"CAPTAIN!"
"Kirk here."
"I'm picking up a subspace distress call, priority channel. It's from Space Station K-Seven."
"Go to warp factor six."
"This is a red alert. Man your battle stations. All hands, man your battle stations. We have a Code-One Emergency Disaster Call. All hands, man battle stations …"
"Captain's log, Stardate 4523.3. Deep Space Station K-Seven has issued a Priority-One call. More than an emergency, it signals near or total disaster. We can only assume the Klingons have attacked the station. We're going in armed for battle."
The bridge smelled fresh, clean, ready. The maintenance crew had just come through, at change of watch. The carpet was refreshed, the usual dusty residue and shavings of general activity were whisked away, and the interiors of all the computer access trunks had been scoured. The bridge looked brand-new, ready to handle anything.
"Space Station K-Seven on approach vector, sir." There was a crack of nervousness in the helmsman's voice. Understandable, at Priority-One alert.
"Ahead standard," Captain Kirk ordered automatically.
And the comforting response: "Ahead standard, aye."
Now the ship would reduce from warp six and come into the sensor globe of the Deep Space station at a manageable speed for close battle.
Battle. The one thing the ship was really built for, and the one thing they hoped never to have to use her for. But she was the first line of defense of the United Federation of Planets. Kirk felt his legs tense and the muscles in his arms tighten. His pulse began to match the throbbing of red alert through the ship.
Battle happened. Had in the past, would in the future.
As for the present, Captain James Kirk was ready and unintimidated. If Klingons had attacked Deep Space Station K-Seven, then he and this ship and crew were the rescue squad, the police, the firefighters, and the cleanup crew all rolled into one. The ship prepared itself because of red alert, bringing forward into automatic mode all the systems that otherwise would be manual, in case the crew were occupied or injured. His own body was the same, tense with grit and resistance, the weight of all with which he was saddled. He felt his posture, muscles, nerves shoring up to sustain him in whatever he had to do. And his mind, the same. More.
"Mr. Chekov, confirm weapons readiness," he said, just for his own comfort.
"Main phasers armed and ready, sir."
Kirk watched the distant dot of the space station growing larger on the screen. He had only wanted to hear Chekov's voice, to know that not only the weapons but the crew were armed and ready.
With alarming speed the three-pronged station swelled on the screen. Pushing to his feet, Kirk scanned the big screen with his eyes from corner to corner, top to bottom, for attacking ships.
He saw them in his mind, but gradually realized that he wasn't seeing any on the screen. None at all.
Not even any trading ships.
"But …" Navigations Officer Chekov squinted at the screen. "There's nothing there … just the station!"
Kirk peered suspiciously at the screen.
"Priority One Distress Call," he uttered, mystified, "yet it's absolutely peaceful. Lieutenant Uhura, break subspace silence." He moved around to the side of his command chair, looked at Uhura, then turned again to face the space station.
On the upper aft bridge, Communications Officer Uhura played her graceful hands across the board. "Aye, sir. Channel's open, sir."
"Space Station K-Seven, this is Captain Kirk of the Enterprise. What is your emergency?"
He knew his voice was sharp, annoyed, but he didn't care. He wanted to sound severe. Space had ears.
After a moment, the hesitant response siphoned up through the emptiness.
Captain Kirk, this is Mr. Lurry, manager of K-Seven. I must apologize for the distress call—"
"Mr. Lurry," Kirk flared, "you issued a Priority One Distress Call. State the nature of your emergency."
"Uh … well … perhaps you'd better beam over. I'll try to explain."
"You'll try to explain. You'd better be prepared to do more than that. Kirk out." He climbed the three small steps to the upper deck. "Mr. Spock, I'll need your help. Mr. Chekov, maintain battle readiness. Lieutenant Uhura, see that the transporter room is standing by."
"Aye, sir. Transporter Room, stand by."
The space station's main office was a roomy base for its manager, generally used as a meeting hall, rumpus room, and, if necessary, additional guest quarters. The multipurpose room materialized around Kirk and Spock, and Kirk found himself standing in a relatively familiar transport cubicle of a somewhat older style. This station had been here a long time.
Before the buzz of transportation faded from his ears, he was out of the cubicle and crossing the red carpet toward an unclelike man with snowy hair who wore the emblematic station-orange one-piece utility suit.
"Mr. Lurry, if there was no emergency, why did you issue a Priority-One Distress Call?"
From the middle of the room, another man, this one a buttoned-down priestly fellow with dark hair, a gunmetal-gray suit, and a stony face announced, "That was my order, Captain."
Mr. Lurry looked instantly nervous, and motioned to the dark suit. "Captain Kirk, this is Nils Barris. He's out from Earth to take charge of the development project for Sherman's Planet."
"And that gives you the authority to put an entire quadrant on defense alert?"
"Mr. Barris is the Federation Undersecretary in Charge of Agricultural Affairs in this quadrant."
"And that gives him the authority," Spock said quietly.
It didn't, really. Kirk knew that Spock was only trying to deflate the moment before his captain embarrassed them both. Barris had authority to summon help in an emergency, but there wasn't one here. He had the authority to put the sector on alert, but not emergency defensive alert with full battle-ready status. Somehow Barris might have the authority to do parts of this, but blend the parts and things just didn't add up anymore.
Aware of how things looked to him and how they'd look on paper later, Kirk accepted Spock's deference for the moment.
Barris gestured to his right to a clean-cut young man with black hair and unfriendly eyes. "This is my assistant, Arne Darvin."
Kirk tipped his head, accepting the trouble of plain courtesy. "And this is my first officer, Mr. Spock," he said, as if parrying, and with his expression he dismissed this and demanded that Barris get back to the point.
"And now, Captain," Barris said loftily, "I want all available security guards. I want them posted around the storage compartments."
Kirk leered at him. "Storage compartments? Storage compartments?"
"The storage compartments containing the quadrotriticale."
"The what, the what? What's … quadro … tritic—"
Mr. Lurry handed him a vial of something, which Kirk spilled into his palm.
"Wheat. So what?"
"Quadrotriticale is not wheat, Captain. Of course, I wouldn't expect you or Mr. Spock to know about such things, but quadrotriticale is a rather—"
"Quadrotriticale," Spock interrupted, the Gothic baritone of his voice taking over the room, "is a high-yield grain, a four-lobed hybrid of wheat and rye. A perennial also, if I'm not mistaken. Its root grain, triticale, can trace its ancestry all the way back to twentieth-century Canada, where it—"
Kirk turned his head, partly to mask his delight. "Uh, Mr. Spock … you've made your point."
Lurry was still trying to keep his station from being a point of embarrassment in a Starfleet report. He filled in, "Quadrotriticale is the only Earth grain that will grow on Sherman's Planet. We have several tons of it here on the station, and it's very important that the grain get to Sherman's Planet safely. Mr. Barris thinks that Klingon agents may try to sabotage it."
With his assumptions confirmed that he and his ship had been rattled for no good reason, Kirk plowed past the station manager, advanced on the tall Federation bureaucrat and drilled a glare up at him. "You ordered a Priority-One Distress Call for a couple of tons of wheat?" he bellowed.
"Quadrotriticale!" Darvin insisted from the side.
Kirk speared the assistant with a glower, but didn't reward him with a comment.
Barris was unflapped, but attempted, "Of course, Captain, I realize that we—"
"Mr. Barris, you summoned the Enterprise without an emergency." Kirk swung away and back to Spock's side. "You'll take full responsibility for it."
"What do you mean?"
"Misuse of the Priority-One Channel," Spock said, "is a Federation offense."
Barris flared—what little a gravestone could flare. "I did not misuse the Priority-One Channel. I want that grain protected!"
"Captain," Lurry attempted, "couldn't you at least post a couple of guards? We do have a large number of ships passing through."
"It would seem a logical precaution, Captain," Spock mentioned quietly. "The Sherman's Planet affair is of extreme importance to the Federation."
Kirk glowered at Barris, shrugged to Spock, got a Spock-shrug back—eyebrows only—and got out the communicator. Damn it.
"Kirk to Enterprise."
"Enterprise here."
"Secure from general quarters. And beam down two—and only two—security guards and have them report to Mr. Lurry. Authorize shore leave for all off-duty personnel."
"Yes, Captain."
Coming up on his toes, Barris knotted his fists. "Captain Kirk, how dare you authorize a mere two men for a project of this importance! Starfleet Command will hear about this—"
Kirk swung a hand toward the man and turned away. "I have never questioned the orders or the intelligence of any representative of the Federation."
At the last moment, he turned back.
"Until now," he added.