The Autobiography of James T. Kirk (39 page)

I was overcome with a feeling of loss. There she was, everything I could’ve had. I caught my reflection in my glass desktop. For the first time I saw the lines on my face. I was old and alone.

*
EDITOR’S NOTE:
Tachyons are particles that move faster than light.

“WELL, MR. SAAVIK, ARE YOU GOING TO STAY WITH THE SINKING SHIP?”

Spock’s trainee crew had made a mess of the Starfleet Academy simulator, which was not at all unusual. As I walked through the replica of the bridge, I remembered doing the same thing 30 years before. I still thought the
Kobayashi Maru
test was a load of crap, but, like every officer before me, I took perverse pleasure watching young cadets struggle with it.

The young officer Saavik was Vulcan but had more obvious emotional responses than I was used to seeing in her species. She didn’t maintain her composure as confidently. And she complained that the test wasn’t fair. She fell right into the trap I’d fallen into. I went on to tell her that a no-win situation was a possibility every commander might face, which is exactly what Commandant Barnett said to me when I put up a fuss. I actually imitated his condescending arrogance. I then strode out of the simulator, not quite sure what I had accomplished, except perhaps continuing a tradition I didn’t believe in.

About ten months before, when the
Enterprise
had returned from its five-year mission, this time with Spock as captain, I’d had meetings with him and some of the crew. I wanted them to know I would do everything to help them in whatever career path they chose. The
Enterprise
, which was going to need another refit soon, had become a training vessel for Starfleet Academy, and I was surprised that Spock, Scotty, McCoy, and Uhura wanted to stay with the ship. The lighter duty of training cadets appealed to all of them. Sulu, however, had wanted his own ship for a while, so I put him on the captains’ list. He decided to pursue the new ship
Excelsior
, which was still on the assembly line, and in the mean time joined his
Enterprise
friends in teaching as well. This group of cadets who’d just participated in the
Kobayashi Maru
, and were under Spock’s tutelage, would be going on a training cruise, with support from some of the older officers. Out of a sense of nostalgia, I arranged to conduct the inspection.

As I exited the simulator, I was pleased to run into Spock. In the intervening years he’d become much more comfortable in his own skin; he balanced his human and Vulcan halves with much more ease and conveyed a kind of judicial wisdom. He was a pleasure for me to be around: he was captain to everyone else, but for me he fell right back into being a first officer.

We joked about what his trainees had done to the simulator, and he reminded me the only way I beat the test was by cheating. Before we parted, I took a moment to thank him for the present that he’d left in my office and I’d been carrying all day. A first edition of
A Tale of Two Cities
by Charles Dickens. I would take great pleasure in reading the book. Its themes of self-sacrifice and rebirth would end up having unique meaning for me. He went back to the ship to prepare for my inspection, and I went home. The ennui that had set in when I returned to Starfleet the previous year had not abated.

It was my 50th birthday. I decided to spend the evening alone, though Bones had other plans. He showed up uninvited, with a bottle of Romulan ale and a pair of reading spectacles to fix farsightedness. He didn’t waste time getting to the crux of my problems. He told me the solution to my depression was getting back my command. I thought about it. I wasn’t sure; I thought that my foray into space had shown me that my day was over. And I felt like I was lost in an endless cycle.

“What do you mean?” McCoy said.

“I go out in space, I get promoted, I give up the promotion and go back to a ship,” I said. “I did that already. I can’t do it again. I’ll look like an idiot.”

McCoy and I talked about the pursuit of happiness, and that some of us just didn’t have the tools to achieve it.

“You’re not going to find contentment outside of yourself,” he said. “It’s got to come from within.” I then wondered why he thought I needed a command to make me happy. He said it was as close as I was going to get. And he was getting tired of taking orders from Spock.

We drank a few more glasses of Romulan ale, and McCoy staggered out. The intoxicating effects were a little hard to shake off the next morning.

“Admiral,” Uhura said. “Are you all right?” She was in uniform, standing over my bed. I had arranged to travel with her, McCoy, and Sulu to the
Enterprise
. She gave me a warm smile; I wasn’t sure how she’d gotten into my apartment, but when I checked the clock and saw how late it was, I was thankful she had.

We beamed up to the maintenance satellite, where we met Sulu. McCoy joined us, also looking a little worse for wear. Sulu piloted us over to the
Enterprise
in a travel pod. It was always nice to see my old ship from the outside. It was majestic, comforting.

We docked and entered through the port torpedo room, greeted by Spock, Saavik, and a phalanx of crew and cadets. This wasn’t the first time I’d seen these trainees, but I still couldn’t get over how young they were. They looked like children. But among the young faces standing at attention, an old one: Scotty, now gray, still with the bloodshot eyes, just like that first day I’d come on board, still enjoying his shore leave too much. I decided to talk with one cadet.

“Midshipman First Class Peter Preston, engineer’s mate, sir!” He looked like he was 12. I couldn’t imagine I was that young when I had served, and then I remembered myself sleeping under a staircase on the
Republic
, and smiled. Whatever ambivalence I had toward this inspection, it began as a paean to nostalgia. It would soon become a requiem.

“Who the hell even knows about Genesis?” Morrow said. “It’s a top secret project.”

“It’s not the first time that’s happened, Harry,” I said. I knew the Klingons and Romulans had extensive spy networks. And they’d all love to have it. The Genesis Project was a device that could theoretically reorganize inanimate matter on a subatomic level to create life on a planetary scale. It was Carol’s project. I was very worried because she had just called me from her lab on the space station Regula I. We hadn’t spoken in years, and she was angry. She was accusing me of “taking Genesis away.” I didn’t know what she was talking about, and the communication was quickly cut off. Someone was jamming it; she was in danger. I was worried, and I could see Morrow was worried too. The Genesis Project would be a powerful weapon; it would destroy all life on a world to make room for the new life it created.

“You’ve got to get a ship to Regula I right away,” I said.

“Okay, get going,” he said.

I hadn’t meant me. I wanted to go; I was concerned about Carol, but I didn’t have the support I needed. This ship and crew weren’t cut out for it.

“You have to make do,” Morrow said. “Except for some freighters and a science vessel, you’re the only ship in the quadrant.”

“But I’m going to spend the whole trip changing diapers.” Morrow laughed, but he didn’t care.

“Report progress. Morrow out.”

I went to see Spock. I told him the situation and my concern that his crew would crumble at the first sign of trouble. They were kids. Spock, however, had faith in them. And he instinctually knew what I needed.

He gave me back the
Enterprise
. He could see that I wanted to take control of the situation, that I didn’t want to be second-guessing him or anyone else. He made the right decision for me; I’m not sure it was the right decision for everybody else.

We soon ran into the
Reliant
. It cut into us with full phasers.

Reliant
was the ship I’d assigned to assist Carol and her team in the search for a lifeless planet to test the Genesis Device. The last I’d heard it was several hundred light-years away; now it was intercepting us. That should have been my first clue that something was wrong; Morrow said the
Enterprise
was the only ship in the quadrant. If
Reliant
had been reassigned, it had come from the direction of Regula I. Morrow would’ve assigned it to investigate.

I had trouble believing a Federation starship would be an enemy, especially one where Chekov was the first officer. That was my mistake. They knocked out our shield generators and warp drive with their first shots. The impulse engines came next. I hadn’t been in a battle in years, and my instincts were slow. My crew consisted of a few adults trying to manage a screaming, crying nursery. A lot of people died in that attack; I felt responsible, and that was even before I saw who was firing at us.

The
Reliant
called for our surrender, and I had no choice. On the screen, a face I hadn’t seen in 15 years. Long gray hair where it was jet black before, strange clothing, but it was him.

“Khan.”

I couldn’t believe it. I’d left Khan a hundred light-years away, but somehow he’d hijacked the
Reliant
. He said he wanted vengeance on me. At first I didn’t know why. But I didn’t see McGivers with him. I soon found out his wife was dead. He blamed me. And now everyone on the
Enterprise
was at risk. I offered myself in exchange for the crew.

“I’ll agree to your terms if …” he said. “If in addition to yourself, you hand over all data and materials regarding the project called Genesis.” Oh my god, how did he know about it? That weapon, in his hands. Had he already been to Regula I? Had he hurt Carol? David?

This was all my fault. I’d let this murderer live. I had to get us out of this. I remembered Garth at Axanar taking remote control of his enemy’s weapons consoles. Federation ships had combination codes, but Khan might not know about it. It was all I had.

It worked; I lowered Khan’s shields and damaged his ship so he had to withdraw. But I’d done nothing clever; my only advantage was I knew more about our ships than he did. As I watched the young cadet Peter Preston, whom I’d met only a couple of days before, die in sickbay, I realized it was no victory, and it would only get worse.

We limped to Regula I, a lonely space station around a desolate asteroid. It was a chamber of horrors: bloody corpses hanging from the rafters; Carol’s team had been tortured to death. Chekov and his commanding officer were locked up in a storage cabinet. They were not quite themselves after having been abused and forced to do Khan’s bidding. More suffering caused by my hubris.

I had left Khan alive, and now he was leaving a trail of devastation across the Galaxy. I had to find Carol and David.

McCoy, Saavik, and I had beamed down into the Regulan asteroid with Terrell and Chekov. We found constructed tunnels, and we also found the Genesis Device. Carol had hidden it from Khan.

And then someone hit me in the back. He then jabbed a knife at me, but I easily disarmed him.

“Where’s Dr. Marcus?” I asked. He was at least 30 years younger than I was, but he couldn’t fight. I was going to hit him again, when he spoke: