Dear Irina,
Part 4
Stardate 4486.4
Dear Irina,
How lucky that you were visiting your mother when my last message came. Again, I am sorry to have been the bearer of such bad news, but I knew you would want to know about Matt's death. At least you know that I was there with him when he died. I'm so glad you wrote me back. I never want to loose you as a friend. We've been through too much together, at the Academy and now this.
It sounds like your life is moving along just as you always wanted it to. You may not be following the path that we all thought you would at Starfleet Academy, but you are doing the pure research that you always wanted to do. Who knows what discoveries you and your group may make? I only hope that the apples in your Garden of Eden don't turn out to have worms. And dear Irina, don't tell me that I'm being my usually gloomy self. It's not Russian to fear the worst. It's realistic.
It was very perceptive of you to notice that I don't feel as unsure of myself anymore. I am starting to believe that I belong on the Enterprise. I still have doubts every now and then, because as the saying goes, a Russian bear can not turn into a Siberian fox overnight. (That's a really stupid saying, if you stop and think about it.) I am making friends, and I no longer worry about making a navigation error and plunging the ship into some alien sun. At least not all the time!
Irina, you would not believe the things that happen on this ship. The Enterprise and her captain do seem to attract more than their share of trouble. I have talked to some of my other crewmates about this. I am becoming very friendly with our helmsman, Hikaru Sulu. I think that I mentioned him before. He is a little older than I am, and the Enterprise is not his first posting. He says his other ships were never like this. We both think that sometimes the Enterprise seems to be the only ship in the galaxy. We have seen more than our share of action just in the few months I have been aboard. I can't really tell you about most of it, since so much of what we do is classified. But, I can tell you about the one incident that made me decide that I will work very hard to fit in on the Enterprise, and that I would willingly lay down my life for Captain Kirk. You may have seen a version of what happened on the news vids. Some of the civilians involved talked to reporters, and that's why I can tell you about what happened.
Shortly after Commodore Decker's death, and the destruction of the Constellation, the Enterprise was ordered to investigate the disappearance of a small passenger liner, the Derberus. She was missing from an area of space that had been thoroughly charted. Starfleet thought some mechanical problem must have disabled the ship, and ordered us to investigate and give any aid necessary. I plotted a course to the last know coordinates of the liner and calculated that it would take a little more than two days to get there. The captain was on light duty at that time because he was still troubled by some bug that he had picked up on Vulcan. I did get a chance to look into that word I mentioned in one of my other letters, "Lirpa". I thought it was the disease that was making the captain sick, but it seems that it's not a disease. It's a kind of Vulcan weapon. Hard to see how the captain could get sick from a weapon.
Anyway, as we tracked the position of the Derberus, Captain Kirk insisted on staying through his whole watch. Dr. McCoy had a few choice words about that, I can tell you. He and Mr. Spock seem to argue constantly about everything, but on the subject of the captain's health they are always in agreement. Both men told the captain that he was spending too much time on the bridge. Captain Kirk seemed annoyed at their concern and did his best to ignore them. He only left the bridge when the doctor actually threatened to bring him up on charges of endangering the ship if he didn't report to Sickbay for treatment. I actually thought that I saw Mr. Spock smile (he did wrinkle his lip slightly) at the doctor's tactic. I used to think that Mr. Spock was pretty cold, but if you watch him carefully, every once in a while you can catch a glimpse of humor. He even makes the occasional joke, though he always denies it when the captain catches him.
The captain was back on the bridge well before the start of alpha shift of the second day. I had just come onto the bridge to begin my shift when I heard Mr. Spock report that he had made contact with something that sensors indicated might be debris. I could feel the captain stiffen, and he seemed to crackle with energy as he ordered me to increase speed to the debris field. Although sensors showed nothing in the area, Captain Kirk ordered that we raise shields. It was as if he could sense a presence that our sensors could not. He ordered Mr. Spock to scan the debris field and the first officer soon confirmed our worst fears. The remains of the liner Derberus, with 94 souls onboard, was nothing more rubble floating in the vacuum of space.
Mr. Spock reported that he detected a warp trail leading away from the wreckage of the Derberus, and that the warp signature was Orion. He also reported that there was no sigh of organic remains in the debris field. Irina, this was the classic "good news-bad news". The passengers and crew had not perished on the Derberus. Instead they were about to become part of the Orion slave trade. Without a moment's hesitation, Captain Kirk ordered me to compute a course based on Mr. Spock's scans. I can tell you Irina that I was shaking. I could feel that all 94 lives depended on my not making a mistake. One tiny error in computation and we could loose the warp trail, and those people would be worse than dead, they would be slaves. All of a sudden, I felt Captain Kirk's hand on my shoulder. It was as if he could sense my fear. He didn't say anything. I would have been mortified if he did. He just made me feel that he had confidence in me. At that moment, I would have flown into a star if he had ordered it.
Mr. Scott, our engineer, had a fit, as usual, but the captain pushed the ship to warp 8. It took nearly 20 hours, but we finally had the Orion ship on sensor scans. None of us left the bridge during that 20 hours. The beta shift navigator could have relieved me, but somehow I couldn't imagine being anywhere else while this was happening. I tried to anticipate the captain's actions if and when we found the pirates, but I came up with nothing. The Orions are notorious for spacing passengers to make a quick getaway. How was the captain going to prevent that?
As soon as the Enterprise was within communications range he ordered Lieutenant Uhura to hail the Orion ship. The Orions are first and foremost traders even if they traffic in the most terrible goods. Captain Kirk had the lieutenant make the Orions an offer to trade something they could use to make a great deal of money. I must admit to being puzzled. There was nothing on board the Enterprise that was worth much to the pirates. Or, so I thought. Captain Kirk just doesn't always see things the way that others do.
I wouldn't have thought that the pirates would have believed that a Starship Captain would ever trade with them, but somehow Lieutenant Uhura managed to convince them to listen. The thing of value that the captain offered was James Tiberius Kirk. Irina, he offered to trade himself for the people from the Derberus. The smile on the face of the Orion pirate captain was horrifying as he quickly agreed to the captain's terms. It was clear that the knowledge of Starfleet and the secrets of the Enterprise inside the captain's head were worth more to the Orions than 94 civilians were.
Mr. Spock and the doctor practically leapt to the captain's chair. They spoke so softly that I couldn't hear then, even though I was only a few feet away. I didn't have to hear the words to sense the anger coming from the two officers. I am sure that they tried to convince Captain Kirk to withdraw his offer. He refused. Instead he called Mr. Scott to the bridge to arrange for the beam out of the Orion's hostages. They would have to use the cargo transporters to get all 94 over the Enterprise. Mr. Scott did not look happy, but he assured the captain that it could be done. He tried to argue with the captain. Scott even offered to go himself. He said that his engineering knowledge might tempt the Orions. The captain just smiled and said that he had to be the one to go.
You know, Irina, I used to wonder what the big deal about being a captain was. At the Academy it looked to me like all they did was sit in the center seat and tell everyone else what to do. I didn't think that they really did anything themselves. But, at least on the Enterprise, the captain is the first line of defense. It is Captain Kirk who leads the landing parties. It is Captain Kirk who makes the hard choices. And, finally it is Captain Kirk who puts his life on the line to protect his ship and crew and anyone else for whom he thinks he is responsible. This is not showboating. This is just how the captain does his job. It's taken me a while to figure this out, but now that I understand, I can't imagine serving with anyone who didn't think like that.
I will admit to you Irina that I was starting to get really scared. The thought of loosing the captain seemed too terrible to think about, but then I looked at Sulu. Instead of looking scared or angry at the captain's sacrifice, he looked calm, almost confident. I would have liked to ask him why, but I didn't dare. The captain gave the con to Mr. Spock, and before he left the bridge he addressed the whole ship. He explained his plan to exchange himself for the hostages. He told us all to hold steady and that what he was about to do was for the best. All the while, he had Lieutenant Uhura hold open the channel to the Orion pirates. They heard every word that was said on the bridge.
The Orions lowered their shields so that he could beam aboard. They insisted that they would not begin returning their prisoners until Captain Kirk was aboard. I was surprised that the captain agreed to that, but then this whole situation seemed beyond my comprehension. Irina, I couldn't breathe. My heart was pounding so hard that I was surprised that it didn't explode. The bridge was absolutely silent. We waited. The next words I expected to hear were those of Mr. Scott, saying that the exchange was complete and that the people from the Derberus were on board. Instead, Mr. Spock spoke. He said that the captain had been successful and that everyone onboard the Orion ship was unconscious. Successful! I wanted to hit him. The captain was lost forever. Then I noticed that everyone on the bridge was smiling. I was so lost in my sadness that I really didn't understand what had just happened. Sulu finally grabbed my arm and explained it to me. He said that he had thought all along that the captain had something up his sleeve. That's why he looked so calm while I nearly had a stroke.
Well, as the news vid reported, the captain arranged to be beamed aboard the Orion ship with a large canister of Solopaine, a very quick and very powerful nerve gas that knocked out everyone on board, including the captain. He took a huge chance that the Orion sensors wouldn't detect the gas. The captain is nothing if not a gambler, and this time the dice rolled in his favor.
I volunteered for the boarding party and beamed aboard the Orion ship. It was eerie. Everyone on the ship was unconscious. We found all the hostages from the Derberus and the captain, and transported them back to the Enterprise. I can tell you that the medical staff had their hands full treating 95 very nauseous people. That Solopaine has some nasty side effects. I don't think the ship will ever smell the same. The air scrubbers just couldn't do the job.
It was apparently hardest on those who had the biggest doses. Captain Kirk, who carried the canister aboard took the largest dose. The only good thing about that was that Doctor McCoy was finally able to keep him in sickbay long enough to treat that Vulcan bug that had been bothering him. Ship's scuttlebutt was that every time Captain Kirk started to get out of bed to go to the bridge he threw up. The doctor just waited him out.
Mr. Scott was able to disable the pirate's engines permanently and we contacted Starfleet to send a prison ship to tow the Orions to a Starbase. I have to admit that I didn't mind at all when I heard that the Solopaine was just as hard on the Orions as it was on the hostages and the poor captain. I hope he had some small pleasure in knowing that the pirates were as nauseous as he was.
After the excitement died down, and I had a moment to think about what had happened, I realized that this was the only place in the universe that I want to be. I want to be a part of the crew of the Enterprise. I know the captain has confidence in me. He showed that when he had me follow the Orion's warp trail. It's more than that somehow. I realized when the captain sacrificed himself for the Derberus hostages and I thought that he would die, that I didn't want to lose this life. This crew really functions as a unit. And, at the head of the unit, or perhaps I should say at the heart is Captain Kirk. I feel a part of that unit now.
I know that Captain Kirk doesn't always go by the book, but Irina, some books have not been written. In the few months that I've been on the Enterprise, I've seen more and done more than we could have ever imagined at the Academy. Not all of it has been good; some of it has been painful and scary. But this is where I feel that I must be. This ship is where I can grow to become much more than I ever imagined. I may change my mind again, but right now I want to stay on the Enterprise for the rest of Captain Kirk's five-year mission. Who knows what is to come? Only my grandmother can predict the future and if you remember, she was convinced that I'd never graduate from the Academy. The next few years should be interesting.
Please write soon. I have spent this whole letter talking about myself. I want to hear more about you.
I have a feeling in my bones that we will be together again.
Love,
Pavel