NEW Aegyptus, TOS-AU, Ancient Destroyer, PG13, 2/4 (Ancient Destroyer)
Gojirob
Author : ‘Goji’ Rob Morris
Series : The TOS-based AU, The Ancient Destroyer Cycle
Type : Conflict; Drama; Adventure
Part : 2/4
Characters : Sarek, Saavik, Peter Kirk, Characters in flashback
Rating : PG13
Summary : Sarek and Saavik have rescued Peter Kirk from Admiralty
Hall; but the flight to safety will not be a smooth one
Aegyptus
by Rob Morris
We’re going to Vulcan. I always felt a connection to it, but I don’t
know why.
I remember seven great heroes, who sailed the stars, and made me feel
at home.
Or were they just a holovid fantasy that I got lost in?
The Ambassador, Mister Spock’s father, apologized to me for the cot-
bed I have to lie down in. But it feels so soft, so warm—and Saavik is
here with me. Why would he apologize?
Is Ambassador Sarek in pain? And why are there two other people inside
his head?
They tell me that they’ve been in his head all of his life, and that
they have to get out.
The world doesn’t make any sense.
----------------------------
Saavik stared in wonder at the readout.
“Father, there is a planetary body on sensors. There should not be one
here.”
Sarek took in the readout, then nodded.
“That, Saavik, is the legendary Sol-X, or Sector 001-10.”
The girl was not the scientist her unacknowledged birth-father Spock
was, but she understood this well enough.
“A tenth planet in Earth’s solar system? Why does no one know of it?”
Sarek looked in on the sleeping boy Peter Kirk, so deprived for over a
decade that the cot-bed in Shuttle Surak seemed to him like a downy
mattress in a luxury hotel.
“Because, as with your brother, the Order Of The Ancient Destroyer did
not wish anyone to know of its existence.”
Saavik Brianna Kirk seemed to become nervous.
“Father, I have yet to inform Peter of our family connection. In his
fragile state, I feared his mistaking my adoption by Uncle Jim for his
being replaced.”
This was not the whole reason, and perhaps Sarek sensed this, but he
did not question her given reason.
“You will need to inform him, eventually. Perhaps when his sense of
self and time passages is clearer.”
Saavik also presented Sarek with the recording of Hall activities as
regarded Peter Kirk. The Ambassador winced openly at the record of the
boy’s brutalization, and subsequent retaliation before his recapture.
“Father, if this Colonel West is to be believed, Peter’s acts of
fierce resistance ended plans for a political coup and a general purge
of Starfleet officers not loyal to the Order. They apparently had
plans to target Uncle Jim and his crew, first and foremost.”
Sarek looked over at the boy. He then thought of Spock, so savaged on
Hellguard that he could not recall having become Saavik’s father. The
Vulcan and master of peace-making fought back the urge to feel joy at
Peter Kirk’s retaliation.
“Then, it is life-kind itself that owes him a debt, Saavik-kam. A debt
he will be owed again, I fear.”
Saavik nodded.
“I also came to the conclusion, Father, that this Colonel West must
have been your contact within Admiralty Hall.”
Sarek gazed upon his unacknowledged granddaughter with appreciative
eyes. He had never told her he had such a contact.
“He would be in such a position. Tell me—were you forced to take a
life, as I feared would become necessary?”
Saavik looked down.
“Their means of holding Peter was a blood-simple one. Doors of great
mass and density were situated along the sloping downward path. At one
of them were perhaps two hundred armed guards. They saw past my
technological disguise and attacked me. While they could not kill me,
any one of them could have sounded further alarms. I was forced to act
decisively.”
Sarek felt regret at this, but the stealth of their effort was its
paramount asset.
“Were there any other casualties?”
“I cannot imagine that the lobby guards that allowed me in will do
very well in a short time. Then there is Admiral T.E. Bunson. She—had
draped her nude form over Peter’s cryo-chamber. She very nearly
defeated me. Peter awoke, and used his abilities to de-limb her. Those
limbs proved to be cybernetic, something she had done to herself. She
is alive, but until they find her, she is in no condition to give them
information.”
Sarek recalled accepting this loathsome woman’s handshake at a
ceremony, and sensing no thoughts at all from her.
This now made sense.
“Though a hateful sort, her life guarantees the stability of the
Hall’s structure and power. In this, our Colonel West was correct.
Saavik, I will guide the ship manually through the cloaked fields
surrounding the tenth planet. I will be in the cockpit area. Will you
stay with Peter?”
Her simple answer gave him pause.
“Always.”
*What had passed between them?*, thought Sarek. Perhaps, he mused,
Saavik simply liked having someone to care for, a not uncommon thing
for a child as lonely as her.
When the two were alone, Peter woke up. On the floor on a futon next
to him, Saavik took note of this.
“Are you well?”
“Guess.”
His tone clearly indicated that he meant ‘I Guess’ rather than
challenging her to some riddle game.
“Peter, I could sing a song Aunt Nyta taught me.”
“Okay.”
Recalling the words and tone Uhura had shown her, Saavik began.
“Maybe far away; Or maybe real nearby; He may be pouring her coffee;
She may be straightening his tie. Maybe in a house; All hidden by a
hill; She's sitting playing piano, He's sitting paying a bill.”
She saw his tired eyes already closing again.
“Good night, Peter.”
“Saavik?”
“Yes?”
“Aunt Nyta drinks tea. Uncle Jim doesn’t wear ties.”
“Go to sleep, Peter.”
“Good night, Saavik.”
In the control area, Sarek found he could not bear to watch more than
a few minutes of the footage of Peter Kirk’s brutalization by the
Admirals. This boy was the son of his son’s brother, and the brother
of Sarek’s own granddaughter. Emotions he had spent decades telling
Spock Vulcans did not have now assaulted him mercilessly.
“I am a Vulcan. There is control. I am control.”
Yet suddenly Sarek no longer felt in control of his own memories.
-----------
2222, Vulcan
“I stand before you today to proclaim that the last words of Surak are
fulfilled in me. I am The Rock Of Prophecy, meant to bring low the
beast Gh’draeh and his hateful Order Of The Ancient Destroyer. I will
begin my…”
Sarek felt the touch of his grandmother, the Lady T’Pau, and then he
felt immense pain. He saw the face of his new bride, T’Rea, cold and
impassive, and he saw the face of his grandmother, heavy with contempt
and disgust. Before losing consciousness, he realized she had used a
forbidden technique on him. This was his last conscious thought for
five years.
-------------
2278
When he awoke after those five years, he had been told that the
heretical T’Rea was gone, his marriage annulled. Sarek could not help
but feel true rage at the manner in which Sra Sra T’Pau had summarily
shut down his mind, to prevent him from ‘spouting on’ about the Rock
Of Prophecy.
*You and I are not so different, Peter. Lost time, followed by
awakening to a world no longer the one you knew.*
He was dispatched as junior consul to the Vulcan Embassy on Earth.
Staven, who had almost allowed the use of General Order Seven to go
unchallenged some decades ago, was still Ambassador. Sarek found him
challenging, and now he would find him difficult. Perhaps even
insuperably difficult.
Sarek would face a choice.
---------------------
2227
“I merely believe, Ambassador, that, while necessitated on a practical
level, the Kzinti Containment Area called by some The Dead Zone may in
fact be incompatible with nothing less than IDIC itself.”
Staven dismissed Sarek’s words nearly before they were said, and it
was not the first time.
“You may find, young one, that IDIC itself is incompatible with
reality. The idea that all things may even be combined has largely
proven to be an idealistic fantasy.”
In an absurdly challenging tone to use on an underling,
Staven asked Sarek a telling question.
“Will you now report this to your lady grandmother?”
Sarek shook his head.
“I was reminded forcefully of protocol during the Koren case. I will
not violate it again.”
Staven nodded in apparent triumph.
“Yet I would have you report to her on other matters, Sarek. Go to my
aide, Sunel. He will deliver to you an attaché case, and you will then
take a shuttle and pilot it back to Vulcan with all haste. There are
matters in those files that may not be transmitted.”
“It will be as you say, Mister Ambassador.”
---------------------------
2278
Staven’s openly mocking tone and virtual invitation to report his
anti-IDIC, very nearly Anti-Cthia, diatribe raised Sarek’s hackles. So
when handed the attaché case in question, Sarek noted that the one
Sunel kept for himself was identical. A quiet switch was made. Sarek’s
shuttle made it to Vulcan, the switched case containing evidence of
attitudes far worse than the one Staven spoke of openly among many of
his senior staff, not to mention the Ambassador himself. Staven and
Sunel also left Earth by shuttle.
That shuttle exploded for reasons no one could discern.
Newly appointed Ambassador Sarek tried to reassure himself that he had
not assassinated, he had avoided assassination and had only handed
back Staven’s own property to him. It was a hard sell, and over fifty
years later, he still didn’t completely buy it.
*Yet for all such drama, Staven’s death paled in significance to two
more meetings that same year. One I did not recall until recently. The
other, I pray that I am never so feeble as to forget.*
--------------
2227
The Starfleet Cadet spoke with some fervor. He was a man convinced
that he was preserving something precious, and trying to prevent
something apocalyptic. He was correctly concerned on both fronts.
“This Admiralty Hall is a violation of our democratic values in the
Federation and our traditions here in Starfleet. Democracies fall fast
and hard, history tells us, when the leadership of their militaries or
like services begin to separate themselves from those they lead.
Admiral Forrest, mourning his late friend Jonathan Archer, stated
flatly that such proximity reminds the low of where they may end up,
and the high of where they started. Are cadets, Captains or Commodores
allowed to simply seal themselves off and talk only with people of a
like burden and opinion. If no one is present to tell the top echelon
that they may be wrong, then wrong will often seem like right, until
that sad and sorry day that wrong becomes right. We must make our
opinions known…”
A man with a sharp shrill voice came up, interrupting the man on
stage.
“What about the opinions of the Admirals themselves? Or are you saying
that only a bunch of ungrateful cadets, who, like all of us, owe their
lives to the Admiralty, should hold any sway?”
The cadet on the podium stared at his heckler.
“You’ll have your turn to speak, Cadet Gill. This is my time.”
“Why? Are you afraid that I’ll prove that the construction of a single
building isn’t going to cause universal Armageddon?”
In the crowd, Sarek again noted how one mountain in Israel kept being
used to describe the end of time. The original speaker stood his
ground.
“You’re a good debater, John. But whether you prove that or not, you
will wait to do so until I finish.”
Men of dubious standing emerged in the crowd, chanting against the
original speaker.
“LET HIM SPEAK! LET HIM SPEAK! LET HIM SPEAK!”
An old tactic, thought Sarek, older than Humans, Vulcans, Bajorans or
possibly Iconians. If the original speaker allowed himself to be
shouted down, he was done. He was also done if he allowed the shouters
to portray themselves as defending free speech while denying him the
right to do so as well.
“He’ll have his scheduled chance. You bunch are not on the schedule.
Now, it just so happens I have people in the crowd, too. You want them
to start shouting? Because if they do, Mister Gill’s turn might never
come around.”
The speaker held out his hand, palm raised, as though imploring them
to trigger the other side’s shouters.
Things quieted down, and he finished. The one called John
Gill took the podium next.
“To start with, I’m sorry that my esteemed opponent had to resort to
petty threats to finish his backward thinking speech.”
The first speaker smiled at Gill.
“It wasn’t a threat, Mister Gill. It was a bluff. I have no operatives
in the crowd. This is a debate, not an Ian Fleming novel.”
Gill’s face reddened, and Sarek saw the jaws of his apparent followers
nearly drop off. Gill now seemed in a huff as he resumed speaking.
“History teaches us that our leaders bear awesome responsibilities. In
the old United States Of America, who did serving Presidents turn to?
Former holders of that same office. A like set of experiences unite
those who serve in our Admiralty. They have risen to our highest rank
by already being head and shoulders above the rest of us. This
isolation some small minds fear is already a reality. Admiralty Hall
will merely be a place they can work and be at peace while they make
the choices that affect all our lives. Is this asking so much, when
they have given their lives over to us already?”
The debate was over soon enough, and the general consensus seemed to
be for the first speaker. But when Sarek spoke with this young man, he
shook his head.
“Thank you, Mister Ambassador. But I think and fear it’s largely a
case of win the battle, lose the war. The decision has already been
made to put that Hall up. There is nothing I can reasonably do to
prevent it. Those admirals will go in there, and there will be no one
to ground or contradict them. People will that kind of power, isolated
to just their own? Not a good thing. Maybe in fact, a very bad one.”
Sarek understood one part of the man’s argument, but not the other.
“How would it be that bad?”
“Well, sir—haven’t you noticed that there simply are no non-Terran
Admirals? A streak of xenophobia has always persisted at the highest
levels of this ‘Fleet. Giving the old boys’ network its own clubhouse
is not going to remedy that. Far from it.”
Sarek was taken aback. In fact, he had never noted this exclusion.
“Still, you must recall that the Federation Charter is no older than
myself, that not all planets joined at the same time, nor have all
worlds disbanded their exploratory and defensive fleets in favor of
joining Starfleet.”
The man shook his head.
“That’s a reason for not having very many non-Humans in the top
echelon. It’s not a reason for having none of them at all.”
Sarek was very impressed with this man’s sagacity.
“Cadet—I am in need of a Human cultural liaison. You seem to possess a
singular understanding of your own people, both in their strengths and
in their weaknesses. Would you be interested in this position?”
Sarek expected any number of reactions. The man gave none of them.
“Move!”
He and Sarek barely ducked in time to avoid the small shuttle-bus that
barreled toward them. It halted, and then came back at them again.
“You know, you offered me a job, but never bothered to ask my name.”
Sarek knew well the potentially grave reason why he might make so
fundamental an error, but kept his tone even.
“I offer apology, Mister…?”
The man then committed his own error, and offered his hand to a
Vulcan.
“George Samuel Kirk, of Riverside, Iowa. Now let me take this, if you
would.”
The shuttle-bus came straight at Kirk, and thuggish men inside laid
down weapons-fire. Since Sarek saw no reason to die, he found cover.
Kirk, for his part, waited directly in the path of the shuttle-bus.
Just as it was about to strike him, he impossibly grasped the
vehicle’s front end, and lifted it above his head.
“You’re not hunting children, tonight!”
In one motion, Kirk threw the shuttle-bus at a Commons wall, smashing
it and sending the occupants fleeing in terror. Kirk smiled.
“Where *have* all the soldiers gone? And when will they ever learn?”
Sarek pointed at the carnage.
“How did you do that?”
“I eat my vegetables.”
Sarek raised an eyebrow.
“Humor—a most difficult concept, made more so when the humor in
question is lacking.”
Kirk’s head turned like that of a dog or sehlat, hearing something
past even Sarek’s range.
“Mister Ambassador, were you told that an applicant for Terran
translator would meet you here?”
Sarek realized what was being said.
“I now believe that this applicant will be what you Humans call a no-
show.”
George Kirk nodded.
“But some of his friends are on their way. I know how Vulcans are
about violence, so can I ask if you’ll sacrifice a bit of dignity so
that we can avoid a fight?”
Sarek suddenly drew back his right arm, connecting with a would-be
attacker.
“I fear that such may no longer be possible.”
“How the hell did he get that close? Never mind—just take enough of
them out to give us an opening to escape.”
“Kill the race-traitor if you can, but take out that damned Vulcanian
trash!”
As the attackers descended on them en masse, Kirk was like a mountain,
shrugging off batteries of blows and effortlessly pushing them back.
Sarek was a gliding master of avoidance and of using blows with just
enough force to get the job done. He also found his sash to be of use
against their attackers, and cut quite an impressive figure with his
outer robe flowing behind him like a cape. He grabbed one attacker,
and held him up before him.
“This wasn’t my idea, Pointy! Don’t kill me!”
“I do not desire your life. Merely deliver a message to those who sent
you. I will defend myself if forced to, and I will do so with a
terrible efficiency.”
“The way you move—even for a Vulcan! What are you?”
Sarek pulled the squirming man close.
“Do you not read your own racist literature, concerning the origins of
we Vulcanians? It is now night-time. Obviously, I am a bat.”
Sarek threw the man well away, and fairly soon, between him and Kirk,
the attackers were wholly dispersed. This time, Sarek moved slowly and
did shake his partner’s hand. He also staggered into his arms, the
realization of the violence he had engaged in taking hold.
*It will be my time soon enough. I cannot allow the savage days to
come early.*
“We’d better move, Mister Ambassador. These punks scare easy, but they
seem to have a lot of friends to call on.”
“They do seem a lot bound by false myth and ignorant fear. You spoke
of an affront to my dignity. I will take my chances on that, if you
would.”
Kirk then threw Sarek’s arm around his shoulder, and jumped straight
up. As they descended and then leaped again, Sarek shook his head.
“You can cover a third of a kilometer in one bound?”
“Aw, hell. I could clear the Seattle Space Needle. But one-third K is
safer for passengers, and easier for control and stealth. Well, here’s
your embassy.”
Sarek walked through the presumed safety of the gates, and asked Kirk
a question.
“Again—the source of your abilities?”
Kirk nodded.
“I was born aboard the USS Enterprise NCC-01, second starship to bear
the name. As my mother was giving birth, a maniac named Melvin Koren
started shooting up the ship. My mother placed me in an escape pod.
That pod skirted Jupiter’s gravity well. The Vulcan Doctor who
analyzed me upon recovery speculated that the forces at play changed
me, or maybe activated a recessive gene.”
“Koren? I attempted to defend him for those very crimes.”
“Well, everybody deserves counsel. Point is, Doctor T’Nia said that I
was a genuine miracle. So I took that miracle and swore upon my
parents’ graves to make war on people like Koren, and the Order Of The
Ancient Destroyer he served.”
Sarek seemed shocked.
“But T’Nia is my own great-aunt, and raised me for much of my early
life. And you are saying that the Order has taken root on Earth?”
“Actually, Ambassador, they’ve been here for many millenniums, if not
longer. Oh, and one more favor?”
“Of course.”
Kirk spoke one word, as his eyes glowed silver and his voice echoed.
“Forget.”
---------------------
The next morning, Sarek was informed he had an appointment. He felt
physical strain, but could not account for it. He had talked with a
man named George Kirk, but what had they spoken of? Was Pon Farr
hitting him that soon?
The applicant’s credentials were stellar. She came from a Minnesota
family that produced many translators of non-Terran tongues, with her
great-grandmother having served under the estimable Hoshi Sato, prior
to the original Enterprise’s disappearance during the Romulan War.
“You wish to join my staff as our Senior Translator?”
“Yes. A distant cousin of mine from Iowa said the Vulcan embassy
needed one, in addition to a cultural liaison.”
Sarek was not skeptical, but still guarded in his enthusiasm.
“It would be unusually fortunate if you could fill both positions.”
Amanda Grayson smiled, and Sarek felt a stirring at this.
“Let’s face it, Mister Ambassador. You just hit the jackpot!”
---------------------------------------
2278
Sarek felt a stirring, but it was neither romantic nor sexual. It was
a feeling of peril. With the controls now locked for a time, he
ventured out into the shuttle’s main area, to check on Saavik and
Peter.
Saavik had moved onto the upper bed with Peter, and both slept
soundly. A man in a Starfleet uniform lay where Saavik once had been.
He glanced casually at Sarek, waved a little ‘hello’, and then began
to sing.
“Hush, Little Peter, don’t throw fits; But your birth presaged the
apocalypse; A big scary dragon is coming for you, and he will eat up
all you knew; And if you don’t stop things from getting worse; You two
will be left alone in all the universe; You and Saavik will be quite
annoyed; As you go mad in the starless void.”
Sarek asked the extremely obvious.
“Who are you?”
The man smiled.
“The better question might be, Sarek—what children are these?”
Sarek glared. The man shrugged.
“What, too soon?”
“Tell me who you are.”
The man got up, and waved a shaming finger.
“Testy, testy, Mister Vulcan. Bendii Claus coming early, to drop off
his gifts of memory loss and emotional chaos?”
Sarek showed his shock at this openly. The man chuckled.
“Yes, yes, I know all your deepest darkest secrets. It’s who I am,
it’s what I do, really, it’s all I know.”
He stopped Sarek from speaking.
“Yes, yes—who am I? Allow me to introduce myself, I’m a man of wealth
and tast---oooh, wrong ID. Our mutual friend Jim knows me. So does
Saavik. She should. I did try and kill her three years ago.”
Sarek knew then. The entity before him had once called himself Squire
Trelane, but now chiefly called himself by the name of his species and
native continuum.
“Q.”
-------------
She is beside me, and everything feels right.
I am at peace.
But they now that I have escaped them.
I will not let myself be taken back.
That Q is a jerk.