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  Terrell smiled. “I can certainly understand how not having the answers can be a source of fear and discomfort. But it can also be a source of wonder and optimism. Because not knowing the answers means that you get to go and look for them. It means the universe still has mysteries and uncharted spaces—and there’s as much room in those open spaces for hope as there is for fear. You just have to be willing to seek it out.”

  * * *

  Once Captain Terrell had said his farewells to the Altairians and summoned a yeoman to escort them to the transporter room, Chekov stared at him in appreciation. “That was quite a speech, sir. It really won the ambassador over.”

  “Oh, he was just putting on a show of confrontation to appear strong,” Terrell said. “I doubt he ever seriously believed it was a weapons test. All he needed was a credible excuse to let us defuse the situation, so he can say he addressed the fears of his public back home and convince them it’s all right.”

  Chekov thought that over. “I hope you’re right, Captain. This is a beautiful system. I’d hate to see it fall back into war.”

  “I don’t think there’s any risk of that. The Altairians are a proud, contentious people, but they’re better off now than they were during the wars, and they know it.”

  The science officer frowned. “I just wish we could be equally sure that these vacuum flares won’t be a problem. Two of them in close succession, less than ninety light-years apart…” He shook his head. “They may not have been an Altair VI weapons test, but what if there is some artificial cause behind them? Some alien force making it happen?”

  “To what end?” Terrell asked. “So far they’ve both happened in open space. The flare at Argelius only damaged a few nearby ships, and that was in a crowded spacelane. This happened in an empty part of the system, millions of kilometers from anything, and would’ve been totally harmless if not for the political tensions. If you’re suggesting these are some kind of attacks, then their aim is so bad that we may have nothing to worry about.”

  “Unless they’re still trying to find their range.”

  Terrell shook his head. “It isn’t even that destructive. A photon torpedo barrage would do far worse. I still think it’s more likely that this is a natural phenomenon. Maybe some kind of… storm moving through subspace, occasionally surfacing. Maybe it popped up between systems too, but nobody was around to notice it. If there are more of these, we’ll soon find out if they’re following any kind of path.”

  “We should notify Starfleet Command. Advise all vessels to scan for these signatures.”

  “I’ll do that. In the meantime, let’s continue forward on the vector it would have followed from Argelius to here. Maybe we can pick up some trace of whatever it is.”

  Chekov gave him a rueful look. “So no shore leave this time?”

  Terrell grimaced. “I never did develop a taste for Altair water.”

  Chapter Three

  Arcturus IV

  Horatio stood proudly at attention alongside his fellow Warborn. They were a small cohort, only a dozen strong—one of the smallest gatherings of his kind that Horatio had ever experienced in his two years of conscious existence. Yet as Commander Rakatheema of Starfleet stood before them and gave his address, the natural-born Arcturian spoke of their small number as a victory in itself.

  “I commend all of you. The Starfleet Academy Preparatory Program is normally a course of six standard weeks, yet you have completed it in half the time.” Rakatheema smiled. “Of course, such rapid learning is in your nature. But the subject matter was not. I recognize how challenging it must be for you—to be trained from childhood for war alone, yet now be asked to lay all that aside and learn the ways of peace. Yet you few, you happy few, you band of brothers—and sisters—rose to that challenge and mastered it, as I knew you could.”

  Horatio recognized the paraphrase from Henry V, Act IV, Scene 3. Shakespeare’s canon had been part of the Warborn’s curriculum over the past months, both before and during the Preparatory Program. Most Arcturians learned it from childhood as an entry point for understanding the minds of humans and other Federation cultures, for it explored psychological drives shared by nearly all species. Yet it was a universality in which the Warborn had not been expected or asked to participate until now.

  No wonder that most of the other Warborn in the program, like Horatio, had chosen to adopt their new names from the characters in Shakespeare’s plays. Some of them, like Bertram, Viola, and Titus, had done so grudgingly, insisting their serial numbers were good enough identifiers, but Horatio had adopted his name with pride. His lot was to serve Arcturus, as Horatio had loyally served and supported Prince Hamlet. And he would do so by learning of the many things in heaven and earth that had hitherto been undreamt of in the Warborn’s philosophy.

  “Soon,” Rakatheema went on, “you will travel to Earth and join this year’s new class of cadets at Starfleet Academy. You will be working and living alongside classmates from many other species—human, Vulcan, Andorian, Saurian, and numerous others. Much like the Arcturian nations of the past, these peoples set aside their historical conflicts and joined together for the mutual good. The Federation is one people, one nation, as Arcturus is one people and one nation. I trust that you will all serve that greater whole in the same spirit that guides you in your service to Arcturus.”

  Horatio found his words puzzling. The lapse in his discipline must have shown, for Rakatheema turned to him. “Yes, Horatio? You have a question?” At his hesitation, the commander continued. “It’s all right. Starfleet cadets are encouraged to ask questions and engage in dialogue with their instructors. You may all speak freely.”

  “I merely sought to clarify, Commander.” Horatio chose his words with care. “When you say to serve the Federation in the spirit of our service to Arcturus… that is… our service to Arcturus is in the spirit of warriors.”

  Rakatheema nodded. “I understand your concern, my friend. Rest assured that Starfleet officers serve in many capacities, most of them peaceful. You are already skilled in the ways of war; you go to the Academy to learn other ways to serve.”

  “But if we should be called upon to do battle…” Horatio shook his head. “We will not fight for anything but our homeworld. Will Starfleet honor that sacred commitment?”

  “Starfleet would not force its members to act against their beliefs, Horatio.” Rakatheema looked around the group. “Yet Starfleet also encourages its members to think for themselves, and to open their minds to new possibilities. I admire your commitment to peace, Horatio. But such a commitment is truer when it comes from informed choice and conviction rather than unthinking dogma. Give yourself a chance to learn.”

  The commander’s answer did not clarify Horatio’s confusion. But that did not matter. It was enough to know that Starfleet would respect his beliefs and commitments.

  Once they returned to their barracks and disrobed for the showers, the Warborn named Portia moved toward Horatio. Portia was female, though that was only obvious to the eye at times like these when she was undressed. Historically, few Warborn lived long enough to procreate, so they did not develop secondary sexual characteristics.

  “You didn’t like what the commander said about new possibilities, did you?” Portia asked him. “You think Starfleet may want us to fight for them.”

  Horatio met her eyes evenly. They were approximately equal in height, like most Warborn. “He says Starfleet will not force us to defy our oath.”

  “You do not wish to fight?”

  His gaze sharpened, as did his voice. “We were made to fight for Arcturus alone. That is our sacred calling.”

  Portia looked annoyed by his response. “We were made to die for Arcturus. Should we hold sacred what was decreed by those who made us only to die?”

  Another male, Bertram, laughed loudly. He was not like most Warborn; his head rose higher than the others’ and his highly developed musculature was clearly displayed as he turned within his sonic shower chamber.
“You object to fighting, Portia? You’re the fiercest warrior among us.”

  She turned her sharp gaze upon him. “I never said I had a problem with fighting. Test me anytime.”

  “Then what are you saying?” Horatio asked.

  Portia turned away. “I don’t know. I just don’t see the point of all this.”

  Bertram nodded. “Nor do I. I studied as I was ordered, I passed their tests, but what is the use of it all? We’re not scholars or diplomats. We were made to protect Arcturus. And, yes, to die if we must, in the name of its peace.”

  “A peace we don’t get to be a part of,” Portia interjected.

  “Nor should we. It’s not our purpose.”

  The group moved out of the showers into their dormitory, where they began to don their nightclothes. Bertram continued his thought. “They should never have revived us. They should have kept us frozen until we were needed to fight.”

  Portia stared at him. “Or until our pods failed and we died!”

  “That’s our purpose—to die for the peace of Arcturus. Warborn in peacetime are a threat to the peace. So I say let us die.”

  “In battle, yes. I’m not afraid to die fighting. But to lie down and let it come to you? Do nothing to fight against it? Is that what we were made for?”

  Horatio interposed himself between them, catching both their eyes to stem their dispute. “You’re both right!” He paused just long enough to ensure they were listening. “We do not serve the peace of Arcturus as we are. That is why we must leave it to learn another way.

  “I know it is difficult, what they ask of us. It is not what we expected. But were we not taught that the unexpected is a given in any battle, no matter how well we train?”

  Horatio’s gaze widened to take in the whole group. “My friends—we are still going into battle for the peace of our homeworld. But this time… our battle will be with ourselves.”

  U.S.S. Asimov NCC-1652

  Approaching Kappa Fornacis system

  “… And Peter stood right up to him,” Montgomery Scott declared with avuncular pride as he cradled his cooling coffee mug. “Even though the other lad was twice his size and he didn’t have a prayer of winning—still, he stood up for his friend.”

  Nyota Uhura smiled, having recognized the story from the moment she entered the Asimov’s officers’ lounge. Yet it was new to Erin Blake, the tall, striking, dark-haired captain of the Malachowski-class starship. She leaned forward eagerly, her bright eyes glinting. “So what happened?”

  “Oh, he lost, of course. It was over in seconds. But then his friend stood up and said he’d take on the leader next. And then all the other smaller kids stood up too, united against him, and it finally sank in that he’d become the very kind of bully he thought he was protecting them against.”

  “Your nephew is a brave boy,” Blake told him. “Separated from his family for weeks, yet he never lost his cool.”

  After getting her own coffee and a pastry from the food slot, Uhura joined them. “His parents were worried sick, though.”

  “Ach, they should’ve had more faith in the backbone of a Scotsman—even one without the accent.” The engineer grimaced, wrinkling his bushy salt-and-pepper mustache. “That blasted Yankee father of his should never have taken him on that expedition to begin with. Let alone let himself get separated from his boy.”

  Uhura put a calming hand on his arm. “You know it was beyond his control, Scotty. And Thomas knew he’d be in good hands with Doctor Varian.”

  “Well, anyway, it sounds like a fantastic journey,” Blake put in, trying to ease the tension. “But then, your tales about your family are always colorful. I sometimes wonder if you’re embellishing a little, but I enjoy them too much to care.”

  Scott crinkled his eyes to emphasize the gleam in them. “Aye, well, that’s the storyteller’s prerogative, Captain.”

  Blake turned to Uhura. “You never seem to talk about your family, Nyota. In fact, we’ve been serving together more than six months and I hardly know anything about your past—aside from your time on the Enterprise, of course.”

  Uhura hesitated. “Well… there isn’t much to tell. I’m from Nairobi, in the U.S. of Africa.”

  Blake’s brows drew together. “Doesn’t your file say Kitui?”

  “Oh, yes. I was born in Kitui, because my mother, M’Umbha, was working in the area at the time. Her work with elephants entails a lot of travel.”

  “She’s a biologist?”

  “A lawyer, actually. She’s a judicial liaison for Africa’s elephant communities. They’re intelligent, of course, but not civilized. They saw what human civilization did to their ancestors, and they have long memories.”

  An embarrassed silence fell. Humans rarely liked to be reminded of how brutally they had treated their fellow sapient species on their own planet, such as elephants, great apes, and whales, before they ever encountered an alien intelligence.

  “Still,” Uhura went on, “they need someone who can speak for them in the halls of power—make sure their interests are represented.” After the arguably misnamed First Contact, once Vulcan telepaths had confirmed what most human scientists had already come around to accepting even before the Third World War, humanity had striven to achieve communication and peace with the surviving wild intelligences of Earth.

  “Like a Council advocate for a Federation protectorate.”

  “Exactly.” After a thoughtful pause, Uhura went on. “It seems my mother’s work with the elephants was what inspired my own interest in language and communication, my own interest in contacting new life-forms.”

  “ ‘It seems’? ” Blake chuckled. “You sound like it happened to someone else.”

  Uhura fidgeted. “Well… it was a long time ago. In many ways, none of us are who we were as children. And my family moved around so much—sometimes in Nairobi and central Africa for my mother’s work, sometimes in Mombasa for my father’s.”

  Blake opened her mouth and paused. “I was going to guess he did something space-related, but my last guess fizzled.”

  “No, this time it’s the obvious. My father, Alhamisi, was a star pilot. He worked for a couple of Mombasa’s major interstellar shipping and transport firms before going freelance with my uncle Raheem.”

  “So space travel’s in your blood too. Do you see your family often?”

  Uhura cleared her throat. “My father… he was lost in deep space in my third year at the Academy.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. I understand if you don’t like to talk about it.”

  She caught the look in Scott’s eyes, expressing his truer understanding. “No, it’s all right,” she said. “I just feel more defined by my career, my accomplishments in Starfleet. I’ve come to think of my shipmates as my family.”

  “Aye, in all my years, I’ve never seen a closer bunch than we became on the Enterprise,” Scott put in, trying to change the subject. “It was a rare blessing that we were able to bring the entire command crew back together for V’Ger and afterward. Ah, now, V’Ger, that was a mighty—”

  The intercom interrupted him. “Bridge to Captain Blake.”

  Blake tapped her wrist communicator—an older model, but one still in use on second-tier ships like the Asimov. “Blake here. Go ahead, Tarha.”

  “We’ve just received a navigational advisory from Deneva traffic control,” came the voice of the communications officer. “We only just received it due to signal interference. Some sort of anomalous energy bursts have been detected in interplanetary space. A series of sporadic, intense EM and gravimetric eruptions causing interference and subspace turbulence. All ships advised to divert around the phenomenon.”

  “Does it affect our course?”

  “Mister Chung says no, but they match a recent Starfleet advisory pertaining to a newly discovered type of energy anomaly called a vacuum flare. Any vessel that detects one is requested to investigate.”

  Uhura exchanged a look with Scott. “That’s the phenomenon Chekov’
s been telling us about in his letters. The one the Reliant encountered at Argelius and Altair.”

  “Aye,” Scott said. “But they were probing outward along that path, last I heard. Deneva’s practically in the opposite direction.”

  “So either this is something different—”

  “—or they’ve been chasing a wild goose for weeks now,” Scott finished.

  Blake was already on her feet. “Then I suggest we get to the bridge and find out.” Raising her communicator to her mouth, she ordered, “Have Chung set an intercept course.”

  “Captain, there are two other Starfleet ships already en route,” Lieutenant Tarha replied. “The T’Viri and the Meitner.”

  “Great, then we’ll have multiple readings we can compare.” She smiled wryly. “I know you were looking forward to leave, Tarha, but this shouldn’t take long.”

  It was a two-deck turbolift ride to the bridge, so they arrived in moments. Uhura noted that the main viewscreen already displayed a long-range sensor scan of the target area, showing the mysterious display of brief, blinding pinpoint flashes spread over a wide swath of space. After a few moments, the flickers slowed and faded, but then another surge of them began in the corner of the screen, with the vantage adjusting to compensate. “It’s like a mob of old-time photographers is taking flash pictures of us,” Blake said.

  “Or like a fireworks show,” Uhura said. “There’s a similar rhythm to it, bursts of high activity with rests in between.”

  “Commander Uhura, do you remember the lights of Zetar?” Scott asked. “They looked a little like what’s out there.”

  “The entities that attacked Memory Alpha back in the late sixties?” Blake asked.

  “Yes, Captain,” Uhura said as she relieved the officer at the science station. “But they weren’t quite like this. Not as widespread or blinding, and persistent rather than intermittent. And their effects were neurological, not EM or gravimetric.”