“Captain Kirk! We’re getting a hail. It’s Norinda.”
Kirk reached out to rub his son’s head, thinking with a guilty start that his young son had again perhaps heard more than he needed to. “Sorry, Joseph. Captain Riker’s tour has to wait. And you have to stand way over there by Geordi and keep out of sight.”
When Joseph was dutifully beyond the range of the bridge’s visual imagers, Kirk called down to La Forge, “On screen.”
Norinda appeared in the center viewscreen on the forward bulkhead. The banks of exotic, multihued flowers behind her strongly reminded Kirk of the greenhouse deck of her ship, where they had first met in person. If she had chosen the backdrop for that reason, she’d done so in vain. He was immune to such nostalgia now.
“Listen carefully, Kirk.” Norinda’s tone was cold, implacable. “We discovered your deception. Steps—”
“What deception?” Kirk interrupted as innocently as he could.
“The holographic replica of your child.”
“What? That’s impossible. You think I don’t know my own son?”
Norinda’s voice hardened. “Steps are being taken to punish Picard, and Crusher, and Scott. However —”
“Harm them and I’ll—”
This time, Norinda cut him off. “However! They will be returned to you, and Picard will be free to contact the Tal Shiar, once you have sent T’Kol T’Lan down to me—to learn of his true heritage on Remus. In exchange, I offer you the lives of Picard and your friends and the billions of others who will be drawn into the civil war. In nineteen minutes, your ship’s orbit will bring you within transporter range of the Jolan Segment. Beam down T’Kol T’Lan then, or everyone dies.” She pressed a control off-screen. “Transmitting coordinates. Nineteen minutes.”
Norinda’s image winked off the screen, replaced by a forward sensor view of Remus, the terminator on the horizon, the dayside glowing brilliantly beyond.
Kirk was left staring into the expanding field of light, and slowly he became aware that everyone on the bridge was waiting for the captain to give the word; fearing that the father would be unable to do so.
But what the others didn’t understand, Kirk knew, was that this was not a decision that belonged only to him.
“Joseph,” Kirk said.
His son stood up beside La Forge. “Yes, sir.”
Kirk chose his words carefully. “Did you understand what that woman said?”
Joseph chewed his lip for a moment, troubled. “If I don’t beam down, then she’s going to hurt Uncle Jean- Luc, and Uncle Scotty, and Doctor Crusher. And there’s going to be a war.”
“What do you think about that?”
“I don’t think she should hurt anyone. And there shouldn’t be a war.”
Kirk used every technique Spock had ever taught him to keep his face from registering what he felt. He could not lead his child in this. “What do you think we should do?”
Joseph straightened, as he had when he had spoken to Admiral Janeway. “She’s a bad guy. We should stop her, Dad.”
“You mean, beam down there, as she said?”
Kirk saw Joseph’s eyes register apprehension. At far too young an age, he was faced with what all children want and fear at the same time: control.
“By myself?” he asked.
“No,” Kirk answered. “Never by yourself.”
“Us?”
Kirk nodded. As terrifying as this felt to him, the decision had to be his son’s. Kirk knew it was the only way either of them could ever live with the results of what might happen.
Joseph held firm. “We should beam down, Dad. We should stop the bad guys from hurting anyone.”
Pride and fear mixed equally in Kirk as he motioned to Joseph to come to him.
“Mister La Forge,” he said, “contact Norinda. Tell her Joseph and I will beam down together in a transporter swap. Tell her that Captain Picard, Mister Scott, and Doctor Crusher are to be on the pad at her location or there is no deal.”
“Aye, sir,” La Forge said, and he turned to his board.
With Joseph at his side, Kirk went to Worf. “Mister Worf, by any chance would you have a bat’leth?”
Worf squared his shoulders. “A bat’leth would be difficult to conceal. But I am a Klingon warrior in Romulan space. I sharpened my mek’leth on the journey here.” He leaned forward. “And I have daggers.”
Kirk approved. The mek’leth was the Klingon short sword. And he was familiar with it. “May we borrow them?”
Worf bared his teeth as if he were personally going into battle. “I would be honored.”
Riker joined them. “You know, we do have hand phasers on the yacht.”
“I doubt they’ll make it past the transporter filters, but you know what else we could use?”
Riker’s broad grin eclipsed his beard. “A starship? Fortunately, I know just where to find one.”
Kirk looked across the bridge, saw McCoy’s scowl, knew he didn’t approve. But it was far too late to worry about exposing Joseph to danger. Starfleet Intelligence had failed them all in that regard.
All Kirk could do now was remain determined not to repeat the error.
And with his son at his side, he was ready to stop the bad guys.
25
JOLAN SEGMENT, STARDATE 57488.2
“Two minutes, Captain,” La Forge said.
Kirk crouched down by Joseph, to look into his son’s eyes as an equal. “Say it again,” Kirk prompted.
Joseph sighed, and Kirk could see how nervous he was. But he knew that would pass once they were on their way.
“The bad guys won’t hurt me,” Joseph recited. “They think that I’m special and that I can help them. But they might tell me lies about Mommy and you. And I don’t believe lies.”
“I love you,” Kirk told his child. “And your mother loved you.”
A small smile appeared on Joseph’s face as he fell into one of their bedtime rituals. “How much did she love me?”
“More than all the stars you can see. More than all the stars you can’t see. More than all the stars that ever were or will be…”
They recited the last line together, each tapping a finger against the other’s nose. “And that’s how much I love you, too!”
Kirk prepared himself and Joseph. “Whatever they tell you, don’t ever forget that.”
“I won’t,” Joseph said, then added in Klingon, “jIH lay’.”
“One minute,” La Forge said. “I have three life-forms on the pad in the target chamber…Picard…Crusher… and Scott, confirmed. Linking carrier waves.”
Kirk stood beside Joseph on the single large pad in the bay. Kirk wore the same civilian clothes and jacket he had on when the Calypso had been boarded by the still unidentified intruders. He had a hand phaser in one pocket, a large civilian communicator in another, and Worf’s mek’leth slung in a back harness under his jacket. The phaser would not get past the weapons filter on Norinda’s transporter, but if it were a typical Romulan installation, bladed weapons were so common that the mek’leth might not be noticed.
Joseph wore clean overalls, bright red, with a civilian communicator sealed in his chest pouch, and a d’k tahg dagger in a scabbard attached to a loop at his waist. He was under strict orders never to use it against a person, but Kirk could imagine many scenarios in which a good knife could be a useful tool.
“Carrier waves linked,” La Forge said. “Fifteen seconds.”
