Star Trek - Strange New Worlds VII

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Contents
Introduction
Dean Wesley Smith
Star Trek®
“A Test of Character”
Kevin Lauderdale
“Indomitable”
Kevin Killiany
“Project Blue Book”
Christian Grainger
“The Trouble with Tribals”
Paul J. Kaplan
“All Fall Down”
Muri McCage
“A Sucker Born”
Pat Detmer
“Obligations Discharged”
Gerri Leen
Star Trek
The Next Generation®
“Life’s Work”[Grand Prize]
Julie A. Hyzy
“Adventures in Jazz and Time”[Third Prize]
Kelly Cairo
“Future Shock”
John Coffren
“Full Circle”
Scott Pearson
“Beginnings”
Jeff D. Jacques
“Solemn Duty”
Jim Johnson
Star Trek
Deep Space Nine®
“Infinite Bureaucracy”
Anne E. Clements
“Barclay Program Nine”
Russ Crossley
Star Trek
Voyager®
“Redux”
Susan S. McCrackin
“The Little Captain”
Catherine E. Pike
“I Have Broken the Prime Directive”
G. Wood
“Don’t Cry”
Annie Reed
—Star Trek®—
Enterprise
“Earthquake Weather”
Louisa M. Swann
Speculations
“Guardians”[Second Prize]
Brett Hudgins
“The Law of Averages”
Amy Sisson
“Forgotten Light”
Frederick Kim
Contest Rules
About the Contributors
POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc.
1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY
10020
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead
is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2004 by Paramount Pictures. All rights reserved.
STAR TREK is a Registered Trademark of
Paramount Pictures.
This book is published by Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc., under exclusive license
from Paramount Pictures.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
ISBN: 0-7434-9379-6
First Pocket Books trade paperback edition June 2004
POCKET and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Visit us on the World Wide Web:
http://www.SimonSays.com/st
http://www.startrek.com
Contents
Introduction
Dean Wesley Smith
Star Trek®
“A Test of Character”
Kevin Lauderdale
“Indomitable”
Kevin Killiany
“Project Blue Book”
Christian Grainger
“The Trouble with Tribals”
Paul J. Kaplan
“All Fall Down”
Muri McCage
“A Sucker Born”
Pat Detmer
“Obligations Discharged”
Gerri Leen
Star Trek
The Next Generation®
“Life’s Work”[Grand Prize]
Julie A. Hyzy
“Adventures in Jazz and Time”[Third Prize]
Kelly Cairo
“Future Shock”
John Coffren
“Full Circle”
Scott Pearson
“Beginnings”
Jeff D. Jacques
“Solemn Duty”
Jim Johnson
Star Trek
Deep Space Nine®
“Infinite Bureaucracy”
Anne E. Clements
“Barclay Program Nine”
Russ Crossley
Star Trek
Voyager®
“Redux”
Susan S. McCrackin
“The Little Captain”
Catherine E. Pike
“I Have Broken the Prime Directive”
G. Wood
“Don’t Cry”
Annie Reed
—Star Trek®—
Enterprise
“Earthquake Weather”
Louisa M. Swann
Speculations
“Guardians”[Second Prize]
Brett Hudgins
“The Law of Averages”
Amy Sisson
“Forgotten Light”
Frederick Kim
Contest Rules
About the Contributors
Introduction
Dean Wesley Smith
Every year for the past seven years I have looked forward to October and readingStar Trek® short
stories by the very talented, very smart fans of the shows. I have often said that as aStar Trek fan, I have
the best job in the world, and the hardest. And again this year, that proved to be true. I had to pick just
twenty-three stories out of the boxes and boxes of wonderful stories that poured into the contest. The
wonderful part was reading them all, the hard part was picking just twenty-three.
But now this book of stories is in your hands, and I need help from all youStar Trek fans out there. I
need you to write one or two or three or moreStar Trek short stories, following the rules in the back of
this book, and send them in by October 1, 2004. Why am I putting out a call for even more stories than I
normally get? Simple. Many of the fans who have been sending me stories and trying to get into this
contest for the last six or seven years have sold too many stories. This contest, by its rules, has a limit of
only three professionally published short stories by the deadline of the contest. That’s why you might see
the same name two or three years running, or scattered over the years, and then that author is disqualified
from sending in any more. As you might have noticed, many of them are still writingStar Trek, only over
in the novels. Authors like Ilsa Bick, Dayton Ward, Christina York, and others. They started here and
then eliminated themselves with too many sales, leaving room for new writers to join the fun.
On a fewStar Trek boards in different locations, people have pointed out to me this year that a very
large number of the writers I have bought once or twice can no longer be in the book again. And this
includes this year’s Grand Prize winner, Julie Hyzy, who has been sending in stories regularly for five or
six years now. She and many others have “graduated,” as they say on the boards.
And as an editor, that scares me, which is why I need all of your help. Come on, haven’t you been
watching an episode, seen a detail, and thought, “Wow, that would make a wonderful story?” Well, I
need you to write that story this next year and send it in. I give every story the exact same chance at
being in the book, and if you write a great story, it will make it in.
What kind of stories am I looking for? My best suggestion on that question, which I get a lot, is to read
this volume, and then go find copies of the previous volumes of this anthology. Not only will you have a
wonderful reading experience, but by the time you are done reading all seven of the books, you will have
a very good sense of the stories that have made it intoStrange New Worlds over the years.
So pass the word. Tell otherStar Trek fans that the cutting edge of theStar Trek world is right here, in
the short stories in these volumes, stories written by fans like you. Tell your friends, tell the other
members of your starship crews, maybe challenge other writers in your writers’ group, then sit down and
write a story or two and send them in. You’ll discover that the writing is a lot of fun, and if one of your
stories makes it into the book, you’ll have added to theStar Trek universe and be aStar Trek author. And
trust me, the only thing more fun than readingStar Trek is being aStar Trek author.
This is your chance. Enjoy the reading, then get to the writing.
Star Trek®
A Test of Character
Kevin Lauderdale
The Klingons were gaining on him.
“A little faster,” Kirk said through clenched teeth, as if saying it could make it so. He leaned forward in
the bridge’s command chair. “Just a little faster…”
“Still closing, sir,” said Gaton at the helm.
Kirk punched a button on his chair’s right arm. “Engineering, I need everything we’ve got for speed!
Redirect it all! Life support too!” He took his finger off the button, breaking the connection. “Everybody
hold your breath,” Kirk muttered.
“They’re firing again!” reported Gaton.
The ship shook from blast impact. There were sparks and flashes of fire all around the bridge. People
flew from their chairs. Someone called through the sounds of the emergency klaxons that the energizers
had been hit, and someone else yelled that the remaining shields were failing.
Smoke began to fill the bridge. There were already bodies on the floor.
Then a voice from the ceiling called out,“It’s all over. Let’s have the lights.”
The viewscreen in front of Kirk rose, revealing the lanky, white-haired Admiral Jublik stepping up and
into the training module.
“Damn,” said Kirk. His ship had been destroyed. TheKobayashi Maru scenario had beaten him. Again.
Kirk felt no guilt as he pulled the computer disc out of his pocket. No bigger than his palm and colored a
bright green, it brought a smile to his face. Just yesterday, in his History of Technology course, he had
seen a video of twentieth-century Earth scientists using discs that looked exactly like this. The packaging
hadn’t changed over the centuries, but the amount of information that could be stored sure had.
Kirk stood in a darkened side hallway, facing the back of a computer. Except for one slot and a
keypad, it was just a wall of cold black and gray metal. He didn’t bother to look around. He knew there
wouldn’t be anybody else in the building at this time of the morning. 0200 hours was the middle of
lights-out for the Academy’s cadets, and even the most dedicated of the instructors were getting some
well-deserved shut-eye.
It bothered Kirk a little that he wasn’t supposed to be in the training building at this time of the morning,
but only because he wasn’t supposed to be anywhere but bed at this time of the morning. It didn’t bother
him at all though, that, making his way to the computer, his palm light had illuminated a sign readingUSE
OF THIS FACILITY WITH AUTHORIZED SUPERVISION ONLY . As far as Kirk was concerned,
he wasn’t using it. He wasn’t operating any of the machinery of the simulation. He was just inserting a
computer disc and pressing a few buttons. There were no passwords on the software loader. There
weren’t even any physical locks.
Kirk’s disc held the completeKobayashi Maru scenario: the Neutral Zone, the freighter, and the
Klingons. Until two hours ago, it had also contained the keys to inevitable failure. If you stayed and
fought, the Klingons got you. And if you tried to run, the Klingons got you.
It had taken every free minute of Kirk’s time for nearly two months, but he had managed first to obtain a
copy of the computer program that ran the simulation and then to hunt down and remove all the
“optimization protocols”—the sections of code that made sure you would fail, no matter what.
Just that night Kirk had found the last one: a particularly nasty booby trap that saw to it that if you
somehow managed to evade the three Klingon ships you faced, another group of three would arrive from
the opposite direction to box you in. You could not escape.
Kirk frowned. His second time taking the test, he had been sure that a flat-out retreat once you lost the
Kobayashi Maru ’s signal was the right answer. The first time, he had stayed and searched after losing
the freighter’s signal—and his ship had been destroyed.
Both times, he had done what he was supposed to do. When you got a distress signal, you went to
render help. After all, Section 10 was only a little way into the Klingon Neutral Zone.
But Kirk had wondered if it was a trap. Within the universe of the simulation, there really was a
Kobayashi Maru ; she was in his ship’s database. Still, the Klingons could have faked the distress call.
So, on his second attempt, he had gone after the crippled ship prepared to leave at a split-second’s
notice.
When the freighter’s signal disappeared and the Klingons arrived, Kirk had stuck to his plan. He had felt
bad abandoning the rescue mission, but he knew he would have felt worse had he simply tried the same
tactics as in his first attempt.
Kirk remained convinced that if you could survive long enough, and were clever enough, there was a
freighter out there waiting to be saved—along with three hundred eighty-one people.
Those people were what had first started Kirk thinking that the test was unfair. In the real world, no
neutronic fuel carrier would have three hundred passengers aboard. Eighty-one crew members was
outrageous enough, but passengers! Ancient oil tankers hadn’t carried casual passengers. Available
space concerns aside, the things just weren’t configured for them. It didn’t make sense.
The whole idea of a no-win scenario didn’t make sense to Kirk. It wasn’t just that he didn’t like to
lose—Finnegan had taught him the hard way that no matter how fast or clever you were, you sometimes
lost—it was that Kirk didn’t like to lose unnecessarily. TheKobayashi Maru simulation was not a true test
of his command abilities because no matter what he did, the computer would arrange things so that he
lost. The program was not only unfair, it was inaccurate. Besides, it wasn’t as if he had programmed
stress fractures into the Klingons’ hulls or anything. Kirk had not added one line of code to the program.
He had merely removed those things that unbalanced the equation.
Everyone said that it didn’t matter which path you chose, it was how you walked it that mattered. The
Kobayashi Maru was a lesson. It was supposed to teach you that commanding officers were not gods:
try as they might, they couldn’t always get out of tough jams. The scenario was also a way, without
racking up actual casualties, to instill the lesson that people did, and would, die under your command.
And, of course, it was a test of character. In the end, which was more important to you: trying to save
the freighter’s crew or trying to save your own? And how well did you deal with your failure when you
chose the wrong path? Never mind that there was no right path.
Kirk turned the disc over in his hands. It was amazing what you could learn if you spent enough time in a
library. His research had indicated that this unmarked software slot was the key to the whole operation.
He inserted his disc.
There was no such thing as a no-win scenario for Kirk. Every time you rolled the dice, somebody won
and somebody lost—unless you were using loaded dice. As far as Kirk was concerned, the Academy
was using loaded dice, and it was his job to unload them.
Admiral Zheng, who ran the simulation scenarios along with Admiral Jublik, had called Kirk a glutton for
punishment when the cadet had asked if he could take theKobayashi Maru a third time. But they didn’t
have any reason not to allow it.
Kirk typed in the loading sequence, waited a moment, retrieved his disc, and then crept back to bed.
“Captain’s log.U.S.S. Horizon on a training mission to Gamma Hydra, Section Fourteen,” reported Kirk
for the bridge’s recorder. “So far—”
摘要：

ContentsIntroductionDeanWesleySmithStarTrek®“ATestofCharacter”KevinLauderdale“Indomitable”KevinKilliany“ProjectBlueBook”ChristianGrainger“TheTroublewithTribals”PaulJ.Kaplan“AllFallDown”MuriMcCage“ASuckerBorn”PatDetmer“ObligationsDischarged”GerriLeenStarTrekTheNextGeneration®“Life’sWork”[GrandPrize]J...

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