Lieutenant Heisenberg, the handsome chief communications officer, smiled back at her and nodded.  “Great,” he said.  “And you?”

“Well, I enjoyed the mud baths and the shopping centers, so I guess I’m relaxed and ready for another mission or two.  It doesn’t take as much for those of us ‘at the end of our careers’ to let off steam as it does you young people.”

Heisenberg winced at their running joke.  Earlier in his career as a transporter officer at Starfleet Command, he’d underestimated the attractive senior officer and ended up in a closet at the business end of a phaser.  Since then, she privately called him “Mr. Adventure,” and he teased her about her quick draw abilities.

Uhura changed her tone.  “I know it’s none of my business, Lieutenant, but why do I never see you when we’re on shore leave?  I see lots of the crew, and sometimes we even get together, but as soon as we beam down, you disappear, and you don’t reappear until shore leave is over.”

He shrugged.  “Well, I don’t like crowds much.  I find some sweet young thing who’s interesting in providing some tender, loving care to a dashing Starfleet officer.  It can be very...therapeutic.”

“I imagine so,” Uhura said with a laugh as the turbolift came to a halt.  She preceded him through the doors, continuing their conversation.  “Have you heard that Starfleet is considering sending families into space sometime soon?”

“Yes,” replied Heisenberg.  “Everyone was talking about it at Starbase 47.  It’ll make a big change in the way we do things having crews with families onboard.”

“I don’t know if I agree with the decision or not.  Placing families in danger seems  a strong reason against it, but it would be nice having a family around.  Who of us hasn’t thought about the relationships we’ve given up for Starfleet?  Maybe someday you could bring your sweet young thing with you.”

He stopped at his door and grinned.  “I don’t think so, Captain.  He didn’t seem  interested in space, just spacemen.  But I will miss him.”

Uhura shook her head.  “Now you know why I stick to shopping.  See you on the bridge.”

“Yes, sir.”  He watched her disappear down the hall without really seeing her.  He stood there a minute--a wistful look in his eyes--before entering his small cabin.

Later, their conversation in the hall was forgotten as they met on the bridge to attend to the daily operation of the vessel.  The Marcus Polo was a Starfleet scout ship, one of the few ships in Starfleet equipped with transwarp drive.  Listed as an experimental vehicle under the command of acting Captain Uhura, it had a ship’s complement of 40 men and women. Most of them made up the First Contact Team of scientists and scouts responsible for exploring uncharted worlds.

Uhura sat comfortably in the command chair on the bridge of the scout ship and monitored the activity around her.  Heisenberg was handling shipboard communications from his console with his usual skill.  Ensign T’Challa, the ship’s navigator/helmsmen, had lain in a course for some routine planetary mapping.  The young chief engineer, Lieutenant Commander Howard, was busy at her engineering console, checking the repairs made at Starbase 47.

Two bridge officers were missing from their posts.  Lieutenant T’Sue, science officer, was inspecting the computer core on the third level to ensure that completed repairs met with the Vulcan’s high standards.  Uhura’s first officer, Commander Grayhawk, was in sickbay with Dr. Chapel checking on the FCT (as the First Contact Team was known).  He was their commanding officer, and he took an active interest in their health, especially after the brawls and mishaps that the FCT were frequently involved in on shore leave.

“Uhura to Sickbay,” the captain said, pressing the internal comm button on the arm of her chair.  “Is Commander Grayhawk available?”

“Grayhawk here, Captain,” came the deep reply.

“Damage report?”

“Only six with injuries serious enough for Dr. Chapel to handle personally.  She’s bonewelding Vasquez’s leg right now.”

“Any locals injured?” she asked, knowing that there hadn’t been any official complaints logged from Starbase 47.  Yet.

“No,” he replied.  “They take out their frustrations on one another, and as long as the cost of property damage doesn’t exceed profits, the locals seem happy.”

“Fortunately for us,” she added.  “Keep me posted, Commander.  And let me know if I can do anything.”

“Aye, Captain.”  Grayhawk knew that disciplinary action, if any, was up to him.  He tended to ignore FCT shore leave antics; as the initial contact with many dangerous planets, they dealt with stress in their own ways.

He thumped Vasquez affectionately on the back and nodded to Dr. Chapel.  “Take good care of them, Doctor.”

“Better than they take care of each other,” she muttered as he headed for the bridge.

“Captain,” Heisenberg was saying as Grayhawk exited the turbolift with Lieutenant T’Sue.  “We have a message coming in from Starfleet.  Change of orders.”

“Let’s hear it, Lieutenant.”

The familiar Federation symbol replaced the screen image of approaching stars.  “Marcus Polo, this is the USS Excelsior with a priority message from Starfleet Command.  We are relaying new coordinates and change of orders now.”

Heisenberg nodded at Uhura as he received the data on his console.

“Received,” Uhura acknowledged, watching the viewscreen as an image of the smiling captain of the Excelsior appeared on the screen.

“Captain Uhura,” Sulu said with a familiar grin.  “I like the sound of that.  How long is this ‘temporary’ duty going to last?”

“Captain Sulu,” she replied.  “I like the sound of that, too, and I’ll probably stay in this chair until they send you to bring me in.”

“Never happen.  We transwarp captains have to stick together.  It’s good to see you again.”

“Thank you, Hikaru.  Now, what’s so important that the Excelsior is playing communications relay?”

Sulu stopped smiling.  “Actually, Uhura, we’re all responding to the same situation.  We’ve discovered a series of small but powerful beacons moving through the galaxy.  They are broadcasting some unknown signals, nothing as strong as the whale probe that almost destroyed Earth, but they are headed for some heavily populated star systems.”

“Dangerous?” she asked, aware that everyone on the bridge had stopped to listen.

“We don’t know yet.  Starfleet has assigned ships to each beacon, but we won’t know anything until you do.  You’re the closest to one.”

Uhura nodded.  “Understood.  We’ll keep you posted on what we find.”

“Thanks.  Take care of yourself.”  He seemed reluctant to sign off.

She smiled at her longtime friend.  “No problem.  Remember where we came from, Captain.”

“I don’t forget it for a moment, Captain.  Excelsior signing off.”

Uhura turned to her helmsman.  “Feed those coordinates to the helm, Lieutenant Heisenberg.  Ensign, transwarp--”  She glanced at the Lieutenant Commander.  “Two?”  The blonde woman nodded.  “Two,” Uhura repeated.

“T’Sue,” she continued, “review the information we received from the Excelsior and find out all you can about what we’re up against.   T’Challa--”

T’Challa turned from his console.  “Estimating target coordinates in four point three hours.”

“Good.  Let’s get those system checks finished before we arrive.”  The crew returned to their tasks, motivated by the prospect of an interesting mission.

Four point three hours later, the small scout ship had traveled an incredible distance from Starbase 47 and stood at a full stop near the dark artifact Starfleet had referred to as a beacon.  It had slowed its speed when they’d come within range and stopped as if waiting for them.  The crew studied the viewscreen and their instruments for a clue as to its purpose and origin.

“It is exactly two meters in length and one meter in diameter,” reported T’Sue as she studied her scanners.  “So old that our scanners approximate an age at 100,000 years plus.  Composed of a variety of metals and synthetic compounds.  It is radiating a broad spectrum of electromagnetic waves.”

“Captain!” Heisenberg exclaimed and threw down his earpiece.  The sound of loud static filled the bridge.  “It’s sending out broadband comm signals, too, some cutting into the subspace frequencies.  Whatever it is, it wants to make sure we know it’s here.”

“Open hailing frequencies, Lieutenant,” she instructed.

“Aye, Captain.  Hailing frequencies open.”  After several minutes of trying standard greetings, he turned from his communications panel.  “It’s no use, sir.  No response.”

“Keep trying.”  Something about this didn’t seem right.  She restrained herself from checking the subspace frequencies herself for any signs of life.

Grayhawk moved from his monitoring station behind Uhura and stood by her chair.  “Ever been fishing, Captain?” he asked without taking his dark eyes off the object on the screen.

“Not for a long time, Mr. Grayhawk,” she answered.  “Why?  Do you think that this thing is a lure of some kind?”

“Just a possibility.”

“Well right now,” Howard interrupted, “It’s more of a weapon than a fishing pole.  It’s firing a particle beam at us!”

“Shields!” ordered Uhura.  “Go to red alert.  And get some distance between us and that thing.”

T’Challa set the engines to full reverse, but the object didn’t seem to move.  “No good,” the helmsman reported.  “The particle ray is like a tractor beam, keeping us connected.  When we move, it moves with us.”

“Gravitron emissions are increasing,” added T’Sue.  “Shields are only blocking fifty percent of the particles.”

Uhura turned to face the science officer.  “Is it dangerous to the crew?”

“Unknown.  Up to now, gravitrons have been theoretical particles.  This is the first known encounter we’ve had with a construct capable of producing them.  Hypothetically, gravitrons should have little effect on organic life, other than changing their apparent weight.”

Uhura, unwilling to take a chance on “hypothetically” safe alien beacons attached to her ship, ordered, “Fire phasers.”

“Aye, Captain.  Firing phasers one and two,” said the young engineer.  Twin beams of crimson light hit the beacon and bounced off into space.

“No effect,” T’Challa reported needlessly.

Uhura frowned.  “Increase shields to maximum.  Heisenberg, warn Starfleet of what’s happened.  Recommend other investigating ships stay out of graviton range of the beacons.”

“Increased shields have reduced beam penetration another twenty-five percent,” T’Sue relayed.  “Power drain is excessive.”

“T’Challa, find us the nearest planetary body.  I’ll take anything, meteors, asteroids, or suns going nova.”

“Trying to dislodge the fishhook?” Grayhawk asked.

“Exactly.”  Before her orders could be carried out, the beacon suddenly blazed brightly.  The viewscreen automatically tried to compensate for the brilliant light, but some of the crew became momentarily blinded by the flare.  As suddenly as it began, the beacon went dark.

“Gravitron emissions have ceased, Captain.  Beacon power levels are not registering.”  T’Sue looked up from her scanners.  “Gravitron particles have penetrated all decks.”

“Run a detailed scan on that thing out there and take us off red alert,” Uhura commanded.  “System status?”

Lieutenant Commander Howard monitored the flashing lights of her console.  “Gravitrons appear to have no effect on the hull, life support, or superstructure.  I’m running microcircuitry checks now.”

Uhura looked at Grayhawk.  “Maybe our fisherman packed up and went home.”

“Possibly,” he agreed.  “Or, maybe we’ve already been thrown up on the bank.”

“T’Challa,” instructed Uhura, “see if we can get away from that beacon now.”

Before he could move, the red alert klaxon automatically came back on, and a tremor ran through the ship.

“Captain!” Howard shouted for attention.  “I’ve suddenly got structural damage on levels six and seven.  No loss of atmosphere, but the walls seem to be collapsing on the FCT decks.”

Uhura turned to Heisenberg.  “Evacuate levels six and seven.”

As Heisenberg complied, Lieutenant Commander Howard shook her head in disbelief.  “It’s impossible!  Rooms are forming where rooms didn’t exist before.  The FCT quarters are gone, separating into larger rooms.  I’m getting changes on all decks now.”

“T’Sue,” the captain said, “verify that graviton particles have stopped bombarding the ship.”

When the Vulcan didn’t answer, Uhura repeated her command.  Grayhawk finally moved into her line of sight, and she looked up with an expression that would have conveyed surprise if it had been on a human face.

“Verified, Captain,” she said slowly.  “Particles have ceased, and the ship is no longer undergoing reconfiguration.  The beacon is still on minimal power; however, the gravitrons we absorbed are affecting the computer systems, too.  According to internal sensors and the data banks, the ship’s complement has jumped from 40 to 60 personnel.”

“Check all systems,” Uhura told them.  “Perhaps it’s just our readouts that are faulty.”

Grayhawk turned to the communications officer.  “The FCT will have to do a visual inspection if we can’t trust our computers.  Lieutenant, get me Chief McNamara.”

Heisenberg tried to reach the FCT chief, but was answered only by silence.  Even if the chief had left level six or seven, he would have heard the shipwide hail.  Heisenberg tried contacting some of the other FCT members, concerned about the continued lack of response.  He could hear voices and strange noises below decks, but none of the FCT answered his hail.

“According to computer records,” explained T’Sue, “the Marcus Polo has no FCT personnel currently assigned.”

“It has to be the comm equipment,” insisted Grayhawk.  “Try contacting someone not on the FCT.”

“Bridge to Dr. Chapel,” summoned Heisenberg.  “Sickbay, come in please.”

“Chapel here,” came the quick response.  “What’s going on around here?  I had three FCT members on sickbeds down here, and now they’ve vanished into thin air.  Have we been attacked?”

“I’m not sure, Christine,” Uhura joined in.  “You’d better get up here until we find out what’s going on.”

“Okay.  I’ll be there as soon as--”  The communication link was broken.

“Bridge to Dr. Chapel,” began Heisenberg.  “Bridge to Dr. Chapel.”  He turned to his commander.  “The equipment is working, but she’s not responding.”

“What’s going on around here?” asked Uhura, leaving her seat and heading for the turbolift.  “Howard, you have the con.  Grayhawk, come with me.”

“Captain.”  T’Sue stopped her in mid-stride.  “Maybe you’d better look at this before you go.  If the FCT has been removed from the computer’s memory bank and from the ship, you should know that some things have been added.”

Uhura waited as the Vulcan woman continued.  “According to the personnel records, I am no longer the senior science officer on the Marcus Polo.”

“Who is?” Uhura asked slowly.

T’Sue answered without expression.  “Your husband, Commander Weldon Norris.  I am the assistant science officer.”

“What?”  Howard looked up from the unfamiliar ship diagrams.  “Captain Uhura has a husband?”

“As do you,” added T’Sue.  “According to this, you married Mr. Drew Murphy six months ago.  He’s an ensign in engineering.”

“Drew?”  The lieutenant commander looked shocked.  “But he’s a childhood friend.  He never even went to Starfleet.”

T’Sue continued.  “T’Challa is married to Inasia T’gola and has three sons.”

It was the helmsman’s turn to be startled.  “Inasia?  She and I went to college together.  She’s the governor’s daughter.”  He seemed pleased with himself.  “Three sons!”

“Lieutenant Heisenberg is married, also, and has a daughter.”

“Married?  To whom?” he asked.

“Lieutenant Marcus Alletto.”

“That’s impossible!” he exclaimed.  “Marcus Alletto was the communications officer aboard the USS Grissom when it was destroyed by Klingons around the Genesis planet!”

“My husband,” said T’Sue, “is my child-betrothed, Sallek.  He is a teacher of the children aboard the Marcus Polo.  Everyone appears to have a family except Commander Grayhawk.  There are no FCT members aboard, according to ship records.”

“This is impossible,” said Uhura, agreeing with her confused crew.  “We’ve got to find out if the computer is--”

The turbolift doors opened and a small group stepped onto the bridge, deep in their own conversation.  They stopped when they saw the bridge crew staring at them.

“Uhura,” the tall, handsome man in a Starfleet commander’s uniform addressed her.  “Is everything all right?”

She inhaled and straightened her jacket.  “Yes, Weldon.  Everything’s fine, but I think we all need to have a little talk.  Someone turn off that damned alert klaxon.”

Down in sickbay, Dr. Christine Chapel slowly became conscious.  She thought that she had seen it all in her years in Starfleet.  She’d seen monsters and mechanisms.  She’d experienced mental and physical manipulation; held careers as a biochemist, nurse, and doctor; and followed her heart to the stars.  She had been startled when the FCT crewmen disappeared and the sickbay doubled in size, but she believed that she’d experienced stranger things.  She was wrong.  As she had stood with her fingers on the comm panel while talking to the bridge, the sickbay door had opened to admit a middle-aged man carrying two cups of tea.  Christine Chapel, veteran of years of space duty and situations strange and wondrous, fainted.

“Christine!” exclaimed her husband, Roger Corby, as he sat down the tea and tried to catch her before she hit the floor.

The command crew met later in a small conference room (it had been much larger before the graviton beam had restructured it to allow for the daycare center next door).  Grayhawk remained in command on the bridge while the others met to discuss the situation.

Uhura sat at the head of the table and looked around the room for answers.  Everyone seemed to be in shock, including Dr. Chapel.  “Does anyone have any idea where these people came from?” she asked.

Chapel focused on Uhura.  “No, but I can tell you they are not composed of graviton particles.  According to the medical tricorders, they are living, breathing humanoids.”

“So they’re not some kind of hologram,” Heisenberg decided, abandoning his own theory.  His mind raced with the possibility of meeting an old lover that he knew was dead.  And a daughter that hadn’t existed before today.

“I have met Sallek,” said T’Sue.  “He is as I remember him, down to the telepathic link.”

“If they’re alive,” offered T’Challa, “maybe we’re on some kind of alternate timeline.”

T’Sue shook her head.  “Theoretically, if a timeline were changed, we wouldn’t be aware of it.”

“Perhaps the graviton beam kept us aware of our original timeline,” suggested Howard.  She hoped it didn’t sound as lame to them as it did to her.  “Or they could be aliens transformed into shapes that we’ll be comfortable with.”

Uhura stood.  “We need more information.  It’s too convenient that just when Starfleet considers putting families into space--and it’s foremost on our minds--we encounter a strange machine and suddenly have families.”

“Are you saying that the beacon read our minds and gave us what we secretly wanted?” Heisenberg asked.

“And if it did,” continued T’Challa.  “Why?”

“I don’t know, but I intend to find out,” Uhura promised.  “In the meantime, we must get as much information from the visitors as possible.  If they really think they are our families, they’re going to be as confused about all this as we are.  Perhaps this is their timeline, and we’re the interlopers.  I’ve experienced an alternate universe before, and those inhabitants were no less real than you or I.”

Christine looked at her old friend.  “But Roger Corby?  You can’t expect me to talk to him as if he were really my husband.  He died a monster, years ago.”

“Not this Roger Corby.  This Roger Corby waited for you to finish Starfleet training and went into space with you.  He didn’t turn into a heartless android.  In this universe, you stopped him.”

Heisenberg nodded.  Perhaps he’d been able to influence Marcus from taking the Grissom assignment in the same way.  “What about Commander Grayhawk?  Why doesn’t he have a family?”

Uhura shook her head.  “I don’t know.  Commander Grayhawk already has a large family.  Perhaps his heart’s desire is something else.”

“And who is Weldon Norris?” Lieutenant Commander Howard asked with a smile.

Uhura smiled back.  “He was a good man, Commander, but he made the mistake of making me choose between him and Starfleet.  I’d just been assigned to the Enterprise; I couldn’t stay home when there was an entire universe waiting for me.”

Heads nodded around the table.  Most of the people there had made similar decisions in their careers.  Each had made sacrifices to get where they were, but now it looked as if they could take back their sacrifices and have their careers, too.

“I’m going to inform the crew of what little we know,” Uhura went on.  “I hope they will bear with us until we can find out what’s happened.  Dismissed.”

T’Sue hesitated as she started to leave.

“What is it, Lieutenant?” Howard asked.

The Vulcan looked at the door.  “I almost reminded the captain of Chief McNamara’s weekly staff meeting in an hour.”

“That’s okay,” Howard said, trying to sound cheerful.  “He and the FCT will be back before we know it.”

They weren’t back by the time the bridge crew was relieved by the night shift.

“So you really don’t remember me?” Weldon asked as he and Uhura walked from the bridge to her--their--quarters.

“Of course, I remember you,” she told him, surprised at how comfortable her arm felt in his.  “It’s just that in my life, you didn’t play a big part.  We dated at the academy, but you wanted to go into the private sector, and I wanted to explore strange new worlds.”

He stared at her.  “You don’t remember our honeymoon on Andor, or the time Mr. Spock and I destroyed the space amoebae?  What about our teaching positions at the academy before you got the Marcus Polo assignment?”

She shook her head.  “I’m sorry, but none of those things happened to us in my universe.  Some of them happened to me, but not with you.  I’m sorry.”  The door of their quarters slid open as they approached, and the wonderful smell of her grandmother’s mutton stew filled her nostrils.

A beautiful young woman was setting the table, and she looked up as they entered the room.  “Well, it’s about time,” she said.  “It was especially busy in sickbay today with Dr. Chapel acting so weird.  You’d think that she’d never delivered a baby before.  I barely got here before you.”

She moved gracefully in the comfortable clothes Uhura often wore.  The younger woman met them and kissed each of them on the cheek.  “Come and sit down, Mom.  You look exhausted.”

“Mom?” Uhura repeated weakly.

Weldon smiled sympathetically.  “Captain Uhura, I’d like you to meet your daughter, Mista.  She’s a nurse in Sickbay.”

Mista stared at her father and then at Uhura.  “It’s true then?  You really don’t remember us?”

Her father patted his stunned daughter’s shoulder.  “Just think of it as temporary amnesia, darling.  Treat her as if she’s suffering from shock.”

Uhura felt as if she was in a bad dream.  Suddenly, her “husband’s” arm in hers didn’t seem so comfortable.  Who were these people, and what were they doing on her ship?

Down the hall, Heisenberg stood outside the door of his cabin for a long time.  When he and Uhura had first met, she had warned him to be careful with what he wished for, he just might get it.  And once again, he’d probably wished for something that could get him in trouble.

Taking a deep breath, he opened the door and entered quarters that weren’t his.  Before, he had lived in one efficient room, typical of officer quarters.  Now, he had several rooms.  The lighting was subdued, and soft music filled the air.  He heard laughter and splashing noises and followed them to the doorway of the bathroom.  A very wet, very naked  bundle of pink energy jumped at him and affixed itself to his chest.
 
“Daddy!” it screamed and hugged him.  Marcus, handsome as ever, stood watching them with a towel in his hands.  Heisenberg hugged the little girl tightly, soaking in her wonderful soapy smell and giggly affection.  For the first time in a long while, he felt happy.

“Tony,” Marcus said softly.  “Are you all right?”

Heisenberg nodded but didn’t speak for a few moments.  “I’ve missed you,” he whispered, including them both.

“I think I understand,” said Marcus.  “Now let’s get some pajamas on our baby and get her off to bed.”

Big blue eyes met Tony’s.  “I want you to tell me a story tonight, Daddy.  My favorite!”

Tony looked desperately at Marcus.  He didn’t know what her favorite story was.  He didn’t even know her name.

“Not tonight, Phina,” Marcus told her as he gathered her up in the big fluffy towel.  “Tonight is Papa’s turn to sing the monkey song.”

Tony gave her a peck on the cheek as she disappeared into the towel and was carried off down the hallway.  He found a bedroom with his clothes in it and changed out of his uniform.  He stood outside Phina’s door and listened to Marcus sing the last few notes of a lullaby.

“I didn’t know you sang,” Tony told him as they left the sleeping girl and headed for the dining area.

“According to the captain’s announcement today,” Marcus said, placing laden plates on the table, “there’s a lot you don’t know about us.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony told him.  “I feel as if I’ve been in a coma or something.  I know that I loved you when we were in the academy.  I know I’ve always wanted a little girl.  I  just can’t believe that we named her after my mother.”

“As if she’d give us a choice,” Marcus said with a chuckle.

Tony laughed.  His mother did make Klingons seem like pacifists.  “So tell me about us.  To me, you and Phina are figments of my imagination, things I’ve only dreamed about.”

Marcus leaned across the table and touched his fingers to Tony’s cheek.  “Does this feel like a figment?  Can a dream do this?”  He kissed him long and hard and sat back to see the response.

Tony grinned.  “If it can, don’t wake me up.”

Several floors below, Lieutenant Commander Howard was surprised to find her new husband still working when she reached engineering.  She hadn’t gone to her quarters after she was relieved of bridge duty but had gone to the engineering section.  She was on a ship that she didn’t know anything about, the same ship that she had known like the back of her hand earlier in the day.  She wouldn’t feel comfortable until she checked everything out herself.  Drew and a team of people (only half of whom she recognized) were replacing a burnt power panel damaged when trying to increase their shield strength against the graviton particles.  Drew waved at her from across the room and went back to work.

Moving to a different part of the room, Amanda began scanning the new equipment.  Life support was a much larger system and had several additional backups.  She tried to trace the new circuits, but her mind kept wandering to the other side of the room.

Unlike many of her shipmates, Amanda had kept in touch with her “husband” over the years.  She’d seen him only a month earlier while visiting her father on Memory Alpha.  The two Murphy boys were her father’s godchildren, and she and her brother had grown up with them.  She and Drew were just friends--good friends.  She told him about her boyfriends and he told her about his girlfriends.  She loved Starfleet and he loved music.  They both detested their siblings and spent hours discussing life, the universe, and everything.

“Can I help you with that, Boss?” came the soft question from behind her.

“Drew!” she exclaimed, happy to see him in spite of the surreal situation.  How like him to joke about the fact that she outranked him.  “How are you?”

“Confused, like everyone else.  How about you?”

“The same.”

He glanced at the departing maintenance crew.  “Well, I’m off-duty now.  How about a cup of cocoa on the rec deck?”

She smiled, comforted by something as trivial as his remembering her favorite antidepressant.  “Sounds great.”

On the rec deck, they sipped scalding cocoa and talked about graviton beams and maintenance schedules until they ran out of business conversation.

“Okay,” Drew said finally.  “Have I ever told you the story of the little engineer who got carried off by a handsome prince?”

“In my version of the story, you were the comrade-in-arms.  I can’t imagine what happened to change that.”

“You mean you don’t know how we graduated from friends to lovers?”

Honest as ever.  “Yes.”

“As teenagers we hung out together and dated other people, but I never found anyone that I could talk to as easily as I could talk to you.”

“Really?” Amanda asked.  “I always compared everyone to you, too.  No one was half as much fun as you were.”

“Well, last winter solstice, I visited your dad, and you came home for vacation.  We went hiking through the crystal caverns, got caught in an avalanche, and thought we were going to die.  When they dug us out two days later, we were engaged.”

“And after our rescue, we decided to make our new relationship permanent?  But what about your music?  How did you get to be an ensign in Starfleet?”

“I still play the horn,” he told her.  “I just don’t do it in an orchestra anymore.  And your father, the commodore, appointed me an ensign based on my years of work on Memory Alpha, most of it as a junior engineer to please my father.  Our brothers are still at the academy, a little upset that I got my commission in the field.”

“I can imagine,” she said with a small laugh.  She sat back and stared at the empty cup.  “Drew, I didn’t go home last year for winter solstice.  I was going to, but, at the last minute, we got called away.”

“Wow.  This has timewarp written all over it,” he said with a shake of his head.  “I guess this means that I will be sleeping on the couch for a while.”

“Don’t be silly, Ensign.  Of course not.  You’ll be sleeping down in engineering.”

Not far from the rec deck where Amanda and Drew were discussing sleeping arrangements, Grayhawk entered the gymnasium, not surprised to find it empty.  With no FCT and everyone else involved with their families, there wasn’t much need for an exercise area to relieve stress or occupy one’s time.  Dressed in a dark warm-up suit, he began stretching for his workout.  He was startled when a young woman stepped in front of him, also wearing a warm-up suit.  He hadn’t seen her come into the room.

“Am I disturbing you?” she asked.

He straightened up and looked down at her.  Very pretty and very blonde, she seemed undaunted by the large Amerindian.  “No,” he told her.  “You’re not disturbing me.  Who are you?”

She sighed as if it was a question she’d been answering all day, and Grayhawk realized that she probably had.  Maybe in her universe, they had been good friends.  “My name is Neva Perry,” she said.  “I’m in one of the communal marriage groups aboard.  I’m a therapist.”

Odd, Grayhawk thought, I went over the new crew list earlier and I don’t remember a counselor named Perry.  It was possible that he’d overlooked it.  He certainly hoped that new people weren’t still appearing on the ship.  He continued stretching and she joined him.

“I understand that you are the only one aboard now who doesn’t have a family.  Why do you think that is?”   Her frankness surprised him, but he appreciated people who got to the point.  He tried to think of her as a fellow crewman and not a therapist.

“I don’t know.  There weren’t many opportunities that I turned my back on in my life.  I’ve been stationed planetside twice and had families both times.  Some of my children are in Starfleet, and I see them occasionally.  To me, I guess Captain Uhura and the crew are my family.”

“Interesting,” said the woman.  “Family isn’t it.  If you could have anything you wanted, what would it be?”

“Good therapist question,” he decided.  “I don’t know, maybe adventure.  That’s why I joined Starfleet in the first place.”

Before he could elaborate, the ship’s communications system interrupted their conversation.  “All bridge personnel report to the bridge immediately.  Repeat, all bridge personnel report immediately.”

“Excuse me,” he said.  “Duty calls.”  He grabbed his jacket and headed for the door.

She smiled at him.  “It’s been nice talking to you, Commander.  I hope we do it again.”

“I look forward to it,” he replied.  He grabbed his towel and walked quickly to the turbolift.

When he arrived on the bridge, it was alive with activity.  Several of the battle station terminals had been activated and additional crewmen stood manning them.

“What’s happening?” Uhura asked, arriving just behind him and taking command from Lieutenant T’Sue.

“Klingon cruiser off the starboard bow,” came the Vulcan’s quick reply.  “No screens or weapons active.”

“Was it cloaked?” Uhura asked.

“Possibly,” answered T’Sue, back at her science station.  “It appeared out of nowhere.”

“Captain,” Lieutenant Commander Howard got her attention.  “The beacon is still attached to us, but we can move.”

“Wait,” she responded.  “Let’s see what they’re up to.”  The Klingon craft waited motionless on the viewscreen.

“Maybe they’re responding to the beacon, too,” suggested T’Challa.

“Open hailing frequencies, Lieutenant Heisenberg, and we’ll see,” Uhura ordered.  “Stand by on shields and transwarp drive.”

Heisenberg complied and listed for a response.  “They’re not answering our hail, Captain.  Shall I inform Starfleet that Klingons have been detected in this quadrant?”

“No," Uhura instructed.  “I don’t want the Klingons monitoring our transmissions.  Prepare a buoy.”

“Transferring armament to Security,” Grayhawk announced as he took his position at the security console.  Howard nodded at him, relieved that she could focus all her attention on the ship’s defenses.

“Fire a warning shot,” Uhura told him.

Grayhawk fired a phaser blast close enough to engage their deflectors, but they didn’t return fire.

Uhura looked puzzled.  “Are there lifeforms aboard?  Why haven’t they done something?”

T’Sue rechecked her sensor readings.  “Sensors indicate that it has a crew of twenty and full weapons capability.  The ship is one of the very early battle cruisers.  It’s not even carried on the Klingon registry any longer.  It does not have cloak technology.”  She moved aside as Commander Norris reported to the bridge and took his assigned station.

Uhura had no time to comment as the Klingon vessel suddenly began firing.

“Shields are up,” Howard reported.  “Transwarp drive engaged at your command, Captain.”

“Phasers ready to return fire,” added Grayhawk.
 
“Wait,” Uhura said.  “Shields at maximum.  Lieutenant, keep trying hailing frequencies.”

“Aye, sir.”  He continued to hail the other ship.  The Klingons fired another round of phasers in response.  Surprisingly, some of the blast made it through their shields, and the little ship rocked from the impact.  Heisenberg set the hail on automatic and responded to internal calls as decks began reporting their status.

“Return fire,” Uhura commanded and watched as Grayhawk released a salvo of crimson beams at the larger vessel.  Unexpectedly, it exploded in a giant fireball.
 
“Vessel destroyed,” Weldon Norris reported in mild surprise.  “Apparently, their screens were weaker than normal.”

Uhura studied the viewscreen for a long moment.  “Full sensor sweep.  I don’t want to run into any more of those antiques.”  Turning to Grayhawk, she said, “Explain to me how a Klingon vessel has phasers stronger than anything we’ve ever encountered and screens like paper.”

He shook his head in bewilderment.  “I’ll go over the record tapes, Captain, and see what I can find out.”

“Captain,” Heisenberg interrupted, “Sickbay reports six people injured, including Teacher Sallek.  Lieutenant T’Sue is to report to Sickbay immediately.”  He watched T’Sue leave the bridge, worried but grateful that the summons had not been for him.

Captain Uhura leaned back in her seat.  “There are too many questions and not enough answers here,” she said.  “I want everything reviewed that’s happened since we arrived.  I want telemetry on the beacon and the Klingon vessel gone over again.  Anything--anything at all--out of the ordinary, I want reported.  T’Challa, lay us in a course to the nearest starbase.”

Several exhausting hours later, she sat in the doctor’s office and sipped a cup of tea with her equally exhausted ship’s surgeon.  “Let’s not have another incident like that,” suggested Chapel.  “Vulcan physiology is not my field.  Thank heavens, Lieutenant T’Sue was here.”

“Is everyone all right?” Uhura asked, never considering that members of her family might be among those injured.

“Yes, except for Sallek.  His spine is crushed.  I’ve done all I can for him, Uhura.  Fortunately, T’Sue’s mind meld has blocked most of the pain.  If we can get him to a starbase, he may have a chance.”

Uhura looked at her with a small frown.  “And if he doesn’t make it, she’ll still have the Sallek that she left on Vulcan.  What’s going to happen if we get our Sallek home in one piece?  What if there are suddenly two of everyone?”

“Except Roger Corby, of course.”

Uhura smiled.  “How is it being an old married woman?”

“Honestly?”  Christine paused to take a sip of tea.  “I never realized how boring Roger really was.  He’s nothing at all like I remember him.  He spends all his time in the lab, and when we’re together all he wants to talk about is how he’s spending his time in the lab.  I’m not used to being ignored; even Mr. Spock didn’t ignore me.”

“I know what you mean,” Uhura said with a laugh.  “I feel like I’m on stage and Weldon, Mista, and the twins are actors working with me.  Only someone forgot to give me a script.”

Christine nodded.  “I think we all feel like that.”

“I shouldn’t complain.  They’re sweet and supportive.  I probably could get used to this after a century or two.”

“Not me.  As soon as we get this Corby back to Earth, he can bury himself in any laboratory he wants.  Plus, I’m still concerned about the FCT.”

“Me, too.  Beacons that attack for no reason, Klingon vessels that don’t act like Klingon vessels, family members appearing, and the FCT disappearing.  Weird things like Grayhawk meeting a therapist who tried to discover what made him happy.  And the worst part of it is, we aren’t any closer to discovering how or why this is all happening than we were yesterday.”

“Speaking of strange incidents,” Christine said, unexpectedly.  “I had something odd happen to me today.  I was on my way past the gymnasium and a striking blonde woman came out and addressed me as ‘Number One.’  It was almost like she knew me and was surprised to find me here.”

“Number One?” asked Uhura.

“Yes, my older sister was called Number One by the crew of the Enterprise when she was assigned there with Christopher Pike.  There’s a strong family resemblance between us.”

“I never realized that she was your sister,” Uhura said.  “Strange that this woman would know her.”

“Very strange,” agreed Christine.  “I’m going to start looking for that script of yours.  I didn’t seem to get one either.”  As she spoke, she looked across the darkened sickbay at Sallek.  Near him, in the shadows, sat T’Sue.  “And neither did she,” the worried doctor thought to herself.

After Uhura had finished her tea, she returned to the bridge with a nagging thought that she should know what was going on.  Something was bumping around inside her head, but she couldn’t see it clearly enough to figure it out.

“Look at this, Uhura,” Weldon said excitedly as she left the turbolift.  On the main viewscreen was a series of wavy lines, a computer generated graph that he was working on.  “This is the level of energy coming from the beacon shortly before the Klingons appeared.”  The lines were slow moving and almost flat.  As they watched, the lines grew brighter and shot off the screen before settling back to their former placid rhythms.  “That,” continued Weldon, “is the energy expended by the beacon at the time that the vessel appeared.”

“What does it mean?” Uhura asked her science officer.  The rest of the bridge crew were watching the screen as intently as she was.

“I’m not sure yet, but look at this.  These are the energy levels recorded from the beacon when the crew complement changed from forty to sixty.”  He pressed a button and an apparent replay of the earlier jagged line appeared on the screen.  “They’re identical.  Whatever caused the Marcus Polo to reconfigure itself also caused the Klingons to appear.”

Heisenberg considered the screen for a moment.  “So an ancient beacon created the additional crew and the cruiser?  Why?  What kind of a weapon makes your dreams come true?”

“Maybe it’s not a weapon,” suggested Weldon.  “Maybe it’s a simple communications device that affects our senses.”

Uhura looked thoughtful.  “You must understand, Weldon, that my first responsibility is to my crew, including the FCT.  We must destroy the beacon before more deadly creations arise, too dangerous for us to handle.”

Weldon nodded, but before he could reply, Heisenberg jumped to his feet.

“Captain!” he exclaimed.  “You can’t be serious.  These people are a part of us now.  We can’t turn them off like a computer program.”

“He’s right,” agreed T’Challa.  “You said these people were no less real that we were.  They have rights.”

“And what of the rights of the FCT?” asked Uhura.  “And the rights of the Weldon Norris who lives on Earth?  And our real families?  We chose this life, they didn’t.  We didn’t build these families.  In fact, we didn’t even want them two days ago!”

“But we feel alive,” argued Weldon.  “Isn’t that really the only requirement for being alive?”

Uhura took his hand in hers.  “It is, Weldon, it is.  I hope you return to the lives that you led before you arrived, wherever that may be.  But you don’t belong here.  We’re as much strangers to you as you are to us.”

She looked around the bridge.  “Things have to be put right, no matter how much we’d wish it otherwise.”

Heisenberg angrily turned to his communications console.  He wasn’t so sure that he would choose the FCT over Marcus and Phina.

Howard returned the viewscreen to its usual forward view, complete with the ancient beacon.  “How are we going to destroy it?” she asked.  “It reflects everything we throw at it.”

“We’re going to have some inside help,” Uhura informed them.  With a stab at the internal comm button on the arm of her chair, she carried out her plan.

“I don’t understand,” Neva said a short time later as Grayhawk escorted her to the bridge, “why Captain Uhura is looking for a way to send the families away.  Isn’t being happy part of being human?”

Grayhawk smiled and shook his head.  “I think humans are more happy pursuing happiness than actually achieving it.”

“I still don’t understand,” she said in a small voice.

“First of all, we have missing comrades,” he tried to explain.  “But I believe that even if the FCT were here with the families, we’d still have trouble adjusting.  Humans, by nature, appreciate what they work for more than what they have given to them.  We are suspicious of things that are too good to be true.”

As they stepped onto the bridge, Uhura moved from her chair to stand in front of the nervous woman.  Dr. Chapel stood discretely nearby.  Uhura studied the stranger for a few moments, ignoring the tension in the air.  “You’re Vena, aren’t you?  The Talosian survivor?”

The woman stared at her, a sudden look of panic on her pretty face.  “Vena is dead,” she said finally.  “Christopher is dead.  I’m an image of Vena, a memory of what once was.”

Uhura shook her head.  “Whatever you are, some part of you is still Vena, I think.  You’ve been too inquisitive and too obliging to be something the Talosians dreamed up on their own.  You have to help us stop what’s happening.  Help us destroy the beacon.”

Vena looked around angrily.  “Fools!  They gave you what you wanted.  Now come back with me, and they’ll give you even more.  Please!”

“Or else?”  The Captain knew how deadly the Talosians could be.

“Or else they’ll make you fly into a planet or a sun!  There’s no way to keep them from making you see what they want you to see.  And there are other probes.”

This sounded dangerously familiar to Uhura.  She had been aboard the Enterprise when Mr. Spock kidnapped his former captain, Christopher Pike, and took him to the quarantined planet of Talos IV.  The inhabitants of Talos were psychic vampires, living their lives through the experiences of others.  With Vena and Pike dead, they needed new dreams and new illusions.

She grabbed Vena by the shoulders.  “You helped us against the Talosians before, you can do it again.  You know how stubborn we humans can be, you were one yourself once.”  She shook the young woman.  “Can you feel this?  I’m a warm, living human being, just as you were. “Others don’t tell us who to love, who our families are.  We decide.  What if the Talosians had told you not to love Christopher Pike?  Could you have done it?”

“I...could not.”

“And when Captain Pike decided to come back to you, by his own free will, wasn’t that worth a million Captain Pikes that the Talosians created?”

Her eyes lit up.  “Ten million.”

Uhura smiled.  “That’s what a choice is worth.  None of us chose the families the Talosians gave us.  We made our own decisions, and we pay for them.  Please don’t let them take that away from us.  From you.”

Vena noticed the rest of the crew nodding in agreement, even Heisenberg.  “You’re not coming back with me?”

Uhura shook her head.  “No.”

“Even though you know the consequences?”

“Yes.  We choose.  We decide.”

“Then I can do no less.  I see the truth of what you say, even if they don’t.  They had hoped you had changed, become less willful over the years.  They were wrong and will not use my image again.”

She turned to the screen and the beacon suddenly sparkled with lights.  “I miss him,” she told Uhura.

Uhura placed her hand on Vena’s shoulder and looked at the stars with her.  “I’m sure he misses you, too.”

“Captain,” reported Ensign T’Challa.  “The probe is moving away.  It’s--”

Suddenly, the viewscreen was lit with a bright glare that quickly died down.  When the stars returned to normal, the beacon was gone.  As was Vena.

“Thank you,” whispered a small voice.

“It’s gone,” Howard announced.  “I’m not even getting any debris on the sensors.”

“Ship status?” asked Uhura, returning to her seat.

“No change.”  The engineer stopped to peer at her readouts.  “Wait!  I’m getting structural changes on decks six and seven.”

Everyone waited breathlessly for the changes to cease.  The bridge was strangely silent and missing a few crewmen who had been there before Vena disappeared.

“Lieutenant,” Uhura softly instructed her communications officer.  “Inform Starfleet of everything that’s happened.  Make sure no one approaches the beacons, and recommend they strengthen the barricade around Talos IV.”

“Talos IV?” T’Challa asked.  “Isn’t that planet restricted?  Something about aliens that live off emotions and fantasies?”

“Yes,” answered Grayhawk.  “Aliens so powerful that they could imprint a beacon with the memories of a human girl that had crash-landed on their planet.  A girl named Vena.”

“Who once loved a man named Christopher Pike,” finished Dr. Chapel as she stepped onto the bridge with Lieutenant T’Sue.  “To think she almost destroyed us to get us to Talos IV.”

“Then our ‘families’ were fake,” Heisenberg said.  “They took our memories and created what we wanted to see.”

“I’m sorry,” Uhura told him.  “They thought that by giving us our fondest dreams, we’d let them share them with us.  Unfortunately, they didn’t care how much those dreams hurt when we woke up.”

“Doctor Chapel,” said Uhura.  “What do you think of a memorial service after the watch today?”

“For Vena?” she asked.

“And Christopher Pike,” added Uhura.  “And the families we’ve loved and lost in the last 24 hours.  It’s the least we can do.”

Heisenberg hadn’t gone to Marcus’s memorial service after the Grissom was destroyed.  He suddenly realized how much he had needed to attend.  He looked around at his shipmates, busy with their duties.  They would be at the memorial service and most of them would go back to empty cabins.  But some would call home, and maybe--on their next shore leave--they’d visit old friends and rekindle old relationships.

Personally, Heisenberg thought he’d go shopping with Captain Uhura.

He caught her eye and gave her a brave smile.  She nodded before sending Grayhawk and Dr. Chapel to check on the FCT and explain where two days of their lives had gone.

A sudden wailing filled the bridge speakers, and Heisenberg scrambled to reduce the volume.  “Captain!  It’s a distress signal from a race of aliens we’ve never encountered before.”

“I have a location,” Ensign T’Challa reported.

“Warp eight,” Uhura said, not bothering to consult her busy engineer.  “Who are they?”

“It’s pretty garbled.  All I can make out is the name of the ship or the homeworld, I can’t tell which.  It sounds like Furrygi or Ferring something.”

“Another potential ally for the Federation,” said Uhura.  “Rescuing a simple cargo ship is going to be a piece of cake after dealing with that Talosian beacon.  Let’s go, people.”
 
The Adventure Continues                    November 23, 1995                            Unpublished