Title : Staff Meeting At Nine
Author : ‘Goji’ Rob Morris
Series : The TOS-AU, The Ancient Destroyer Cycle
Type : A Response to the 'Ordinary Times' Challenge on Ad Astra
Part : 1/1
Characters : TOS 7
Rating : PG
Summary : In the Ancient Destroyer Universe, it is not all conspiracies and skullduggery. But trying to keep that aspect out of even the most mundane of tasks can prove impossible. Still, our heroes must try.
--------------------
Staff Meeting At Nine
By Rob Morris
USS Enterprise, September 30th, 2277
"At Nine? Uhura, you have got to be kidding me."
The Console Officer shook her head at Tactical Officer Sulu's objection.
"2100 Hours, Mister. All those little things we've been putting off for so long come a calling eventually, and this is that eventually."
Security Chief Chekov groaned with his friend and mentor.
"Bozhe Moi. Vwe vwill be swimming in paperwork in an era vwhere no one uses paper."
Uhura would not be put off.
"Hard copies will be printed, no way around it. My heart bleeds, gentlemen, as does that of our Captain. Staff Meeting at Nine, boys. Deal with it."
As she left, Sulu smiled, a smile everyone present knew was the result of his mind working overtime to think about anything other than the staff meeting.
"Hey, Pavel? I have just obtained some seeds so rare that---"
"Forget it, Hikaru. Your last plant bit a part of my ear off!"
"The Doc recovered it, didn't he? Besides, this one is telepathic in nature."
"Oh good-vwill it devour my mind and soul, or just my brain?"
"Your presuming anything that ate brains would even want yours. C'mon, where's your sense of adventure?"
Chekov left the Bridge with a dismissive wave.
"I am in charge of Security. My aim is to let no one have adventures. Vwhen there are adventures, there are problems."
Sulu started to say something else as the doors closed, and then just chuckled.
------------
"That's a wee bit late in the evening lass, don't you think?"
"You can numb yourself after, Mister Scott. Just be sure and save some for me."
Owing to being a gentleman, Scotty waited till she left entirely before speaking.
"Och, an hour when I planned to sleep in the bosom of the hum of me blessed bairns, tis I'll instead be logging ideal energy usage versus actual versus projected..."
He trailed off.
"Lads and lassies, ye listen up, and ye listen good! Tis' a bottle of Glenfinnan's finest Scotch to the hobbyist who can produce a miniature warp core with the highest stable yield---nae bigger than a meter squared!"
Cheers went up. It was not uncommon for Scotty to propose one of these challenges. One young lady challenged the challenger, though.
"Scotty-that's an awfully small area to produce in. Just what kind of yield do you think you'll get?"
The older man nodded.
"Aye, twill surely be negligible. But we need to continually work the size of these engines down by crook, hook, and ladder. I'm concerned that some of the planners of this fleet are well content to rest upon the release of the most secret portions of the Archer cache. Och-cept for that one lad at Utopia Planitia, Aaron Sisko-may he be forgiven for his demon of an uncle, our *Laird* Cartwright. But if we fail to build pon' what the good Henry Archer was able to pull from all that, we have nae right callin' ourselves engineers. Do ye ken what Walt Disney called his lot? Imagineers. That's why Buena Vista Six is the wonder it is. Building upon the technology that was started in Anaheim and Orlando on Earth, till it took a whole planet to house one wee mouse."
She smiled.
"I knew I was joining the crew of the Enterprise-I never knew I was going to Disney's World!"
-----------------
"At the risk of an emotional response, Commander, I will say that this is less than welcome news. Perhaps far less than welcome."
McCoy contradicted Spock not at all.
"Uhura, is Nine PM the only time this can happen?"
She nodded.
"Extra duty shifts and overlaps make that our only bit of free time. I suggest we order in. Pizza, anyone?"
With that snarky comment floating in the air, the two found themselves alone.
"Spock, my suggestion remains the same, and it is seconded by T'Nia, your own great-aunt. A period of withdrawal would do you a world of good. You've kept up this superhuman---hell, SuperVulcan façade for some time now, but dammit, man, something's got to give."
Spock was too polite to dismiss McCoy's advice out of turn, and yet it was clear that accepting it was also not in him.
"Doctor, I will remind you that, as a Half-Vulcan, I would like as not need a regimen of genetic *balancing* more often than is standard, in any event."
"I know that! But you, Mister Spock, have generally had control over your stressors, those lovely little subset of free radicals that can have anyone, hybrid or no, on my table to keep the touch of time back a bit more. Your Lady Mother has to hit her local station at least once every three months, owing to Vulcan's air and gravity differential to Earth's. But you have never had to. I hate admitting it, but I suppose the stress of your early life made you a stress-managing machine, and I mean that as a compliment. Now, though? Spock, you're here almost once a month. We are starting to rub out the fine line between patient-doctor privacy and overriding medical concerns. You have some manner of demons, Spock, and they are something you are on the verge of not being able to handle."
Spock's eyes softened.
"Leonard, I need to be who I have always been, for the ship, the crew-and for him. Will you enable me to continue to function at those levels I have known?"
McCoy bid him lie down on the bio-bed.
"He's another one set to crack wide open. Between pretending not to mourn Peter and pretending not to worry everytime Saavik so much as sneezes...ahhh. Okay...regale me."
Spock did as he was asked.
"You were correct. The cleric in the 1953 film version of War Of The Worlds was a more thoroughly realized character than HG Wells caricature of one in the original novel. I found his seemingly pointless death off-putting at first, till I surmised that he needed to stand against..."
One old friend took care of another, and as long as there were pre-arranged topics to speak of, things were relatively peaceful.
-----------
She dreamed. In her dream, the fortune teller held the precious newborn.
*Yours?*
*No, the child of two friends, Sam and Aurelan Kirk. But I love him enough for that.*
*Strange-I would say he has your eyes. Was this child born on any manner of Holy Day?*
*Umm-does Nineteen days before Christmas count?*
*That-is the feast of Saint Nicholas. This child will one day engage in an act of nearly divine charity. It will cause him to be lost to you.*
*Lost? Where will he be?*
The fortune teller was weeping.
*In Hell, Nyota Uhura. Not for any crime, but before his thirteenth birthday, this beautiful child will go to...*
She woke, and saw that it was just past 2000 Hours. She was not in her own bed.
"Jim?"
He was typing at the terminal.
"Sleep help any?"
She nodded.
"Yes. How strange that, in the bed of the lecherous Captain Kirk, I am completely safe."
Their past relationship often seemed on the verge of rekindling, but this was not to be that night.
"I wanna get there early. You wait about twenty minutes, okay?"
"Jim, I officially hate this."
"No more than I do, Lady. But this is a part of everyday life. I'll make my rounds as I go. Will everybody be moaning about the late hour?"
She nodded.
"More importantly-everyone heard them moaning."
He smiled, nodded and left, while she took over his terminal and pulled up a ship's console schematic.
*Okay-try rerouting explosive power from console brown-outs to emergency power. Boost comm-signal strength near Galley 3. Restore Scotty's old engine-routing map in his personal office-and see about Hikaru's old telescoping targeting binoculars. Pavel wants physical relay check stations for patrols? He seems to know his job-but I need a tally method to match the low-tech nature of it. Increase white noise generation for Plus-Human species suffering audio feedback.*
"Oh, yeah---I'm just a secretary."
Happily, she knew the man who had invented the role of Console Officer just for her knew that she was worth far more than that. It was now time for her to join him.
--------------
He walked the decks, a legend trying to be just a man, and almost making it. But it was his own legends that haunted him, for he knew the truth behind the myths. Mostly, they involved a lot of loss.
He saw one lieutenant being a quick-witted glad-hander, and tried not to think of Gary Mitchell.
He saw another embarrassed by some good-natured ribbing from her friends, and tried not to think of the far more vicious treatment that once faced Saavik on Vulcan.
He saw a yeoman who was just too damned cute and pert and perky for her own good, and tried not to think of the grisly fate of Lesley Thompson, crushed to powder as a minor demonstration of an invading alien's power.
He saw a group of crewmembers in Astrometrics, all relying on one quiet workhorse who seemed to thrive on the effort, and could only think of Peter, dead nearly nine years.
He was not Christopher Pike. He took pains to keep this common touch, to remind himself that the bold gambles he was so praised for came with living markers and a cost to be tallied that was always too high. He also took the occasional verbal hit from those who wanted to know why he had been so slow to fill vacant positions.
"All of you have proven yourselves time and again. The people I bring on have to meet your standard first, mine second."
As he arrived at the meeting room, he wished that this explanation had not been mixed in with a lie.
-------------
The senior staff, their aides and departmental seconds, and those who would keep the minutes, were all seated when Spock dropped a bombshell.
"Spock, you can't be serious!"
"Doctor, you know that I am."
"Och, Man-this could keep us here for three hours or better-and the hour tis' late enough."
"Kyptin-vwhile the concerns Meester Spock raises are technically valid, I believe they can be gone around in this case."
Kirk looked at his Tactical Officer.
"Mister Sulu?"
"I-sorry, guys. The call cuts Mister Spock's way. We are mixing standard ship's day-to-day business with some serious eyes-only clearance-driven materials, and it's impossible to fully insulate one from the other. Those are regs that could get us all up that well-known creek, if the contents of said creek hit the fan."
Kirk looked at Uhura, who nodded.
"I agree to supplement the auto-recorded minutes, and then to edit them for content. This meeting has to take place, Captain, and it has to be now. Everyone here will also be required to read my edit before departing."
"Which adds on another half-hour of..."
"Bones, that's enough. I've depended on Mister Spock's judgment on too many occasions to dismiss it now. Add to that, these regulations come from Admiralty Hall, and while I have been known to buck them, I feel the need in this instance to comply, given the nature of the material in question."
Kirk turned to those outside the command circle.
"People-you are the lucky ones. Misters Arex, M'Ress and Naraht have the Bridge, and you get to eat and sleep. Would that we were all so fortunate."
"Sir-if the Bridge staff needs relief, we can provide it."
"Something wrong with the performance of the officers on duty, Mister Roberts?"
Kirk's yeoman-one of the first to actually be a man in a long time-almost seemed to form a sneer, one that was fought off at some obvious cost.
"No, sir. Of course not. They're my friends."
When all except seven had left, Kirk shook his head and thought to himself.
*Damn. I had liked that kid.*
All were silent as Spock concentrated, going so far as to tap his left ear.
"We may begin."
Uhura, Chekov and Scotty had scanners in hand. Kirk checked the walls and floor, Sulu the table itself. Spock and McCoy removed a series of air vent covers, activating recessed buttons that began to generate so-called ‘white noise'.
"Doctor, you played your part well."
"Sadly, Mister Spock, a doctor learns how to put on a front. Though I usually reserve it for relating the news of terminal conditions."
Chekov broke apart a writing stylus that proved to have more than just writer's ions in it. Uhura found the residue of transmission chips unique to her old comm-console, now in ship's storage. Scotty sprayed the room's doors after taking note of a nearly-transparent strip running along them. Sulu found minor heating elements in the chairs, perhaps meant to enhance scans no one there knew of any purpose for. Kirk found a minor protrusion in the wall, took it open with an old bulky docu-padd, and there found a simple communicator, stripped of almost any casing and installed nearly flush by someone who knew how. When Uhura finished lacing the room with miniature, directed E-M pulses, Sulu finally spoke.
"They're getting cleverer. Too damned clever."
McCoy nodded.
"Tell me, did we ever really beam back from the Mirror world? Because that seems where we're headed."
Uhura waved a hand in the air.
"At this rate, we may have to let them succeed a few times, simply to keep up the façade."
Chekov disagreed.
"Vwe are a lot better off shutting out those amateur KGB agents than attempting to play their sick game."
"Aye, lad. But for that, I have to counter-we are playing their game. Those terrorists have won, when we no longer know who to trust. How much longer can we keep this up?"
Kirk took all this in.
"We won't have to keep it up much longer. Spock?"
"Requests for transfer off the Enterprise have been made by every officer under suspicion. Admiralty Hall has, unsurprisingly, approved these transfers rapidly. We have made their sources of information and potential mischief in effect unusable."
"Gentleman, Miss Uhura-we all some time ago came to the conclusion that the forces currently in charge of Starfleet Command are not merely politically unpalatable, or even merely extreme in their viewpoints. They have made a habit of promoting professionally unfit officers who adhere to their increasingly xenophobic and warlike point of view. But they also keep the Federation Council on their side, so removing them is not an option at present. That day will come. Until then, we need to remain vigilant against their efforts to spy on and indoctrinate the crew of this ship. After the Probes Crisis six years ago, they responded to our need for replacement officers with an officer stock I wouldn't let pick up a cadet application. When we used our time in the Dead Zone to identify these officers and boot them out, the Hall responded by not sending us any replacements, placing our crew in a constant state of overwork."
Sulu smiled.
"You have a plan."
"Vwell of course he does."
"Tis true, ye always do have an ace or three tucked down those long sleeves, Cap'n. But are we now playing septuple fizzbin?"
"Of a sort, Mister Scott. The Captain and I have devised a means to alleviate our staffing concerns. It is no more logical than his approach to chess, yet it will I think prove an effective solution. Commander Uhura?"
"Gentlemen, I've been in contact-discrete contact-with officers assigned to some of the Hall's more hastily-promoted commanding officers. The little bigots want them gone, and many of them have huge amounts of sabbatical time built up. It will involve some fancy footwork and frankly some altering of records, but we can get them on board. Many have said they'd rather serve as crewmen here than as senior officers where they are now."
McCoy breathed in.
"Really, it'll be our most dangerous game to date. They'll finally have us lying to their faces, about where these officers are. Which means, Jim, they may also have us right where they want us. Where they want you."
Kirk sliced the air in front of him with his right hand.
"They have the power to remove me, and I've given them several excuses. For some reason, I serve the Hall's purposes by being here. On the day they don't, we may then have to openly rebel, which was Heichi Nogura's ultimate nightmare-aside that is, from Cartwright taking his position. So it's to be nightmare versus nightmare, when the time comes. The instant the suspect officers go off, the replacements come on. Anyone tries to call home about it, they go too. I'll find an excuse. We need to get back to day to day. Playing footsy with our corrupted Fleet is going to make someone out there-maybe the Klingons, but it could even be an ally-get ideas. They have enough of those, as I'm sure we all remember."
Kirk's plan would not go unnoticed, and the Hall's vengeful response would be nothing so straightforward as a court-martial. But that was for another day.
"Spock-any other business?"
"Merely Sarek's well-wishes, Captain. His diplomatic and non-official inquiries into the deaths of your mother and nephew continue, and he may have a promising lead of some sort."
Sarek would have a great deal more than that to show, in less than one year's time. But the crew that would be so overjoyed then was beset now. Uhura handed out file chits.
"Here are the dossiers, boys. We have to figure out how to officially get them on board within six months of their actually coming aboard. There's some real talent here, but place them carefully. We don't know that our sweeps nailed everyone. We almost didn't catch Jenkins-she's a good deal more subtle than the Captain's Mister Roberts."
Into the long night, actual ship's business mixed pell-mell with the need to survive a command structure gone horribly wrong. As each legend did work that frankly disgusted them, they looked forward to the day when, with these sketchily-obtained officers, they could again be about the business of simply exploring the final frontier.
That day would be long in coming.
Author : ‘Goji’ Rob Morris
Series : The TOS-AU, The Ancient Destroyer Cycle
Type : A Response to the 'Ordinary Times' Challenge on Ad Astra
Part : 1/1
Characters : TOS 7
Rating : PG
Summary : In the Ancient Destroyer Universe, it is not all conspiracies and skullduggery. But trying to keep that aspect out of even the most mundane of tasks can prove impossible. Still, our heroes must try.
--------------------
Staff Meeting At Nine
By Rob Morris
USS Enterprise, September 30th, 2277
"At Nine? Uhura, you have got to be kidding me."
The Console Officer shook her head at Tactical Officer Sulu's objection.
"2100 Hours, Mister. All those little things we've been putting off for so long come a calling eventually, and this is that eventually."
Security Chief Chekov groaned with his friend and mentor.
"Bozhe Moi. Vwe vwill be swimming in paperwork in an era vwhere no one uses paper."
Uhura would not be put off.
"Hard copies will be printed, no way around it. My heart bleeds, gentlemen, as does that of our Captain. Staff Meeting at Nine, boys. Deal with it."
As she left, Sulu smiled, a smile everyone present knew was the result of his mind working overtime to think about anything other than the staff meeting.
"Hey, Pavel? I have just obtained some seeds so rare that---"
"Forget it, Hikaru. Your last plant bit a part of my ear off!"
"The Doc recovered it, didn't he? Besides, this one is telepathic in nature."
"Oh good-vwill it devour my mind and soul, or just my brain?"
"Your presuming anything that ate brains would even want yours. C'mon, where's your sense of adventure?"
Chekov left the Bridge with a dismissive wave.
"I am in charge of Security. My aim is to let no one have adventures. Vwhen there are adventures, there are problems."
Sulu started to say something else as the doors closed, and then just chuckled.
------------
"That's a wee bit late in the evening lass, don't you think?"
"You can numb yourself after, Mister Scott. Just be sure and save some for me."
Owing to being a gentleman, Scotty waited till she left entirely before speaking.
"Och, an hour when I planned to sleep in the bosom of the hum of me blessed bairns, tis I'll instead be logging ideal energy usage versus actual versus projected..."
He trailed off.
"Lads and lassies, ye listen up, and ye listen good! Tis' a bottle of Glenfinnan's finest Scotch to the hobbyist who can produce a miniature warp core with the highest stable yield---nae bigger than a meter squared!"
Cheers went up. It was not uncommon for Scotty to propose one of these challenges. One young lady challenged the challenger, though.
"Scotty-that's an awfully small area to produce in. Just what kind of yield do you think you'll get?"
The older man nodded.
"Aye, twill surely be negligible. But we need to continually work the size of these engines down by crook, hook, and ladder. I'm concerned that some of the planners of this fleet are well content to rest upon the release of the most secret portions of the Archer cache. Och-cept for that one lad at Utopia Planitia, Aaron Sisko-may he be forgiven for his demon of an uncle, our *Laird* Cartwright. But if we fail to build pon' what the good Henry Archer was able to pull from all that, we have nae right callin' ourselves engineers. Do ye ken what Walt Disney called his lot? Imagineers. That's why Buena Vista Six is the wonder it is. Building upon the technology that was started in Anaheim and Orlando on Earth, till it took a whole planet to house one wee mouse."
She smiled.
"I knew I was joining the crew of the Enterprise-I never knew I was going to Disney's World!"
-----------------
"At the risk of an emotional response, Commander, I will say that this is less than welcome news. Perhaps far less than welcome."
McCoy contradicted Spock not at all.
"Uhura, is Nine PM the only time this can happen?"
She nodded.
"Extra duty shifts and overlaps make that our only bit of free time. I suggest we order in. Pizza, anyone?"
With that snarky comment floating in the air, the two found themselves alone.
"Spock, my suggestion remains the same, and it is seconded by T'Nia, your own great-aunt. A period of withdrawal would do you a world of good. You've kept up this superhuman---hell, SuperVulcan façade for some time now, but dammit, man, something's got to give."
Spock was too polite to dismiss McCoy's advice out of turn, and yet it was clear that accepting it was also not in him.
"Doctor, I will remind you that, as a Half-Vulcan, I would like as not need a regimen of genetic *balancing* more often than is standard, in any event."
"I know that! But you, Mister Spock, have generally had control over your stressors, those lovely little subset of free radicals that can have anyone, hybrid or no, on my table to keep the touch of time back a bit more. Your Lady Mother has to hit her local station at least once every three months, owing to Vulcan's air and gravity differential to Earth's. But you have never had to. I hate admitting it, but I suppose the stress of your early life made you a stress-managing machine, and I mean that as a compliment. Now, though? Spock, you're here almost once a month. We are starting to rub out the fine line between patient-doctor privacy and overriding medical concerns. You have some manner of demons, Spock, and they are something you are on the verge of not being able to handle."
Spock's eyes softened.
"Leonard, I need to be who I have always been, for the ship, the crew-and for him. Will you enable me to continue to function at those levels I have known?"
McCoy bid him lie down on the bio-bed.
"He's another one set to crack wide open. Between pretending not to mourn Peter and pretending not to worry everytime Saavik so much as sneezes...ahhh. Okay...regale me."
Spock did as he was asked.
"You were correct. The cleric in the 1953 film version of War Of The Worlds was a more thoroughly realized character than HG Wells caricature of one in the original novel. I found his seemingly pointless death off-putting at first, till I surmised that he needed to stand against..."
One old friend took care of another, and as long as there were pre-arranged topics to speak of, things were relatively peaceful.
-----------
She dreamed. In her dream, the fortune teller held the precious newborn.
*Yours?*
*No, the child of two friends, Sam and Aurelan Kirk. But I love him enough for that.*
*Strange-I would say he has your eyes. Was this child born on any manner of Holy Day?*
*Umm-does Nineteen days before Christmas count?*
*That-is the feast of Saint Nicholas. This child will one day engage in an act of nearly divine charity. It will cause him to be lost to you.*
*Lost? Where will he be?*
The fortune teller was weeping.
*In Hell, Nyota Uhura. Not for any crime, but before his thirteenth birthday, this beautiful child will go to...*
She woke, and saw that it was just past 2000 Hours. She was not in her own bed.
"Jim?"
He was typing at the terminal.
"Sleep help any?"
She nodded.
"Yes. How strange that, in the bed of the lecherous Captain Kirk, I am completely safe."
Their past relationship often seemed on the verge of rekindling, but this was not to be that night.
"I wanna get there early. You wait about twenty minutes, okay?"
"Jim, I officially hate this."
"No more than I do, Lady. But this is a part of everyday life. I'll make my rounds as I go. Will everybody be moaning about the late hour?"
She nodded.
"More importantly-everyone heard them moaning."
He smiled, nodded and left, while she took over his terminal and pulled up a ship's console schematic.
*Okay-try rerouting explosive power from console brown-outs to emergency power. Boost comm-signal strength near Galley 3. Restore Scotty's old engine-routing map in his personal office-and see about Hikaru's old telescoping targeting binoculars. Pavel wants physical relay check stations for patrols? He seems to know his job-but I need a tally method to match the low-tech nature of it. Increase white noise generation for Plus-Human species suffering audio feedback.*
"Oh, yeah---I'm just a secretary."
Happily, she knew the man who had invented the role of Console Officer just for her knew that she was worth far more than that. It was now time for her to join him.
--------------
He walked the decks, a legend trying to be just a man, and almost making it. But it was his own legends that haunted him, for he knew the truth behind the myths. Mostly, they involved a lot of loss.
He saw one lieutenant being a quick-witted glad-hander, and tried not to think of Gary Mitchell.
He saw another embarrassed by some good-natured ribbing from her friends, and tried not to think of the far more vicious treatment that once faced Saavik on Vulcan.
He saw a yeoman who was just too damned cute and pert and perky for her own good, and tried not to think of the grisly fate of Lesley Thompson, crushed to powder as a minor demonstration of an invading alien's power.
He saw a group of crewmembers in Astrometrics, all relying on one quiet workhorse who seemed to thrive on the effort, and could only think of Peter, dead nearly nine years.
He was not Christopher Pike. He took pains to keep this common touch, to remind himself that the bold gambles he was so praised for came with living markers and a cost to be tallied that was always too high. He also took the occasional verbal hit from those who wanted to know why he had been so slow to fill vacant positions.
"All of you have proven yourselves time and again. The people I bring on have to meet your standard first, mine second."
As he arrived at the meeting room, he wished that this explanation had not been mixed in with a lie.
-------------
The senior staff, their aides and departmental seconds, and those who would keep the minutes, were all seated when Spock dropped a bombshell.
"Spock, you can't be serious!"
"Doctor, you know that I am."
"Och, Man-this could keep us here for three hours or better-and the hour tis' late enough."
"Kyptin-vwhile the concerns Meester Spock raises are technically valid, I believe they can be gone around in this case."
Kirk looked at his Tactical Officer.
"Mister Sulu?"
"I-sorry, guys. The call cuts Mister Spock's way. We are mixing standard ship's day-to-day business with some serious eyes-only clearance-driven materials, and it's impossible to fully insulate one from the other. Those are regs that could get us all up that well-known creek, if the contents of said creek hit the fan."
Kirk looked at Uhura, who nodded.
"I agree to supplement the auto-recorded minutes, and then to edit them for content. This meeting has to take place, Captain, and it has to be now. Everyone here will also be required to read my edit before departing."
"Which adds on another half-hour of..."
"Bones, that's enough. I've depended on Mister Spock's judgment on too many occasions to dismiss it now. Add to that, these regulations come from Admiralty Hall, and while I have been known to buck them, I feel the need in this instance to comply, given the nature of the material in question."
Kirk turned to those outside the command circle.
"People-you are the lucky ones. Misters Arex, M'Ress and Naraht have the Bridge, and you get to eat and sleep. Would that we were all so fortunate."
"Sir-if the Bridge staff needs relief, we can provide it."
"Something wrong with the performance of the officers on duty, Mister Roberts?"
Kirk's yeoman-one of the first to actually be a man in a long time-almost seemed to form a sneer, one that was fought off at some obvious cost.
"No, sir. Of course not. They're my friends."
When all except seven had left, Kirk shook his head and thought to himself.
*Damn. I had liked that kid.*
All were silent as Spock concentrated, going so far as to tap his left ear.
"We may begin."
Uhura, Chekov and Scotty had scanners in hand. Kirk checked the walls and floor, Sulu the table itself. Spock and McCoy removed a series of air vent covers, activating recessed buttons that began to generate so-called ‘white noise'.
"Doctor, you played your part well."
"Sadly, Mister Spock, a doctor learns how to put on a front. Though I usually reserve it for relating the news of terminal conditions."
Chekov broke apart a writing stylus that proved to have more than just writer's ions in it. Uhura found the residue of transmission chips unique to her old comm-console, now in ship's storage. Scotty sprayed the room's doors after taking note of a nearly-transparent strip running along them. Sulu found minor heating elements in the chairs, perhaps meant to enhance scans no one there knew of any purpose for. Kirk found a minor protrusion in the wall, took it open with an old bulky docu-padd, and there found a simple communicator, stripped of almost any casing and installed nearly flush by someone who knew how. When Uhura finished lacing the room with miniature, directed E-M pulses, Sulu finally spoke.
"They're getting cleverer. Too damned clever."
McCoy nodded.
"Tell me, did we ever really beam back from the Mirror world? Because that seems where we're headed."
Uhura waved a hand in the air.
"At this rate, we may have to let them succeed a few times, simply to keep up the façade."
Chekov disagreed.
"Vwe are a lot better off shutting out those amateur KGB agents than attempting to play their sick game."
"Aye, lad. But for that, I have to counter-we are playing their game. Those terrorists have won, when we no longer know who to trust. How much longer can we keep this up?"
Kirk took all this in.
"We won't have to keep it up much longer. Spock?"
"Requests for transfer off the Enterprise have been made by every officer under suspicion. Admiralty Hall has, unsurprisingly, approved these transfers rapidly. We have made their sources of information and potential mischief in effect unusable."
"Gentleman, Miss Uhura-we all some time ago came to the conclusion that the forces currently in charge of Starfleet Command are not merely politically unpalatable, or even merely extreme in their viewpoints. They have made a habit of promoting professionally unfit officers who adhere to their increasingly xenophobic and warlike point of view. But they also keep the Federation Council on their side, so removing them is not an option at present. That day will come. Until then, we need to remain vigilant against their efforts to spy on and indoctrinate the crew of this ship. After the Probes Crisis six years ago, they responded to our need for replacement officers with an officer stock I wouldn't let pick up a cadet application. When we used our time in the Dead Zone to identify these officers and boot them out, the Hall responded by not sending us any replacements, placing our crew in a constant state of overwork."
Sulu smiled.
"You have a plan."
"Vwell of course he does."
"Tis true, ye always do have an ace or three tucked down those long sleeves, Cap'n. But are we now playing septuple fizzbin?"
"Of a sort, Mister Scott. The Captain and I have devised a means to alleviate our staffing concerns. It is no more logical than his approach to chess, yet it will I think prove an effective solution. Commander Uhura?"
"Gentlemen, I've been in contact-discrete contact-with officers assigned to some of the Hall's more hastily-promoted commanding officers. The little bigots want them gone, and many of them have huge amounts of sabbatical time built up. It will involve some fancy footwork and frankly some altering of records, but we can get them on board. Many have said they'd rather serve as crewmen here than as senior officers where they are now."
McCoy breathed in.
"Really, it'll be our most dangerous game to date. They'll finally have us lying to their faces, about where these officers are. Which means, Jim, they may also have us right where they want us. Where they want you."
Kirk sliced the air in front of him with his right hand.
"They have the power to remove me, and I've given them several excuses. For some reason, I serve the Hall's purposes by being here. On the day they don't, we may then have to openly rebel, which was Heichi Nogura's ultimate nightmare-aside that is, from Cartwright taking his position. So it's to be nightmare versus nightmare, when the time comes. The instant the suspect officers go off, the replacements come on. Anyone tries to call home about it, they go too. I'll find an excuse. We need to get back to day to day. Playing footsy with our corrupted Fleet is going to make someone out there-maybe the Klingons, but it could even be an ally-get ideas. They have enough of those, as I'm sure we all remember."
Kirk's plan would not go unnoticed, and the Hall's vengeful response would be nothing so straightforward as a court-martial. But that was for another day.
"Spock-any other business?"
"Merely Sarek's well-wishes, Captain. His diplomatic and non-official inquiries into the deaths of your mother and nephew continue, and he may have a promising lead of some sort."
Sarek would have a great deal more than that to show, in less than one year's time. But the crew that would be so overjoyed then was beset now. Uhura handed out file chits.
"Here are the dossiers, boys. We have to figure out how to officially get them on board within six months of their actually coming aboard. There's some real talent here, but place them carefully. We don't know that our sweeps nailed everyone. We almost didn't catch Jenkins-she's a good deal more subtle than the Captain's Mister Roberts."
Into the long night, actual ship's business mixed pell-mell with the need to survive a command structure gone horribly wrong. As each legend did work that frankly disgusted them, they looked forward to the day when, with these sketchily-obtained officers, they could again be about the business of simply exploring the final frontier.
That day would be long in coming.
