STAR TREK®: VULCAN'S HEART Page 17

  Sarek went absolutely motionless, the warmth in his eyes disappearing. “Transmit immediately,” he snapped, the calculated urbanity of his voice gone.

  As he absorbed the message without waiting for it to be decoded into ordinary Vulcan script, Garrett saw what she never expected to see: a Vulcan desolate and terrified. Now, Sarek looked every day of his age, which had to be somewhere close to two hundred.

  “Captain, are there any other data? I would examine them.”

  No point in explaining that Commander Saavik’s reports should be classified; Sarek had helped preserve the Federation’s direst secrets long before Captain Garrett’s birth. She transmitted Saavik’s navigational records, her medical files, her personal log. Sarek’s proud carriage sagged more with each report.

  “Thank you for contacting me,” he said at last. “I am much in your debt, as is the Federation. But I have an additional request to make of you. Bring my daughter home. Please.”

  For what? So she can be debriefed? So she can be cured? If Spock isn’t there, they’ll both die. Maybe, Garrett realized, he just doesn’t want Saavik to die among strangers. She felt her vision blurring and told herself fiercely, Stop that!

  Rumor had it that the Vulcan watching her had not wept even at the death of his human wife. Rumor was often wrong.

  “I promise,” she said.

  To her amazement, Sarek smiled bleakly. “The promise of the captain of the Enterprise? I require no better assurance.” And broke contact.

  Garrett headed back toward sickbay. An aide hovered over Saavik, attempting to make her drink water through a straw; an IV went into one arm, where a greenish bruise was forming. Recognizing Garrett’s footsteps, Saavik tried to rise, then sank back down onto the biobed.

  “I just spoke to Ambassador Sarek,” Garrett told her. “We’re taking you home.”

  “No!” Saavik interrupted. “We must go to Narendra III.”

  “We’ll get it all done,” Dr. Stewart said, her voice almost a croon of reassurance. “Trust the captain.”

  Saavik sighed. “Enterprise.”

  Her eyes shut.

  “Doctor!”

  “Don’t worry. That’s natural sleep. If we’re really lucky, she’ll go into healing trance. If not, well . . . I’ve studied some of the Disciplines. Most shrinks do, sooner or later. I know a little Vulcan, too. I’ve been talking to her in it. It seems to anchor her.”

  “Can you get the whole story out of her?” Garrett asked.

  “I’ve tried. I think she’s hiding something.”

  “Like why she crossed the Neutral Zone in the first place?”

  Dr. Stewart nodded. Garrett stared down at her hands, aware that she had clenched them into fists. Deliberately, she forced herself to uncurl her fingers. “Keep trying, Doctor. Report to me anything you hear.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  Returning to her own quarters, Garrett checked for messages. No word yet.

  So. She sat for a moment, fingers steepled, resting her chin on them. Sarek had thought Spock still on Oriki. Easy enough to follow up on that.

  But, as Garrett was coming to suspect, he might be on Romulus itself. If Spock were on Romulus, it stood to reason that Saavik might have followed him, to provide backup.

  She accessed navigation and tapped in a theoretical course. Yes. If Enterprise diverted to Narendra III at warp nine, the Klingon base was some nine hours away.

  Saavik’s message had warned that the fleet would initiate attack three hours after emerging from the Neutral Zone.

  Alone. Against a fleet of brand-new warbirds with unknown capabilities that a half-Romulan Starfleet officer with Command training regarded as formidable.

  You know, if you divert without orders, people will think you’re as crazy as Saavik.

  Let them.

  She leaned forward to signal the bridge.

  “Divert course to Narendra III,” she ordered. “Maximum warp. Tell the engineers to give me everything she’s got. Yellow alert.”

  “With all due respect, Captain . . .” began Tholav’s soft voice. “

  Do it!” She heard orders relayed, took a breath, and asked, Any word from Captain Keel yet?”

  “Ma’am, I have Captain Walker Keel on screen now.”

  She heard the relief in Varani’s voice. Attaboy, she thought, but did not say, and leaned forward, both elbows on the table, to greet the image on the screen. No point playing poker with this one; the term “poker face” could have been invented to describe him. And she’d known him long enough to be blunt.

  “Walk, I’ll put my cards on the table. I’ve just diverted course to the Klingon base at Narendra III on the word of a possibly deranged Vulcan woman. She’s telling me I’m going to face seven Romulan warbirds solo. Tell me she’s wrong.”

  She had to give Keel credit. Not even an eyelid twitched. “I think, Captain,” he said, all traces of humor gone, “that you had better explain.”

  Garrett keyed open a channel to Communications. “Transmit Commander Saavik’s tape.”

  “Transmitting now.”

  “There isn’t a whole lot of time,” Garrett said, quickly filling Keel in on the rescue of Commander Saavik. “Now that I’m about to put my head in the warbird’s beak . . . You’d better level with me, Walker.”

  Keel stared at the coffee cup in his hand as if it were an alien object. He drank, then clearly came to a decision that tasted worse than the coffee, and set the cup down.

  “I’ll let Admiral Lynn fill you in.” Walker’s face faded out and for a moment Garrett was staring at a blank screen.

  As the admiral appeared onscreen, Garrett rose.

  “As you were, Captain.” Acknowledging her salute, he added, “Finish your meal.”

  She sat down, remaining at attention as she had every dinner of her first year at Starfleet Academy. If Admiral Lynn wasn’t close to retirement age, he had probably intimidated Records into shaving a few years off his date of birth. Despite his years in space, he was as weathered as a downworlder, with white hair and a white mustache that gave him the look of a predator: a deceptively mild predator who would smile before he struck.

  Without any soft words, he began, “Staff indicates that if you divert now you’ll reach Narendra in five hours.”

  That was the admiral she’d heard about: Never mind the covert ops. What was the old saying? “Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead.”

  “I diverted one point five hours ago, sir. ETA now at four point three hours.” By the time Enterprise arrived, Narendra III would already be under attack. If Saavik wasn’t crazy. “Admiral, what’s the time horizon until you can send reinforcements?”

  Meeting her eyes, the admiral gave the bad news to her straight. “The protection of Melville Colony must be top priority if we’re to have any hope of avoiding all-out war. Under the circumstances, Captain, you’re on your own. I don’t need to tell you to govern yourself accordingly.”

  “I understand, sir.”

  “I thought you would.” Lynn’s face was very bleak. “As for Saavik, Sarek of Vulcan has contacted me. Commander Saavik must be returned to Vulcan for debriefing. She has vital information about the Romulans.

  “Godspeed, Captain,” Admiral Lynn continued. “If my physician wouldn’t knock me down, sit on me, and certify me unfit for command, and if I had a ship I could commandeer in time, I’d come and back you up myself.”

  “We’d appreciate that, Admiral.” Garrett sighed. “I’ll send Commander Saavik back to Vulcan.”

  “I’ll get you reinforcements as soon as I can, Captain,” Admiral Lynn said bluntly. “So hold out. You don’t need old-style Fourth of July speeches about how important this situation is. But, Enterprise . . . ” He grinned without humor, looking remarkably like an enraged predator. “Do your best.”

  “Aye, sir. If you’ll excuse me now, I must go inform my crew.”

  By rights, she should have let Admiral Lynn break communications. She paused, but the admira
l had risen and was saluting her.

  “Godspeed,” Admiral Lynn said again.

  He knew better, she thought, than to wish her good luck.

  Discussion in Garrett’s ready room had been brief. Course had been set; nothing more remained to do but wait. And fine-tune the weapons systems. Lieutenant Castillo left, his eyes bright with interest. Normally, doctrine discouraged some tactics. But when a ship was as badly outnumbered as Enterprise, he was damned well going to try them.

  Garrett accompanied Chief Medical Officer Aristide to sickbay. She knew he was watching her. Evaluating her fitness. Damn.

  Saavik would no doubt perceive distress. Garrett attempted to calm herself. By the time her breathing had steadied, she had managed her grief, her fear to the point where she could hide them. Was this how Vulcans did it?

  Already, Saavik looked paler, thinner than she had the last time Garrett had seen her. But she roused the instant she heard footsteps, and her eyes were very bright.

  “Is the word given?” she whispered.

  “The word is given, Commander. Enterprise is bound for Narendra III. Maximum warp. As for you, we’re going to get you home, where your own people can take care of you. We’ll have you on board a shuttle to Vulcan within the hour.”

  “Begging the captain’s pardon,” said Frances Stewart. “Just who do you think you can send on board that shuttle? We’re going into what may be a war zone, and you’re stripping the ship of essential personnel?”

  “You’d kill me if I said ‘nonessential passengers,’ Frances,” Garrett told her. “I want you to volunteer to escort the commander to Vulcan.”

  The psychiatrist’s gaze flashed to her chief. Aristide spread out his hands: What do you want?

  “I’m sending two security guards and a pilot,” Garrett continued. “A ship with a complement of seven hundred can spare four.”

  At least they would have a chance to go on living.

  “But why me?”

  “You like this woman, don’t you? She trusts you? That makes you, pardon the expression, the logical choice.”

  “Captain, I took an oath . . .”

  “You took several oaths, only one of which was to obey all lawful orders of your superior officers. Now, will you volunteer or do I make it a direct order?”

  “Aye, aye, ma’am. Request permission to escort Commander Saavik to Vulcan.”

  “That’s better. I don’t like it either, Frances, but . . .” Garrett shrugged. “We can always hope we’ll all be luckier than we deserve.

  “By the way, just in case, I want to tell you, I respect the way you’ve cared for your patient. I’ll note that in your file before . . . before . . .

  “Dismissed.”

  Garrett walked beside Saavik’s gurney on the way to the shuttlebay. In general, one did not touch Vulcans, but in a brief interval of consciousness, Saavik had grasped Garrett’s hand and pulled at it, drawing her down so she could whisper hoarsely, “He is still out there.”

  Saavik would not have revealed that information if she expected Enterprise to survive.

  Garrett squeezed her hand. “I thought so. There’s a ship out there, too. It’ll bring him home.”

  Saavik sighed. “ ‘The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Or the one.’ ”

  Do they?

  The Vulcan seemed to read her hesitation. “Kobayashi Maru, Captain. Thee understands.”

  Garrett patted the other woman’s hand.

  “Take care of her, Frances. And of yourself.”

  Stewart drew herself up and saluted formally. The shuttle’s doors sealed. Garrett left the deck.

  “Depressurize,” she ordered.

  Godspeed, Rachel Garrett wished the departing shuttle as it dwindled among the stars.

  She returned to the bridge, going the long way round to take a last look at her ship—and to let her crew see her.

  NINETEEN

  SPACE, THE NEUTRAL ZONE AND BEYOND, YEAR 2344

  As the Honor Blade sped out and away from Romulus, Charvanek, seated in her ship’s command chair, allowed herself a quick glance about the bridge. Akhh, yes, as cramped and awkwardly designed as it always had been—what idiot could have placed the controls for the left thruster away from the other set? The lighting had a greenish cast that made everyone look newly deceased, and the once-elegant red and silver bulkhead had faded to an un-Romulan . . . pink, ghastly in the green-tinged light. It was, without a doubt . . . timeworn (Charvanek’s hand searched for and found the frayed patch on her command chair’s left armrest). And they never had been able to get rid of that mysterious hint of burnt wiring.

  Still, the bird-of-prey guarded Honor Blade’s bridge, and her engines were as fine and as finely tuned as Takvi could make them.

  Her ship, restored with her own treasure. Not some unblooded new design or some Klingon trash, but a solid Romulan vessel as well known and reliable as its crew.

  “Orbital defenses successfully jammed, Commander. Leaving homeworld orbit.”

  “Once out of weapons range, cut transmission,” she ordered. She, who went to defend the Empire, would not leave her homeworld defenseless.

  No one on board had questioned this. They were hers, from grizzled old First Engineer Takvi, with her since the old days and loyal as they came, to lean, wild-eyed Subcommander Durnak, to her eager young aide, M’ret, who’d followed her here gladly. She had chosen only those whose utter loyalty lay not to the praetor, not even just to her, but to the emperor and Romulan honor.

  Subcommander Durnak, pilot, sat all but welded to his controls, murmuring steadily under his breath. Nothing wrong, Charvanek knew; he merely begrudged even the slightest dust particle striking his ship. She had seen less reverent faces in shrines. Beside him, Centurion Ekenda, Navigation, a grim-faced middle-aged woman, awaited orders.

  “Navigation. Lay in the following course.”

  Unblinking, Ekenda absorbed its audacity: cut across the Neutral Zone, uncloaked for greater speed, and, if the Fates were with them, outrace the fleet to Narendra III. Durnak glanced at the new heading, raised an eyebrow, but complied without a word.

  “Five seconds to warp speed,” Ekenda called off. “Three . . . two . . . one . . . warp speed!”

  As the universe blurred and blazed about them, Charvanek leaned forward slightly.

  We’re coming, Volskiar, my old foe, we will overtake you and your arrogantly named Victorious, and that so dishonorably launched fleet.

  And if some Federation ship spots us before then? Do I . . . inform upon Romulan ships to my enemy?

  In this case, I do.

  I must.

  Her hand stole, just for an instant, to the amulet about her neck: a childish charm for good luck such as even nobility sometimes wore. But this one held a tiny, undetectable, and exceedingly powerful recording chip. The events of this mission would not go unnoted.

  How long has it been since we last went into battle? How long since the old days, when Subcommander Tal was at my right hand and issues were simple: good or evil.

  Bah, no, they had never been that simple.

  And I was never that naïve.

  Spock, her mind told her, unbidden, First Officer Spock of the Starship Enterprise.

  Ah well, Charvanek thought wryly, maybe I was that naïve. Once.

  “Subcommander Selta,” she snapped. “Open a channel to all within Honor Blade.”

  His hands flew over the console. “Ready, Commander.”

  Charvanek took a steadying breath. They had this precious time alone while in warp drive, and she would not waste it. “My shipmates, you are no doubt aware of the new fleet and of the praetor’s plans to restore our ancient glories. What you may not know is how he plans to do so.”

  As meticulously as if she laid out a battle plan in a council of war, Charvanek explained the situation: what, exactly, Narendra III was, the hazards and the political situation, and the cost to the Empire. The bridge crew’s discipline held, but the softest of snarl
s came over the ship’s speakers from First Engineer Takvi:

  “Dishonorable.”

  “You need not fear to say the word more loudly. Yes! It is dishonorable! If we submit to be used, and used on this raid, this one-sided massacre, it will be the blackest stain ever to mar the Empire’s name.”

  She got to her feet, stalking about the bridge, catching the eye of this man, that woman. “Those of you who have served with me in the old days know my history. You others surely have heard the tale, in one form or another, of how I was kidnapped by the Federation.” This was hardly the time to burden them with too many facts; the official version would serve. “You know how, in the years that followed, I waged a long, fierce battle to regain rank, honor—to, in blunt honesty, save my own life. Some of you were with me.”

  Charvanek paused, hands on hips, listening with a concealed wild delight to the murmurs of agreement, even of approval. They are mine.

  “You have heard. You know. You know me. So you can believe this: I would not risk my life, my honor, after that long, long struggle were it not that I believe the cause is just. I have killed in battle. We all have. But I have never yet murdered an unarmed foe. And I have never yet, and never will, slay children. And no, it matters not what race, what species:

  “I will not slay the helpless.

  “I will not so stain my honor.”

  She paused, waiting. “Nor will I.” That was Durnak’s mutter.

  “Nor I.” Centurion Ekenda.

  “Nor I,” came in from First Engineer Takvi.

  And now the voices were joining in quickly, “Nor I! Nor I!”

  She held up a hand for silence. “Easy words. But do you know what lies behind them?”

  She waited. They were all too well trained to ask the questions she saw burning in their eyes. M’ret, Charvanek decided, and whirled to him, commanding, “Ask!”

  He was still young enough to actually flush. “Who—this is not the emperor’s command, this can’t be!”

  “It is not. Think. All of you. Would Emperor Shiarkiek ever, ever do anything that would harm Romulan honor?”

  “The praetor,” someone muttered, as she had expected.