Star Trek: The Original Series - 147 - Devil’s Bargain (10 page)

“What a difference from that awful Elasian woman,” Uhura had said to Kirk.

Ah, Elaan, now of Troyius,
thought Kirk.
Yes, Elaan and I gave Uhura’s quarters quite a workout.

As if Uhura sensed that there was something more than met the eye between Hannah and her
captain, she added, “I would say this one is a keeper, Captain.”

“I really have no idea what you’re talking about, Lieutenant,” Kirk replied, but in a light tone to let her know he didn’t really mind the teasing.

Uhura smiled and went to her station.

Hox and Ferlein, Hannah’s aides
cum
bodyguards, were also housed on deck five, sharing a double-bunk quarters normally not in use. Major Merling proved to be the Vesbian most difficult to accommodate. Upon beaming aboard, he had insisted on being placed as far away as possible from Spock’s quarters, which required that he be assigned a junior officer’s cabin.

In the close confines of the ship, however, Merling found complete separation from the Vulcan impossible. There was even a tense moment in the rec room when Merling entered to pick up some entertainment tapes and ran into Spock, who was playing three-dimensional chess with Ensign Perkins, one of Scotty’s young Turk wizards in engineering. The look of disgust that passed over Merling’s face was apparent to all in the rec room, and had Merling not made his exit immediately, there may have been trouble. While many humans on the
Enterprise
found Spock to be cold and off-putting, he was still one of them, and crew loyalty ran deep on the ship.

Five days into the voyage Merling was forced to
encounter Spock in the ship officers’ mess at a formal dinner that Kirk gave for his visitors on the trip out to Janus VI. Hannah and Merling were seated at places of honor, and all the attendees wore dress uniforms fit for the occasion. These included Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Sulu, and Uhura.

Hox and Ferlein, the bodyguards, were also invited, but they had insisted on standing nearby and “observing,” as Ferlein put it. The two had mostly stayed in their quarters during the voyage and had split their time hovering over Hannah wherever she went. Each time they appeared, however, they looked noticeably more pasty-faced and sickly. The immune response had begun with them as well as with Hannah. Merling, so far, seemed to have avoided it, perhaps because he was not a Vesbian native and had had the gene therapy later in life.

Hannah was not less beautiful, but she certainly was less vibrant, Kirk thought. She was alternately flush and pale, as if fever were running through her body. She had begun to tire more easily, but she was making up for this by sheer force of will. Hannah had been as ardent as ever with him as before, perhaps more so, sensing her coming illness.

She had dutifully allowed McCoy to examine her and administer the daily immune-suppressant vaccine. McCoy had been entrusted with a large enough supply of the precious material to treat the Vesbians for a longer mission. The problem was, the
vaccine didn’t seem to be working; or, if it was, it seemed to be losing effectiveness.

Kirk’s own feelings had not lessened.

At the dinner, Hannah found out about Sulu’s interest in ancient firearms and both discovered a particular fascination with blunderbuss pistols of seventeenth-century Earth. Hannah, it seemed, was a crack marksman and had competed in phaser-skeet competitions on Vesbius. Sulu was obviously smitten with Hannah, and Kirk found himself feeling jealousy. But it didn’t take Sulu long to see in which direction Hannah’s interest lay and, although his kindness to her did not wane, all flirting went out of it.

Dinner was spare by the standards of Vesbius. Kirk did not attempt to equal the feast he’d been given on the colony world, but he did order his personal cache of 2169 Saurian brandy broken out. It had been a gift from a connoisseur, perhaps the greatest of all time, and was the only beverage Kirk knew of that might be the equal of Vesbian ale.

Merling, for his part, behaved tolerably at the dinner. He spoke of the military life on Vesbius, and his role in organizing a planetary militia that he considered second to none.

“I’m not a part of the first wave of settlers, nor am I a native-born child of the planet. No, I am a veteran of the Deneb II expeditionary force,” Merling said. “We saw action during the uprising on
that benighted world, and I personally commanded a charge on the rebels’ position.”

“Wasn’t that uprising notorious for the use of military nanotechnology?” Scott asked. “Using that stuff is a war crime and forbidden—and for good reason.”

“The rebels would stop at nothing,” Merling said. “They were animals. I lost a lot of men that day purely from the lack of discipline. It was my own fault. I had been lax on their training, afraid, as a young lieutenant, to push them farther than they wanted to go. It cost some of them their lives. Since that day, I have believed that a strong hand saves lives, and that discipline—of both the self and the body politic—is key.”

“Is this why you advocate replacing the Council with a single voice during the crisis and afterward?” Spock asked.

“Yes,” Merling answered, without looking at Spock. It sounded like he was spitting out something distasteful in his answer.

“There is a certain logic in your position,” said Spock. “During times of war a democratically elected leader becomes less a representative of the people and more a commander-in-chief. Those who do not go into a war organized and acting as one often live to regret this fact. Believers in democracy do not, however, think that the same logic applies to civilian life. There is a certain degree of disorder
that is necessary for change and creativity to bring about advancements. Even Vulcans make room for this in our society.”

“It may be the Vulcan way, but it should not be the way of Vesbius. We Vesbians are a different breed.”

“Indeed,” Spock said. “You are. Literally.”

“Gentlemen, please let us not argue over this now,” said Hannah. “We must come together in this difficult time as best we can. It is my belief that we should use the institutions that we already have in place. On Vesbius, there is the possibility of the chancellor taking a strong hand in emergency conditions, and my father has done just that. Witness the fact that he ordered me on this voyage against my wishes. Even now, I would rather be supervising the shelter reconstruction on Vesbius. But the point remains: Many decisions have been made unilaterally—of necessity. This is one of the reasons the Exos terrorists are dissatisfied and strike out.”

“But surely they are a fringe element,” said Doctor McCoy, “who are using this situation to advance their own agenda.”

“They are,” said Hannah. “But we must not dismiss the legitimate dissent just because some choose to take it too far.”

“You were in those shelters pulling out bodies,” said McCoy, “as was I under the ballroom. If you’re truly expressing forgiveness . . .”

“I forgive, Doctor,” replied Hannah. “But I do not forget. And I will do everything in my power to prevent it from happening again, including prosecuting those who are found to have participated in this action. And we
will
find them eventually, Doctor. Vesbius is a very small world in some ways.”

With that, Kirk raised his glass of Vesbian ale, and the Vesbians, for their part, raised their Saurian brandy, which they’d politely tried and found as good as Kirk had hoped. “To Vesbius,” the captain offered. “May there be a bright future for her and her citizens.”

“Hear, hear,” came the calls of the others. Hannah blushed and raised her glass, as did Merling. They drank.

“This beer
is
extraordinarily good,” said Uhura, who had decided to try the Vesbian ale at Hannah’s request. “And I usually prefer wine.”

“I hoped you would find it so, Lieutenant,” said Hannah, with a beaming and genuine smile.

The dinner was a success. Kirk had a replicator specialist create a new linguine recipe that he named Tholian Web. It included herbs and spices from several of the planets that the
Enterprise
had visited over the course of its mission and imparted quite an exotic flavor to the ordinary pasta. At times Hannah seemed lost in thought, and when Kirk asked her what she was thinking about, she answered the she was trying to figure out from aroma
and from taste what the herbs were that she was experiencing. It seemed that every aspect of biology was of interest to Vesbians, particularly to Hannah.

•   •   •

The trip out proved to be one of the best of Kirk’s life. He allowed his feelings to bloom for Hannah, and she the same. In the confines of the ship and despite the pressure of the mission, it was as if they were living out a long relationship in fast forward.

While Hannah nominally bunked in Uhura’s quarters, it was the captain’s quarters where she was most often to be found. Her bodyguards had been ordered to make themselves scarce at such times and were usually lurking around the corridors of deck five with scowls on their faces.

“You’re the xenobiologist,” Kirk said to her. “How can we be so compatible when we’re so different?”

They lay together on the deck beside his bunk, having fallen off in the process of making furious love. They were wrapped in one of Kirk’s few keepsakes, a vintage blanket from a Federation vessel.

“Biology is a wonderful field of study,” Hannah answered. “But a rose is a rose is a rose.”

“Fair enough,” Kirk said.

“Why does this blanket say
U.S.S. Archer
?” Hannah asked. “We are on the
Enterprise,
after all.”

Kirk fingered the worn fabric. “It was my mother’s. She wrapped me in it once.”

“And thereby hangs a tale?”

“Thereby hangs a tale,” Kirk said. “But what about you?”

“I grew up in the country. My parents were biologists who became farmers.” Hannah sat up, a leg held against her chest.

“And they grew you.”

“In a manner of speaking,” Hannah said. “I studied biology. And that led to anthropology. And economics. And politics.” She shook her hair and it fell around her shoulders and over her breasts in unkempt but beautiful waves. “So here I am.”

“A politician?”

“Yes. And still a farm girl in many ways.”

“But your father is the chancellor of Vesbius, not a farmer.”

“And who do you think got him elected?”

Kirk sat up beside Hannah, put a hand on her chin, and kissed her softly. “You?” he said.

“Little old me. I managed the campaign.”

“The power behind the throne.”

“We don’t have a throne on Vesbius,” said Hannah. “We are a democracy, and I aim to keep it that way.” She took his hand in hers and squeezed it. He could feel the tension within her, and the resolve. “Even through all this.” And then she let out a long breath and released it, and the tension within her seemed to dissolve.

“You think I have it pretty easy, just having
a starship to run, don’t you?” Kirk said with a laugh.

She leaned over and brushed her lips against his cheek. “I would never say that, Jim.”

“But you might think it.”

“If I ever did, I’d keep it to myself,” Hannah replied.

“You are a politician, aren’t you?” Kirk said.

“I’m also a woman,” she said. She took him by the shoulders, pushing him gently toward the blanket. “A woman in love with you.” She was quiet for a moment, then finally spoke with a twinkle in her eye. “It doesn’t take much to see that the problems of two little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.”

“Someday you’ll understand that,” Kirk said, completing the quote. “
Casablanca
?”

“
Casablanca,
” she said. “Crazy ending. Sad. Kiss me.”

He kissed her and they came together again. And when it was over and Kirk was sure she lay sleeping on the blanket, he allowed himself to say the words: “I love you, Hannah.” Then he kissed her a final time and lay down beside her.

Hannah did not open her eyes, but she smiled.

“Here’s looking at you, kid,” she whispered.

•   •   •

Two days later, they arrived at the Janus VI system. They had notified the mining colony that they were
on their way. Kirk had not communicated what their purpose was because he did not know the state of affairs between the miners and the Horta. He suspected it was cordial, since the mine was still putting out a record haul of pergium each quarter. But he did not want anyone to do his talking for him. This was going to be difficult without prejudices being formed beforehand.

There was a new mining director, Debra Weisskopf, a big, blustery woman who seemed a hale and hearty sort. She immediately greeted Kirk and his landing party with a strong handshake that almost crushed Kirk’s fingers. She had flaming red hair, and Scotty, whom Kirk brought down with him, was clearly smitten with her.

“What a woman,” Kirk heard Scotty mutter under his breath after the handshake.

Kirk, Hannah, and Merling sat down in chairs in front of the director’s desk. The others in the landing party—Spock, Scotty, McCoy, and the two Vesbian bodyguards, Hox and Ferlein—were crowded into the small office.

Weisskopf did not stay behind her desk but instead plopped herself down on its surface, facing them. Informality seemed to be part of her leadership style, but Kirk noticed a series of carefully drawn charts that decorated her office walls, and all of the trends on the charts were pointing up. “All right, now we can solve the big mystery of why
the
Enterprise
is back at Janus VI?” Laughing, she added, “I know it is not for shore leave.” It was such a contagious laugh that everyone else, except Spock, joined in with her.

“Perhaps some other time,” Kirk replied. “What we want, Director Weisskopf—”

“Call me Debra.”

“What we’re here for, Debra, is the Horta. We want to talk with them, and, quite frankly, we want to recruit some of them to come with us.”

Now Weisskopf’s laugh was even louder and more raucous, but this time the others did not join in with it. She was laughing at them. “You’ve got to be kidding,” she said. “Those Horta are very attached to this world and to their rock. And what do you want them for, may I ask? Are you going to make them into Starfleet cadets?”