inner circle, however, guessed that the quake had actually been triggered by an underwater concussive charge.) Death tolls attributed to the 1993 quake vary widely, ranging from nine to thirty thousand fatalities; given the widespread devastation, Khan can certainly be forgiven for assuming the worst.

  Chapter Eleven: The Dunes Casino, later re-created holographically on Deep Space Nine, was open for business from 1955 to 1993. It was demolished in a controlled implosion on October 27, 1993, a few weeks after [429] Roberta and Shannon had their final rendezvous there. As far as we know, Khan had nothing to do with the casino’s destruction, although I wouldn’t bet the farm on that.

  Chapter Twelve: Why a sub attack? Khan had few other options, given United Nations Security Council Resolution 781, adopted in October of 1992, which banned military flights over Bosnia-Herzegovina. Subsequently, Resolution 816, adopted March 31, 1993, allowed NATO to shoot down aircraft violating the no-fly zone, severely curtailing Khan’s ability to launch an air strike against Vasily Hunyadi’s Bosnian headquarters.

  The experimental Shkval (Squall) torpedo, which Khan employed so successfully against Hunyadi’s attack sub, was indeed developed by the Russians during the late seventies. Later on, desperate for hard cash, Russia is rumored to have sold improved versions of the Shkval to such nations as France, China, and Iran. Not to mention the Great Khanate, of course!

  Chapter Thirteen: Contemporary historical records contain no mention of the submarine battle between Khan’s and Hunyadi’s forces, suggesting that all involved succeeded in keeping the deadly encounter out of the press, much as Gary Seven hoped. On the other hand, it was then pretty much impossible to open a newspaper or turn on the television without hearing about the well-publicized scandal involving Olympic ice skaters Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan. What with Tonya and Nancy occupying the news, not to mention O.J. and Amy Fisher, it’s no surprise that the average American never noticed the Eugenics Wars.

  Chapter Fourteen: Even by Indian standards, the [430] summer of 1994 was a scorching one, with temperatures reaching as high as 50 degrees Celsius in New Delhi; small wonder Khan felt so uncomfortable posing in his garden.

  He was also entitled to feel pessimistic about the state of the world that year. His despairing litany of geopolitical hot spots and crises, from North Korea to Rwanda to the Middle East to the Balkans, was all too well-informed.

  Just as on-target were Ament’s timely warnings of inflation and unemployment in large parts of India, as that struggling nation endured a painful transition from pseudo-socialism to a more free-market economy.

  Chapter Fifteen: Militias such as the Army of Eternal Vigilance were becoming a serious threat by 1994, convincing tens of thousands of Americans that evil government forces were plotting to steal their freedom. Thankfully, most of these private armies were not led by a genetically engineered superman, but they still managed to inspire the likes of Timothy McVeigh. (For a terrifying and eye-opening look at the rise of the militias, check out A Force Upon the Plain: The American Militia Movement and the Politics of Hate by Kenneth S. Stern.)

  Chapter Sixteen: By August of 1994, NATO was threatening another round of air strikes against Serbian positions in Bosnia, with the full sanction of the United Nations. It was the continuing threat of these strikes that surely prompted Vasily Hunyadi to confront the U.N. in Geneva.

  The nerve gas assault on the Palais des Nations anticipated a similar attack that occurred in Japan not long after. In March 1995, members of Aum [431] Shinrikyo, an apocalyptic cult, released sarin gas in crowded rush-hour subway trains in Tokyo, killing a dozen innocent commuters and injuring countless more. (An earlier trial run, in June 1994, killed another seven people.) Thankfully, neither event claimed as many casualties as the attack in Geneva.

  Concocted by German scientists in the 1930s, sarin was also used by Saddam Hussein in the 1980s, against both
Iran and the Kurds. Twenty-six times more deadly than cyanide gas, it works by inhibiting the production of cholinesterase, an enzyme produced in the liver that causes contracted muscles to relax. With no cholinesterase, muscles stay contracted, resulting in suffocation, paralysis, and eventual death. (Dr. Beverly Crusher, of the U.S.S. Enterprise, later diagnosed the cause of Claire Raymond’s death as an “embolism,” suggesting that the sarin caused some sort of fatal clotting in the unfortunate woman’s brain.)

  Giving credit where it’s due, it should be noted that Walter Nichols’s revolutionary cryosatellite technology has an absolutely astonishing record of success. Not only did it preserve Khan and several dozen of his followers way into the twenty-third century, but it also allowed Claire Raymond and two other twentieth-century Americans to be revived nearly a hundred years later, in the time of Captain Picard. Those twentieth-century cryonics units were obviously built to last!

  Chapter Seventeen: As Roberta suspects, Seven was no doubt busy in the summer of 1994 monitoring the tense situation in Southeast Asia, where North Korea had threatened to turn its long-time rival, South Korea, into a “sea of flames” in response to U.S. [432] accusations that it was attempting to develop nuclear weapons by diverting plutonium from power plants to bomb-making. Attempts to mediate the situation by former President Jimmy Carter (with perhaps the covert assistance of Gary Seven) were complicated by the sudden death of North Korea’s long-time dictator, Kim Sung, leaving it unclear as to who was in charge in Pyongyang. A tentative accord was finally achieved in October of 1994, but only after many months of anxious uncertainty that surely occupied much of Seven’s attention.

  Chapter Eighteen: The symptoms exhibited by the late Dr. Donald Williams, although artificially accelerated, correspond with the known effects of necrotizing fasciitis. For more information on this very real, but thankfully rare, syndrome, check out the Web site of the National Necrotizing Fasciitis Foundation at: http://nnff.org.