Vonda McIntyre - The Entropy Effect

McCoy kept listening, and finally he realized where the explanation was leading.

“Spock,” he said, “you’re telling me that Jim wasn’t killed by the Georges Mordreaux we have in custody on the Enterprise at all—that it was some other Georges Mordreaux. One from the future!”

“Precisely, Dr. McCoy. It is the only explanation that fits all the parameters of the incident It is what Dr. Mordreaux himself believes. Given that he had access to the information he would need to go back—come back—in time, it is also the simplest explanation.”

“Simplest!”

“Indeed.”

“Simpler than an accomplice?”

“An accomplice who appeared from nowhere, looked exactly like Dr. Mordreaux, referred to an incident that has not occurred—yet—and vanished again?”

“Someone on the ship who had some reason to hate Jim—someone who understands hologrammatic disguise ...” His voice trailed off at Spock’s look.

“Hologrammatic disguise is easily detectable,” Spock said. “It was not such a disguise.”

“An actor, then. Someone experienced in transformation—”

“Who also managed to hide long enough to change back to normal and dispose of the weapon, with everyone on board searching for someone resembling Dr. Mordreaux?”

“It’s possible,” McCoy said belligerently.

“Indeed it is. It is also possible that the Enterprise is playing host to a shape-changer.”

“That’s easier to believe than a time-travelling assassin!”

“My theory possesses one unique factor, which may persuade you to help me.”

“What?”

“If this hypothesis is correct, then these events are a serious perturbation in the time-stream. They must be put right. Captain Kirk need not die. He must not die.”

McCoy rubbed his eyes, sorting through Spock’s barrage of reasoning. It made a certain amount of absurd sense; at the very least it explained the pervasive feeling he, and Jim, and half the other people on the ship had had: that everything was going wrong, in some weird, implacable, uncontrollable way.

“All right, Spock,” he said. “What do you want me to do? I’ll help you, if I can.”

Did a flicker of relief, even of gratitude, pass over the Vulcan’s face? McCoy chose to believe so.

“Technically, I am in command of the Enterprise until Starfleet can assess the situation and assign another captain,” Spock said.

“Or promote you into the rank permanently.”

“Out of the question. I would not accept it, but in any event it will not be offered. That has no relevance to our concerns. I cannot perform the duties of captain and carry out this task as well: Dr. Mordreaux and I will have to build the hardware to take me back to yesterday. It will take some time and it would be better if we were not disturbed.”

“Why can’t we just whiplash back?”

“For the same reason that we will not attempt to calibrate the singularity and use it to travel back: because it would result in our taking the entire ship into the past, including the captain’s body; we would be forced to confront ourselves, to try to persuade ourselves—”

“Never mind,” McCoy said quickly. “What do you want me to do? Say I’ve taken you off duty on medical orders?”

“Not an unreasonable suggestion,” Spock said thoughtfully. “You may do as you think best, whether you wish to dissemble or simply refuse to answer queries at all.” “Under normal conditions you’d have to go to sleep pretty soon,” McCoy said, for he knew the schedule Spock had put himself on. “Come to think of it—how are you going to stay awake?”

“I can delay the compulsion.”

McCoy frowned. “Is that wise, Mr. Spock?” Spock so often pushed himself beyond all limits, though no doubt he would deny that he tried to prove himself more than the equal of any full Vulcan.

“It is of no account,” Spock said. “I will simply require a few minutes later on today to stabilize my metabolic state. It will not affect my work.”

“But that’s absurd! Why don’t you just go to sleep? We’ve got plenty of time!”

“But we do not. The effort required to change an event is proportional to the square of its distance in the past. The curve of a power function approaches infinity rather quickly.”

“The longer you wait, the harder it will be?”

“Precisely. In addition, we are still proceeding toward the rehabilitation colony, and if we cannot complete the hardware before I am forced to relinquish Dr. Mordreaux to the authorities it may never be completed at all.”

“Wait. I thought you believed he was wrongfully convicted. I thought you were going to try to prove him innocent.”

“Unfortunately, that is impossible.”

“Why?”

“Because even if he were innocent, which technically he is not, he is not being rehabilitated for that crime. His work is perceived as such a threat that a high-level decision has been made, somewhere in the Federation, to eliminate it.”

“That’s paranoid, Mr. Spock!”

“Their actions, or Dr. Mordreaux’s belief that this is what is happening? I doubted the proposition myself. However, the trial records are lost from the public archives. The professor’s name has been eliminated from the news indices of Aleph Prime. And, most important, his monographs are being systematically eradicated from Federation memory banks. The Aleph Prime computer infected the computer on the Enterprise with a virus program. It seeks out and destroys Dr. Mordreaux’s work; it replicates itself and transfers itself to any computer with which it has contact. It had already done its work on the Enterprise when I discovered it, and it is only because my own computer is protected, immunized, if you will, against such infection that I retain copies of the papers.”

McCoy slowly began to understand how frightening the implications of Mordreaux’s theories were. Anyone who could put them to use could change the time-stream: history itself. Even now they might all be changing, being changed, without their consent or even their knowledge. He shivered.

“No argument I or anyone else could make would prevent the authorities from sending Dr. Mordreaux through rehabilitation,” Spock said.

McCoy folded his arms across his chest. “I have no reason to feel any sympathy at all for this man, Spock, but it does sound to me like he’s being thrown to the wolves.”

“Thrown to—? Oh... I recall the reference. On the contrary, doctor. There are several ways to prevent his being imprisoned, but he will not accept my help. He prefers that a very small number of people appreciate the validity of his work. The alternative is for his theories to remain discredited, and that, he cannot accept.”

“You’re going to let them ‘rehabilitate’ him?”

“I have no choice. I have given my word not to try to undo his past actions, however self-destructive they may be.”

“Mr. Spock—”

“Dr. McCoy, I cannot take the time to argue with you now. I do not disagree with your position, but for now we must be satisfied with Dr. Mordreaux’s help in saving Captain Kirk. Do you wish a formal assignment of captain’s duties?”

“Don’t see that it’s necessary,” McCoy said.

Spock nodded and started away.

“Spock—wait”

The Vulcan turned back.

“Why the secrecy, my covering for you and all that? Let’s just announce what happened and what we plan to do, and we’ll have every member of the crew on our side.”

“That is quite possibly the worst course of action you could imagine.”

“You aren’t making any sense.”

“This work is perceived as threatening, not only to the Federation but to the history of the universe itself. If we are detected using it—by, for example, Ian Braithewaite—we would undoubtedly find ourselves court-martialed and on our way to the same rehabilitation colony that awaits Dr. Mordreaux.”