The Autobiography of James T. Kirk (31 page)

About a week later, I was telling the whole story of Neural again. I was reminiscing, or more accurately orating, about life aboard the
Republic
and
Farragut
under the command of Stephen Garrovick. I was in my quarters, sharing a bottle of Saurian brandy, my drink of choice, and holding my audience of one in rapt attention; it was Captain Garrovick’s son, David, who was now, coincidentally, my chief of security.

Garrovick was 12 years old when his father died, and he seemed hungry for information about his father. I told him everything I could remember, but most of the stories were from my point of view, and I really had not spent that much personal time with Captain Garrovick. Still, there seemed to be some entertainment value, especially the story of how I found out I was going over to the
Farragut
.

“He just waited until he was about to leave and told you to get on board the shuttle?” Garrovick was incredulous. It seemed almost impish to the young man, who thought of his father as serious and responsible.

I came to know the younger Garrovick during one of those freak coincidences that made primitive people believe in a higher power. The
Enterprise
accidentally stumbled on the cloud creature that had killed so many of the
Farragut
’s crew. It went on to kill some of mine, and in doing so, I discovered that Ensign Garrovick, the son of my former captain, was actually aboard my ship. We would eventually destroy the creature together, but not without cost.

Over the years, I’d had nightmares about the cloud creature. In the dream, I’m in phaser control, and I don’t hesitate; I fire and the creature is destroyed. It was always a nightmare because I’d wake up to discover it wasn’t true. Sometimes in the dream, Captain Garrovick is standing next to me.

I got to live the dream, because a few days earlier I was on the bridge, the creature was approaching the ship, and the image of Garrovick was standing next to me, in the form of his son. Like in the dream, I felt triumphant as I ordered Chekov to fire the phasers.

They did nothing.

And like the nightmare I’d already lived through, the creature came aboard my ship and started killing again. I was able to get it off the ship, and Garrovick and I had destroyed it using an antimatter bomb.

I had invited the young man for a drink. He evoked his father, and we had a far-ranging discussion. I learned that he had joined the academy searching for an identity, hoping to reconnect with his father by imitating his career. When I first met him, I was guilty over the fact that my own hesitancy had cost this son his father. I then learned my hesitancy made no difference; our phasers were useless against the creature, both now and eleven years ago.

It didn’t make me feel better. As I talked to this young man, something about our discussion made me feel guilty. I didn’t realize why until we finished our conversation and he got up to leave.

“Goodnight, David,” I said. I had had a few drinks, but wasn’t too drunk to realize he had the same name as my son.

“Most efficient state Earth ever knew,” John Gill said.

I was dressed as a Nazi, I was on a planet of Nazis, and I was staring at the Führer.

John Gill, my old academy history professor.

He was in a chair, drugged by a native named Melakon, his deputy Führer, who was now running the planet. Gill had come to Ekos, a world of unsophisticated, crude people as a cultural observer. They had a technology that corresponded with mid-20th-century Earth. Gill had stopped transmitting reports, so we’d been sent to find out what happened to him. Somewhere along the way, Gill had decided to start his own Nazi movement and take over the planet as the Führer. It made no sense.

“Perhaps Gill felt such a state,” Spock said, “run benignly, could accomplish its efficiency without sadism.” It was hard to take him seriously, since he too was dressed as a Nazi. Also, it didn’t explain it.

John Gill was the greatest historian of his generation. He’d studied history his whole life and taught generations of students what he learned. He’d had a great effect on me as a student at the academy. He taught me to look at the causes and motivations of people to determine why history happens, and how to fight those trends that lead to large-scale suffering and conflict. I felt that any of the good I did in Starfleet was due in no small part to the teachings he gave me. I especially remembered my conversation with him about Khan, when he told me I couldn’t separate admiration for accomplishments from the morals behind those accomplishments. It was a truth that would soon rear its head in my own life.

But I still didn’t understand him, and what he had done on Ekos, and he would not survive to explain himself. After we corrected the damage he caused as best we could, we returned to the
Enterprise
without Gill, who’d been killed. McCoy and I talked at length about why a peaceful man would indulge himself in this way. As usual, McCoy was able to boil it down.

“All those years teaching history,” McCoy said. “Maybe he just wanted to go out and make some.”

Something began to happen to me toward the end of my first five years on the
Enterprise
. I had many successes, made so many discoveries. I’d stopped wars, sometimes single-handedly; I had a record number of successful first contacts. I’d escaped death on numerous occasions, not just for myself but also for my crew.

I feel now that the problems began when I started to “believe my own press.” I got arrogant, confident in the belief there was nothing I couldn’t do. I was losing touch with who I was and buying into the prestige that went with being a starship captain. And since there was little else to my life than serving on the
Enterprise
, I began to think I needed more. I wanted promotion. I started taking unnecessary risks to get even more attention from my superiors.

One mission in particular comes to mind. I had received coded orders from Starfleet regarding intelligence on a new Romulan cloaking device. This new upgrade rendered our tracking sensors useless; the previous cloak was invisibility only and allowed Federation ships to detect movement. Now, however, the Romulans had solved that problem. It was a grave threat to our security; the Romulans had tried to start a war a couple of years before, and now, with this new weapon, they would do it again. It was too big an advantage, and we had to nullify it.

My orders were simply “acquire intelligence, specifications, and, if possible, procure a working example.” That was it; whoever cut the orders knew that “procure a working example” was basically asking the impossible. At that time, however, I was convinced I could
do
the impossible. I came up with a plan and presented it to Spock, who would be the only crew member I would initially include. I briefed him on the intelligence, and then told him my intention.

“We’re going to steal one,” I said. I was looking for a reaction, and Spock gave me none.

“Indeed,” Spock said. “That will prove difficult.”

“I have a couple of ideas,” I said. My plan involved both of us getting aboard a Romulan ship. For this to work, I needed to speak fluent Romulan. The shortcut I had in mind for this language course was for Spock to mind-meld with me.

I had had the experience of a mind-meld before with him. It is difficult to describe what it’s like. It was a stripping away of all my mental armor. Your thoughts are there for the Vulcan to peruse; Spock picks up my memories and thoughts like they are books on the shelves of a library. You try to protect the secrets, but the Vulcan is in there and pushes you aside. Your most embarrassing memories and thoughts are his; yet his logical demeanor makes you trust him as he reads your intimate desires and fears. I was willing to go through it, however, because it could efficiently teach me a language that Spock already knew.

“How do you propose, Captain,” Spock said, “that we then get aboard a Romulan ship?”

This part was far riskier. I was going to spend several weeks as a difficult captain on my own ship, convincing the crew I’d become irrational, someone who was craving success. Ironically, I was playing only a less affable version of the person I was turning into. This glory hound captain would take the
Enterprise
across the Neutral Zone into Romulan space.

“It is likely we will be captured relatively quickly,” Spock said.

“Yes,” I said, “and when we do, you’re going to say it’s my fault and defect to your Romulan brothers. And to prove your loyalty, you’re going to kill me. Then, after I’m dead, I’m going to disguise myself as a Romulan, beam back aboard the Romulan ship, and steal the device. Then the
Enterprise
will beam us both back, and we’ll get away.”

Spock raised an eyebrow.
There
was my reaction.

The plan was audacious, dangerous, and in hindsight, ridiculous. And it also happened to work. Upon reflection, the only reason we succeeded was we encountered a Romulan commander who was so blinded by the possibility of capturing a functioning starship, she ignored some pretty obvious warning signs she was being manipulated. In any event, I delivered a new cloaking device to the Admiralty, and, in doing so, prevented another war. And in less than a year, it got me what I thought I wanted.

*
EDITOR’S NOTE:
Captain Kirk wanted to play a small trick on his readers; he told me that the star system he listed in his memoirs was not the true location, was in fact several thousand light-years from the actual world. He knew that news of this discovery he’d made had become public in the intervening decades, and he was doing his duty to try to keep its location a secret. After his death, Starfleet Command reviewed the manuscript, and discovered that Kirk had unwittingly left a subconscious clue to the location of the real place, so Starfleet redacted the false references. They would not tell me what the clue was, but had no problem with me revealing his original intentions.

*
EDITOR’S NOTE:
Carolyn Palamas did have a child she named Troilus, and in 2271, she became part of an expedition that established a colony on Pollux IV.

*
EDITOR’S NOTE:
I questioned whether to include this, as Captain Kirk is admitting to falsifying records. His response to me: “They want to lock me up for that? Good luck to them.” He seemed both determined to be as honest as possible in his account, as well as being confident that Starfleet wouldn’t prosecute a hero whose success as an officer was often due to a loose interpretation of the regulations. In any event, the circumstances of the book’s publication made the point moot.

“NOGURA SAYS THEY’RE GOING TO MAKE ME AN ADMIRAL,”
I said. I was sitting with McCoy and Spock in my quarters. McCoy had a drink and sat across from me; Spock stood by the door. He carried a data pad, clearly expecting this was a work meeting.

There were about six months left in our five-year mission. I should’ve had the meeting with Spock alone, but I’d become so used to the three of us together that I broke protocol. Upon hearing the news, they congratulated me, though McCoy said it wasn’t really news; there’d been subspace chatter about it for weeks.