STAR TREK: Strange New Worlds I

by Dean Wesley Smith (Editor)

  “That’d be something, all right,” I replied softly, unable to accept what I was hearing. The Scarecrow brought me a picnic basket and I had a solemn last supper under the stars. Minnie didn’t eat, not even a Saltine; the Scarecrow, naturally, did not eat. For some reason I felt guilty, so I didn’t eat much myself. I kept thinking that there must be something that I could have done to help Minnie, despite the fact that she didn’t appear to need any help whatsoever. And I continued to wonder which Minnie this was. I thought it was probably the trans-droid, considering her lack of interest in food, but the thought did not appease my sense of concern over the [424] outcome of the whole matter. I was afraid to question her any further; she might have spouted some epitaph at me, like, “I don’t need to go looking for my heart’s desire down here anymore. It’s been in my own little padded cell on the Enterprise all along,” and I just couldn’t have stomached that at the moment. Her whole sudden “there’s no place like home” attitude was bad enough. She probably had a pair of ruby slippers on under her boots.

  Minnie wanted to beam up to the ship immediately after dessert, as she was unable to resist the rewarding call of space stenography for another minute. I wasn’t quite ready to accompany her, so I sent her on ahead.

  “All right,” I said to the Scarecrow after she had twinkled away. “What do you think? About her, I mean.”

  He scratched his thatched skull. “I’m not thinking, in this case. I don’t think you should either. It might strain your brain.”

  “It’s already been strained and sprained. But I still need to know.”

  “Well, you heard her yourself,” the Scarecrow said. “Someone had to go back to the ship. C simply picked the best-suited Minnie Moskowitz.”

  “But which one was it?”

  “Does it matter? That one is happy to go back to your ship and the other one is happy to dance under a streetlamp. Everybody’s happy.”

  “I’m not,” I said, frowning. “Everything’s all copasetic for everyone—except me. I feel rotten. I don’t understand what’s going on and my once-in-a-blue-moon shore leave is almost over and I’ve got an awful headache.”

  “That’s terrible. You shouldn’t leave here in that [425] condition. There must be something we can do for you here that will cheer you up.”

  “I doubt it,” I sighed. “I don’t know what I want anymore. I wish I didn’t have to go back right away. I don’t feel R and R’d up enough for life on the Big E just yet.”

  “Then stay here with us. We’d be honored with your presence.”

  I smiled faintly. “Well, it’s nice to know that. Thanks, but that’s not for me.”

  “Why not? It could be anything you want it to be. You could be anything you want to be.”

  I indulged him by letting my mind explore the possibilities for a moment, then laughed. “No, that’s ridiculous. There couldn’t be more than one Gene Kelly in the universe.” I hesitated. “Could there?”

  “Well, I really don’t know,” said the Scarecrow.

  “Maybe Fred Astaire, though,” I mused. “He’s got a good pair of feet on him, too.” I placed an imaginary top hat on my head and struck a pose. “What do you think?”

  “Gosh, I think you’d be swell. Why don’t you stay and be Fred?”

  I laughed again. “I’m not really serious. I couldn’t stay here forever.”

  “It wouldn’t have to be forever. Just until the next time your ship comes back for shore leave. We really enjoy having company down here.”

  It was a tempting proposition. After all, what was a year or so out of my life? Time enough to decide whether it was more fulfilling to live around insensitive humans or compassionate androids. Time enough to decide whether I preferred thinking rationally or not at all.

  [426] “I don’t know,” I said slowly. “Do you really think—?”

  “Oh, yes, yes!” The Scarecrow clapped his gloved hands together in glee. “Come on—let’s go talk to C right away.”

  “C?” I repeated nervously. I wasn’t certain that I was ready to meet face to face with Oz, the great and terrible.

  “Of course. How else can you work out all the details?”

  “What details? I wouldn’t have to sign my name in blood or anything, would I? Or have to steal Mister Spock’s broom?”

  “Of course not,” he reassured me. “Everything will be just hunky-dory!”

  He led me to a dark narrow passageway set within a stony ridge. I couldn’t recall having seen it there before. “Through here?” I queried.

  “Through here,” he confirmed.

  “I’m really not too crazy about dark, confining passageways—” I began.

  My words echoed hollowly against the dark, confining walls and I closed my mouth in order to better concentrate on not stubbing my toes.

  “So you’re the Big C,” I addressed the console with what I hoped was a convincing show of nonchalance.

  If it hadn’t been a computer, I’d have sworn that it made a sound like a sigh. “That is the nomenclature that Yeoman Moskowitz prefers to use in addressing me. It is adequate, if uninspired. I am the custodian of this convenience. It is my understanding from your recent dialogue with one of my units that you wish to make arrangements for an extended stay on this planet.”

  [427] “Well, you see, I’m not exactly sure. It isn’t every day that you willingly sell your soul, you know.”

  “I do not wish your ‘soul.’ The Caretaker informed me that the souls of humans are unalterable by temptation. It is also my understanding that they are not a marketable commodity. The arrangement that I made with Yeoman Moskowitz was a much more reasonable exchange: information for temporary asylum.”

  “Not so temporary, it would seem.”

  “My programming will not permit me to reject her desire.”

  “Or mine?”

  “Or yours.”

  That easy. How interesting. I wondered vaguely how many different patrons of this big amusement park had failed to return to their respective ships in the past year or so. It was a little spooky to consider.

  “If you are ready, I can begin to program a replacement for you.”

  “Replacement?”

  “To return to your ship in your place.”

  “Oh. Like that Minnie Moskowitz that went back a while ago.”

  “That is correct”

  “What did you do to her, anyway? She’s ... she’s different”

  “A minor but necessary adjustment. It had originally been programmed to be exactly like the original, which made it as dysfunctional in its environment as the human one is. It will now be precisely what a well-adjusted human in Yeoman Moskowitz’s situation should be.”

  [428] “Seems like a nasty trick to play on one of your units.”

  “ ‘Nasty’ is an inappropriate modifier. My units function as they are programmed to function.”

  Yeah, but did they resent it? I doubted that C would know, so I decided not to ask. “What do you need from me,” I asked instead, “in order to make ... uh ... me?”

  “Very little. Your cooperation in a minor procedure. I believe you are familiar with psych-scans?”

  “I’ve never been particularly fond of being on the receiving end of them, but I know all about them.” I allowed C to draw the background material it needed and made a few professional suggestions as to which personality traits to under-emphasize so that the trans-droid would fit into my mundane lifestyle. I asked how long the whole duplication procedure would take and was informed that the replacement would be ready by the time my leave was over.

  “The work on the physical construct is almost complete,” C concluded.

  “Really? Where is it? Can I see it?”

  “If you wish. It will be ready in approximately one of your hours. You may return at that time to view it. In the meantime, you may do whatever you desire. That is the purpose of this world.”

  I desired a walk outside. I needed some fresh air. It was all kind of intoxicating
, knowing that everything around me belonged to me, in the sense that I could shape it and change it and control it, for however long I wanted. I could walk through the forests of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, or the crystal plains of Renan VII, or the red sands of Vulcan, all within the space of a mile. I could reencounter old flames, [429] spark relationships with new flames, have an orgy. The possibilities were endless!

  At the moment, though, I couldn’t really think of much I’d rather do than walk quietly through this beautiful habitat that seemed to be the amusement park planet’s natural unfantasized condition. I came to a clearing in the midst of some catalpa-like trees and paused to take a deep breath of the cool, clean air.

  Okay, Doc, said the Jiminy Cricket of my soul, what are you going to do with the rest of your life?

  I shrugged and mumbled a reply to myself aloud. “ ’S not the rest of my life. Just a year or so. And by then I will be a much more fulfilled, self-confident person. Calm, cool, totally relaxed, capable of functioning in any and all surroundings—”

  Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound—

  “—content with all manner of mundanity, as witty and urbane and debonair as Fred Astaire on his best day.”

  Sure.

  I caught sight of something at that point, something which popped up behind a rock, presumably from one of C’s inconspicuous little trapdoors. Upon approaching the objects, I began to smile in recognition.

  Top hat. And cane.

  “Hey,” I addressed the planet. “Thanks, but I’m really not much of a dancer.” The Astaire accoutrements remained before me, and I picked them up out of curiosity. The hat was genuine imitation beaver fur—very fancy. The cane, well, I’d never really thought about what the original might have been made of, and C had guessed at a nice, durable lightweight polymer blend. It felt comfortable in my hand, [430] familiar and well balanced. The hat was another matter. It fit my head just fine, but it was predictably weighty across the crown, and I knew that it was bound to give me a headache if I wore it for very long.

  But it was a very cool hat, and I couldn’t resist putting it on. And no sooner had I done so than I actually began to believe that perhaps I was something of a dancer, after all. I took a few tentative steps forward, pleased with the newfound spring in my step, and twirled my cane, glancing anxiously to the left and the right.

  Ah, what the hell. There was nobody watching anyway.

  “Eine kleine mood music, maestro,” I requested, and somewhere I heard this marvelous orchestra strike up. I tried a few practice steps, and I must admit that my feet really seemed to know what they were doing. Of course, I had no partner to dance with, but as I recalled, that had never stopped Fred. I’d seen him dance with hat stands and chairs and even an empty room in his films. I didn’t have anything like that around, but I’d gotten a better idea anyway. It topped any of Fred’s classic numbers and maybe even matched Gene’s rain dance. What I needed was a good strong breeze.

  The catalpa branches above began to sway slightly, in response to a zephyr that had been nonexistent a moment earlier. “Very good,” I murmured as the music again began to swell.

  The trees were ripe with the white popcorn-shaped blossoms that grow in early summer, and the air became filled with them as the wind picked up.

  I danced.

  And God, I was good. I tripped the breeze fantastically. I [431] was almost as light as the air. I didn’t crash a single flower. They swirled gracefully around my ankles as I moved to the tempo of the swaying branches. I venture to say that I was poetry in motion for those blissful moments. I was sure right then that there was nothing better in life to be and nowhere better in the galaxy to live. I think I actually caught a glimmer of what it was like to soar.

  Then somehow the glimmer faded, and it wasn’t quite heaven anymore. The wind was beginning to give me an earache and the hat was pressing heavily on my skull and natural clumsiness was suddenly betraying me, tripping me ungracefully over my white-tipped cane.

  “Shit,” I commented as I fell toward the leaves. It was definitely the wrong thing to say. I hadn’t noticed any cows in the clearing, but I suddenly discovered that I had landed in a heap of unprocessed bovine fertilizer. Or perhaps “commingled with” would be a more accurate phrase. “Oh ...”

  Fortunately, I stopped the curse before I inflicted myself with some new catastrophe. I bit my lip, got up, found the nearest stream (and a wonderfully convenient bar of soap), and scrubbed myself off.

  Just lovely. I wondered again if soaring was really my long suit. Or tuxedo. Or whatever.

  The construction room was at the end of Corridor B. I don’t know what I expected to see in there. Perhaps a bunch of hunchbacked dwarves dragging in stolen corpses in large duffel bags. What I actually found was a very neat workroom, filled with several small banks of computers, each equipped with several sets of waldoes, easily able to reach the long stainless steel tables before them. Almost all of the [432] tables were unoccupied, I suppose because the majority of vacationing crew members had already returned to the Enterprise. At the far end of the room, I spotted one supine body in a blue Starfleet uniform, and I approached it somewhat apprehensively. She ... “I” ... hadn’t been activated yet and was just lying there, staring glassily up at the ceiling. I’d prepared myself for a mild jolt of cultural shock, or whatever one experiences upon being faced with a doppelganger, but it didn’t come. Either that or I was doing one terrific job of repressing it. I whistled softly through my teeth. The hair was the right color, the mole was in the right spot, the fingernails were uneven, the bust was a little saggy. “That’s me all over,” I murmured.

  “That’s my line,” said a voice from the next table. “At least you’re all put together.”

  I spun around in surprise and found myself staring at the Scarecrow—or what was left of him, anyway. His legs had already been neatly detached by the mechanical hands, and they were presently working on removing an arm.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Being recycled,” he said calmly.

  “Recycled? Why?”

  “Why not? That’s my function.”

  “But why are they taking you apart now? What if I want to talk to you later?”

  “The component bin is a little low. Not all of your crew-mates’ fantasies have come home yet and C needed someone’s raw material for a new construct. I volunteered.”

  His other arm was carefully detached, and I watched in growing discomfort. “For what construct?”

  He smiled warmly. “Why, yours, of course. I wouldn’t [433] have it any other way. I’m happy to be you. We’re very ...” he searched for the right word, “uh, copasetic?”

  I winced. “But my construct’s already made.”

  “Oh, no—all the internals still have to be put in. They need a lot of material for that.”

  “Internals? But it looks like it has, well, just about everything.”

  “No, no. ‘Internals’ are what we call the stuff up here.” He tried to gesture up at his head, but lacking any arms, had to settle for a meaningful shrug of his shoulders. “You know—intellect, personality, that stuff. That’s what they’re going to use me for.”

  “Why are you so all-fired anxious to get sent to some flying bucket of bolts and pretend to be me?”

  He thought for a moment as the waldoes reached out to detach the smiling straw head. I was never quite sure if what he said before he was detached was “Because I like you” or “Because I’m like you.” It didn’t really make much difference when I thought about it. It didn’t matter how much he liked me (if, indeed, he was capable of liking anything) or how “copasetic” our personalities were. With the personality adjustments I’d recommended for my replacement so that it would be content with its position on the Enterprise, my friend would be no more like me (or its old self) than Minnie-2 now inwardly resembled Minnie-1.

  The realization bothered me a lot. It was as if I were responsible for taking all of that
wonderful altruistic nonreality away from my poor Scarecrow, personally draining every last drop of kitsch he had. No more Oz for him. No more “singin’ in the rain” for Minnie-2. If what C had said was true, the trans-droids didn’t really care. I suppose if I’d had a [434] lobotomy I wouldn’t much care what was done with my life either. But that didn’t make me feel any less culpable now.

  I picked up a leftover handful of straw from the metal table and stared at it silently. It wasn’t exactly the good-bye I’d had in mind. I’d pictured it more like the movie, with me telling him I’d miss him most of all and him standing there, sadly speechless. Very touching, guaranteed to wring a tear from all but the totally kitschless.

  I suddenly remembered what Minnie-2 had said in the film library, about Dorothy having chucked the opportunity to fulfill every daydream she’d ever had. “And for what?” Minnie’d complained. “For Kansas!”

  The corner of my mouth twisted upwards in a fleeting smile. Yeah, Kansas. Mundane old Kansas. As in, there’s no place like ...

  Ah, what the hell. If there was the slightest possibility that I had overlooked something in my own backyard, maybe I could stand it for another few years.

  So I chucked it and went back to my own backyard and the old mundane routine of Starfleet. It was predictably lonely out there. At least Dorothy had Zeke and Hunk and the others to welcome her back when she went home. All I had was a lobotomized Minnie Moskowitz, who’d become a much better yeoman third class than she’d ever been before, not to mention a very boring person. I kept the tape of the old one for a while, and on the most mundane of mundane days, it was a great temptation to pull it out and plug it in, but I always resisted. It would have gotten me too depressed. Besides, it was a dangerous record to keep around. You never knew who might happen to catch a peek of it and [435] notice how different the psych profile based on the taped Minnie was from the one currently programming coffee breaks. So eventually I ended up tossing the tape into a disposal chute.