Chapter 13

Kirk was alone in some far place. But it was a place where aloneness did not exist. He had only to stop fighting, let go, and he would not have to be locked back into his single skull, his stubbornly solitary body. It would be a relief. And it would clear the way for something else which he knew he had to stand aside and allow. He knew nothing very clearly, but he knew that there was some time-bomb ticking away for the Vulcan, and that Sola held some answer to that. He would have given anything if she did not. Except the one thing it would cost: Spock’s life.

He struggled toward consciousness, aware of some desperate urgency to reach them. But he was dragged back down toward the Oneness. There was an illusion of safety there, a presence which had saved him once-and let him go…gray eyes and an ironic mouth and a quality of certainty which had warned him that he would find what he needed-on the planet where he had found her …And how would the gray eyes have known that? Kirk was struggling for some vague memory of that gray-eyed presence. It had held him in its power, saved him from something, and-temporarily- let him go. But the compelling invitation was still there.

Then abruptly he was caught by another rip-tide, another call to a different Oneness-this one a totality so strange that he recoiled, knowing that it was utterly alien to him, and utterly dangerous. It reached for him with a power which was unanswerable. It was a call of Sirens, Sirens not of body but of mind, Sirens of the Unknown-And he had always been the Ulysses who would have had himself lashed to the mast to be able to hear the Sirens’ call…

But he was lashed to no safety now, and the Sirens of Totality were claiming him…

Kirk seemed to feel someone take his hand. He seized that someone’s hand as a life-line, crushing it, but it did not crush. He pulled himself back, knowing that he had come very close to both death and Oneness.

For a long time he merely looked at it and held to the hand. Finally, he said, “That is the second time you wouldn’t let me go. I was very annoyed.”

She smiled. “I do not apologize. Where would you have gone-this time?”

He shook his head. “There was some-dream, possibly. Two forces of Oneness fought over me, and one of them was-Totality. It could not be fought. A Siren Song of the mind, sung exactly for me. Sola-someone has planned this, somehow.”

She frowned. “The same thought has been coming to me. But how? And-who? Someone might have learned that I would have to come here. Someone might have arranged for you to come. But who could know what the effect of our meeting would be? I have not spoken your name, aloud, for years.”

He smiled. “Maybe-to a sufficiently astute mind-it was written all over us. Just in our records. For the same reason that I knew yours, and you mine.”

“Spock-also knew.”

“I wonder if anyone counted on that?” He pulled her down to sit beside him. “Sola, tell me now. Was there any way in which you arranged this?”

She sat very straight. “When I saw the Enterprise, I sent a Free Agent code signal requesting it be ordered to turn back.”

“Turn back-when you knew who we were, and you needed help?”

“I did not think your starship, nor you, would survive untaken. The Enterprise is much too dangerous a weapon to give the Totality. And to give them you would be still more dangerous.”

“One man?”

“You are known to the galaxy as the Starship Captain who is the symbol and the reality of what takes us to the stars. You are the last man who would choose a Oneness. But if they could claim you-what would it do for their cause?

Kirk shook his head. “Am I the last amoeba? Sola, how do we know that Gailbraith is not right-that we are defending our little, limited lives against the great multicelled experiment in evolution? It was that first little multicelled blob which finally climbed out on land, and up to stars.”

“That is the question which sent me back to Zaran,” she said.

“To do what?” he asked. “What I never understood is how you could give up your starship.”

“You risked yours-your command, your career-once to take Spock to Vulcan against a direct Starfleet order. I know Vulcan well enough to guess that it was for his life…”

He shrugged. “Then you would know there was no question. It is not the same as giving up the stars for an abstract cause. To free your people?”

“That, and more. I saw that the galaxy would have to deal with Oneness and that Zaran would become the focal point. I believe the Totality has found a way to use the native powers of females of my species to force unity on the missing ships. It may be nearing the solution of how to force it on the galaxy. If it could also unite with other forms of Oneness, such as Gailbraith’s-or capture you…or both…it would take the galaxy.”

Kirk started to sit up, found that he couldn’t. “I have to warn Spock. In the dream-I remembered that Gailbraith warned me…to expect you. If he is behind this, if he brought us together-” He caught her hand. “What powers of females of your species, Sola?”

“When we bond with a life-mate,” she said, “it is a psionic joining. Out of it the female can create a wider psionic unity. Once it was only of the tribe for a hunt. Now certain females might be made to unite a planet, perhaps even a galaxy.”

“You?” he asked.

“Unknown,” she said in a tone which reminded him of Spock. “But the Totality believes I am at the head of the list. Perhaps even that I will possess a new level of power.”

He looked at the meeting of their hands. “Then it would be to their advantage-to bring you a life-mate.”

“It has been tried. Various males were ‘planted’ on me. Without success. Until n-“

He put up a hand and stopped her from saying it. But the hand touched her lips, then her face, then slipped into the tawny hair to pull her down to him. “If that was their plan,” he murmured, “make the most of it.”

He felt her smile against his mouth.

After a time she lifted her head and looked down to him. “If that is their plan,” she managed, “we are playing with anti-matter.”

He laughed softly. “We are, anyway.” Then a thought struck him and the other part of his dream came back to him. “Sola-is Spock all right?”

Some expression he could not read touched her face. “Spock is-quite all right.”

He was remembering now. “In the scoutship he said he was a dead man. And you-knew what he meant. You said only one act would save him. Sola-I can’t have understood what you said.”

“You understood me perfectly.”

“That Spock would have to deal with you in some way? I saw him learn that in the clearing. And you are-not dreamed of in Vulcan philosophy. But then Spock himself was never exactly contemplated in Vulcan philosophy.”

“No.”

“He would find you-most uncommon.” Kirk smiled. “But why not? And with those emotions which of course he does not have, he would be angry with you and with himself over what happened to me. Maybe the primitive Vulcan under that veneer would have liked to break your neck for you-or at least bend it. But Spock didn’t do that, obviously.” His eyes narrowed, seeing something dark on her jawline. “Or did he? Sola-I thought earlier that when he saw you-it triggered an old Vulcan pattern for him. I hoped I was wrong.”

He stopped and she did not answer, letting him work it out. He realized only then that there was some subtle change he had sensed in her, something she had been telling him without words.

“You said-only one act, one choice could save him?”

She nodded. “And I had only one choice, if he was Spock enough to save himself. I made it.”

His hand tightened on hers and then released it suddenly, as if he caught himself in some impropriety. “My mistake!” he said.

She pulled her hand away sharply and started to rise. “Mine,” she said. “That was the risk I took.”

His hand shot out and caught her wrist and pulled her down again with surprising power. “Stop that,” he ordered. “If you made your choice, you can damn well stay until I understand it.”

Now he looked at her very hard and saw the strain, the effort, the pride. “Is it possible,” he asked, “that you meant what you said-to both of us?”

She laughed then. “They had to send the one man in the galaxy who would know that that was the right question.”

“Answer me.”

“Yes. Always. Exactly.”

“Tell me now, exactly.”

“Vulcan physiological control can be broken down. By too much mental contact, by Oneness, by personal affinity. Love. Or the need for it, the hope, the longing. And even by the philosophical search for a way out of the Vulcan box,” Sola said. “If you exist, then Spock’s Vulcan theory of non-emotion is already strained to the snapping point. But he has lived with that. If I also exist, my “logic” may be the straw which breaks his back.”

“Or-his heart?” Kirk said.

“Literally,” she said, “he was prepared to die, not to impose the consequences of his state on me-nor on any of your Human crew, who are much too fragile. I was not prepared to let him go, either. I told him he would leave you nowhere to go but Oneness. He was not prepared to leave you to that. But he was Vulcan enough to have no choice left-except one. And he was Spock enough to make it.”

“You-did it only to save his life?”

“No. I would have done it for that. But that was not my reason. He is Spock.”

Kirk sighed. “Yes. He is.”

She lifted her head. “I had also another reason. There would have been no choice left for us if I had destroyed Spock. There is one now, and it is yours.”

“Did you tell Spock that?”

“Yes. And that it was not treason.”

“Isn’t it? Not for you, possibly. Sola-did you say that the choice is mine?”

She nodded, suddenly wary. She saw effort in his face.

“Then go to him.”

She pulled back as if he had hit her. This time he did sit up, heedless of the pain and of the room’s lurching. He pulled her to him and held her as if it was a punishment for both of them. It was. He could not escape the too-specific vision of other arms holding her. And she could not forgive him for telling her to go-nor could she make herself pull away. He did not release her until they were both ravaged, knowing that it was a taste they should not have allowed. Drink deep-or taste not…

“Did you suppose I would take you away from him now?” he asked.

She shot to her feet and her eyes were angry. “Yes! He does not require any favors.”

“I know what he does not require. And what he does. Sola, I have broken my-anatomy- trying to get Spock out of that box. And if you have done it-even for a moment-” He shook his head. “If you saw Prometheus chained to his rock, and still keeping on, dragging chains, rock, vultures, and all-and then for a moment he was free…”

He held himself up by the strength of her hand and looked at her as if he would break her in half. “Is the choice mine?” he demanded.

She lifted her head and met his eyes. “Yes.”

“Then, when you leave this room, you will not come back unless in the line of duty. You do not have to remember that I exist. Whatever might have been, these next days, at least, cannot be mine. You will go to him, and you will be to him-what you are. Will you do it?”

Sola was on her feet suddenly, standing rigidly, as if in the military manner of facing punishment. Her face was the battlefield of some sense that it was flatly impossible-and the sudden realization that it was not.

“I did give you my word,” she said flatly.

“Not as punishment,” he said. “Not if it is punishment.”

“And if it would not be?” she asked, not sparing him, clearly not wanting to.

He set his jaw. “Then go.”

“For him?” she asked.

He knew that she saw the weakness hitting him again. “Yes,” he said. “And for me. You haven’t finished with Spock. You may never finish with him. Sola, I am the galaxy’s greatest living expert on Spock. If you’ve seen him begin to shake off the vultures, you could not have eyes for anything else. Not now. I may pin his Vulcan ears back for him”- he was shaking now and he could barely sit up- “later,” he said ruefully, and she caught him and eased him back down.

She felt his forehead, smoothed it out with a touch of the life-energy until the shaking quieted. “Idiot,” she said. “I am the fool. I will go now. But I will be back.”

He caught her hand. “No. You gave me the choice.”

She met his eyes then. “I cannot answer for what I would feel for the Spock who would exist at the end of those days.”

“Don’t you suppose I know that?” he said harshly. “But don’t you know-I want to set that Spock free, too? I’ve broken my head to jar that Spock loose, for years.”

She merely stood and looked at him, for once at a loss. “You have said the one thing which would make me go-and you have made it impossible.”

He grinned weakly. “You’ll manage. I want-that Sola, too.”

“I wanted that Sola-from you.”

“I would have liked that,” he said. “My fault. I should have tracked you to the ends of the galaxy, years ago.”

“Yes,” she said, and he heard the edge in her voice. “You should have.”

He lifted his head, and he knew that his eyes were angry with her. “You knew where I was.” He jerked his head toward the door. “Call Spock.”

“Spock?” she said, startled.

He nodded. “I can afford the luxury.”

She stepped to the intercom. “So can he.”

Before she could touch it the doors opened and Spock stood in them.

“Mr. Spock, report,” Kirk said.

“On the ship?” Spock asked involuntarily.

“Certainly on the ship, Mr. Spock,” Kirk said with a certain wicked innocence. Short of pinning the Vulcan’s ears back, that tone would have to do.

“All vital systems appear to be-functional,” the Vulcan said, possibly not to be outdone in innocence.

“Including yours, Mr. Spock?” Kirk looked pointedly at the Vulcan himself.

“I was referring primarily to mechanical systems, Captain.”

“Indeed. Very well. Carry on, Mr. Spock.”

“Sir?” The Vulcan sounded faintly scandalized.

“Dismissed, Mr. Spock. You have-the con, among other things-until further notice. I won’t need you.”

“Sir,” Spock said firmly, beginning to get the picture, and not certain that he liked it. “I am entirely-functional.”

“I never doubted it,” Kirk said. “I, however, am not, at the moment. Get out of here, both of you, and let me loaf.”

For a moment he saw Spock catch Sola’s eye and see that she was rather proud of both of them.

“I see,” Spock said. “Recommendation noted, Captain. I shall, however, be rather busy with command duties. Since you are not fit, I will give you a full report-later.”

He started to turn.

“Spock!” Kirk said in a tone which would have cut glass. “Now, Mr. Spock.”

Spock turned back, but now the private man dropped away and the command officer remained, looking at Kirk with the unspoken respect of their years. “Captain,” he said, “we are Condition Seven, under alien mental attack. I must conclude that you are a primary target, perhaps the primary target, and that Sola’s presence may be related to your danger. Crew members have been made to unlock essential locks and sabotage reporting systems. We have detected on the planet below camouflaged geo-thermal power readings and intelligent life-form readings in a solitary volcano near the clearing where Sola landed. It is doubtless the starship-trap advance base of the Zaran Totality. Our crew is being taken over, and the Enterprise will, at the present rate, swiftly fall prey to the Marie Celeste syndrome.”

Kirk merely looked at him for a moment, then he swung his legs down and stood up. Sola was close enough to catch him as he fell….