§ § § - sometime in 2282
Fortunately for Lauren's and Inriya's peace of mind, M'sis'tenk's only royal edict so far had been to close the door of her room and keep out of her sight till she wanted them around again. T'Rala simply turned and walked away after that, but Lauren and Inriya were bound by their shared contempt for their roommate. "Couldn't we put in for a transfer?" Lauren wondered that evening, sitting on her own twin bed in the smaller room she was sharing with Inriya and T'Rala. "Nobody can live with a character like that."
"Of all the beings to be roommates to that so-called princess," Inriya lamented, "we have to be the chosen ones. Perhaps if we speak to Commander DeVanay..."
"I believe," said T'Rala then from her own twin bed, "that this experiment is intended to be a test of one's ability to get along with others. It is highly unlikely we will be allowed to petition for a different roommate. It has occurred to me, however, that we are surely not the only ones here who find themselves experiencing difficulties in their living arrangements."
"I wish Kylie could have been our roommate," Lauren admitted. "The four of us got along pretty well on the Enterprise. Even if Kylie does have to live with a bad apple, hers can't possibly match ours."
"Did you see that poor girl she calls her servant?" Inriya exclaimed, full of righteous wrath. "So thin I find it a wonder she can even stand on her own feet. Truly, T'Rala, even you must find it a moral outrage just to look at poor Arzi. I knew that system was corrupt, but to see first-foot evidence of it..."
"You must mean 'first-hand' evidence," Lauren said and grinned a little. "But Inriya, how do you know so much about our, uh, friend in there? Have you met her before?"
Inriya shook her head. "No, but their system was the first we discovered when my people first developed space flight. Their star, Clanim, is only twelve light-years from ours. There are six planets in their system and it is the innermost two that support life. Clanimid I carries the dominant population. The government is on that world, along with all the wealthy inhabitants of the system. All others live on Clanimid II—there is a tiny middle class that is a sort of governmental outpost for supervision of the rest of the population, who are all poor laborers, farmers, merchants, all trying desperately to scratch a living out of the poor soil and resources of their world."
"Are they the same species?" Lauren asked. "On the surface at least, both Mrs. Stink and Arzi look humanoid, but I could see a lot of physical differences."
"Who is Mrs. Stink?" inquired T'Rala. The question sounded incongruous coming from her.
Lauren snickered. "I just created a new nickname for our royal roommate. Her name sounds like those two words in English, you have to admit that. Tell us more about them, Inriya."
"Yes, all Clanimids are humanoid, but there are cosmetic differences, as you can see. Lack of nutrition causes white hair in the Lesser Clanimids—that's how the people of Clanimid II are known. The green hair you see on Mrs. Stink is natural to all Clanimids, so if Arzi were allowed to eat properly, she would also have it. Anyhow, the whole master/servant arrangement began several centuries ago, when the Lesser Clanimids were looking for a way to better themselves. The Greater Clanimids were generous at first in hiring the Lesser ones as servants in their homes, because they believed the Lessers would take what they had earned back to their own planet and work to improve it. Instead, the Lessers remained on Clanimid I and tried to rise to prominence among the people there. This angered the Greater Clanimids, and over the years the system grew corrupted until now, all Greater Clanimids believe the Lesser Clanimids exist simply to be servants. In the beginning the servants were treated well; now there is almost no servant who is not better described as a slave. The abuse is horrible. This is the reason the Clanimids have been denied membership in the Federation. The Greaters simply refuse to allow change in the current system."
"Wonder if Captain Kirk could do something about it if he knew," Lauren mused, thinking of similar situations she had seen Kirk resolve on the TV series.
"The Prime Directive of Starfleet stands in his way," Inriya said. "Have you forgotten about that?"
"Well, we aren't Starfleet," Lauren retorted. "So who's to say we couldn't try?"
Inriya laughed without humor. "We? Convince a Greater Clanimid to change the soft life she leads? Lauren, my friend from the island of dreams, you must leave those dreams behind. You alone cannot change the universe." She jumped off the bed. "I have had enough talk of the Clanimids. My friend Somartu resides in Building C and I think I shall try to contact him." With that, she left the room.
"What do you think, T'Rala?" Lauren ventured.
T'Rala looked up from the book she was reading and focused on Lauren. "I suggest," she offered, "that you do not refer to the princess as 'Mrs. Stink' in her presence." So saying, she returned to her book.
For a moment, Lauren stared at her, wondered whether to laugh, and finally gave up, falling back onto her bed. First thing tomorrow, she was going to find Kylie and tell her the entire story.
§ § §
A full three days passed, during which time Lauren grew very uneasy. No one, not even Roarke, had come to see how she was doing, and she was sure that by now they thought she was playing truant at school and her parents were probably drawing up plans to sue Roarke for not returning her from her fantasy.
The fantasy itself was not progressing very well. M'sis'tenk was more arrogant by the hour, it seemed; and no one, other than the self-styled princess herself, had yet heard Arzi utter a word. Lauren had not seen Kylie till late in the day after their arrival, and then had breathlessly poured out the story of the princess and her slave. Kylie had listened with great interest, then offered to send her Klingon roommate over to beat up M'sis'tenk and put everyone else, particularly Arzi, out of their misery. It was a sign of Lauren's state of mind that she had actually considered this suggestion.
Now it was mid-afternoon of Lauren's fourth day in her fantasy and she was on the verge of doing something drastic. It had been made clear to every last participant in the Spirit of Achievement experiment that they were all expected to pull their weight, do their share, contribute to the greater good, and a barrage of other clichés that had made Lauren's head hurt. It was obvious that M'sis'tenk had no intention of pulling her considerable weight; what was more, she refused to allow Arzi to do anything for anyone except her. Lauren was just about ready to snag a phaser from the first Starfleet crewperson she saw and put M'sis'tenk right out of existence. Never mind that it would probably put an ignominious end to her fantasy; the darn thing had gone on far too long anyway. So when Leslie appeared unexpectedly in the little kitchen that Lauren, Inriya and T'Rala shared, Lauren yelled, "Where've you been, Leslie Hamilton? I could kill you for not checking up on me before now! What took you so freakin' long?"
Leslie stared at her in amazement for a moment, then said, "What're you talking about? It's about ten on Sunday morning, you goof. How bad has it been that you think it's taken me ages to get here?"
"I've been here four days," Lauren informed her blackly. "You can't be serious that it's only Sunday morning. When I get back, they're going to haul me in for playing hooky from school."
Leslie stared some more, then frowned while her gaze shifted out of focus. "Maybe there's a glitch in the time travel," she murmured, half to herself. "If I'd known about that, I'd have asked Mr. Roarke before I came here." She came back to the here-and-now and studied her friend. "Well, other than that, how's the fantasy coming along?"
"There's loads to tell, so I hope you're planning to stay awhile," Lauren said, and with that related the story of meeting Kylie, Inriya and T'Rala, seeing some of the Enterprise crew, and the last three disastrous days with Princess M'sis'tenk and her sorely overworked servant Arzi. "I keep trying to think of some way to fix that," she said. "Obviously Mrs. Stink won't listen to reason, so I thought maybe I could talk to Arzi and make her see that she doesn't have to live this way. That green-haired horror doesn't do anything around here. And it's not bad enough that she won't do her share, she won't let Arzi help us either, let alone let us try to help Arzi."
"Mrs. Stink!?" Leslie blurted and burst out laughing. "That's a good one! She really does sound like a stinker, judging from what you've told me. You mentioned a Commander DeVanay...have you tried talking to her about this lazy roommate of yours and her poor slave?"
"Kylie and I finally talked Inriya and T'Rala into coming with us to do that. T'Rala's been saying all along that the whole idea of this experiment is to get along with other cultures, and she came only under duress. It turned out to be a waste of time, because Commander DeVanay said the same thing. Supposedly, Dr. McCoy and Mr. Sulu are down here for a few more days, but I haven't seen a trace of them since we landed. Kylie offered to send her Klingon friend over to beat up old Stinkeroo, but I turned her down. Now I wish I'd told her to go ahead, and have her bring a phaser while she was at it."
Leslie giggled. "Well, at least you're not bored," she remarked and held up both hands as if in surrender when faced with Lauren's glare. "Okay, sorry. You know, I can see both sides—you wanting to help Arzi out of her slave's existence, and Starfleet trying to teach all you guys how to live peacefully. I guess you just have to do what feels right. And if it feels right to you that you should try setting Arzi free, then what's stopping you? Do you think Mrs. Stink will have you shot at sunrise if you just sit down and talk to Arzi? She might say she's a princess, but you and Inriya and T'Rala have already defied her by refusing to become her indentured servants. When you get right down to it, she can't make you do anything at all, and she can't actually punish you in any way. She might scream and yell a lot, but that's about it."
Lauren let Leslie's words sink in for a couple of minutes, and then slowly smiled. "You're right," she said softly. "Let her rant...I'm in just the right mood to yell back."
They heard knocking and then the sound of the door opening, and Kylie's voice called, "Lauren? Are you there? I've a problem and I don't know what to do."
Lauren leaned out the kitchen doorway. "Be right there," she said, and retreated back through the door—only to discover that she was alone in the room. Just like Roarke, Leslie had vanished, seemingly into thin air. "Just wait till I get back home," she muttered aloud. "I'll make her tell me how she did it."
"What was that?" Kylie asked, coming into the kitchen.
Lauren jerked to attention. "Nothing," she said. "Just thinking out loud. So what's the problem?"
"Enterprise is being called away from the planet," Kylie said. "Seems that a band of Klingons is threatening to take over a couple of planets inhabited by blokes who call themselves Clanimids. And my friendly Klingon roommate Kah'gos wants to extend the battle to our lovely little experiment."