Star Trek: Enterprise - 016 - Rise of the Federation: Tower of Babel

by Christopher L. Bennett

  “Incredible,” breathed Lieutenant Samuel Kirk. “It took humans over three hundred and fifty years between Galileo’s first telescopic observations and the first robot probe landing on Mars.”

  “Maybe if we’d had proof of intelligent life on the world next door,” Travis Mayweather told Pioneer’s historian, “we’d have been motivated to develop spaceflight faster, too.”

  “But we did assume there was intelligent life on Mars for centuries,” Kirk replied. “Remember Percival Lowell’s so-called canals? We didn’t abandon the idea until the space probes of the nineteen sixties revealed the truth.”

  The first officer shrugged. “Assuming is one thing. Actually seeing it? That’s always a stronger motivator.”

  “Very true,” Vons replied. “But that was only the beginning. Over the generations that followed,” the pale-haired assistant director went on, “the Jelna established ongoing trade relations first with the Zami, and later with the Chelons of Rigel III. We shared our technology and medicine in exchange for the local goods and the unique art and literature of each species. Naturally there were turbulent times—cross-species diseases, political oppression, wars—but through those hard lessons, the Rigelians learned the value of trade without judgment, cooperation without cultural domination. We learned to respect one another’s autonomy and freedom of choice, and it only brought us closer. The Trade Commission oversaw a peaceful, prosperous Rigel system for over a century and a half before the Coridanites made first contact.”

  Kirk traded a look with Mayweather, aware of the bias that informed the board member’s account. As the most junior member of the board of directors—Sedra Hemnask’s assistant, filling in for her now that she was en route to Babel—Vons had been tasked with the assignment of shepherding Pioneer’s crew on their fact-finding tour. Yet he had made it clear enough that, unlike Hemnask, he was skeptical of the benefits of Federation membership and reluctant to abandon the Commission’s traditional laissez-faire policies.

  True, it was Hemnask herself who had gone to represent the RTC at Babel. But Babel was the Federation’s side of the equation. The Rigelians would conduct their own vote on the membership question. And Vons’s attitude, alongside the skepticism of Directors Zehron and Tenott, made it clear that Pioneer’s crew would have to make a strong case for the Federation. But that struck Kirk as a good sign. A healthy, open debate could be very beneficial for social progress.

  Not to mention that it would make his account of this historic event that much livelier. Generally, a Starfleet historian’s job was to study the recorded history of the alien worlds they visited—and Beta Rigel was a mother lode in that regard, three distinct planets with their own independent histories as well as a millennium of mutual interaction. Yet Kirk now had the opportunity to write new history as it happened.

  But his gaze darted to Valeria Williams, Pioneer’s fetching and fiery armory officer, and he wondered if such an achievement would improve his standing in her eyes. It seemed unlikely, though; while they had bonded last year in the aftermath of a serious warp accident, the lieutenant had subsequently shown no more than friendly interest in Kirk. Indeed, though her physical relationship with Reynaldo Sangupta had ended even before then, she still responded more passionately to the brash young science officer than to the quiet Lieutenant Kirk, even if that passion usually took the form of argument. Right now, Val and Rey were lingering beneath the antique telescope, carrying on a hushed debate while Vons led Commander Mayweather out of the chamber, the sound of the Jelna’s rattling beads echoing in the hallway beyond. “You’re kidding,” Williams was saying. “You support Rigel’s admission? I thought you Planetarists were afraid it would trample your cultural autonomy or something.”

  “Hey, I’m not just a label,” Sangupta countered. “Sure, I want the member worlds to hold on to their autonomy, but I don’t see why letting more worlds in would hurt that. I mean, space is really big. Even with warp drive and subspace radio, it takes a lot of time and effort for different worlds to interact. That’s why a more centralized government won’t work—the worlds are going to go their own ways just by being so far apart. So why not let Rigel and other worlds join?”

  “Maybe. But what’s the rush?”

  “Wait, wait. You’re against admission? I thought you backed al-Rashid.”

  “I do, but that doesn’t mean I agree with Vanderbilt forcing the issue just so he can leave a legacy,” Williams told the science officer. “I’m all for a bigger Federation, but let’s choose our members wisely. That’s why we’re here, right? Because there’s so much we still don’t know. What’s really going on inside the Trade Commission? What aren’t they telling us about Rigel VII or the corruption on Two?”

  “What makes you so convinced they’re up to something?”

  “Because I don’t trust corporate government. You know what happened on Earth when the corporations got too much power. Political parties used as fronts for dismantling environmental and ethical regulations. Justice becoming a commodity to be bought. The wealthy few impoverishing the masses, the homeless walled inside Sanctuary Districts.”

  Sangupta held up his hands to quell her increasingly fervent tirade. “All right, all right, no need to convince me. But in case you’ve forgotten, the RTC’s a nonprofit corporation. Like a charitable foundation. The board members are elected by their worlds. They get paid a stipend so they aren’t motivated by profit.”

  “Sure, in theory. But they do business with a lot of companies that are definitely out for profit, and they don’t worry too much about keeping their excesses in check. What if they’re just as corrupt as the people they deal with? The Federation should’ve taken the time to learn all this before inviting them to Babel.”

  “Well, that’s what we’re here for now, isn’t it?” Sangupta replied breezily, leading the way outside after Mayweather and Vons.

  Williams rolled her eyes and turned to Kirk, implicitly inviting him to join her as she followed the science officer out. “So what do you think?” she asked him. “In or out?”

  Kirk replied carefully. “I just think I’m lucky to be here to witness such a historic decision in the making. Even better, to be the one to chronicle it firsthand. It’s quite a privilege.”

  Williams smiled. “Lucky you. We all get so caught up in the politics of the moment—you have the perspective to see the big picture. I guess that makes all our arguments seem a bit petty.”

  The historian smiled back. “Without those arguments, my job would be more boring.”

  She chuckled. “But you’re right. When all this is said and done, it’s your words people will read to learn about this. Students for centuries to come will know your name.”

  He flushed. “It’s names like Jonathan Archer and Malcolm Reed that they’ll remember. I might get mentioned in citations here and there, but that’s not the same as being famous.”

  She clapped his shoulder. “It’s not about fame, Sam. Fame is fleeting. It’s about making a lasting impact.”

  Kirk gazed after her fondly as she pulled ahead to join the rest of the group. They had emerged into the large circular plaza surrounding the observatory, a plaza that was one vast orrery representing the Beta Rigel system. The observatory dome itself, painted bluish-white, represented Raij. Rotating slowly around it, driven by the oft-repaired antique clockworks under the plaza, were models of each of its planets. Williams jogged past the large blue orb representing the hot Jovian Rigel I, preceded and trailed at sixty-degree intervals by arc-shaped sculptures representing the Trojan asteroids held in orbit by the interaction of the Jovian’s gravity with the sun’s. Kirk followed her across the closely packed orbits of the planets within the habitable zone, though most of them were elsewhere in their courses at the moment. He paused to study the intricate mechanisms driving the multiple moons that circled Rigel VI, a Neptune-type giant whose rocky satellites hosted several of the Rigel Colonies along with some of the system’s most prominent mining and shipbuilding
facilities.

  Kirk caught up with the others as they approached the model of Rigel VII, a harsh, volcanically heated world nearly half-covered in oceans, and its co-orbital partner Rigel VIII, a cratered ice planet akin to Saturn’s Rhea or Tethys but far larger. Beyond them, Rigel IX was a Jovian with a vast ring system, and the rocky Rigel X was a frigid world that had needed partial terraforming and atmosphere processing to enable even a small portion of its surface to be made habitable.

  The orrery ended there, for the distant, cold worlds beyond had not been discovered until after Dleba’s era, and there was insufficient room on the plateau to expand the plaza. Perhaps this was fitting, for the Rigelians had designated everything from Rigel X’s orbit outward as beyond their territorial interests, free for others to settle or exploit as they chose. Rigel X itself had become a significant free port for the Kandari Sector, but as of yet, no one had found the worlds beyond it worth the effort to develop.

  But Commander Mayweather was still lingering by the models of Seven and Eight, and Kirk could tell he was trying to find a diplomatic way to broach the topic of the Kalar without treading on any local taboos that might make Rehlen Vons more hostile than he was already. Leave it to Rey Sangupta, then, to breeze right up to them and ask, “So what’s the story with these Kalar?”

  Mayweather and Williams both glared at the science officer. But while Vons hesitated for a moment, he simply gave a sad tilt of his sallow-skinned head before replying. “Yes, it was inevitable that this would come up eventually. In truth, it isn’t something we like to talk about. It reflects a dark chapter in our system’s history.” He sighed. “But sometimes we value our secrets too much. This is a truth we should not hide, for it informs who we are and what we believe.”

  The first officer kept his handsome features calm and nonjudgmental. “We’re here to learn, sir.”

  “The Kalar were originally a racial group native to Four, alongside the Zami.” Kirk had gotten used to hearing Rigelians refer to their planets by number, a custom adopted to avoid favoritism toward any one people’s language. “But they were larger, more aggressive. They terrorized and enslaved their neighbors. In the first century of interplanetary contact, as the Jelna pursued economic development on Four, the Kalar were a major obstacle. As Zami prosperity grew from offworld trade, the Kalar coveted what they had, and chose to take it by force.” He shrugged. “Or maybe they felt threatened by the Zami’s growing power. In any case, they became a greater threat to both species’ interests. And so the Jelna and the First Families mutually agreed to relocate the Kalar to Seven.”

  He went on solemnly. “The Kalar resisted fiercely but could not prevail over Jelna technology. They were transported in chains, in terrible conditions, for months as they made the crossing from world to world. Afterward, the relocated . . . survivors . . . were understandably resentful toward outsiders. Ever since, the Kalar have maintained a policy of total isolationism. Any offworlder who sets foot on Rigel VII cannot expect to live for long.”

  Williams grimaced. “I can’t say I blame them.”

  “The Jelna and the Zami both paid a penalty for our actions,” Vons replied. “As a result of different species spending so long in such conditions, disease organisms crossed species and mutated, and the plague you know as Rigelian fever evolved. The Kalar were immune, but the fever ravaged both Four and Five. Even with the best of medical care, tens of millions died on both worlds. Which hit Four harder, since it had a much smaller population and less advanced medicine, but it was a cataclysm for Five as well. The result was chaos and war on both worlds for generations, until the Zami expatriates on Five discovered the cure.

  “It took generations more for regular space travel to resume, but when it finally did, it brought renewed prosperity to both worlds—and Rigel had learned a harsh but necessary lesson about the dangers of imposing our will on other societies. Ever since, we have respected the Kalar’s isolation, and they have remained apart from Rigelian society.” He gazed at the painted globe representing Rigel VII and sighed. “This is our greatest shame—but it is why we are so loath to judge and impose upon others.”

  “That’s a remarkable story,” Kirk said after a respectful silence. “Humanity has been through similar ordeals in its history. When explorers from Eurasia began regular contact with the isolated American continents, their diseases wiped out nearly its entire population, destroying many great civilizations and leaving most of the survivors too weak to resist conquest for long. History might have been very different if the infections had gone both ways.” He gave a sad smile. “Perhaps we would’ve learned a lesson in tolerance far sooner—before we, too, began abducting people and forcing them to spend weeks chained in the holds of slave ships.”

  The assistant director pondered. “Your candor is much appreciated, Mister Kirk. It demonstrates your commitment to building closer ties, and it gives me more cause to trust your people.”

  Kirk smiled. “As has your own candor about the Kalar tragedy.”

  Vons returned the smile. “You came here to learn about our people, and I think that if there is any prospect of our becoming true partners, then such learning needs to go beyond the superficial tours and texts. I would invite you to visit the Commission’s private archives. There are records there, original documents from the founding of the Commission onward, that are found nowhere else. Some of them are . . . sensitive, reflecting aspects of Commission history that we are not proud of. We keep our own secrets, just as we respect our business associates’ right to theirs.” Kirk nodded. “But establishing a closer relationship often entails the sharing of such secrets, as necessary to create mutual . . . understanding.”

  “I’d be honored.” After a moment’s thought, Kirk turned to Mayweather. “That is, sir, if it’s . . .”

  The commander chuckled. “Absolutely, Sam. That’s what we’re here for, after all.”

  Kirk snapped his fingers. “You said original documents. Untranslated?”

  “Oh.” Vons frowned, recognizing the problem. “I’m sure we could provide translators to assist you . . .”

  “No—that is, thank you, but it would be more beneficial for me if I could bring Ensign Grev with me. He’s a skilled translator and linguist, and he’s more familiar with my language, so he could do a better job translating things for my benefit.”

  The assistant director spread his arms. “Certainly. He is welcome as well. It might take some time to get the necessary clearances . . .”

  “Not a problem,” Mayweather said, smiling. “We’re in no hurry to leave. There’s still a lot of Rigel left to see, and we’re enjoying your hospitality.”

  Kirk’s heart raced in anticipation as the group moved on. Williams punched him in the shoulder as she went past, and he realized what a silly grin he must have on his face. “Careful there,” she said. “If you decide to float back to the ship, remember not to hold your breath. It’ll rupture your lungs.”

  5

  June 11, 2164

  Veranith, Sauria

  K’SHINARI WAS ONE of Antonio Ruiz’s favorite patients to tend to. Although the elderly Saurian had been hit hard by the plague, she never lost her good spirits, never failed to muster up the energy to regale Ruiz with stories about her dozens of grandchildren and great-grandchildren . . . and never looked at him and his fellow offworlders with suspicion or fear. It had been some time since he’d felt such uncritical acceptance on this world.

  He smiled as he approached her cot with her dinner tray in hand, anticipating the look on her bulbous-eyed face when he showed her the piece of pevrig cake that her youngest grandson had managed to smuggle in to him. True, it went against doctor’s orders, but Ruiz firmly believed that a positive state of mind was as vital to health and healing as physical condition. K’shinari had been in this increasingly crowded treatment wing for weeks, lacking the comforts of home, and Ruiz believed the favorite family recipe could work wonders for her.

  But he slowed as he reached her
cot and saw Doctor Sobon and his nurse standing solemnly over the motionless figure who lay there. Sobon was a renowned xenomedical specialist from the Vulcan Science Academy, and his arrival had given Ruiz hope that a cure for the plague would now be within reach. But the doctor turned to him, his kindly, middle-aged features showing a sympathy unusual for a Vulcan. “I’m sorry, Mister Ruiz,” he said. “K’shinari expired just moments ago. We made her final hours as peaceful as we could.”

  Ruiz had known this was a possibility, even a likelihood. Still, it hit him harder than he would have expected—perhaps because he’d fooled himself into hoping. He heard himself muttering some kind of thanks to the doctor, then turned away, took a step or two into the aisle . . . and just stood there, having no idea what to do next.

  “Here, lemme take that.” A pair of hands firmly but gently eased the tray out of his own, and Ruiz belatedly realized he had been about to let it fall. “Hey, are you gonna be okay?”

  As the new arrival put a solicitous hand on Ruiz’s arm, he finally had the presence of mind to look up. The other man had a lean, light-complexioned face with a sharp nose and chin and protruding ears, giving him a slightly gawky quality. “Uh, thank you,” Ruiz said, pulling himself together. “Thanks, I’ll be all right. It’s just . . .”