• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

But the Romulans’ apparent destruction of the Miracht—one of the most advanced military starships in the star navy of Tellar, a civilization whose starfaring experience significantly exceeds that of Earth and Alpha Centauri—does not bode well for Earth’s space forces in their efforts to find a quick solution to this problem. After all, Tellar’s starfaring technologies are more advanced than those of Earth’s NX- or Daedalus-class starships, rivaling those of Andoria and even Vulcan. Could the nearly simultaneous loss of both the Miracht and the Yeager, immediately following the as yet unexplained catastrophic failure of Deneva’s early-warning grid, be seen as clear evidence that the Romulans have developed potent new weaponry? Senior Starfleet officials have harbored such suspicions for months, citing prior incidents involving ships from Vulcan and the Klingon Empire, and even Earth’s own Starship Enterprise.

But as dire as the future might appear now that the Romulans have added Deneva, like Calder II and Tarod IX before it, to its expanding list of subjugated worlds, this reporter can see more reason for encouragement than despair. And that is because for all that we don’t know about these mysterious Romulans, and for all the fear that a lack of knowledge can engender, the simple truth is that the enemy’s knowledge of humanity is equally deficient. The Romulans just don’t understand how often humans have risen to occasions such as these in the past.

And that will be their undoing.

TWENTY-THREE

Saturday, October 18, 2155

Enterprise, Oregon, Earth

THE TIDINGS OF WAR from the frontier droned on in the corner where Selma Guitierrez sat lotus-style on the floor, doing her yoga stretches in front of the living-room screen.

Nelson Kemper tried to ignore the broadcast, concentrating instead on the laughing, brown-eyed, brown-haired toddler who sat on his knee, balancing herself precariously as he leaned back on the sofa as her pudgy fingers maintained a firm grip on both of his thumbs. Although little Elena had already been walking for more than six months, she had yet to outgrow the need for “daddy rides,” much to Kemper’s delight.

On most days, such small but sublime joys served only to vindicate the decision that he and Selma had made almost two years earlier, shortly after their discovery of the unplanned pregnancy that had ultimately given them Elena, who had since become the light of their lives. They had decided then to swap their military careers for a semirural existence in a town that shared its name—Enterprise—with that of the Starfleet vessel where they had last been posted as MACO troopers.

Today was not one of those days.

After the third time Selma had replayed the recording of Gannet Brook’s report about the assault on Deneva—neither of them had been in the mood to listen to any more of Keisha Naquase’s well-meaning but ill-advised pacifism—Kemper knew that something was very different today. Although he found that playing with Elena brought him no less joy than it ever did, he also noticed that it was becoming harder than ever before to keep trying to ignore what was going Out There, in the hostile immensity of deep interstellar space.

Just as it was becoming increasingly difficult to tamp down his burning need to do something about it.

After swinging Elena playfully onto his shoulder, Kemper got his feet beneath him and walked toward his wife.

“How many more times are you going to watch that?” he said, nodding toward the image of Gannet Brooks, whose every pore seemed to radiate a mixture of both concern and encouragement.

Selma stretched once more, then rose to her feet. She pointed a small remote control unit at the screen, and Brooks’s likeness abruptly vanished.

“Sorry, Nelson,” she said, brushing several strands of her dark, lustrous hair away from her eyes. “I didn’t realize it was bothering you.”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t.