STAR TREK: TOS - Enterprise, The First Adventure

by Vonda N. McIntyre

  “Of course, nothing interesting is going on now,” Commander Cheung said. “It’s pretty boring, going from one starbase to another.”

  Janice glanced at the viewscreen. “But it’s so beautiful,” she said. “And you see it all the time.” The expanse of stars held her.

  As Uhura had earlier, Sulu and Cheung followed her gaze.

  Suddenly becoming aware of her own rudeness, Janice tore her attention from the viewscreen. “I—I’m sorry, I—” Her fair complexion colored.

  “But you’re right, Janice,” Uhura said. “It is beautiful. Somehow we get used to it and we forget to look at it the way you do. It’s good to be reminded.” She squeezed Janice’s hand.

  “Ah, Yeoman Rand, you’re here.”

  Startled, Janice jerked her hand from Uhura’s. Captain Kirk strode onto the bridge.

  “Lieutenant Uhura’s introduced you around? Thank you, lieutenant. Yeoman, let me show you what I need you to do.”

  Janice gave Uhura the look of someone about to be eaten by lions.

  “Don’t worry—you’ll do fine.”

  Uhura returned to her place. She did not envy Janice Rand the job of keeping the executive paperwork, arranging the captain’s schedule, reminding him of appointments and changes, and handling problems or referring them to the proper department unless they would only get worse without Captain Kirk’s authority. A list of the duties made the job [118] look trivial. But Uhura had served on a ship with a disorganized yeoman. The captain had lived a life of chaos and everyone considered the subordinate incompetent. A yeoman who coped with the responsibility received little: no notice, few compliments.

  Jim showed Yeoman Rand to the open console on the port side of the bridge. “It’s traditional for you to use the environmental systems station,” he said.

  She inspected the daunting display panels.

  “Don’t be concerned about the complexity,” Jim said quickly, hoping to ease the doubt and fear in her expression. “Computer runs all the environmental systems. But you can use this console as your work station on the bridge.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “As soon as you can, put together an appointments schedule for me. I want at least half an hour with each person on board. Spread the meetings out during the transit time between starbases. Don’t bunch them up into one or two weeks. Try to arrange it so no one will have to visit me in the middle of their sleep cycle—or mine. Be sure not to conflict with staff meetings or inspections. Make it clear that it’s informal, that it’s just a chat. But don’t take no for an answer. Understood?”

  “Yes, captain.”

  He nodded. “Make yourself familiar with your station. I’ll need you in a moment—one of your duties is to register the log and bring me the seal to sign. But,” he said, feeling bored, wishing he had anything to do but record log entries for a trip on which nothing would happen, “the entry won’t take long to record.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Instead of going to his seat, Jim gazed at the viewscreen. He tried to think of something to put in the log. “One o’clock, and all’s well”? Accurate—but he doubted Starfleet would appreciate it.

  He thought he smelled coffee—good coffee, too. He wondered where the smell was coming from.

  The turbo-lift doors slid open to admit Lindy. She carried a roll of paper in one hand and a folder under her arm. She wore a suit of soft white leather. Her iridescent black hair streamed behind her, long and loose, unstyled.

  [119] “Jim, have you got a minute?”

  Jim realized he was grinning foolishly at her. He composed himself. “I’m at your disposal.”

  “I could use some help with this poster.” She showed him what she was working on.

  He had neither graphics experience nor drawing ability; he failed to cobble up a believable excuse for helping her himself. He decided to give the job to Rand to see if she could handle independent work.

  “Yeoman Rand,” he said.

  She flinched at the sound of her name. “Yes, captain?”

  Impatient with Rand’s terror, Jim let Lindy’s poster roll itself up against his hands. “Lindy, Yeoman Rand will help you with whatever you need. Yeoman, you have my authorization to call on the ship’s resources within reason in order to carry out Ms. Lukarian’s wishes. For starters you’ll need to find a graphics-oriented comm unit. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir,” she whispered.

  “Thanks, Jim,” Lindy said.

  Lindy and Rand left to find the graphics terminal. Jim watched them go, wondering what he had done to frighten Rand so badly. He did not understand her terror. He wished he knew how to alleviate it. He wished he could think of a good reason to spend time with Lindy. He wished he could figure out where the smell of coffee was coming from.

  When he took his place, he noticed the mug. Fragrant steam escaped from the vent-hole in its lid.

  “What’s this?”

  “Yeoman Rand said it was yours,” Uhura said.

  Jim lifted the lid and was rewarded by the smell of coffee. He tried a sip. The covered mug had kept it hot, and, to his amazement, it tasted the way good coffee was supposed to taste. More than that, it tasted the way good coffee smelled.

  Jim glanced after Janice Rand, bemused.

  Janice Rand found the design room. Its enormous graphics screen glowed to life.

  “Please show me what you have in mind, Ms. Lukarian.”

  “What I want, ma’am, is something attention-getting.”

  “You mustn’t call me ‘ma’am,’ ” the yeoman said. “I’m just a petty officer, and that isn’t even registered yet.”

  [120] “What should I call you?”

  “Um ... yeoman, if you want. Or Rand.”

  “How about Janice, and you call me just Lindy?”

  “If that’s what you’d like.”

  “It’d be easier, don’t you think?”

  “All right ... just-Lindy.”

  Lindy giggled.

  “We’d better do your poster,” Janice said, serious again.

  Lindy opened her folder. She enjoyed showing off the flamboyant designs. Whoever had painted them enjoyed their work.

  “These are playbills—reproductions, I mean—from classic vaudeville companies.” She unrolled her new poster and flattened out the curling corners of the paper. “I’m not happy with the design ...” She had been designing posters for nearly two years, and she had never liked any of them. “It’ll have to do, it’s the best I can come up with. My daddy used to design a new one for every city. They were all different, but you could tell a hundred meters away that they came from our company. Unfortunately,” she said, “that’s one talent I didn’t inherit.” She scowled at the paper again. “Maybe the computer could fix it up a little?”

  Janice flashed the scanner at Lindy’s design.

  Lindy groaned when it appeared on the screen, larger than life-size. “I wanted it to look classic but modern at the same time, but all it is, is awful.”

  “It isn’t that bad,” Janice said. She stroked the touch-sensitive screen. The letters straightened and fancied to a sort of neo-deco style.

  “It never looks the way I imagine it.”

  “We could adapt something. One of your father’s posters, maybe?”

  “No!” Lindy was embarrassed by her own vehemence. “I mean it has to be different. We have different acts.”

  Janice glanced again at one of Lindy’s reproductions. “I’m sure it’s fine the way it is,” she said. “But if you move this from here to here, and slide this over to this corner ...” She rearranged it. “And make the background look like brush strokes, and clean up this line a little ...”

  Lindy gazed at the new design in silence.

  [121] “I’m sorry.” Janice sounded scared. “I’ll put it back the way it was.” She reached to delete the changes.

  “No, wait!” Lindy said. “Janice, that’s beautiful. How did you do that?”

  “You had all the elements alrea
dy. There is one other thing—I don’t mean to keep butting in.”

  “No, go ahead.”

  “Different beings see different kinds of light. So if you widen out the color range—” She made the changes.

  “It looks awfully dark,” Lindy said, doubtful.

  “It wouldn’t if you saw ultraviolet or infrared. But I can brighten the middle colors.” She did so. “Before, if you were a Corellian, say, it would look like this.” The computer performed the transposition. The poster darkened almost to black. “Now it would look like this.” It brightened in a different way from the original.

  “I wouldn’t even have thought of that,” Lindy said. “How do you find it all out?”

  “I’ve lived a lot of different places. It wasn’t anything I did anything special to learn.”

  “Want a job?” Lindy said.

  “What?”

  “I need a designer. You could join the company. I don’t suppose you can juggle, can you?”

  Janice hesitated so long that Lindy thought she might actually accept.

  “I thought you were the designer.” Janice’s voice trembled.

  “No, I’m the manager, among other things. What do you say? Do you want the job?”

  Janice looked down. “I can’t juggle.”

  “That’s okay! I mean, that part was a joke. Will you join the company?”

  “No.” Her whole tone had changed; she acted withdrawn and fearful. “I signed on with Starfleet for two years.”

  “Oh,” Lindy said, disappointed. “The offer holds, if you change your mind.” She admired Janice’s poster. “Hey, have you had lunch? Do you want to go get something?”

  “No—I mean, I’m sorry, I can’t, I left papers all over Captain Kirk’s desk, I’m sorry, I have to leave.”

  “Okay,” Lindy said as Janice hurried away. I guess I [122] don’t know Jim well enough, Lindy thought. I wouldn’t have guessed he’d get mad if she took a lunch break.

  Janice Rand returned to the captain’s cabin. She sighed. Helping Ms. Lukarian with the poster had put her awfully far behind. She had to admit she enjoyed the work, until she realized she had been talking to the manager almost as if they were equals. Lukarian had not seemed offended, but sometimes people covered up their anger for a while and then let it boil out all over you.

  Janice envied Lukarian her freedom—freedom to choose how she would act and how she would dress and how she would look, unhampered by regulations and laws and proscriptions and rules. Janice allowed herself a moment to wonder if, now that she was in Starfleet, far from the world she had escaped, she might let her own hair grow a little. Then she shook her head at her own frivolity.

  She set back to work on the executive files. Captain Kirk really had made a botch of them—she wondered why he had tried to do all the work himself—but with computer’s help she got them straightened out and in a form that made them comprehensible and compatible, rather than awkward and unique.

  She had access to far more computer power at the captain’s comm unit than she ever had with quartermaster. She had the freedom to design her own work; she could speak directly to computer. Quartermaster only allowed his subordinates to work within a narrow frame that he designed. He disliked it if someone tried to suggest a quicker or more efficient method.

  She did not explore the system too aggressively, afraid that she might somehow stumble onto something she was not supposed to see or know about, and set off an alarm.

  She paused to stretch and rub her eyes.

  “Yeoman, are you all right?”

  Janice leaped up, alarmed by the unexpected voice.

  “Yeoman! It’s just me.” Captain Kirk gazed at her with a bemused expression.

  “I’m sorry, you frightened me, I didn’t hear you—!” She clutched the edge of the desk. “I’m sorry, sir, I—” She had been daydreaming; she had no excuse. “I’m sorry.”

  [123] “You’re working late—the files must have been a mess.”

  “Oh, no, sir.” She could hardly tell him the truth. She was glad she already knew how much this one disliked criticism. The ones who were most dangerous encouraged you to say what was wrong, then punished you for being honest.

  “You’ve done enough for today. You run along. Come back tomorrow.”

  “I’m—I’m sorry I’m not finished, sir, but really, it will only take me another few minutes. Sir.” She set back to work, wishing he would not watch over her shoulder. Soon he wandered away. A leather chair squeaked and sighed when he sat down; the pages of his book rustled as he found his place.

  “Yeoman, I don’t remember calling the steward—did you straighten up around here?”

  She looked up, feeling her face pale with apprehension, then turn red with embarrassment. Her fair complexion shouted her emotions to the world, and she hated it.

  I was afraid of this, she thought. He doesn’t like people touching his things ... or suppose he can’t find something and thinks I stole it. I knew I should have put everything back where it was.

  But she had not memorized where everything had been. If he had noticed the difference, he would have thought she had been snooping. “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t think—”

  “Yeoman, stop apologizing for everything!”

  “I’m sorry, sir, I mean, yes, sir.”

  He scowled. “I didn’t intend to criticize. It wasn’t necessary for you to clean my cabin, that’s the steward’s job, but thank you anyway.”

  “Yes, sir. You’re welcome, sir.”

  She tried to work, but he shifted in his chair, cleared his throat, rustled pages. His impatience frayed her nerves. If he would only let her alone—

  “Yeoman—”

  “I’m almost finished, sir, honestly!”

  “This isn’t emergency duty—it isn’t necessary for you to finish it tonight.”

  “It ... it isn’t?” she said, amazed. “Sir?”

  “No, it isn’t. I thought I said that already. Shut things down and go get yourself an early dinner. Rest your eyes. [124] Relax. Have a swim or a game of jai alai or whatever you like to do in the evening. Finish this tomorrow.”

  “Oh. All right, sir, if that’s what you want.” He probably wanted to check her work so he could get someone else if she was putting things in a muddle. She hoped he did not notice that she had barely started on his schedule.

  She shut down the system. She would prefer to work. She could not swim. Her roommate played jai alai in the intramural league, but the dangerous game terrified Janice. People always started classes on the ship, but if she joined one everybody would wish she would go away. As for an early dinner—she preferred eating late, with no one else around. She hoped she knew table manners now, but she might make another mistake. Then everyone would laugh at her again.

  An early dinner meant a long lonely evening in her cabin. If her roommate was there with friends, they would not talk to her. She evaded questions, so they thought she was stuck-up and creepy. Too late, she understood that the way to divert attention from her background was to ask other people to talk about theirs.

  “Yeoman, how old are you?” Captain Kirk said.

  “What? Sir—?” Her knees trembled. She collapsed at the comm unit, pretending to have one final task with the papers. She wondered frantically if it were he, not the science officer, who could read minds. If he could, he knew her secrets. She ought to break down and confess. But if she did, they might be lenient with her and send her back. She would prefer a reformation camp or even prison. They let you earn money in refo, didn’t they? A little? She would have to pretend to be tough and mean and unrepentant so they would think she was unfit to be returned.

  “How old are you?”

  “I—I’m almost twenty, sir, I forget exactly, I always have to convert to earth-standard years.”

  “You don’t look twenty,” he said.

  She distrusted his smile. She tried to laugh. It came out faint and false. “People always say that, sir.”

&
nbsp; “Decided young to go to space, eh? So did I. A family tradition? Or did you choose it on your own?”

  Her carefully invented details vanished in her fear. “I [125] decided on my own, sir,” she said, hoping she had never told anyone the opposite. Before he could ask her another question, she plunged ahead. “What about you, sir?”

  He spoke about his background and his past, about his parents and his brother, about his best friend very ill in the hospital. At first her fear deafened her. But her ruse had worked, so she calmed a little and heard what he was saying. He had done fascinating things and visited fascinating places, and he told of them with wit and charm.

  The charming ones were even more dangerous than the thoughtless ones or the cruel ones.

  He stopped. “I didn’t mean to go on like that, yeoman. You run along. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Janice fled.

  As soon as the door closed behind his strange skittish yeoman, Jim requested a private subspace channel back to earth.

  The ease of communication would diminish soon. The Phalanx was an immensely long tentacle of Federation space stretching to Starbase 13 at its far end. It lacked subspace relay stations. Any Klingon patrol that happened to come by would try to jam the signals that did get through. This might be Jim’s last chance of getting a comprehensible answer from earth till his ship reached the starbase and its powerful amplifiers.

  The Phalanx made Jim uncomfortable, both the existence of it and the idea of taking his ship and crew into it. Starbase 13 guarded Federation territory of little worth and low population, a planetary system attached to the Federation by ill chance. He suspected that moving the people to a more hospitable planet and closing down 13 would cost less than keeping the starbase staffed, supplied, and protected for one year.

  He waited impatiently for his call to go through.

  Worst of all, the Phalanx made the oligarchy of the Klingon Empire particularly paranoid. And Jim could hardly blame them for their reaction. He would not like it if they extruded a narrow finger of territory several hundred light years long into the Federation.

  He must be scrupulous about remaining within the Phalanx. Violating the borders of the Klingon Empire would be [126] worth a court-martial and his career. If his ship survived the Guardians of the Empire.