Vonda McIntyre - The Entropy Effect

Kirk sorted through the technicalities of his science officer’s statement.

“Spock,” he said, “you aren’t saying you haven’t had any sleep in six weeks, are you?”

“No, Captain.”

“Good,” Kirk said, relieved; and, after a pause, “Then what are you saying?”

“It will not be six standard weeks until day after tomorrow.”

“Good lord! Didn’t you trust anyone else to make the observations?”

“It was not a matter of trust, Captain. The data are sensitive. The difference between two individuals’ interpretations of the same datum would cause a break in the observational curve larger than the experimental error.”

“You couldn’t have run several series and averaged them?”

Spock raised one eyebrow. “No, Captain.” If I didn’t know better, Kirk thought, I’d swear he turned a couple of shades paler.

Captain’s log, Stardate 5001.1:

We are now a day away from the singularity, but the unease that gripped the Enterprise and my crew throughout our mission there has not faded. It has intensified. We have left one mystery behind us, unsolved, in order to confront a second mystery, about which we know even less. The ultimate override emergency command takes precedence over any other order. The Enterprise is now under way to the mining colony Aleph Prime, maintaining radio silence as the code requires. I cannot even ask why we have been diverted; I can only speculate about the reasons for such urgency, and be sure my crew is prepared to face .. . what?