by Jane Seaton

Part 3/4

Kirk stood in sick bay, watching McCoy check on one of his surgical cases from the morning. The patient grinned as he flexed his reconstructed leg. "I can't believe it, Doc. You're a miracle worker. Just saying thank you seems... Well, thanks, anyway."

"Don't mention it. Just keep up the physio." McCoy squeezed the young lieutenant's shoulder and turned away to Kirk.

"Yes, Captain?"

"Can we have a word in private?"

"Of course." McCoy led the way into his office. He gestured at the locker where he kept the captain's favourite label brandy, but Kirk shook his head.

"I've just been watching a visual recording of Admiral Fleetwood and Chekov, taking a pleasure flight in the admiral's gig. You wouldn't know it was the same kid. He's like... everyone's favourite nephew. Yet from the moment he arrived on board the Enterprise, he was determined to be trouble..."

"Hold on," McCoy said, frowning. "What are you getting at here? He was real quiet when I first saw him. He wasn't making trouble for anyone."

"Maybe, but he's not exactly falling over himself trying to be helpful now, is he? I'm sure if the admiral had asked him to get out and push the Enterprise to Alpha Tyr, he'd have died trying. But he won't do anything for me. You'd think I was the devil trying to recruit him for eternal damnation. Somehow, I have to tap in to whatever hold Woodie had on him."

"Maybe he just liked Woodie," McCoy suggested.

"Then how do I get him to like me? Come on, Bones. This could be life and death."

McCoy frowned deeper. "It's a shame you had to hit him..."

"I know. That was a misunderstanding, anyhow, because I thought he didn't understand Standard. That's not going to happen again."

"Yes, but... Jim, I think you're just starting out from the wrong place here. You're used to cadets and ensigns arriving on board who already think you're the closest thing to God they're ever going to encounter. Treat them halfway fairly, make some small talk about their families, look pleased when they manage to work a shift without blowing us all up, and they're yours for life. You're pretty good at it, but... he didn't come on board with the ink on his graduating diploma still wet."

"No, he came on board shocked and frightened, having just lost his home and his... his benefactor, I suppose. But Starfleet was Woodie's life. I can't believe the admiral didn't instil more respect in him for the fleet than any Academy commandant could have done. I can't believe Woodie didn't have a good word for the Enterprise, too. So we rescue him, we give him first class medical care, he gets his own cabin and a free ride back to Earth. And at that point, he chooses to pretend he can't understand us. Why?"

McCoy had started to look decidedly uncomfortable.

"What's wrong, Bones?"

"We were pretty pushed in sick bay when he arrived. He came in with a dozen or some walking wounded from the docking arm, and I had three cases of radiation poisoning too. He might have felt... well, he didn't get looked at for a while."

"He had to wait in line?"

"He got sent to the back of the line. And when I checked him out quickly and found he just had a few knocks and scratches, I... well, we'd been full stretch for nearly twelve hours by then. I didn't realise he'd understand me. I sent a couple of paramedics to take a break, told them to deal with him when they'd had a rest."

Kirk was frowning now. "Brilliant."

"Well, it's worse than that. I was practically sleep walking by then and I... I hadn't noticed he'd dislocated a couple of fingers and perforated an ear drum. And... and taken quite a dose of radiation too. Jim, we were all running on emergency batteries. It was just unfortunate..."

"You left him to last because someone didn't examine him properly? Who was doing triage?"

"I left him to last because everyone else was... because he was Russian. Okay? Chapel was responsible for triage, but she never saw him. If you want to blame someone, blame me."

Kirk took a deep breath, his eyes sparking fire. "In future, doctor, you'll attend to your patients in order of strict medical priority, regardless of their nationality. Understood?"

"I hardly thought about it..."

"Bones," Kirk interrupted tiredly, "I think that makes it worse."

"Yes, Captain."

"But he got treated properly eventually?"

"Of course!" McCoy insisted. "I administered the radiation treatment myself. Malidoma and Christie dealt with everything else, and I checked on what they did. But they were... speculating, rather explicitly, on his relationship with Admiral Fleetwood."

"Great."

"I reprimanded them... later. They didn't know he could understand them..."

"Following which, I come along and tell him he's sharing my quarters. You're right. Most of the young men I deal with don't get left in pain for hours while the entire medical staff goes for lunch, then begin to suspect they've been brought aboard so I can screw them."

"Jim... It was a misunderstanding. Just start by explaining that to him."

"It wasn't a misunderstanding, Bones. You said it yourself. It was because he was Russian. There might also have been some mix ups, some over-tired and over-worked personnel, and an appalling lack of sensitivity, but..."

"I'm sorry, Captain."

Kirk shook his head. "I was just as stupid myself. I wouldn't even be worrying about all this now if we weren't depending on him to do something for us."

McCoy sat in silence while the captain appeared to think over his next move.

"I suppose I have to ask this. Was Woodie..."

"Certainly not. There's no medical evidence, and I can't believe the admiral would do anything of the kind."

Kirk took Chekov into the arboretum. The captain's cabin no longer seemed neutral ground, and Kirk was now sharply aware of the almost unthinking apartheid that a majority his crew were imposing on the Russian, moving to give him too much space as they passed him in the corridors, failing to acknowledge him in any way when he entered a room. The two duty botanists, however, presumably because they classed all non-photosynthesising life forms as uniformly inferior, smiled at the youngster and enthusiastically recommended certain plants which were particularly worth viewing.

"Well, let's go look at the Andorian orchids," Kirk suggested. Chekov followed him wordlessly into the sub-tropical zone.

"Have you ever seen anything like that?" Kirk asked when they stopped in front of a bank of blooms that seemed to include every hue discernible with the human eye.

"I have been to Andor," Chekov said. "With the admiral."

"What were you doing with the admiral? How did you meet him?"

"He said he wanted me to stay," Chekov said unhelpfully, looking down with studied indifference at a patch of cadmium yellow flowers right on the edge of the path.

"Stay where, and when?" Kirk asked, feeling his patience evaporating.

Chekov almost smiled. "I hid aboard Victoria. Six... seven years ago." He shrugged. "Dockyard pilot was collecting her. I had switched off internal sensors. No one noticed."

"What happened when they did notice you?"

"Admiral found me. Took me home. He asked foreman if I can work for him when I am eighteen. Foreman says, take him now."

"When you were what? Fourteen? That must be illegal..."

"He had to pay more, I think, and pay local soviet, not CredStat, until I was eighteen."

It suddenly occurred to Kirk to doubt that this was the truth. When would a fourteen year old Russian have had access to a landing field, or...

"You don't believe me? No one is supposed to go away to work until they are eighteen, but it happens often. Particularly girls. Sometimes there is a little payment and parents agree. Sometimes they are just gone."

"Where was the Victoria when you stowed away?" Kirk asked calmly, ignoring the revelation of organised prostitution of minors in CredStat for the moment. There were bound to be allegations, but equally, there must be safeguards. It wouldn't be allowed to happen. No way would it be allowed to happen.

"On landing field at Saint Petersburg. Admiral was visiting old city, Hermitage. Winter Palace. There was fault and he was... he had to leave quickly. I hid in cabin while he tried to fix it. Then he went. I was locked inside. I turned sensors off and pilot didn't check anything." Chekov's tone was contemptuous.

"Were you trying to run away?"

"No. I wanted to fly, then they send me home, and beat me." Chekov half smiled to himself, then turned his face up challengingly to Kirk too, smile still in place. "I understood. I run away to fly, and they beat me. They understood too. Everyone understood."

"You'd done this before?"

The Russian nodded.

"But this time, the admiral paid for you to stay? Why?"

"He said, that it is safer to keep me where he can see me."

"Did you object?"

Chekov shook his head. "No."

"You were happy to stay with him? Indefinitely?"

"For as long as I could, yes. Very happy."

"Chekov," Kirk said, a moment later, "I'm sorry that hasn't worked out, but... why can't you be happy to stay here? I'm not offering to be a foster father to you, or whatever the admiral was, but... if we go to Alpha Tyr as planned, we won't return to Earth for at least three months. It could even be a year. If I don't hassle Starfleet to arrange a transfer for you, they'll probably forget you're here. Stay on board."

"I can't do what you want me to do."

"Everyone gets cold feet on their first posting."

"I don't understand you."

"I don't believe you can't do it. I don't understand why you're so convinced you can't..."

"But I know I can't do this. And when you know too, all this..." Chekov combed through the air with his fingers as he sought for the right phrases. "All this being nice to me will stop again. I like to be spoken to like this, to be allowed to run the simulations, and to walk around the ship. Perhaps I can even enjoy Lieutenant Sulu trying to be my big brother or something, but I am not stupid, Captain Kirk, and I know I can't sell you what you want to buy from me."

By the time Kirk had drawn breath to respond, Chekov had left.

"I tried, sir," Sulu said, despondently. "I talked to him. Or at him. I didn't get off to a very good start this morning, making stupid digs about how much the Russians are in debt..."

"Was that what the credits were about?"

"Yes. He thought he was paying me off... or something. So... I felt pretty bad about what I'd said, and I just tried to accept the money with a good grace. I mean, I thought it might even make things easier, but... He seems to think the collapse of the Russian economy at the end of the twentieth century was a Japanese conspiracy I'm personally responsible for."

'If I had time,' Kirk thought, 'I'd read up an impartial account of the Russian Compromise, a Vulcan one, for preference. Then I'd track down CredStat's records of when and why Chekov came to be with Admiral Fleetwood. And then...'

"Sir..."

"Yes..."

"I don't mean to speak out of turn, but he might be a little sensitive about being where he is. People make jokes, and say stupid things..."

"I know. Get the quartermaster to find him a cabin. Someone else can double up."

"Yes, sir."

Shortly thereafter, Hardiman's restraint failed. He asked if the Enterprise would be able to take the medical shipment, or if he should divert another ship for the purpose. It was clear what answer he wanted. Kirk gave it to him.

Kirk knocked at the door directly into Chekov's cabin. He should never have put the kid in the guest suite to start with, but it had seemed the obvious thing to do. Chekov was aboard the Enterprise as a 'family member', technically. Giving him the run of Kirk's suite had more than doubled the space available to him. Kirk had meant well he told himself.

There was no reply. He overrode the lock and went in. The door through to his own cabin stood open, and Chekov was at the computer, concentrating too hard on the screen to notice Kirk's approach from an unexpected direction.

"What are you doing?"

A hand flicked out to kill the power. Chekov shifted back in the chair and looked up at him, resigned.

Kirk groaned inwardly. "Get up." He pointed back to the other cabin. "Pick up your kit."

It took Chekov a few seconds to pile half a dozen items into a duffel that bore the insignia of the Victoria. He picked the bag up and waited for the next order, his eyes round and apprehensive.

"Look, Pavel, let me explain. There are some things you just can't be allowed to do on this ship, for your own safety and other people's. That's why I said you weren't to touch the computer. If you wanted to find out about survivors, you only had to ask, but I can't allow you to hack into the system whenever you want to."

"Then..." Chekov bit off whatever he'd been about to say.

"Go on."

"Then why am I here, where there is computer? Why am I in your cabin?"

"Because you're on board the Enterprise as my guest, and my guests stay here."

"I see."

"But I see that it makes you uncomfortable, so I'm putting people out to give you a completely separate cabin. That's just being fixed up now. Okay?"

"Yes. Thank you."

Chekov's reaction seemed genuine enough, Kirk thought, if a little low key.

"Good. Now, I have told Admiral Hardiman that this ship is able to take medical supplies to Alpha Tyr, because I honestly believe that you are a better pilot than most..."

"I am not."

"Right. Well, more to the point, you obviously have no intention of obeying my orders, so I can hardly let you loose on the bridge of this ship." Kirk shook his head at the Russian's sullen expression. "I just want to sort one thing out before we leave here. If this ship got into difficulties and I had to order a general evacuation, would you pilot a shuttle?"

Chekov took a long moment to consider his answer.

"Yes."

Commander Steele, the officer in charge of the salvage operation, looked like a woman hanging onto civility by a thread. "Jim, we've got a problem."

'The sooner that shipment is ready and we get underway...' Kirk thought. "Yes, Ella. We'll help if we can. What is it?"

"Everything. I've got so many damaged hulks hanging off the docking arms, some of them in a dangerous condition, I can't begin to make the Starbase safe for my salvage crews. I'm planning to send teams in from the old number nine docking arm, as it's the least damaged, but the only cargo port that's intact is taken up with Woodie's little Vikki. I don't know what she was doing there, but if I can free that up, I can put men and equipment in at three times the rate..."

"So what do you want? The keys? I don't have them."

"She's got more security safeguards than your brig, Jim. They can't blow her clear without wrecking the lock mechanism and losing a couple of hours. You've got Pasha, haven't you?"

"Well, yes. He's here."

"Send him over to me for twenty minutes, Jim. He can put her in a parking orbit out of harm's way. Pretty please?"

Kirk scowled. Someone else who obviously thought Chekov could do no wrong. "He's all yours and welcome, Ella. Shall I send him over in a shuttle..."

"No. He can beam in. Tell your transporter people we have a two person max safe zone on the docking arm with beacons on standard signal. When he's finished, you can pick him up again from the Victoria direct if he takes her clear of all the static."

"Okay."

Fully formed, the idea of offering Chekov the chance to take the Victoria and go seek his fortune, like the unwanted stepson in a fairy tale, materialised in Kirk's imagination. After all, he couldn't honestly claim he was offering the Russian anything back on Earth. It would be a perfectly rational choice, given the Russian's situation. It would probably get Fleetwood's vote. So far as Kirk knew, the admiral's family wouldn't be depending on the yacht's second hand value to keep them in gin and tonic.

Kirk dismissed the temptation and leaned over the intercom. "Lieutenant Sulu?"

"Sir?"

"Where's Chekov now?"

"I showed him to his new quarters as you ordered and left him there, sir. He was trying out how far he could get into the computer with level one clearance and I..." Sulu stopped.

"And what?" Kirk prompted.

"I thought he might want to send a message to his family that he's okay, so I gave him access to my mail account. I don't think he can do any harm..."

"I think if he wanted to do any harm, he wouldn't need your permission to get in there and do it," Kirk agreed bitterly.

"No. Well, he seemed happy enough."

"Fetch him down to the transporter room for me. I'll meet you there."

Chekov was standing by the pads, his duffel over his shoulder.

"He seemed to think you were throwing him off the ship, Captain," Sulu explained. "And I wasn't sure what you wanted. I'll get him to stow his stuff in a locker..."

Kirk hesitated. Here was Chekov, all ready to go. The Victoria, if she was fully fuelled, could take him almost anywhere in the sector, including to a handful of non-Federation worlds that wouldn't ask to see his papers; worlds where someone would sooner or later mug him in an ill-lit spaceport alley, or hire him to run drugs, or slaves, or...

"Let him take it with him, if it makes him happy." The captain turned away to inform Kyle of the party's destination. The co-ordinates arranged, Kirk crossed over to the Russian. "Apparently the Victoria is sitting at a cargo lock that they need for urgent salvage operations. They want you to move her."

Chekov nodded. "I can't move her to personnel dock. The docking ring is damaged."

"That doesn't matter. I think they're clearing all the remaining ships away from the Starbase. Commander Steele wants you to put her in a parking orbit, out of harm's way. Apparently she's security coded and they've no one else who can move her."

The Russian nodded again. Unsurprised, unmoved. Had he seen the opportunity to run? Was he just trying not to arouse anyone's suspicions?

"And I'm sending Lieutenant Sulu with you. There's still a good deal of junk flying around, and radiation levels that might distort your sensor readings. Local control won't be able to help you. They may not even be able to see you. I think you'll find it easier with a second pair of eyes."

"And after she is in orbit?" Chekov asked, neutrally.

"Inform local control of her orbit parameters, reconfigure any security locks to codes you can give to Commander Steele for forwarding to the Admiral's family or their agents, and let us know you're ready to beam back. Everyone's going to be much too busy to even notice she's sitting there for a few days."

"Yes, sir," Chekov assented, dutiful as one of Kirk's officers.

Kirk looked at the Russian hard, trying to read his mind. Chekov wasn't giving anything away. The risks might be bad, but Kirk knew what he'd do in the young Russian's place. "Oh, and Sulu, apparently there's still a problem with interference affecting the transporters. To be on the safe side, I want you to transport back one at a time after you park the Victoria. You'll have to let Chekov close down so you'll come first. Understood?"

Sulu blinked at him. "Yes, sir."

"Are you locked on to their safe zone, Scotty?" Kirk asked as the two men mounted the pad. The engineer gave him a preoccupied nod. "Aye, no problem there, Captain."

Scott pulled the lever for transport and was immediately bombarded with flashing lights and screeching alarms.

Kirk resisted the temptation to demand explanations. The engineer was fully occupied in taking manual control of the process.

Scott finally let out a sigh of relief. "They made it, Captain. The power to the signal amplifiers must have gone. We nearly lost them." He hit his intercom. "Lieutenant Uhura, can you get me someone on the docking arm. They've a problem..."

Kirk stared at the transporter pad. The debris and residual radiation always made operating in salvage situations hazardous. Maybe he should have thought twice about letting them go...

Unaware of their brush with mortality, Chekov and Sulu rematerialised. There was no clue that anyone on the arm had noticed the power problem, but the chaos into which he'd transported sent a ripple of panic through the helmsman. It was cold. There was a bitter tang of burnt synthetics. The artificial gravity was operating at less than fifty percent and a few degrees out of perpendicular with the deck. This wasn't a good place to be.

Sulu shook off his unease. There was evidence of order being restored. Wreckage had been cleared from their beam in site, which was hemmed with transporter amplifiers. A Starfleet yeoman stood at a field communications centre. Technicians were moving with haste that made them look almost comical in the low gravity. A worried looking woman glared at them and gestured them away from the safe zone, as if she was expecting another arrival.

The lieutenant looked round for an authority figure and spotted a burly civilian in very dirty Starbase coveralls.

"We've come to move the Victoria," he announced when the man looked up at them.

"Two minutes. We're just linking in an emergency power supply to that section. One forty nine, Carter?"

"One forty... five," a disembodied voice replied.

"Go. Pasha, I'm glad you're okay. I'm sorry about the admiral. We all are. Starfleet taking care of you?" He spared a sideways glance at the helmsman as he asked.

"Yes," Chekov replied blandly. "This is Lieutenant Sulu."

Sulu shot a suspicious look at the Russian, who suddenly seemed to have almost no discernible accent.

"Pleased to meet you." The civilian made no offer to shake hands. All ten of his fingers were busy on a couple of keyboards.

"Mister Drake," Chekov continued hesitantly. "I am not sure I can move Victoria. But if I can't, then I can manually undock if someone will use the grab to secure her."

Drake's hands stopped their furious typing. "She looks okay to me. She would have been sheltered from the main blast on this side of the arm. You shouldn't have any problem."

"Why didn't you mention this to the captain?" Sulu demanded.

Chekov ignored him. "She was damaged before I docked her. That is why I chose the cargo dock. Access is easier. But now she's a problem for you..."

"Hell, don't worry about that," Drake said easily. "You weren't hurt were you?"

"No." Chekov shook his head. "I am not sure how bad the damage is."

Drake had apparently reached a lull in his frantic activity. "Well, if your friend here can operate the grabs, and you trust him not to scratch her, then do that, but she'll have to be towed away from here eventually. Help yourselves. There's power to the grab arm for now. I can't promise how long. You be careful now." The engineer looked sternly at Sulu. "We don't have any backup out there. If you break his line or anything, Lieutenant, I don't know how we'll get him back. And you, Pasha, no showing off, and make sure you use a bloody line. You be damned careful!"

Chekov turned to Sulu. "Can you do that? Hold the ship while I return through the airlock?"

"You're going to space walk back here?" Sulu asked. "Pavel, why didn't you tell the captain the Victoria was disabled?"

Chekov shrugged. "He only wants me to move her. I can do that." He turned away abruptly, and Sulu followed him, assuming he was heading for the correct dock. There was a keypad and palm reader by the hexagonal port where Chekov halted. They looked dead.

"We'll have to ask your friend Drake to power up the port..." Sulu began.

Chekov snorted contemptuously and swung his duffel off his shoulder. He pulled out a remote. "No problem. Mister Drake said two minutes."

The indicators on the port controls lit and a moment later the iris of the hatch began to contract.

Sulu stood in the narrow access way and stared, dumbstruck, at the scene which met his eyes.

The whole compartment was smoke blackened, streaked with iridescent residues where more chemically reactive components had burned. One monitor was smashed. The panels that covered the walls and ceilings were punctured in half a dozen places. The clearsteel viewscreen was crazed. As Sulu stepped forward he almost tripped over a heat blister on the deck. Chekov climbed down to the pilot's seat and began wiping smuts from the control panel with his sleeve.

"What happened?" Sulu stepped past him and touched the inner surface of the viewscreen wonderingly. "This panel should be as tough as the Enterprise's hull."

"Overload," Chekov said succinctly. He cursed quietly to himself.

Of course, the navigation readouts which were superimposed on the pure 'window' function of the viewscreen were carried in a micro-layer of optical tracking which had melted. The clearsteel itself was intact. Sulu heaved a sigh of relief. But still, the optical tracking should never have been overloaded to that extent...

"What happened?"

"E.m. pulse," Chekov said. "When Starbase generator went critical."

"Where the hell were you when it blew?"

Chekov had coaxed a few lights into life and seemed not to dare look away from them in case they went out again.

"Didn't you have shields up? Didn't you hear the warnings to get the hell out of there?" Sulu looked hopelessly around the cockpit. "You're wasting your time, Pavel. Every piece of circuitry on board will have been vaporised."

Chekov did look up now, angry. "No. All manual control is isolated, solid state. Also docking circuits are solid state. That is how I docked."

"But... but Pavel, why did you dock? If you still had control, why didn't you just go? There could have been secondary melt downs, or fuel tank ruptures, or..."

"I thought I can maybe take off survivors," Chekov said matter-of-factly. "But the arm was less damaged than I thought. It was safer to stay here in reinforced modules." He suddenly hit a switch that extinguished the little embers of light on his panel. "Power reserves are drained. There is leak from battery. This ship is dead. You are right. Everything is gone." He folded his hands in his lap and bowed his head.

Sulu felt like an intruder at a funeral.

He came and stood beside Chekov. "Captain Kirk meant for you to take her. Did you realise that?"

The Russian looked up at him. "Take her? Take Victoria? He thought I would steal her?"

"No. Don't misunderstand me. He thought you deserved to take her and make a fresh start for yourself."

Chekov shook his head, not angry, as Sulu feared he might be, just puzzled. "He sent you to stop me, then?"

"No. He sent me to let you. To... to help you."

Sulu's words slid off the Russian as if they had never been spoken. "We have to move her," Chekov said without emotion.

Sulu laid his hand on the back of Chekov's seat and felt charred fabric crumble under his fingers. "What happened in here, Pavel? It looks like someone took a phaser to it. What happened?"

He found he was holding his breath, waiting in the unnatural silence of the dead ship for the Russian to answer. Probably Chekov would never tell him, and no one else would ever ask. The Victoria would be just one more piece of salvage. Had frustration at his lack of status finally made Chekov turn on a symbol of luxury, of his owner's power... Maybe the admiral had been aboard at the time. To someone with a cool head, what a perfect opportunity it would be for revenge...

"There were e.m. anomalies. Fireballs."

"But... fireballs only occur within a few metres of a warp bubble fracture."

Chekov, Sulu realised eventually, wasn't interested in enlarging on what he'd said.

"And your shields... You lost your shields?" Sulu tried to go back and piece together a sequence of events that would explain the particular types of damage he could see around him, a sequence that preferably didn't include first degree murder. "They knew the warp generator was in trouble, so they ordered all ships to leave. Right?"

Chekov nodded.

"And you were already bringing the Victoria in, or just taking her out. You were close by, and able to manoeuvre. Is that right?"

"Yes."

"And..." Struggling to make sense of it, Sulu suddenly saw the light. "You went back for something, or someone."

"Yes."

"But the collapsing magnetic shielding on the generator was creating localised e.m. pulses fireballs already, strong enough to take out your shields, and then your instruments, until the final pulse overloaded all your main circuitry."

"Yes."

"The radiation should have killed you..."

"Yes."

"I mean, this ship must have structural shielding in the hull. Does she? Does the Victoria have structural shielding?" Surely, Sulu thought, the yacht wasn't big enough.

"No. Then I was... I was running away." Chekov turned in his chair, away from the helmsman, and pointed towards the stern of the ship. "Her warp engines are there, between the explosion. They acted like shield."

It was nervousness that broke up the Russian's Standard, like static, Sulu realised. He'd been within metres of a potential core breach and when he'd finally made a break for it, he thought he'd been 'running away'.

"What did you go back for?"

"No one. I was too late. I couldn't find the way. I couldn't..." Chekov choked into silence, then began again more calmly. "I took too long. I could not steer. The navigational beacons were malfunction, also the sensors and I did not realise, then it was too late. I must use visual, but correct procedure so close to the station..."

Chekov ran his fingers over the console. Heat had distorted the lettering, pitted the plastic. Sulu couldn't imagine how Chekov had found his way back to the docking arm, let alone located a cargo hatch and closed with it.

"Pavel," he said as gently as he could, "you were trying to do the impossible. Did you know what might have happened, what problems you were flying straight into?"

"But I had to go back. I could not leave him."

"The admiral?"

"Yes."

Sulu moved around to where he could see the Russian's face. It was screwed up against the threat of tears. "Pavel..."

"I... was frightened, very frightened. I must not be frightened..."

"You panicked?"

"Yes, I panicked."

"I don't think you're being fair to yourself..."

"So I cannot be pilot. It is easy to be pilot when nothing is wrong. But when it is difficult, I panicked."

Sulu looked around the interior of the Victoria again. It seemed to him that Chekov had done more than duty, or love, could require, only retreating long after most people would have judged the situation clearly hopeless. If he'd really panicked at any point, he wouldn't be here worrying about it.

"Pavel, you should tell Captain Kirk..."

"I hate Captain Kirk," Chekov said, sounding somehow more desolate about it than venomous.

"Why?"

"He thinks I am thief." Chekov laughed. "Of course."

"Of course? What do you mean?"

"Because he is thief himself."

"What? I don't understand you."

"He thinks only what people can give him, or do for him. Like you. To you, I am just six credits fifty. To Captain Kirk, I am pilot when he needs pilot. Before and after I am nothing."

"He... he thought you'd stolen something?"

"This ship. The admiral's ship. The admiral has a wife, and he has sons, grandchildren. I am not a thief."

"No, but... I think..." Sulu stopped. He didn't know what he'd thought. When you looked at it like that, Kirk had been positively encouraging Chekov to make off with a few million credits worth of someone else's luxury yacht.

Chekov wiped his face dry with his sleeve. "He never wanted anything from me, not even to say 'thank you'. And his wife too, what can I give her? And Peter Drake, I help him sometimes, but he doesn't say, you can't help me today so go away, don't come here."

The lieutenant sat in silence. He'd even wondered if Chekov had murdered the admiral. What could he say?

"I... I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"That you feel like that. It's really not true. The admiral wasn't... wasn't so very different from anyone else. The captain has to think of the safety of the ship first, but if you gave him a chance, if you'd done what he asked, you'd have seen, he's..."

"If I did what he asked."

"Well, yes, but... the Enterprise is a ship, not a... a family or something. Everyone is there to do a job."

Chekov shrugged. "I can't do this job. So he lets me to steal Victoria and run away. Very kind. Peter Drake asks me to move her. I can do that, so I will move her."

Sulu straightened. Chekov was right about that, at least. They were probably holding up a whole chain of salvage manoeuvres while he tried, and failed, to counsel the Russian. Maybe he could persuade Drake to offer Chekov a temporary refuge, or an introduction to a commercial ship's master who wouldn't mind taking a competent technician with no papers. On the other hand, Sulu now knew that, guilt apart, Chekov could probably navigate a paper kite through a meteor storm and come out in one piece. Maybe if Captain Kirk could somehow present the situation differently, not in terms of just wanting a pilot, but...

But what else was there to say? Sulu didn't feel he was just a round peg in a round hole of Starfleet's making. He felt he was valued as a person, that his happiness mattered, not just his ability to fly the ship. Unfortunately, he couldn't honestly say why he felt that, let alone point to a concrete reason why Chekov should feel it too.

"Come on, then. Is there enough power to turn off the security locks? Then we can move this lady from inside the arm. How do we do that?" Sulu reached a hand out to the switches in front of the navigator.

Chekov nodded. He pulled the remote from his duffel again and set to work.