Star Trek: The Lost Era - 08 - 2319 - One Constant Star

by David R. George III

  “See that you do,” Gedlin said. “We will be watching for Federation treachery.”

  You’d better be watching closely, Harriman thought, or you’re going to miss it. “Harriman out,” he said, and Amina nodded once she’d closed the channel. He checked the navigational sensors and saw that Enterprise followed Cassiopeia at a distance of half a kilometer, just as he’d ordered. Well done, Xintal.

  “What are we going to do?” Amina asked.

  “A little sleight of hand, I hope,” Harriman said. “Otherwise, if we ever do make it home, we might find the Federation at war with the Tzenkethi.” He offered the words as though delivering a punch line, but he knew they contained more than a little bit of truth.

  “Maybe I should have stayed on Helaspont Station after all,” Amina said.

  Harriman shrugged. “Too late now.” He kept his gaze glued to the navigational sensors. “The Enterprise is keeping pace,” he said. “But so are the Tzenkethi frigates.”

  “I don’t think they trust you,” Amina said.

  He shrugged again. “Go figure.” He watched Cassiopeia’s distance to the portal diminish. “We’re getting close to transport,” he told Amina.

  “Not close enough,” she said. “The Tzenkethi are hailing us.”

  “Put him on.”

  “Tzenkethi squadron to Federation starships,” Gedlin said. “Admiral Harriman, what is the large circular object for which your ships are heading?”

  “Yes, what is it?” Harriman asked, raising his voice. “What Tzenkethi treachery have you been hiding?”

  “That is not Tzenkethi technology,” Gedlin said. “Clearly the Federation—”

  “Clearly the Federation has much to distrust about the Coalition,” Harriman said, lacing his words with anger. He waved Amina over, and she circled the bridge to the station where he sat. “Here is physical evidence that the Tzenkethi are developing a metaweapon to use against us. No wonder you wanted our ships out of this system.” He engaged the impulse engines, and the ship hummed to life around them. Then he stood up and took Amina’s hand.

  Gedlin Siv Vel-B began to rage, but his words drifted away from Harriman as the familiar whine of a transporter beam started to form.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Linojj watched from the command chair as Admiral Harriman and Captain Sasine materialized at the forward end of the bridge, directly in front of the main viewer. Behind them, the screen showed two distinct images: on the left, Cassiopeia charged toward the portal, its velocity suddenly increasing just before Lieutenant Ved had beamed the two officers aboard, and on the right, the three Tzenkethi frigates following closely behind Enterprise. As soon as the transport process completed, the admiral sprang into action. Giving him the trust for which he’d asked—And which he earned from me in my time as his second officer, Linojj thought—she’d prepared her crew for that moment by instructing them to act on his orders without first seeking her approval.

  “Tenger, shields up,” he said. “Navigation, head us directly through the center of the portal. Helm, full impulse, now!”

  Linojj saw the admiral’s plan unfolding and understood where it would take them. Considering the circumstances, she agreed with his assessment that, if they wanted to attempt to save both crews—that of Enterprise and that of Excelsior—they had no other alternative. The immediate responses of the Enterprise bridge crew to Harriman’s orders inspired and impressed her.

  “The Tzenkethi are firing on us,” Tenger said an instant before Enterprise trembled.

  “Ignore them,” Harriman said.

  Linojj opened her mouth to object—Why not fire on an adversary who’s fired first?—but then she grasped the admiral’s reasoning. If they did manage to escape the Tzenkethi, why leave them with any physical evidence that a Starfleet vessel had attacked them? The last thing the Coalition needed was any more motivation to declare war on the Federation; they seemed to mine that from their own psyches quite well.

  “They are firing again,” Tenger said, and again, the ship rocked beneath a Tzenkethi disruptor blast.

  Harriman quickly sat on the railing at the front of the bridge, threw his legs over it, and jumped down in front of the navigation console. “Keep us on target,” the admiral told Aldani. “The portal will probably emit tractor beams.” He glanced over at Linojj. “Right?”

  “Yes, to guide us through,” Linojj confirmed.

  “Don’t fight them,” Harriman said. Another disruptor blast slammed into Enterprise, that time without the virtue of Tenger announcing it ahead of time. “Keep the ship aimed directly for the center of the portal.”

  “Yes, sir,” Aldani said.

  Harriman looked toward the main viewer. On the right side of the screen, a green bolt of energy emerged from the tip of the first ship’s central tine and streaked toward them. On the left side of the screen, the Enterprise closed rapidly on the portal, overtaking Cassiopeia. As it did so, it confirmed for Linojj what she’d thought: that the admiral had set the Constellation-class vessel on a collision course with the alien device. Once destroyed, the Tzenkethi would not be able to follow Enterprise. Of course, there will also no longer be any possibility of anybody modifying the portal in order to get us back home.

  “Viewer ahead,” Linojj said, and the image of the Tzenkethi frigates disappeared, leaving the portal in the center of the screen. Streaks of golden light shot from points all around the circular structure, all aimed directly at Enterprise. The ship bucked momentarily, but then continued on its course. The portal grew on the viewscreen as they neared it, until all that remained was an unfamiliar starscape.

  * * *

  11

  * * *

  Admiral John Harriman stepped from the starboard turbolift onto the Enterprise bridge. As much as he loved his wife, as much as he appreciated her professionalism and valued her considerable abilities, he still preferred a busy, fully occupied bridge to one crewed by just the two of them. As he moved toward the command chair among a number of people with whom he had once served—Xintal Linojj, Tenger, Borona Fenn, Ramesh Kanchumurthi—he realized that he felt comfortable. He didn’t experience a sense of homecoming, despite having commanded Enterprise for nearly two decades—he had moved on in his life, and believed himself better for it—but he did feel that he belonged.

  Some of his self-assurance, Harriman knew, stemmed from all that he had helped to accomplish over the past couple of days. Once Enterprise had traveled through the portal, he had ordered the ship hard to port, then brought it about to wait for any Tzenkethi vessels to follow. None did, nor did any probes arrive to perform recon. That likely meant that the admiral’s plan to destroy the portal by crashing Cassiopeia into it had succeeded. If the timing worked as he’d intended, then Gedlin Siv Vel-B and the rest of the Tzenkethi squadron witnessed the explosion an instant after Enterprise had passed through the alien device, concluding that both Starfleet vessels had been destroyed.

  What the Tzenkethi believed mattered only in terms of political fallout. If they thought that the Enterprise crew had somehow escaped the area by employing some new technology, which they had then intentionally eradicated by crashing Cassiopeia into it, then they likely would take issue with the Federation. But if Gedlin believed that nobody from either Starfleet vessel had survived their encounter with his squadron, the Coalition would probably never address what had taken place—not when doing so would necessarily point to the deaths of hundreds of Federation citizens.

  Harriman paced toward the command chair, where Linojj stood up to greet him. He still hadn’t grown accustomed to seeing her with only one arm, but according to Doctor Morell, she and her staff had almost completed crafting her biosynthetic replacement. “Good morning, Admiral,” Linojj said. “I trust you slept well.”

  “Not as well as I’d expected,” Harriman admitted. “Maybe because the last couple of days have been so intense.”

  Linojj nodded. “I know what you mean, sir.” After it had become clear that the Tzenke
thi would not or could not pursue Enterprise through the portal, Linojj had left a probe in space at that location. It would function as a gatekeeper that would monitor the area, notifying the crew if a ship or probe appeared anywhere in the vicinity. Efforts then began in earnest to recover all of the Starfleet personnel down on the planet.

  “Has there been any additional word on Captain Sulu?” Harriman asked. Demora had been the first person transported up to the ship. The Enterprise captain had been taken directly to sickbay and straight into the surgical suite. Doctor Chapel, already familiar with Demora’s physical condition, performed the surgery, an involved set of procedures that lasted several hours. Enterprise’s chief medical officer characterized the operation as a success, but also noted it as only the first of several the captain would require. Chapel and Morell considered Captain Sulu’s prognosis good. They also expected Ensign Young, who had been treated for his injuries as well, to make a complete recovery. The entire medical staff had also begun to examine all five hundred sixty-five surviving members of the Excelsior crew, a process that would take days to finish.

  “I actually visited Captain Sulu this morning before my shift,” Linojj said, making no effort to hold back the smile that blossomed on her face. “She’s looking better.”

  “Is she awake?” Harriman asked. “I thought they were going to keep her sedated for another day or two.” The admiral had yet to visit sickbay, believing it wiser to allow the doctors and nurses to perform their duties without the distraction of his presence.

  “They actually brought her out of it for a little while not long after surgery,” Linojj said. “But yes, Doctor Morell wants to leave her unconscious for a little while longer as she starts healing. I only got to see the captain, not to talk with her, but it’s good just to see her back aboard the ship.”

  “I’m sure it is,” Harriman said. “So now that we’ve retrieved everybody from the planet, are you prepared to try to get back to the Federation?” Once they had escaped the clutches of the Tzenkethi, Harriman had ceded command of the ship back to Linojj, although, as the highest-ranking officer aboard Enterprise, he could have remained in charge for the duration of their journey. Similarly, because of their positions as starship and starbase captains, he could have assigned the center seat to either Hikaru Sulu or Amina. He’d spoken with both of them, and they’d agreed with him that, after everything the Enterprise crew had endured, including having to deal with the potential loss of their captain, it would benefit morale to leave Linojj in the big chair on the bridge.

  “I think we’re all ready to get back home, sir,” Linojj said. Harriman had briefed the commander, as well as Hikaru and Amina, on what Demora had viewed as a means of returning back to their place and time: the effect of a single star that apparently existed across many universes and somehow provided a gateway between them. Both the existence of the strange star and its location remained classified by Starfleet Intelligence, its general area designated on all Federation charts as an extreme hazard, and therefore off-limits, but because the admiral intended to utilize it as a means of returning them all back to their own space and time, he had needed to inform them of what lay ahead. Once she had passed through the portal, Demora Sulu must have checked the appropriate spatial coordinates and found the star. In the time since the Enterprise crew had escaped the Tzenkethi, Harriman had also confirmed its existence.

  “Once we’re on our way, somebody’s going to need to address the crew,” the admiral said. “Since there are no guarantees that this plan will actually work, they deserve to know what we’re attempting.” He and Demora had never discovered a means of controlling the transition from one universe to another. It had been—at least from their perspective—random, though based on their own experiences, they knew that it was at least possible for them to get back to their universe.

  “I agree,” Linojj said. “I can speak to the crew, but since you know more about this than I do, I think it should come from you.”

  “So do I,” Harriman said. “I’ll plan a shipwide statement for later today.”

  “Thank you, Admiral.”

  “All right,” Harriman said. “Let’s give this a try.” Harriman moved to the navigation console, where he relieved Lieutenant Aldani, much to her surprise. As she withdrew to a secondary station on the outer ring of the bridge, the admiral sat down and worked the console. He located the star that he and Demora had named Odyssey, then plotted a course to it. Finally, because of the classified nature of the information, Harriman encrypted the course. He then recalled Aldani to the navigation console and relieved Ensign Syndergaard.

  It’s been a lot of years since I’ve done this, he thought as he sat down at the helm. Probably back to my days on the Hunley. He remembered his time serving under the late Captain Linneus fondly.

  At the helm console, Harriman used his biometric information to call up and decrypt the course he’d just laid in. He locked it into the helm, then encoded it once more. When the admiral engaged the sublight drive at full impulse, the ship thundered to life around him. Amazingly, he recognized the sound of Enterprise, the rhythms and notes of its operation distinct.

  Harriman followed Enterprise’s progress on his console as the great starship broke planetary orbit. When the vessel had reached a safe distance, he brought the ship to warp, settling it at factor eight. He didn’t know where the journey would ultimately end up taking the thirteen hundred men and women aboard Enterprise, but they had started on their way.

  2319–2320

  * * *

  Iliad

  * * *

  * * *

  12

  * * *

  Sasine sat alone in a comfortable chair, in the cabin that Commander Linojj had assigned to her and John. Though not nearly as spacious or as nicely appointed as their quarters on Helaspont Station, the VIP guest accommodations would certainly suffice. Sasine had no notion of just how long she and John would need to remain aboard Enterprise, but from what he’d told her, they could be in for a considerable stay.

  Peering down at the padd in her hands, Sasine continued reading Captain Hikaru Sulu’s preliminary report of the incident that had sent his crew through the portal and destroyed Excelsior. He had appended his log entries, as well as those of his first officer, Ryan Leslie, which she found both fascinating and chilling. She could think of few traumas greater than having to abandon a failing starship.

  After reading about the crew’s encounter with a gruesome and deadly life-form, Sasine glanced over at the communications-and-computer interface set atop the desk in a corner of the living area. She saw that the time neared for her husband’s shipwide address. A day earlier, after the recovery of the stranded Starfleet personnel, John had conferred with Linojj, explaining just what Demora Sulu had meant when she’d spoken of an “Odyssey solution,” and telling the commander what he intended to do in order to attempt to return Enterprise and its crew and passengers to their own universe. Afterward, he finally shared the same information with Sasine.

  Up until that point, John had kept the classified data about Odyssey to himself—refusing to disclose it even to his wife. Sasine took no offense, understanding both her husband’s dedication to duty and his punctilious nature. He genuinely believed in the need for Starfleet Command—and Starfleet Intelligence, from whom he occasionally accepted missions—to keep certain information secret. Sasine trusted his judgment; he had never given her any reason not to do so.

  Because of the uncertainty of Demora’s proposed solution, John felt that everybody aboard ship should be told what would happen, despite the classified status of Odyssey. He hoped to avoid revealing precise details, such as the location of the star, speaking instead on a general level. Linojj had agreed that the crews of both Enterprise and Excelsior deserved to know what lay ahead for them. John offered the first officer and acting captain the opportunity to make the address to the two crews, but citing the admiral’s specialized knowledge of the situation, she demurred.

>   Sasine looked back down at her padd, but she did not resume her reading. Instead, as she awaited John’s statement to the crew, she thought about Demora Sulu. The outlook for the injured captain continued to improve, even though Doctors Morell and Chapel still kept her under sedation. Sasine considered paying a visit to sickbay to see her old friend, but thought that she should wait until Demora had regained consciousness. Perhaps I should go find her father, she thought. She had met Hikaru Sulu on a couple of—

  The boatswain’s whistle trilled. “Attention, all personnel, this is Admiral John Harriman,” announced her husband, his words calm and steady. She found it comforting just to hear his voice. “As you all know, until yesterday, the crew of the U.S.S. Excelsior had been marooned on a desolate planet for eleven years, having traveled through an alien device into another universe. The Enterprise has now carried us through that same device, which was subsequently destroyed in order to prevent a superior Tzenkethi force from pursuing us, and also to ensure that the technology did not fall into the hands of the Coalition.” Sasine thought that John’s last-minute plan to escape the Tzenkethi squadron, while at the same time preserving the possibility of rescuing the Excelsior crew, had been inspired.

  “Commander Linojj had hoped that the Enterprise crew could reverse the direction of the one-way portal, but that no longer remains an option. Prior to the injuries she sustained on the planet, though, Captain Demora Sulu imagined a different solution to get her stranded crew members back home—a solution she called upon me to help implement. I am aboard the Enterprise for that purpose.” Sasine knew that John wanted to provide justifiable hope for everybody aboard ship, but also to temper their expectations. According to him, he truly could not measure their prospects for a successful return home.