7

The Vulcanorion Connection

Chapter Two: Soval of Shir'Kaya

As Soval sat in his office, he found that his mind was wandering...he was thinking frequently of his son's future. His worry was not particularly logical, but family matters seldom conformed to the rigors of logic.

What was he to do with Sorral? The boy was now twenty-two standard years old, and he was married to a woman of the same age who was presently living on Vulcan. Vanal was a supremely logical young woman who had been carefully chosen for Sorral, to serve as a role model to him. Soval had hoped that, in time, Sorral would grow into his familial responsibilities well enough to become a father. Unfortunately, however, the year that Sorral and Vanal had spent together after their wedding had not been an especially productive one. Vanal had found Sorral to be far too immature for her, and so she had involved herself in pursuits that did not involve her child-like husband.

Sorral was left to cope on his own, for the most part, and so he was sent every day to a special program at the T'Pannok Centre for Reintegration to learn more about his culture and history. He had excelled at his studies in Vulcan history and literature, but his scientific and mathematical skills had left much to be desired.

The Director of the Centre, Madam T'Pannok, had decided that Sorral would do well in a community service placement, teaching literature within the Shir'Kaya Tribal District. This area was home to the Shir'Kayas, a group of Vulcans with their own distinct culture and traditions. Sorral had been fascinated by them, as he had grown up hearing Soval's stories about them. Soval was himself a member of the Shir'Kaya tribe, and he had instilled in the boy tales of its polytheistic folklore and tales of old battles lost and won.

The Shir'Kayas lived in a very traditional manner, as they had in the days before Surak—the master who had brought the principles of logic and emotional control to the Vulcan people at a very savage time in their collective history. Soval had spent a great deal of time as a young teacher, working with the Surakian monks to teach logic and emotional control to the people of Shir'Kaya...who were very adverse to changing their way of life, particularly with regard to modern technology. The elders in the district tended to discourage the people from embracing new technological advances in favor of keeping things as they had always been.

Things had changed on Vulcan, however, since the Ancient days before Surak, and the Shir'Kayas had not kept up with the rest of modern Vulcan society. The youth of Shir'Kaya were unfortunately paying the price for this refusal to modernize, and it had always been a deep source of frustration for Soval that this was the case. The young people were forced to attend third-rate desert schools which taught various traditional trades, but nothing that would prepare them for a modern-day career in science or technology. Although some students studied hard and earned the right to go to the institutions of advanced learning, as Soval had done, many of them became discouraged and still others dropped out of the education system entirely. Many had become unwittingly involved in the Orion Drug Trade, especially when they left Vulcan on low-grade freighters with the naive intention of "traveling the galaxy".

Some of the more unscrupulous Vulcans who had become involved with the drug trade returned to their homes in Shir'Kaya and other tribal districts, and they began to lure the youth into using and distributing a drug called "Jaboraxin". This particular drug had been the bane of the Shir'Kayas' existence, as it had a debilitating effect on the intellects of its users. This would, in turn, cause further problems when the young addicts tried and failed to receive a proper education, which would then push them back into the drug trade. It had become a vicious circle about which Soval knew only too well.

Soval had himself become involved in the use of Jaboraxin when he was a young boy of fourteen years, growing up in the village of Sh'Vaht in his mother's tumble-down shack. He had been fortunate, however, in that his birth father, Skarn of Sh'Vaht, had been the Magistrate of that village and had punished Soval by sending him to a juvenile offenders' camp, where he had been forced to work long hours in the desert mines.

He had afterwards been obliged to join an order of Surakian monks, who had helped him to use his life in a more productive manner. They had taught him the disciplines of Surak, as well as many of the telepathic disciplines such as the Vulcan Mind Meld. The education he had received from the monks had been a saving grace for young Soval, as it had given him the strength and confidence he had needed to stop using Jaboraxin and to embrace the idea of service to the needs of the many.

It had not been easy for the young Soval to overcome the handicaps of his youth, but he had always found a way to persevere and meet his life's goals. Sorral, however, did not seem to possess the same degree of focus as his father did, and he was constantly trying new things before changing his mind and beginning something else again.

Soval had been most concerned that Sorral would become unwittingly lured into the drug trade while he was teaching in Shir'Kaya, and so he had asked his birth father, Skarn, to send some of his people to watch out for the young "Vulcan Earther". To Soval's relief, Sorral had not been tempted to use "Jaboraxin", but had rather tried to teach Earth "Twelve Step" philosophies to the hapless Shir'Kaya addicts. As a result, the addicts had avoided Sorral like the plague.

By the time the year had ended, Madam T'Pannok sent Sorral back to Earth with an excellent report on his literary and interpersonal skills; his academic record with regard to the scientific and technological disciplines, however, remained abysmal.

When he returned to Earth, Sorral had indicated that he now intended to learn about his father's profession—diplomacy. He had enrolled in an Interplanetary Diplomacy program at United Earth University. Soval had decided to support him in this, although he had some misgivings about his son's ability to adhere to his chosen career path for more than a month. He knew that Sorral needed extra help in order to accomplish his goals, and so he had arranged for him to take special training with Dr. Fer'at, the resident psychiatric analyst at the Vulcan Embassy. Sorral had recently attended his first appointment with Dr. Fer'at, and Soval was waiting to discover how the session had progressed.

As if in answer to his thoughts, the buzzer rang.

"Enter," the Ambassador said into his intercom, and Dr. Fer'at walked briskly into the room.

"Ambassador Soval," he greeted the diplomat, "I have recently conducted my first session with Sorral, and I believe he is ready for a new challenge."

"What sort of a challenge, Doctor?" Soval asked.

He had known Fer'at since they were both young boys growing up in Shir'Kaya. Soval had been a few years older than Fer'at and had encouraged him to leave his tribal district in order to study science at a first-rate academic institution. Fer'at had been curious about life beyond his little village, and so he had taken up the study of science with a vengeance, qualifying to attend a school in the city. He had eventually become a psychiatrist, and had returned to the district of Shir'Kaya to help the youth there. Fer'at had lived and worked in Shir'Kaya for eighty years before finally responding to an invitation from his old friend Soval to come to Earth for a change of pace. Fer'at had brought his wife, Dr. T'Lan, and his adolescent son, Sethir, with him.

"Sorral needs to be sent on an educational placement of some kind which will challenge him. You must stop being so over-protective of him, Soval. He has a great deal of potential; Madam T'Pannok saw it in him, and so do I."

"I see," Soval replied, "and what would you suggest?"

"Sorral says that his professor at the United Earth University would like him to go to Mars to work at the Vulcan Embassy there. He wants to go with his friend, Mark Forrest, who is taking the same program in Interplanetary Diplomacy. I told him that I thought it would be an excellent idea. He told me that you would want him to stay closer to home. I said that I would speak to you for him to change your mind."

"Sorral is not yet ready for a placement on Mars," Soval argued, "He should go to the Embassy in London. Sub-Ambassador Sarthel will find something simple for him to do."

"This is the problem, Soval," Fer'at chided his friend, "You want him to stay close to home and do simple things so that he does not embarrass himself or his family. But I believe he learned a great deal by going by himself to Vulcan, and he surprised you by staying the whole year. He did not perform quite as badly as you had feared...especially with regard to his work teaching the children in Shir'Kaya. Apparently, he inspired them to want to read the old stories of Vulcan's past."

"Fer'at," Soval explained to the psychiatrist, "Sorral is just beginning his studies. He has recently disgraced himself by engaging in some silly antics which were reported in the Earth newscasts. We cannot send him to Mars on his first assignment! When he went to Vulcan, that was different; it was for family and educational purposes, and not in any kind of professional capacity. I do not believe that he will function well at the Mars Embassy, because I know Sirtek, the Diplomatic Envoy there; and he has no patience for foolish behaviour."

"Yes," Fer'at concurred, "I know Sirtek as well, and I consider him to have the grace and intelligence of a sehlat...although perhaps I insult the Great Bear of the Desert."

"Fer'at, please. Your opinions of Sirtek are irrelevant. Soval must take a placement closer to home. He is not yet ready for Mars...I fear that he might, in his naïveté, become involved in unsavory elements. There are a growing number of Vulcanorions going to Mars because they cannot make a life for themselves on Vulcan."

"Soval," Fer'at remarked, "You hardly have to remind me about the lack of opportunity on Vulcan for the Orion hybrid people."

Fer'at himself had a Vulcan-Orion daughter named Jovan, whom he and his wife T'Lan had been raising for the past twenty years along with T'Lan and Fer'at's fully Vulcan son Sethir. Jovan's mother Orela had also been a Hybrid; her father had been a Vulcan and her mother had been a member of the green-skinned Orion species. Orela had tragically died at the hands of a Shir'Kaya drug lord. Her young daughter, Jovan, had been given over to her birth father Fer'at to raise. He and T'Lan had worked extremely hard to keep Jovan connected to her Vulcan rather than her Orion heritage so that she would not be drawn into the schemes of The Orion Syndicate.

The Orions were an aggressive, highly manipulative species which had been intent on creating populations of "hybrids" amongst his people and that of the Andorians' for some time now. Their goal, as far as Soval could determine, was to actively encourage the creation of the hybrids amongst the populations of the host worlds in order to one day colonize the planets. Soval believed, as did Fer'at, that the antidote to this was to raise the hybrids to be loyal to their host species—and in order to do this, the Drug Trade on their world needed to be eliminated. There were many dedicated Vulcans and "Vulcanorions" as the Vulcan-hybrids were called, working towards that goal in vulnerable tribal districts such as Soval's old home, Shir'Kaya. The districts had been a hot-bed of the Jaboraxin trade since Soval had been a child, over one hundred and ten years ago. The vulnerable areas were, Soval discovered when he later became involved in interplanetary diplomacy, being used as "gateways" for the Orion Syndicate's "conquest-by-stealth" schemes.

And now, to Soval's dismay, the Orion Syndicate appeared to be turning its sights upon Earth. Admiral Washington of the Mars colony had been sending reports of increasing numbers of Vulcanorions arriving from Shir'Kaya and other "gateways" on Vulcan. Soval was determined to do whatever he could to stop the Syndicate from establishing Mars as a "gateway" to Earth. The Humans themselves were at a vulnerable stage of their development, and they would require the assistance of Vulcans in order to neutralize the threat to their society. Soval was to meet with Vice-Admiral Forrest to discuss the issue today.

"Fer'at," Soval said to the psychiatrist, "I thank you for your suggestion with regards to my son going to Mars. I understand that he needs a challenging placement in order to keep him out of mischief. That placement, however, will need to be closer to home."

"And by "home", Soval, you mean the Earth."

"Yes, Doctor," Soval replied, struggling to repress his irritation, "I mean the Earth. Sorral was born here, and he has been raised here upon the insistence of his mother. I have accepted the fact that Sorral will never truly be a part of his original culture...his formative years are over, and I have failed to instill within him the proper amount of discipline for him to succeed on Vulcan. I know he is a young adult, but he will require further guidance if he is to embark on a career in diplomacy."

"Just as the Humans require your 'further guidance', Soval?" Fer'at asked, "I have known you for a long time, and I am aware of your tendency to be over-protective of those for whom you care deeply."

"Fer'at," Soval responded, attempting to keep his tone as neutral as possible, "I value your insights as a psychiatrist and as a friend. However, I am not in need of your analytic services at the present time. Your task is to focus on my son, not me. I would remind you to concentrate on that, and leave the diplomatic matters to myself and my staff. That will be all...you are dismissed."

"Yes, Ambassador," Fer'at conceded, "but if you should change your mind, I will be traveling to Mars in a week's time. I could accompany Soval there and supervise him. My daughter Jovan and her...consort...will be arriving at the colony in order to explore career opportunities which have become increasingly difficult for her to find on Vulcan."

"I will give the matter some thought, Doctor," Soval assured him, "Now if you will excuse me, I am due to meet with Admiral Forrest within the next few minutes."

"Yes, Ambassador," replied Fer'at. The psychiatric analyst exited without further comment, of which Soval was exceedingly grateful.