"EVERYTHING ALL RIGHT over here?"
The waitress rushed over with an expression on her face that told Odo she sensed trouble between two patrons who looked as if they came from far, far apart.
Worf was still glaring at the round puff in Odo's hands. To the waitress he ground out, "We … are … fine."
"Sit down," Odo said to Worf as the waitress moved away. "You're drawing attention."
Slowly and very unhappily, Worf took his seat once again, but did not shift toward the table. The tribble in Odo's hand stopped screaming, but did shudder and flinch repeatedly.
"Where did you get that thing?" Worf demanded.
"From a man named Cyrano Jones. He said tribbles like everyone, but it doesn't seem to like you," Odo commented with mild interest.
"The feeling is mutual," Worf rumbled. "Tribbles are … detestable creatures."
"Interesting," Odo said. "It's my experience that most humanoids love soft furry animals." He ran his hand along the ball of fuzz and was lost again in the creature's gentle cooing. "Especially if they make a pleasing sound …"
"They do nothing but consume food and breed," Worf uttered with contempt. "If you feed that thing more than the smallest morsel, within a few hours you will have ten tribbles. Then a hundred. Then a thousand!"
"Calm down."
"They were once considered mortal enemies of the Klingon Empire."
With unshielded mockery, Odo looked up at him and held the tribble higher. "This is a mortal enemy of the Klingon Empire?"
"They were an ecological menace! A scourge! A plague that had to be wiped out!"
"Wiped out? What are you saying?"
With relish, Worf actually inched forward. "The Empire sent an entire armada to obliterate the tribble homeworld. Then hundreds of handpicked warriors were dispatched to track them down and destroy them throughout the galaxy. By the end of the twenty-third century, they were completely eradicated!"
With a groan, Odo parried, "Another glorious chapter in Klingon history. Tell me, do they still sing songs about the Great Tribble Hunt?"
Worfs face crumpled, not exactly with embarrassment but with some mixture of that and frustration at Odo's lack of comprehension about the critical nature of eradicating purring fuzzballs.
He parted his lips to speak, but the station broke into red alert. Klaxons blared all over, in the bar and in the corridor.
Most patrons in the bar gawked and swiveled, not knowing what to do. The Starfleet personnel, though, in sharp contrast, all bolted for the door.
Worf and Odo were among those who swiveled and gawked.
"Bureaucrats. Summoning a ship of the line as if calling a moon shuttle. Never ceases to amaze me. Put a collar and a badge on a civilian, and he turns into a commandant."
Aware that he was grumbling, Kirk pulled his cup of coffee out of the access port in the bulkhead and turned toward Spock. They were in one of the ship's briefing rooms, only because Kirk had wanted a few moments to grumble in peace.
"Maybe I'm a snob, Mr. Spock," he went on obsessively. "I just expect a person to have a few experiences under his belt before he starts giving orders to people who actually have some. My crew deserves better than to be treated like hired help."
"Agreed," Spock said impassively, but Kirk knew his first officer was only placating him.
Spock was a steadying presence for him, both in times of tension and in times of prickly annoyance, like now. Like a brick in the sand, Spock seldom flinched, no matter how the winds rattled the stuff around him. Right now the Vulcan was amused. Though there was little outward hint, Kirk could tell. A twinkle in the black-dot eyes, the way Spock's Vulcan brows both went up at the same time, and just a mist of a smile, very subdued. Amused, for sure. Somehow, it helped.
He blew across the top of his coffee and took a sip. "We're not at the beck and call of every administrator who can't tell the difference between a security detail and a fully rigged and armed starship. You don't summon four hundred and thirty people to do the job of two."
"Mr. Barris would prefer to have many more than two guards," Spock observed, standing nearby with a profound economy of movement.
"Times like this," Kirk grumbled on, "I wish I could retire to some barrier island someplace, get myself a little wooden ship with a narrow hull and a deep grip on the water and go cantering around the seaways … spearing bureaucrats with my bowsprit."
He gritted his teeth over the last words. Felt good. Then he imagined it. Looked even better. Shishkebabed Barris.
The comm on the table whistled. Fielding Spock's bemused gaze, Kirk turned and punched the button. "Yes, what is it?
"Message from Starfleet, Captain, priority channel. Admiral Fitzpatrick speaking."
"Put it on visual, Lieutenant."
On the small centerpiece screen, a frosty man in a gold shirt appeared. "Captain Kirk."
"Kirk here."
"Captain, it is not necessary to remind you of the importance to the Federation of Sherman's Planet. The key to our winning of this planet is the grain quadrotriticale. The shipment of it must be protected."
Kirk looked at Spock with unshielded annoyance, and Spock's only response was to passively fold his arms. It was his equivalent of sighing and leaning on a wall without really doing either.
"Effective immediately," the admiral went on, "you will render any aid and assistance which Secretary Barris may require. The safety of the grain and the project are your responsibility."
From exploration and defense to babysitting wheat in one drumming boom.
"Well, that's just … lovely," Kirk complained.
Spock nodded. "But not totally unexpected."
No, it wasn't. Kirk knew Fitzpatrick and had never given him a serious thought. Whenever circumstances had required him to respect Fitzpatrick, he had been respecting the uniform and not the man. A terminally office-bound serviceman, Fitzpatrick had never commanded anything bigger than a bathtub and no farther afield than Starfleet Academy. He was a paper admiral, running paper battles in a paper universe. Now he was communicating with another paperpusher—Barris.
Between the two, instead of pushing paper, they were pushing a starship.
The comm whistled again. "Captain Kirk, Captain Kirk!"
"Yes, Lieutenant, what is it?"
"Sensors are picking up a Klingon battlecruiser, rapidly closing on the station!"
"Go to red alert. Notify Mr. Lurry. We'll be right up."
Red alert trumpeted throughout the decks of the Starship Enterprise. On the bulkheads, light panels slashed on and off in bright carnelian alarm, making sure that nobody heard wrong. This was not yellow alert.
A voice on the comm system boomed, "Red alert. Red alert. All hands to battle stations. This is not a drill."
Ben Sisko looked at Dax, and she looked back. For the first time, she seemed confused.
"What should we do?" she asked. All around them other crew members—real ones—hurried about, heading for assigned emergency postings. For each of these people there was a deck assignment and a station bill made up by that deck's officer of the watch, and on that station bill was a place to go during an emergency. A job to do. Something very specific. Go there, stand by.
Sisko glanced around. "Get to battle stations." He closed up the panel he was pretending to fuss with, and the two of them plunged into the hustling crowd, trying to blend in and hoping they didn't end up stampeded into a place where they couldn't explain themselves.
To avoid any embarrassment—or worse, the chance of being discovered—Sisko ducked into a turbolift and waited for Dax to join him. He grasped the handle then and said, "Deck Seven."
The lift started whirring, and Sisko gave it a few seconds to get between decks. Then he twisted the handle to off let go of the handle and the lift stopped. "Let's see if we can find out what's going on," he said. He tapped his uniform insignia. "Sisko to Defiant."
He waited for a response, long enough that Dax started grinning in that you're-being-an-idiot way she had. Funny—the one trait she had left over from her days as Curzon Dax, and it had to be that.
Sisko sighed with annoyance, realizing his mistake, and pulled out the communicator stuck to the back of his belt. Those were the days.
He flipped the grid open. "Sisko to Defiant."
"Defiant here." It was Kira.
Sisko knew she'd been working on making the Orb operate, but now she was on the bridge and answering for the ship. That alone meant something was going on.
"The Enterprise just went to red alert. What's going on out there?"
"A Klingon D-Seven battlecruiser has dropped out of warp and is approaching the station."
"Are they locking weapons?"
"Not yet."
Dax held out a hand, as if remembering. "Wait a minute … Kira, can you identify the Klingon ship?"
There was silence for a few working seconds on board the Defiant, then Kira's voice returned, "The IKS Gr'oth."
Dax smiled conspiratorially. "That's Koloth's ship!"
Grinding her with a glare, Sisko decided she was enjoying herself way too much.
"Curzon's old friend?" he guessed.
"Yes, and he's not going to attack. I remember Koloth telling me he once traded insults with Kirk on a space station near the Federation border. He always regretted not getting a chance to face him in battle."
Kira's voice broke in. "The Klingon ship just transported two people over to the station manager's office, Captain."
"That's Koloth!" Dax exclaimed, gathering memories and plugging them into the moment. "Maybe we should beam over to the station and help Odo and Worf. We know that Darvin was there a few hours ago and—"
"I think," Sisko said evenly, "maybe Dr. Bashir and Chief O'Brien should go."
"But if we went, we might run into Koloth!"
"Exactly."
Dax huffed with frustration that he wasn't letting her have any fun. "It's not as if he'd recognize me! And I'd love to see him in his prime—"
"Dax," Sisko said sternly. Then into the communicator he said, "Major, beam the doctor and the chief over to K-Seven."
"Aye, sir."
Sisko clapped the communicator shut and grasped the lift handle.
"It would've been fun," Dax complained.
He leered at her. "Too much fun."
The corridors of the Enterprise bristled with activity under red alert. The constant whooping of the alarms kept adrenaline flowing. As he and Spock hurried to the nearest turbolift, Kirk was gratified by the excitement he felt in the crewmen rushing past them. His crew liked action, even battle. They were that kind of people. They had to like it even while disdaining it. That was the only way to survive.
When the lift reached the topmost deck of the starship and the doors parted, the comforting sounds of the bridge engulfed Kirk like a blanket. All his nerves buzzing, Kirk dropped to the lower deck and came around his command chair, settled into it, and immediately asked, "What is the position of the Klingon ship?"
As Spock came to stand beside him, Chekov answered, "Hundred kilometers off K-Seven. It's just sitting there."
"Captain," Uhura said then, "I have Mr. Lurry."
"Put him on visual."
"Aye, sir."
When the picture of Lurry appeared, seated and calm, Kirk quickly told him, "Mr. Lurry, there's a Klingon warship hanging one hundred kilometers off your station."
"I don't think the Klingons are planning to attack us."
"Why not?"
"Because at this moment the captain of the Klingon ship is sitting right here in my office."
Lurry doctored the sensor visual to expand the picture, showing a Klingon commander and his first officer, both glaring defiantly into the screen.
Koloth. Hand on his knee, legs crossed. Doing his imitation of a persnickety winner. Even though he hadn't won anything yet. Or lately, for that matter.
Then again, he was down there in the office and Kirk was up here, about to have to walk in there as if summoned.
"Cancel red alert," Kirk growled. "We'll beam right down."
"Of all Klingons, it has to be Koloth."
Jim Kirk strode out of the Enterprise's transporter room and felt like taking a shower. He'd just met with and sparred with Captain Koloth in Manager Lurry's office.
"Is there something specific about Captain Koloth which disturbs you?" Spock asked, as they walked the corridor.
"Nothing specific," Kirk admitted. "Attitude, mostly. Undeserved arrogance. He's never done anything remarkable, but he feels he can fly into Federation border territory and demand shore leave on a Federation-run station."
"You gave it to him," Spock pointed out.
Kirk sighed. "I said that, didn't I? The sailor in me was empathizing with their having been in space for five months without a break. I should've told them to turn around and eat asteroids. Let's go this way," he added, suddenly turning down the corridor that led toward the mess hall and rec room.
"Are you hungry, sir?" Spock asked.
"The corridor's empty. The watch is probably finishing lunch. I feel like seeing them."
Spock nodded as if he understood, but Kirk knew he probably didn't.
Then again, maybe he did.
"Lurry, Barris, Koloth," Kirk muttered, as he fixed on the rec room door panel and went through it.
The first person he saw was Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott, nested at a computer terminal, gazing happily into the screen as if looking at a picture of a beautiful woman.
Kirk leaned forward, enough to catch a glimpse of the screen, hoping for a glimpse of paradise. No such luck.
"Another technical journal, Scotty?" he asked. "Don't you ever relax?"
The engineer blinked up at him, confused. "I am relaxing!"
Just that small exchange, a venture into normalcy after this peculiar morning, set Kirk on the road to feeling better.
He strode to the largest table, where a dozen of his crew were gathered over a purring mass of powder puffs. What was this?
The powder puffs were purring, and the crew was petting them. Alive?
He glanced across the table to where Ship's Chief Surgeon Leonard McCoy stood with his arms folded, gazing down at the puff balls. Well, there wasn't any contamination or risk, then, because McCoy would've isolated the little puffs by now. Instead, the doctor seemed fascinated by the effect of the purring on the crew members. Everyone was completely quiet, mesmerized by the soft noise and the action of stroking what amounted to an earless, legless, faceless bunny.
"How long have you had that thing, Lieutenant?" McCoy asked.
Lieutenant Uhura glanced up at McCoy. "Since yesterday, Doctor. This morning I found out that he—I mean, she—had had babies."
"Well, in that case I'd say you got a bargain."
"You running a nursery, Lieutenant?" Kirk asked.
"Oh, Captain," she said, just noticing that he was there. "I hadn't intended to, sir, but the tribble had other plans."
As the mesmerized crew drowsily stroked the dozen tribbles on the table, Spock picked up a white fuzz ball and put it to his ear. It purred and bubbled happily.
Kirk looked at Uhura. "Did you get this at the space station?"
"Yes, sir."
"A most curious creature, Captain," Spock observed. At first, he was listening to the tribble, tugging its fur analytically, feeling the consistency of its body, but after a few seconds, he began simply stroking it groggily. "Its trilling seems to have a tranquilizing effect on the human nervous system. Fortunately, of course, I am … immune … to its … effect …"
Kirk felt his tensions untwist a little as he embarrassed Spock with a quirky gaze.
Spock realized what was happening, glanced at Uhura, at Lieutenant Freeman, finally at Kirk, and deposited his tribble back on the table.
Stifling a comment—he'd store it up for later—Kirk simply led the way out of the rec room.
Lurry, Barris, Koloth, Tribbles.