Gemini (25 page)

But to Spock it seemed far more. He examined the screen for a few seconds, then turned to McCoy, both brows raised. “Remarkable,” he said.

“Spock, what is it?”

“Dr. McCoy is the medical expert, Captain, not myself—”

“Will somebody please tell me what's going on?”

“I told you,” said McCoy, speaking slowly, as if feeling his way through unfamiliar terrain, “I was doing a computer analysis of the Nadorian genome and the princes' DNA. This is the results of that analysis, cross-referenced with the princes' DNA and a readout of the princes' spinal column before the operation which separated them.”

“Which explains the two overlapping lines,” said Kirk. “Their spinal nerves?”

“That's right. But, Jim, what you can see on this scan, the highlighted points, are where the princes' DNA contradicts their spinal scan.”

“‘Contradicts'?” Kirk paused. A cold feeling was forming in his stomach, a harbinger that he had learned, from bitter experience, was always the bearer of unpleasant news and was never wrong. “But if their spinal scan is contradicted by their DNA, that means—”

“It means the princes were born separated, like any normal set of twins,” said McCoy. “It means they were conjoined surgically, after birth!”

“M
Y
G
OD
, B
ONES
,” said Kirk, softly, as the enormity of what McCoy had said sank in. To admire the conjoined princes for their grace, to respect them for making a full life under conditions that other men would find totally untenable—these sentiments were all perfectly admirable when you thought they were a response to conditions that a freakish whim of nature had dictated, a seemingly random caprice of fate that one could do nothing about, and could only learn to cope with.

But to realize that someone had deliberately planned this juxtaposition … that a mind had planned, of its own free will, to join two healthy infants together without their knowledge or consent, to have purposefully and coldly determined that the two should be denied a normal life … This was evidence of such malice that it drove the coldness in Kirk's stomach throughout his entire body, made him want to strike out and destroy whoever had done this until—

“But how? Why—?”

“There's no way of telling without an investigation, Jim,” said McCoy. “The operation had to have been done not long after their births, with only a few key people aware of the truth. And the surgical technique was superb. If not for a few readings that were slightly off, I never would have seen it. Whoever conjoined them, I wouldn't mind studying under him for a while.”

“He was a butcher,” said Kirk. “Who else would have deliberately done that to two children, condemned them to a life like that … ?”

“Captain,” said Spock, “your characterization is founded in emotion. We have no idea why the royal twins were so conjoined. Doctor, has your examination made you aware of any reason why such a surgical procedure should have been performed?”

“Not immediately, no. There are differences between the Earth-standard physique and the Nadorian system, of course, and the answer may lie there. But there's no guarantee that any of this will help you, Jim.”

“It explains a great deal about the twins'relationship, though,” Kirk said, musingly. The anger was seeping away now, to be replaced by a certain deliberate coldness.

“True,” said Spock. “Their impatience with each other, their argumentative nature—I would think it comes from the memory, long since forgotten, naturally, of their not being joined when they were first born.”

“It makes sense,” said McCoy with a nod.

“But, Bones—could you have told that the twins were conjoined after birth from their official records?”

“No, Jim,” McCoy said slowly. “The official records have been altered to conceal any evidence of the princes' true birth state.”

“Then … they were never told.”

“No.” McCoy's voice trailed off, then he shook his head. “I have no idea if this helps you, Jim.”

“You never know,” said Kirk, blandly, at which point Spock and McCoy exchanged a glance. They had heard that tone before.

* * *

“Captain, this is most kind of you,” said Lonal. “We had always regretted not having a chance to receive the full tour of your magnificent ship before.”

“It was a regret of mine, too,” lied Kirk. The change in Regent—no,
Prince
Lonal was even more pronounced now that he had officially been made Nador's ruler.
It's easy to seem confident when your word is the final authority,
Kirk thought. It had been a simple matter to persuade Lonal to tour the
Enterprise,
leaving his security guard in the transporter room—after all, weren't they all part of the Federation?

“And here,” said Kirk, ushering Prince Lonal into his cabin, “I have a fine Saurian brandy I hoped Your Highness would give me an opinion on.” Lonal smiled beneficently. It was the term “Your Highness” that did it, Kirk was sure.

“We should be delighted,” he smiled.

Kirk saw that Lonal got the most comfortable chair behind his desk, then took the bottle of brandy from a secret compartment in one of the cabinets in his quarters. Kirk was sure Lonal did not see him surreptitiously press a button on the side of his viewscreen console.

“What shall we toast to?” asked Lonal, lifting his glass to the light. Kirk wasn't sure if by “we” Lonal included him, but figured the assumption wasn't too big a risk.

“There are so many things,” said Kirk, sitting across the desk from Lonal. “How did the Earth writer, Lewis Carroll, put it? ‘Of shoes, and ships and sealing wax, of cabbages and kings.'”

“‘Cabbages'?” asked Lonal.

“A kind of Earth vegetable. Large, leafy, used in cooked dishes. I know,” said Kirk, as if seized by sudden inspiration, “kings.” He stood and raised his glass. “Let us toast the monarchy of the planet Nador.” Prince Lonal remained seating, beaming from ear to ear.

“Captain,” he said, at last, “I don't think I could—”

“Let us toast,” continued Kirk, “the memory of Their Serene Highnesses, Princes Abon and Delor.”

“Oh. Of course.” Lonal raised his glass halfheartedly toward Kirk's, then lowered it and drank, guzzling the brandy far too quickly to properly enjoy it, Kirk noted.

“Interesting thing,” said Kirk, as he paced around the cabin, “what Dr. McCoy found when operating on the princes.”

“Captain,” said Lonal, “must we speak of the two departed monarchs? Their memory is so still fresh in my mind that—”

“Of course.” Kirk nodded sympathetically. “As I was saying,” he continued immediately, “McCoy found that they had not been born conjoined, but had rather been conjoined
after
they were born.” He raised his glass, drank, and lowered it slowly, peering at Lonal over the rim. “Remarkable, don't you think?”

“Quite impossible,” said Lonal, gulping another mouthful of the brandy. Kirk shook his head sadly. He could have saved the good stuff and given him Scotch from the dispenser. “The princes were born conjoined, Captain. I was present at their delivery, which took days. Their poor mother was in agony, I well recall her screams.” He shuddered, the unpleasant memory necessitating another gulp of brandy.

“That's your final word on the matter?” asked Kirk.

Lonal looked up from his glass and stared at Kirk, for the first time realizing something else was up. “What do you mean? Captain, do you doubt the word of Nador's monarch?”

“Not at all,” said Kirk. “But shouldn't you put that in the plural?” He reached to one side and touched the button on his door controls.

The cabin door slid open. Kirk didn't look at who was standing there—or rather, who he hoped was standing there—he was watching Prince Lonal.

His scrutiny was well rewarded. Lonal half-rose from his chair, then thudded back into it as if the gravity in the room had been suddenly tripled. But not even increased gravity could have accounted for the expression on his face, which looked something like a minnow confronted with a shark. He dropped his glass, which fell to the carpeted floor, spilling its contents. At that, Kirk winced.

But he said: “Please, Your Serene Highnesses, come in.”

Prince Abon and Prince Delor entered Kirk's cabin, nodding to Kirk and examining their surroundings, their expressions somehow contriving in the same moment to thank Kirk for the invitation and to appropriate the room as their own domain. It was a maneuver that only the truly noble, no matter their station of birth, could bring off. Even the Starfleet jumpsuits and slight disguises they were now stripping off could not hide their bearing, though Kirk thought he detected in their manner, beneath the gravity of the situation, a certain delight at for once not being mirror images of each other.

None of which described Prince Lonal at this moment—
if the honorific still applies,
thought Kirk, idly. His manner, his demeanor, were anything but graceful or noble; it seemed as though the old Lonal had returned, the man who was uncertain of his standing, the man who was used to having his every decision questioned, second-guessed, and then often overruled.

In that moment, Kirk almost felt sorry for him.

“Well, Regent Lonal,” said Delor, putting a faint but discernible emphasis on the second word, “is this how you greet your monarchs?”

Lonal jumped like a little girl caught playing at her mother's makeup table. “Your Serene Highnesses,” he said. “I rejoice to see you both—alive.” Kirk gave him credit for not stammering, while at the same time realizing that Lonal's astonishment was quite genuine. He wasn't that good an actor. Anton Karidian hadn't been that good an actor.

“We are certain you do,” replied Abon, “and hope our absence has not weighed too heavily on our subjects.”

Lonal's mouth opened and closed twice, looking for all the world like a fish gasping for air. “How … ?” he finally said.

“A ruse,” said Kirk, matter-of-factly, bowing slightly as he indicated chairs for the princes.

“But … your own doctor said the bodies destroyed in the malfunction of your transporter contained the princes' DNA.”

“He didn't say they were bodies.” Kirk smiled, though not in a good way. “Dr. McCoy was able to whip up a sample of organic matter from the skin-replacement samples in sickbay, laced with the princes' DNA.”

“Why … ?” asked Lonal, at which point Kirk lost even more respect for him; certainly that answer was obvious.

“We thought the person who wanted the princes dead would be in a more vulnerable position if he thought his efforts to kill the princes had succeeded.” Kirk leaned over his desk and gently poked Lonal in the chest, sending him back into his chair. “If you don't want to be included in the list of suspects,
Regent
Lonal, you'd better tell us what you know about Their Serene Highnesses' birth, and quickly.”

“They—were not born conjoined,” said Lonal. He still hadn't quite managed to catch his breath. Kirk glanced quickly at the princes; at Lonal's admission their eyes narrowed and their lips tightened, but they otherwise showed no reaction. McCoy had told the princes of his findings—Kirk knew the physician would consign to a special circle of hell doctors who kept vital medical information from those whose lives it affected “because they'd be better off not knowing”—but this was the first active admission of the fact they had heard from anyone in a firsthand position to know.

“We already know that,” said Kirk, his voice cold. “But why were they conjoined?”

“Because—” Lonal's tongue darted out of his mouth like a serpent after a fly, in a futile attempt to moisten his lips.

At that instant, Kirk's console sounded. Kirk ignored it, keeping his eyes on Lonal, who seemed to be on the edge of a stroke.
“Spock to Captain,”
came a voice from the console.
“Captain, please respond.”
Cursing the gods of timing, Kirk hammered a console button angrily.

“Kirk here,” he snapped.

“Captain, the energy storm we encountered earlier has returned.”

“Red alert. Sound battle stations. I'll be right there.” On the wall of his cabin, the red-alert panel began flashing, nearly, Kirk thought, in time to Lonal's pulse.

“You two get to sickbay,” Kirk told the princes, as if they were the lowliest ensigns in Starfleet. The two exchanged a glance, filled with equal parts dread and awe at this new adventure, and nodded, rising and beginning to again don their disguises with an air better attributed to Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer.

“What about him?” Abon pointed to Lonal, who seemed to be having trouble breathing.

“No!” said Lonal, suddenly finding some spine, and using it to straighten to his full height. “No, you must return me to Nador!” Muscles coursed in his face for a few seconds. “My people need me!” he finally shrieked.

“No one's leaving this ship,” said Kirk, grimly. He reached over and grabbed the collar of Lonal's robe, handing him over to Delor. “You two are awarded battlefield commissions. Take him to sickbay. Make sure he doesn't contact anyone on the planet.”

“Yes, sir!” echoed the twins, utterly delighted at their newfound responsibility. From somewhere, Kirk found a smile.
I was young once.

Spock rose from the center chair as soon as Kirk's feet hit the bridge. “Status?”

“As before, the storm seems to have coalesced with no noticeable indications,” said Spock, now at his station.

“Normal lighting,” said Kirk, seating himself. The viewscreen had already been activated. The morass of energy hovered before them in space, eternally whirling with some internal fury of its own that could never be sated, only expressed in destruction. It was like staring at the halo of energy from a dying star or at a nebula, always different, yet always the same. Yet it seemed somehow bigger this time; its edges were off the screen.