Tales from the Captain's Table Read online

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2005 by Paramount Pictures. All Rights Reserved.

  STAR TREK is a Registered Trademark of Paramount Pictures.

  This book is published by Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., under exclusive license from Paramount Pictures.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  ISBN: 1-4165-1028-1

  First Pocket Books trade paperback edition June 2005

  POCKET and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Cover illustration by Mark Gerber

  Cover design by John Vairo, Jr.

  Visit us on the World Wide Web:

  http://www.SimonSays.com/st

  http://www.startrek.com

  Let us raise our glasses to Plato, Geoffrey Chaucer, Lord Dunsany,

  L. Sprague de Camp & Fletcher Pratt, Arthur C. Clarke, Larry

  Niven, Spider Robinson, John Ostrander, Neil Gaiman, and all those

  past, present, and future who know the value of gathering together,

  hoisting a few, and telling tales….

  Contents

  Introduction: How We Built the Bar

  Dean Wesley Smith

  William T. Riker

  Improvisations on the Opal Sea:

  A Tale of Dubious Credibility

  Michael A. Martin & Andy Mangels

  Jean-Luc Picard

  Darkness

  Michael Jan Friedman

  Elizabeth Shelby

  Pain Management

  Peter David

  Klag, Son of M’raq

  IoDnI’pu’ vavpu’ je

  Keith R.A. DeCandido

  Kira Nerys

  The Officers’ Club

  Heather Jarman

  Jonathan Archer

  Have Beagle, Will Travel: The Legend of Porthos

  Louisa M. Swann

  Demora Sulu

  Iron and Sacrifice

  David R. George III

  Chakotay

  Seduced

  Christie Golden

  David Gold

  An Easy Fast

  John J. Ordover

  About the Authors

  Introduction

  How We Built the Bar

  DEAN WESLEY SMITH

  Back in the mists of history, around 1997, the Captain’s Table was built, to float forever in time and space, allowing only captains of ships through the big wooden front door. If my memory serves, the creation of the Captain’s Table was slow, like any construction process—a labor of love carried out over a number of phone calls between myself and former Pocket Books editor John Ordover.

  John and I both loved the tradition of bars in literature, and often talked about the White Hart, one of our favorites. I’m not sure of the exact conversation between us that sent the Captain’s Table into full construction, but I do remember that at one point John suggested I create the bar.

  Since I had worked as a bartender and have a degree in architecture that I have seldom used, it was a logical assignment. I took the task very seriously, actually going to my architectural studio and drawing up floor plans. As I would in any good design, I included restrooms, determined the location of stairs, provided for liquor storage, and so on. Every detail, all to scale. Then John and I worked out the characters who would be regulars, who would be there to listen to the captains’ stories.

  We developed the rules of the bar, and how it works with captains of ships from any time and any space. We developed the tradition of captains telling tales, and many of the other details that threaded their way into the bar. Then John hired eight of his writers to bring the Captain’s Table to life and write six novels. He assigned each the task of writing in first person, from the captain’s point of view while in the bar.

  Since I had designed the bar, I was given first choice and picked Benjamin Sisko, writing with my wife, Kristine Kathryn Rusch. The team of L.A. Graf took Jim Kirk and Hikaru Sulu, Diane Carey wrote about Kathryn Janeway, Michael Jan Friedman got to record Jean-Luc Picard’s story, Jerry Oltion told Christopher Pike’s, and Peter David told Mackenzie Calhoun’s tale.

  John kept everyone together in details and timeline, even managing to have the different books linked by last and first chapters, with one captain leaving the bar while another came in. John even had the artist put in the faces of the authors in the crowd scene behind the captains in the cover paintings and on the big poster. Only not always on our own books. (Hint: Kris and I are right behind Captain Janeway.)

  As a hard-core Star Trek fan, this was all grand fun for me, not only the creation of the bar, but writing the novel. Since then, I have been editing Strange New Worlds, the annual-contest anthology that lets the fans into the professional writing side of Star Trek. Over the years, my biggest regret has been that the rules of Strange New Worlds don’t allow Captain’s Table stories. I’ve really wanted to read more about the bar that floated out there, giving the captains of ships a needed place to relax.

  Now Keith R.A. DeCandido has solved that problem with this wonderful book, getting some of the best Star Trek writers to drop in to the Captain’s Table and listen to more stories from many varied captains. I feel like I have come home.

  So sit back and enjoy great stories in one of the most interesting and strange places in all of time and space. And when you leave, don’t forget to tip the bartender.

  Tending Bar…

  Cap was cleaning glasses as the pair entered the bar—both human, both Starfleet. The shorter, bald one, Jean-Luc Picard, had graced the Captain’s Table on several occasions, becoming more gregarious with each visit. The taller, bearded human with him, William T. Riker, was new. Cap smiled, enjoying the ritual of the captain bringing the newly promoted beloved former first officer here for his first drink.

  And, of course, for his first story.

  Off in a corner, another human Starfleet captain, this a blond-haired woman who was drinking a succession of Orion whiskeys, sat dolefully, ignoring those who entered, even though they were known to her. Cap knew that Elizabeth Shelby’s story was not one for the entire tavern. Another captain was moving to sit with her. She would pay her way soon enough, and the rules only said you had to tell a story, not necessarily tell it to all of the bar’s patrons.

  At the bar itself was another doleful captain, a Klingon named Klag, who was attempting to drain Cap’s warnog supply. The new arrivals were known to him as well, and nods were exchanged among them.

  As Picard and Riker approached the bar, Cap walked over to where they stood, already knowing what they would order….

  William T. Riker

  Captain of the U.S.S. Titan

  Improvisations on the Opal Sea:

  A Tale of Dubious Credibility

  MICHAEL A. MARTIN & ANDY MANGELS

  “Ah, Paris,” said Jean-Luc Picard after the shimmering transporter beam released him and faded from sight. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply.

  Not wishing to offend his former commanding officer, Captain Will Riker struggled not to wrinkle his nose noticeably as he, too, sampled the chill air and took in his new surroundings. The ancient, cobbled alley in which they had materialized seemed utterly unremarkable.
r />   Except for its rather pungent smell.

  “You look disappointed, Captain,” Picard said, reminding Riker how unaccustomed he was to being addressed by his new rank. Captain Picard had been in the habit of calling him “Number One” for fifteen years now.

  Gesturing toward a meandering, meter-long crack in the brick wall beside him, Riker favored Picard with a wry smile. “As sightseeing destinations go, this doesn’t exactly measure up to the Arc de Triomphe or the Champs Elysées.”

  Picard strode confidently away from the wall and into the late-afternoon shadows. Despite the apparently anonymous obscurity of the alley, he was clearly familiar with the terrain.

  “You’ve seen those things before, Will,” Picard said. “I’ve something more important to show you today. It’s a rare privilege, and you’ve earned it.”

  A rare privilege, Riker thought, stepping carefully around a noisome pile of animal droppings as he followed his erstwhile CO around a corner. A scenic tour of an alley that smells like an open latrine.

  “You brought me here because I scratched up your yacht, didn’t you?” Riker said aloud as they reached a crowded, filthy rue that Riker recognized as emblematic of the oldest portions of the area surrounding Paris’s Gare du Nord . “You realized you wouldn’t be able to put reprimands in my file any longer, so you had to find another way of getting even with me.”

  Pausing to let a cluster of harried, overcoat-bundled Parisians pass him on the ancient concrete-and-cobble sidewalk, Picard turned toward Riker, an uncharacteristically fraternal smile splitting his face. “I lent you and Deanna the Calypso II as my wedding gift. I’ve no regrets on that score, Will, dents and scratches notwithstanding. But the important thing is that you and Deanna had a safe and pleasant honeymoon trip.”

  “You know what they say, sir. Any honeymoon you can walk away from…” Riker said, trailing off as he returned Picard’s grin. He quickly fell into step beside Picard as they walked down the rue, which teemed with pedestrians and old-style ground vehicles.

  “Do tell,” Picard deadpanned.

  Still grinning, Riker shook his head. “Not even under the influence of Romulan mind-probes.”

  “We’ll see,” Picard said enigmatically, though his smile remained firmly in place.

  Despite the comradely familiarity his newly achieved rank afforded him with Captain Picard, Riker found he really wasn’t very keen on discussing his recent three-week honeymoon in any detail. Suddenly, a new mix of pungent aromas assaulted him, causing his nose to wrinkle like a Ferengi’s—and giving him the perfect excuse to change the subject.

  “I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, Captain, but why does this place smell so…strong?”

  Picard gestured as broadly about the rue as the relentlessly determined streams of pedestrian traffic would permit. “For the same reason that the people prefer to walk. Or take vintage twentieth-century ground transportation. Or live in apartment buildings that predate the Industrial Revolution.”

  Riker nodded, beginning to understand. “It’s a museum city.” He was familiar with the common French complaint that many of Earth’s modern cities were too sterile and antiseptic for Gallic tastes.

  “My people are known for their singular resistance to change,” Picard said. “As well as for our frequent small acts of rebellion against modernity. We’re fiercely protective of our language, our architecture, our cuisine. Parisians are particularly so. Did you know that food replicators are forbidden in this arrondissement?”

  Riker sniffed the air again. Cooking smells melded with the sickly-sweet bouquet of ripening garbage—and the dog droppings he had so carefully avoided, which now seemed to be stalking him.

  “Here we are,” Picard said, coming to an abrupt stop before a crumbling gothic structure that might well have been a thousand years old. Looking up toward the shadowy, gargoyle-festooned roofline, Riker counted six stories and guessed that the structure had endured at least four centuries past its safe lifespan.

  Riker looked to Picard, who was pointing toward a narrow flight of concrete steps that led downward to a dingy-looking basement door.

  Riker found himself staring at a wooden sign whose peeling paint nearly obscured the words LA TABLE DU CAPITAINE.

  This can’t be right, Riker thought, blinking mutely at the sign.

  Picard had evidently noticed Riker’s confusion. “Well, I know the exterior doesn’t exactly rival President Bacco’s château in the Loire Valley for beauty. But I can assure you the Captain’s Table is a good deal more attractive on the inside.”

  Riker shook his head in disbelief. The Captain’s Table was the name of the secret and exclusive bar Captain Picard had told him about—very quietly—on the very day his promotion to captain had come through. Not only was it a place that catered only to ship captains, but Starfleet personnel of lesser rank weren’t even supposed to be aware of its existence. Riker hadn’t had the heart to tell him that Captain Garfield of the Independence had told him about the place four years earlier.

  But there was one huge problem: It was on the wrong planet.

  “I thought you told me you visited this place a few years back with Captain Gleason of the Zhukov,” Riker said, frowning. “On Madigoor IV.”

  Picard nodded, a puckish grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. “You’re right. That’s precisely where Neil and I were the first time I visited the Captain’s Table.”

  Riker scratched his beard in confusion. “I guess they must be a chain.” A chain of exclusive, hush-hush, top-secret, captains-only drinking venues, he thought. Right.

  “No, Will,” Picard said, his grin becoming almost mischievous. “I assure you that the Captain’s Table is an utterly unique establishment.” And with that, he descended the stairs and pushed the dilapidated wooden door open.

  Shrugging, Riker followed Picard down the stairs, across the threshold, and into what appeared to be a dimly lit, utterly unremarkable drinking establishment.

  A burst of raucous sound greeted them even as Riker’s eyes struggled to adjust to the scant illumination.

  “Postrelativist jazz, I think,” Picard said, nodding toward the narrow, battered stage where a trio of musicians labored, respectively, over exotic brass, string, and percussion instruments.

  Riker shook his head, wincing at the strains of the furry humanoid who seemed to be fighting for his life against a vaguely trombone-like instrument. From the discordant hoots issuing from the instrument’s coiled metal bowels, it wasn’t at all clear who was going to emerge the victor.

  “Sounds more like what passes for pop music on the Opal Sea,” Riker said with a wince. “Mixed with a fair amount of Sinnravian drad.”

  Riker turned away from the stage and began taking a brief inventory of the Captain’s Table’s other habitués. Present were humanoids representing at least a dozen Federation species, along with perhaps half that many humans. A handful belonged to races Riker had never seen before. Most of the patrons sat at tables scattered throughout the room, while a few had bellied up to the bar. They all appeared to be intent upon either their quiet conversations, the various hot and cold liquors before them, or both.

  A familiar face caught his eye. Seated at a corner table was Elizabeth Shelby. A multitude of small, empty glasses surrounded her, several of them upended. Not only had she taken no notice of him, but she seemed to want nothing more than to crawl inside the half-drained whiskey bottle into which she stared.

  Riker wondered what was wrong, but resisted the temptation to walk over to her and ask. Maybe she’s taken on a first officer who’s as big a pain in the ass as she was for me back when the Borg first tried to assimilate Earth.

  As Riker turned to follow Picard to the bar, he began to revise his opinion of the place upward. Though the Captain’s Table appeared no less worn-out and seedy than it had when he’d entered, its walls boasted autographed photos of jazz legends, including Junior Mance, Charlie Parker, and Louis Armstrong, showcased alongside the bric-
a-brac of a score of obscure worlds, objects ranging from a baritone sax to something that strongly resembled (but wasn’t quite) a standard Terran trombone to a zither-like stringed instrument Riker recognized as a Shaltoonian linlovar to the chrome fittings of various ground vehicles that surely had never come within several sectors of Earth.

  How did a hubcap from a Jupiter 8 end up here? Riker thought, staring at the shining disk on the wall with unconcealed amazement as he leaned on his elbows across the bar. In a captains-only drinking establishment that somehow transported itself all the way from Madigoor IV to Paris, no less.

  A pair of large pewter mugs thumped heavily onto the bar between Riker and Picard.

  Picard raised his mug and took a generous swallow, then glanced with satisfaction at Riker before casting an appreciative smile toward the bartender.

  “Perfect, as usual,” Picard said, setting his drink back onto the bar. “A very dry Pentarian dresci.”

  Riker scowled in confusion. “I don’t remember you placing an order yet. You must have called ahead.”

  “No, that’s not necessary,” said Picard, shaking his head. “That’s one of the special things about Cap here, and his establishment. Both always seem to deliver exactly what one needs, whenever one needs it.”

  As long as one is a ship’s captain, Riker thought, recalling what both Picard and Garfield had already told him. He studied the barkeep, a thickset human male with a shock of short, white, and slightly unkempt hair. And as long as one pays one’s tab with a story.

  “Thank you, Cap,” Riker said, raising his mug toward the bartender. He wondered how much of his story would be expected to be true.

  “All part of the service, Captains,” the bartender said with a knowing grin as he polished a metal drinking stein on his apron.

  “How’s your drink, by the way, Will?” Picard said.