The Beginning

        RECORDS LOG ENTRY: 4-7612.18H. Ship losses ... Rigel sector ... Unexplained ... disappearances of cargo vessels. Losses ... exceed acceptable levels... Orders from Central ... to advise.... Follow...
       
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        Spock sat reading the intercepted message and considering the impact it would soon have on his life. As a Vulcan-human genetically created half-breed, he was a conspicuous outcast among his own people. He was from a lowland tribe in ancestry but stood over 6 feet tall. At 195 lbs. he was considered thin by human standards, if they thought anything of the tall blond science specialist with the midnight-blue eyes and blue-tinged skin. His appearance was not out of the norm by today’s standards. Humans had adapted to alien life forms far stranger than himself.
        The initial contact between Vulcan and Earth had resulted in many attempts to join the species; the humans wanted the genetics for the 200-year life span, the Vulcans being simply curious as to the possible result.
        The results had been chaos. It had been more chaotic among the volatile Kashin tribe.
        Kashin men were short, usually less than six feet tall. Kashin women were usually close to seven feet in height. These long favored characteristics were considered proper and attractive. Variations were highly discouraged. The genetic tampering had delivered many variations and the humans and Vulcans had been touchy allies ever since. The Kashin were not even friendly.
        Spock was tall. He was also more independent, carrying the rash idea that he should control his own life. Most Vulcans were herd-instinct personalities, doing things that were good for the entire race over things that might be good for the individual. Like reproduction.
        Vulcans choose genetic partners very carefully. He had refused the breeding partner his parents had arranged even though it would have meant that the male tallness stigma would be removed from the family line.
        He choose to enter the space fleet service rather than stay on Vulcan and be the silent recluse his aberration required. Space fleet thought his height was normal for a humanoid.
        Now he was back on Vulcan. Had been back for the past two years. His ship, the one on which he had served for fifteen years, was a wreck. His human friend and Captain, James Kirk, was demoted and disgraced. Spock had disagreed with the court martial and had refused to re-enlist for active duty afterward. He had come home to try Vulcan life once again. He had tried. And again, it just wasn’t working.
       
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        The huge space cruiser hung suspended at the end of her thick power cables, strung off the space buoy like a discarded toy. Her lights were dimly winking a feeble warning of her presence to passersby.
        The one engine strut remaining held its shattered engine at a ridiculously tilting angle. Carbon scoring streaked across the heavily battered main hull where peeling paint from visiting vandals was splashed across the surface, blocking her numerals, hiding her disgrace. The Enterprise was in mothballs, discarded and alone.
        Or was supposed to be.
        A newly formed hole, its edges still shining, was punched through the secondary hull where the latest visitors had come to loot and to destroy. Near the rent in the side, and dwarfed by the giant cruiser, was a tiny shuttle bearing the bold insignia of the nearby Star Base. It had swung around the derelict in various orbits for the past hour and now hovered about the ruptured hull with all sensor probes extended.
        Like a tiresome fly it buzzed past the opening, now close, now far, as if seeking something. Then, moving just as quickly as before, with a final thrust from its engines it zipped away and back around to the open shuttle bay doors.
        Its pilot demonstrated both proficiency in flight skills and an open familiarity with the larger craft as the shuttle zoomed into the bay and set down without hesitation, its landing runners slipping neatly under the special parking hooks.
        A figure garbed in a cumbersome spacesuit appeared at the shuttle door a few moments later, paused to turn back for something, and then cautiously stepped out and down to the bay floor. The spacesuit boots were equipped with grippers that the figure expertly positioned onto the Velcro-like flooring strips that ran across the floor and walls of the bay in almost every direction. Automatically deployed during the last gravity-loss emergency, they had remained so when the ship was abandoned.
        The figure paused again, peering thru the heavy, tinted visor, turning this way and that, as if checking for something. Then it began to move in a slow steady pace toward the rear of the shuttle bay and, after a few moments of delay at the air lock, on into the ship.
        Zrrrippp! Zrrrippp!
        The sound was faint in the thin atmosphere. The damage sustained by the cruiser had left her frozen in air -mergency status. As a result, each gantry way, each hallway, was partitioned with the huge sliding wall sections, the bulkheads that had been automatically deployed, like the Velcro strips.
        Undaunted by the numerous doors, the figure used a hand-held lock-control device to transmit a release signal, then it manually opened and closed each one in turn.
        Zrrrippp! Zrrrippp!
        The figure persisted, struggling with the old and clumsy space suit. It was laden with equipment, a video recorder and other supplementary devices slung from every available suit loop and hook. Heavily burdened, transfer to the various ladders was awkward but the figure continued undaunted. Up it climbed through the maze of levels, hand over hand, and then down more hallways and up more ladders.
        Zrrrippp! Zrrrippp!
        The figure was in the main engineering section and dwarfed by the immense size of the now stripped-down facility. On the walls and floors, dusty, charred streaks mingled with darker stains left by dead or dying crew gave mute testimony to what had befallen the cruiser on her last voyage. The figure reached out to reverently touch the main control panel, or rather, what was left of it. Then it paused, peering about again as if expecting someone or something.
        “God-damn!”
        The curse was the only sound emitted by the figure’s helmet speaker. It echoed about the room. Scratch marks showed where equipment had been dragged about in careless patterns, leaving what remained in disarray. A relatively clean section of the floor showed where something had been more recently removed.
        The figure was obviously distressed by this newest violation, but it wasted no further words or time on the desolate room. Instead, it pulled a video recorder out of one of the carry-pockets in the spacesuit, and adjusting the visual feed of the input sensors to its satisfaction, it methodically swung the blinking face of the recorder around the room. The task completed, it pocketed the device, turned and continued its journey further on into the bowels of the ship.
        Zrrrippp! Zrrrippp! Zrrrippp!
        The figure moved along, through the air doors, and up ladders. Clumsy in appearance, the figure was almost graceful in its ascent, its familiarity with its surroundings evident in every move.
        Zrrippp! Zrrippp!
        Still it continued, stopping only long enough to open and close the doors, or to check its chronometer and air pressure. Now and then it made a check of the portable sensors, looking for signs. Of what?
        “Finally!”
        The first indication of its weariness at the task was the audible remark of relief of the nearness of its quarry. The figure approached another ladder, and climbed upward. At the top of the ladder, it paused again, and pulled out the hand laser and another one of the recorders it carried. After checking over both, it stepped out from behind the main display and onto the wrecked bridge platform of the derelict.
        “Damn! I knew it!” The figure shook its head at the waste of life and property.
        A body, humanoid in form, lay stretched across the remains of the navigator’s console, its spacesuit ruptured in several places from what looked to the naked eye like a narrow laser beam, the type of weapon that was known to be carried by the salvage pirates.
        The figure stopped to carefully examine it, then, apparently satisfied that the death was not too recent, the figure holstered its laser and set about scanning the bridge. Again, there was evidence of recent looting. And again, the figure acknowledged it with a simple epithet.
        “Blast!”
        Finished at last, the figure prepared to leave. Moving back to the view screen and then to the ladder to go back down, it paused and turned for one last look around the vandalized bridge. Then, Montgomery Scott allowed himself a moment of private reverie before he turned and left the ruined bridge of the sister ship to the USS Enterprise.