Fiction: The Horror with Holodecks (for my_daroga) (PG)
Title: The Horror with Holodecks
Author/Artist: cherie_morte
Canon: Phantom of the Opera (Leroux)/Star Trek (The Original Series)
Pairing(s): Kirk/Christine, Erik/Christine, Spock/Daroga? (that one is a joke)…alright, I make a Kirk/Spock joke in the end. I can’t stop slashing people!
Rating: PG
Summary: Kirk decides to take an unorthodox vacation but when it follows him back to the Enterprise, things begin to get out of hand.
Total word count: 2,833
Original prompt request number: 57
Author's/artist's notes (if any): Kirk’s behavior in this story is based somewhat on the episode “City on the Edge of Forever”. I know that holodecks are not strictly a part of TOS canon but supposedly there’s one on the Enterprise and it made sense for the story. I have never seen an episode of The Next Generation and am just taking what I understood from a friend’s explanation of holodecks and running with it-I made up all of the rules for them in this story, and really apologize if you’re a TNG fan and I am bastardizing your series! Also, I’m really sorry that this isn’t more Erik-centric. He’s a big driving force for the piece but he isn’t in it much-I hope that’s ok!
Beta(s) (if any): wutendeskind
James Kirk was a man who should never have been left to his own devices. The man was brilliant and could captain a ship like no other-nobody ever tried to contest that. But the fact of the matter was that when you got down to it, he was a bit of a lunatic.
“You know, Mister Spock,” Kirk said one day after a particularly bland week in space. “I think I’d like a vacation.”
“Captain, Starfleet has put the ship on standby to receive a mission any day. Taking a vacation at this time would be illogical.”
“I was being wistful, Mister Spock.”
“I apologize, Captain. I do not recognize the worth of spending your day discussing something you know will not happen.”
“The worth, Spock, is that it is amusing and there is nothing else to do.”
Spock lifted an eyebrow and then stared pointedly at the captain.
“Let me guess, boredom is not an emotion you are familiar with?”
“There is always something to do, Captain. Boredom is-“
“Oh, I know, Mr. Spock, it’s illogical.”
“Precisely, Captain.”
“Where’s McCoy when you need a nice, pointless conversation?” Kirk grumbled.
Spock made a face that suggested that the very idea of starting a pointless conversation with McCoy was enough to give him nightmares for eternity. If nightmares had any practical purpose, that is. He turned back to whatever strange contraption he had begun to build three days ago when he’d realized there actually was nothing else to do on the ship, focusing on it as if it were actually necessary for something. Kirk sighed heavily and got up, wandering away and leaving Spock to his own devices. Spock should have known then that a bored Captain Kirk could only cause trouble.
“Good news, Mister Spock!” Kirk said cheerfully as he reentered the command room.
“We’ve received our assignment?” Spock asked hopefully.
“No, I’ve found a way to take my vacation. And you’re going to help me.”
“Captain, I do not approve of disobeying Starfleet’s commands.”
“I’m not disobeying anything. I’ll still be on board once we’re needed. Now, what do you think of this? I found Doctor McCoy in the Medic’s Bay reading some ancient Earth book to fill the time and we got into a conversation about how excellent it is to escape in a good novel. I would like you to help me program the holodeck to place me into a book.”
It was, in all honesty, not the craziest thing Kirk could have said on an impulse and in the grips of an awful case of cabin fever. Spock considered the possible pitfalls of the plan.
“What book in particular are you considering, Captain?”
“Well, that’s the best part! I’m just going to have the computer throw something in from its library at random.”
There it was: the James T. Kirk spirit Spock had feared.
“I must object to this, you could land in something dangerous.”
“Oh come now, Mister Spock,” Kirk said with a self assured smirk that screamed “what’s the worst that could happen? I’m James Kirk.” Spock didn’t have a retort. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.
The next day, Spock found himself programming his Captain into what he was sure was not going to turn out to be a favorable situation. Damn Jim Kirk, he thought, remembering how he had been tricked into this. Kirk always knew exactly how to swindle him into doing things he didn’t want to do. It wasn’t, of course, that he was too proud to let the Captain’s challenges go unfulfilled. He just didn’t want anyone to think that he really couldn’t pull off what Jim was asking him to do.
So he typed in the last formulas necessary to generate a random work of literature and let Kirk deal with his own mess.
--------
It was four days before the Enterprise heard from Captain Kirk again. He dialed in asking Spock a most interesting question…
“Suppose, Mr. Spock, I wanted to bring something back from my vacation with me. I would just have to be holding on to it when you turned the safety back on, am I correct?”
“Theoretically, yes, Captain. I would strongly advise, however, that you do not bring anything back with you. It would open a possibility for other parts of the universe you’re inside to come into ours.”
There was a long, awkward pause from the Captain’s end.
“Yes. Well. Sure. That would be dreadful. Prepare for my return, Spock. And turn the safety back on in about thirty seconds.”
In about thirty seconds, the Captain reappeared through the door to the holodeck he had disappeared through four days earlier. It was immediately obvious that he had not heard, or not listened to, Spock’s wise advice.
“Oh, my, it is every bit as strange as your descriptions!” a thick French accent said in a way that made it sound poorly translated. Blue eyes the size of saucers were staring at the crew members who had collected to welcome the Captain back. The eyes belonged to a woman with a blonde head and very beautiful face.
“What book is she from, Captain?” Uhura asked curiously.
“You know, I haven’t the damnedest idea, I haven’t read the thing and it had no discernable plot. But she’s a wonderfully kind woman! Helped me find lodgings for a few nights and has the song voice of an angel!”
Kirk was watching at the young woman with a look Spock had seen in his features too many times. He was usually around when Kirk was falling in love with every woman he met to talk sense into the Captain. Now it was obvious that it was too late.
“Well, congratulations, Jim! She’s lovely!” McCoy said stepping forward with his usual enthusiasm for unwise, emotion based decisions.
“Thank you, Bones. Christine, this is our Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Leonard McCoy. Dr. McCoy, this is Christine Daae.”
“Charmed to meet you, Doctor, I have heard so much about you! James speaks of you with the greatest fondness. I know we shall be the absolute best of friends.”
“Christine Daae! Well, I’ll be damned! Jim, you’re a hero. This poor girl had a real monster on her hands.”
“Oh, you must not speak of poor Erik that way! He is simply so very unfortunate.”
“You mean to say you know where she’s from, Bones?”
“Sure I do. Phantom of the Opera. Real classic back on Earth.”
“Well, now she’s one of us. Miss Daae and I are going to get married.”
“Captain, this is all highly illogical. You cannot just marry her after four days. Furthermore, you could potentially alter the entire course of a classic piece of literature.”
“You must be Mister Spock,” the girl said with laughter in her childish face. “James told me you would not approve. But you see…James and I have fallen in love! We were destined to meet. He reminds me so of a friend I have not seen since I was a child. They are both very handsome and tell such excellent stories. I know James and I will be happy together, and you will grow to like me, too.”
Spock scowled because it was more logical to scowl than to smile at the fact that the girl really was very charming. After all, Spock wasn’t human and could not be affected by the same things that would charm humans.
“Don’t look so happy, Mister Spock,” Kirk warned jealously.
“I don’t know what you mean, Captain,” Spock said forcing his face to remain indiscernible.
“Well, are we going to stand around all day or are we going to celebrate? I’m starving,” Kirk said and the excited crowd broke to begin to prepare for a feast.
--------
The morning after the Captain’s return to the ship, the crew awoke to a rather nasty surprise. A man who had been stationed near the holodeck the night before had been found unconscious. Doctor McCoy had confirmed the worst. He was dead, strangled by something-evidence pointed to some kind of noose, though there were no such weapons known to be aboard the ship.
It was clear, therefore, that not only had somebody aboard the Enterprise committed murder, but they had been rather skilled at it, too.
“The strangest thing about any of it,” Bones said as he, Captain Kirk, and Spock gathered privately to discuss the emergency, “is that…well, I know it’s going to sound crazy, but it’s almost right out of the book.”
“What do you mean, Bones?”
“Well, Captain. The book you spent a week in was set in 19th century Paris, you spent a week in an opera house, and fell in love with an ingénue named Christine Daae. Christine had two suitors in the novel, as well. It seems she hadn’t been reunited with one of them when you got to her. But the other, the Phantom, he kills with a noose just like the one that must have killed that man.”
“You think the murderer is familiar with the story and is trying to be clever?”
“Something like that, Jim. Whoever the killer is must not like that you took that vacation or that you came back with that girl.”
“May I venture a guess at the true nature of our dilemma?”
“Of course, Mister Spock.”
“This Phantom is, I take it, a man and not really a ghost?”
McCoy confirmed.
“While a ghost would not have been capable of penetrating into this world, I tried to warn you that bringing something from the book could create a passage way for other elements from the story. One such possibility being that you have brought not just the girl but her jealous lover as well.”
“That’s ridiculous. I think I would have noticed if I was letting a man in behind me.”
McCoy shifted uncomfortably. “Well, Captain, this Phantom was a sneaky type. A genius and excellent at exploiting nooks and crannies. If Spock is right, he could hide in this ship until everyone aboard has been-“
“Now look here, no one is hiding on my ship and harming my crew. Order everyone to their rooms for the night, say nothing about this, and keep your eyes out. I’m sure this is just someone aboard but I’m not taking any chances.”
When Spock returned to his room, he decided to search the computer for the novel and read it, just to analyze what they were up against.
“I have a faster way to get the information you are looking for,” a thick, strange accent said shocking Spock from his work. He looked up and a dark man stepped forward from the shadows.
“Who are you?”
“My name is not your concern, Mister Spock. What you need to know is that I can help you. If you will allow me, I will be a friend to you.”
“Go on.”
“I am a detective, an acquaintance of the man you must get off this ship before it is too late. I know him better than perhaps anyone. It has been my unfortunate duty to keep him from harming others, a job I have often done poorly, but I will be better at it than anyone else aboard this ship.”
“How did you get here?”
“I am afraid, sir, that you were right to be concerned. When your Captain brought Miss Daae here, he infuriated Erik. Erik followed, as he will always follow her, and I followed him as it is my lot to do. Now listen to me well, because I will need you to win over the Captain. We must get Miss Daae off this ship. Erik will not leave her unless he has been murdered and there is no one aboard this vessel with the brains and strength to match him. He will kill until she has been returned to him. You must convince the Captain to release her, or we shall all pay for it.”
“Why did you not go to the Captain immediately?”
“Mister Spock, I respect your Captain just as you do and trust he knows how to do his job well, but I am a man of reason and I can tell already that James Kirk is not. Now, I was watching and listening earlier to your conversation, which means Erik may have been as well. He knows you are on to him. I could tell that your Captain respects you and it falls to you alone to make him see the possible disaster he will create if that girl is not off this ship before long.”
Spock felt it was his duty to defend Kirk’s ability to see reason, but he did not want to risk losing the mysterious detective’s respect.
“Your logic is sound, Mister…?”
“Just call me Daroga, Mister Spock. And take me to James Kirk.”
--------
The argument had lasted for six and a half hours. The Daroga and Spock’s cold logic versus Doctor McCoy’s moral fervor that Christine not be sent into a monster’s hands and Captain Kirk’s appreciation for pretty young blonde women.
“You are an iceberg-I get that. But you, you are a man! Have a little human feeling! That man is killing people and you want to feed that nice girl to him?”
“Doctor, I am a rational being as much as I am a human. I know what Christine is in danger of. Erik will not harm her. The men and women you have spent many years of your life working beside, on the other hand, he will slaughter.”
“We’ve tricked clever devils before, Daroga, why should we immediately give up the fight?”
“Captain, this man is not like any other you have faced before. He will destroy you, one by one, and none of you will see him coming. I have known him for decades and have seen what he is capable of far more times than I would have liked.”
“I agree that the risk is not worth the reward, Captain. You have fallen in love before, you will again. Let this girl go.”
“But to a monster?”
“Doctor McCoy, you read this novel. Let it play out the way it is supposed to-Erik does not harm Christine.”
“We could at least try to fight. Try to make the man pay for his actions.”
“It is wasteful to allow this man to claim anymore lives. We will ultimately decide to hand the girl over. Doing it now is only logical.”
The Captain was on the verge of closing the subject and refusing to negotiate with a murderer when the news of another body reached his cabin.
“Erik knows what we are discussing, sir. He is trying to influence your decision. I recommend you allow him to.”
Kirk fell into his chair with an air of defeat.
“How do I know he will follow her?”
“Captain, I vouch my life on it.”
“Very well. Mister Spock, I leave it to you to tell that sweet face that she will not be a bride. Escort her to the holodeck and take Mr. Daroga with you. Daroga, you will know when Erik has gone back even if we miss seeing him again?”
“Absolutely.”
“Good, then go with Spock and get off my ship as soon as Erik has left. Bones, you save that man if it’s possible. I’m going to have some Romulan ale and I don’t want to be disturbed until my ship is clear.”
--------
By the time Spock returned from his assignment to tell Kirk that he had successfully gotten all three of the intruders back into their book and shut down the holodeck (for what turned out to be the last time while James Kirk was Captain of the Enterprise), Jim had about seven glasses of strong ale in him.
“The ship is clear, Captain.”
“Ah, that’s a shame, Mr. Spock. She was a cute little thing, wasn’t she?”
“She was very attractive as far as humans go, Captain.”
“It’s for the best, though, wasn’t it? Other cute women will come along, eh?”
“They will, Captain.”
“But they won’t be as cute as you,” Kirk slurred.
“You are drunk, Jim.”
“Incredibly!” he agreed before collapsing onto his desk.
“Poor Jim must have been really upset to have finished off a whole bottle of that toxic,” McCoy said maternally as he disposed of the empty bottle of ale and helped Spock carry the Captain to bed. “I’m betting he’ll be out for another four days.”
“If you are trying to make me feel bad for him, Doctor, I assure you it is a waste of your time,” Spock said with a self-satisfied smirk.
“As if I don’t know well-enough that you couldn’t feel sorry if-“
The Doctor and the Vulcan made their way back to their rooms bickering over the merits of emotion and once more, all was as it should have been aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise.
Author/Artist: cherie_morte
Canon: Phantom of the Opera (Leroux)/Star Trek (The Original Series)
Pairing(s): Kirk/Christine, Erik/Christine, Spock/Daroga? (that one is a joke)…alright, I make a Kirk/Spock joke in the end. I can’t stop slashing people!
Rating: PG
Summary: Kirk decides to take an unorthodox vacation but when it follows him back to the Enterprise, things begin to get out of hand.
Total word count: 2,833
Original prompt request number: 57
Author's/artist's notes (if any): Kirk’s behavior in this story is based somewhat on the episode “City on the Edge of Forever”. I know that holodecks are not strictly a part of TOS canon but supposedly there’s one on the Enterprise and it made sense for the story. I have never seen an episode of The Next Generation and am just taking what I understood from a friend’s explanation of holodecks and running with it-I made up all of the rules for them in this story, and really apologize if you’re a TNG fan and I am bastardizing your series! Also, I’m really sorry that this isn’t more Erik-centric. He’s a big driving force for the piece but he isn’t in it much-I hope that’s ok!
Beta(s) (if any): wutendeskind
James Kirk was a man who should never have been left to his own devices. The man was brilliant and could captain a ship like no other-nobody ever tried to contest that. But the fact of the matter was that when you got down to it, he was a bit of a lunatic.
“You know, Mister Spock,” Kirk said one day after a particularly bland week in space. “I think I’d like a vacation.”
“Captain, Starfleet has put the ship on standby to receive a mission any day. Taking a vacation at this time would be illogical.”
“I was being wistful, Mister Spock.”
“I apologize, Captain. I do not recognize the worth of spending your day discussing something you know will not happen.”
“The worth, Spock, is that it is amusing and there is nothing else to do.”
Spock lifted an eyebrow and then stared pointedly at the captain.
“Let me guess, boredom is not an emotion you are familiar with?”
“There is always something to do, Captain. Boredom is-“
“Oh, I know, Mr. Spock, it’s illogical.”
“Precisely, Captain.”
“Where’s McCoy when you need a nice, pointless conversation?” Kirk grumbled.
Spock made a face that suggested that the very idea of starting a pointless conversation with McCoy was enough to give him nightmares for eternity. If nightmares had any practical purpose, that is. He turned back to whatever strange contraption he had begun to build three days ago when he’d realized there actually was nothing else to do on the ship, focusing on it as if it were actually necessary for something. Kirk sighed heavily and got up, wandering away and leaving Spock to his own devices. Spock should have known then that a bored Captain Kirk could only cause trouble.
“Good news, Mister Spock!” Kirk said cheerfully as he reentered the command room.
“We’ve received our assignment?” Spock asked hopefully.
“No, I’ve found a way to take my vacation. And you’re going to help me.”
“Captain, I do not approve of disobeying Starfleet’s commands.”
“I’m not disobeying anything. I’ll still be on board once we’re needed. Now, what do you think of this? I found Doctor McCoy in the Medic’s Bay reading some ancient Earth book to fill the time and we got into a conversation about how excellent it is to escape in a good novel. I would like you to help me program the holodeck to place me into a book.”
It was, in all honesty, not the craziest thing Kirk could have said on an impulse and in the grips of an awful case of cabin fever. Spock considered the possible pitfalls of the plan.
“What book in particular are you considering, Captain?”
“Well, that’s the best part! I’m just going to have the computer throw something in from its library at random.”
There it was: the James T. Kirk spirit Spock had feared.
“I must object to this, you could land in something dangerous.”
“Oh come now, Mister Spock,” Kirk said with a self assured smirk that screamed “what’s the worst that could happen? I’m James Kirk.” Spock didn’t have a retort. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.
The next day, Spock found himself programming his Captain into what he was sure was not going to turn out to be a favorable situation. Damn Jim Kirk, he thought, remembering how he had been tricked into this. Kirk always knew exactly how to swindle him into doing things he didn’t want to do. It wasn’t, of course, that he was too proud to let the Captain’s challenges go unfulfilled. He just didn’t want anyone to think that he really couldn’t pull off what Jim was asking him to do.
So he typed in the last formulas necessary to generate a random work of literature and let Kirk deal with his own mess.
--------
It was four days before the Enterprise heard from Captain Kirk again. He dialed in asking Spock a most interesting question…
“Suppose, Mr. Spock, I wanted to bring something back from my vacation with me. I would just have to be holding on to it when you turned the safety back on, am I correct?”
“Theoretically, yes, Captain. I would strongly advise, however, that you do not bring anything back with you. It would open a possibility for other parts of the universe you’re inside to come into ours.”
There was a long, awkward pause from the Captain’s end.
“Yes. Well. Sure. That would be dreadful. Prepare for my return, Spock. And turn the safety back on in about thirty seconds.”
In about thirty seconds, the Captain reappeared through the door to the holodeck he had disappeared through four days earlier. It was immediately obvious that he had not heard, or not listened to, Spock’s wise advice.
“Oh, my, it is every bit as strange as your descriptions!” a thick French accent said in a way that made it sound poorly translated. Blue eyes the size of saucers were staring at the crew members who had collected to welcome the Captain back. The eyes belonged to a woman with a blonde head and very beautiful face.
“What book is she from, Captain?” Uhura asked curiously.
“You know, I haven’t the damnedest idea, I haven’t read the thing and it had no discernable plot. But she’s a wonderfully kind woman! Helped me find lodgings for a few nights and has the song voice of an angel!”
Kirk was watching at the young woman with a look Spock had seen in his features too many times. He was usually around when Kirk was falling in love with every woman he met to talk sense into the Captain. Now it was obvious that it was too late.
“Well, congratulations, Jim! She’s lovely!” McCoy said stepping forward with his usual enthusiasm for unwise, emotion based decisions.
“Thank you, Bones. Christine, this is our Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Leonard McCoy. Dr. McCoy, this is Christine Daae.”
“Charmed to meet you, Doctor, I have heard so much about you! James speaks of you with the greatest fondness. I know we shall be the absolute best of friends.”
“Christine Daae! Well, I’ll be damned! Jim, you’re a hero. This poor girl had a real monster on her hands.”
“Oh, you must not speak of poor Erik that way! He is simply so very unfortunate.”
“You mean to say you know where she’s from, Bones?”
“Sure I do. Phantom of the Opera. Real classic back on Earth.”
“Well, now she’s one of us. Miss Daae and I are going to get married.”
“Captain, this is all highly illogical. You cannot just marry her after four days. Furthermore, you could potentially alter the entire course of a classic piece of literature.”
“You must be Mister Spock,” the girl said with laughter in her childish face. “James told me you would not approve. But you see…James and I have fallen in love! We were destined to meet. He reminds me so of a friend I have not seen since I was a child. They are both very handsome and tell such excellent stories. I know James and I will be happy together, and you will grow to like me, too.”
Spock scowled because it was more logical to scowl than to smile at the fact that the girl really was very charming. After all, Spock wasn’t human and could not be affected by the same things that would charm humans.
“Don’t look so happy, Mister Spock,” Kirk warned jealously.
“I don’t know what you mean, Captain,” Spock said forcing his face to remain indiscernible.
“Well, are we going to stand around all day or are we going to celebrate? I’m starving,” Kirk said and the excited crowd broke to begin to prepare for a feast.
--------
The morning after the Captain’s return to the ship, the crew awoke to a rather nasty surprise. A man who had been stationed near the holodeck the night before had been found unconscious. Doctor McCoy had confirmed the worst. He was dead, strangled by something-evidence pointed to some kind of noose, though there were no such weapons known to be aboard the ship.
It was clear, therefore, that not only had somebody aboard the Enterprise committed murder, but they had been rather skilled at it, too.
“The strangest thing about any of it,” Bones said as he, Captain Kirk, and Spock gathered privately to discuss the emergency, “is that…well, I know it’s going to sound crazy, but it’s almost right out of the book.”
“What do you mean, Bones?”
“Well, Captain. The book you spent a week in was set in 19th century Paris, you spent a week in an opera house, and fell in love with an ingénue named Christine Daae. Christine had two suitors in the novel, as well. It seems she hadn’t been reunited with one of them when you got to her. But the other, the Phantom, he kills with a noose just like the one that must have killed that man.”
“You think the murderer is familiar with the story and is trying to be clever?”
“Something like that, Jim. Whoever the killer is must not like that you took that vacation or that you came back with that girl.”
“May I venture a guess at the true nature of our dilemma?”
“Of course, Mister Spock.”
“This Phantom is, I take it, a man and not really a ghost?”
McCoy confirmed.
“While a ghost would not have been capable of penetrating into this world, I tried to warn you that bringing something from the book could create a passage way for other elements from the story. One such possibility being that you have brought not just the girl but her jealous lover as well.”
“That’s ridiculous. I think I would have noticed if I was letting a man in behind me.”
McCoy shifted uncomfortably. “Well, Captain, this Phantom was a sneaky type. A genius and excellent at exploiting nooks and crannies. If Spock is right, he could hide in this ship until everyone aboard has been-“
“Now look here, no one is hiding on my ship and harming my crew. Order everyone to their rooms for the night, say nothing about this, and keep your eyes out. I’m sure this is just someone aboard but I’m not taking any chances.”
When Spock returned to his room, he decided to search the computer for the novel and read it, just to analyze what they were up against.
“I have a faster way to get the information you are looking for,” a thick, strange accent said shocking Spock from his work. He looked up and a dark man stepped forward from the shadows.
“Who are you?”
“My name is not your concern, Mister Spock. What you need to know is that I can help you. If you will allow me, I will be a friend to you.”
“Go on.”
“I am a detective, an acquaintance of the man you must get off this ship before it is too late. I know him better than perhaps anyone. It has been my unfortunate duty to keep him from harming others, a job I have often done poorly, but I will be better at it than anyone else aboard this ship.”
“How did you get here?”
“I am afraid, sir, that you were right to be concerned. When your Captain brought Miss Daae here, he infuriated Erik. Erik followed, as he will always follow her, and I followed him as it is my lot to do. Now listen to me well, because I will need you to win over the Captain. We must get Miss Daae off this ship. Erik will not leave her unless he has been murdered and there is no one aboard this vessel with the brains and strength to match him. He will kill until she has been returned to him. You must convince the Captain to release her, or we shall all pay for it.”
“Why did you not go to the Captain immediately?”
“Mister Spock, I respect your Captain just as you do and trust he knows how to do his job well, but I am a man of reason and I can tell already that James Kirk is not. Now, I was watching and listening earlier to your conversation, which means Erik may have been as well. He knows you are on to him. I could tell that your Captain respects you and it falls to you alone to make him see the possible disaster he will create if that girl is not off this ship before long.”
Spock felt it was his duty to defend Kirk’s ability to see reason, but he did not want to risk losing the mysterious detective’s respect.
“Your logic is sound, Mister…?”
“Just call me Daroga, Mister Spock. And take me to James Kirk.”
--------
The argument had lasted for six and a half hours. The Daroga and Spock’s cold logic versus Doctor McCoy’s moral fervor that Christine not be sent into a monster’s hands and Captain Kirk’s appreciation for pretty young blonde women.
“You are an iceberg-I get that. But you, you are a man! Have a little human feeling! That man is killing people and you want to feed that nice girl to him?”
“Doctor, I am a rational being as much as I am a human. I know what Christine is in danger of. Erik will not harm her. The men and women you have spent many years of your life working beside, on the other hand, he will slaughter.”
“We’ve tricked clever devils before, Daroga, why should we immediately give up the fight?”
“Captain, this man is not like any other you have faced before. He will destroy you, one by one, and none of you will see him coming. I have known him for decades and have seen what he is capable of far more times than I would have liked.”
“I agree that the risk is not worth the reward, Captain. You have fallen in love before, you will again. Let this girl go.”
“But to a monster?”
“Doctor McCoy, you read this novel. Let it play out the way it is supposed to-Erik does not harm Christine.”
“We could at least try to fight. Try to make the man pay for his actions.”
“It is wasteful to allow this man to claim anymore lives. We will ultimately decide to hand the girl over. Doing it now is only logical.”
The Captain was on the verge of closing the subject and refusing to negotiate with a murderer when the news of another body reached his cabin.
“Erik knows what we are discussing, sir. He is trying to influence your decision. I recommend you allow him to.”
Kirk fell into his chair with an air of defeat.
“How do I know he will follow her?”
“Captain, I vouch my life on it.”
“Very well. Mister Spock, I leave it to you to tell that sweet face that she will not be a bride. Escort her to the holodeck and take Mr. Daroga with you. Daroga, you will know when Erik has gone back even if we miss seeing him again?”
“Absolutely.”
“Good, then go with Spock and get off my ship as soon as Erik has left. Bones, you save that man if it’s possible. I’m going to have some Romulan ale and I don’t want to be disturbed until my ship is clear.”
--------
By the time Spock returned from his assignment to tell Kirk that he had successfully gotten all three of the intruders back into their book and shut down the holodeck (for what turned out to be the last time while James Kirk was Captain of the Enterprise), Jim had about seven glasses of strong ale in him.
“The ship is clear, Captain.”
“Ah, that’s a shame, Mr. Spock. She was a cute little thing, wasn’t she?”
“She was very attractive as far as humans go, Captain.”
“It’s for the best, though, wasn’t it? Other cute women will come along, eh?”
“They will, Captain.”
“But they won’t be as cute as you,” Kirk slurred.
“You are drunk, Jim.”
“Incredibly!” he agreed before collapsing onto his desk.
“Poor Jim must have been really upset to have finished off a whole bottle of that toxic,” McCoy said maternally as he disposed of the empty bottle of ale and helped Spock carry the Captain to bed. “I’m betting he’ll be out for another four days.”
“If you are trying to make me feel bad for him, Doctor, I assure you it is a waste of your time,” Spock said with a self-satisfied smirk.
“As if I don’t know well-enough that you couldn’t feel sorry if-“
The Doctor and the Vulcan made their way back to their rooms bickering over the merits of emotion and once more, all was as it should have been aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise.