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He stopped five feet short of the end of the runway, staring like a jerk at the ambassador and the captain and all those other spiffy dressers.

The ambassador waited a few seconds, then came forward into the honor guard tunnel. The other dignitaries just followed him in there.

Ambassador Spock’s weathered face shone every crease in the harsh hangar bay lights, but under the Vulcan reserve there was an unmistakable sheen of pride and delight. In fact, a hint of a grin tugged at his bracketed mouth and his slashed brows were slightly raised. As he stood flanked by the captain and the dignitaries, all facing Stiles like a vast wall of phaser stun, the applause tapered off and then suddenly stopped in deference and respect.

“Welcome home, ensign,” the ambassador said warmly. The soft knell of victory rang in his words and triggered a whole new wave of applause and cheering. As he turned toward the captain beside him, the applause almost instantly fell off again. “I am honored to present Captain James Turner of the U.S.S. Lexington.”

“Ensign Stiles, I’m pleased to finally meet you in person,” the thin officer said, smiling broadly and pumping Stiles’s hand. “I first heard about you when I was in command of the Whisperwood. Your story was very compelling to me, and I used it to train my fighter squadrons. I admit to pulling some strings so the Lexington could be the ship to meet you today.”

“Oh… I… thanks.” Stiles leaned closer and urgently told him, “This is some kind of mistake!”

The captain grinned again and took Stiles’s elbow and turned him slightly. “My first officer, Commander Auch’ey.”

“Welcome aboard, Ensign,” the smiling woman said, “and welcome home.”

The captain turned him a little more, while Ambassador Spock watched in passive approval despite the desperate glance Stiles tossed him. In a whirl he was introduced to a half dozen other people.

“Federation Ambassador Whitehead… Provincial Ambassador Oleneva… Chief Adjutant Kuy, representing Admiral Ulvit… Governor Ned Clory from your home state of Florida… Port Canaveral’s Mayor Tino Griffith, Princess Marina from the Kingdom of Paln’s on our host planet here in this star system …. “

They each greeted him and pumped his hand and patted his arms, some even hugged him,, but he scarcely caught a syllable, registering only the mention of an honors breakfast in the ward room.

“You’ve-got the wrong guy,” he protested again as Captain Turner steered him back to Ambassador Spock. By now, Dr. McCoy had shuttled down the ramp and was standing beside Spock, and for an instant as Stiles turned the years peeled back and he saw them as they had been so many decades ago. Spock, streamlined and subdued in his blue Science Division tunic, his black hair glossily reflecting a single horizontal band of light from the hangar ceiling. Leonard McCoy, in a shortsleeved medical smock, strong arms casually folded, his thick brown hair glistening in a much more raucous way, his supremely human expression enjoying a proud and friendly grin, cirrus-blue eyes set in a square face now famous throughout the settled galaxy. Two legends, standing together, for Eric Stiles. This couldn’t be happening. They had something so wrong. He was whisked to a podium mounted at the far end of the hangar bay while a team taxied the pod into its cubicle and the crowd closed in on the hole it made. Somebody ushered him to a row of chairs and put him between Ambassador Spock and Dr. McCoy-good thing, too, because then he had a buffer from those adoring grins. As Captain Turner and those other ambassadors stood up to make speeches-heroism, selflessness, sacrifice, fortitude, survival, strength, pride of Starfleet, son of Federation dynamism-Stiles caught only the odd word or phrase, none of which struck him as applying to himself, and he leaned slightly toward Dr. McCoy. Through his teeth he implored, “Will you please tell them?”

“Just smile and nod a lot,” McCoy wryly advised. “Let ‘em have their ceremony. Next week the president