"I won't! I won't! and you can't make me, I won't, I won't,
I won't I won't I won't Iwon't Iwon't Iwon't Iwon't Iwon't I
won't I won't Iwon't Iwon't Iwon't Iwon'tIwo-"
Personal Log, Captain Rod Steiger, Federation Scoutship,
USS Lightfoot, Stardate 1625.9. Final entry.
Captain's Log, USS Enterprise, Captain James T Kirk
Stardate 1598.8
We have arrived at Starbase 9 and are preparing to take on
our passengers. The Enterprise crew have prepared with
their usual high standards and I have every confidence
that Operation Moses will proceed without a hitch.
Sulu touched his board, and the Enterprise drifted closer to
the docking bay. A slight correction, and her nose sat
exactly centre on the guidance target. Tiny figures,
dwarfed by the Enterprise's hugeness, somersaulted out
from the walls, dragging docking cables behind them, and
converged on the starship. The cables attached, they
withdrew and the slack in the cables was taken up until
the Enterprise sat tethered.
Sulu always hated this part. The ship which could leap
forward at his command, throwing herself joyously into
that otherspace of warp and showing the mundane world
her heels, tied and trapped like any freighter or tugshuttle.
He patted the edge of his console.
"It won't be for long." he consoled her, and then flushed at
Kirk's knowing smile. Sulu *knew* his personification of
the Enterprise was irrational, and he didn't care. He did
care about the captain's opinion of him, however, and he
had no desire to make a fool of himself with something
that the captain might see as superstition, or worse,
instability.
Kirk stepped down to the helmsman's station, and Sulu
lowered his eyes to his board. "All stations secure, sir."
he said.
"I didn't doubt it for a minute, Mr Sulu." Kirk said. "That
was an elegant docking, if ever I saw one." Then he bent
forward a little and lowered his voice. "And she never has
liked docking, either. Remind me to tell you about the
time Mr Jackson took his eyes off the board and nearly let
her go her wilful way right through the observation lounge
on Starbase 4."
Sulu looked up, met the captain's amused gaze. "Yes, sir."
he said, and returned the smile.
"Duty calls." Kirk said to the whole bridge. "I'll be with
Admiral Ullenski, confirming our manifest. All
Departments to stand by for my confirmation."
"Aye sir." the chorus came.
"Mr Spock, you're with me. Ms Uhura, you have the conn.
Please let the crew know how we stand."
"Yes, sir." she said, stepping down to the centre chair, and
tapping in the computer commands that recorded her as
duty officer. As Kirk and Spock walked up to the lift,
Uhura's voice was already sounding over all call, warm
and calm and slightly amused, telling the crew where their
captain was, what they were expected to do, and how
long it would be until they would be needed to do it.
In the lift, Spock turned to Kirk. "Captain," he said, "I
could not help over hearing your conversation with Mr
Sulu. Surely it is illogical to encourage him in irrational
superstition."
Kirk laughed. "You could look at it that way." he said.
"On the other hand, the last efficiency study Starfleet did
on helm officers two standard years ago produced some very
interesting results about that 'irrational superstition'."
"I am not aware of the study you refer to." Spock said.
"It was never widely circulated." Kirk said. "Academy
instructors, and captains and higher ranks only. It was
considered - not particularly productive to let it get
around. They compared the records of all dedicated helm
officers across the Fleet, and then subjected all those
they could get their hands on to an absolute battery of
tests - reflexes, co-ordination, psychological stability,
and then they interviewed them on how they felt about the
tests, how they felt about their job, how they felt about
their ship, how they felt about the breakfast menu practically.
And they discovered an interesting little thing, Spock."
He paused, grinning, until Spock obediently raised an
eyebrow and said: "I would be fascinated to know what
that 'little thing' was, sir."
"They discovered that the single common factor among
the helm officers whose records were at the top of the range -
officers like Sulu - wasn't their reflexes. They all tested
out in the top one percent, of course, but there were others
who fell in that range. And it wasn't co-ordination, and it
wasn't Academy results, and it wasn't anything else they'd
expected."
They arrived at the deck for the transporter room, and
again Kirk waited until Spock prompted "What was this
single common factor, sir?"
"Each and every one of them, Spock, thought of their ship
as 'alive'. A being, with a personality, with likes and
dislikes - oh, take the eyebrow down! I don't mean that
they actually *believed* their ships were living entities, or
that they imagined the ship talked to them, or anything-
no, it was a habit of thought. Like Mr Sulu, up there,
thinking that the Enterprise wouldn't be too happy about
being locked and docked in a Starbase. Officers who have
that kind of relationship with the ship come out on the top
of every efficiency list Starfleet has ever devised."
Mr Kyle saluted as they strode into the transporter room,
and Kirk nodded in acknowledgement. "Transporter
crews ready for the loading?" he asked, although he had
no doubt they would be.
"Yes, sir!" Kyle said, positively bursting with the chance
to tell the captain personally how well he'd done his job.
Kirk listened to crew rotations, maintenance back-ups,
scheduled tests and fail-safe sureties for several minutes
with great attention, nodding where appropriate and
complimenting the chief on each arrangement.
"Very good, Mr Kyle," he said at last. "We're bound for
Admiral Ullenski's office. Can you put us in a transporter
room close by?"
"Already laid in, sir!" Kyle said, and Kirk smiled again,
and walked up to the platform, Spock close behind.
"Energise when ready, Mr Kyle." he said.
When the transporter beam released them on the platform
of Starbase 9's third transporter room, Kirk stepped off
the platform immediately.
"Which way, Spock?" he said.
"Left, sir. Then the third right."
Although Kirk walked quickly, Spock's longer stride
enabled him to keep up with his captain without effort.
"Captain," he said, "Were the transporter crew reports not
among those you received yesterday?" If such an
important report, one critical to the success of the mission,
had not reached the captain, then he, Spock, was at fault.
"Of course they were, Spock." Kirk said. "As usual, your
efficiency ensured I had every report I needed."
"Then your purpose in requiring that verbal report from
Mr Kyle was merely an issue of morale."
"Never say 'merely' about morale." Kirk said, and stopped
in the corridor, forcing Spock to stop as well. Kirk's
expression was very serious, and he searched Spock's
face as if for some indication of understanding. "I know
you understand the importance of morale to our ship and
our crew. Never say merely."
"It was -" Spock began, and after a microsecond's
hesitation continued deliberately: "It was merely a figure
of speech, Captain."
Kirk laughed, and started walking again.
"Captain," Spock said, "Am I to understand from your
remarks before we beamed over that you encourage Mr
Sulu in his habit of referring to the Enterprise as a living
being because it improves his efficiency?"
"Partly." Kirk said, coming to a stop outside a door with
'Ullenski' on the nameplate. "Partly. And, of course," -
and the captain's smile was particularly mischievous -
"there are times that I half believe it myself." And he
strode through the door before Spock could do more
than raise an eyebrow, forcing the Vulcan to follow with
his response unsaid.
Ullenski's administrative assistant showed them through to
the Admiral immediately, and Ullenski himself was
already in mid-sentence as Kirk and Spock came through the
door.
"- *you* that we're on a tight timetable here, very tight
indeed. Never does *anybody* any good to disappoint
First In, no, not ever. And not this time. Are your people
ready, Captain?"
"Waiting for your word, Admiral." Kirk said. "Are there
any changes to our manifest or our orders?"
"No, no changes, no changes at all. Waiting for my word,
eh? Very proper of you, Captain, very proper indeed. Well,
consider it given, indeed, consider it given, my word yes."
Ullenski said.
Kirk took out his communicator, and though his face was
solemn Spock could see the glint in his eye that was
James T Kirk enjoying himself. "Uhura, this is the
captain. We have confirmation of the manifest. Please initiate
Operation Moses."
Spock's eyebrow went up. He had not heard the captain
refer to this operation by that name before. Ullenski was
chuckling.
"Well, well, Captain, are your crew going to part the Red
Sea?"
"Put the docking bay onscreen and see." Kirk said.
Ullenski keyed in the commands, and his eyes widened as
the picture resolved.
The Enterprise hung, still motionless and tethered, but no
longer alone. Her shuttlebay doors gaped open and the
full complement of shuttles were already moving at
reckless speed towards the landing bay at the docking
bay's edge. Even as the three men watched, the shuttles
landed in perfect formation, the containment field went up
to restore atmosphere to the landing bay, and the shuttle
doors flew open. Crew poured out and without hesitation
flew to their assigned posts at double-time, forming into
work-crews and beginning to move the crates of supplies
towards the shuttles even as the last crew members were
still departing.
'Well, well." Ullenski said. "It seems the Enterprise may
deserve its reputation after all. Computer, please
show the transport points."
The picture of the docking bay vanished to be replaced by
a cavernous room where crowds of people stood, luggage
by their sides, in a loosely organised queue. Enterprise
crew were moving among them, PADDs in hand,
organising beam out groups. One group dissolved into
multicoloured light almost immediately, and Kirk knew
that in the Enterprise's main transporter room there would
be crew members waiting to lead their passengers off the
transporter platform and into the corridor, taking them as
quickly as possible to the places where they would be
housed. For a while the corridors of the Enterprise would
seem chaotic to any observer who did not know the
pattern to which all the different teams were moving, but
by the appointed time - Kirk guessed that it would be well
within the appointed time - every passenger, every piece
of luggage, and every article of cargo, would be boarded,
ticked off, put in the right place and secured there.
Another group of people winked out of the transport point.
Most of those left were civilians, and Kirk was struck by
how many had the strained, scrubbed look of proud
poverty. He had always known, intellectually, that the
majority of those who volunteered to be in at the start-up
of a new base were, like colonists, those looking eagerly
for a better life. Those who were struggling, scraping
through by skimping on this and saving on that, but who
had nothing that, when weighed against the chance of a
better life, was strong enough to tip the balance of the
scales.
Some of the adults had the bony look of long periods of
never quite having enough to eat, and clothes that hung
too loosely. Look as he might, though, Kirk could not see
any child that looked less than well fed.
We'll get you there, he thought. We'll get you there, and
god willing you'll find it worth the trip.
"Moses." Ullenski said, and his voice was soft and
sad. "Will Starbase 34 be the promised land? Many of
these people thought their promised land was here."
Kirk cleared his throat. "Well, sir, we have business to
attend to. If you'll excuse us?"
When he and Spock got out into the corridor, Kirk used
his communicator to instruct Mr Singh that all the
passengers were to have an unlimited calorie allowance, and
the Quartermaster was to take on such supplies as were
necessary to ensure this.
"Aye sir." Singh said. Kirk could hear a babble of voices
behind him, children's among them, and guessed he was at
his post in Cargo bay 4, getting passengers bedded down
and comfortable. "I'll certainly do that sir."