Pocket Books has provided us with another exclusive preview, this one a complete short story from a new anthology to celebrate the 20th anniversary of The Next Generation.
The complete book, "The Sky's the Limit," will be released later in October.
Star Trek: The Next Generation "The Sky's the Limit"
Excerpt: "Ordinary Days"
by
James Swallow
Historian's note: This tale unfolds concurrently with the episode "Journey's End," during the seventh season of Star Trek: The Next Generation
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The twin sunrise on Dorvan V painted the sky with a cherry-red tint that reminded Mika of her grandmother, of the dresses she used to wear. Unlike the rest of her clan, the old woman had never left the land where she had been born, married, had children, and died, and yet Mika felt like she was still with her, casting an eye over their township each time the suns came over the horizon.
Mika wondered what Grandmother would have made of the colony. As long as one didn't look too hard at the fields of kittik wheat, the second orange star on the horizon, or the odd birds that wheeled in the skies, it wouldn't be difficult to fool yourself into thinking you were still on Earth. But the fifth planet in the Dorvan system was so very far from the lands of Mika's ancestors, and the distance was not just a measure of simple light-years. It was a distance of the heart. At night she would see the stars, all the alien constellations, and feel it most strongly. As she walked, she gave a rueful half smile to the emerging day. It was strange for her to think of abstractions like "home" when she had spent so much of her life rootless and wandering.
But that had changed now. Marriage had a way of turning your life about, so Mika's sister Liso had said. Without noticing, Mika had grown connected, the need to wander that characterized her youth fading and a yearning for reconnection rising in its place.
She got a wary nod from Hectu, the Denobulan botanist who lived in the house just past the school; she was one of the few nonhumans in the township. The portly woman was, as ever, up to her arms in Dorvan's powdery brown dirt, leafy plants in her big, thick-fingered hands. Mika didn't stop to talk. It wasn't that Hectu was bad company, but she had a tendency to make every issue into a drama, no matter how small—and with the current situation, a circumstance of real importance, Mika knew that she'd be listening to her fret for hours if she stopped to be polite.
The treaty announcement was all that anyone could talk about now, the shifting of ghostly and unreal borders on some computer-projected map of the galaxy, decisions made by unknown men on worlds orbiting stars so far away as to be invisible in Mika's night sky. The talk was of lines of influence, demarcations between nation-states that were as removed from the township on Dorvan V as to be almost inconceivable. The settlement had existed on the fringes of human space for centuries, but because of the consequences of a slow-burning conflict that had never even touched their lives, the colonists awakened one day to learn their world had been ceded to alien control. Cardassia or Sol, Federation or Union—the name upon the territory where the Dorvan system lay was an abstract concept, not something that had a bearing on their everyday lives. Not until now.
The girl walked on, threading her way through the open paths between the adobe buildings. Here in the township proper, the sense of tension hanging over the community was more noticeable. As today had drawn closer, the laughter and freedom of the place had become less obvious, more forced. People were worried, and worried people stayed in their homes. They ruminated and let their thoughts turn to dark places. Last night, while her husband slept soundly beside her, Mika had heard raised voices from the house two doors down, an argument over something petty inflated by fears about other, deeper concerns. She looked up into the morning, saw the faint lights of the last bright stars of dawn. The starship would be coming soon.
"Hey, Mika." The voice drew her attention and she turned as a friendly figure approached. He gave her an easy smile and she did her best to match it.
"Lakanta." She nodded back. "You're up early."
"It's going to be a long day," he noted, without even the smallest hint of irony. He was quiet for a moment, and Mika knew he was trying to frame the question. She made a little wave with her hand.
"I've asked him," she said. "He hasn't given me an answer."
A frown creased Lakanta's pleasant, open face. "It's . . . difficult for him," he noted. "I don't think the elders really understand that. They only see his connection, and—"
"His obligation," she finished. Mika looked away. "Marriage makes him family and an extension of the tribe."
"The nature of family often forces us to places we don't want to visit," he said quietly. "I do not envy him."
Mika hesitated and gave Lakanta a long look. "They asked you to come speak with me, didn't they?"
He nodded again. "Don't think ill of the elders. They see your husband as the only line of resistance against the Starfleet people. Their fears are strong."
"He's just one man," Mika retorted, more sharply than she wished. "He's not a soldier or a diplomat."
"He used to be one of them."
She snorted. "He was never one of them. That's why he chose to leave all that behind."
A curious expression passed over Lakanta's face, a peculiar look of knowing that seemed oddly alien. "Choices always return to us when we least expect them. The cost of them is never fully apparent at the time." He blinked, and his manner changed again. "I'll come by in a little while. Perhaps he'll listen to a friend."
Lakanta wandered away and Mika walked into her house alone.
The smell of warming oatcakes met her and she was instantly hungry. A pot of tea steamed gently on the kitchen table, and her mug waited for her, a spoon resting beside it. For a moment, the simple gesture wiped away her darker musings.
A hand snaked around her waist and Mika felt the bristles of an unshaven chin tickle her neck as her husband kissed her there. "Hey," he said.
Mika turned in his embrace and took up the thread of their little ritual. "Good morning, Mister Crusher," she told him.
"Good morning, Missus Crusher," he replied and kissed her again. "Breakfast's ready."
She slipped from his grasp, and the casual warmth in his expression faded. The question hung in the air between them.
"Wes," she began, but he turned away and went to the stove.
"I said I would think about it," he replied. "I'm doing it. I'm thinking about it."
She felt a knot of tension in her chest. A moment ago she had been ready to take his side to Lakanta and the others, defend her husband's right to his privacy, and now she found herself on the other face of the argument. Wesley had come to live with Mika's clan on Dorvan V because he had walked away from that life, and now she was asking him—they were all asking him—to return to it again for the good of the colony.
Finally she spoke. "I hate this. I hate that you're being asked this." Mika sighed. "You should refuse."
"I want to." Wes brought her breakfast and poured her tea. "More than anything, I want to."
"Then say no," she said in a rush. "Tell the elders to take the weight of this themselves, just as they should. You're not a councilman. It's wrong to make these demands of you, you're just a—"
"A what?" He eyed her. "An ordinary man?"
"Wesley Crusher." Mika touched his hand. "You have never been ordinary."
The knock at the door broke the moment. She pulled it aside and found Lakanta there, breathless from running.
"Wes," he called, looking past her. "There's word from the lodge. The Federation ship has made orbit. They're sending a delegation down by transporter to the square." He swallowed hard.
Mika saw the flicker of emotion when her husband said the next word, there and then gone. "Enterprise?"
Lakanta nodded.
Wesley studied the tea in his cup for a moment, then took a sip of it. He put it down and touched Mika's wrist. "I won't be long," he told her and followed the other man out into the brightening morning air.
