Chekov materialised in front of the old house. He took in its tall multipaned windows and the pale blue-green paint of the walls and sighed. This was his childhood home. Lamps gleamed behind heavy curtains in the downstairs windows, warm and inviting. He took a step forward and felt the virgin snow crunch beneath his boots. The edge of his greatcoat swished across the icy crust and dagged along behind him. The sun was just going down behind the small birch wood next to the garden. It cast its last dying shadows in firey red streaks in front of him. He felt his nose crinkle in the frosty air. He looked up at the stars which were starting to appear above him. He had looked out of his window at them many time as a boy, dreaming of travelling to them. It occured to him that he had now been to many of them. Each one was a story in his head - a delight - an adventure - a horror... It was going to be cold night.
He took the handle of the door and hesitated, as if he were about to enter a sanctuary. For all deep-space crewmen, home was a revered, special place - that distant spot of true security in the vastness of the galaxy. He took a deep breath and opened the door. He stepped over the threshold and into the large hallway. As the snow began to melt off his boots and onto the parquet floor, a comforting rush of warmth touched his cheeks. he pulled down the collar of his coat from around his ears and pulled the grey fur hat from his head.
"A-uu!" he called out, smoothing down his thick ruffled hair. He looked around the room. Portraits of his ancestors stared sternly back at him. You should have stayed with us, Pavel Andreevich. You would have been safer. Like his father, when he told him he was leaving to join Starfleet, they deeply disapproved.
"Kto tam?" came an urgent man's voice from deep within the house, asking who was there. Footsteps could be heard. Chekov didn't reply. He was content to wait, tugging his gloves lazily off his fingers.
A man of about forty years appeared through a door to one of the large rooms beyond. His smooth dark hair, high cheekbones and slightly asiatic eyes took in the new arrival with a look that turned from suspicion to joy. He flung open his arms.
"Pasha! You're home. Why didn't you reply when I called? We've been waiting for hours." He turned back towards the door he had come through. "Nastya! Come quickly. Pasha's here." He threw himself forwards and caught Chekov in a bear-hug, kissing him firmly on both cheeks.
Chekov clung onto his arms and stood him back. "Nikolka. It's been too long." He hadn't seen his cousin since he had left Earth to join the Reliant. That seemed like a very long time ago.
"I hope you've been looking after the house," he said, pushing away the memories of his last departure. Transferred from the Enterprise in what seemed like an unseemly hurry, he hadn't wanted to go. Had he known what was going to happen, he wouldn't have gone at all. He caught sight again of the pictures on the wall. We told you so, they seem to say.
"Of course we have!" came an admonishing voice from a side door. He turned to see a young woman with soft dark blonde hair and clear grey eyes. "Places this big don't look after themselves, you know."
Chekov cast his eyes down and smiled, blushing like the schoolboy he had been when he had first met her. Anastasia Dmitryevna was so beautiful she always made him tongue tied, even though she was his cousin's wife - she always had done and he had never been able to help himself, which was an endless source of amusement to the couple.
"Nastya, give the blushing virgin a kiss," said Nikolai, rolling his eyes and pulling the greatcoat from Chekov's shoulders.
Anastasia stepped forward with her hands behind her back and gave him a chaste kiss on his burning cheek. "Na tebye," she said primly. "Now, I have to go out, so no bread and salt for you just yet. I'm meeting the girls tonight. Kolya, take Pasha through to the study. His friends are waiting. Get him some strong black tea and be nice to him. No teasing. See you later!" She spun round and disappeared back through the door she had come from.
"My friends? I wasn't expecing anyone." Chekov frowned. No one should have known he was here. Even Nikolai hadn't know he had been in hospital.
"Your friends from the Enterprise. They arrived about an hour ago. They said it was urgent," explained Nikolai opening the door and ushering his cousin through. "You won't want tea though, will you?" He flicked his forefinger off his thumb against his throat. Chekov smiled at the gesture - the Russian sign that something more alcoholic was required - and nodded.
"Enterprise? Here?" he asked, as Nikolai stepped aside to let him pass. He went through into the library, lined with his father's collection of generations of books. He paused momentarily to gaze at them, transported back to his childhood, sitting on his father's lap in his armchair under the lamp, leafing through books on astronomy, space travel, mathematics, poetry.
"Pasha! Have you gone deaf or something?"
"Huh?" Chekov turned round to find Nikolai glaring at him. "Sorry, did you say something? I don't..." He pointed vaguely at his right ear but froze as he did so. "I don't hear so well at the moment," he said flatly.
"I said, stop dithering and go on through to the study. Your friends are waiting," said Nikolai, frowning at him. "I'll bring you some vodka. Just fifty grammes, mind."
He bustled out of the room leaving Chekov face to face once more with another door handle. He paused again, suddenly afraid, but unsure why. He knew Uhura and Sulu would be on the other side. Only Uhura could have intercepted the communications on his movements and only Sulu, with his new captain's rank, could have got the required visas to get them here. There was nothing to fear from them. It was himself he was afraid of, he realised. They would soon be cutting him up, disecting him with their smiles and sympathy and he would hate what they would reveal to him. Another one of Khan's victims strung up to die.
Suddenly the door was flung open, making him start. Sulu stood in the doorway, grinning his sparkling smile.
"I knew it was you lurking outside the door. You can't even stand still quietly. Don't just stand there. Come on in. We've been waiting ages."
Chekov was grabbed unceremoniously by the arm and pulled in. He all but fell into Uhura's outstretched embrace. She loked as beuatiful and elegant as ever in a crisp white shirt and slim navy blue trousers. She kissed him on the cheeks. He recognised her purfume with its sandalwood notes. It's familiarilty reminded him of his other home - the one he had been away from for nearly two years - the Enterprise.
"It's so good to see you," said Uhura warmly, pushing him down into a chair by the stove in the corner of the room. "We've been trying to get hold of you for weeks at the hospital in St Petersburg but they woudn't let us make contact. I hope you don't think we abandoned you. Your parents kept us informed. You don't mind, do you?"
Chekov looked into Uhura's clear dark eyes and shook his head. He was happy to see them both, but they brought back searing memories for him. He had held it together after his return to the Enterprise from Regula I. Adrenaline and fear had pushed him out of sickbay and back to his post to be a part of the destruction of Khan. He had not let Dr McCoy finish his work: he had needed to see the face of their enemy obliterated - with his long grey-streaked hair and proud, care-worn, accusing face... When it was all over and they turned back towards Earth, limping into the dock at Starbase 6, he had collapsed. Rushed into the Medcentre there, they had decided to send him back to Earth. Back home. It was a gesture in itself. Starfleet did not expect him to live, let alone to return to duty. Had his mother told them about her tears at his bedside in the military hospial? Had she told them about his deafness in one ear and the crippling bouts of dizziness and pain? But that was not why they had kept him in so long, even when his life was no longer in danger. 'Emotional trauma' one of the doctors had politely put it. 'Damaged goods - no use to Starfleet any more' he had overheard another say. Maybe they were right. He had become, after all, Khan's spy, Khan's liar, Khan's infiltrator, Khan's murderer...
Sulu sat down opposite his friend. He could read him like a book. "Are you ok?" he asked gently.
It wasn't the question he needed. Normally Sulu's calm eyes instilled the same sense of certainty in him, but not today. He bent down to pull off his knee-length boots. Actions avoided thoughts.
"I was just injured, that's all," he said gruffly. "Of course I'm ok." He placed the boots by the side of his chair and turned his head away to stare at the flames flickering behind the sooty door of the stove. He tucked his legs up underneath him as he had done as a boy in the security of his family.
Uhura looked at her friend sat hunched up in his chair. His hair had grown longer than regulation length again in hospital. It fell across his face casting a dark shadow across his eyes in the softly lit room. He reminded her once again of the hot-headed ensign who had first come aboard the Enterprise. Kirk had tolerated his outlandish hairstyle for so long but had forced the issue eventually. Chekov had grudgingly complied – to a certain extent. But now he was hiding behind it, she could tell.
"We know you were injured, Pasha," she said gently. But you've never told us what happened on Alpha Ceti V and Regula I. You can't keep all this bottled up inside you. You haven't even told the councellors in hospital -"
"Have you been spying on me?" he asked aggressively, looking up and pushing his hair out of his eyes with the palm of his hand.
"Yes," replied Sulu bluntly. "Yes, we have. Because we care."
Chekov was about to spit back a retort when the door opened and Nikolai walked in carrying a small glass of vodka, some black bread and three cups of steaming tea on a tray. He took in his cousin's expression and raised his eyes in silence at Uhura and Sulu. Putting the tray down on a small table by the stove, he stood up and addressed them as if Chekov was not there.
"Don't mind him. He's always been bad tempered. Even as a child he could be sweetness and light one minute and the next you'd find his hands at your throat. Always getting into trouble - always fighting. Too clever and too proud to roll with the punches. Usually starting an argument over some girl or other. He even got sent home from the Nakhimov Academy one term. Can you imagine it? His mother was furious. Especially when he brought the girl back with him! You should have heard his chat-up lines though. They all had to mention within thirty seconds that his father was a government minister and he really was related - although somewhat distantly - to our national playwright, Anton Pavlovich Chekov. And it worked. We lack for nothing on Earth, but a bit of fame and fortune never seems to do any harm with the ladies, does it, Pasha?"
"Thank you for the tea, Nikolka. You can go now," growled Chekov.
"Pozhaluista," he sighed and left the room.
"Durak," muttered Chekov in irritation as the door clicked closed.
"He's only trying to help," soothed Uhura. "He's only trying to make this normal for you again. We've all been through hell and only just made it out the other side. Here." She leant forwards and picked up the shot glass from the table and held it out to him.
He looked her in the eyes again. "Are you trying to loosen my tongue? I was in Security for five years, remember - I know all the tricks."
"And I'm in Communications and I want you to communicate with us."
Chekov eyed the glass suspiciously but eventually uncoiled himself and reached forwards to take it from her. He didn't drink it, however, but clutched it against his chest like a talisman. He wasn't going to fall for her charms just yet. In his own time maybe. How could he tell them – how could he tell anyone – what he had witnessed? How could he express in meaningful terms the death of a quarter of your crewmates, the execution of a lab full of scientists, and the suicide of your captain, your friend? Their faces passed in front of him, one after the other, their eyes both accusing and non comprehending. He felt the room sway.
"Why are you here?" He tried to keep the anguish out of his voice. He knew the deliberate change of subject would annoy his friends, but it was the best defence he had available at the moment. "I heard that you got your own command, Hikaru. How's that working out? And I heard you have a lectureship at the Academy, Nyota." Better than me, he thought bleakly. They deserve it. I don't deserve anything – not after everything I've done. I have no future.
Instead of a scolding, Chekov was surprised to find Uhura and Sulu exchanging nervous glances. Each of them wanted to speak but seemed unwilling initiate the conversation. Eventually Sulu spoke up. They had both come a long way from their last meeting with Admiral Kirk and even now they had had time to digest the information he had given to them, the situation still seemed bizarre.
"Yes, the Excelsior... it's great. But... we have some news..." he said tentatively.
"Hmmm..." Chekov said, suddenly disinterested. He had found it difficult to concentrate since the eel had been inside his head. Starfleet neurosurgeons had done an amazing job of patching him up. He had vague recollections that Christine Chapel had supervised some of the work. But he felt constantly tired and broken. He held up his glass to look through the distorted light it refracted. It was like how he experienced the world now – disjointed and fractured. He wanted to forget recent events. He needed to move on. He continued to stare at the fire. What had Sulu been talking about? News? "About what?" he asked out loud, more out of an effort to be polite. He had started to resign himself to giving up on Satarfleet information. He didn't have any future in the Fleet. What was the point of engaging in news and gossip from the ranks?
"Well..." Sulu shifted in his chair. "It's about Dr McCoy..."
"What about him? Is he retiring?" Was this going to be another invitation to another morbid gathering? They were all getting old... worn out...
"Oh, Hikaru," said Uhura impatiently. "It's not about Dr McCoy really... well, it is, but..."
Chekov looked up and frowned. "What is wrong with you two? Is it about Dr McCoy or isn't it?" His friends really were starting to behave very strangely.
Uhura stood up, suddenly agitated. She began to pace the small room. "Pasha, we had a meeting with Admiral Kirk. Now I know this might sound strange, but he told us that before his death Spock, when he was in Engineering, put his katra, his soul if you will, into Dr McCoy so that he could be saved and returned to his body. His body is alive. It regenerated on Regula I due to the Genesis effect. We have to go back and save Spock so that he can be reunited with his katra. So he can live again. We need you to come with us." She topped pacing and looked at Chekov hopefully. She wasn't sure how that had sounded to him. Mad, probably. She still became a bit giddy just thinking about it.
Chekov looked at her momentarily then shook his head. "No. Spock can't be alive. I killed him."
Uhura was taken aback by the conviction of his words. "What do you mean? Of course you didn't. He was killed by the radiation from the warp drive. He saved the ship."
Chekov didn't seem to hear her. "I don't know how many people I killed that day. I lost count."
He pressed himself into the back of his chair, curling himself up defensively again. He closed his eyes against a flashback to the space station: a swinging body, the flash of a blade, blood on his hands... He shuddered inwardly and opened his eyes, hoping the sight of his friends would reassure him that Khan wasn't there any more, whispering commands into his ears that he could barely hear above the rushing of the blood in his head caused by the eel.
Sulu looked up at his friend, alterted by the distance in his voice. The flames of the fire danced a tortured reel in his black eyes.
"Pasha, you didn't kill anyone that day. You're being too hard on yourself. There's nothing any of us could have -"
"No, you don't understand, it was all my fault," Chekov cut him off sharply, fixing him with an intense look. "I helped him -," he swallowed hard, forcing himself to say the name he hated most, "Khan to take over the Reliant, to beam down her crew to Ceti Alpha V, to torture and murder the scientists on Regula, to betray you all. If I'd been stronger, if I'd been cleverer, I would have remebered the location of the Ceti Alpha system. I could have warned Captain Terrell and none of those people would have died and Khan would still be in his living grave."
Uhura felt desperately sorry for the self-loathing she heard in his voice. She knelt down by his feet and rested her hand on his knee. She looked up at him. "Nobody can be expected to remeber one set of co-ordinates in a lfetime's worth of figures. You weren't even our navigator then, Pasha. You were still training. How old were you? Twenty? Twenty one?"
Chekov's eyes were full of self reproach. "But I saw the co-ordinates. I remember Lt Farrell showing them to me when I started the nightshift."
"I'm amazed you even remember that, Pasha. Be reasonable with yourself."
Sulu could see that deep inside he was trying to find someone to blame - even it was himself. He wanted to find that events had been controllable and not just the terrible co-incidence that it had been.
"It was I who killed Spock. I killed Admiral Kirk's best friend and my mentor. And all the others. Who do you think it was who told him where to target the Enterprise when you first arrived in the Ceti Alpha system? I knew exactly where to hit you. I heard Scotty lost his nephew in that battle. How do you think I feel about that? How will I be able to look him in the eyes? How will I be able to look Admiral Kirk in the eyes? " Khan's mocking expression and his delight at Chekov's compliance lurked constantly at the back of his mind. It was there everytime he shut his eyes, when he went to sleep, in his quiet moments... The hospital had given him therapy and drugs that Dr McCoy would have been proud of and, while they worked during the day, the pain and fear and anguish of the events spilled over like a flood into his dreams. He feared the night.
Sulu leant forwards. "The Admiral has requested you personally, Pasha. He doesn't blame you. Nobody blames you. Only yourself. You must come with us. And Scotty has asked for you to help him to get the ship ready for departure. They need you. We all need you. We don't trust anyone else. We don't want anyone else."
Chekov digested the information. It was bizarre enough that Spock could still be out there somewhere but, with the crew disbanded, how were they going to get there. "Are you telling me that Starfleet is allowing us to go all the way back to Regula I to rescue Spock?" Chekov knew Starfleet Command always tried to be reasonable, but regulations and rules did not account for resurrecting the dead.
"Well, that's the problem. Not exactly," said Uhura slowly. "They won't let us have the Enterprise. They want to scrap her. That's why we need your help."
Chekov looked up at Sulu. "But I thought you'd just got your own ship, Hikaru? Shouldn't you be on the Excelsior? And haven't you got students to teach, Nyota?"
"They've given my ship to Captain Styles," growled Sulu. "Temoprarily of course."
"And why do I want to be standing around in lecture halls all day?" scoffed Uhura. "That's not me. That's not who I am."
"Spock is more important," said Sulu emphatically.
Chekov sighed and slumped back into his chair. "Lord knows, I've got nothing to lose. Starfleet Medical won't sign me back to duty. They want me to take things easy, get a job on Earth. Seems like my father will get his way after all this time."
"Well if you've got nothing to lose then come with us," said Sulu decisively. "We need to steal the Enterprise and take her back to Regula I. You can't just languish here in the northern wilderness looking after an old creaky house. You belong on a starship. Scotty needs help in getting past the security at the docks and then we'll need a navigator... and a science officer. Only you can do all that. We can't do it without you."
Chekov gave a small lop sided smile and raised the shot glass. "Jack of all trades... na zdoroviye." He knocked back the vodka and grimaced, banging the glass down on a small table beside his chair. "Gospodi bozhe," he muttered. "If what you say is true then I'll need access to the security rota on Starbase 6 and the access codes for any other starships at the dock. Can you get those?"
Sulu nodded. "Already done."
Chekov grasped Uhura's hand. "Then when do we go?"
Sulu and Uhura got to their feet and pulled him up. They hugged him. "Now, Pasha. We'll go now."