“You’re a wise man, John Jason Harriman,” she said. “I mean, I don’t know about the Tzenkethi, but as far as women are concerned, you have exceptional taste.”
John smiled, and she was happy to see that. In the past few days with him, she’d seen it a great deal. And John rarely smiled in a small way; when happy or amused, his mouth widened broadly, his joy apparent. She had always loved that about him: he enjoyed being happy. It seemed an odd thing to consider, but Sasine had known many people who could not exist within a moment, could not live for the simple but important pleasures life could offer. But John loved life as he loved her: fully. That did not mean that he didn’t suffer difficulties or doubts—life always provided such obstacles—but John never appeared to take for granted the things that brought him happiness.
“Yes, I do have great taste in women,” he joked, “but I have to wonder about your taste in men.”
“I do too,” Sasine said with a smile. “I mean, a mere starship captain? You’d think I’d rate a commander in chief.”
John playfully wrinkled his nose. “Admiral Sinclair-Alexander isn’t really your type, though, is she?”
Sasine shook her head. “No. A little too severe for me,” she said. “Which means I suppose I’m stuck with you.” She leaned forward and whispered into his ear, “So will you marry me?” Then she stepped back and looked at him, allowing him to answer.
“Yes, of course,” he said.
“When?” she asked, just as he had when she’d first seen him back on Foxtrot XIII.
“Every day,” he said.
Sasine smiled, perfectly content with the vitality of their commitment to each other. “I’ll contact you once I’m settled in at Helaspont,” she said.
John nodded, and then turned and boarded Enterprise. She watched him go, and when he turned a corner and disappeared from sight, she headed for the nearest turbolift. She would go to an observation lounge with a view of Enterprise and watch as the ship departed the station. It would allow her to feel connected to John for just a little bit longer. And even after the time they’d just had together, she wanted to continue to experience that connection, even if for just a few more seconds.
As Harriman watched the image of Space Station KR-3 start to recede on the bridge’s main viewscreen, he decided that he detested farewells. He pictured Amina back on KR-3, where they had just parted, and imagined her standing at a viewing port, gazing out at Enterprise as it fled into the eternal night of space. The thought saddened him. He supposed that he should have become inured to such experiences by now—after all, his relationship with Amina had strung together a long series of goodbyes over eight years—but he found each new parting more difficult to bear than the last.
“Viewer ahead,” Harriman said from the command chair, fully aware of both the irony and the denial inherent in the order. For reasons personal and professional, though, he actually would look ahead to the future. But he also knew that there would be no renouncing his emotions; he might be able to bury the sadness of his separation from Amina, but it would never leave him.
“Viewer ahead,” Lieutenant Tenger echoed from his side of the tactical-and-communications console. The main screen blinked and the scene on it changed, the three-armed, honeycombed form of KR-3 disappearing in favor of an empty starscape.
“Ensign Tolek, plot a course for the Bonneville Flats,” Harriman ordered.
“That course has already been plotted, Captain,” the navigator responded. He tapped the controls on his console with the long, slender fingers common to many Vulcans, then turned and glanced over his left shoulder at Harriman. “And now it’s been laid in,” he said, and smiled.
Harriman felt momentarily startled, still not quite accustomed to Tolek’s demeanor. Harriman had served with several Vulcans during his Starfleet career, but until Ensign Tolek had come aboard Enterprise, none who’d ever smiled—or laughed, or frowned, or fraternized with the crew, or engaged in any number of other behaviors considered anathema to Vulcans. To most Vulcans, anyway; there were also the V’tosh ka’tur—Vulcans without logic—but Harriman knew that Tolek did not count himself among their number.
“The helm answers ready,” Lieutenant Commander Linojj reported.
“Take us to warp nine, then,” Harriman said.
“Warp nine, aye,” Linojj replied, her hands skipping nimbly across her station.
Around Harriman, Enterprise came alive, an awakening more felt than heard as the warp drive engaged. After eighteen years commanding this vessel, Harriman could tell the condition of the engines simply by feel. And as the stars began their relative movement on the main viewscreen, he knew Enterprise was not just healthy, but vigorous.
“Time to arrival at the Bonneville Flats,” Tolek said, “forty-seven hours, fifty-three minutes.”
“Thank you,” Harriman acknowledged. Tolek had been assigned to Enterprise less than two years ago, and promoted to alpha-shift navigator just within the last six months. Despite his unusual manner, at least in terms of typical Vulcan customs, Tolek claimed to live as most Vulcans did: according to the tenets of Surak, a philosopher who, two millennia ago, espoused the employment of logic and the suppression of emotion.
When Tolek had chosen to enter Starfleet, though, and therefore to live among humans and members of other emotive species, he had concluded—by way of logic, Harriman assumed—that he and his crewmates would be best served if he could develop a means of smoothly integrating with them. With that goal in mind, he had set out to become a student of social interaction, eventually putting into practice what he learned. According to Tolek, no happiness resided behind his smiles, no humor behind his laughs, no sorrow behind his frowns; he only emulated such expressions in the appropriate contexts in order to better interrelate with his crewmates.
Except that, no matter what Tolek claimed, there seemed to be more than mere imitation behind his conduct. If there hadn’t been, then no matter how much he attempted to fit in with his crewmates, he would have been perceived as dishonest. Harriman believed that Tolek acted as he did in order to satisfy, at the very least, an intense curiosity about other species and other individuals. And so his behavior did not simply reflect his abilities to mimic others, but his genuine interest in their lives, their beliefs, and their activities.
By all accounts Harriman had heard, Tolek had succeeded well, even holding a measure of popularity among the crew. He had even been known, on occasion, to entertain them. Not long ago, Harriman had been passing by the crew mess and had heard Tolek telling a rapt group: “A Vulcan, a human, and a Klingon are stranded on an uninhabited planet.” Harriman hadn’t had time to stop, but he’d intended to ask Tolek later to share the rest of the joke.
The memory of that incident suddenly made Harriman feel alone. He peered around the bridge at his crew—at Demora Sulu and Xintal Linojj, at Tenger and Ramesh Kanchumurthi, at Borona Fenn, at Rafe Buonarotti up from engineering—but doing so failed to alter his sense of isolation. Harriman considered these people closer to him than family, but he felt disconnected from them right now.
Uncomfortable, he stood from the command chair. “Commander Sulu,” he said, unable at that moment to use her given name, “you have the bridge. I’ll be in my quarters.”
Sulu looked up from where she stood beside Ensign Fenn at the sciences console on the port side of the bridge. “Sir?” she asked, obviously surprised, but Harriman headed for the turbolift without offering an explanation. “Yes, sir,” he heard her say behind him, acknowledging and accepting the order.
He entered the turbolift and waited for the doors to close. Once they had, he stated his destination, then leaned heavily against the wall. What’s wrong with me? he thought as the lift descended. This feeling of seclusion that had washed over him, this melancholy…he didn’t understand where these emotions had originated.
Maybe it was saying goodbye to Amina again, he speculated. Maybe he just hadn’t wanted to leave her again. The times they’d spent with
each other during the last several days—first on Foxtrot XIII, then on Enterprise, and finally on KR-3—had been absolutely wonderful. Unlike their trips together, when they met in some interesting place to enjoy one activity or another—sailing the garnet seas on the Canopus Planet, donning artificial wings to soar through the low gravity of Izar’s Shroud, spelunking the bottomless ice caves on Catulla—they’d remained almost exclusively in their quarters this time. With Amina commanding Foxtrot XIII—and soon Helaspont Station—and Harriman commanding Enterprise, propriety would not have permitted them to do otherwise.
The lift slowed its descent, came briefly to a halt, then started to glide laterally. Harriman shifted his weight and straightened from where he had been leaning against the wall. Thinking of the last few days with Amina, he smiled. They’d talked and laughed, they’d danced, they’d watched some of the old films that they both loved so much: Greer Garson in Mrs. Miniver and Random Harvest, Frank Capra’s amazing It’s a Wonderful Life, the magical and powerful An Ancient Season. And more than all of that, they had simply reveled in sharing each other’s company. Parting today had been torturous, unquestionably more difficult for him than it had ever been.
But isn’t that the way it always is? Harriman asked himself. Isn’t the most recent farewell always the most difficult? That made sense; time blunted memory, assuaged emotion. That would be the case this time too, he was certain: as time passed without Amina by his side, the ache of their goodbye would fade.
Except that he was no longer sure that he wanted time to pass without Amina by his side. But then, that was one of the prices he paid to be a starship captain.
The turbolift eased to a stop and the doors opened. Harriman exited into the corridor and started for his quarters. On his way, he passed several of the crew, and he nodded automatically in their direction as he passed them, a long-standing habit of a life lived almost entirely aboard starships. Harriman had been born on U.S.S. Sea of Tranquility, and then had moved to numerous other vessels as his father—John “Blackjack” Harriman, now an admiral—had advanced through Starfleet. As a result of Blackjack’s life aboard starships—and therefore of his own such life—the first time that Harriman had spent more than a couple of weeks planetside had been when he had traveled to Earth to attend Starfleet Academy. His three years there—he’d been approved to take an accelerated course of study, in addition to receiving credits for duties he’d performed aboard his father’s ships—had been the only time in his life when he hadn’t called a Starfleet vessel home.
He reached his quarters and strode inside. He stopped for a moment, considering what to do. He eyed the arc of his desk sitting in the near left corner of the cabin, but realized that he didn’t feel up to concentrating on any work right now. The door to his bedroom stood open in the wall beyond the desk, but neither did Harriman feel like sleeping. Instead, he crossed the room to the outer bulkhead and stared out at the stars slipping by as Enterprise warped through space. His quarters sat on the starboard side of the ship, so the stars raced from left to right across his view.
After a few minutes, his thoughts wandered back to Amina, and his emotions back to being apart from her. Frustrated, Harriman dropped onto his back on the sofa, thinking that perhaps he could rest for a while and refocus his thoughts. He attempted to blank his mind, closing his eyes to shut out the rest of the universe, but before long, he found himself staring at the ceiling.
That’s something that never changes, he joked to himself: starship overheads. They all had that same off-white color, that same beam-to-beam construction, that same pattern of lighting panels. And I should know, Harriman thought; for the vast majority of his life, such a ceiling had been his sky.
He recalled those first weeks he had spent on Earth after he had joined the Academy. He’d felt helpless, and even fearful, being outdoors and under a wide, open sky so often, a condition he’d self-diagnosed as mild agoraphobia. He had never revealed that experience to anybody but Amina—and certainly not to his father. At the time, he had chosen to suffer through the unhealthy emotions, convinced that he could help himself past the problem. He’d read psychological texts regarding the condition, and had researched the techniques people utilized to overcome it. Within just a couple of months, he had gotten better, and by the end of his term at the Academy, he’d actually come to appreciate and take pleasure from outdoor activities.
Once he had graduated, though, Harriman’s Starfleet career had taken him back aboard ship. He had never really wanted another way of life. Truthfully, he had never even considered it.
Of course not, he thought. The admiral saw to that.
He swung his legs down to the floor and sat up on the sofa. Is that it? he wondered. Was Blackjack’s presence on the upcoming mission what had led to his own pensiveness and sense of disconnection? Other than in an official capacity, the admiral hadn’t spoken to him in seventeen years, since an incident in which Harriman had transported Blackjack from the bridge of Enterprise and into the brig. At the time, Harriman had been under orders from Starfleet Command to track down Excelsior and escort it back to base. He had instead helped Excelsior’s captain—Hikaru Sulu, Demora’s father—rescue her from Askalon V; Demora, Enterprise’s navigator back then, had previously been believed dead.
After the incident, Harriman had gone to his father and convinced him not to empanel a court-martial for the actions of either starship’s captain. But relations between father and son had cooled after that, and a few silent months later, it had become clear that their relationship had foundered. They had spoken during the years since, but only in their official capacities within Starfleet, including some important meetings within the last year or so. Two days from now, though, their respective roles in the Universe project would require more interaction between them than they’d had since…well, since all those years ago.
And maybe that’s affecting me more than I’ve been willing to admit, Harriman thought. Maybe—
No. He had long ago come to terms with his estrangement from his father. For despite all of the time they had spent together on the various starships to which his father had been assigned, they had never really shared a father-son bond. Even as a boy, Harriman had been treated more like a subordinate than like a child; Blackjack seemed to have been grooming him for service in Starfleet even then.
He pushed up from the sofa, but he didn’t move from there, his feet remaining planted and his thoughts remaining in the past. By the time Harriman had graduated the Academy, his father had attained the rank of rear admiral, a position that had allowed him some influence in forwarding his son’s fledgling career. Doors of opportunity had opened early and often for Harriman, more so than his performance—as good as it had been—had merited. More so than anybody’s performance would have merited. He had initially felt divergent emotions about this: on the one hand, he had appreciated the chance to rise rapidly through the Starfleet ranks, but on the other, his pride and personal ethic had made him want to earn his promotions solely on the basis of his accomplishments and abilities. He had also resented that his father had not apparently believed him capable of such a career on his own.
Except that his father had thought him neither capable nor incapable, Harriman had eventually realized; the admiral’s actions had been motivated not by his opinions of his son, but by his opinions of himself. Blackjack had worn his son’s career as he would have a medal, as something that reflected upon him. It had taken Harriman a long time, but on that day seventeen years ago when the admiral had essentially taken command of Enterprise from him and had prepared to fire on the undefended Excelsior, he—Harriman—had finally faced the depth of his father’s self-involvement. He wished it were otherwise, wished that his father were different from the man he was, but in actuality, Harriman did not really like or respect him, and so also did not miss him.
But if this feeling of segregation from the crew was not about his father, as awkward as it might be to work with him in the next few days, and
if it was not about Amina, much as he loved and missed her, then what was it about?
He paced across the room to his desk. He reached over it and turned the desktop computer interface around so that he could see it, then toggled it on. The image of Enterprise appeared on the display. “Computer,” he said, “show me U.S.S. Universe, NX Twenty-nine Ninety-nine. External views, bow and starboard.”
“Please state identity and authorization code,” the computer responded in its mature, female voice.
“Identity: Harriman, Captain John J.,” he said. “Authorization: beta thirty-one meteor green.”
“Voiceprint and security code confirmed,” the computer said. “Displaying requested data.”
On the computer screen, the Enterprise vanished, replaced an instant later by split-screen images of Universe; a view from in front of the vessel sat on top, and a view from the side on the bottom. With a particularly wide beam and shallow depth, the starship looked as though it had been compacted top to bottom, and spread port and starboard. The primary hull, a narrow ellipse with its major axis running fore and aft, had no rise to it at its center. The secondary hull, another level, narrow ellipse, but smaller, connected to the primary hull directly, the forward section of the former lying directly below the aft section of the latter. A pair of thin struts, angling backward, connected each of the two warp nacelles to the secondary hull. The nacelles themselves were flat and wide, flaring out broadly from their midpoints aft. The two-hull, two-nacelle alignment suggested a resemblance to other Starfleet vessels, but departed dramatically from those other designs in execution.
This is what’s troubling me, Harriman thought. He circled around his desk and sat down in the chair behind it, pulling the computer interface around as he did so. This is what’s dividing me from my crew. Not the work to be done with Blackjack, not the goodbye with Amina. This.
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