ENSIGN JAMES T. KIRK, the twenty-two-year-old tactical weapons officer aboard the U.S.S. Farragut, had been badly wounded in the ship's final battle against the pirates of Epsilon Canaris III—bloodthirsty types who had taken full advantage of the thin spread of Federation law in that sector to set up a thriving business in hijacking, slavery and drug smuggling.
The Farragut, outnumbered six to one, had taken a terrible pounding. Toward the end of the battle a heavy stanchion on the Farragut's bridge had come loose and crashed down directly onto Jim Kirk's leg, crushing the knee and shattering the thigh.
The young Kirk had never known such incredible pain, but he had learned his life's lesson in duty that day. He had stayed at his weapons console, keeping a tenuous hold on consciousness. The citation for Kirk's Decoration for Valor—his first Starfleet award—would read: "Ensign Kirk, despite the severe pain of his wound, accurately returned the combined fire of the enemy, round for round. He did not slacken until Captain Garrovick declared the enemy destroyed and the ship safe. Only then did Ensign Kirk report his physical condition."
Kirk had "reported" his condition to Garrovick by dragging himself toward the captain and passing out at his feet. A long time later Kirk had awakened in the Farragut's Sickbay, his leg splinted and encased in a stasis field. The leg didn't hurt at all; in fact, under stasis, it felt dead.
Captain Garrovick had stopped by shortly after Kirk had awakened. He had shaken Kirk's hand firmly and had said only one thing: "You belong in this service, Jim. I'm glad you're aboard my ship."
Kirk had been proud to receive that praise.
Starbase 7 began its career as a tough plastic dome mounted on the ragged equator of an irregularly shaped free asteroid in interstellar space. More than a century before, Starfleet had begun adding to that dome. Now the asteroid was completely covered with several decks' worth of facilities and was staffed by some six hundred Starfleet personnel and civilians.
About two weeks after the Epsilon Canaris battle, the Farragut limped into Starbase 7 for repairs to the ship and medical treatment for ship's personnel. Kirk was at the top of the sick list, and the admitting medico from the starbase hospital came into Farragut's Sickbay to see the ensign.
"Good afternoon, Mister, ah, Kirk," the doctor said. He gave Kirk's ruined leg a quick look. "Your captain wasn't kidding me, Ensign," the medico said. "That's a nasty bump you've got there."
Kirk nodded. "What do you think?" he asked a bit hesitantly. "Am I going to lose it?"
The medico shrugged. "Dunno." He scratched his chin and examined Kirk's leg closely.
"Well, I don't think we'll have to saw it off," the doctor finally drawled. The corner of his mouth turned up. "I've got something I'd like to try first. It's a fairly new approach; I'd like you to go into this with your eyes wide open, because I'm not giving any guarantees this week. We can talk about it. Okay?"
Kirk nodded. "Anything you say, Doctor—?"
"McCoy. Pleased to meet you, Ensign." They shook hands.
Leonard McCoy took full charge of Jim Kirk's rehabilitation. First, the skilled young doctor teased Kirk's thighbone into regenerating; under gentle pressure from drugs and electrotherapy, the thighbone reformed itself and redeveloped the superstrong interior lattice that is one of the marvels of the human body.
The knee was even tougher—There are so many things the cells have to be taught to do! McCoy thought in wonderment and weariness—but, eventually, Kirk's knee regenerated and then regained its range of motion. Then, finally, muscle and skin reformed, without a scar.
Kirk's leg took four long months to regenerate. The ensign was physically whole now—but more months of physical therapy lay ahead; Kirk had to be taught how to use his new leg. He was a twenty-two-year-old man who had never used that leg in walking, running, kicking—or even in supporting his own weight unassisted. Kirk had to learn how to walk all over again.
It was a painful process; Kirk's nerves screamed in agony as his new leg muscles were forced to do the hard work of moving him around. Leonard McCoy worked with Kirk every day through that ugly period of pain and despair. "There's still no better way to practice using the leg than to use the leg," McCoy told Kirk once, early on, as the sweating ensign groaned his way through a three-kilometer treadmill walk. "It hurts, Jim, I know it does—but you have to get through that pain."
Kirk gritted his teeth and nodded … and got through the pain.
Seven months after Kirk's arrival at Starbase 7, McCoy pronounced his patient completely cured. The doctor personally did the paperwork on his patient's discharge. Jim Kirk went to Dr. McCoy's hospital office for his exit interview.
"I see they've cut your orders for a return to the Farragut as tactical weapons officer," McCoy observed.
"That's right," Kirk replied. "I'm glad about that; I wouldn't want another ship. The rendezvous flight leaves from here in two months. I've got some R and R coming to me. I think I'll take it—I could go for a long walk in somebody's woods, or something."
"Hmmm," McCoy said. "Sounds better than drawing light duty in Starbase Seven's clerical department." The doctor scratched his chin. "Y'know," he drawled, "I've been working on your case just about every day for the past seven months. This organization owes me some R and R, too, I think. Why don't you tag along with me?" He grinned. "I'll show you some woods that'll take your breath away."
"Delighted, Doctor."
"Call me Bones," McCoy said. "All my friends do."
Bones McCoy's official residence was in a small, private room in Starbase 7's medical dormitory—but his home was on the planet Centaurus, just about half a light-year from the star base. McCoy rated four free trips home per year via available Starfleet transportation—usually a supply ship—and Kirk, still excused from regular duty for medical reasons, rated a trip if his doctor prescribed one.
His doctor did. McCoy and Kirk flew to Centaurus aboard the U.S.S. Cook County, an old, small, impulse-only cargo craft that took nearly a week to get there. McCoy and Kirk spent the time talking about women, playing cards, blue-skying about their career plans, and talking some more about women.
Kirk had never been to Centaurus before; he knew it only as Alpha Centauri IV, an Earth-type planet orbiting a star fairly similar to Sol. The name of the planet had come from the star group's traditional name. "Sure, you need sunglasses on Centaurus," McCoy told Kirk once when the doctor had been in a hometown mood. "Alpha's half again as bright as Sol and a tenth bigger, too. Plus, there's Beta. But so what? Think of a Caribbean island on a hot, clear day and you've about got it. Jim, I tell you, the planet's lush. Earth flora and fauna just love it there. Just wait—my sister and her husband have a nice place in Athena Preserve; that's a government park just outside New Athens. You'll see."
McCoy called the planet home not because he'd been born there—he hadn't been—but because his nine-year-old daughter Joanna lived there with McCoy's older sister and her husband. "A starbase is no place for a kid," McCoy told Kirk. "I want her to get sun and fresh air and meet different kinds of people. I never want her to become a Starfleet brat."
Kirk knew McCoy was divorced, but the doctor never talked about his failed marriage and had never encouraged questions from Kirk about it. Once, during the long trip on the Cook County, McCoy volunteered the information that he had first met "what's-her-name" in his native Georgia; Kirk had not felt free to pursue the subject.
But McCoy worshiped Joanna. Kirk took it as a supreme compliment that the doctor had given up two home leaves to stay with Kirk during his recuperation. Now McCoy had invited Kirk to go home with him. Kirk had not been especially close to anyone in the service—part of that was Kirk's basic reticence, and the rest of it was due to his heavy schedule of work and study as an ensign still under review—but Kirk had warmed to McCoy during his long recovery, and McCoy's generous offer of hospitality had cemented their friendship.
The Cook County set down at the military field attached to New Athens Spaceport. Kirk generally disliked meeting children, but he liked McCoy's daughter on sight. Kirk first saw Joanna McCoy at the military arrivals gate; she was waiting there with her aunt and uncle.
"Daddy!" she cried happily upon seeing the doctor. She glanced at Kirk, gave him a polite smile of the kind appropriate for strangers, and then turned her full attention back to her father. McCoy dropped his personal kit, snatched up his daughter and hugged her powerfully. "Hiya, Squirt," McCoy said, his eyes watering.
"You big mushball," Joanna said mock-scornfully, too low for anyone but McCoy to hear. "Don't get sloppy on me." Joanna cheerfully ignored her own tears. She was a small girl—brown-haired, blue-eyed and slightly built, just on the edge of the beauty that would be hers beginning in her teens.
Joanna broke her hug and McCoy put her down. She looked at Kirk and waited politely, with an interested expression. "Oh, I'm sorry," McCoy said. "Jim Kirk, this is my daughter, Joanna; my sister, Donna, and her husband, Fred Withers." Kirk nodded politely to Donna Withers and shook hands with Fred; he had a firm, salt-of-the-earth grip.
Kirk then turned to Joanna and extended a hand. Joanna shook it with a ladylike grip, squeezing once and pumping twice. "I'm very happy to meet you, Joanna," Kirk said. "I've heard a lot about you from your father." Kirk addressed her, standing; he felt this child would not tolerate the easy condescension of his stooping to talk to her.
Joanna beamed and McCoy said to himself, Jim passes inspection. Thank God. Joanna may yet let him enjoy this vacation. "Well!" McCoy said happily. "Let's get going!" Kirk, the McCoys and the Witherses began threading their way through the concourse crowds, heading for the nearest slidewalk to the transient parking lot.
Ensign Kirk, once and future tac weapons officer of the U.S.S. Farragut, was used to the presence of perhaps twenty or so people at any one time; starships are spacious, for the number of people they carry, and hospitals through the centuries have always been known for their empty, lonely, impersonal hallways and corridors.
But the concourse was throbbing with thousands of people of all kinds, shapes and sizes.
Agoraphobia? Kirk wondered nervously. At my age? Or maybe I mean . . . xenophobia? Kirk felt his hackles rise with a subtle, irrational fear of the crowd of travelers. There are just too damn many people! Kirk complained to himself. I'm not used to this …
Kirk felt a small hand slip into his own. He looked down. Joanna McCoy was looking back at him, very seriously.
"I hate crowds, don't you?" she whispered.
Kirk grinned. After that, he felt much better. Kirk and Joanna walked hand-in-hand all the way out of the concourse.
The leave turned out to be the finest of Kirk's life. McCoy made good on his promise to show Kirk some woods; the McCoys and Kirk borrowed the Witherses' recreational flitter and soared over vastnesses of virgin wilderness. Centaurus's population was growing rapidly but, as yet, most of the people on the planet lived in or near the cities on the northern continent's east and west coasts. New Europe had cities, too: They were established and growing on the southern continent's east coast, and farming complexes were located close to all developed areas.
But everything else on Centaurus was virtually untouched by humans.
Seeds from Earth, brought by the original settlers, had been scattered by the winds and had wandered all over the northern continent, New America; terrestrial elms and maples grew and prospered among Centaurian flapjacks and blackapples. Earthly fauna, selected and brought to Centaurus by skilled Federation ecologists, scampered through the great northern wilderness along with native treeturtles and woodscats.
Kirk saw waterfalls a thousand meters high hidden in mountain ranges that stood five times taller. He saw endless hectares of vibrantly green growth interspersed with the cool blue of freshwater lakes and the clean, light gray of rock that had boiled out of Centaurus's core in ages past. Once, Kirk glimpsed an Earth deer leap and bound safely away from the attack of a Centaurian werebear; Joanna had seen that, too, and had squealed with glee as the deer escaped.
But it was not until the three friends flew over a valley about a thousand kilometers west of New Athens that Kirk fell in love.
Kirk had never found it within himself to love a piece of land. His eyes had always been on the stars, and he had always been grateful that he lived in a century when he could soar among them. Kirk was, at heart, a wanderer; he'd never been willing to settle down in any one particular place. He was loyal to the ship on which he served, and to the Federation he had vowed to defend. But the Federation was an abstract thing; it wasn't real, any more than the United Nations had once been real. He deeply respected the history and founding philosophy of his native United States, although the strong patriotism his American ancestors had once felt had faded along with nationalism itself.
But he fell in love with this unknown piece of land at first sight.
"Bones?" Kirk asked, pointing down toward the valley. "What's that down there?"
"Dunno, Jim," McCoy replied, glancing down at his control board. "It's not named on the navigation map. I guess it's unclaimed. Pretty, isn't it?"
"Let's land," Kirk said. McCoy glanced at him—and saw the fascination on his face. With a small smile, McCoy slapped the autolanding controls, and the flitter settled gently to the ground. The three got out.
They had landed on the lip of a small palisade overlooking the valley. A clean, swift river ran from north to south through the virgin heart of the area. The hills were festooned with nature's best bunting: the riot of reds, yellows and golds that comes with autumn, be it on Earth or Centaurus. Kirk could see foliage rustle here and there as animals ran freely through the pass on some unknowable business. All around him the mountains flowed into hills, which gently melted into glades and dells and pastures. It was a vista of natural loveliness.
Kirk had found his place.
"Bones?" he asked. "What are the coordinates here?"
"On the autotracker, Jim. Why?"
Kirk paused. "I want to stake a claim."
Ensign Kirk returned to the valley three times in the following weeks. The first two times he'd flown there alone, bringing with him some primitive camping equipment but no comb, razor or Starfleet uniform. Kirk camped for about four days each time, drinking in the scenery and the peace of the place. On his third trip Kirk brought along a particularly attractive Starfleet nurse from New Athens Medical Complex, where Kirk had had his final medical debriefing a few days after arriving on Centaurus. They'd stayed for a week. It had turned out to be a fine week; the nurse enjoyed camping—and campfires.
Several days After that, and with assistance from Fred Withers, Kirk hired a good lawyer and formed a one-man corporation under Centaurian law. Starstruck Inc., a not-for-profit corporation owned entirely by one James Tiberius Kirk, bought two thousand hectares in the valley at a very favorable price. Kirk's deed to that land became one of his most prized possessions; he would, much later, fold it small and keep it tucked in the lid of the case that held his Medal of Honor.
All too soon Kirk's leave ended, and he promised the Witherses and Joanna that he'd make time for frequent visits from then on. He rejoined the Farragut and soon got back into the ebb and flow of his job as tac weapons officer.
But that phase of Kirk's career came to an abrupt and tragic end when Captain Garrovick and fully half the Farragut's crew died at Tycho IV after an attack by a living cosmic cloud. Kirk, a member of the Tycho IV landing party, could never understand why he had survived when so many others had died; it was a question that would bother him for many years to come.
But one of the things Kirk had done was to send a brief subspace message to his lawyer in New Athens. It read simply: REGISTER NAME CHANGE OF PLOT TO GARROVICK VALLEY IMMEDIATELY. KIRK.It had been done.
* * *
As Kirk's career advanced, so did his salary. Starfleet pays its top officers an almost embarrassing amount of money in recognition of their superior skills, the hazards they face, and the responsibilities of their duties. Most officers Kirk had met simply allowed the bulk of their pay to pile up in a Federation bank.
But Kirk split his income. A generous portion went to provide a trust for his only living relatives, the family of his brother, Sam. When Sam and his wife, Aurelan, died, Kirk transferred the trust to their young son, Peter. But most of the rest of Kirk's money was banked with his New Athens lawyer, earmarked for land acquisition in and around Garrovick Valley. Kirk gave his lawyer loose instructions for investment and growth; Kirk believed in letting his subordinates exercise full authority within logical limits, and Kirk viewed his lawyer as just that—a civilian subordinate.
Twelve years after Kirk's first trip to Centaurus, Starstruck Inc. owned all of Garrovick Valley and the banks of the Farragut River all the way back to its source, thirty kilometers farther north, and for another thirty kilometers downstream. Kirk also owned all exploitation rights in the valley and the land around the Farragut; this guaranteed that no one could touch his property or the river that flowed through it. The lawyer reported frequent offers from land developers and real estate brokers to buy Garrovick Valley at a handsome price—Centaurus's wilderness was opening up rapidly—but Kirk refused to sell. He frequently congratulated himself on his foresight in securing all rights to protect the valley.
Kirk had had a log cabin built on the site where he and the McCoys had first landed the flitter. Kirk was not a mountain man; the cabin was small but had its own independent utilities. Power came from a small geothermal generator hidden not far from the cabin, and water came from the river. Kirk's cabin had a septic tank, too; he was unwilling to run a waste pipe into the Farragut and sully that clean, clear river. It was also the only log cabin in the Federation with its own subspace communications link to Starfleet Command; it had been installed when Kirk had gotten the Enterprise.
Kirk resisted the temptation to name the cabin the "Captain's Log"; he did not name it anything. He preferred, instead, to think of the valley and everything in it as his place, just as he had when he had first found it.
Captain Kirk had not been back to his valley since assuming command of the Enterprise; starship captains cannot take a couple of months' leave and disappear into the woods. While he and the McCoys had stayed there together several times, they had not done so since Bones McCoy had come aboard the Enterprise as chief medical officer. Joanna was free to use the place, too—but now twenty-one, she was terribly busy with her courses as a first-year student at New Athens Medical Complex. Kirk had often wanted to take Spock there—Spock would like it, Kirk often thought, because he's able to see the beauty in such things—but Kirk had not yet had the chance to do that, either.
But Captain Kirk, content, knew that one day far in the future, he'd have a place to go when space was done with him, and he with space.