Sondra Marshak: The Price of the Phoenix

“Don’t be absurd!” the man snapped. His face had been slowly coloring.

“You are property, replica,” Omne said. “Move!”

The figure remained carved in stone. “Even if I were a creation, I belong to no man. Spock doubts me. Therefore I am prepared to consider the possibility that James Kirk died. I know, equally, that I am James Kirk—whatever my origins. And I know that I am a man, and a mind. A mind cannot be owned, and a man will not be, must not be. You may be able to kill me, perhaps even to keep me, but you will never own me.

“I own you now! Omne’s gloved hand blurred with the speed with which it would reach for a gun, and stripped the sheet away.

Spock’s hand closed on Omne’s offending wrist, and he learned that it was not Human when it did not break. For a moment he locked with a strength to match his own, perhaps more than match. Then too many Romulan arms locked around his shoulders from behind.

And one vulnerable Human was coming off the bench with fire in his eyes, undeterred by extraneous and unpreventable problems.

“No, Jim!” Spock ordered.

And was obeyed.

The Romulan arms locked around Spock were a kind of needed support. Vulcan eyes locked with Human, and the Human’s were very bright and full. It had always been a part of what they were, Spock thought, that his Captain would know the moment to obey.

“This is my Captain,” Spock said. “I require no inspection.”

“But I require it,” Omne answered.

Kirk’s eyes never left Spock, acknowledged no other presence. “And I require it,” he said. “Your faith was what I wanted. It is your certainty I need—and my own. Use the mind-touch, Spock.”

Spock bowed his head, knowing also how to obey.

“By all means, Mr. Spock,” Omne agreed. “Feel free to verify the—fidelity of the reproduction.”

The guards eased their holds and Spock straightened.

“It requires privacy,” he said.

“It does not, Mr. Spock,” Omne said. “I am a student of matters Vulcan, as you will learn.” He turned and smiled at the woman. “So much, again, for the legend that Vulcans cannot lee, my dear. But you knew that, of course.”

“Mr. Spock is fond of unspoken truths,” she said. “This one is that he requires privacy, most urgently, for his friend.”

“He is in no position to require it,” Omne said. “But tell me, my dear, what think you of the reproduction?”

“Quite perfect,” she said archly. “The original, to the life.”

Spock felt an eyebrow rising and subdued it She was not above needling him. There had, of course, been that long trip to drop her off when she was their captive—and their guest. He had thought she had spent it absorbing Human cultures. She would not see Spock, but…

Kirk’s face was unreadable, for once.

And Spock prided himself that his own was inscrutably Vulcan.

Then it came home to him what a change there had been in her attitude—and his own.

The almost metaphysical horror was gone. This Kirk was real.

The horror returned to Spock with sickening force. This same Kirk—his Kirk—had been killed! This living body was dead on the Enterprise.

And yet it was still impossible not to take this Kirk as real, not to take him as a blessing. Could this, indeed, be the defeat of death—even if it were born of murder?

Spock moved forward and flexed his hands, hastening and delaying the moment of the mind-touch. What if he found—imperfection? A less-than-complete copy? There was still so much. What if he found even-fraud? That biological android? Some life-form which could mimic, to the life? Would even that still be-enough?

And what if he found the real Kirk?

Too much?

For the first time in his life, Spock declared a plague on all philosophical questions.

He took Kirk’s face in his hands, not asking this time a permission which had always been granted.

His fingers found the stylized position of the mind-touch and he cleared his own mind of the vision of the flames. He could do it now. He swept mind and body clean of the horror that must not be in the touch.

And he saw the same land of clearing in Kirk’s face, the steadying down to quiet control, the fine courage of the willingness to open.

“How touching,” Omne drawled.

Spock felt murder knot in his shoulders again. He did not let it reach his hands.

And then Kirk’s hands reached to ease the shoulders and to draw him surprisingly close. “We are alone, Mr. Spock,” he said. “Quite alone. Do you understand?”

Indeed, Captain. Quite alone.” And he made it true.

The mind-touch was a lowering of personal barriers. If it did not require privacy, it nonetheless cried for it.

Spock slipped in easily at the level of warmth. He had been here before. It knew how to accept him.

Spock fought to keep the touch narrow, to move quickly up to the cooler level of consciousness. ‘Jim?’

‘My God, yes! It is yes?” Spock heard the soft mind-laughter. Hell, yes! Spock?”

“Yes. Indeed, yes!’

Laughter again, rippling like quicksilver. “Where is my logical Vulcan?’

‘Here.’

Sudden catching of breath, “Even if—it’s not—me, Spock?

‘It is you, all of you, irrespective of anything which has happened. That is my certainty, and your own.’

A shudder, caught and held to stillness. Then—it has happened?” Steadiness, open steadiness.

Impossible to lie to that.

‘I—see no other possibility, but I do not rule one out.’

Deep breath. That’s it, then.’ Spock felt the Human’s shock, felt sadness like soft music, anger like flaring fire. His hands felt the fine face steady itself, the head lift. ‘It will be hardest for you, Spock. Don’t feel—you must force it to be—the same. Its only that I—can’t feel—any different.’

‘“A difference which makes no difference is no difference.”’

Spock felt a small, startled ripple in the quicksilver. And a large jolt of gratitude in the stomach muscles. Felt something trying to burst the heart “Logician’s paradox, Spock? A Vulcanism?’

‘Also a Terranism. And—a truth. You have another. “And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against us.”’

Perhaps the Human’s heart did burst then. The answer was not at the level of words. There were words running suddenly along below the level of mind-speech, ancient words, intoning, but the Human thought that he could not say them. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil… for thou art with me… There was a bracing of the wide shoulders and a ripple of quicksilver. ‘Gates of Hell’, Spock. ‘We’ve broken out of worse places.’

It was for Spock to draw breath now, and he felt as if he had forgotten how for a long time. He drew his consciousness back, reaching for the calculation of necessity which had been proceeding at the sub-thought level. Yes, the logic was clear and must be faced, whatever the cost.

‘Jim? ‘ he called, ‘James.’ It was a name he never used.

Kirk’s head lifted. “Yes?

‘I am going to—mark—you now. It will be—my way back to you, for I think that he will keep you from me.’

‘Keep—me?” Cheeks moving to swallow. Jaw firming. ‘Mark me, Spock? ‘

In the mind. Not to be seen, or counterfeited.’

Puzzled reaching. Sudden jolt “You think he could make more—copies?”

‘A—possibility.’

My God!’

Ragged breath. Brow furrowed in thought. Thought racing through consciousness and beyond it, lightning fast and adding to a sum. ‘Spock, you have to leave me. He can hold me over your head—forever. He can—kill me before your eyes—and bring me back.’

“Yes. We must assume so.’