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French fried potato products have long been popular as a food item. French fried potato products which have been frozen and can be relatively easily reheated or reconstituted by the consumer in an oven, toaster oven, microwave oven or deep fat frying are particularly popular. Various methods and techniques have been proposed and utilized for preparing such products so that they have a desirable French fried appearance and pleasing textural qualities.
One type of known frozen French fried potato product is a formed potato product. In this type of product, potato pieces are cooked and then appropriately processed into a potato mash or mixture. The potato mash or mixture is mixed with other ingredients such as binders and salt, and the resulting mixture is then formed into the desired potato product through use of an extruder. The formed potato product is then fried, frozen and packaged.
Another form of French fried potato product involves the use of raw potatoes that are at least partially cooked by blanching and/or steaming, and then fried, frozen and packaged. With these types of potatoes, it is known in the industry to apply a batter coating that coats the outer surface of the potato pieces. After the batter coating is applied, the potato pieces are subjected to final frying, followed by freezing and packaging as mentioned above. The batter coating is applied for purposes of improving certain characteristics of the potato product. In particular, with the applied batter coating, the potato product is better able to maintain its crispness characteristics, upon reheating or reconstituting by the consumer, for a longer period of time than would otherwise be the case.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,484,617 describes a process for preparing golden yellow potato products that involves passing the potato pieces through an aqueous solution containing annatto. The patent describes preparing raw potato pieces in a conventional manner for partial cooking in a water bath or steam chamber. The potato pieces are then passed through an aqueous solution containing annatto so that the potato pieces emerging from the aqueous solution have a light golden yellow color. As the potato pieces are passed through the aqueous solution containing annatto, the solution is readily absorbed by the gelatinized surfaces of the potato pieces. The potato pieces are then cooked and frozen for packaging and sale. The consumer can then reheat or reconstitute the potato pieces for consumption through use of an oven or by deep frying.
U.S. Pat. No. Re 27,531 discloses a process for treating potato products from reconstituted raw potatoes or sliced raw potatoes. The potato pieces are dipped in an amylose coating, followed by cooking in hot edible cooking oil. The amylose coating is intended to produce a product having improved appearance, texture and taste when used to coat potato products prior to deep frying.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,751,268 discloses a method of coating potato pieces with ungelatinized, unmodified, high amylose starch prior to being cooked in edible frying oil. By coating the potato products with ungelatinized, unmodified, high amylose starch prior to deep fat frying, the oil absorption during deep fat frying is reduced and the resulting product is said to have an improved textural quality.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,424,591 discloses a method of surface treating potato pieces with a synthetic or chemically modified natural hydrocolloid prior to deep fat frying to produce French fried potato products having a lighter, more even color, a firmer texture, a higher residual moisture content, and a reduced oil content. The patent describes dipping partially cooked potato pieces in non-ionic alkylcellulose ether, such as hydroxypropylmethyl cellulose, or carboxymethyl-cellulose, generally designated as an aqueous hydrocolloid solution. This coating is said to inhibit natural browning, with the primary purpose of the disclosed hydrocolloid being to form a viscous coating preventing penetration of oil during the subsequent cooking period.
It is also known in the industry to apply salt to frozen French fried potato products for imparting salty taste characteristics to the frozen French fried potato product.
As evidenced by at least some of these patents, there is an interest in the industry to provide consumers with frozen French fried potato products having preferred color characteristics and textural characteristics. However, no attention has been given to providing frozen French fired potato products with unique taste qualities. More particularly, no attention has been given to providing frozen French fried potato products with topical additions, such as sugar or other sweet flavored coatings, that result in a frozen French fried potato product significantly different from known frozen French fried potato products. There thus exists an interest and need in the marketplace, particularly amongst younger consumers, for frozen French fried potato products that are uniquely appealing, for example from the standpoint of taste and possibly visual appearance, and different from anything commercially available. |
What patients should ask of consumers' guides to health care quality.
Consumers' guides that profile the quality of care of individual health care providers may be influential in shaping health care markets. We propose four simple questions that can be used to evaluate such guides: (a) Does the guide measure distinct and important domains of health care quality? (b) Are the individual measures of quality described simply and precisely? (c) Do the measures take into account relevant differences between patients? (d) Are the ratings of quality presented fairly? Using these four questions, we examine the validity of one prominent guide that annually identifies America's best hospitals and present a set of recommendations for the design of future guides. Although the evaluation of health care quality is undoubtedly complex, the four questions that we pose provide a basis for developing a more rational approach to informing the public about health care quality. |
Q:
ASP/VB/C# .NET Dynamic Calculations & Referencing
I'm developing an app in which there's hundreds of different calculations involved and would like for my app's admins to be able to tweak these calculations by specifying the formulas.
For example, my database table contains price and quantity. One of the columns 'X' might contain "(price * quantity) over the past 7 days". How can I allow my app's admins to change the calculation from "7 days" to "14 days"?
Is there some way to make calculations dynamic within VB.NET or do I have to rely on stored procedures and write some code to alter those procedure if a change is needed? What are the best practices in this type of a scenario?
Ideally, I would like to use something similar to the "Tags" box used when posting questions on here to bring up the available fields and add mathematical operators in between them to perform calculations. It might be adding more complexity, but would be great if an existing calculation isn't overwritten so that it could be used in building a new formula.
Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks!
A:
You could use an eval function, like the one described here or here.
Make sure you implement it in a way that is safe. Allowing users to execute arbitrary code can be dangerous, for obvious reasons.
|
Journey 2 sinks Vernes isle in brainless 3-D muck
This 3-D sort-of sequel wears its formula-for-dollars purpose
with pride, delivering a dash of cinematic nonsense that represents
Hollywood calculation at its most shameless.
Again poking Jules Verne's remains with a sharp stick, the
producers of the 2008 hit Journey to the Center of the Earth
present their second modern take on the 19th-century fantasist's
wild stories. And Mysterious Island is every bit the amusement park
ride cloaked as a movie that the first Journey was, the new flick
stranding a misfit band of adventurers on Verne's lost island of
freakish creatures.
What this one lacks by comparison is the relative novelty of
digital 3-D, which was in its infancy for mainstream theatrical
releases when Journey to the Center of the Earth came out.
It also lacks the likable goof factor of Brendan Fraser, who
starred in the first movie but isn't back for the second. Dwayne
Johnson steps in this time, and while he tries to yuck it up amid
the nonstop action, he's just not a goofball on the order of
Fraser, who somehow can make extreme silliness palatable with that
big, simpering grin of his. Johnson, on the other hand, merely
simpers.
Journey 2 also features a change of directors, with Brad Peyton
(Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore) overseeing a
collection of impressive but annoying visuals, serving up gimmicky
3-D that's continually trying to poke things in your eye.
Johnson stars as ex-Navy guy Hank, stepfather to troublesome
teenager Sean Anderson (Josh Hutcherson, reprising his role from
the first Journey).
In its rushed and clunky opening minutes, Journey 2 establishes
that Sean's a bad-boy genius who resents his stepdad; bonds the two
in a scene that shows Hank's an OK guy and Sean's not such a bad
boy and not such a genius; sends them off to the South Pacific in
search of Sean's grandfather (Michael Caine), who sent a cryptic
transmission that he had found Verne's supposedly fictional island;
and lands them in the company of helicopter pilot Gabato (Luis
Guzman) and his beautiful daughter, Kailani (Vanessa Hudgens), who
ferry the visitors to the remote isle.
Size matters to the filmmakers here, which might be why they
signed up Johnson, a co-producer as well as star, who strains for
some laughs with an overdone gag about his massive pectoral
muscles.
The actors make an effort with the interminable repartee they're
given to mutter, but the presence of actors as good as Caine and
Guzman only highlights how dreadful and dumb the banter is.
The 3-D images have improved greatly since the first Journey,
but even more this time, the filmmakers play a game of "made you
flinch" with cheap shots of objects hurtling off the screen. Good
for a giggle at a theme park attraction, good for some groans and
grousing when paying a 3-D premium to park your carcass in a
theater for 90 minutes.
The root of the franchise is kind of clever, updating Verne's
novels to our times by pretending they weren't fantasies but
chronicles of actual expeditions. And Journey 2 has its heart in
the right place as a family-friendly adventure that might interest
some kids in checking out Verne's books.
If only the movie had the hint of a brain.
MOVIE RATING
Journey 2: The Mysterious Island
**
Rated PG, 94 minutes.
Opens Friday.
Comments
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The present invention relates to a sheet feeding mechanism in use with an ink jet printer, for example, and more particularly to a sheet feeding mechanism including an object pressing member for pressing a printed sheet.
To print by an ink jet printer, the nozzle orifices of a printhead selectively eject ink drops onto a printing paper in accordance with print information while synchronizing with a relative movement of a printhead relative to a printing paper.
Generally, to feed a printing paper in the printer, the printing paper is nipped by a pair of paper-feed rollers, and one of the paired rollers is rotated.
In the case of the ink jet printer, characters, for example, printed on the printing paper are not fixed. Accordingly, when the printed paper is pressed against the rollers, ink of the printed characters is still wet. The wet ink sticks onto the roller, and is transferred from the roller to the sheet or paper.
An ink jet printer designed to solve the ink sticking problem is disclosed in JP-A-2-41277.
In the ink jet printer, the sheet is held by pressing the medium on the sheet feed roller. Therefore, the ink jet printer indispensably includes a sheet-pressing member having a spur gear with sharp teeth on the shaft.
The sheet-pressing member is designed to act elastically to the spur gear or the shaft, and the thus designed member presses the printing paper against the sheet feed roller.
A contact area where the spur gear is in contact with the paper is small in the ink jet printer using the thus constructed sheet-pressing member. Therefore, no ink transfer to the paper takes place in such a printer.
The sheet-pressing member of the printer takes the form of a bar or a plate, and the thus shaped member, while being bent, presses the sheet against the sheet feed roller.
The sheet-pressing member has a large spring constant, and inevitably suffers from dimensional variations. For this reason, work to properly set a pressing force is very difficult.
Where the pressing force is too large, an excessive load acts on the paper being fed. On the other hand, where it is too small, a sheet feeding force is insufficient. Either case leads to degradation of print quality. |
Sitting at an even 16-16, the Florida Gators men’s basketball team’s match up today with 31-0 Kentucky in the SEC Tournament may seem an impossible task. The Gators lost to these Wildcats 67-50 last week after running out of gas in the second half, which is the fate that all teams that have challenged Kentucky have suffered.
Today’s rematch is at 1 pm on the SEC Network. So what will it take for the Gators to pull off the upset of Kentucky today? Besides a ton of luck, here are five keys for the Florida Gators to pull the big upset.
Frazier Has to Start Hitting
Guard Michael Frazier II, who has been slowed by an ankle injury, will have to regain his shooting form. He connected on a dismal 2-for-18 shooting performance in the Gators 69-61 win over Alabama on Thursday, hitting only one three pointer. He’ll need to shoot better than 50 percent from the floor for the Gators to win.
Another Double Double From Doe Doe
Forward Dorian Finney-Smith, who scored 23 points and grabbed 11 rebounds, will have to make contributions all over the court, especially in rebounds, where the much bigger Kentucky team should dominate. But his versatility on the court can keep the Wildcats off guard and help create opportunities elsewhere on the floor.
A Combined Double Double from Walker and Robinson
Forwards Chris Walker and Devin Robinson need to make contributions that will nullify the Kentucky size, meaning these two will need to make the Wildcats pay with every opportunity. Walker will have to chase down the rebounds and play bigger inside, while Robinson’s three point shooting and play around the rim could help even the Gators disadvantage there.
Hill Must Slash to Kentucky Frontline
Guard Kasey Hill has been coming on in recent weeks with his aggressive drives to the basket, creating shots and setting up other players. He’ll need to be fearless among the trees of the Kentucky frontline today.
A Wildcard Performance
There’ll need to be one more playmaker to beat this powerful Kentucky team. Guards Eli Carter and Chris Chiozza have shown they can hit the long ball. Forward Alex Murphy is hitting shots. Or maybe fan favorite Jacob Kurtz will be the hero.
For the Gators to keep their NCAA tournament hopes alive with a win over Kentucky, it will take a complete team effort the likes of which hasn’t been accomplished yet this season. But after a lackluster season, this Florida Gators men’s basketball team has the potential to still surprise, and an upset over Kentucky would surely be the biggest yet. |
The present invention relates to a central processing unit of a modular programmable controller with a communications interface. The central processing unit includes a processor unit, a memory device, a peripheral interface, and a programming interface, all interconnected with a bus system.
In the case of a central processing unit of a modular programmable controller, the programming interface is designed as a point-to-point interface, so that a programming unit, e.g.,a programming terminal or a PC, can be connected via an interface cable to the central processing unit. To network the central processing units of a plurality of controllers of this type, modular programmable controllers have their own communication modules with two interfaces. The one interface can be coupled via an interconnecting cable to the programming interface of the central processing unit. The other interface has bus capability, so that the communication module is connectable to a bus, e.g.,to the SINEC H1 or to the SINEC L2.
There are several disadvantages entailed by this configuration. First, space is needed for the communication module. Also, the communication module is often more expensive than the central processing unit itself. In addition, the communication between the communication module and the central processing unit is interference-prone and slow. Data transfer rates of up to 1.5 MBaud (SINEC L2) or of up to 10 MBaud (SINEC H1), for example, can be realized over the bus, while the data transfer rate over the interconnecting cable merely amounts to 9.6 kBaud.
EP-A-0 540 903 discloses a control module having a network interface. The application program, inter alia, can be loaded via the network interface into the control module.
A programmable controller having an interface with bus capability is known from the WO-A-91 14988. However, this interface is not used as a programming interface.
Modular programmable controllers consist not only of the central processing unit, but also of at least one peripheral unit, mostly of a plurality of peripheral units. In particular, when the peripheral units are designed as intelligent peripheral units, it may be desirable to have the peripheral units communicate with other units outside of the programmable controller. |
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Table of Contents
Section One
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Section Two
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Section Three
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Section Four
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Section Five
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
## SECTION ONE
# DEATH
# Chapter One
IF DEMORA SULU had known her funeral would be in a week, she would have had the chocolate mousse.
She fixed an icy glare on the woman in front of her. It was hard to sustain the glare, because the bowl of mousse kept moving directly into her line of sight. The reason the mousse was mobile was because the woman was holding the dish, bringing it close to Demora's face, drawing it back, even having it engage in a little happy high-calorie jig.
"Get it away, Maggie," Demora warned her.
Maggie didn't seem to have heard. In a cheerful voice, she said, "Look at me, here I go, a happy carefree chocolate mousse . . . oh no! Somebody's watching me!" She brought it so close to Demora that half a centimeter nearer would have lodged it squarely against Demora's nose. "Could it be . . . you?"
Oblivious of the concentrated silliness going on in the center of the room, various off-duty crew members of the Enterprise 1701-B went about their business. The food dispensers set into the walls of the crew mess hummed steadily. There was the customary dazzling assortment from all over the galaxy. No one wanted for anything.
Except for Demora, who "wanted for" the chocolate mousse.
"Maggie, you're going to be wearing that," said Demora.
Lieutenant Maggie Thompson, science officer, didn't seem particularly intimidated by the threat. Her face was round, her thick dark hair rather curly, her brown eyes sparkling in amusement. She wrinkled her freckled nose at Demora. How Maggie maintained freckling while spending so much time in space had been an utter mystery to Demora, a mystery that Maggie had been disinclined to explain.
Demora was quite the opposite: serious when Maggie was being playful, yet possessed of a mordant wit that caught people completely off-guard because she had a calm air about her that some mistook for passivity. Her shoulder-length hair was black and straight, her dark brown eyes gracefully almond-shaped.
Her most interesting feature was her voice. There was a musical quality to it, a gentle lilt so distinctive that, even when Demora was speaking casually, she sounded as if she were singing. Except when an emergency was presented. In fact, that's how one could tell when matters had suddenly turned serious: Demora would speak in flat, inflectionless—albeit confident—tones. When she sounded like that, that was the time to, if not panic, at least proceed with extreme caution.
"You want it," Maggie told her. "You know you want it. It's delicious," and she indicated her own empty bowl. "Trust me."
"You can't be serious."
"I am serious, and this is seriously good mousse, and I would be nothing less than a total creep of a so-called friend if I willingly allowed you to pass this up. Just one taste." She dipped a spoon into it and waved it in front of Demora.
"I'm warning you, Maggie . . . I know karate . . . kung fu . . ."
"And several other dangerous words. I don't know which is a worse offense, Demora . . . threatening a superior officer, or using old jokes on her."
Demora actually looked surprised at that. "That's an old joke?" she said.
"Centuries."
"Oh." And there was a look of such unmistakable, undiluted disappointment that slowly Thompson lowered the spoon and stared at Demora in confusion.
"What's wrong?"
Demora forced a smile, which was unusual since normally smiles came so easily to her. "Nothing. It's silly."
"Silly how?"
"Well," and Demora shrugged, "that joke. About 'dangerous words.‣ My father said it, ages ago. And I thought it was so funny, and I just laughed and laughed . . . I couldn't stop laughing, in fact. And I had always just, well . . . I'd just assumed he'd made it up. I don't know why that's important to me, or why it should bother me. But it does. Isn't that weird?"
"Not really," replied Maggie. "I remember . . . God, I haven't thought about this in years. I remember when I was real little, my father would sing me this song at nighttime. It was called 'Bushel and a Peck.'"
"What and a what?"
"It's old-style units of measurement. I didn't know that when I was little, mind you. I thought they were just sort of nonsense words. The song went, 'I love you, a bushel and a peck, a bushel and . . .'"
Maggie Thompson had many fine qualities, but on-key vocalizing was not among them. She was reminded of this when several crewmates started looking in her direction. Quickly she stopped singing, but continued, "In any event, I just—in my childish way—kind of figured that he'd made the song up just for me. And I was shocked to find out that it was actually from an old musical show called Guys and Dolls."
"It was about men playing with dolls?"
"It was about gamblers, I think."
"Gamblers?" Demora made a face. "Singing gamblers?"
"Well, the same era also had shows about singing cats and singing barbers who killed people and turned them into meat pies. What can I tell you; it was an odd and perverse time. In any event, the point is . . . I understand how you feel. No reason to feel sad or even disappointed and yet you still do."
"I guess so."
"Your father and you close?"
Demora shrugged. "Oh . . . sure," she said in a less than convincing tone.
"Why do you say it like that?"
"I'd rather not discuss it."
"But maybe if—"
"I said I'd rather not discuss it," and it was clear from her tone and expression that there was no "rather not" involved. It was simply not up for further debate.
Maggie looked a bit chagrined. "Sorry."
"It's okay," said Demora. "I didn't mean to snap at you. And you really have been great to me, and a good friend."
"I know. And I just hate to see you upset, and think that I was responsible. You know what you need to feel better?" She shoved the chocolate mousse in Demora's direction.
Demora slid it back. "What is your problem today?"
"My problem is I already ate it, and I know I'm going to put on weight from it, and you said chocolate makes you put on weight, and misery loves company. Okay?"
"Ohhh, fine!" She slid the dish of chocolate mousse over toward her side of the table, grabbed a spoon . . . and stared at it. Then she looked up at Maggie and said, "I am a chocoholic. I admit it freely. That's something else I get from my father. If I give in to it, then I will be uncontrollable in all my subsequent urges, devour all chocolate in sight, and blow up faster than a ship with a warp-core breach. I want you to understand that you are dooming me to weeks, even months of uncontrolled weight gain until I manage to recapture my sanity. You, my alleged friend, are doing this to me."
Maggie sighed, reached over, and slid the dish back toward herself. "I hate you."
"I hate you too. That's what friends are for."
The ship's intercom promptly whistled. "All bridge personnel, report in."
"So much for that," she said, stood, and crossed over to the comm unit. She tapped the Receive button. "Thompson here, and Sulu is with me. Go ahead."
"We're receiving a distress-beacon call, Lieutenant," came the voice of Commander Tracy Dane, ship's first officer. "Your presence is requested."
"On our way," said Thompson. She clicked off, turned, and made a small finger-waggling gesture for Demora to follow her. With a sigh Demora rose, and together they walked quickly out of the officers‣ mess.
The chocolate mousse was left behind, unwanted and unloved, until Ensign Li noticed it abandoned some minutes later and took pity on it by devouring it in under thirty seconds.
* * *
Demora took her seat at helm, and smiled gamely at Lieutenant j.g. Magnus. Magnus, for his part, was a somewhat officious individual. Extremely competent, and extremely aware of his competence . . . and, for that matter, never hesitant to let others know that he was certain he was on a fast track for command some day. He always sat ramrod straight, and spoke in a crisp, clipped tone.
As it was, it was difficult for Demora to warm up to him. Previously that chair had been occupied by Ensign Tommy Singer. Demora and Singer had come up through the Academy together. They had many similar interests, had fallen into instant rapport . . . and had even, on occasion, fallen into bed. They had a nonexclusive relationship, but the relationship they did have was comfortable and pleasurable for both. In short, they meshed in a variety of ways.
And when they had both been assigned, by luck of the draw, to the Enterprise, they had been pleased beyond belief. After all, perhaps part of what had prevented their relationship from going any further was the mutual, back-of-their-head concern over where their assignments would take them. With them working side by side with Starfleet's blessing, well . . . who knew?
Who knew?
Who knew that on the maiden voyage of the Enterprise 1701-B, Demora would find herself cradling the corpse of Tommy Singer in her arms, dead from flying shards that had killed him instantly while the valiant starship fought for its life in the grip of gravimetric pressures.
Lord, what a hideous launch that had been. Oh, sure, ships bearing the name Enterprise had had shaky launches before. Most notably was the time that the refitted Enterprise was five minutes out of drydock and she suddenly found herself trapped in a wormhole.
But that had been a cakewalk compared to the fiasco of the Enterprise 1701-B launch. It had not helped that the media coverage had been less than generous. Reporters had been right there, on the spot, seeing what Captain John Harriman was going through in his endeavor to rescue the two trapped transports. They didn't focus on the dozens of lives his efforts did manage to save. That was a piddling detail, quickly omitted from all subsequent stories in favor of discussing the lives that had been lost despite Harriman's labors.
And one life in particular, mentioned in report after report.
Starfleet had gone over the log of Harriman's actions with a particle microscope. It was as if they were hoping to find something he had done wrong, so that the media's howlings for a scapegoat could be fulfilled. But Harriman was finally judged to be blameless.
The tragic initial launch of the Enterprise-B had consumed gigabytes of coverage on the galactic web. The calmer, sedate, and utterly routine relaunch had barely garnered any notice.
With all of that, the loss of Tommy Singer had seemed almost incidental to many. A sidebar at most.
But not to Demora Sulu.
The death of Kirk had hit her as hard as anyone else . . . harder, considering how often and glowingly her father had spoken of him. So much so that . . .
She shook it off. She didn't want to start thinking about that. That way lay madness.
A pair of fingers snapped in front of her face and she looked around, startled. Magnus was looking at her sourly, which was how he looked at everyone. For that matter, it was how he looked at the world.
"Got something on your mind, Sulu?" he asked.
"No," she said quickly.
Dane was in the command chair, studying the preliminary reports. Dane was tall and muscular, with a triangular face and hair of prematurely gray and white that made her look far older than her thirty-three years. When Harriman strode in, Dane said crisply, "Captain on the bridge," rose promptly from the chair, and snapped off a quick salute.
Harriman shot her a look of resigned annoyance. Dane came from a family with a history of service dating back to the Civil War, fighting in the Union Army. Although Starfleet wasn't military per se despite its trappings, nevertheless Dane routinely acted as if she were operating on rules of procedure from centuries ago. It had been so thoroughly drilled into her that it was second nature; she didn't even know she was doing it, and couldn't help herself.
At first it had bugged the hell out of Harriman. However, there was no debating the fact that Dane was a superb officer. So he decided to tolerate her little quirks, particularly since they served to keep her sharp. "Report, Commander?" he said.
"Distress beacon, Captain," she said. "Originating . . ."
"From a heading of three-two-four mark three," Demora volunteered when Dane hesitated slightly.
Harriman nodded to Demora, acknowledging the information, and turned to Dane. "Any known vessels in that sector?"
"No registered vessel has filed any flight plans with Starfleet within the last six months that would coincide with those coordinates," Dane told him.
Harriman nodded slowly. "Which means nothing, of course, except that it's not a Starfleet vessel. Which pins it down to one of several thousand independent operators."
From the communications board, Lieutenant Z'on spoke up, his gravelly voice reproduced electronically through the rig attached to his crinkled blue throat. "I've managed to cut through some of the local interference, sir," Z'on said. "Getting a clearer reading on the distress signal now."
"On audio, Lieutenant," said Harriman. He leaned thoughtfully on the edge of the command chair as a female voice issued through the bridge speaker. He frowned, the words a steady stream of incomprehensible syllables.
Demora looked up immediately, blinking in surprise.
Harriman turned to Z'on, frowning. "What is that? Sounds like . . ."
"Chinese," Demora said, turning in her chair. "Actually, one of the more obscure dialects."
"I'll run it through autotranslate," said Z'on.
"Don't trouble yourself, sir," said Demora. "I'm slightly rusty, but . . . it's a general call for distress. It just keeps repeating, 'We are in distress. Please help. We are in need of aid from any vessels in the area. We are in distress,‣ and so on."
"No specifics?"
"None. Just what I said, over and over."
"Pinpointed the origin," Z'on said. "Askalon Five."
"Askalon Five," Dane said without hesitation, "Class-m world, but uninhabited, and not particularly hospitable. Traces of a long-dead civilization were discovered in preliminary planet scans; awaiting further research from an archaeological team. The system's star is in a transitional stage, the gradual cooling having a less-than-positive impact on the planet's surface environment."
"Does the cooling sun offer any danger to the ship?"
"Remote."
"Remote meaning . . .?"
Dane smiled thinly. "If we remain in orbit around Askalon Five for several hundred thousand years, there might be some jeopardy posed."
For a long and surprising moment Harriman said nothing; it was a period of silence that actually drew several curious glances from his crew. But then Harriman chuckled softly, low in his throat. "I believe we'll have to take that risk. Helm, lay in a course for Askalon Five."
"Course plotted and laid in, sir," said Magnus.
Harriman, out of habit, rapped his knuckles once on the arm of his chair before giving the command evocative of another captain of a ship called Enterprise. In the style of the great Captain Christopher Pike, he said, "Engage."
* * *
In his quarters, Captain Harriman stared out at the passing starfield and reflected that a ready room might be a really great idea. Some sort of special quarters for the captain, just off the bridge. That way if he wanted or needed some private time—some time to think or plan or just get away from the crushing burden of being in charge—he could avail himself of it without having to leave the bridge entirely, and go all the way back to his quarters.
He didn't like to leave the bridge.
Unfortunately, these days, he wasn't especially anxious to remain there, either. . . .
"Captain?" came a slightly concerned voice from outside, jostling him out of his momentary reverie, and he realized that his door was chiming.
"Come," he called.
The door slid open and Ensign Sulu walked in. She looked slightly tentative.
"Yes, Ensign?"
"Sir . . . permission to join the rescue party to Askalon Five, presuming there is one."
From behind the desk he looked up at her. "Why wouldn't there be one, Ensign? There's a beacon calling for help. We're on our way to help. Once we're there, you don't actually think we're going to just stare at the place, do you?"
"No, sir."
"Odd choice of words, then."
"Yes, sir. I'm sorry."
"Landing party is hardly a 'party,‣ Ensign, despite the term. This would be your first one."
"Yes, sir." Trying to sound relaxed, she offered, "I could wear white."
He stared at her. "That would be an attempt at humor, I take it."
Her mouth moved slightly, no words immediately forming. Finally she got out, "Yes, sir." Then, rallying, she said, "I wanted to bring it up to you now, sir, rather than just keep my fingers crossed, or discuss it with you on the bridge in front of everyone."
"Out of consideration for your feelings, Ensign, or mine?"
"I . . ." She shrugged. "I didn't think it appropriate, sir."
"Well, you were right." He paused, and then his own shrug mirrored her own. "Very well. You'll be assigned to the landing party."
"Thank you, sir," said Demora. "You see, I figured I would be an asset because the distress message was in Chinese . . ."
"Yes, I know that."
"Plus if there really are ruins down there, ancient civilizations are a hobby of mine. . . . I have quite a few hobbies, in fact. Actually, for a brief while there I considered a career ch—"
"Ensign," said Harriman forcefully but gently, "there's an old expression: Once you've won your case, get out of the courtroom."
She blinked. "Pardon, sir?"
"You came in here to request permission to go. I've granted permission. Don't stand there telling me all the reasons I should make a decision that I already made in your favor. The only thing that's going to do is make me want to change my mind. You don't want me to do that, do you."
"No, sir," said Demora. Reflexively, she started to open her mouth to say something else, but then she thought better of it, closed it, and got out.
It was only after she had left his quarters that Harriman allowed himself to smile, ever so slightly. But then the smile faded.
He tapped a button on his desktop console. "Personal log, supplemental," he said. He had made a terse and fairly standard log entry earlier in the day. But his conversation with Ensign Sulu had stirred a distant sadness within him.
And he had no one to talk to.
He couldn't talk to his junior officers; that wouldn't be appropriate. The ship's engineer was older than he, as was the doctor . . . but he didn't feel secure enough to seek out their counsel. He was, after all, the captain. He couldn't start seeking out substitute father figures. He was the one to whom everyone was supposed to be looking. It made him feel very, very isolated.
So he did the only thing he could: He talked to himself.
"Was I ever that young?" he mused aloud. "Well, now, that's the problem, isn't it. It seems like only yesterday I was that young. Here I am, in charge of a starship—the starship—and yet in many ways I still feel that tentative, uncertain little ensign inside me. Looking to advance, looking to try new things, but not wanting to cause problems, not wanting to stir things up.
"Dammit, I was tentative up on the bridge. Not by much. Just the slightest bit. But the crew could tell, I know they could tell. I was asking too many questions about safety. I was being too damned careful!" He slapped his open palm on the desktop. "The moment I determined that there was a call for help, there shouldn't have been any further discussion! Someone needs our help, we help, and that's it, and that's all!
"Every time . . . every time I step out on that bridge, I see Kirk sitting there. Staring at me, watching every move I make. Judging what's going on. And I'm always coming up short. Always. Every decision I make, any order of any consequence, I mentally double-check with Kirk to make sure that it's the right move. And he never tells me. He never tells me. Just . . . just sits there. Sits and watches.
"They think I don't know. They think I haven't heard the nickname floating around for this ship. 'The Flying Dutchman.‣ Behind closed doors, behind the backs of their hands, they say I'm the captain of the death ship. The ship that killed the living legend.
"And it's my fault. It is. They cleared me, all right. Cleared my involvement, cleared my name. All so we could keep the dirty little secret, the one that we all know. I should never have let the ship be taken out before she was ready. I was so grateful and excited for the opportunity, I let them steamroll right over any misgivings I had. Key weapons, key defense mechanisms, not on-line until Tuesday. So why the bloody hell didn't I just insist we wait until Tuesday! Oh, but no. Couldn't allow that to happen. Some high muck-a-muck arranged for all the press conferences, then found out we were going to be delayed a week and didn't want to risk looking like a fool. 'Take the ship out, Harriman. Everything will be fine, Harriman. A quick spin around the solar system, what could go wrong, Harriman. Obey orders, Harriman. Do what you're told, when you're told, and there's a good boy Harriman. Damn them! Damn them and their sanctimoniousness. Thanks to them, I wound up taking this ship into a rescue mission that we simply weren't equipped to handle, and now I get to be known as the captain whose first mission destroyed the indestructible Kirk. The man who survived a thousand dangers, until he found the one thing he couldn't overcome: the command of Captain John Harriman."
He was silent then, staring at the computer terminal. Then he said, "Computer . . . delete all of today's entries in personal log."
"Deleted," said the computer.
Harriman tapped the desktop for a moment, and then said, "New entry. Captain's personal log: All is well."
It was a noteworthy log entry for two reasons. First, it was commendably brief. And second, it was identical, word for word, to the last two weeks‣ worth of log entries. All of which had come about in much the same way.
One week before he would be slugged by Commander Pavel Chekov, Captain John Harriman shut off his computer and headed up to the bridge.
# Chapter Two
ASKALON V lived up to its billing of not being someplace anyone would wish to be voluntarily.
A haze of a deep purple hue hung over the sky. The air was filled with a steady breeze that was deceptively gentle. However, after only about thirty seconds the members of the landing party realized that a deep, tingling chill to the bone was creeping through them.
The ground was soft, almost claylike beneath their boots. Consequently walking was something of a chore. So there they were, with the ground defying them, the wind starting to freeze up their joints, and the dark sky adding to the general air of gloom. All in all, not the sort of atmosphere that lent itself to high spirits or jaunty feelings of exploration.
Harriman himself was leading the landing party. It was a practice that had been common enough back in Kirk's time, certainly. Federation policies had begun to shift, however, when other captains followed Kirk's example. In following this practice they displayed bravery and ingenuity; what they did not display, however, was Kirk's almost supernatural luck.
This was not to say that captains were dropping like flies; far from it. There had been, however, several hideously close calls . . . not to mention two cases of lost limbs, and one unfortunate and wasteful demise when a captain had unknowingly trod on a small patch of land that seemed utterly routine. He had no way of knowing—indeed, probably never even had time to realize—that it was an alien equivalent of quicksand, except ten times faster and a hundred times more corrosive. There had barely been enough left of him for DNA identification.
Certainly no one would have been "happier" if it had been the second-in-command, or a security guard, or someone of lower rank who had met such a ghastly death. One life was not intrinsically worth more than another. But what it boiled down to was the cold, hard realities of space, and of training for that hostile and unforgiving environment. In that respect, captains simply had to be considered in a different class.
Plus the Daystrom Institute had produced a fascinating, if somewhat controversial, study. Thousands of landing-party assignments had been fed into a vast database, processed through positronic circuitry as perfected in the M9 computer. The computer made its own selections, which were then turned over to a Starfleet blue ribbon panel for comparison. The panel's decision, which sent something of a chill through the Fleet, was that the computer's picks made more sense. They couldn't be swayed by cronyism or other, even subliminal, human considerations.
The most conspicuous inequity was in the selection of captains spearheading away teams. The computer dismissed the need for the ship's chief commanding officer in ninety-five percent of those cases, describing them as nonessential personnel.
Consequently there was already word of changes filtering down through Starfleet regulations. The right of a captain to lead a landing party, previously sacrosanct, was now up for discussion and review.
This was a hard pill to take for many captains. First and foremost, they were explorers. They had joined Starfleet to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, and everything else described in the literature. Being stuck on the bridge while everyone subordinate to you was given the opportunity to do so firsthand seemed a less than stellar reward for years of dedicated service.
What it all boiled down to was that Harriman should have been—indeed, was—aware that his presence as leader of the landing party was questionable, particularly given the current atmosphere within Starfleet.
Harriman decided, however, that he didn't care. He was going to do what he wished to do, and if others didn't like it, then they could go to hell. He did not like the feeling of always second-guessing himself, and he was going to put a stop to it. The selection of the landing-party lineup seemed as good a time as any.
Given all that, Harriman still couldn't help but wish that he had chosen to lead a landing party into a tropical, lush paradise, instead of this relative hellhole they were staggering around in.
Well, maybe next time.
* * *
Demora Sulu huffed a bit as she made her way across the uncooperative terrain. From just behind her and to the right, Lieutenant Thompson muttered, "What were you thinking?"
"Pardon?" said Demora.
"You wanted to come along on this detail?" said Maggie as Demora slowed down, allowing her to catch up. "Good lord, why?"
"May I remind you it was your suggestion?" Demora pointed out to her. "You told me that the signal being in Chinese was an interesting coincidence. You said that I should approach the captain about it."
"Nooo, I said if you were interested, then you should. I didn't really think you'd volunteer. Good lord, Demora, of all places to want to attach memories of your first landing party, and it's this place?"
"It's exciting," said Demora with genuine enthusiasm. The ground started to incline and she braced herself as best she could before pushing herself up it. Maggie followed nimbly.
"God protect us from newbies," Maggie Thompson commented, but she couldn't quite keep the smile off her face. "I'll tell you one thing, Sulu: Your enthusiasm is easily the best thing about this pile of . . . whoaaa!"
The outcry came as a result of the ground going out from under Thompson's feet. Demora turned just in time to see Thompson fall to her belly and skid back down the short but steep hill. She left a deep groove behind her in the claylike surface.
"Lieutenant!" called Demora. "You okay?"
Slowly Thompson pulled herself to her feet. Her uniform was covered with the clay. It was also in her face, and she spit out a large glob of it that had gotten into her mouth during her abortive outcry.
"Oh . . . fine," said Thompson, making no attempt to hide her aggravation. She brushed off the filth as best she could, but her best wasn't even close to adequate. "See, Demora? If you hadn't come along, see what you'd have missed?"
Demora waited patiently as Thompson found another, slightly more hospitable way up.
From behind them, they heard Harriman's voice. "Lieutenant! How close are we to the origin of the distress call?"
Harriman, along with security officer Kris Hernandez and medtech Adrian Tobler, was bringing up the rear. He walked with easy steps, apparently not the least bit perturbed by the terrain. Both Thompson and Sulu were slightly envious. The captain was disgustingly surefooted.
"Just ahead, sir. Over that rise, as near as I can determine," she said as she checked her tricorder.
Harriman paused and regarded her. "Took a tumble, Lieutenant?"
"I'm fine, sir."
He nodded and started for the same embankment where Thompson had run into trouble. Demora started to say something in warning, but Thompson rested a restraining hand on Demora's forearm. The message was clear: Shut up.
Then Harriman suddenly seemed to pick up speed. He took several long, sweeping strides, and then vaulted up the side of the embankment as if gravity were of only passing interest to him. He landed at the top in a crouch, next to his junior officers.
"Nice bit of exercise you get around here, wouldn't you say?"
"I would indeed, sir," agreed Thompson reluctantly.
"Any signs of life-forms?"
There had been none when they'd first gotten there. But it had been difficult to be absolutely certain, because the atmosphere was heavily enough charged that it might be interfering with the ship's sensors. Now, on the ground, Thompson checked her tricorder once more. "Nothing so far, Captain. Still a remote chance, but . . ."
"But not likely." He nodded. "That's what I was afraid of. Still, we're obliged to check it out thoroughly. Let's go."
Demora, for her part, didn't like the smell of the place. Her enthusiasm as they made their way across the surface remained undiminished. But the air had a certain staleness to it that made her lungs burn after a time. She did the best she could with it through slow, steady, controlled breathing. But it was still something of a hardship.
And then, utterly unbidden, thoughts of her father came to her.
He had told her so many times about the occasions when he had been standing on an alien world. He had made it sound somewhat romantic, just as he seemed to take a romantic view of most aspects of life. He regaled her with incredible stories about far-off spheres. About worlds with time portals, or run by supercomputers, or populated by white rabbits and samurai (although the latter even the gullible Demora had thought sounded somewhat farfetched).
He had made the universe sound like an incredible place.
So why hadn't . . .?
Demora quickly shut down that avenue of thinking. There was no point to it, no way of resolving it. That way lay any number of concerns and problems that simply had no business being addressed. And she wasn't about to start now.
"Sulu!"
It was Harriman's voice, from farther up ahead than she had realized. "Taking your time, aren't you?" he called to her.
"Sorry, sir," she said, chiding herself. She had to stay focused, rather than let unresolved concerns about her father cloud her thinking. The consequences of muddied concentrating, after all, could be extremely disastrous.
She had to stay on her toes.
Then she felt something tug at her ankle. She looked down in surprise and gasped.
Her last fully aware thought was an echo of Maggie's words: See what you'd have missed?
* * *
Thompson had no idea how long the distress beacon had been there, or who had placed it.
Harriman stood several feet away as Thompson closely inspected the device. It stood approximately three feet tall, on a tripod. It looked weather-beaten and a bit corroded, but it was still resolutely sending out a signal recorded by a person or persons unknown.
"Any idea of its pedigree, Lieutenant?" asked Harriman.
Slowly she said, "Well, that's what's odd about it, Captain. It has a general look that says late twenty-second-century Earth . . . but there's markings on it I've never seen before." She tapped the metal exterior. "Not only that, but if you look closely, you'll see variations."
Harriman studied the markings. "You're right," he said. "Several different styles. It's as if it's printed in several different languages, suggesting some sort of . . . joint venture. Any of them Chinese? Sulu, is—?"
He stopped and looked around.
There was no sign of her.
"Sulu!" he called again.
Still no answer.
Hernandez and Tobler glanced about them. Lieutenant Thompson straightened up, and now she looked around as well. "Sulu!" she shouted. But the only thing that came back to her was the sound of her own voice.
She started to reach for her communicator, but Harriman had already flipped his open. "Harriman to Sulu, report." He paused a few moments and then repeated himself. There was no response from the other end.
If Harriman was concerned, he restrained it well. "Tobler . . . Hernandez," he said matter-of-factly, "backtrack, would you please? See if you can locate our wandering helmswoman."
"Aye, sir," they echoed each other and headed back.
"Permission to aid in the search, sir," said Thompson.
"I already have two people looking for a third, Lieutenant," Harriman said briskly. "That will be sufficient, I'm sure. Now, let's get these markings translated. They might tell us . . ."
Then his voice trailed off as he saw something. There had been some cloud cover, but the clouds—swept by the winds of the planet's surface—had parted to reveal a city.
Or the remains of one, in any event. High towers stretched along the horizon, but many of them were battered and broken, the jagged edges quite visible. It was impossible to tell from that distance what they were made from—stone or steel, or something else.
But even from that far away, Harriman knew that the city was dead. There were no lights burning anywhere. Death and decay, in Harriman's imaginings, were draped over it like great shrouds.
"'Behold my works, ye mighty, and despair,'" he said softly.
Thompson looked up from the distress probe with polite confusion. "Pardon, sir?"
"An old poem, Lieutenant," said Harriman, unable to tear his gaze away from the far-off ruins. "A man traveling in the desert discovers the broken remains of a statue. And there's an inscription that reads, 'I am Ozymandias, king of kings. Behold my works, ye mighty, and despair.‣ The point of the poem was the transitory nature of man's accomplishments. Here was this great and powerful 'king of kings,‣ who apparently had ruled a vast empire . . . and there was nothing left of him or anything that he had done except a ruined statue. The rest of it had been lost to time."
"We all get lost to time, sir," said Thompson matter-of-factly. She had flipped open her communicator. "Z'on? You got it?"
"Got it," came Z'on's voice. "Analyzing now."
Thompson turned to Harriman. "I fed the images of the markings into the tricorder, and from there up to Lieutenant Z'on."
"Good work, Lieutenant." Harriman looked in the direction that Hernandez and Tobler had gone. He frowned a moment in concern and then spoke into his communicator once more. "Harriman to Hernandez." What Harriman found a bit daunting is that he had absolutely no idea what he would do if Hernandez failed to answer. That would mean that he had more than a lost crewman on his hands; he had a genuine situation. Couldn't anything go routinely for him at any time?
Fortunately enough he was spared having to concern himself. Hernandez's voice came through immediately in that customary, laconic tone of his. "Hernandez here."
"Any sign of Ensign Sulu?"
"We found her tracks, sir. Following them now. But they seem to just go in a circle. We're trying to find another possible trail."
"Keep me apprised," said Harriman as he closed his communicator. Thompson looked away from him quickly, obviously trying to mask her own concern and maintain as much as possible her professional demeanor.
Thompson's own communicator beeped and she flipped it open. "Thompson," she said crisply.
"Got a translation for you," Z'on's voice came back with no preamble. "Two problems: It's somewhat rough, and it's somewhat useless."
"What does it say?"
"It says, 'If found, please return.'"
Thompson and Harriman exchanged looks. "That's it?" she said incredulously.
"Yes, ma'am," Z'on said. "None of the symbols were anything vaguely Terran. I managed to cross-reference it off similar, already translated symbols from digs on Minox Nine and Alpha Prime Twelve. It corresponds to the known written language of an ancient, apparently long-dead race called . . ."
He paused. Thompson frowned. "Called what?"
"The Blumbergs."
Harriman stepped over. "Say again?" He couldn't quite believe he'd heard it correctly.
"The Blumbergs, sir," said Z'on with an air of resignation.
"The Blumbergs?" Despite the dreary atmosphere, despite the concern over the missing Ensign Sulu, it was all Harriman could do not to laugh. "What kind of a name for an alien race is that?!"
"Apparently, sir, the kind of name given them by the man who first discovered traces of their existence and has written all the major papers and studies regarding them. That man, as one might guess, being Dr. Matthew . . ."
". . . Blumberg," both Thompson and Harriman said in unison.
"Correct."
"All right. Thank you, Lieutenant. Thompson out." She snapped off the communicator and looked to Harriman, who shrugged expansively. "I don't know," said Thompson after due consideration. "Kind of a different name for a race, when you get down to it."
"Oh, absolutely, Lieutenant. The Klingons, the Romulans, the Blumbergs. All of them names to strike terror into the hearts of millions." He sighed, looked around once more. "This is a waste of time," he said finally. "There's no sign of habitation here, or any sign that there ever was habitation. No sign of a crashed ship, no sign of natives, no sign of anyone attending to this distress beacon. Whoever left it here is long gone. Let's find Ensign Sulu and get the hell out of h—"
There was a low growl behind them.
Harriman knew, even without turning around, that the life scans of the planet had been wrong. There was indeed some sort of indigenous life on Askalon V. And from the sound of it, it was big . . . it was most likely covered with very thick fur . . . it probably had teeth the size of steak knives . . . it was very hungry . . . and it was long past its dinnertime.
Both Thompson and Harriman, as was standard for landing parties, had their phasers strapped to their belts. The growl seemed to be coming, best guess, from about twenty feet away. For a predator about to spring, that distance was nothing at all. It could cover it in one leap, and Harriman's first inclination was to turn and shoot as quickly as possible. But if he moved fast and rushed the shot—and in so moving, spurred the creature to spring instantly—he or Thompson (or both) could be down beneath its claws before there was time for another action to be taken.
The creature growled again. By this time both Harriman and Thompson had their hands resting on their weapons. Their gazes were locked on each other and Harriman mouthed the word Slowly to Thompson. She gave a nod so slight that her head didn't even move, but the acknowledgment was there all the same.
Slowly, ever so slowly, they turned to face the creature who threatened their lives.
Their jaws dropped in mutual astonishment.
It was Demora. Not only was she barely recognizable as herself, she would barely be recognized as human.
She was crouched on a boulder overlooking them. Her uniform was gone; she was stark naked, her hair so wildly askew that her eyes were barely visible beneath it all. But when the hair did blow aside enough to reveal her eyes, there was nothing in them but a feral, animal gleam.
Her lips were drawn back and her teeth were bared. Spittle was hanging from the corners of her mouth. Her fingers were spread in a palsied, clawlike manner. Her entire body was trembling, like a barely restrained missile wanting to tear itself loose from its moorings.
They froze there for a moment, the three of them, like some bizarre tableau from an alternate universe where humans were stalked, not by animals, but by animalistic humans. The only sounds were the whistling of the wind and the distant rumbling of the seething sky.
Thompson could barely get a word out. "D . . . Demora?" she stammered.
The word broke the spell, and Demora leaped.
Incredibly, impossibly, as if she'd been possessed by a puma, Demora covered the entire distance in one leap. She crashed into Thompson, knocking her back, sending her head slamming into the distress beacon. Thompson went down, the beacon crashing atop her. With the howl of a wild beast, Demora leaped upon Maggie, and at that moment she looked completely capable of ripping Thompson apart with her teeth.
Harriman brought his phaser up and fired.
The blast hit Demora squarely in the small of her back, knocking her clear of Thompson. Thompson didn't get up, and Harriman saw a trail of blood from her forehead.
He started toward Thompson, taking for granted that Demora was out cold. The first and only warning he had of his error was the full-throated roar that ripped from Demora's throat, and then Demora plowed into him, bearing him to the ground.
He couldn't believe it. From that distance, with that intensity, the phaser blast should have knocked her unconscious. The only indication that Demora seemed to register from having been shot was to go even more berserk.
Her fingernails raked across Harriman's forehead. He screamed as they drew blood, and Demora's howl of triumph was earsplitting. If he'd heard a recording of it, there was no way he would have thought any human at all could ever produce such a sound, much less an eminently civilized, charming, and witty human such as Demora Sulu.
And even as the thought flashed through his mind, even as he saw that Demora's frothing mouth was poised directly over his throat, he realized that he was still clutching his phaser in his right hand. He angled it around, jammed it directly against her bare skin, and fired.
The blast knocked her clear of him. The pressure momentarily gone, Harriman tried to get to his feet. He grunted in pain, his leg twisted back around, and then, oh God, she was getting back up. A little bit less steady, but no less angry, no less dangerous.
Blood poured into his eyes from the cuts on his forehead and he heard her roar once more, sensed rather than saw her charge. Blinded by his own blood, he desperately thumbed the power level on his phaser, jacked it up, and fired in the direction of the sound coming toward him.
The whine of the phaser combined with the shriek of its target, and Harriman couldn't see what the result was. He scrambled back across the ground, trying to put some distance, however meager, between himself and his frenzied helmswoman. He drew an arm quickly across his eyes to clear them of blood and then brought his phaser up, double-handing the grip to keep it level.
That was when he saw Demora.
She lay on the ground, sprawled on her back. Her head lay still and lifeless, her eyes staring at nothing. Her torso was dark with burns from the close-range phaser blasts. Her legs lay twisted.
Harriman's breath was ragged in his chest. He couldn't believe it. He simply couldn't believe it. What had happened? What the hell had just happened?
He heard movement from just above the ridge, whirled with his phaser, and came within a hair of firing blindly before he realized it was Tobler and Hernandez.
They skidded to a halt, appalled at the scene before them. The captain, his face smeared with blood as if he'd been in a war. Thompson, down and unconscious. And Demora . . . dear God, what had happened to Demora.
Tobler's communicator was already in his hand, however. "Tobler to Enterprise! Medical emergency. Beam us all directly to sickbay!"
Harriman nodded in acknowledgment of the order, and said nothing else as they vanished from the surface of Askalon V.
# Chapter Three
THERE WERE MANY "firsts" in Dr. Metcalfe's career in which he could take genuine pleasure. The first operation he performed . . . the first life he saved . . . the first child he delivered . . .
But now he had to pronounce the first death aboard the Enterprise.
Oh, certainly, the ship was associated with calamitous death and destruction. But Metcalfe hadn't been there for any of it. He, along with the rest of the medical personnel, had not come aboard until after the debacle of the ship's launch. Technically many had died, but it hadn't happened under Metcalfe's watch. Indeed, he felt a small degree of guilt (nothing major—he was too old a hand at this—but small nonetheless) over not having been there at the time of the ship's first crisis. Perhaps in some way he might have managed to save some lives.
But there was no great point in contemplating the past. Only the future at this point was of any interest to him. Unfortunately, it was a future that did not include the young woman laid out on the table in front of him.
Metcalfe was an older gentleman, with a salt-and-pepper beard and a gleaming bald head. He was studying the readouts that his instruments were making, speaking softly and for the record that was automatically entering his words into his medical log. Standing nearby was a stone-faced Captain Harriman, his arms folded resolutely across his chest. His forehead had been cleaned and a thin layer of plasticskin had been applied against it to seal the wound.
"Deceased died from catastrophic cellular disruption caused by a series of phaser blasts in increasing grades of intensity," Metcalfe said tonelessly. "One in the small of the back . . . shot from behind," and he glanced at Harriman with eyebrows raised in apparent reproof. Harriman met his gaze levelly and said nothing. Metcalfe continued, "One in the side positioned squarely between the third and four ribs . . . and the third, the most intense blast, in the solar plexus. Blood flow was halted in—"
Harriman couldn't stand there and listen anymore. He turned and strode out of the lab area of the sickbay, into the main area. Thompson was lying there, still unconscious, but breathing steadily. Her injuries had likewise been attended to and her condition had been stabilized. Tobler was looking over readings and noticed Harriman looking on.
"She's going to be fine, Captain," Tobler offered tentatively.
Harriman nodded once, briefly, and then started for the door. He stopped and turned as Tobler said to him, "Captain?"
"Yes?" His arms were still folded resolutely across his chest. Clear body language telling anyone who might be looking on to keep their distance.
Nonetheless Tobler said rather gamely, "Sir, maybe I'm out of line, but . . . I just want you to know, you saved Lieutenant Thompson's life."
Harriman said nothing for a moment. Then he asked flatly, "Is that it, Tobler?"
"Yes, sir. I guess it is."
The sickbay doors slid shut behind Harriman's retreating figure.
* * *
Commander Dane entered Harriman's quarters, taking immediate note of the fact that it was rather dim. She could barely make him out. "Captain?" she said with just a trace of uncertainty.
"Yes," came Harriman's voice from the darkness.
Dane straightened her shoulders a bit, mentally remonstrating herself for slouching. "We're still in orbit around Askalon Five. Awaiting your orders on how to proceed." He said nothing at first, and Dane continued, "I have another landing party selected, if you wish to continue exploring the planet surface."
"That's easy enough, I suppose," Harriman said after a moment. "A crewman dies, at the hands of her captain. So bring in another crewman to fill the slot. That's all they are, after all. Slots to be filled. Life goes on, doesn't it, Dane."
"Yes, sir. It does."
"Except for Demora Sulu. Life isn't exactly going on for her, is it."
Dane paused a moment. "I'll take that to be rhetorical, sir."
Harriman laughed softly, and it was not a pleasant sound. "God, you are a cold one, aren't you, Dane. They offered me a Vulcan first officer, you know. It was down to you and him. I went with you. Vulcans . . . fine people. Brilliant minds. I admire the hell out of them. But, provincially, I felt more comfortable with a human at my side. And you know what? You give me the creeps sometimes."
She looked down.
"I'm sorry," he said softly after a moment. "I've spent the past hour tearing at myself. Now I'm starting on you. It's not fair and it's not appropriate."
"It's understandable, sir. Losing a crewman under any circumstance is difficult."
"I didn't lose her, Dane. That makes it sound like she was misplaced and might turn up if I check under the seat cushions. I killed her."
"You had no choice."
"That doesn't exactly mollify it, does it."
"No, sir. It doesn't."
He said nothing for a moment and once again Dane prompted, "The planet, sir? Askalon Five. How shall we proceed?"
"You want to know if I'm interested in risking more of my people in the exploration of a world that turned one of them into a homicidal berserker . . . all in the hope of rescuing nonexistent people in distress."
"I wouldn't have phrased it in quite that way, but yes, sir. That's basically the question before us."
"No, I am not interested in doing that. Slap a quarantine on Askalon Five, inform other ships to keep away, and have done with it."
"With all respect, sir, the ruins down there shouldn't be made off-limits to—"
"Which is more important to you, Dane? Ruined buildings? Or ruined lives?"
She opened her mouth with an immediate answer, but then thought better of it and instead simply said, "Yes, sir. I'll order course set for Starbase Nine. We can transfer the . . . Ensign Sulu . . . to them, and proceed from there to the Donatti system."
"Take us home."
She blinked. "Pardon?"
"The statement seems self-explanatory, Commander. Set course for Earth."
"Sir . . . we're due in the Donatti system. You're scheduled for a reception with the—"
"Set course . . . for Earth."
"As you wish, sir. I feel constrained to point out that Starfleet's orders as to our expected arrival date in—"
And Harriman rose from his chair, his body trembling with barely contained fury. His jaw set, his voice a low growl, he said, "I don't give a damn about what Starfleet's orders are. I don't care if they came via subspace, or appeared on the main monitor screen in flaming letters two feet high! Demora Sulu was the daughter of Hikaru Sulu, and I killed her, and I will show her the respect that both her parentage and the circumstances of her death dictate! I don't care if the only way we have of setting course for Earth is having you go outside and push! If that's the case, then the only question I have for you is, How long can you hold your breath?!"
"Actually, sir, holding one's breath in a vacuum would hasten the . . ." Then she saw his expression and cleared her throat. "I'll give the orders, sir."
"You do that."
She walked out, leaving Harriman behind with his grief.
At Starfleet Academy, they had tried to mentally steel trainees on the command track for that inevitable day when people under their command went down and didn't come back up. The decisions that had to be made which might sometimes result in the death of crewmen.
But there were some things that somehow didn't quite make it into the curriculum. Things such as how you deal with it when a living legend dies on the maiden voyage of your greatest command.
And how you deal with informing one of the oldest, most dedicated associates of that selfsame living legend that you killed his daughter.
# Chapter Four
CAPTAIN HIKARU SULU woke up trembling and covered with sweat.
"Demora," he murmured.
He sat in the darkened quarters for a moment, and then said, "Lights." They came on in prompt response.
He felt an absurd sense of relief. He was, naturally, still within the confines of the Excelsior. No reason he wouldn't be; that was, after all, where he'd gone to sleep at the end of his shift.
But for a moment it had all seemed so real.
Demora had been dead.
The dream could not have been any more clear, or any more frightening. She had been lying there, unmoving, on the surface of a dark and frightening world. Phaser burns covered her broken body. And Sulu had been there, shouting her name, unable to make himself heard over the steady roar of the wind. It had seemed to blow the name back into his face.
He had tried to reach her, to get to her somehow so that he could help her. But he'd been unable to move. Indeed, he had seemed intangible, incapable of physically interacting with the world in any way. So he'd stood there, an impotent and frustrated ghost, shaking fists that no one could see and shouting names with a voice no one could hear. He was so close to her, so close, and yet unable to help her.
"Demora," he said again. He checked the time and discovered that he had awoken an hour before he was supposed to. He tried lying back down, but it did him no good. He simply lay there and stared at the ceiling until he couldn't stand it anymore and roused himself out of bed.
As he showered and dressed, he thought of Demora. He also thought of the dream about her. He'd read any number of cases wherein a relative—mother, father, sibling—had a sort of psychic "flash" at a time of a loved one's crisis. It didn't matter how much distance separated the two. There was somehow, in some way, a connection that no one really professed to be able to understand. It happened without rhyme or reason. Many people who reported such instances made no claim to psychic ability. They'd had no similar experiences before, and could go (and probably happily would go) the rest of their lives without having such a thing recur.
Some scientists tended to dismiss such notions out of hand. There were some, though, who gave it credence and greater study. It was their position that the human mind was capable of far more than it was generally given credit for.
Demora, he thought again, and he did not like one bit the tremendous discomfiture he was feeling every time Demora's name crossed his mind now.
He had hardly been in touch with her since her assignment to the Enterprise. Something had happened between the two of them, and he wasn't entirely sure of what it was. Ever since she had gotten into Starfleet Academy there had been a change in her. She was still polite to him. That much was unfailing. But it had come across as very . . . formal, somehow. The warmth wasn't quite there the way it used to be. Or at least so he thought.
"Velcome to reality," Chekov had said to him. Chekov and Sulu had spoken of it, right around the time that Sulu had been given command of the Excelsior.
"What are you talking about?" Sulu had asked.
"Eesn't it obvious? A child always rejects her father. All part of growing up, Meester Sulu."
Sulu had smiled in amusement. "The wifeless, childless Pavel Chekov is the world expert on what children do and don't do, eh?"
"Of course I am the expert," Chekov had said sagely. "Only an expert in children vould be intelligent enough not to have any."
"Well, that's tough to argue with, I suppose. Although that is an alarming attitude for my daughter's godparent to have."
Chekov had shrugged and then gestured expansively. "Vat can I say?"
Sulu had been unwilling to accept Chekov's easy answer, in any event. Sulu had never "rejected" either of his parents, and he had done just fine. . . .
Demora . . .
His mind had drifted, and was once more pulled back to his feeling of unease. If he tried to contact her on the Enterprise out of the blue, what would he say? "Honey, I dreamed you were dead; how are you doing?" That wouldn't sound particularly good.
Besides which, they were probably nowhere near enough to the Enterprise to have a real-time conversation anyway. He'd probably have to settle for a letter. Yes. That was definitely the way to go. A letter.
He sat down at his workstation and said, "Activate messaging service."
"Service activated," the computer informed him.
"To Demora Sulu. Ensign, helmswoman"—the latter he added somewhat unnecessarily, but with distinct pride—"U.S.S. Enterprise. Demora . . ."
He stopped a moment, unsure of what to say, and came to the surprising realization that he'd never composed a letter to her that was merely for the purpose of chatting.
Oh, he'd sent communications to her, of course. Many a time, in fact. But there was always a specific reason for it that was based in conveying information: promotions, extended stays, unexpected events that could have an effect on her. That sort of thing. For all his hobbies, for all his interests, simple "Hi, how are you" gabbing over subspace was not something in which he indulged.
Which was why he was struggling now. The "information" to be conveyed was that he'd had a bad dream about her. But he couldn't call her and tell her that, because either he'd make himself look foolish or else he'd worry her needlessly. Needlessly because he didn't really think anything was going to happen to her. He was just trying to quell his admittedly irrational concerns.
Left to her own devices, Demora might very well get around to contacting him on her own. Then again, she had acquired Sulu's knack for being unable to turn out anything except the most perfunctory of missives. Unless something genuinely major happened to her, it might be ages before he heard from her. The only way to speed up the process was to write to her himself.
And maybe it was about time he did that.
"Waiting," prompted the computer, just in case Sulu had forgotten he'd left the function on.
Sulu looked into the screen, trying to appear relaxed, since it was a video message and his image was naturally going to be recorded. "Honey . . . I'm just writing to say hi," he started, using the term "writing" in its traditional sense—as so many still did—even though he was, of course, not really writing anything. "I was thinking about you . . . thinking about all the things you're experiencing and . . ."
Might as well be blindingly obvious about it.
". . . I'd like to hear from you. Things that seem trivial to you will very likely be interesting to me. Think of it as me being selfish, wanting to see early days aboard the Enterprise through your eyes so that I can relive my own early career just a little. As I said, selfish. I hope you can forgive me the indulgence. Of course, since I outrank you, I can order you to forgive me." He flashed a smile and hoped that the joke seemed remotely funny. Ah, well . . . if it didn't, well, to paraphrase Leonard McCoy, he was a captain, not a comedian.
"I hope all is well, and that you'll inform me soon of how things are going. Very truly yours . . . your father." The closing line seemed a bit hokey, considering that she would have to be both deaf and blind not to know who was sending her the letter. But it was traditional, and besides, there was something about the way the words "your father" rolled off his tongue.
"Computer, end transmission and send."
"Sending."
Sulu nodded with satisfaction. It was on its way. Now it would just be a matter of time before he received a response from Demora. It would be one of her usual pleasant, straightforward letters, perhaps with a touch of mild surprise that her father had initiated the contact. But why shouldn't he have done so? He was her father, after all. They weren't estranged. Sure, there was that distant way she acted sometimes, but hell, she had a lot on her mind. Starfleet Academy, as Sulu well knew, was enough to change anyone's behavior patterns. Why should Demora be any exception?
She'd respond, the sheer normality of her reply helping to ground him once more. And that would be that.
He headed for the door of his quarters, only to discover Lieutenant Commander Janice Rand, the communications officer, standing outside his door about to push the door chime.
"Janice," he said, somewhat in surprise. "Is something wrong?" It was a natural question to ask. As far back as the two of them went, nevertheless it was unusual for Rand to simply drop by, particularly at such an early hour.
She looked down. "Captain . . ."
"Captain?" He made no effort to hide his amusement. "Getting somewhat formal on me, aren't you, Jan—"
Then his voice trailed off because he knew, he knew.
He backed up, his legs suddenly feeling weak, and when he bumped into a chair it took no effort at all to release the muscles in them so that he dropped heavily into it.
"Demora," he said.
Rand blinked in surprise. But her wonder vanished immediately as the gravity of the situation reasserted itself. "Yes" was all she could bring herself to say.
There was a long moment of silence. Then, sounding about a thousand years older, he said, "How?"
She paused a moment.
"How?" he asked again. "In combat? An accident? Ambush? What?" It was amazing—truthfully, he himself was amazed—how calm and even he was keeping his voice. Actually, it took no effort. He was simply numb.
She looked down, and could barely get out the words: "Friendly fire."
It was a term that had survived centuries. Terms that have such remarkably self-contradictory perversity often do.
All the color drained from his face. "What?" he said, the word thudding from him. "One of the crew shot her?"
"Captain . . . maybe you should just read the report. . . ."
He looked at her oddly. "The report . . . would have been marked 'Personal.‣ You read something directed to me that was indicated to be personal."
She looked down guiltily. "Yes, sir. It was from the Enterprise . . . but from the chief medical officer. I . . . put two and two together. I am aware that my actions could be considered cause for severe penalties . . . even court-martial, if you choose to pursue it . . ."
"Oh, be quiet, Janice," he said, but there was no heat in his voice. Indeed, just for a moment, he sounded like the Sulu of old. The one who, back when she was a yeoman and he was a helmsman, she would bring sandwiches to while he messed around with whatever his latest hobby might be. Back when they were both young, and the galaxy was an infinity of possibilities.
And in the spirit of those long-gone days, the ranks fell away for a moment. She stomped her foot in irritation. "Well, dammit, Sulu, what did you expect me to do? I mean, this message comes in, and I can pretty much guess what it says. And I'm supposed to just forward it down to you without comment?"
He walked to her and rested a hand on her shoulder. "If you wanted me to read the report, you'd simply have sent it down to me. Obviously you wanted to cushion the . . . the blow." And now it was an effort to keep his voice level, the initial numbness having worn off. "I can handle it. Tell me."
"It's . . . I don't pretend to understand it, sir. It . . ." She gathered her strength and then it all came out in a rush. "The report is that she began attacking other crewmen while on a landing party. Assaulted the science officer, nearly killed the captain. He was compelled to shoot and ki . . . to use terminal force against her."
He stared at her as if she'd grown antenna. "The . . . captain shot her? Are you serious?"
"Yes, sir. The report was very specific."
Sulu looked as if he'd been sucker-punched. "And . . . and what caused it? Caused her to attack her own people?"
"They don't know. They haven't been able to determine any . . ."
"There must be an answer," Sulu said, his efforts to rein in his frustration stretched to their limits, "It's insane. Demora wouldn't just . . . something must have caused it. Some virus, some animal that bit her . . . something. What sort of subsequent investigations is Harriman performing?"
"Reading between the lines: None. The CMO made mention that the planet's been placed under quarantine. No one in or out."
"That's a reasonable precaution," he admitted slowly. "But my daughter's life ended there. I see no reason that the investigation should end as well. Are we close enough to Enterprise for a direct subspace link?"
"No, sir."
He nodded. "That's . . . probably fortunate. I don't think I'd . . . trust myself to speak with Harriman right now. I need time to . . . deal with this, so that I can act in an appropriate manner."
"Meaning a manner more appropriate to the decorum of a Starfleet captain than to a grieving father."
Rand took a step toward him and said softly, "I know how you feel."
"I know. No one knows better than me how close you and Demora . . ."
"It's not just that. I mean, that's part of it, sure. But . . ." She looked down. "There's something I never told you."
He looked at her, waiting. He didn't feel like he had the strength to say anything.
With a sigh that sounded heavy with exhaustion, Rand said, "It was years ago. Years and years. Didn't you wonder why I took a leave of absence from Starfleet for a time?"
"Your record cited personal reasons. I never felt it was my business to ask."
"Yes, well . . . that was the personal reason. Her name was Annie. She lived until the ripe old age of two, and then she got sick and died. Because for all our medical knowledge, sometimes people—even young people, even very young people—still die. And after she was gone, I was at loose ends for a time before I was able to bring myself to return to Starfleet. End of my life as a mother."
He put a hand on hers. "Janice . . . I'm so sorry. . . ."
"This is not the time for you to be comforting me. I just . . . I wanted you to know how much I feel for you."
"Do you still think about her?"
Rand smiled thinly. "Only on days ending in the letter y."
Sulu stared straight ahead. Rand reached over and touched his back. Every muscle under his jacket was knotted. It was like touching rock. There seemed to be nothing more to say, so she headed for the door.
"Rand . . ."
She stopped, turned, and looked at him questioningly.
"The father," Sulu asked. "Do you mind my asking . . . who it was."
She sighed. "It doesn't matter," she said. "He's dead now, too."
"Did you ever tell him?"
"I didn't want to risk sidetracking his career. You see . . . I suspected that he was headed for a great destiny, and I didn't want to do anything to distract him from it."
"And did he fulfill his great destiny, Janice?"
With a sad look she said, "We all do, Sulu. We all do." And she walked out of his quarters.
Sulu sat there for quite some time. He waited for the tears to come . . . but none did. There was a slight stinging in his eyes, but overall it was like the sensation of a sneeze that's puttering around one's nose but doesn't quite escape.
He was still numb. That was it. Still overcome by the shock.
Demora was dead. His little girl, whom he had known for so brief a time, was gone. Never to laugh with him or at him again, or to puncture any of his pretensions with her musical laugh or her mischievous wit.
Never again to look into Demora's face, or into her eyes, and see her staring back at him.
Her . . . Demora's mother.
The lunatic. The madwoman. The exotic nut, straight out of those old adventure stories that Sulu had read when he was so young, a lifetime ago . . .
You know the old Russian saying . . . be care—
Sulu shook it off. He didn't want to think about those times now. Didn't want to dredge up the old memories of that period in his life. Of that insane time, with her, and the mysterious enemies, dangerous cities with threats hiding within every shadow, a roller-coaster ride which, for all that he had experienced in his very full life, remained for him the pinnacle of loopy, non-sequitur bizarreness . . .
And the tears still weren't coming.
He wanted that release. Wanted to get the anger and rage and hurt out of his system, but it wouldn't go. What the hell was the matter with him? Had he become so closed up, so out of touch with his emotions, that he couldn't even properly grieve his daughter?
Or was it that with this loss, coming so hard on the heels of the demise of James Kirk, had simply overloaded him. Robbed him of his ability to deal with any more grief.
He thought of Demora, and he thought of Ling . . . and couldn't deal with thinking of either of them.
He informed the bridge that he would be indisposed for a short time and would be late in arrival. And then he lay back on his bed and, even though he had just awoken from a full night's sleep . . . he closed his eyes.
The words echoed once more . . . You know the old Russian saying . . . be careful vat you vish for . . .
. . . and then, mercifully, the darkness claimed him before the memories could return.
* * *
Word spread quickly through the Excelsior, as such things are wont to do. Rand never did find out the origin of the news; she sure knew they hadn't heard it from her. Regardless, within hours of Rand's talk with Sulu, it seemed that every crew member from the newest ensign to the oldest hand knew of Sulu's loss. And, of course, Sulu knew that they knew. It was clear from the deference paid above and beyond that which he normally received in his day-to-day life as captain of the Excelsior. Crewmen would greet him in low, respectful tones, and a number of them had trouble making eye contact. It wasn't just the death of Demora, although that was certainly odd enough. It was the bizarre circumstances surrounding it.
Sulu walked out on the bridge. The bridge was never filled with bustling, idle chatter even under normal circumstances. But this time it was silent as . . .
As the grave, thought Sulu.
Sulu's first officer—a Maternian named Anik—was newly assigned to the Excelsior. Anik was tall and thin, almost ethereal-looking, with skin so thin that one could see blood flowing against the surface. Normally, when Sulu was off the bridge, Anik would have been seated in the command chair. But today she felt a certain reluctance. As if it would somehow be disrespectful, although she couldn't exactly articulate why.
He stepped out of the turbolift, and he could feel the difference in the atmosphere. Everyone was looking at him and, by the same token, trying to look away.
Opting to take the initiative, Anik stepped forward and said, in her accented English, "Captain, the crew wishes to extend to you its condolences for the loss of your daughter."
He stood there for a moment, his hands draped behind his back. His voice sounded especially gravelly as he said, "I appreciate that. I appreciate the support from all of you. Some further news of interest to all of you, I'm sure: We'll all be going home. Our current heading brings us close enough to Earth so that the readjustment in our schedule is minor. So crew members who have friends or family on Earth will have the opportunity to visit."
"That being the case, sir," said Anik, "I would anticipate a considerable portion of the crew asking about the appropriateness or desirability of attending the funeral services."
Sulu gave it a moment's thought with furrowed brow, and then shook his head. "If any of them happened to know Demora personally, then attending is, of course, their prerogative. But if anyone feels obliged purely out of deference to me . . . by all means, they should not. What they should do is go and spend some time with the people they love. I certainly think Demora would have far preferred that."
"Yes, sir," said Anik, and there were nods of understanding from around the bridge as well.
Sulu had been standing with his hands resting lightly on the back of his command chair. Now he moved around to the front and lowered himself into it.
It was all in his imagination, he was sure, but all at once he felt his age . . . and older. He could swear his knees audibly creaked, and there was a pulling sensation in his thigh. His body mass seemed to have tripled, and it was all he could do to keep his head up.
"Captain?"
He suddenly realized that Anik was standing directly in front of him. Why was she doing that? Why had she walked around to be in front of him that way?
"Yes, Commander?"
Anik tilted her head slightly in that curious manner of hers. "We're . . . awaiting your orders, sir."
"Oh. Of course." He let out an unsteady sigh. "Set course for Earth."
"Course plotted and laid in, sir."
"Take us home, then."
He stared at the screen, not really registering the shift in the star patterns that indicated the great ship was coming around. Instead he was watching in wonderment as the screen seemed to waver and then blank out. Moments later another image appeared on it.
It was a town. A town that Sulu had not seen for many, many years.
By any definition, it was primitive . . . which was its entire charm.
It was the last place that Sulu wanted to think of. For a moment he thought he was losing his mind, because, of course, it couldn't possibly be that the town was there on the screen.
He realized at that point just how badly he had slept, as if tossing and turning in premonition of things to come. He should just get off the bridge, get the hell off.
But he didn't want to just up and bolt. Go hide in his room like some upset child. He was the captain of the Excelsior. He could deal with this.
To hell with it. He was not afraid of his memories. He was not afraid of thinking about the things he had done. It was many years since he hadn't dwelt on that wild, insane, deliriously dangerous week . . . and yet, in odd contradiction, it had never really been far from his thoughts.
And he had no regrets. No regrets over what had happened a little over twenty years ago. (Twenty years ago! Could it have been that long? An eyeblink it had been, certainly.)
No regrets. None at all.
Well . . .
. . . maybe except for his deciding to listen to Chekov . . .
## SECTION TWO
# FIRST DATE
# Chapter Five
"YOU KNOW the old Russian saying . . . be careful vat you vish for . . . you may get it," said Chekov.
Around them the streets of Demora bustled with activity. The air was thick with smells of cooking meat, and from all around them in the bazaar there were merchants hawking wares at the top of their lungs.
As Chekov and Sulu made their way down the main boulevard, outrageous beggars, with eye patches or thick beards, would try to bum money off them, offering to do odd jobs, offering their children in trade . . . the absurdity of the attempts to get funds escalating with each passing moment.
"I will be your eternal slave, sir! I will lick your boots until such time that it will give you pleasure to kick me in the teeth!" said one particularly aggressive fellow.
"That sounds like a serious offer," Chekov deadpanned, and looked to Sulu for confirmation.
Sulu sighed and shook his head.
Sternly, Chekov said, "Ve vill consider it and get back to you."
"Thank you, sir! Oh, thank you!" He bowed and scraped, shuffling off in the other direction.
Sulu looked at Chekov with undisguised incredulity. "'We'll think about it and get back to you'?"
Chekov shrugged. "He seemed sincere."
Sulu shook his head and quickened his stride, gliding smoothly between the crowds in that effortless way he had. Chekov, a bit more bull-in-China-shop, had to elbow his way through, wondering how in the world Sulu made it look so easy.
"Slow down, Sulu!" said Chekov as he managed to get alongside the quickly moving officer. "You're not soaking up the ambience!"
"Ambience?" Sulu shook his head. "Chekov . . . how can you be interested in any of this? How can you make yourself a part of it? It's all . . . it's all nonsense!"
"Life is nonsense. Anyvun who believes otherwise is kidding themselves. Here. Over here," and, taking Sulu firmly by the arm, he indicated a small café.
With a sigh, Sulu accompanied him, and moments later they were seated at a small table, watching the crowds of tourists hustling past.
"This is ridiculous," Sulu said again for what felt like the hundredth time since yesterday when they'd first arrived.
"But you vished for something like this, just as I said before," Chekov reminded him. "You said you vanted something exotic. Something adwenturous. Vell—?" He gestured around them to take in the scope of the city.
"But Chekov," said Sulu, leaning forward and sliding aside his cup of coffee. "Don't you see? It's all . . . manufactured."
He was correct, of course.
It hadn't happened overnight. The transformation of Demora from barren desert to tourist attraction had taken quite a few years. It had been a logical outgrowth of technology, however. After all, terraforming techniques were being used on far-off worlds to transform them into Earth-like environments. So it was only logical to use those same techniques to change sections of Earth as well . . . while maintaining some of the ambience of the surroundings.
A group of private investors purchased one section of the Sahara and proceeded to transform it into an inhabitable area. Permanent sunblock satellites hovered several thousand feet above Demora, high enough to appear as nothing more than dots in the sky, but effectively moderating and screening out the intensity of the sun. Buried dearridizers made the air more breathable and added a bit of moisture . . . not so much that one completely lost the desert flavor, but sufficient that guests were not made to feel incredibly uncomfortable. The object, after all, was to show the folks a good time. Give them a feel for the mysterious, romantic, and adventurous cities such as the fabled Casablanca.
Unlike a simple amusement park, however, Demora was a genuine city unto itself, populated by a variety of people.
Some were employees of the owners. They were provided free room and board, spending their private time and off hours in plush subterranean apartment complexes. They were "actors," in a sense. Hired to provide color and excitement for the tourists, portraying a variety of mysterious, shady, and ultimately entertaining denizens of Demora's underbelly.
Then there were genuine entrepreneurs. Most of them operated booths, stores, and shops in Demora. The management skimmed ten percent off the top, and also provided housing consisting of apartments of varying quality within the confines of Demora itself. It was a fun and colorful place for artists, craftsmen, or even would-be future moguls to operate. It was the closest thing available to stepping back in time and setting up shop. The shopkeepers even had their own alliance and union, voting on local affairs and considerations. A school had opened up to accommodate the small number of children living there as well.
There was some concern over kids who were born and raised in the city. It hadn't happened yet, but it was inevitable, and there was some debate over the ethical considerations involved. Imagine spending one's developmental years in the isolated and unique environs of Demora and then, for whatever reason, leaving to go out into the "real" world. The culture shock would be staggering, and several hotly debated town meetings had done nothing to resolve the situation.
Then there were the tourists, of course. Most of them were there on some sort of package deal, which included a stay in one of the elaborate luxury hotels that studded Demora. Interaction with the city's population was 100 percent.
Some tourists even tried to get into the swing of things by obtaining costumes for themselves, roaming the streets as beggars, musicians, petty conjurers, whatever caught their fancy. One young couple went there on their honeymoon, on a very tight budget. They staked out a street corner, and the young wife—in a scanty, gauze outfit—proceeded to put on belly-dancing displays while her husband cheerfully accompanied on drums. At the end of each show they'd pass a hat for credit chits. By the time they left, they were in better financial shape than they'd been in upon their arrival.
There were even Demora employees who were "disguised" as run-of-the-mill tourists. They would seem normal at first, but if you spent any time at all with them, it quickly became apparent that they had some sort of mysterious dark side to them. Invariably they would lower their eyes in the midst of conversation, take on a cautioned, even frightened air, and mutter something along the lines of, "This is not a good time for us to talk. We'll rendezvous later. Watch your back." Then they'd vanish into the ever-present shadows of Demora, usually never to be seen again.
The result of the mixed-bag population was that one could never quite take for granted whom one was interacting with. Might be a employee, a fellow tourist, an independent operator . . . whomever. It added to the excitement; to the feeling that no one was necessarily what they seemed, and that anything could happen.
The city was walled, ostensibly to protect it from passing desert raiders. (The raiders attacked on cue Saturday at 1900 hours precisely. There were seats that could be purchased at some key points along the wall, as well as monitors for those who were feeling slightly less adventurous or slightly more economically minded.) Entrance to the city was through the main gate, where a nominal admission fee was charged. Nothing major, though; the organizers of Demora (unsurprisingly, headed up by one Mr. Demor) wanted to keep the entrance cost down. The better to put people at ease, so that the significant spending of credits could occur inside. After all, if visitors left half their budget at the front gate, they'd cling with greater urgency to the remainder. If admission, on the other hand, was only a small fraction of whatever credits visitors had available to them, they'd be feeling pretty flush upon entering the city . . . almost guaranteeing that they would wind up spending the entirety of their funds before their stay was over.
Many things had changed about humanity over the course of centuries. The fundamental knack, however, of separating the fool and his money was a constant.
At the moment, Sulu was feeling like something of a fool.
"You said you vanted excitement," said Chekov. "I don't understand."
"No," sighed Sulu. "I guess you wouldn't." He rose from the table and said, "I'll see you back at the hotel, Chekov."
"At the hotel! But vy? The day is young!"
But Sulu didn't respond. Instead he simply walked away without so much as a backward glance.
* * *
Sulu sat on the veranda, watching the sun drift toward the horizon. It was a cloudless evening, as always. The temperature in the desert actually tended to get pretty cool. He was wearing loose clothing, the sleeves fluttering in the breeze. A drink was perched on the table next to him, but it was barely touched . . . the ice long melted, watering it down.
He heard the door to the room swing open on squeaky hinges. It had taken him a while to grow accustomed to a door whose handle you had to turn to enter. Indeed, when they'd first arrived at the room, Sulu had unthinkingly walked right into the door in calm anticipation of it sliding open. This had gotten him a bruised nose and a snort of derisive laughter from Chekov.
"Hello," said Sulu without turning.
He heard the door close again, and there was a soft grunt followed by the rustling of packages being set heavily onto a table. Then Chekov stepped over to his side.
"Lovely," said Chekov, looking out at the sunset. The sun was a red obelisk hanging in the sky. Then he said, "So . . . you vant to tell me vat's on your mind?"
"Not especially," Sulu replied. He got up from the chair and walked over to survey Chekov's acquisitions. A shirt or two, a garish statue, a small prayer mat, and a couple of other odds and ends. "You've been busy."
"Sulu," said Chekov patiently, "vat is bothering you? I thought you vould love it here."
"Love it here?" Sulu looked at him skeptically. "Chekov . . . this place is a joke. Why couldn't we have done something normal!"
"That's not vat you vanted, remember? I suggested that." Chekov paced the room with wide strides, gesticulating for emphasis. "'Vere is the adwenture in that, Chekov? Vere is the excitement? How can some quiet staring at mountains or natural vonders on Earth compare to vat vee have seen.‣ Remember saying all that?"
"I remember saying it with more correct placement of 'v‣ and 'w,'" Sulu said half-seriously, getting a derisive snort from Chekov in response. He dropped down onto one of the twin beds. It was amazingly comfortable . . . more so than his bed on the Enterprise had been, in fact. He looked around the room, with the rattan furniture, the tiled walls, and the large ceiling fan turning leisurely overhead. "But I didn't exactly have this place in mind."
"Vat did you have in mind? Ve both wisited our respective families. Ve deserve to do something fun while the Enterprise is being refitted. Earth is our home, Meester Sulu. Ve should enjoy it vile ve can."
"I don't know about that."
Chekov stared at Sulu uncomprehendingly. "Pardon?"
"Don't you see, Pav? That's part of the problem. I have this sense of . . . of disassociation. People like you, and other officers . . . you come back to Earth, and you feel like you've come home. But me . . . when I set foot on Earth, all I can do is think about leaving."
"I see," he said slowly.
"Do you?" asked Sulu. "It's a hell of a way to be, Chekov. To find that I consider a starship to be more of a home than the world I was born on."
"But vy do you feel that vay?"
"Because Earth is boring, Pav! The things we've seen and done . . . and then I come back here, and I do what? I sit and talk with my family and try to tell them about what I've experienced. They can barely grasp it, Chekov. How do you tell them about beings like Trelane, or Charlie Evans? How do I tell them that the world they knew vanished out of existence, and was replaced with a timeline where Hitler won World War Two? My mother asked me what a typical day for me was like. Well, let's see, Mother. There was the typical day a madwoman switched minds with my commanding officer. Or the typical day we were face-to-face with a planet eater. 'Oh, my, Hikaru, that sounds strenuous! Don't you ever get shore leave?‣ Well, certainly I do, Mother. And it can be relaxing, except when a samurai jumps out of nowhere and tries to cut me in half."
"Vat's your point?" said Chekov with a rather dry tone.
"The point? The point, Chekov, is that with all the new life-forms and new civilizations I've encountered . . . I come back to the planet of my birth, only to find that the people I love most in the world are alien to me. My shared experiences are all with people other than them . . . and those experiences have changed me. When you come back 'home‣ there's a certain expectation that you revert, mentally, to the way you used to be. But I can't. I've been through too much. We've just come back from our five-year mission, and all I can think about is getting back out there as soon as the Enterprise refit is finished. When I first embarked on my career with Starfleet, the hardest decision I had to make was leaving my family, knowing it would be years until I saw them again . . . if I saw them again. That was so difficult for me, I can't express it. It used to be that the greatest pride I took in myself was my family and lineage. Yet now, I sit with them and I get . . . bored. There's no other word for it. Bored."
"Bored because you vant . . . vat?"
"Because I want excitement. I want that feeling of being on the edge." Sulu swung his legs down off the bed and strode back to the veranda. The sun was very low now in the sky, the sand gleaming red. And the stars . . . the stars were already becoming visible. He stared up longingly at them, studying the constellations, the positions, even making rapid-fire calculations of how long it would take to travel from one to the other. And he did it for no other reason than love of doing so.
"When I sit at the helm of the Enterprise, any second . . . any second . . . something could happen. I'm on my toes every second of every minute on my watch. Waiting to see what the next thing we encounter will be; knowing that, sooner or later, something will happen. Something always does. How can I say all that to my family?"
"You said it all to me."
"Yes, but you understand."
"Never assume." He frowned. "If you miss it so much . . . vy are you still here? It vill be another six months until the refit is finished, even vith Mr. Scott overseeing it. You could have taken assignment on another ship, instead of agreeing to teach at the Academy like I did. I, personally, didn't mind the prospect of staying on Earth for a little vile. But you . . .?"
"Because," Sulu sighed, "it's the Enterprise. It's working under Captain Kirk. It's . . . everything. A position on another ship would simply feel like a step down, almost by definition."
"Even a captaincy?"
Sulu shrugged. "Well, I wouldn't see myself turning that down. Then again," he added thoughtfully, "it would depend, wouldn't it. Helmsman of a starship versus captain of a ten-man science vessel? Maybe I wouldn't be so quick to agree to that captaincy after all."
"So let's see if I understand this," Chekov said slowly. "You feel Earth has no challenge for you."
"That's essentially correct."
"You feel like an outsider . . . alien . . . out of touch, with little to no connection to your homeworld."
"More or less."
"You vant to get back into space on the Enterprise, and until then you're just marking time."
"Basically."
"All right," said Chekov. "I understand now." And then he sighed heavily and shook his head. "You realize you are in major trouble now."
Sulu frowned. "How so?"
"Vell, you remember the old Russian saying I mentioned earlier?"
In spite of himself, Sulu smiled. Chekov always made comments such as these with such an utter deadpan that it was impossible to tell whether he was joking or not. "I'd always thought it was from an Aesop's fable myself, but all right," said Sulu. "Just for laughs, we'll say it's the latest in a long line of 'Russian inwentions.'"
"Good. Because, you see, there's another famous saying—a curse, actually—vich I am afraid you have brought down on yourself."
"Let me guess," said Sulu, as the last of the sunlight vanished, leaving the desert in cool, stark relief. "'May you live in interesting times.'"
Chekov clapped his hands in appreciation. "You read my mind."
"You are aware, of course, that that isn't a Russian saying."
To Sulu's surprise, Chekov retorted indignantly, "Of course I know that! You think I am a fool? I know wery veil that it isn't a Russian saying."
"Well, that's good," said Sulu.
"It's Polish."
Sulu rolled his eyes and returned his attention to the sky. The sun had set completely, and the stars in their full bloom called to them.
His heart answered in silence.
# Chapter Six
SULU HAD BEEN DISCUSSING cutting their stay short, but he had patiently allowed Chekov to talk him out of it. In a way, he was envious. He wanted the younger man's enthusiasm to be infectious. Unfortunately he couldn't begin to muster the same excitement as Chekov.
They had split up today, promising to meet for lunch at a predetermined restaurant at the corner of Humphrey and Rick's. Sulu watched, arms folded and shaking his head in amusement, as a "police officer" made inquiries of tourists over a bit of unpleasantness that had occurred at a café. With grave and serious demeanor he had turned to Sulu and asked if he knew anything of it. Sulu apologetically replied in the negative.
He walked away then, still trying to figure out what in the world Chekov saw in the place. It was so manufactured, so artificial. Compared to the natural wonders that space had to offer, Demora was a joke. It was a pleasant getaway for those with an utterly pedestrian life. Not for someone who had basked in the glow of a thousand different suns, and had trod worlds so remote they had no names.
It was ten in the morning, and Sulu was bored already. He moved through the streets, feeling apart from everyone on them. An old-style car motored past, the driver gesturing imperiously for people to get out of the way. Sulu gave way, shaking his head and trying to wonder how others so managed to lose themselves in the nonsense of . . .
He never saw her coming.
She slammed squarely into him, rocking him back slightly on his heels. Nevertheless his concern was immediately for her as he said, "Whoa! Are you all right?"
At first she didn't seem to focus on him. She was clearly of Chinese extraction, with long black hair and a slightly confused look about her. Her face was quite triangular, and her features were very delicate.
And her eyes . . . her eyes were green. That was unusual, to put it mildly. Green as emerald, with a sparkle in them like a diamond.
She was glancing over her shoulder. The shoulder was bare, for the loose white shirt she was wearing had slipped down slightly. And Sulu spotted a small, diamond-shaped birthmark on her shoulder. She saw where he was looking and quickly adjusted her shirt, and then started to move past him.
"Are you all right?" he said, noting her distracted air. He moved in synch with her. "Is something the mat—"
"Excuse me," she said quickly. She placed her hand squarely on his back and pushed around him.
Sulu watched her go as she disappeared around a corner. "Now, that was odd," he murmured to himself, and then shrugged.
But then he noticed something very curious. Three men, moving quickly, went around the same corner that the woman had vanished around moments before. It appeared as if they were following her.
Sulu looked around to see if anyone else had noticed, but no one seemed to. He started after them, picking up speed and rounding the corner just in time to see the three men standing several yards away, looking around in frustration.
The trio was a mixed bag of types. One of them was Asian, with hair shaved close to his skull. The second was Caucasian, large and muscular, with shoulder-length blond hair that gave him a decidedly Nordic look. The third was black, slim and wiry, bald but with a thick, curly beard.
There was no sign of the woman.
Then the three men spotted him, and glanced quickly at each other. Clearly they recognized him as the man that the mysterious woman had been talking to.
As one, they started to approach Sulu, the look in their eyes uniform in intent and hostility . . .
And then he realized.
He began to laugh to himself.
Oh, he had fallen for it. Fallen for it with the proverbial hook, line and sinker.
It was a setup. Another Demora setup.
No, more than that. This had Chekov's fingerprints all over it. The Russian had made all those oblique comments about living in interesting times, saying that Sulu should be careful what he wished for.
It was now all painfully clear. Chekov had arranged this. Gotten together with some Demora employees and cobbled together some half-witted "adventure."
Did he really think that Sulu would fall for it? Did he truly believe that Sulu was that stupid?
It didn't seem likely. What seemed more likely was that Chekov expected him to see through it, but hoped that Sulu would be willing to play along.
Sulu could have, should have, pulled the plug on it right then and there. But his long friendship with Chekov stopped him from doing so. Here Chekov had gone to all this work to arrange this . . . this whatever-it-was. Was Sulu now going to blow it off with a quick dismissal of the players involved? Would that be what a friend would do?
It wasn't any different than somebody arranging a surprise party that the "victim" accidentally found out about. The accepted, expected reaction was to act surprised.
Far be it from Sulu to flaunt proper protocol, especially in the face of Chekov's efforts on his behalf.
The Asian man was in the forefront. Perhaps he was the leader; it was difficult to tell. "Excuse me, sir," he said in a gravelly voice. "That young woman earlier . . ."
"Yes?"
"Are you . . . acquainted with her, by any chance?"
Sulu paused a moment, weighing the variety of responses. What the hell. Might as well play it to the hilt.
He stepped in close to the other man and said in a low voice that was as dangerous as he could make it, "So you're the ones she mentioned."
The other two were moving in now. The black man now spoke in a silky voice, "Is there a problem here, Taine?"
The one he'd addressed as Taine didn't look back at his companion. Instead he kept his attention focused on Sulu. To Sulu, it felt as if the air around him had become filled with a sort of dark energy.
"There may be," said Taine evenly. "I'm not certain if we have a joker here . . . or simply a fool."
The black man gestured with a nod of his head in Sulu's direction. "He know her?"
"I'm not sure. For some odd reason, he may simply be trying to be a hero. Tell me, hero . . . what's her name?"
"Her code name is Jade Eyes. That's all you need to know."
At this, the three men laughed. And then, shaking their heads, they started to move off.
And Sulu called out, "You'll never get the device."
It was a reasonable thing for him to say. In adventures such as this, there was always a device. Either that or a rare statue or religious artifact. It didn't matter, of course. This whole thing was a setup by Chekov, and they would undoubtedly play along with whatever he came up with.
It worked like a charm. The trio froze in their tracks. The one called Taine turned to him, and this time there was genuine suspicion in his eyes. Passersby walked past them, oblivious of what was transpiring.
"The device," said Taine slowly, but then he added derisively, "'Jade Eyes‣ told you of it, did she?"
"Her code name is Jade Eyes. As for me, I call her Diamond . . . after her birthmark."
And this was enough to cause the blood momentarily to drain from Taine's face. In a voice darkly sinister, he said, "All right. Now . . . we talk."
He briskly nodded to the Nordic-looking one. "Thor," he said, "escort the gentleman to somewhere quiet."
Thor. Oh, that was too much. Chekov had really gone over the edge on this one. Naturally he was named after a Norse god. Thor. That was rich.
Thor stepped forward, clamping a hand on Sulu's forearm.
Sulu moved quickly and, with a brisk twist of his arm, yanked it free. Thor stood there, looking momentarily confused.
"Stay away from us," said Sulu. "We're backed by an organization so huge, you can't even begin to grasp it."
Thor's face darkened and he swung a huge fist. Sulu effortlessly ducked under it. And then, before Sulu ever saw it coming, the fist swung back again and slammed him on the side of the head.
Sulu went down, head momentarily spinning. Clearly these guys were taking it seriously. They played their part well. Well, naturally that would be the case. Chekov would see to that. Perhaps Chekov even entertained the notion that Sulu might actually be taken in by it all if it seemed real enough.
But . . . all right. If that's how they were going to be, then Sulu saw no reason to be any gentler with them than they were with him. Whatever Chekov was paying them, Sulu would make damned sure they earned it.
Thor reached down for him and Sulu saw his opportunity. He lashed out with a fist, catching Thor just behind the right knee. Thor's leg crumbled under him. Sulu slammed a fist up into Thor's gut, knocking him flat on his back.
"Rogers!" Taine shouted, summoning the black man to join him, and the two of them converged on Sulu. Thor, the wind momentarily knocked out of him, was trying to pull himself up.
Observers slowed down to watch the scuffle. On their faces were momentary looks of confusion.
Sulu slipped in between the charging forms of Taine and Rogers. Rogers started to turn and Sulu whipped his foot around in a spin kick. It connected solidly and Rogers‣ head snapped to the side. He went down, the world spinning around him.
Now the observers laughed and applauded. It was now obvious to them what they were witnessing: Street theater, of the type so typical in Demora.
Sulu spun to face Taine. Taine had adopted a defensive posture, his lips drawn back in a contemptuous sneer.
They circled each other for a moment, feinting, each trying to ascertain the other's weaknesses. Taine moved with far too much confidence for Sulu's liking.
Sulu lashed out with a foot and Taine caught his ankle with ease. He sent Sulu tumbling to his back and then leaped, slamming down with both his feet directly toward Sulu's head. Sulu barely rolled out of the way in time, and Taine sent a fierce kick into Sulu's side that felt as if someone had jammed a fireplace poker into him.
Several feet away was a merchant selling carpets. Sulu scrambled to his feet as Taine came after him, snapping, "I don't know who you are . . . but you're going to be sorry you mixed into—"
Sulu grabbed one of the carpets and swung it around. It sailed through the air and enveloped Taine's head. For just a moment, he was blinded. Pushing off the balls of his feet, Sulu slammed a fist into the bump under the carpet that represented Taine's head. Taine staggered, grasping at air. Sulu easily dodged in between his outstretched hands and struck again. This time Taine went down, still entangled in the carpet.
"Hah!" Sulu said, and turned just in time to see a massive fist winging toward his face. Then he saw nothing else as the world went dark around him.
* * *
Chekov sat at the café table, drumming his fingers in annoyance on the tabletop. A waiter drifted over and said politely, "Do you have any idea when your friend will be joining you, sir?"
"He should have been here by now," Chekov said with mild impatience. "Do you know the time, by any chance?"
"Twelve-thirty, sir," said the waiter. "Can I get you anything?"
"That vould be nice. Do you have any wodka?"
The waiter looked at him oddly. "Pardon, sir . . . did you say 'wotka'?"
"No. Not wotka. Wodka."
Clearly embarrassed, the waiter shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. "Sir, I'm . . . not sure we have any of that."
"You don't have any wodka?" Chekov was appalled.
"No, sir, I'm . . . afraid I never heard of it."
"Never heard of wodka?"
"Never, sir. Although it does sound rather exotic. Perhaps I could interest you in something to drink instead."
Chekov stared at him as if he'd lost his mind. "Something to drink? Instead of . . ." Then he paused and, very slowly, said, "You make mixed drinks, yes?"
"Absolutely, sir. Best in Demora."
"Good." Chekov searched his mind for the appropriate old-style drink that would typically be served in these environs. Finally he said, "Bring me screwdriver. You can do this?"
"Absolutely, sir."
But before he could walk off, Chekov raised a finger as an afterthought, keeping him in his place. "If you don't mind . . . no orange juice."
"What? No orange juice?"
"That is vat I said, yes."
"But sir," said the waiter patiently, "if there's no orange juice in it, then all that will be left is . . ."
Then his voice trailed off and a slow smile crossed his face. "Wotka," he said understandingly.
"Ah-ah," said Chekov, waggling his finger. "Not wotka. Wodka. Be careful how you speak. It must be very hard for people to understand you vit that accent."
"I'll be more cautious in the future, sir."
"See that you are," Chekov said sternly.
The waiter went off to get the drink, slowly shaking his head in amusement. Chekov was no less tickled by the entire exchange, until he came to realize that more time had passed and there was still no Sulu in evidence.
Where the devil had the helmsman gotten off to?
"Perhaps," Chekov said out loud to no one in particular, "he found some charming young woman to occupy his time. That vould be wery nice. Wery nice indeed."
* * *
Sulu's first thought upon coming to was that Chekov had gone just a bit too far, even for arranging an adventure.
His face ached a bit and he wanted to reach up and rub his throbbing forehead. He was unable to do so, however, because he realized very quickly that his hands were tied together behind him.
He sat in a chair, his hands anchored behind him as noted, his legs tied to the chair legs. Seated directly across from him, straddling the chair, was Rogers. His eyes narrowed as Sulu came around.
The room itself was nothing special: dark, probably because the windows were boarded over. A ceiling fan hung low but wasn't turning. There was a skylight above, caked with dust so that only a small bit of sunlight was able to filter through.
Out of the corner of his eye, Sulu caught brief movement nearby the edge of the room. Some sort of small vermin; a mouse, most likely. It darted out of sight behind a narrow black case that was propped up against the wall.
"Well well well," said Rogers in a purring, singsong voice. "Look who woke up. The hero."
Sulu said nothing; merely glared at him with intensity. Or at least with what he hoped passed for intensity.
"You won't get anything out of me," said Sulu.
Rogers smiled thinly and slid a razor-thin knife from the sleeve of his jacket. Placing the flat end gently against Sulu's throat, he murmured, "Oh, I expect we will. It'll probably be red, and warm, and go trickling down your throat and ruin that fine shirt of yours. Shame to see such an excellent shirt go to waste."
The door at the far end of the room opened and Taine walked in, Thor bringing up the rear. Thor closed the door behind them and remained there, massive arms folded. "Thought you'd be coming around about now," said Taine. "You are most fortunate that Thor went lightly on you. I've seen him hit men with sufficient strength to make their bodies lonesome for their heads."
"As opposed to making them merely lonesome for intelligent conversation."
The comment didn't appear to register. "You do realize the level of trouble that you're in," said Taine. "We've done some quick checking on you. It appears, my dear fellows, that we have one Lieutenant Commander Sulu of Starfleet among us." He leaned forward, his face a question. "So tell me, Lieutenant Commander . . . what interest does Starfleet have in Ling Sui, eh? Oh, I forgot. Jade Eyes. What interest does Starfleet have in Jade Eyes?"
"None of your business," Sulu said, even as he filed away the name that Taine had just spoken. Ling Sui. A mildly musical name. An exotic name, even, for an exotic woman. No less a woman would do, of course. One couldn't have an adventure with a heroine who was a hausfrau from upstate New York or some other similarly unlikely location.
"Oh, I disagree, my dear L.C. Sulu. It's very much my business. So . . ." He leaned in closer to Sulu. "Are you here as part of Starfleet covert intelligence?"
"You expect me to tell you? You expect me to just spill to you whatever happens to be on my mind?" Sulu laughed disdainfully. "You really underestimate me, don't you."
Taine regarded him for a moment, stroking his chin thoughtfully. "L.C.," he said at last, "you are either incredibly brave or incredibly ignorant. If it is the former, then my problem is simple. I merely torture you until you break. And you will break, sir. Every man, no matter how brave, has his breaking point. We will find yours. You may turn out to be stronger than you think, or weaker than you think. It all depends on self-image, I suppose.
"If, however, it is the latter case—if you are incredibly ignorant—then the problem becomes that there is nothing you can tell me. I will not be prepared to believe that, however, until you are dead. By that point, of course, it will be too late. That would be a most unfortunate outcome for all concerned, but . . . what can one do? One has to work with the tools available to him, does he not?"
Sulu looked at him with a contemptuous glare. The smug look of confidence in Sulu's face was in no way an act. He had every certainty that he was in total control of the situation.
Taine shook his head sadly. "Very well. Have it your way, then. Rogers," and he snapped his fingers briskly.
Rogers nodded once in understanding and stepped out of the room.
"What will it be?" said Sulu defiantly. "Electric current? Mental scans? Mind probes?"
"Please, L.C. Have you no respect for your surroundings? For the ambience? No," said Taine, "we want to have respect for traditions here."
Sulu felt the source of warmth before he actually saw it. Rogers walked in briskly, using thick mitts to carry a glowing brazier. Rogers paused and tilted the brazier slightly for Sulu to see that it contained coals, gleaming a dull red.
"If I'd known we were having barbecue, I'd have brought a steak to toss on the grill," Sulu said wryly.
"Your wit is most appreciated, L.C. Sulu, if not your timing," replied Taine. He passed his hand over the coals and nodded once approvingly at the heat. "Another several minutes, I think, to make sure that they are as hot as possible. Do you have your tools, Rogers?"
Rogers nodded and walked toward the case Sulu had noticed earlier. He flipped the latches, opened it, and began to extract rods. The rods had points of different widths, and Rogers examined each of them as if he were trying to choose the appropriate golf club for a difficult shot.
"Rogers is particularly expert at these sorts of things," said Taine.
Sulu stifled a laugh. He wanted to play along as much as possible, but this was really pushing it. Ambience? These guys were going to use primitive torture techniques because they were concerned about ambience? How ridiculous could one get?
"So . . . tell me your plan," said Sulu.
Taine looked at him askance. "I beg your pardon? Are you under the impression that we are here to answer your questions?"
"Oh, but that's usually how these things work, isn't it," Sulu said confidently. "I, the hero, am tied up and helpless. You, the smug and stupid villains, believing that I'm finished, proceed to tell me your entire insidious plan."
The three captors looked at each other, then back at Sulu. Rogers laughed out loud at that point, and Thor glowered. Taine, for his part, merely stared at Sulu with undisguised pity.
"You've seen too many old movies," Taine said sadly. "You really are a fool. Ah well. No concern of mine, really."
Sulu paused a moment, the wheels turning. "Ohhh, I see. You're going to walk out of here, secure that Rogers will extract information from me . . . and then, with the odds more even, I'll manage to break free from this chair and overwhelm him."
"No," said Taine, leaning back against a wall, his arms folded across his chest. "We're not going anywhere. We have people watching the exits from the city. Ling Sui can't get away. Nor can you, although your situation is a bit more dire than hers at the moment."
"Then in that case," said Sulu, "there's only one answer left in this little dance: a daring last-minute rescue."
Thor was beginning to look rather impatient. Rogers had his rods heating to a blazing red against the coals. Taine seemed genuinely confused.
"Lieutenant Commander," he said, "you seem to be under the impression that this is a game. That it's an artifice of some sort. Is that truly your belief?"
"He's just trying to make us think he's an idiot," Rogers commented dismissively.
"Well, he's succeeding admirably. L.C. Sulu . . . you are genuinely in trouble here. There will be no last-minute rescue. There will be no extended discourse from us, giving you the key pieces of information you require. We are going to do you bodily harm until you tell us what we want to know, or we will kill you . . . or both. Any other outcome is purely in your imagination."
Sulu smiled grimly. He had to give them credit: They were damned effective. Particularly Taine, the Asian. He was going all out to give the proceedings an air of genuine menace. If Sulu hadn't been so certain of his true status, he might actually have begun to get worried.
"Quieting down," noted Taine. "Going for stoicism? Inscrutability, perhaps? Well, we'll attend to that. Rogers?"
"Ready," said Rogers, standing over the heated brazier. With his thick gloves, he removed one of the rods. Sulu noted with mild interest that the tip was glowing red. Smoke was pouring from it.
"At your convenience, Rogers," said Taine, gesturing toward the bound Starfleet officer.
Rogers approached slowly, savoring the moment. Sulu watched confidently, waiting for the last-minute rescue. Knowing that salvation would be imminent. Any second now there would be the whine of phaser blasts, or the crashing in through the skylight.
(Rogers drew closer.)
Something to stave off doom because, in situations like this, the hero never really got maimed. Was never really put through some grueling, hideous . . .
(The broiling point of the rod was closer still. . . .)
. . . ordeal, such as having heated metal stroked across the skin, searing it, blackening it, causing it to peel back and away while the hero screamed for mercy . . .
(He could feel the heat, the intensity, and he saw the total lack of pity in Rogers' eyes.)
And just for a moment, Sulu's confidence slipped.
He started to pull, yanking at his bonds, but they were too tight. All he managed to do was cut off circulation to his hands.
His abrupt signs of struggle brought Rogers to a momentary halt, before he chuckled and started to advance.
"Feeling a bit nervous?" asked Taine silkily. "Suddenly realizing you're overdue for a rescue?"
That was, indeed, precisely what Sulu was realizing. He pulled more furiously at his bonds, but they simply drew tighter as the rod drew closer.
"Now," said Taine, "tell us what you know."
The air seemed to shimmer from the heat directly in Sulu's eyes.
Taine repeated, caressing each word, "Tell us . . . what . . . you know."
Sulu licked his lips briefly and then said, "Heading is a mathematical expression describing a direction with relationship to the center of the galaxy. A heading is composed of two numbers, measuring an azimuth value and an elevation value in degrees. A heading of zero zero zero, mark zero, describes a direction toward the geometric center of the galaxy."
Rogers and Taine exchanged confused glances.
Sulu didn't slow down. "In terms of navigation on a planet's surface, this is analogous to describing a direction in degrees from north, in which case a course of five degrees—"
"What are you doing?"
"—would be slightly to the right of a direction directly toward the planet's north pole. A heading differs from a bearing in that it has no relationship to the current attitude or orientation of the spacecraft."
There was a pause, and Taine and Rogers thought Sulu was finished.
He was just catching his breath.
"Now bearing, by contrast, describes a direction in space with relationship to a space vehicle. A bearing measures the angular difference between the current forward direction of the spacecra—"
"Shut up!" Thor roared from across the room. It was the first thing he'd said since Sulu had had the misfortune to encounter him. Sulu had begun to assume he was mute.
"What is the purpose of this, L.C.?" asked a befuddled Taine.
"You said I should tell you what I know," said Sulu. "Would you like me to move on to fencing techniques? Fun facts about botany? Old Earth firearms, perhaps."
Taine regarded him for a long moment.
"Oh, to hell with this," he said finally. He turned to Rogers. "Kill him. Slow, fast, I don't care. Just kill him."
# Chapter Seven
ROGERS NODDED, perfectly happy about the instruction. He turned toward Sulu, swung back the rod, and brought it around in a baseball-bat-type arc.
Sulu managed to push off, sending the chair tilting backward, and he slammed to the ground as the heated rod swished over his head, barely missing him.
"Don't dance with him," said Taine in genuine irritation.
Rogers grimaced with annoyance as he strode forward. Sulu was still helpless, tied to the chair, and Rogers gripped the rod with both hands and prepared to bring it slamming down squarely into Sulu's chest.
And it was at that precise moment that the skylight smashed inward.
Sulu's captors looked upward in confusion just in time to see a small, round device plunge from overhead. It struck the ground and exploded, and in that instant everything went completely black.
Sulu had no idea what was going on. Actually, that wasn't true strictly speaking. His faith in his situation had been confirmed. It was, in fact, a last-minute rescue. They'd really had him going there for a minute, but now he knew beyond doubt that this was all an elaborate hoax staged by Chekov.
What he didn't know was who was staging the rescue, or how it was being done.
He heard yelling from the trio of captors, but they were as blind as he. He heard people slamming into each other, the sounds of tripping or falling bodies.
And then there were hands pulling at his bonds. A quick, sharp tug and then they came free. "Who's there?" he whispered.
"Be quiet and you'll live," hissed back a female voice. He recognized it instantly. It was Ling Sui.
There was a tugging at the ropes binding his right leg. By the time he had pulled it loose she'd already cut through the one on his left. She pulled at his arm and said, "Come on!"
"She's in here!" came an angry voice, clearly belonging to Taine. "Find her!"
"Here!" came her fierce whisper to Sulu, and she was shoving something onto his face. Instantly the room glowed with a dim red light and he was able to see.
Clearly she had made use of a blackout bomb, plunging the room into total blackout by disrupting all the visible wavelengths in the room. But the special goggles enabled the wearers to discern their surroundings.
He saw the three men staggering about in the darkness. Rogers was waving one of the heated rods, and the metal brushed against Thor's right arm. Thor spun with a yelp of indignation and swept his arm around, tagging Rogers squarely on the head. Rogers went down, the metal rod clattering to the floor.
"Let's go," grunted Ling. She wrapped fingers around his forearm. It was like having one's arm in a vise; her grip was that strong. Then abruptly Sulu was yanked into the air. He felt a surge of power that seemed to be coming from the vicinity of her feet. And then the next thing he knew they were up and through the skylight.
They landed on the roof and Sulu looked around quickly, trying to get his bearings. Although he and Chekov had been in the city for several days, they hadn't even begun to cover all the sections. It was, after all, situated on twenty-three square miles of land. Other roofs spread out around them like a vast field of black tar, buildings clustered closely together.
Ling Sui was, naturally, dressed entirely in black. Actually, not entirely. She was wearing a thin green choker with a small locket on it. Her brow was covered with a thin line of sweat, but otherwise she looked unhurried and unperturbed. There was, however, an intensity about her. A sense that she was completely and utterly in charge of the situation. She yanked off her goggles, and stretched out a hand for Sulu's. He handed them over and she shoved them into a small knapsack attached to her belt.
"Where are we?" he asked.
"Thieves Quarter," she replied.
"Of course." He looked down at her feet. "Nice antigrav boots."
"The power cells are low. Come on."
Even though the boots could be somewhat clumsy when the antigrav field wasn't in use, they didn't seem to slow her down as she ran across the flat roof. Either that, Sulu realized, or else she was even more fleet of foot when she wasn't wearing them.
Sulu ran quickly after her, no slouch in the speed department himself. She afforded him a quick, approving glance and then together they leaped over the gap separating the rooftop they were on from the next.
Sulu paused to catch his breath, but Ling didn't slow. "Come on," she urged once more. He started to follow her . . .
. . . and a disruptor blast sliced just above his head. The smell of burnt ions hung in the air as Sulu and Ling went flat on their bellies. From street level they heard the angered shouts of voices which Sulu knew instantly belonged to their pursuers.
"Stay low!" she said and started to run. Sulu followed her, thinking to himself, So much for ambience.
The air crackled again, this time mere inches to Sulu's right. They were managing to close on the targets. Sulu and Ling got to a roof edge and barely ducked back in time as a disruptor blast ripped up from the street. Sulu didn't even have time to see who was wielding the weapon; it was all he could do to get out of the way.
Ling turned to him. "You have to trust me," she said tightly.
"You can't be serious."
"Deadly serious."
"Well, when you put it that way," he said, trying to sound casual.
She pulled him to her. "Hold on as tightly as you can," she said.
He did so. Her body was small and compact, but remarkably muscled for what was there. He tried not to smile as he gripped her. "When do we start the deadly part?" he asked.
There was a door that opened onto the roof behind them. It burst open and Taine was standing there. He yanked out a disruptor and screeched in inarticulate rage.
"Now," she replied, and kicked the antigrav boots into overdrive. The boots roared to life and drove them forward, arcing over the rooftops like a pair of missiles. Taine fired and missed. From the street below, more blasts ripped upward, but none of them managed to nail the fast-moving forms of Sulu and Ling.
The rooftops hurled past them at dizzying speed. It was an odd sensation for Sulu. Compared to moving at warp speed, this was a crawl. And yet he felt as if he'd never traveled quite as fast in his life. The outraged invective pouring from the mouths of their pursuers was left far behind.
Then something shuddered beneath them. Sulu had only a moment to realize that it was the gravity boots beginning to give out.
"Warned you" was all Ling said as their momentum carried them forward a short distance before they arced downward, the street coming toward them at dizzying speed.
This is going to hurt, thought Sulu as he saw they were angling straight toward a building.
His helmsman instincts kicked in, and he threw his weight to one side, hauling Ling with him. They banked sharply to the left, missing the building by centimeters. They hurtled down an alleyway, almost hitting the building on the opposing side. Sulu kicked out like a diver, striking the wall squarely with his feet and propelling them back in the other direction and then down.
They crashed into laundry.
It was hanging suspended between the two buildings, large blankets and comforters flapping in the breeze. How convenient crossed Sulu's mind before the dangling laundry encompassed them. It momentarily blinded them, but it also helped save them from serious harm as they hit the ground and skidded the length of the alley. They slowed to a halt inches away from the alley's dead end. For a moment neither of them said anything as they just lay there, recovering their breath.
"Just for the record," he finally managed to get out, "I'm Hikaru Sulu."
From somewhere within the folds of the blanket, she replied, "Ling Sui. Charmed."
He pulled the blanket off their heads and looked into her face. He was surprised—and yet, not entirely so—to see that there was laughter in her eyes.
"You realize," he said, "that we're simply going to have to get married."
She tilted her head slightly, regarding him with bemusement. "How do you figure that?"
"Because it would be worth it just so we could tell our children how we met."
She laughed incredulously. "You are really quite a unique individual. You seem to take all of this," and she gestured vaguely, "this . . . strangeness . . . very much in stride."
It helps that I've seen through the deception, he thought, but he simply said, "In my line of work . . . one is not easily rattled."
"Indeed. Let's discuss lines of work . . . someplace where we won't be shot at."
They got to their feet, dusted themselves off, but at the same time never quite took their eyes off each other. She continued to stare at him as if not quite believing that he was there.
Sulu, for his part, was amazed. Obviously this was not something that Chekov had simply thrown together. This woman and the others . . . they were pros. Pros up and down the line. It would have been so easy for him to be sucked into the exquisite unreality of it all.
Fortunately enough, he was far too smart for that.
# Chapter Eight
CHEKOV WAS BEGINNING to get worried.
It was now getting on evening, and Sulu had been a no-show. Perhaps there had been some sort of screwup. Some sort of miscommunication that had resulted in Sulu waiting for him at another restaurant. Chekov wished that they had their Enterprise communicators with them. Then it would simply be a matter of flipping his open and asking Sulu where the devil he was.
But they didn't have their communicators, so clearly that wasn't an option.
He stepped out onto the veranda and drummed apprehensively on the railing. He saw tourists going about their business, the various inhabitants into their usual routines. For the first time the artificiality of it all crept through to him. None of it mattered. None of it was real. What was real was the fact that his friend was absent, and he had absolutely no idea why.
Well, enough was enough. It was time to contact the authorities. Chekov had been reluctant to, for fear of looking like a total fool if he sounded an alert and it only turned out that Sulu was out somewhere having a good time. But he saw no choice at this point.
At that moment, the comm screen inset into the wall (one of the few allowances made in the room for modern conveniences) bleeped at him. Chekov quickly went to it and toggled the On Line switch.
Sulu's smiling face appeared on the screen.
"I vas vondering!" said Chekov in exasperation.
"Oh . . . I just bet you were," Sulu replied.
It seemed an odd response for a man who had vanished for the better part of a day.
"I'm on to you, Chekov," Sulu continued. "Admit it."
Chekov blinked. On to him? On to what? Did he mean that he knew Chekov had been concerned about his absence? Well, of course, that was self-evident. "I admit it freely," Chekov said, trying not to look as confused as he felt.
"I knew it," said Sulu triumphantly. He leaned forward and said conspiratorially, "I have to admit, I'm impressed. I knew you wanted to sell me on this place . . . but I never thought you'd go to all this trouble."
"No trouble at all," Chekov said reasonably.
"And she is quite remarkable."
Again, Chekov blinked. "She is?"
"You don't have to sound so surprised," said Sulu. "I should have had faith in your judgment."
"That's always a good thing to have," Chekov nodded, still feeling as if he were in the midst of another conversation entirely. One thing was clear: Sulu had found female companionship. It was, of course, a possibility that they had both discussed before arrival, and each had mutually agreed to give the other as much room as required to do justice to that situation. "Uhm, Sulu . . . where are you now?"
"Her place," said Sulu. He lowered his voice still further. "She's registered here under an assumed name. I could have guessed that, I suppose."
"I suppose," agreed Chekov. "Do you vish to stay vith her for a bit?"
Sulu looked slightly guilty. "It . . . would be pleasant. If that's all right with you."
"Pffff," Chekov made a dismissive noise. "Vatever you vish. You are . . . sure you're all right?"
"Well, there were some close calls in there. But that's part of what makes it all so interesting. After all, isn't that what the captain once said? 'Risk is our business.‣ I'll be in touch. And Chekov . . . thanks again."
"You're velcome," he said grandly. "No thanks necessary."
The picture blinked out, leaving Chekov grinning. Indeed, no thanks had been necessary. Sulu, that lucky dog, had found a fetching companion. He hardly needed Chekov's blessing or permission to pursue her.
He, Chekov, should be so lucky.
* * *
Ling Sui sat on a rattan chair, regarding Sulu in amazement as he looked around the room. It was small and dark, because Ling had the shades drawn.
"We'll be safe here," she said, never taking her eyes off him. Then she gestured for him to come over, which he did. One of her long legs was crossed casually over the other. She pointed downward. "Kneel," she said.
He eyed her with level gaze.
"Stand," he replied.
She smiled in amusement. "All right," she said, and rose, propping herself up on one knee. "Turn around, at least." From the folds of her garments she had pulled a small device that looked somewhat like a small electronic tuning fork.
He did so, wondering what was going on. He felt her brush the edge of the tuning fork along the back of his shirt. It gave off a faint humming noise. Then, when she reached a point just around the area of his right shoulder blade, the noise jumped slightly. Apparently it had located whatever it was she was looking for. "Hold still, please," she said. "Okay. Got it."
"Got what?" he asked, turning to face her. "The secret formula? The hush-hush plans?"
"Something like that."
"On some sort of microminiature data chip."
"Good guess."
"May I ask what it was doing on my back?"
She seemed to be weighing the option of bald-facedly lying to him before dismissing the idea. "I put it there," she said matter-of-factly. "When I bumped into you in the street. I knew they were after me, and in the event they caught up with me, I didn't want to be in possession of it. You should have been in no danger at all. And I knew I could always use this," and she held up the tuning-fork device again, "to track you down and retrieve it. I didn't expect you to try and come riding to my rescue."
"I saw those goons chasing you," said Sulu at his most gallant. "I'm not the type to just stand aside and let a woman be harassed."
"I know that now," she informed him. She tossed her head slightly to keep her long hair out of her face. She'd done it once or twice since they'd first gotten to the room. Obviously it was a bit of a nervous habit, although he had no idea what she had to be nervous about. She was an absolutely brilliant actress, virtually radiating charisma. She had down cold the part of the daring mysterious heroine. She was exciting and vibrant . . . everything that one could wish for in a mystery woman. Sulu felt himself falling in love with her already . . . except it probably wasn't really a matter of being in love with her, but rather with what she represented. Adventure. Intrigue. When involved with a female like this, any second could herald a new escapade. Just like involvement with another female . . . one named Enterprise.
"I know you, don't I," she said after a long moment. "The name was familiar. Hikaru Sulu. From Starfleet, correct?"
He wasn't surprised, of course. Chekov would have given her all the information she needed. Still, he was interested in the rationalization. "That's right. May I ask how—?"
"Oh, there are some people whose careers I've been following somewhat closely. A bit of a hobby of mine. Comes from my own abortive attempt at a career in Starfleet."
"You?" he said with raised eyebrow. "What happened?"
"It . . . wasn't for me. I'm not terribly good at following orders. Too much of an independent thinker." She paused and then added, with amusement, "No offense meant."
"None taken." He allowed himself to preen slightly. "If you have any questions about Starfleet . . . about the Enterprise . . . I'd be happy to . . ."
"Well, actually, I do."
He stood with folded arms, waiting.
With an expression of intense curiosity, she leaned forward and asked, "What's Captain Kirk really like?"
Sulu felt like a deflated balloon. You told her to say that, didn't you, Chekov. I'll get you for that one, my friend.
"Yes, well," and he cleared his throat. "He's . . . well, what can you say about someone in whom you'd trust your life implicitly? What higher compliment can you give someone than that? If I ever get command of a starship, and I'm half the commander that James Kirk is . . . I'll be satisfied."
She studied him appraisingly. "I don't believe that," she said flatly, challenge in her eyes. "That would be 'settling.‣ I can't see you as being the type of man who would settle for anything."
"And you? What type of woman are you?"
"Do you really want to know?" she asked challengingly.
He thought about it a moment, and then shook his head. "No. What sort of mystery woman would you be if I knew too much about you? All that matters is where we go from here, and what you owe me."
Her gaze was steel. "You risked your life, and it was a stupid thing to do. And I had to risk my life to bail you out. If you hadn't decided to be heroic, neither of us would have been in that fix. So what, precisely, do I owe you?"
He stepped forward, "invading" her personal space. She didn't flinch, didn't back up so much as a millimeter. Her green eyes glittered, reminding Sulu of nothing so much as a cat.
"Fifty percent," he said. "We're partners now."
It was hard for him to read precisely what was going through her mind: Anger? Astonishment? Amusement? A tension, caused by . . . what?
"What did you say?" she asked in slow, measured tones.
Slowly he brought his lips to her right ear and whispered, "I said . . . we're partners now."
She pirouetted away from him with a grace that indicated she had dancer's legs. With undisguised amazement she said, "May I ask how you figure that?"
"Simple. As of this point, this little operation of yours continues purely at my whim. I could shut the whole thing down with one well-placed call. But I'm not going to do that . . . provided I'm a partner."
"Who do you think you are, Sulu? You're Starfleet, not a law-enforcement official."
"True enough," replied Sulu. "But I have reason to believe that the property you're dealing in has interplanetary, even galactic, ramifications. That makes it Starfleet business."
"And what reason do you have to believe that?"
"I'm suspicious by nature. That's good enough."
Her mouth was so thin as to be almost invisible. And yet those eyes, those gorgeous green eyes, seemed more intrigued than angry.
"Fifty percent, Ling Sui," he said. "That's a considerable bargain. An alliance with a Starfleet officer. Certainly that would be fairly handy in your line of business . . . that is, whatever business you might be involved with at any given time."
"It would," she admitted. She gave the matter some consideration, playing her "part" to the hilt. "Twenty percent," she said finally.
"You wish to insult me now, is that it? Fifty percent."
"Thirty."
"Sixty."
She blinked in surprise. "It's not quite supposed to work that way, Sulu. I go higher, you go lower, and we meet somewhere in between. If I, for example, offer forty, you should counter with . . ."
"Seventy," he said with absolute deadpan.
She let out a long sigh. "All right. Fifty."
He scratched the underside of his chin thoughtfully. "Oh, all right," he said finally. "You talked me into fifty."
"Which is where you started."
"Is it?" he said, looking at her with feigned innocence.
She shook her head. "Of course, I still have to deal with one problem. Namely: I have no reason to trust you."
"I risked my life to help a woman I didn't even know. Just imagine what I can do when I actually have personal involvement."
She eyed him thoughtfully. "Ahh. And just how 'personal‣ did you envision our association getting?"
"My dear woman," he said, drawing himself up. "I am, in every respect, a gentleman."
"Is that so?" she asked. She ran a finger lazily along the line of his jaw, and he felt a sensation as if she were running a live wire across his skin. "Pity. But then, I knew you had to have a drawback somewhere."
# Chapter Nine
THE SHADOWS were growing long in the southwest corner of the Thieves Quarter. There were not too many people on the streets, what with most folks hustling to dinner appointments. Besides which, the Thieves Quarter was not the most crowded of areas even during the busiest times. It was, after all, where only the most adventurous of folks chose to go. Anything and everything could happen in the Thieves Quarter, and even though it was all a show, it was most definitely not for the faint of heart.
Sulu and Ling Sui stuck to the shadows, which was easy since they were fairly copious. Ling Sui craned her neck, peering around a corner and then ducking back.
"Any sign of your contact man?" asked Sulu.
"Not yet."
"Is he dependable?"
"I've worked with him before. His name is Kelles. His strength is, he's good. His weakness is, he knows he's good."
"And he's your buyer?"
"Of course not. He's representing them."
"Do you trust him?"
She glanced at him. "My, you're full of questions. Will I work with him? Yes. We'll be making the exchange right here. I give him the information, and the credit transfer will be made immediately thereafter.
"But will I trust him? No, of course not. I don't trust anyone."
"Not even me?" asked Sulu with a mock look of hurt on his face.
But Ling Sui did not smile. "Trust you?" she said flatly. "You? A Starfleet officer out to turn a profit? Allying himself with some strange woman dealing in some sort of nefarious who-knows-what? Sulu . . . let's be honest with one another, all right? I tend to react to people on a gut level. And on that level, I find you handsome . . . brave . . . perhaps someone who even fancies himself a bit of a lady's man . . . with a charming sense of chivalry and an overdeveloped sense of being a swashbuckler. If these were calmer times I would be very taken with the idea of seeing you socially. And if I happened to discover you in my bed, I doubt I would kick you out."
"That's . . . honest," said Sulu, surprised that his voice suddenly sounded a bit hoarse.
"But trust?" she continued. "No, trust you, I don't. I would be crazy to. I won't turn my back on you, nor take my eyes off you. And I fully expect you to treat me in the same manner, and if you don't, you're a fool."
"I see," he said evenly. "Now shall I be honest with you?"
"Don't bother," she informed him. "Since I don't trust you, then obviously it doesn't matter what you say since I have no reason to assume you're being honest with me. Q.E.D. Besides," and she inclined her chin slightly, "unless I'm mistaken, here comes Kelles."
It was not at all what Sulu was expecting. The vehicles that he'd seen in the city had mostly been period vehicles. Not this. This was a very impressive antigrav craft: a three-man shuttle, the type designed for inner-city use in that it didn't travel more than a few feet off the ground. After all, not everyone was licensed to maneuver the higher flying shuttles. Anarchy in the skyways would be the result; it had in years past when technology had briefly outstripped humanity's ability to regulate it. The legendary two-thousand-car pileup in San Diego remained a testimony to those dangers.
The shuttle's burnished exterior was sleek, almost looking like the head and beak of a bird of prey. Sulu recognized this particular model: Despite its street-level uses, it was called a Peregrine, after the falcon. The heavy-duty front windows were smoked, insuring privacy.
The Peregrine slid to a halt mere feet away from Sulu and Ling Sui. It hovered there a moment, then settled to the ground. The side door swung open with a sigh of air, and a tall, heavyset black man stepped out. He wore a battered brown hat pulled down low over his face, a white shirt with brown vest, and loose-fitting slacks. His black boots were thick with dust and looked as if they hadn't been polished for months.
"Kelles!" hissed Ling Sui.
Kelles looked toward Sulu and Ling in almost leisurely fashion. "You're early," he said. His voice was very low, and yet it seemed to carry.
"What kind of vehicle is that?" she demanded. "You're the one who always told me to be subtle. You're getting sloppy in your old age."
"Sloppy?" said Kelles, looking offended. "It's reverse psychology, girl. Drive something conspicuous; that way the enemy doesn't notice you because they figure you wouldn't be that stupid."
Ling looked dubious.
Kelles, in the meantime, was looking Sulu up and down. "Who's your friend?" he asked, the question addressed to her, the attention paid to him.
"Doesn't matter."
"It does to me," said Kelles. There was a quiet danger in his voice.
Sulu wondered how this new arrival fit into the grand scheme of things. There seemed to be only one truly logical answer. This fellow, Kelles, was going to be the means through which the whole charade finally ended. Ling would give him whatever it was she has allegedly stolen. He would pay her off. Maybe there would even be one final close call or two. And then it would be over. Ling would say something appropriately mysterious, vanish into the back alleys of the Thieves Quarter, and that would be that.
It was hard for Sulu to believe that it had all happened in one day. He had to admit that when Chekov organized something, he really pulled out all the stops.
"He's my new partner. Look, let's discuss this later," said Ling impatiently. "For all we know, you were followed."
Kelles gave her an incredulous stare. "No one followed me, Ling. That, I promise you. Now, where is it?"
She had a bag strapped around her waist. She started to reach for it.
And for no reason that Sulu immediately understood, his own words suddenly floated through his head. Words describing what it was like to helm the Enterprise, that sense of perpetual anticipation . . .
At any second, anything could happen . . .
Kelles's head exploded.
Sulu wasn't prepared for it, of course. After all, everything seemed to be going perfectly normally. It was only seconds later that the whine of the disruptor that had gunned down Kelles made itself heard. It was an angry sound, like hornets massing.
For a moment, just for a moment, it seemed to Sulu that he could perceive everything simultaneously. He saw his own jacket, with the blood from Kelles staining the front. He saw Kelles's body in motion, still in the process of falling to the ground. He saw Ling Sui's horrified expression, the blood draining from her face. He even saw the shooter, on a rooftop overhead, bringing his disruptor to bear. He saw the door still open to the Peregrine.
His course was laid in. All he had to do was keep her moving.
Before Kelles's body hit the ground, Sulu grabbed Ling by the wrist and yanked her toward the Peregrine. Another disruptor blast roared over his head. Close shot off the bow. It was a clean miss, though. Ignore it. Stay on course.
He practically threw her into the shuttle, leaping in behind her. The shuttle rocked slightly beneath his feet. He took in the controls at a glance. He'd never operated this particular model of shuttle in his life. It didn't matter. One look and he instantly knew how to operate it.
He leaped into the driver's seat, his fingers flying over the controls. "Belt in!" he shouted as the shuttle roared to life. The vehicle started to lurch forward . . .
. . . and someone shoved his way in through the still-open door.
Sulu's head snapped around in alarm. It was a man that Sulu hadn't seen before; he was roughly the size of a small mountain. He hadn't quite gotten his footing yet because of the vehicle's movement.
Ling Sui braced herself, gripping one of the two remaining seats firmly. She swung her legs forward, slamming them into the chest of the newcomer. He staggered, his arms pinwheeling, and Ling released her hold on the seat. She leaped through the air, spinning like a black-clad top, and slammed a spin kick to the side of the newcomer's head. He grunted once, which was the only sound he made during the entire encounter, and then fell backward out of the shuttle. The ground beneath the vehicle was moving faster and faster, and he tumbled out and away.
The entire encounter had taken no more than a couple of seconds. Sulu, who had instant mastery over the steering and operation of the Peregrine's engines, had taken a moment or two more to locate something as simple as the mechanism for closing the shuttle's door. But he found it now, activated it, and the door swung shut with a hiss.
The Peregrine shuddered as something struck in a concentrated blast. Sulu recognized it immediately for what it was: a disruptor, being shot directly at the vehicle. Fortunately enough for them, handheld disruptors—while devastating against human bodies—were less so against heavy-duty inanimate objects such as shuttles.
Pedestrians scrambled to get out of the way as the Peregrine roared down the main street. Sulu quickly glanced at the exterior monitors, surveying the area around them. Then he afforded a quick glance at Ling Sui. She was staring resolutely straight ahead, finishing the process of belting herself in to her chair. Her face was slightly flushed, but otherwise she had composed herself very quickly.
For Sulu, it wasn't quite that simple.
He had leaped to a conclusion the moment that Kelles's head had exploded onto him. But it was not one that he had fully assimilated until just this moment as he scrutinized Ling Sui.
"That man was dead. Really dead."
"I know," said Ling Sui tightly. "Damn him, I warned him. Warned him." In anger she slapped the control board in front of her. "He got too damned self-confident. Even so, he deserved better than that."
"Really dead."
She looked at him with mild confusion. "Not to sound insensitive, but you must have encountered the occasional corpse before."
"But I thought this was all a—"
But then he stopped talking as he noticed something on the monitors. "Oh, no," he said.
"What?" She leaned over to see what had elicited his worried comment.
There were pursuers. Four of them, clinging fiercely to high-speed stratopods. They were small, one-man, high-speed vehicles, oblong in shape. Sulu had had one in his youth. He'd been fairly adept at steering it, and knew how maneuverable they were. Far more maneuverable than a Peregrine inner-city shuttlecraft.
For a moment he thought that perhaps they were the authorities. That being the case, Sulu would immediately bring the Peregrine to a halt, get out and explain the situation. . . .
Although that was somewhat problematic. Explain the situation and say what, precisely? That his female companion was involved in some sort of shady dealing? That he was involved as well, except he'd thought it was an elaborate setup?
It quickly became moot, however, because Sulu suddenly recognized one of their pursuers as the gunman from the rooftop who had, only moments ago, redecorated the front of Sulu's jacket.
All around them, people were scrambling to get out of the way. Some weren't fast enough, knocked aside by the stratopods. The drivers of those small vehicles clearly weren't concerned about whatever damage they might do. If matters continued in the current way, civilians were going to be injured, even killed. This was an intolerable situation.
In the depths of space, Sulu had instrumentation to tell him where he was and where he was heading. That, however, really served as little more than backup to his own innate ability to determine such things. With the briefest of glances at star groupings, Sulu could easily locate himself and the Enterprise in relation to all the many systems that he carried around in his head.
So determining where he was now in relation to the rest of the city was, comparatively, child's play.
A map of the city sprang into his mind, and he immediately "saw" where he was relative to the rest of the environs. He also quickly determined his only option.
"Hold on!" shouted Sulu.
Ling Sui did so, gripping firmly the sides of her chair even though she was belted in.
Sulu cut hard left. The Peregrine angled sharply, its rear swinging around and slamming against the corner of a building before the shuttle continued on its way. The stratopod drivers course-corrected instantly and maintained pursuit, but without managing to close the distance.
"Where are we going?" demanded Ling Sui.
Sulu replied with an inclination of his head. Ling Sui looked ahead of them and gasped.
Large entrance gates to the city of Demora loomed squarely in front of them. They were several stories tall and made of synthetic wood. They were more than adequate to repel the attacks from fake desert raiders.
Whether they could, however, withstand a direct hit from a fast-moving shuttle was another question. Ling Sui was somewhat appalled to discover that they were going to get the answer firsthand.
"Are you crazy?!" she demanded.
"We've got no choice," he shot back. "I'm not putting innocent people at risk."
"What about us?"
"We're already at risk! Brace yourself!"
One moment the gate seemed to be at a great distance, and the next they were on top of it. Sulu had a brief glimpse of people trying to wave him off, and then they were clearing the hell out of the way.
Sulu resisted the reflex to slow down and instead sped up even more. The Peregrine smashed through the gate, synthetic wood shattering under the impact with an earsplitting crack. The shuttle roared forward and out into the desert.
The stratopods, not slowing, kept in tight pursuit.
# Chapter Ten
SULU SHOVED THE PEREGRINE to its maximum speed, hoping that, whatever that might be, it would be faster than their pursuers. Ling Sui had lapsed into silence. She was, however, gripping the armrests so tightly that her knuckles were dead white. She stared resolutely out the smoked front windshield, watching the ground race past them at dizzying speed.
"Don't worry," said Sulu confidently. "This is a lot smaller and a lot slower than a starship. If I could helm that, I can certainly handle this."
"I think you should know," she said slowly, "that I have a fear of moving at high velocity."
"No reason to be concerned about going fast," he told her.
"I know, I know. It's the abrupt stops that should concern me."
"Exactly."
It was odd. With all the insane events in the past hours (again, it was hard to believe that it had all happened so quickly) he had remained confident. It was a confidence built on an incorrect belief on his part . . . a belief that he had nothing to worry about, because all the jeopardy was manufactured.
Yet now that he knew, beyond any doubt, that the danger was real—that his life and that of his companion were at risk—he felt no less confident. Because he was at the helm. He had his steady hand managing his fate, and he had utter belief in his ability to be master of his own destiny.
He had the conn, and when that was the case he knew he could certainly steer the ship to safety.
There was a heavy impact against the side of the shuttle, and the vessel rocked slightly under it. Sulu glanced at his monitors and, sure enough, the stratopods were closing. He could see the four pilots crouched, strapped in, controlling their trajectory with one hand and gripping disruptor guns in the other.
The city of Demora had already been left far behind. In front of them stretched endless vistas of the desert—unchanged, unspoiled. The Peregrine hugged the curve of the land as it swooped and dove, shooting up one sand dune, hurtling down another. The stabilizers kept the shuttle relatively even, but the sensation of forward motion was steady and, in Ling's case, apparently somewhat daunting. Despite the peril they were in, Sulu found it a bit amusing that this capable, resourceful, and intelligent woman had a bit of a weakness. It made her seem more accessible somehow.
The stratopods were closing and the riders fired again and again. The collective barrage was starting to take its toll. The last couple of hits caused the Peregrine to buck under Sulu's steady hand, and the helmsman came to the realization that simply moving wasn't going to be enough. He was going to have to attack somehow.
The thought of possible loss of life wasn't of major concern to him. Certainly he had launched enough photon torpedos, targeted enough phasers, so that the prospect of having to kill an opponent was not a daunting one. It was a necessary evil, but if it was a question of who was going to survive, then as far as Sulu was concerned it was no question at all.
The only problem was that the Peregrine had no weapons. Nor was Sulu himself armed. Nor was . . .
He looked at Ling. "Do you have a weapon on you?"
"I wish."
Okay. So much for that.
She looked at the monitor. "Here they come."
They were coming in a two-by-two formation, moving faster than Sulu would have thought possible. His first instinct was to activate deflectors. His second was to open fire. He had to remind himself that neither option was viable.
"All right," he said. "I suppose we're going to have to get innovative."
There was something in his voice that prompted her to glance at him. She saw where his hand was hovering. "Excuse me . . . that's the door," she said, trying not to sound patronizing.
"I'm aware of that," he said. There was one good thing about maneuvering through the desert; there were even fewer obstacles than steering through space. He watched the monitor steadily, gauging the speed of their approach. Closer they were coming, and closer, and still his right hand remained poised unflinchingly over the door button. One could have balanced a glass filled with wine on the back of his hand, and there wouldn't have been so much as a ripple in the surface of the drink.
They were drawing up right alongside the speeding shuttle. With any luck, that would prove to be a tactical error. "Just keep steady," he said under his breath to the pursuers, although naturally they couldn't hear him. "Three . . . two . . . one . . ."
He activated the door.
Obediently it swung upward, slamming into the stratopod driver who had, at that very moment, pulled alongside the Peregrine. It slammed him to the side and he lost control of his vehicle, the gyros smashed by the impact of the door. On the monitor Sulu had a brief glimpse of his face, twisting in a soundless shriek, and he recognized him as the man who'd been on the roof. The stratopod spiraled and then hit the ground, shattering and turning from a vehicle into a twisted mesh of metal. By the time it stopped rolling, the shuttle was long gone and Sulu was already concentrating on the other three.
He had already slammed the door shut again, reasoning that there was no way they were going to fall for such a stratagem again.
They were straddling the shuttle, pacing him on either side (although the fellow on the right, as Sulu had surmised, was keeping back from the door).
"Hold on," Sulu told Ling again. This time she didn't utter any word of protest, made no snide comment. Instead she simply nodded, and a smile had crept across her face. She seemed in the process of reassessing him.
The Peregrine lurched wildly from side to side as Sulu tried to send the shuttle slamming into the pursuers. He clipped one, but the operator recovered with more adroitness than the one whom Sulu had already managed to dispose of.
Sulu wished desperately that the Peregrine could go at a higher altitude, but it simply wasn't designed to maneuver that way. It had to be within a few feet of ground for the antigrav to function properly.
There was the shriek of weapons fire again, and this time the wall right nearby Sulu's head dented. He snapped his head back reflexively and cast the wall a worried look.
"All right," he said. "This is going to be tricky. I hope you don't get dizzy easily."
"What do you mean by th—?"
She didn't have time to finish the question, nor was it necessary. Sulu quickly demonstrated precisely what he meant.
He sent the Peregrine into a spin. The shuttle whirled, sailing to the left and moving like a buzz saw. It slammed into one of the stratopods, crushing the pod and driver instantly. The stratopod overturned and smashed into another one of the drivers. The driver howled in fury and overturned, colliding with the rear of the still-twirling shuttle. The stratopod erupted in flame, hitting the ground and leaving a skid mark thirty yards long.
Sulu felt the jolt, glanced at the controls. He'd lost some power to the engines from that last impact. He fought to pull the shuttle out of the spin. Ling Sui, for her part, gripped the sides of her chair firmly. Her jaw was set, giving her a very determined air, although Sulu suspected that most of the determination centered around not wanting to vomit.
The last of their pursuers had clearly decided to give them considerable distance. He was hovering meters away, keeping a safe distance from the wildly pivoting shuttle.
Sulu fought desperately with the controls, trying to bring the shuttle on line. The vehicle was within a hairsbreadth of flipping completely over, tearing up a large stretch of the desert sands. Sulu battled and pulled the vehicle back into line. It bucked slightly and then roared forward.
Another disruptor blast, and another, rocked the Peregrine. It was all Sulu could do to hold it on course. He checked the engine readings and didn't like what he saw at all. Then he looked at the monitor at their lone remaining pursuer, and he liked it even less.
For now he could clearly make out what he hadn't before; the man who was after them was Taine, his face twisted into an infuriated snarl. He brought his disruptor gun up and squeezed off a shot.
And then, suddenly, the shuttle shuddered under more disruptor fire and the monitors blinked out. Taine, resourceful fellow that he was, had managed to knock the exterior cameras out of commission. Except for visibility through the front windshield, they were flying blind.
Sulu surveyed their options and didn't find too terribly many. The hull of the Peregrine whined in protest. The vehicle was designed for travel, not combat, and Sulu had already pushed it to the limits of its structural capacity. Maybe even beyond the limits.
His mouth started to form words, but Ling beat him to it. "Let me guess: 'Hold on,'" she said.
"Exactly," he replied. He watched as Ling Sui braced herself once more. She looked at him with an expression that held utter confidence. It was fortunate she had it in him, because his own confidence was starting to waver ever so slightly.
"Here we go," he murmured, and slowed the shuttle's forward motion by half.
The stratopod shot right past it, Taine's head whipping around as he realized his target was no longer beside him. Sulu, banking on his reactions, counted on him to slow down out of reflex.
Which was precisely what he did.
And as he did that, Sulu immediately gunned the shuttle. As a result, the Peregrine leaped forward, roaring past the stratopod.
Leaving the next move as the trickiest. Sulu, one step ahead of his opponent, deduced that Taine—suddenly finding himself left behind—would immediately try to speed up once more. In anticipation of the move, Sulu slammed the shuttle to a complete halt . . . but at a ninety-degree angle relative to its previous position. Basically, he had just turned the Peregrine into a roadblock.
It all happened so quickly that Ling Sui didn't even have time to question what was going on. The result of Sulu's maneuver was exactly what he figured it would be: a loud thunk and a shudder as the accelerating stratopod collided broadside with the shuttle. In front of them, a twisted and empty stratopod fell away.
There was deathly silence for a moment . . . a moment to contemplate how fortunate they were that the monitor was down, so that they didn't have to stare at the sight of the stratopod's former occupant smeared all over the exterior of the shuttle.
"You . . . you did it," Ling Sui managed to say.
Then the windshield cracked, accompanied by the now-familiar whine of a disruptor.
It was the only warning that Sulu had. Hopefully it would be enough as Sulu sent the vehicle flying forward.
"He's on the roof! The bastard's on the roof!" shouted Ling Sui.
She was right. Sulu heard a thudding from overhead, the sound of a body tumbling. But it hadn't necessarily fallen off.
And then it happened. Repeated blasts from overhead, the ceiling denting in and then ripping open. Sulu tried to steer the shuttle violently enough to throw off their dedicated pursuer, but there were spiders who were less tenacious than this.
All that was visible was Taine's hand clutching the disruptor as he shoved it into the cabin of the Peregrine. He fired blindly as Sulu leaped away from the controls barely in time. The blast struck the control board, sparks flying from it, the board starting to melt into rivulets from the impact and the impending fire.
"Take over!" shouted Sulu as he lunged for the intruder's arm.
Ling looked helplessly at the ruined control board. The shuttle's forward motion had not diminished; if anything, it was picking up speed. "Take over what?" she shouted in exasperation.
Sulu wasn't exactly in a position to reply at that moment. He had barely dodged another blast, and now he had grabbed the wrist of their assailant and was struggling desperately, trying to pry the disruptor loose from his hand.
The hole in the ceiling ripped wide, and Taine tumbled down and through into the cabin. He was still clutching the disruptor with single-minded determination.
For all the battering he had taken, Taine did not seem to have been slowed down in the least. He nearly lifted Sulu off his feet as he slammed him up against a far wall.
Ling desperately tried to reroute control functions back through the main board, but there was nothing she could do. The shuttle was completely out of control, lurching wildly. Smoke was starting to pour from the ruined panels, blinding her. Then she heard Sulu's alarmed voice shout "Get down!" and she did so as a disruptor bolt ripped just above her head and blew apart the already-stressed windshield. Wind blew in, accelerating the spread of smoke through the cabin.
Sulu was still struggling hand to hand with Taine.
"You idiot!" snarled Taine. "I don't know what kind of game you think this is . . . but you're going to lose it!"
Sulu didn't bother to respond. What was there to say? He had thought it was a game. He pushed away from his mind the realization that he had been incredibly lucky thus far. Here he hadn't been taking the threat of Taine and his thugs seriously, and he could easily have been dead before realizing that he was in any true danger.
He struggled for leverage, found it, and drove a knee into Taine's gut. Taine grunted, didn't quite double over, but the wind was knocked out of him. He did not, however, lose his grip on his disruptor.
Ling Sui was trying to get close to help, but she was moving warily, keeping an eye on the barrel of the disruptor. It fired again and she barely managed to get out of the way.
One of the lower struts of the shuttle struck a dune, flipping the shuttle around. It sent Sulu and Taine tumbling, crashing into Ling Sui, and all three of them went down in a tumble of arms and legs.
For a moment they were frozen there, the three of them, and Taine and Ling Sui were snarling into each other's faces. Then Ling Sui head-butted him. He rolled back, clutching at his face, and Sulu yanked her to her feet.
In Ling Sui's hand was the disruptor. She swung it around and aimed it squarely at Taine.
"No!" shouted Sulu, yanking her hand wide, the disruptor blast exploding against the far wall.
She looked at him in shock. Sulu didn't bother to exchange words with her, because with the Peregrine hurtling wildly out of control, now was not the time to discuss the relative morals of the situation.
Taine lunged at them. Sulu sidestepped, gripping the disruptor firmly, and slammed the butt into Taine's head. It opened up a vicious gash in Taine's head, blood flowing from it and blinding him. Sulu shoved him aside, spun, and fired short, fast, and concentrated blasts at the top and bottom of the door. The door swung open, hanging loosely by strips of metal, and Sulu had a brief glimpse of the ground whizzing past.
Snagging Ling's wrist, he started for the door, apparently ready to hurl himself to his death. For the briefest of moments Ling hesitated, and she looked into Sulu's eyes.
And for the first time since the whole mad adventure had begun, something seemed to "lock" between them. As if in seeing each other, they actually saw each other for the first time.
She gave the slightest nod of her head, and moved with him. Sulu charged forward and slammed into the door, ripping it free from its moorings. For a moment Sulu and the door teetered on the edge, and in that moment he swung Ling Sui around so that she grabbed on to his back. And then the door fell clear of the hurtling shuttle, Sulu lying flat on his belly and Ling Sui holding on for dear life.
The door hit the desert sands and continued moving at the same clip as the shuttle. It was like being a child and riding on a sled, which would have brought back fond memories for Sulu if he'd grown up somewhere other than San Francisco. Sulu, however, was nothing if not a fast learner.
His fingers held fast to the underside of the door, the sand ripping his knuckles. He gritted his teeth, oddly reluctant to give in to his impulse to cry out. Ling Sui's body, curiously enough considering the circumstances, was relaxed against him. Maybe she had utter confidence in him. Maybe she had just shut down her mind so as not to deal with the still-imminent possibility of their mutual demise.
The door fishtailed around, slowing, and then suddenly it flipped completely over. And now Sulu did yell, an alarmed yelp, and he lost his hold on the door. They tumbled off, but fortunately they had slowed enough so that they were able to roll to a stop with only a few more bumps and bruises on them.
"You all right?" Sulu shouted.
"Yes. You?"
"I'm fine!" he shouted.
"Good!" She raised her voice. "Why are you shouting!?"
It was because his head was still ringing and his hearing was thrown off, but there was no need to go into details. Instead Sulu, his sleeves ripped, already feeling aches in his joints that would only get worse as time passed, looked after the hurtling shuttle.
It was moving so quickly that it was already a speck on the evening horizon, vanishing behind a series of dunes. Then suddenly there was a burst of light, followed moments later by the sound of the explosion.
Sulu and Ling Sui watched for a long time as flame danced across the miles-off dunes, smoke curling lazily into the air.
"Is he dead, you think?" asked Ling Sui after a while.
"We're not," Sulu pointed out.
"Yes, but we're the good guys."
"Are we?" Sulu propped himself up on one elbow and looked around, surveying their situation. The sun had almost set, which was actually the most positive thing they had going for them. Because the fact was that they were out in the middle of the Sahara with no supplies, no conveyances, and no way of covering the distance back to the city except on foot.
"What do you mean, 'Are we'?"
"We'll discuss it later."
"Sulu . . ."
"Later," he said firmly. "Come on."
"Come on where, exactly?" She looked around. "I can't see Demora from here. And we flew so far, so fast, I have absolutely no idea where the hell we are. Which way do we go?"
He paused a long moment, then looked up to the sky. The long red fingers of the setting sun were almost totally withdrawing, replaced by the twinkling of the stars.
"Wait," he said.
"Wait for what?"
He put up a finger and repeated patiently, "Wait."
She opened her mouth, but then closed it again, deciding to wait and see what this most curious of gentlemen was up to.
The sun vanished, the coolness of the nighttime desert settling in. Sulu continued to stare upward, as if communing with the stars. Ling found herself watching him with rapt fascination.
When he spoke it was so abruptly in the silence of the desert that it made her jump slightly.
"That way," he said, pointing.
She squinted, trying to imagine what in the world he might be pointing at. There was no sign of the city from this distance. "How do you know?"
He smiled confidently and held up his palm. "You might as well ask me how I know this is my hand. I look to the stars, and the stars guide me. People can be deceitful. People can tell you one thing and do another. But the stars don't lie."
She didn't say anything, merely shrugged.
Without another word, Sulu set out, with Ling Sui falling into step behind him.
# Chapter Eleven
THEY TRAVELED QUICKLY, and in silence, for the first hour. There was the unspoken understanding that it was important to try and cover as much distance as possible. Traveling during the day would not be a terribly pleasant experience with the desert sun beating down on them. Night was the time to cross the sands.
Sulu glanced at her every so often to make sure that she was keeping up. She seemed to have no trouble. At one point she stopped, removed her boots, and then continued walking. She actually moved faster barefoot. So much faster, in fact, that she passed him and Sulu quickly became aware that she could probably outdistance him with little trouble. She realized it at about the same time, apparently, and slowed down so that Sulu could keep up. She glanced at him as they drew side by side, and there was a degree of impishness on her face as they trudged up one sand dune and down another.
"You're very quick," he said finally, the first words spoken in over an hour.
She stopped and raised the soles of her feet for inspection. They looked hard as shoe leather. "I do a lot of walking," she said.
"So do I. Every morning. Although not barefoot, and not in conditions like this."
"I've crossed a desert or two in my time," she said.
"And what else have you done in your time?"
They got to the crest of a sand dune and Sulu slipped a bit going down it, but righted himself before he could fall over. "Well?" he said.
She looked at him curiously. "Well what?"
"Well what else have you done in your time? What's your time been spent doing?"
"This and that."
"And whatever it is you were ready to sell to Kelles . . . does that come under the category of 'this‣ or 'that'?"
She stopped walking and stared at him defiantly. "Don't be coy, Sulu. It doesn't suit you. You want to ask a question, ask it."
"All right. What is it you were trying to sell, and from whom did you steal it?"
Her gaze was level and she was quiet for a time. Then she said briskly, "None of your business."
He threw his hands up in exasperation. "Well that's helpful."
"The fact that you have to ask the question means that the answer is pointless."
"And the answer is—?"
"You won't believe me."
"Don't tell me what I will and won't believe." He stopped walking and waited. "Well?"
She kept walking. "I'm not going to tell you."
"I'm not moving until you do."
"Fine. Don't move then. To hell with you." She kept on going.
Sulu stayed exactly where he was, and was annoyed to find that he was admiring the sway of her hips and the way that her shoulder blades stood out against the back of her tight black shirt. Her hair swung pendulum-like as she strode away.
She got about a hundred feet, then came to a stop and sighed audibly. Then she turned around and walked back to Sulu, standing there with arms folded and reluctant amusement on her face.
"I don't know where I'm going."
"You mean short-term or long-term?"
She raised an eyebrow in a manner that eerily reminded Sulu of a certain Vulcan. "The latter depends somewhat on the former."
"True enough."
She sighed. "Okay. Come on."
He paused a moment to make sure that he understood her intent, and then he walked alongside her. As they continued their steady pace, Ling Sui licked her lips once—the only indication she gave that she was at all thirsty. "I'm freelance."
"Freelance? Freelance what?"
"Freelance whatever it takes. Freelance inventor, pilot, researcher, explorer . . . adventurer, for want of a better term. The technology I had to sell was invented by my current client."
"Your current client being—?"
"My current client being none of your damned business," she told him, although she didn't sound particularly angry when she said it.
"All right. Fair enough." They started up another sand dune. "Go on."
"My client had an assistant, name of Taine. I'm sure you remember him; he was trying to kill you a short while ago."
"He's somewhat fresh in my recollections, yes."
"Taine stole all the material related to my client's discovery. All the research, the findings . . . all of it. This is something one can accomplish when one is in a position of trust, as Taine was . . . although he's not anymore, as I'm sure you can surmise. This drove home to my client his vulnerability, not to mention the transitory nature of the exclusivity of discoveries. So he hired me to retrieve it: retrieve years and years‣ worth of computations, calculations, test results . . . more than my client could possibly have endeavored to reproduce simply from memory. Retrieve it . . . and line up a powerful buyer for it."
"If it was stolen, why didn't he just report it to the authorities?"
She looked at him in amusement. "You can't report matters to the authorities when there are questions connected that you'd rather not answer. Not all areas of research are 'approved,‣ Sulu."
"Was he involved with something dangerous?"
"By dangerous you mean would people become sick or die from it? No, not at all. Sometimes, though, things are forbidden. Once upon a time, it was heresy to suggest that the Earth revolved around the sun. But just because something is forbidden doesn't mean you don't have to investigate it anyway. Sometimes you do what you have to, even if the authorities would frown on it. Do you agree?"
Briefly Sulu's thoughts flew to the numerous times that James T. Kirk had stretched General Order 1 almost into unrecognizability. And yet somehow things had always managed to work out for the best, Kirk's instinct unerringly guiding them through the rocky shoals of Starfleet regs. Nor was Kirk unique; Mr. Spock (and who was more respectful of the logic of rules than a Vulcan?) had risked death to fly in the face of General Order 7.
But Sulu had never been in that position. He wondered what would happen if someday he was in a command situation and was asked to choose between orders and his sense of what was right and wrong. Indeed, it was only a matter of time before that did happen. He hoped he would do the right thing . . . or even be able to figure out precisely what the right thing was.
Yes . . . he knew he would figure it out. Because whatever it was, it would be the honorable thing. Right and wrong, rules and regulations—these things could be discussed and analyzed to death and even beyond. But honor was immutable. Honor was known. A question of honor was answered with as much clarity as the North Star.
"Yes . . . I agree," he said.
She looked surprised. "Hmmf. A Starfleet officer agreeing with that philosophy. Again you surprise me, Sulu. So . . . in any event, that's why I was brought into this. Because I wouldn't sit in judgment, and I wouldn't start quoting regulations or get involved in politics. I'd come in, do the job, and get out." She paused. "Except I didn't exactly do the job, it seems. I managed to steal the technology back from Taine, set up the meeting place for the sale to occur. And then the whole thing went straight to hell. Not your fault, though. Mine. Only mine."
"It was my fault, too. I . . ."
He paused, and she stopped walking and turned to look at him. "What's up with you, anyway?" she said in that slightly musical voice of hers. "There's something going on here, something you're not telling me. What is it? I've been as honest with you as I can . . . ."
"You'll laugh."
"Maybe," she agreed. "If it's stupid enough."
He stopped, sat down on a dune and pulled off his boots. Upending them, he watched sand pour out as he looked around their surroundings. "Is the entire Sahara like this?" he asked.
"Oh, no." She gestured. "This erg, for example . . ."
"Erg?"
"Sand dune. It's only, what? Ten meters high? There's ergs go as high as two hundred meters." At the expression on his face, she added, "Of course, it's not like the entire Sahara is nothing but ergs. After all, the damned thing's nine million square kilometers . . . as big as the United States. It's not all sand."
"No?"
"No," she said cheerfully. "Some places it's pebbles and gravel."
"Oh, well . . . that makes all the difference," Sulu acknowledged.
"So . . . what will I laugh at?"
"Oh." He'd hoped she'd forgotten. "Uhm . . . you're not going to find this easy to believe . . . but the whole thing back at the city? I thought it was a put-on."
"Put-on?" She shook her head, not understanding.
"I thought . . ." He sighed. "I was visiting with a friend . . . and I'd been complaining that there was no adventure to be had on Earth. That it couldn't possibly compare to the kinds of excitement that we encountered in space exploration. And what with the timing of all of this . . . and the outrageousness, the mysteriousness of it all . . . I was convinced he'd set it up. Demora is filled with people who are employees, or freelancers who are willing to be hired to perform some sort of bizarre adventure play. They were the evil villains, you were the mystery woman with the vague and exotic background. That's what I thought was going on here. Up until . . ." He paused and looked down again at the stain on his jacket that represented some of the remains of Kelles. "Well . . . I know better now."
"So when you went after Taine and the others that first time . . . you thought they were actors."
He paused, remembering. "Not when I first approached them, no. I thought they were following you to try and hurt you. It was only later, as matters escalated, that I thought it was faked."
"So you tried to help me initially believing that I was in trouble . . . and eventually, upon discovering your error, you then leaped to the rescue in a shuttle, engaged in a daring high-speed chase across the desert, battled hand to hand with a man who was trying to kill you, then hurled us to safety with a makeshift sled . . . and now you're concerned I'll laugh at you."
Sulu stared at her. "Well . . . I wouldn't have put it quite that way but, essentially . . . yes, that's right."
And to his utter astonishment she leaned over and kissed him full on the lips. It was brief, sweet, and refreshing, like a summer shower that comes from nowhere, vanishes to the same place, and leaves you feeling invigorated.
She looked at him and he would have sworn that the twinkling stars from overhead were reflected in her eyes.
"You are so cute," she told him. Then she patted him on the knee. "Come on. Let's go."
"By all means," he said, and pulled his boots back on.
She took his hand as they started up the next erg. They made it to the top, slid down the other side, and continued walking, His fingers interlaced with hers as they kept moving, slowly but steadily.
Neither of them complained, both remaining stoic about the situation. But as hour piled upon hour, their progress was nowhere near as rapid as either of them would have liked, and the lack of water was starting to get to them. Plus unspoken was the simple fact that time was against them. Sooner or later, the sun would rise. No one was more aware of that than Sulu. As the sun rose the heat would begin to rise as well, the temperature driven upward, going as high as 110 degrees Fahrenheit. It was incumbent upon them to get as far as they possibly could during the night, but it wasn't as if they'd already had the most restful of days.
As they scaled and then slid down dunes, no discussion passed between them. During the plateaus, however, they would talk. Sulu discussed his youth in San Francisco, and his Starfleet career, which began in physics but then switched to navigation and helm. His family, his friends.
And Ling, for her part, listened. She didn't volunteer much in the way of her own personal history, and when he pressed her she smiled and demurred. "Oh, come now, Sulu. Don't you remember? The mystery woman. What good would be served by knowing too much about the mystery woman."
"But you're not really."
"Oh, but I am. At least, I am now. I rather like it, I must admit." She smiled. "Understand, I don't think of myself that way. I'm just a hard worker, with a background that would sound rather mundane if I went into it. But being a 'mystery woman,‣ well . . . that's an honor. Even a responsibility."
"How is it a . . ." He stopped and pointed. "Look."
She followed where he was pointing, certain that they couldn't possibly be within view of the city. The shuttle had taken them too far, too fast. They couldn't have covered the distance that quickly. . . .
Then she saw it.
"An oasis," she said.
"At first I thought it might be a mirage."
"Not at night. Come on."
There were some ninety large oases throughout the Sahara, and many smaller ones. This was definitely one of the smaller ones, too small to support any sort of large settlement. But the vegetation, while not copious, was still lush, and the water was flowing from an underground spring. They drank of it greedily, for although they were nowhere near as dehydrated as they would have been had it been daytime, their thirst was nevertheless a very real thing.
Sulu let the water run over his parched lips, splashing it in his face, closing his eyes and letting it run over his head. He wavered slightly and realized that closing his eyes wasn't the best of ideas; he was that fatigued. He forced them open and looked at Ling Sui.
She had removed her shirt, revealing a black halter top beneath. Her arms were muscular, even more so than Sulu would have surmised. He could see the curve of her breasts beneath the halter, they looked small and firm. If she was aware of his gaze moving across her, she gave no indication of it. She soaked the shirt in the small spring and then draped it over herself.
"You didn't need me," he said after a time.
She looked up at him questioningly. "Pardon?"
"You seem familiar with the Sahara. From the bottoms of your feet it's clear that you've done a ton of walking. I'd wager you'd have no trouble looking at the stars and figuring out which way to go."
She smiled and looked down. "If you wagered it, your money would be safe."
"Then why . . . ?"
"Why?" She feigned surprise. "Why, don't you remember? I'm your mystery woman now."
He laughed softly.
"Oh, now you scoff," she said. "Obviously you don't really know anything about it."
"I don't?"
"No, you don't." She pulled her legs up and wrapped her arms around them. And she sounded very sincere as she said, "Every man—particularly every man of adventure—should have one mystery woman in his life, Sulu. That woman who enters his sphere like a comet. Who creates her own reality around him and swallows him up in it. Who 'gets‣ to him, inflaming his senses, heightening the sheer experience of living so that from then on, when he wakes up each morning ever after, the world seems a little different to him because he knows that she's somewhere out there in it.
"That woman whom he thinks about, wonders about . . . wonders if, sooner or later, she'll pop back into his life just as abruptly as she entered it before. With some new adventure in tow, some new villains seeking to do her in. It doesn't happen, of course, because such things never happen more than once, really. You can't have a string of mystery women; it's unfair to all those pathetic wretches who, in fact, never do get a mystery woman. And years into the future, when he murmurs her name in his sleep, his wife asks him about it in the morning and he shrugs and says, 'It was just a dream, honey. It's not supposed to make sense.'"
"You've got my entire life planned out for me, then? You come into it, you disappear from it, and I marry someone else and think of you now and then in fleeting moments?"
She looked at him sadly. "I hope not."
They were silent for a time, and then Ling Sui glanced around and said, "Do you think we should start walking again?" But she didn't sound tremendously enthused by the notion.
Nor was Sulu for that matter. He shook his head. "I don't know about you, but I've had a rather long day," he said wryly. "I don't think it'll be all that long until sunrise. And I doubt that we'd luck into another oasis right when the sun's coming up. But if we stay here . . ."
"Then we rest, recuperate, and start walking again tomorrow night." She nodded. "You're right, that's probably the way to go."
He nodded, then removed his jacket, rolling it up into a makeshift pillow that he positioned beneath his head. Ling Sui didn't seem to need any such contrivance, merely lying back with her head resting on the vegetation, her hands interlaced behind her head.
"Are you married, mystery woman?" he asked. "Or affianced, or in some way connected to someone else at the moment?"
"Oh, come on, Sulu," she chided. "Do I seem like that kind of woman?"
"I don't know what kind of woman you seem like. You're a mystery woman, remember."
"Right. That's right. Forgive me . . . this rarefied status is still new to me." Then, her voice soft and devoid of her cockiness, she said, "No. No husband. No fiancé. No one. You?"
"No one," he echoed.
"Ever feel lonely?"
"I have my friends. And I have the stars. We live in a galaxy so teeming with life . . . and I look up at the stars, knowing there are planets out there with alien life-forms that are likely looking right back at me. With all that, how can one ever be lonely."
"Oh, I feel exactly the same way. I've done my share of starhopping. Not on par with yours, of course, but I've gotten around. Seen a lot of things. Been up to my neck in one thing or another. Frankly, I don't even have time to be lonely."
"Same here."
"Ditto."
"Couldn't agree more."
She paused. "Ever feel lonely?" she asked again.
"Yes. A lot. You?"
"The same."
"Any regrets?"
He paused a moment, considering. "Do you want to wade through the same unconvincing rationalizations, or should we go straight for the truth."
"Oh, let's chance it."
"Regrets, yes."
"Same here. Although . . . it's not too late, you know. You're relatively young. So am I. We could each decide that's there more to life than running around and adventuring."
"Not too late?"
"No."
He gave it some thought and then sighed. "No, you're wrong. It's too late."
"I was afraid of that," she said.
They were quiet for a time more. It was so still, so silent around them, and Sulu became very aware of her breathing . . . and, curiously, he thought he could hear the steady rhythm of his own heart. . . .
"Why'd you switch?" she asked.
"Pardon?"
She rolled over, propping her head up on one hand. "Why did you switch?" she asked again. "From physics to helm. Aren't you just a . . . a chauffeur with delusions of grandeur?"
He chuckled softly at the metaphor. "Well, I'm in charge of weapons and tactical as well . . . plus, helming a starship is a bit more complicated than steering a vehicle."
"But that's not why."
"No, it's not." He hadn't stopped looking at the stars. "It's because, as I spent time in the lab, I suddenly came to the realization that, in that part of the service, I'd continue to spend my time in labs. Labs on a science vessel, labs on a starship . . . didn't matter. I'd be down in the bowels of the ship somewhere doing reports, making studies, passing answers on to the captain, who'd be up on the bridge doing whatever was necessary for the survival of the ship and crew.
"And I was talking with my mother one day, and I told her what I was learning at the Academy. And maybe she sensed somehow that I wasn't entirely happy with it. Part of what had drawn me to physics was that my father was a physicist, and so I just felt the inclination to follow in his footsteps. And she said to me—I suspect in hopes of prompting me to stay Earthbound—'I don't understand why you have to be out in space to be a physicist.‣ And I tried to have an answer for that . . . I think I even muttered something, although it was something clever such as 'You wouldn't understand.‣ But the fact was that she was right. There was no reason. Not really. Oh, there were experiments certainly that could only be conducted in space, but . . . was that sufficient reason? And I realized to me, at least, it wasn't.
"But helmsman . . . steering the ship . . . looking straight ahead and seeing the stars clustered in front of you . . . that's what I was really going out there for, Ling. For the stars. To go out and there lose myself in them."
"A helmsman who wants to lose himself? Doesn't sound promising."
He yawned and said, "There's no problem with losing yourself . . . as long as you can always find your way back."
"I suppose you're right," she said. "I suppose that—"
But the rest of what she said began to haze out to him and, almost before he realized it, he was asleep.
* * *
He was in that place where waking and dreaming intersect. . . . Stars seemed to float about him, and he was unsure of whether he was at the helm of the Enterprise or staring up into the night skies above the Sahara. It was an odd sensation, because usually one isn't aware that one is dreaming, and yet here he was, feeling as if the stars were rushing past him as he sped toward some odd destiny.
Star clusters were swirling in front of him, surrounded by blackness, and then they seemed to regroup and form the outline of a face . . .
Her face . . .
"Your mystery woman," she said to him, and she brought her lips to his. She tasted so sweet . . . she tasted like wild abandon, and youth, and adventure, and for bidden fruit that he could not resist here in the garden, and he told her all this, and she laughed. "Tasted all that before, have you, so you could compare?" she said teasingly. . . . And her hands were everywhere, she was everywhere in the dream, in the reality, the stars surrounding them and he had no idea if he was sleeping or awake or both. . . .
"Let this ease both our loneliness, at least for a little while," she whispered, her breath warm in his ear, and whether he was sleeping or awake he didn't care because it felt too good, what she was doing to him, too good, the muscular body moving against his and the heat, God, the heat was . . .
. . . pounding on him.
He sat up, blinking against the sun, suddenly aware that he was baking in it.
It was high above him, so high that he thought it might be around noon or so. The growth around him had protected him for a time, but the sun had moved into position so that it was shining down on him now.
He rolled over, his joints stiff, and he splashed water on his face from the stream.
"Ling Sui," he started to say, and looked up.
She wasn't there.
At first it didn't register on him that she was gone. He thought he was just looking in the wrong direction, but when he rolled over he saw that he was, in fact, alone.
He got to his feet, his legs wavering slightly. "Ling Sui!" he called again, his voice sounding hoarse.
No reply came except the echo of his own voice.
No sound except the nothingness of the desert . . . and the cries of Sulu shouting a name over and over.
# Chapter Twelve
THE MAN WHO WAS KNOWN in the city of Demora as Mr. Molo, designated the Magistrate (and who was known to the creators of the city of Demora as Arnold Brinkman, and was designated on-site manager) let smoke curl lazily from the (fake) cigarette he held delicately between his large fingers. His suit was white, his fez was red, and his ceiling fan was broken.
He was staring across the spotless surface of his desk at the disheveled Asian gentleman seated directly across from him. He had an associate who was a bit younger and not remotely disheveled.
Staying consistent with the ambience of Demora as a whole, Mr. Molo was taking notes on a notepad with a scratchy pencil. "So let's see if I understand this," he said softly, looking over what he'd written. "You were chatting with a young woman, Lieutenant Commander Sulu . . . and suddenly people began shooting . . . you panicked, leaped into a nearby vehicle, and fled, eventually crashing the vehicle in the desert. You walked for a time with the young lady, found an oasis . . . the young lady disappeared during the night . . ." He turned his attention to Chekov. "And then you found him?"
"I vas concerned," said Chekov. "He vas out all night." He looked at Sulu with a deadpan. "You know how I vorry."
Sulu's face was inscrutable. With no comment, Mr. Molo continued, "You rented out a shuttle, began combing the desert, and stumbled over him? That was fairly lucky."
"Lucky?" Chekov looked indignant. "I'll have you know, Meester Molo, that I've piloted shuttlecrafts through ion storms searching for lost landing parties on a planet of active wolcanoes. Spotting Meester Sulu vas child's play."
Mr. Molo took a long drag on his cigarette, then turned his swivel chair in preparation to heft his bulk to a standing position. His back was momentarily to the Starfleet officers, and Sulu took the opportunity to turn to Chekov and mouth, Active volcanoes?
Chekov shrugged. Damn, but it had sounded impressive.
"But you were less successful finding the young woman."
"Ve continued the search in an expanding radius. We searched for several hours. There was no sign of her."
"Where do you think she went?"
Chekov gave him a slightly patronizing look. "If I had an idea of vere she vent, ve vould have gone there and gotten her. Yes?"
Apparently unfazed, Molo turned his attention back to Sulu. "What were you doing in the Thieves Quarter?"
"Being shot at. I told you."
"Were they shooting at you? Or at the young woman?"
"I didn't stop to ask them. They didn't seem the type to be generous with providing information."
"And you never saw the woman before that?"
"Never."
"And did the young woman tell you her name?"
Sulu seemed to hesitate a moment, and then said, "Yes."
His pencil poised over his notepad, Mr. Molo prompted, "And that name would be?"
"Moo."
Mr. Molo blinked. "Would that be a first name or last name?"
"First."
"Most unusual."
"I believe she said she grew up on a farm."
"All right," said Mr. Molo, and he carefully wrote the name, Moo. "Last name?"
"Shu pork."
Chekov cleared his throat loudly, giving him the opportunity to put his hand carefully over his mouth to cover his smile. Sulu remained expressionless.
Mr. Molo allowed the pencil point to hover over the notepad for a moment before he laid the pencil down gently. He steepled his fingers. "Do you think you're funny, Lieutenant Commander? Do you think that a complaint to Starfleet over your questionable conduct in our city would be as amusing as you?"
Slowly Sulu leaned forward, his eyes unblinking. "What I think, Mr. Molo, is that I'm hot. I'm tired. I'm parched. What I think"—and then his voice became low and hoarse, and there was an edge to it that could have carved diamond—"what I think is that you're dirty. Filthy, in fact. I think there are things that go on in this town that are illegal and immoral, and payoffs are made, all of which go into your pocket. I think this lovely little fantasy city has developed its own dark underbelly, just like the cities it was created to imitate. I think you provide information to whoever wants it for the right price. That you don't give a damn about anyone or anything except lining your own pocket. Or maybe it goes higher, to your employer's organization. And if you want to start investigations in Starfleet of me, then you'd better be ready to withstand some heavy-duty investigating directed right back at you. Take your best shot, and I'll take mine, and we'll see who's left standing."
There was a long, deathly silence.
Then, very slowly, Mr. Molo slid open his desk drawer and placed his notepad into it. His pencil went into a pencil holder.
"I apologize for the inconveniences you've encountered, Lieutenant Commander," he said. "I've already sent word to your hotel that all charges are to be considered compliments of management."
Sulu made no motion. Not a nod, or even a blink of an eyebrow. He might as well have been carved from marble.
Chekov rose from his chair and said levelly, "Ve appreciate the gesture."
They started for the door, and as they approached it Mr. Molo said, "Oh, and gentlemen . . ."
They turned to him and waited.
". . . your business is so joyous to have, that I think it would be criminal to keep it all to ourselves. I think you should consider bringing future business to as many other places as possible. Share the wealth, as it were."
"Other places besides here," said Chekov.
"Actually, I was thinking any place but here."
Sulu nodded slowly. "So was I." And they walked out.
* * *
Their bags sat on the bed, packed and waiting for the bellman to come upstairs. Sulu stood on the porch, watching the sun halfway up in the sky.
They had stayed one more night, made one more sweep of the desert. But there had been no sign of her. They had also gone exploring in the Thieves Quarter, this time quietly armed with phasers that Chekov had acquired through means that he didn't volunteer and Sulu didn't inquire about. Still no sign. The mention of her name drew blank stares.
Sulu found where her apartment had been. It was vacant. He found the warehouse where he'd been imprisoned. Empty.
"I swear to you, I didn't arrange it," Chekov had said to him. He didn't have to work hard to convince Sulu of that; Sulu was already a believer.
Now, on the veranda, Sulu let out a sigh. Chekov was doing one of his usual last-minute checks of drawers to make sure nothing had been overlooked. He paused and glanced over at his friend. "If you like, ve can stay longer. See if . . ."
Sulu shook his head. "No. She's gone because she wants to be gone. No trace of her footprints in the sand. No trace of her. Gone. All gone."
"As if none of it mattered."
"Oh," Sulu said, "it mattered. It mattered to me. Whatever happens with her now . . . it's out of my control. That's always a difficult thing for a helmsman to admit: that he's not steering the vessel."
"It's not like you to give up."
"Give up?" Sulu looked at him in surprise. "It has nothing to do with giving up, Chekov. It's simply the end, that's all."
"The end?"
"Of course. Someone once said . . . I don't remember who . . . that the entire trick to ending a story is to know where to end it. Saying 'They lived happily ever after‣ only works because you've ended the story at a high point. If you continue it beyond that point, eventually the hero and heroine grow old and die. Every story really has an unhappy ending. It's all in the timing. Ling Sui . . . she knew the timing called for her to mysteriously disappear. What else was she supposed to do? Stick with me, marry me, grow old and die with me? No no, Pav . . . that would be all wrong. All wrong. This story ends where it has to: on a note of mystery. Anything else would be . . . inappropriate."
There was a knock at the door. The bellman entered, picking up their bags and heading down to the lobby. Chekov walked over to Sulu, stood next to him for a moment, looking out at the sun, and then said, "Those things you vere just saying . . ."
"Yes?"
"You do realize, of course, that I have absolutely no idea vat you vere talking about."
"Of course."
"I mean, it makes no sense at all."
Sulu patted him on the arm and said, "It's just a dream, honey. It's not supposed to make sense." He walked out the door.
"'Honey'?" Chekov muttered. Then he shrugged. "Oh veil," he said, and headed out after Sulu.
## SECTION THREE
# MEMORIAL
# Chapter Thirteen
THE FUNERAL WAS SO PACKED that for a moment Sulu thought he wouldn't be able to get in.
He recognized a number of people from his own crew, and it seemed as if the entire crew of the Enterprise 1701-B had shown up as well. He had no idea what the maximum capacity in the Starfleet memorial chapel was, but whatever that magic number might be, it had to be pushing at the seams by this point.
He stood outside it a moment, looking off to the right. The Golden Gate Bridge gleamed in the morning sun. He remembered when he'd attended Starfleet, he'd always considered the view of the bridge symbolic. The Academy was supposed to be the bridge to the stars. Somehow that seemed consistent with the Academy's motto of "Ex astris, scientia"—"From the stars, knowledge."
Knowledge.
He'd been staring at the stars a great deal lately. Watching them move past from the rarefied position of his command chair rather than the helm. Looking to them for answers. For knowledge.
The stars, which had told him so much in the past, had stopped talking to him. If they had knowledge or understanding of his daughter's fate, they were mute.
Stars didn't twinkle in space, of course. They simply sat there against their black velvet backdrop, unblinking. Staring at him. Laughing at him. Keeping their secrets to themselves.
He'd looked to the stars when James Kirk had died. Looking for answers, looking for understanding. Seeking to grasp what justice there was in Kirk's abrupt and pointless demise while saving lives.
The stars had responded with silence then, too. Yet he had divined answers from them. The notion that Kirk was never meant to die quietly of old age on some bed somewhere. Despite his nominal roles as diplomat and explorer, what he was was, first and foremost, a warrior (he'd referred to himself as a soldier on more than one occasion). Yes, a warrior, battling against ignorance. Against fear. Against death. He'd gone out the way he would have wanted, indeed the only way it was possible for him to go.
But Demora . . .?
She'd barely begun. She'd had none of the experiences, none of the opportunities that Kirk had had. All she'd had were dreams and hopes. Seated at the helm of the Enterprise . . . or at least the ship bearing the name Enterprise . . . ready to follow her father's path.
Except her father's path had taken him to great and glorious adventures, to the command of a starship, to . . . who knew where?
And hers had taken her to a pointless and confusing death.
He'd looked to the stars for answers, and gotten no reply at all. And this time, when the stars stared unblinkingly and silently at him, it hadn't seemed profound. He'd garnered nothing from it. It had just angered him, as if they knew something they weren't telling him.
A hand rested on his shoulder, startling him slightly. He turned and found himself looking into the face of Uhura. Standing just behind her was Chekov. They were in their dress uniforms.
Uhura's eyes were red. "I'm so sorry," she whispered, and held him close.
"I know."
"If there's anything I can do . . ." It was the type of thing one said in such circumstances, even though helplessness was the theme of the day. Chekov, grim-faced, nodded in agreement with Uhura's sentiments.
"I appreciate that," said Sulu, and he truly did. He knew from personal experience that these were the sort of people who would willingly walk into the fires of hell for him if he told them that, by doing so, Demora would be returned to him.
"It's not fair," said Chekov through gritted teeth. There was so much anger radiating from him that it was palpable.
"No. It's not," agreed Sulu.
"We . . . weren't able to let Scotty know in time," Uhura said apologetically. "We got a message out to the Jenolen. It's transporting him to a retirement community at the Norpin Colony. We haven't heard back yet."
"That's all right," said Sulu. "If anyone is entitled to an undisturbed retirement, it's Scotty."
"Meester Spock is on some sort of diplomatic mission," Chekov said. "Ve got vord to Dr. McCoy, but he's ill at the moment."
Sulu looked up in concern. "Anything we should worry about?"
"He said it was nothing a transplant wouldn't be curing. Fortunately he's got several cloned organs in the bank. He'll be fine."
"That's good to know."
Uhura looked him in the eyes and was concerned. He didn't look like . . . himself.
"Are you sure you're all right?" she asked doubtfully.
"Yes. I'm sure."
Sulu turned away then and started into the chapel. As he approached, he was immediately recognized. Despite the density of the crowd, a path seemed to melt away for him.
Uhura didn't follow immediately, and Chekov looked to her questioningly. "Vat is it?" he asked.
She paused and then said, "You know . . . when we look at stars, we're really not seeing what's there."
"Of course." He shrugged. "Because of the time the light takes to travel. A star can be dead, but ve still see the light from it." He stared at her uncomprehendingly. "So?"
"So . . . so that's what Sulu seemed like just now. There was something in his eyes . . . some faint glimmer of life . . . but it was as if the point of origin was dead. As if part of him had simply . . . disconnected."
"I don't blame him," said Chekov, and then he added darkly, "But I know who I do blame."
* * *
Captain John Harriman stepped up to the podium at the front of the chapel and looked out at the assembled Starfleet personnel.
Behind him, in an urn, were the mortal remains of Demora Sulu. Harriman couldn't quite bring himself to turn and look at them.
He began to speak and, to his horror, found that his throat had completely closed up. All he made was the slightest of gagging noises. He hoped that no one noticed; that the sea of faces looking up at him wasn't aware that inside he was shaking.
Because he'd killed her. He'd shot her and shot her until she stopped moving.
He hadn't slept since that moment. Minutes here and there, floating in the gray area of drowsiness, was all he had managed to snag.
He'd replayed the moment over and over in his mind, the entire sequence of events that had led up to the nude, unmoving body of Demora Sulu lying dead on the planet surface. He had tried to figure out what other way he could have handled it. What action he could have taken so that she might have lived and he would not feel like a murderer.
If he'd been faster . . .
. . . stronger . . .
. . . smarter, better . . .
. . . better, that's what it came down to, didn't it. His drive to be the best. The drive that had brought him the captaincy of the flagship of the fleet.
Was he all will and no skill?
He saw Hikaru Sulu.
He hadn't spotted him at first. He hated to admit it, but there had been a sense of relief. Looking Hikaru Sulu in the face was going to be the hardest part of all this.
The faces of his crew members had been tough enough. The looks, the sidelong glances, the conversations that would mysteriously dry up the moment that Harriman came within earshot.
But Sulu . . .
It had been tough enough at the Enterprise launch, with the eyes of three living legends drilling into the back of his neck. But, good lord, having Hikaru Sulu staring straight at him . . . he'd gone from living legends to living hell.
A moment passed between the two men, and it was as if Harriman projected a thought to him. And the thought was, Perhaps you should come up here and do this. . . .
And it was clear that Sulu had gotten the "message," because he gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head. He didn't want to get up in front of this audience. He was going to sit there unmoving, unspeaking, in the eighth row, and Harriman was going to hang out there all by himself. Which was certainly no less than Harriman felt he deserved.
All of it—Harriman's hesitation, his strangled cough, his reflection on what life had been like for him recently, and the entire silent communication with Sulu—it had all taken place in just over a second or two.
He squared his shoulders and began again, and this time—thankfully—his voice emerged firm and confident, belying the inner turmoil he felt.
"When we sign on for our exploratory service . . . we know the risk involved. We know how fragile is our existence, surrounded by a crushing vacuum, encountering unknowns at every turn. But we take that risk, we embrace that risk, because we want to. We need to.
"Nevertheless, acknowledging the inevitability of death and facing it are two different things. Especially when the circumstances are as . . . unfortunate and tragic as Demora Sulu's passing was.
"Demora Sulu was liked and admired aboard the Enterprise. She was a good friend. She was a good officer. She deserved better than what happened. And the fact that we will never fully understand what happened makes it all the more frustrating. We want answers. And the hard truth of the universe we live in is that answers are not only not always forthcoming, but oftentimes they're in short supply.
"She was eager and willing to learn. Her bravery was unquestioned. And she was unfailingly cheerful. She would always have a smile on her face, and she seemed to greet each day with unrestrained joy.
"She was fond of chocolate, saying she loved it more than it loved her. She was a gifted athlete, something of a gymnast. She was a . . ." He actually smiled slightly in spite of himself. "She was an abominable poker player, which made her rather popular. She liked to sing, her enthusiasm outstripping her actual musical skill. And that was part of her charm as well. It is a source of tremendous frustration that we didn't spend more time with her. Didn't have the opportunity to get to know her better.
"As is routine, she specified disposition of her remains in the event of . . ." And for the first time he forced himself to look at the urn. ". . . this. It is her wish that her ashes be scattered into Earth's sun so that . . . according to her will . . . she could keep an eye on what was going on here."
This actually prompted smiles from several in the audience. Soft chuckles of people remembering Demora's rather unique thought process.
"We will honor her request. And, in this ceremony, we will honor her memory. I invite anyone who wishes to share recollections of her to come up and say something about her."
There was a pause, that always uncomfortable moment when no one is sure what anyone else is doing. People glancing at one another, trying to determine through some sort of silent divining who's going to be first up.
More than one pair of eyes turned to Hikaru Sulu.
He didn't move.
Chekov, however, did. He rose at about the same time that Maggie Thompson did. But Thompson immediately sat when she saw who had risen.
Chekov's footsteps seemed to echo in the otherwise silent chapel. He reached the front, turned to face the assemblage, and began to speak.
He spoke of Demora's life. Of the honor he'd felt being made her godfather. Anecdotes that alternately brought smiles and tears to the faces of the mourners.
He was, in short, in excellent form. Never better, in fact. In every way, he rose to the occasion.
Hikaru Sulu didn't hear a word of it.
Instead he was staring intently, unblinkingly at Harriman. Every so often Harriman would glance Sulu's way, seemingly just to check if Sulu was still watching him.
He was.
It was as if he was trying to drill a hole into the man's mind. To see what was in there, to determine firsthand how remorseful he was. To see whether he was devastated, eaten up, or simply accepting of the concept that, hey, she knew what the risks were. That's just simply the way it plays out sometimes.
Harriman felt his soul beginning to wither under the intense scrutiny. And then, slowly, his fatigue, his frustration, his own soul-searching and acute self-examination began to rally. Damn it, he felt guilty enough. He didn't need to feel more so, and even if this was Demora's father, and even if he was legendary, right up there with Kirk, still . . . where did Sulu get off staring at him relentlessly, remorselessly.
He hadn't meant to kill her. It was an accident. The whole thing was a grotesque, outlandish accident, and if Hikaru Sulu had been in the exact same position he'd have done the exact same thing, so get the hell out of my head, thought Harriman.
After Chekov was done, other crewmen came up, one by one, to talk about Demora. But Harriman went through the rest of the memorial service on autopilot. Instead he felt as if he were busy fighting a silent war. It was a war against a man who was certainly no stranger to battle, but Harriman had reserves of strength that he had not even begun to tap.
And if Demora Sulu deserved better, well . . . so did he.
* * *
The congregants were gathering in the courtyard outside the chapel. Since Demora had already been cremated, there was obviously no cemetery to go to. The service with the ashes being delivered into the heart of Sol would take place aboard the Enterprise as the ship prepared to leave orbit.
Chekov, Sulu, and Uhura were gathered in a small group, talking among themselves. Every so often officers or friends of Demora's would drift past and offer their condolences. Sulu nodded gravely, shook hands, accepted the kind words.
Harriman watched, fatigue and his own gnawing guilt (although he wouldn't have recognized it as such, most likely) pushing at him. He squared his shoulders and strode over toward the former Enterprise officers. They looked up as he approached, and he noted that Uhura took a step closer to Sulu in an almost protective posture. Chekov stood his ground. Sulu didn't move at all; a mannequin would have shown more life.
"Captain Sulu . . . I just wish you to know . . . I share your loss," said Harriman. And then he braced himself. Braced himself for the likely invective that would flow forth. The grief and anguish of a father who'd had his only child gunned down, face-to-face with the man who pulled the trigger.
Sulu's eyes flashed for just a moment. Uhura seemed to react to it, as if she'd noticed something she hadn't before. But then Sulu reined himself in, brushing aside the anger and frustration that threatened to overwhelm him.
"It's . . . never easy to lose a crew member," Sulu said. "Under circumstances like these . . ." His voice trailed off and then he cleared his throat and said, "You . . . did the best you could. It's all right."
Inwardly, Harriman let out a sigh. Sulu could have said anything. Could even have walked away, cold-shouldered him. Relief flooded through Harriman.
"I . . . appreciate that, sir," he said. "The responsibility is mine. I know that you can empathize with that. Hell . . . even Captain Kirk lost his share of crew members. I doubt it ever got easier for him."
Sulu nodded, his face impassive.
And then Chekov muttered something.
Harriman hadn't quite heard it, and his head snapped around to lock gazes with Chekov. And whereas Sulu had seemed self-possessed, even slightly removed . . . Chekov was glaring at him with all the anger and fury that Harriman had been inflicting on himself.
And Harriman bristled.
"Did you say something to me, sir?"
"Not a thing," Chekov replied.
For a moment the air between them was electric. Then Harriman started to turn away, and then Chekov was right in front of him, right in his face, anger to the boiling point and beyond.
"Keptin Kirk vould have found another way."
"Would he," said Harriman icily.
"An unarmed girl . . . and you found no other vay to stop her than to shoot her down like a dog." Chekov's voice was rising with fury. Sulu put a hand on Chekov's shoulder, trying to calm him, but Chekov shrugged it off.
"You weren't there."
"No, I vasn't. Because if I had been there . . . if he had been there," and he pointed at Sulu, then gestured to Uhura, "if she had been there . . . if anyone else had been there, Demora would be alive. But no! It vas you! Ve served vit Keptin Kirk, and ve survived five-year mission after five-year mission!"
"Pavel," and now Uhura was trying to calm him, but it wasn't helping. His voice rose, thunderous, and now everyone was looking at him. Officers, diplomats, everyone was watching in thunderstruck amazement.
"But not Demora Sulu! No, she didn't survive five years. Not even five months on your Enterprise! And Keptin Kirk? He didn't even survive five minutes! And you call yourself a keptin?!"
Harriman was trembling within as he said in low fury, "I don't think you're exactly the best person to hold me up to opprobrium, Commander. With all due respect . . . it's Starfleet that calls me a captain, and a starship commander. Something, I should point out, that they have never, and will never, call you."
Harriman was approximately a head taller and fifteen years younger than Chekov. That made no difference, however, because Chekov's left-handed punch hit him squarely on the point of his chin.
Fortunately for Harriman, he did not go down, but instead only staggered.
Unfortunately for Harriman, Chekov was by nature right-handed. And a split second after Chekov had tagged him with his left, he hauled back and dropped him with his right.
Harriman went down, his lip split, slightly dazed.
Now everyone was shouting, trying to pull Chekov away. He was unleashing a string of profanities in Russian.
"Pavel, calm down! This isn't helping!" Sulu was shouting.
But Harriman was back on his feet, and the world seemed to haze red in front of him. He felt as if the surface of Askalon V were crunching beneath him once more, and he drove forward and crashed into Chekov. Chekov met the charge and they shoved against each other even as people tried to pull them apart. They tore at each other's jackets, decorum forgotten, the solemnity of the moment forgotten. The only thing that mattered was doing something about the anger that both of them felt. Anger directed from Chekov at Harriman, and anger directed from Harriman at . . . himself.
"Stop it!" Sulu bellowed, coming between them, shoving them away from each other. "Do you think she would want this? Do you? Do you?!"
Chekov and Harriman glared at each other, chests heaving. They said nothing, for, indeed, what was there to say? They turned away from each other and walked away in opposite directions, leaving silence hanging over the assemblage.
# Chapter Fourteen
HARRIMAN SAT in his quarters aboard the Enterprise, studying his face in the mirror. The swelling had gone down somewhat, which was fortunate.
His door chime beeped. He wasn't especially in the mood to receive visitors; on the other hand, he didn't want anyone to accuse him of hiding in his stateroom. "Come," he called.
The door slid open and Harriman was literally stunned to see who'd entered.
It was a Starfleet admiral, square-shouldered, barrel-chested, white hair trimmed in a buzz cut. He stood half a head taller than Harriman and the room seemed to expand to incorporate his presence.
"Admiral!" Harriman was immediately on his feet. "I wasn't expecting you! I'd have . . . have arranged for a detail to . . ."
The admiral made a dismissive wave. "No need to worry, son. Some people my age like to stand on ceremony, and others like to walk around it. Me, hell . . . I run around it." He stuck out a hand and Harriman shook it firmly. "How you feeling, son?"
Harriman sighed. "I won't lie; it's been rough, Father."
Admiral Blackjack Harriman nodded sympathetically. Technically speaking, he was John Harriman, Senior, making his son Junior. But he'd been called Jack for as long as he could remember, and Blackjack since his Academy days wherein his card playing skills became legendary.
"Glad you're not lying, son," said the admiral. "You never could lie to me, you know. Never."
"Sit down, sir, please."
Blackjack took his son's chin and turned his head this way and that. "Chekov really tore into you, didn't he," said Blackjack. "Starfleet's all abuzz about it. He didn't do himself much good with that little stunt."
"Well, I can't exactly say that I've done myself all that much good either," admitted Harriman.
Blackjack sighed, his meaty fingers resting on his lap. "Well, let's get the simple stuff out of the way. The main reason I'm here is that I'm going to be attending that reception on Donatti Two. Scientifically advanced society, good strategic location . . . and, as it so happens, their sovereign emperor is a nut about Earth card games." He winked broadly. "I'll try not to fleece him too badly, for the sake of interstellar harmony. In any event, I was going to be hitching a transport out there . . . but since you rerouted Enterprise here, Starfleet decided I might as well arrive in style. Seemed like the ideal opportunity to catch a lift from my only son."
"It's an honor to have you aboard, sir."
The admiral leaned forward, his face darkening. "Having a rough time of it, aren't you, son."
"You could say that, sir. I'm . . ." He sighed. "I'm afraid I'm being regarded as something of a jinx."
"Listen, son. There's something I want you to understand, and it goes no further than this room. Get it?"
Harriman nodded.
"Because," continued Blackjack, "I know Kirk had a lot of friends. And hell, I'll admit his accomplishments were not inconsiderable. But a good officer, John, he was not."
"But . . . this isn't about Kirk."
"Oh, yes it is," said Blackjack. "What happened to the girl is tragic, sure, but tragedies happen all the time. Yeah . . . you killed her. Guess what, son. Every time a commander ever sent troops into a situation, knowing that most of 'em wouldn't be coming back except in pieces, that commander was killing those people. They all had folks, and they all had friends, and they were all dead. And that's just the way of it, is all.
"But what's giving this thing its subtext is the Kirk connection. And I'm telling you right now—and I can say this as an admiral, not as your father—that you're ten times the officer Kirk ever was. Kirk was a cowboy, a troublemaker. Thought he owned the galaxy. Thought he had all the answers. Second-guessed regs all the time, did what he felt like doing and managed to come up smelling like a rose because he had admirers in the right places. That, and people who were willing to tolerate his activities as long as it didn't backfire. They gave him the rope, and maybe he tripped on it every now and then, but he never hung himself with it.
"And what's frightening to me as an officer in Starfleet is the notion that some young officers might see him as a role model. That's not what we need, Johnny. We need officers with smarts . . . and respect . . . and an awareness that Starfleet is a unit, and must function with that sort of respect for the order of things. You understand that. Kirk never understood it, and none of Kirk's officers ever understood it. That's why Commander Chekov vented his spleen. I'm just sorry you had to be the recipient of it."
"I'm sorry, too, sir."
Blackjack stood and clapped Harriman on the shoulder. "I'm gonna go grab some chow. Join me?"
Harriman shrugged and then nodded. "Whatever you say, sir. Wouldn't want to buck a senior officer."
"That's my boy!" laughed the admiral, and they headed down to the officers‣ lounge.
* * *
Chekov paced Sulu's apartment, holding a coldpak against his eye. Uhura was seated nearby and looking at him accusingly. At a table, Sulu was calmly pouring out tea.
"Do you have any idea what a fool you made of yourself?" Uhura demanded.
"I'd do it again," shot back Chekov.
"Oh, I see. Well, you're not a fool, then. You're a damned fool."
"I appreciate the wote of confidence."
"Appreciate this then, too," Uhura told him. "Whether you like it or not, Chekov, the fact is that Starfleet has reviewed the facts regarding Demora's death, taken depositions from the other crew members involved, and concluded that Captain Harriman acted properly."
"Oh, acted properly, yes. Paragon of wirtue, that one." He shook his head, removed the coldpak, and examined his face in a mirror. "He has the nerve to stand there and say he takes responsibility for vat happened. Takes responsibility how, precisely? Ven Keptin Kirk took responsibility for his actions, he brought us all back from Vulcan, stood before the Federation Council, took full culpability for all actions, and vas busted in rank. Harriman takes responsibility, and it's business as usual." He shook his head. "Vat a joke. Vat a sick joke." Then Chekov turned to Sulu. "Vat about you?"
"Me?" Sulu looked up at him calmly. "What about me?"
"I did it for you, too."
As always, Sulu's face remained impassive. "I don't recall asking you to take a swing . . ."
"Two swings," Uhura pointed out.
"Two swings at Captain Harriman."
"You didn't have to. I could tell."
"You could tell I wanted you, at my daughter's memorial service, to get into a fistfight with her commander?"
Chekov strode toward him and leaned forward on the table. "I could tell that you were angry. That you were furious. This man, this . . . 'keptin‣ . . . lost Keptin Kirk for us. Lost Demora for us. Lost her? Killed her! And you stood there and gave him absolution! That's vat he vanted, that's vat you gave him! As if vat he did was acceptable! And it vas not! Not to me! And it should not have been to you!"
And Sulu slammed his open palm on the table so hard that the tea service rattled. One of the cups overturned, spilling a thin trail of liquid down the center of the table.
"She was my daughter, Chekov. Your goddaughter, but my child. I will honor her in my own way. And let me tell you that trying to knock out her captain . . . whether we like him or not, whether we accept what he did or not . . . is not how I choose to respect her memory. Is that understood?"
"And how do you choose to respect it, then."
"None of your business."
Chekov and Uhura exchanged glances. Then Uhura slowly stepped forward and said, "Sulu . . . I don't think what Chekov did was any more right than you do. But . . . after everything we've been through together, now you claim something is none of our business. Sulu! I thought we were beyond that."
"Beyond a right to privacy? Beyond a right to deal with grief however we wish?" Sulu shook his head. "I don't think we ever move beyond that."
He rose and went to the window, leaning against the plexi. "I'll be returning to the Excelsior shortly. You each have assignments to get to. I'd recommend you get to them."
Uhura and Chekov exchanged glances. "Aren't you . . . aren't you going to the ceremony?" asked Uhura.
"You mean hurling her ashes into the sun?" Sulu said evenly.
"Of course."
Sulu shrugged. "It's pointless. She's not going to know or care. She's gone, Uhura. She's gone. Those ashes in that urn aren't her, any more than the urn itself is. We say we're doing it to honor her wishes, but it's . . . it's nonsense. Her wish would have been to live. That's all. To live. And since we couldn't honor that wish, what does any of the rest of it matter? Ceremonies like that, they're for the living, not the dead. They're for survivors to find a way that they can . . . let go . . . of the departed. Well, I let go in my own way. And my way doesn't include standing there in maudlin assemblage while a corpse's ashes . . ."
Uhura slapped him.
She did it even before she'd realized her hand was in motion. She gasped as she did so, as if she'd been the one who'd been struck.
Sulu stood there, his cheek flushed red from the impact.
With the slightest hint of amusement, he said, "And you were chewing out Chekov."
Uhura folded her hands and looked down. "I'm sorry," she said softly. "I'm sorry because I know that you're not . . . not acting like yourself. I know you too well to believe that you're this . . . this dispassionate. You're simply . . . I don't know . . . unwilling to accept what's happened. Or unable. Whatever the reason, you're simply not dealing with it. So you're shutting us out. Shutting out emotion, as if you were Spock."
"He has been on my mind recently, yes," Sulu admitted. "And Captain Kirk, as well."
"Don't you see, then?" She took him by the arms, as if she could squeeze emotion into him. "Don't you see what's happening? We've reached an age, Sulu, where it starts to feel like all we're going to experience from here on in is death. We're going to make no more new friends, bond with no more loved ones. Instead we're just going to watch old friends and lovers die, one by one. But we can't just shut down, just disconnect as you're doing. You'll die inside if you do, be less of a human being. . . ."
Sulu met her gaze and, just for a moment, she thought she saw something stirring in his eyes. But then he seemed to just fade away from her once more, and he replied, "I appreciate the sentiment, Uhura. I do. And I'm going to be fine. Truly."
There was a sharp beep from his personal computer station. "That's probably a call I've been waiting for," said Sulu. "If both of you don't mind, I'd . . . like to be alone now. Gather my thoughts. That sort of thing."
Chekov and Uhura nodded in what they hoped was understanding. Sulu moved with them to the door, accepting their muttered condolences once more, nodding in acquiescence to their offers of emotional support. They would both be there for him, that they made quite clear, and he acknowledged it and expressed all the requisite gratitude for their sentiments.
The moment they were out the door, Sulu pivoted and headed back for the computer station. If Chekov or Uhura had still been watching, they would have noticed a subtle but significant change in Sulu's manner. Sharper, decisive, the almost suffocating lethargy lifted from him like the removal of a shroud.
The screen blinked on and there was the image of Admiral LaVelle. LaVelle had a round face, with dark curly hair tinged with gray. "Captain," she said without preamble, her voice echoing a faint Southern drawl, "first allow me to extend condolences once more, both for myself and behalf of Starfleet, on your loss."
"Appreciated, Admiral."
"Regarding your inquiry as to the status of Askalon Five, site of your daughter's death"—LaVelle was clearly glancing at another screen off to the side—"Captain Harriman has quarantined it. You know the regs regarding a quarantine once it's been set in place."
"Yes, ma'am. Quarantine cannot be lifted, nor any contact made with the planet, until a quarantine team has been sent in to discover the source of infection, dispatch it if possible, and then observe the planet for one month to make certain that no sign of the reason for the quarantine remains."
"You know this, then."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Yet you request permission for the Excelsior to go to Askalon Five. You've already put this request in to Admiral Paul over in the quarantine division and, when she said no, you had the request pushed up to me."
"That is correct, ma'am."
LaVelle smiled sympathetically. "Captain . . . I appreciate your concerns . . . but regulations were put into place specifically for this sort of situation. A situation where our emotional impulses might prompt us to take some sort of action that could have serious repercussions. At the time when we most want to get around or ignore regulations is the moment when we must, most faithfully, adhere to them. You understand that, correct?"
"Absolutely, Admiral." He nodded respectfully. "I was simply proceeding up the chain of command in pursuing a query."
"And that is perfectly acceptable. But the query will end here. We understand that, Captain Sulu?"
"Yes, ma'am, we do. A question, though. At what point will a quarantine team be dispatched to make its initial inquiries?"
"I thought you might ask that. At the moment, Captain, our resources are somewhat stretched. The collapse of the Klingon Empire has strained the Federation's capabilities. We're dealing with situations that have greater immediacy than that of Askalon Five. We can't pull a team off Cygnus Three, for example, where a virus is ravaging an entire colony, to investigate where there are no inhabitants. We're trying to prevent people dying, Captain, and shifting a team to see what the problem is on Askalon Five will not bring back your daughter, and may even cost lives if the time could have been better spent elsewhere."
"I appreciate and understand all that, Admiral," Sulu said evenly. "I simply wish to have a projected date."
LaVelle let out a sigh and once again checked a screen that Sulu couldn't see. "Eight . . . nine months, perhaps. Could be a little sooner, I imagine. Could also be considerably later. We do the best we can, Captain."
"Yes, ma'am. We all do."
"Good. Now . . . have you been apprised of the situation on Centrelis?"
"Yes, Admiral. Newly admitted to the Federation, and just beyond the outskirts of Tholian space . . ."
"Correct, and the Tholian assembly is claiming that the planet's orbit brings it into Tholian space thirty percent of the Centrelian year . . . and therefore is making noise that the Centrelians should turn over thirty percent of the planet's resources. We're endeavoring to handle it through diplomatic channels, but the diplomats have requested the presence of a starship as backup."
"The theory being that it will cut down on Tholian saber-rattling."
"Exactly. You, Captain, have the most experience with the Tholians. So you're elected to handle this."
"'Elected.‣ You make it sound like a democracy, Admiral."
"That we most definitely are not. You will proceed to Centrelis with all due haste and stay on-station there until the situation is resolved. Good luck in your mission, Captain. And again . . . my condolences."
"Thank you, Admiral," said Sulu.
The screen blinked out.
Sulu stared for a long time at the computer. Then he leaned forward and said, "Computer . . . prepare to record a message."
"Ready," said the computer.
He steepled his fingers for a moment, and then he began to speak.
"By the time you receive this," he said, "I may very well have thrown away my captaincy. For all I know, I may even be dead."
And he continued. As he did so, his gaze settled on a small holopicture that sat on the desk just to the right of the screen.
It was one of those special ones called a Lifeshot. Taken over a series of years, the Lifeshot took the subject at the youngest age photographed, and merged it sequentially with the next shot and the next and so on. The simple routine on the Lifeshot's computer created a tasteful wardrobe, clothing the image. The morphing program did the rest.
The result was that the Lifeshot gave a visual progression of the subject, at varying speeds depending upon the viewer's preference.
Sulu watched the Lifeshot, ranging from Demora's smiling six-year-old face to the final shot that had been taken of her when she was about twenty. He'd taken her regularly every year until the point where he'd assumed command of the Excelsior. He'd asked her to keep up with it while he was gone, but she'd hemmed and hawed and finally told him that she just didn't want to anymore. He hadn't argued with her because, frankly, arguing with Demora could often be a losing proposition. Once she'd made her mind up, that was pretty much that.
The transition on the Lifeshot took about a minute. Sulu sat there and watched her grow from child to blossoming adolescence, and from there to a young woman . . . nine inches high, to be sure, but there was nothing diminutive about the memories or the feelings.
He was surprised how steady his voice was as he recorded. It really shouldn't have been surprising, because he really wasn't giving much thought to what he was saying. His thoughts, his emotions . . . his soul, he realized . . . were a million miles away. Or, to be more specific . . . thirteen years ago. . . .
## SECTION FOUR
# PARENTHOOD
# Chapter Fifteen
IT HELPED TO HAVE friends in the office of the Surgeon General in Starfleet, and those Leonard McCoy had in abundance. So when the rather curious "situation" arose, it was McCoy who was summoned in for a consult out of deference to his long-standing relationship with the . . . as it was delicately put . . . "person in question."
He wished that Jim were around to handle this, but he was off doing that damned fool diving of his. Kirk had regaled him with tales of deep-sea explorations, wearing antiquated gear and a bathing suit rather than proper insulated suits with their built-in fail-safe oxygen supplies. "That's not really undersea diving," he'd sniffed. "You don't feel like you're part of the sea."
"You'll become a permanent part of the sea if you're not careful," McCoy had grumbled at him. But he'd decided not to push it too much; the problem with Kirk was that he'd probably come up with something even more dangerous to do. That's the kind of guy he was: totally uncaring about personal safety. Under the impression that trivialities such as mortality applied to lesser beings.
Hopefully that would change as soon as Kirk started the faculty assignment at Starfleet Academy. Even that, though, made McCoy apprehensive. There was only one place where Kirk would truly be happy, and that was in the command chair of a starship. But they'd been giving him the full treatment, Starfleet had. Emphasized all the experience he had to share. Convinced him that by teaching at the Academy, he could be improving Starfleet at its core.
And he'd bought it. Blast him, he'd bought it. McCoy knew, in his heart of hearts, that it was going to cost Kirk in the long run. His body might have been on Earth, but his soul was in the stars. He would keep running faster and faster, looking for something that he didn't even know he was missing. And when he finally realized that whatever it was he was searching for was still gone—light-years away and forever beyond his reach—he would start to wither. Wither and die. McCoy could see it clear as anything, but Kirk—home and flush with triumph from his second five-year mission—had been blinded to it. Blinded by the success and accolades. And maybe, God help him, by the legend that was building around him. McCoy had no doubt that, sooner or later, Kirk would realize the hideous mistake. Realize what he'd gotten himself into because he'd believed his own press.
"Damn his ego," he muttered.
"Damn whose ego, Doc?"
McCoy looked up and saw Mr. Sulu standing there, his arms folded across his chest.
"No one's," replied McCoy.
Sulu smiled. "Oh, come on now, Doc. You ask me to come meet you here at the Surgeon General's building . . . you're all mysterious about it . . . and now you won't even tell me what's on your mind?"
"Oh, we'll . . . discuss it," said McCoy. "Uhm . . . sit down, Sulu. How are things going with you?"
Sulu looked at McCoy appraisingly. It was clear he knew something was on the doctor's mind. How could he not, after all? McCoy had summoned him, with some degree of urgency, from Starfleet Headquarters, and obviously had some reason for doing so. But he also knew that McCoy wasn't the type to be rushed. He'd get to it in his own good time, so it was simplest to go along with McCoy at his own speed.
"Things are going fine, Doc," Sulu said as he sank into the chair opposite McCoy. It wasn't McCoy's office, but merely one that he was borrowing. "Have you heard?"
"Heard what?"
"I've been offered the position of first officer aboard the Bozeman. Had a subspace meeting with Captain Bateson. He's," and he smiled slightly, "not exactly Captain Kirk. More the . . . cerebral type."
"Funny. For some reason, I have trouble picturing you any place other than the helm of the Enterprise."
"So do I. But let's face it, Doc. The newest Enterprise refit will take at least six to eight months . . . I've even heard as much as a year. Plus there's talk about this new Excelsior class that will make the Enterprise obsolete. I have as much loyalty to the Enterprise as the next man, Doc . . . but the writing's on the wall. Two, maybe three years tops, and she'll be retired, and I'll be . . . what? Three years older? Still at helm?" He shook his head. "I have to admit that Admiral's Kirk's decision to teach shook me a bit. At first I was a bit stunned. But then I thought, Well, with the sort of career he's had, he deserves it, right? He's entitled."
McCoy said nothing.
Sulu continued, "Somehow I was perfectly satisfied with the status quo as along as James Kirk was in that command chair. But if I'm going to be out there on my own, Doc, then it's about time I started working on my career, too. Sink or swim, as they say."
"As they say." He paused. "Sulu, do you ever wish there was . . . something else? Something more, besides a career?"
"Wish?" He shrugged. "I've . . . thought of it from time to time, of course. But this is who I am, Doctor. It's what I do. No use complaining about it now."
McCoy shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and Sulu looked at him a bit askance. "Doc . . .?" He let the prompt hang there in the air. "Doc . . . we've known each other for too long to be shy about things now. If there's something on your mind . . ."
"You know," McCoy said, "no matter how many times I've had to deliver news like this, it doesn't get easier. Sulu . . . Susan Ling is dead."
Sulu stared at him a moment and then said calmly, "I'm . . . sorry to hear that."
McCoy looked surprised. "Don't take this wrong, but . . . I'd have expected even Spock to give more of a reaction than that."
"More of a reaction?"
"Yes! I tell you she's dead, you sit there cool as you please and just tell me you're sorry to hear it."
Sulu was about to reply, then stopped, reconsidered, and started again. "Doc . . . there's something I'm missing here. I feel badly that this friend of yours is—"
"Mine? I never . . ." He sighed in exasperation, then turned and said, "Computer—file on Susan Ling."
A file appeared on the screen and McCoy swiveled it around for Sulu to see.
Sulu stared at it . . . and went ashen.
McCoy saw the instant change in Sulu's demeanor, and immediately realized the magnitude of his error. "Oh, God . . . you didn't know her real name, did you?"
Sulu shook his head.
"I'm sorry, Sulu."
He stared at the image on the screen. Ling Sui, as he had known her, stared back at him with that slightly uncomfortable expression one always has when posing for some sort of official photograph. Words ran alongside the picture and he tried to read them, but they blurred together. He rubbed at the bridge of his nose and sat back, trying to compose himself. "How?" he managed to ask.
"Sakuro's disease. Apparently the symptoms first manifested while she was on Marris Three, and their facilities aren't exactly up to Federation standard. She managed to get to a starbase, but by then it was too late."
Sulu looked down at his lap. "I . . . haven't seen her for years. Six . . . maybe seven years, I think."
"Haven't thought about her since then?"
He shook his head, and a small smile touched his lips. "Oh, I've . . . remembered her . . . from time to time. I'll tell you about it sometime . . . although it would help if you had a few drinks in you to make it believable. I wish . . ."
McCoy raised an eyebrow. "What?"
"I was just thinking that . . . Susan . . . was a remarkable woman. Being with her was like trying to snag light rays. And I sometimes wish I'd . . . I'd managed to have more of her than just a fleeting memory."
"Well . . . you're always supposed to be careful of what you wish for, because you may get it."
The comment jogged at Sulu's memory for a moment, and then he recalled. He shook his head slowly. "That's funny."
"There's something funny about this?"
"Well, only in that Chekov said exactly the same thing shortly before I met Susan."
Then, slowly, a tumbler clicked over in Sulu's mind. He looked at McCoy with curiosity and said, "Doc . . . how did you know that I knew her?"
McCoy sighed. "I was wondering when you'd ask. She didn't have a formal will, precisely, but she did leave behind a document and you were named in it."
"What, she left me something?"
"Not something exactly . . ."
There was a knock at the door, and a soft voice came from the other side. It was female, very young, with a slightly musical lilt to it. "Doctor? I'm lonely in the other room. Can I come in? Is he here yet?"
Sulu and McCoy exchanged glances.
And Sulu knew.
Instantly.
His voice was a hoarse whisper. "You can't be serious."
McCoy nodded.
"But . . ." Sulu felt as if he'd lost physical contact with the rest of his body. "But . . . we just . . . there was just that one time, in the desert . . ."
"A lot about humans has changed over the millenia, but the fact that it only takes once isn't among them," McCoy said dryly. "Would you like to meet her?"
Before Sulu could get out another word, the door slid open.
She was wearing a carefully pressed blue dress. Her hands were interlaced in front of her, her fingernails delicately painted red. Her long black hair was drawn back in a ponytail. Her face . . .
Her face looked like someone had taken Ling Sui's head, shrunk it to child size, and stuck it on a little girl's body.
She studied Sulu carefully.
"Are you my father?" she asked. Her English was carefully spoken and slightly accented. Sulu knew immediately that she was multilingual.
Sulu looked to McCoy. McCoy nodded slowly. "First thing we did," he said softly. "Ran a test cross-matched against your gene files. There's no doubt."
He turned back and stared at her. "It . . . appears so," he said in answer to her question. He was looking for something to say, something memorable, something that he could look back on years from now and marvel at its brilliance and pithiness.
"And you are—?" he asked after a moment.
It wasn't brilliant. It wasn't pithy. It wasn't even especially useful, because she simply stared at him.
Not wanting to leave matters hanging, McCoy said, "Hikaru Sulu . . . this is Demora Ling. Or . . . Demora Sulu, if you . . ."
"Get married?" asked Demora.
Despite the fragility of the situation, McCoy was nonetheless amused. "I was going to say 'arrange an adoption.‣ But that's pretty much up to you. To both of you."
Sulu felt as if he were reeling. It seemed all a hell of a lot to absorb at one time, and there was Demora simply staring at him with Ling Sui's eyes.
"So . . . you'll be going off on another ship soon, right? The Bozeman?"
Sulu nodded.
"That sounds exciting. Have a good time."
Slowly Sulu hunkered down until he was on eye level with her. "Honey," he said slowly, "I'm . . . look, I want you to be a big girl about this . . ."
"You don't have to sound so patronizing," she informed him airily.
"I'm . . . sorry. I didn't mean to. Demora . . . could you wait outside? I know you've been there for a while," he said upon seeing her face start to twist in exasperation. "Just a short while longer. And then we'll go . . ." For want of a better word, he said, "home."
She seemed to be looking straight through to the back of his head. Then she nodded and stepped into the outside room, the doors hissing behind her.
He remained in a crouched position, his back to McCoy. "It's . . . a lot to absorb. You understand, don't you?"
"I wish there had been a smoother way to tell you." He paused. "What are you going to do?"
"I don't know. Not yet. I just . . . need time to think." Slowly he straightened up.
"I know this may sound like an odd thing to say at this time, Sulu, but . . ." McCoy stuck out a hand. "Congratulations. You're a father."
"Thank you, Doctor." Sulu shook the hand. Then he started for the door, stopped, turned back to McCoy, and said once more, with unmistakable incredulity in his voice, "It was just the one time."
"I hope it was worth it," said McCoy.
"Actually . . . I barely remember it. I was half asleep," said Sulu, and he walked out the door.
And McCoy shook his head and muttered to himself, "Well, it's pretty damned obvious which half was awake."
# Chapter Sixteen
WHEN THE DOOR to Sulu's apartment slid open, Chekov found himself staring at a young Asian girl in a blue dress. Reflexively he glanced at the apartment number on the assumption that he was at the wrong place. But a quick check proved that he was where he was supposed to be.
"Is Meester Sulu here?" he asked.
She nodded but didn't step aside. "Who are you?"
"Pavel Chekov. Who are you?"
"Demora."
"Demora, like the city?"
"Just like."
"Vell . . . most unusual. I am a friend of Sulu's. Are you?"
She appeared to consider it. "The jury's still out on that, frankly."
He was surprised by her apparent erudition. Then again, Chekov didn't have a great deal of experience with children, so he wasn't entirely certain what to expect.
"May I come in?"
She stepped aside, giving him room to enter.
He'd always liked Sulu's apartment . . . not that Sulu had a great deal of time to spend there, what with being gone for years at a time. Furnished in dark browns, with real wood furniture (lord only knew where Sulu had acquired it). His antique weapons collection, ranging from swords to firearms, was secured behind plexi cabinets. Pictures or portraits of his various ancestors hung on the walls. Sulu was fairly big on families, and could trace his ancestry back centuries.
"Vere is Sulu, do you know?"
She chucked a finger. "In the kitchen. Making dinner."
"I'll just go talk to him then."
"Fine," said Demora with a shrug. She moved over to a couch and sank down into the cushion.
Chekov found Sulu in the kitchen. "So . . . vat mysterious and exotic dish are you preparing?"
Sulu was busy scooping something from a pot and pouring it over rolls. "Chili," he said. "It's what Demora wanted."
"Ah, Demora. Your sentinel at the gate. Interesting little girl. She's . . . vat? Eleven? Twelve?"
"Just turning seven."
"She seems older."
"Well, that's appropriate. I feel older."
"So who is she? Niece?"
"Daughter."
"Whose daughter?"
Sulu stared at him. "Mine."
It was clear that Chekov was having trouble digesting the information. "I'm sorry . . . vat?"
"She's my daughter."
Chekov looked in the direction of the living room, where Demora was seated, and then back to Sulu. He looked stunned. "Your . . . daughter."
"Yes."
"Your daughter. Your daughter?"
Sulu put the plates down, making no attempt to hide his impatience. He spoke in a low tone to keep their voices from reaching Demora. "Are we going to move past this sentence anytime soon?"
"You have a daughter?" Chekov whispered. "And you never mentioned her to me?"
"I didn't know! I didn't know until a few hours ago."
"Do you know who the mother is?"
"Of course I know who the mother is."
"Oh, now you say 'Of course.' Considering you didn't know the child existed, the idea of you not knowing who the mother is doesn't seem all that farfetched."
"It's Ling Sui. You remember her."
"Of course I remember her. The woman from . . ." And then he thudded his hand against his forehead. "Of course. From Demora. I should have realized it vasn't simply coincidence." He hesitated. "So . . . so vat do you do now?"
"I don't know," said Sulu in exasperation. "She has no other relatives but me. She's just lost her mother. She doesn't seem especially interested in me. And I'm scheduled to ship out with the Bozeman."
"Does she know that?"
"She knows it, yes."
"Vell, perhaps the reason she's not especially interested is because she doesn't vant to make the emotional investment in someone who is leaving."
Sulu transferred the dishes onto a serving tray. "Since when are you the great child psychiatrist?"
"Since ven are you a father?"
Sulu sighed. "All right. Touché."
As he started to head into the dining room, Chekov stopped him and said, "Uhm . . . you didn't mention to me at the time that you and Ling Sui . . ."
"It was just once."
"That's all it takes."
"So I've heard," said Sulu.
* * *
The meal didn't go precisely as planned.
For one thing, Chekov didn't plan for himself and Demora to hit it off as well as they did. He had grown accustomed to thinking of children as odd, separate creatures, rather than simply small humans. Beings with their own rules and own manner of communication to which no adult could be privy.
Demora was quite the opposite. She was, he suspected, very much her mother's daughter. She spoke with intelligence and education about a startling number of topics, ranging from archaeology to the present condition of Federation politics. Chekov found himself becoming quite fond of her during his visit, and he suspected that Demora felt likewise.
Sulu, for his part, kept his own counsel. His gaze would dart from one to the other as they chatted. Chekov interacted with Demora with such ease that Sulu felt torn. On the one hand he was pleased that they were hitting it off so well. On the other hand . . . he was a little jealous.
But he realized why it was that Chekov felt so at ease with her. It was because he was going to be able to leave. This was Sulu's problem, Sulu's situation, and Chekov was just a visitor to it. He could get to know Demora as a person, chat with her, laugh with her . . . and Sulu got to worry about what in hell he was going to do next.
Chekov stayed late into the evening, regaling Demora with stories about his and Sulu's time together in the service. A couple of times Sulu tried to hush him up, but Chekov was not easy to stop. Each anecdote would remind him of another, and he'd say with growing excitement, "And then there vas the time . . ."
The hour grew later and later, and finally Sulu said, "Demora . . . I really think it's time for bed. I showed you where the guest bedroom is. . . ."
"That's because I'm a guest?"
He looked from Demora to Chekov and back again. Clearing his throat, he said, "That's . . . just what I'm in the habit of calling it, that's all."
"It's early for me still."
"Well, I think it's time you went to bed."
She squared her shoulders and said, "Mother lets me st . . ."
And then she caught herself, speaking of her mother in the present tense. It was a slip that had a very visible effect on her, and she looked downcast. It was the first time since he'd met her that he'd seen anything from her acknowledging her loss. She certainly pulled herself together quickly, however, as she said, "All right. Good night then." She turned and walked briskly away toward the rear of the apartment, and Sulu had the feeling—probably legitimate—that the reason she retreated so quickly was because she didn't want him to see her cry.
Chekov leaned over and said to Sulu in a low voice, "She's a great kid, isn't she?"
"Oh . . . fabulous," Sulu said. "So how do you suggest I handle this?"
"Vell—" Chekov gave it a moment's thought. "—you could try and talk Starfleet into letting you bring her along."
"You mean on the Bozeman? Against regs. Never happen." He looked down, drumming his fingers. "I'm . . . going to make arrangements."
"Vat kind? You'll leave her vith your family?"
"There are schools. I've done some checking. Boarding schools and such that will take care of the child year round. Educate her, feed her. That would be best, I think."
"Vile you're off exploring the galaxy," said Chekov.
"You make it sound trivial."
"I don't mean to," said Chekov. "And you know I don't feel that vay. I'm just saying . . ."
"What? What are you saying?"
He raised his eyes and studied his longtime friend. "I'm saying that here's a child who vill have lost her mother and never really gotten to know her father. And that's a lousy vay to grow up."
"Oh really. How do you know?"
"Because that's how I grew up."
Sulu said nothing for a moment, then went back to tapping his fingers on the coffee table in front of them. "You turned out okay," he said after a time.
"Perhaps. But maybe I could have turned out better. I'll never know."
"And if I leave her, she'll never know. Is that what you're saying?" Sulu rose, looking down at Chekov. "What are you telling me, Pav? That I should quit? Turn down the first-officer position? Walk away from the thing I know most about in the galaxy so that I can try being a father to an instant family, something about which I assure you I know absolutely nothing? Chekov . . . it's crazy. It wouldn't do her any good, and it certainly wouldn't do me any good."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, I'm sure!"
"Then I suppose there's nothing more to say."
"Apparently not."
Sulu sat back down. It had never seemed so quiet in the apartment before. It was as if the absence of noise had become an entity unto itself.
"It's just ironic, that's all," Chekov finally said.
"What is?"
"Vell . . . years ago, you were telling me how life on Earth couldn't be exciting. How there was no adventure. And then you were pulled into the entire business vit Ling Sui, and you thought you had found adventure. But that was only a few days. There is no greater adventure than raising a child."
"You're speaking from experience, I gather," he said sarcastically.
"I vish. Just gut instinct. The same instinct that tells me leaving her behind couldn't be right."
"Maybe you'd feel differently if the situations were reversed."
"Maybe," agreed Chekov. "But . . . they're not. And so I don't."
"What do you want from me, Chekov?" Sulu said in exasperation. "What do you expect me to do? Have some sudden burst of paternal affection that I never had before? Look at this child who is, to all intents and purposes, a stranger to me, and feel so protective of her that I reorder my life around her? Chekov, I . . . I have responsibilities . . ."
"Yes. You do," said Chekov sharply. "And vun of them is in the 'guest bedroom‣ right now. So the only question is: Vat are you going to do about it?"
"I'm going to do right by her," Sulu said. "It just may be that you and I have different definitions of what's right."
"Actually," Chekov replied, "I don't think ve do. Ve simply von't both admit to it, that's all."
# Chapter Seventeen
SULU AND DEMORA spent the next day walking around San Francisco. Demora was quiet much of the time as he pointed out landmarks to her. She seemed politely interested at most.
He stopped outside one building, pointed, and said, "This is where I grew up."
She cast a quick glance at it. "Your family still live here?" she asked.
He shook his head. "My mother moved to New Tokyo to take care of her sister. The rest of my family . . . they're all going on with their lives in other places." He sighed. "Once upon a time, families lived together in the same house for generations. But it's . . . not like that anymore. It hasn't been for a long, long time. There's too many opportunities out there. Too many directions for people to go."
"And no one wants to be anchored with children."
He stopped and looked down at her. Realizing that candy-coating the truth was going to be a waste of time with this child, he said bluntly, "So . . . how much of my conversation with Chekov did you overhear last night?"
"All of it," she said in that matter-of-fact tone of hers.
"And how do you feel about it?"
She shrugged. She had a very expressive shrug.
"That's it? Just," and he shrugged back.
"Mother brought me with her wherever she went because that's what she felt she had to do to be a good mother. You feel you have to dump me in a school because that's how you'll be a good father. Everyone does what they have to do. One way or another makes no difference to me."
He studied her, trying to see if she was being sarcastic. If she was trying to cover up some sort of deep hurt. But her face was as inscrutable as . . .
. . . as his could be.
"You're being very grown-up," he said.
She raised an eyebrow ever so slightly. "Someone has to be," she replied.
* * *
The school that Sulu had in mind was in Washington state, just outside Seattle. Called the Winchester School, it was one of several schools highly recommended to Starfleet personnel who were in similar straits as Sulu (not identical, of course; Sulu's circumstances were rather unusual, even for Starfleet).
They walked around the grounds for a time, visited the dorms, spoke with the teachers. At all times Demora was polite, quiet, respectful.
It made Sulu extremely nervous.
He had long ago learned to trust his gut instinct. For instance, when encountering another ship, he simply knew when there was going to be trouble. Before the other ship would put up their shields, before any alerts were sounded . . . Sulu just had a feeling.
He had that feeling now. Her shields had been raised. He wasn't sure what her weapons were, but he dreaded having them fired in his direction.
"Do you like it?" he asked as they stood in the dorm.
She nodded. That was all. Just nodded.
She nodded in the classrooms. She nodded in the library. She nodded in the grassy center square. She nodded so much that Sulu thought her head was going to fall off.
On the flight home, he said to her, "I think you don't like it."
She sighed in exasperation. "I said I did."
"I think you may just be saying what I want to hear."
She looked up at him icily. "How do I know what you want to hear? I hardly know you."
And it's not like you're giving me the chance. She didn't say it in so many words, but he was positive that's what was going through her mind. Either that or it was so strongly on his own mind that he was superimposing it onto her.
"All right. Fair enough," he said. "What would you like to know about me?"
She gave it some consideration.
"Did you love my mother?" she asked.
He wasn't certain what he'd been expecting her to say. On the other hand, he realized, he shouldn't have been the least bit surprised.
But what was he supposed to say? The truth was that he had barely had any time with her mother. They'd had no time to build a relationship, to establish bonds of trust. To create all the things that went into a loving . . .
And then he thought about her. Thought about her smile . . . her laugh . . . her bravery, her grim humor . . . thought about what she had been to him, what she'd represented . . .
. . . thought about the press of their bodies against each other . . .
. . . thought about what she had given him.
And he smiled and said, "Demora . . . I think I loved your mother before I ever met her."
She looked at him slightly askance. "Does that mean yes?"
"It means yes." He hesitated and then said, "Did she love me?"
Again with the shrug. "I guess."
"Did she ever say?"
Demora laughed slightly. "She never even said she loved me. Mother wasn't much for talking; just doing. Are you like that?"
"In a way. Are you?"
"In a way. Besides," she added with that mature air of hers, "talking about love and everything . . . it's a waste of time, really."
"If it's a waste of time, why'd you bring it up?"
"I felt like wasting time, I guess. I mean, I'm here. You're here. Mother's gone. Love really doesn't much matter in the grand scheme of things, you know? Not in our situation."
"Our situation being—?"
"Well . . . it's like if a meteor is coming toward your planet. You can spend a lot of time wondering where the meteor came from. Maybe it was part of another planet that blew up, and then you wonder if there were people on that planet, and what were they like, and did they all die, and all that kind of stuff. But none of it really matters. The only thing that matters is that you have to do something about the meteor—blast it to pieces—because it's a threat to your planet."
"And I'm the planet, and you're the meteor. Is that what you're saying?"
She shrugged once more. Sulu's shoulders were starting to ache just watching her.
"Demora . . . the last thing I want to do is blast you to pieces."
"And what's the first thing you want to do with me?"
He shook his head in confusion. "What?"
She spoke utterly calmly, not appearing the least bit upset. "The first thing you'd want to do with me . . . is wish that I wasn't here. Because then you could go on with your life."
"That's not true."
She looked away.
He put a hand on her shoulder but she pushed it away. "That's not true," he said again.
And with a set jaw and steady gaze she said, "You know it is."
Which, of course, he did.
* * *
She was to leave for the Winchester School in the morning. This way she'd have enough time to settle in there, and for Sulu to then board the next outbound transport to take him to the Bozeman.
She said nothing as she went off to bed; just nodded her head slightly as he told her that he'd see her bright and early in the morning. He thought he should say more, but decided that there was no reason to do so now. It would seem maudlin and pointless. Plenty of time for goodbyes later.
That night he dreamt of Susan. Or Ling Sui.
He'd dreamt of her before. Some nights aboard the Enterprise when sleep didn't come easily, she'd come to him. Rarely was it in the city of Demora, or in the Sahara. Instead they would be at Wrigley's Pleasure Planet together, or cruising the rings of Saturn, or in a jungle paradise. Occasionally moments of danger from their adventure would reappear in fragmented form. But no matter what the forum for their adventure, she was always smiling and loving and set for anything.
But not this time.
This time he was on the bridge of the Enterprise. He was seated in the command chair. There was no one else around, and the bridge seemed oddly distended, as if being viewed through a fish-eye lens.
He heard weeping from behind him, a soul in torment. It was echoing through the bridge. He spun in his chair and faced the turbolift.
It sat open. Standing in the lift was Ling Sui. She said nothing, did nothing. She just stood there, with tears flowing down her cheeks, her chest heaving slightly in time to the sobs. Sulu got up from his chair and the turbolift doors slid shut. He crossed to the lift quickly, stepping over a tribble, and walked up to the doors. They didn't open. The crying continued. He jammed his fingers in and worked on prying them wide. They slid open with a low moan rather than their customary hiss.
The turbolift was empty.
The crying continued.
He stepped into the turbolift, trying to find where Ling had vanished to. The doors slid shut, and the turbolift began to move straight down.
It began to accelerate, faster and faster, and still he heard the crying. Except it no longer sounded like that of a grown woman. It had escalated in pitch and now seemed to Sulu like the sobbing of a child.
It was about at that time that he realized the turbolift was dropping faster than it should. Much faster. The floors were streaking past and Sulu suddenly knew that he was in free fall. There was absolutely no way in hell that the turbolift was going to slow down in time to prevent him from being a smear on the bottom of the shaft.
The sobbing was fading, becoming fainter and fainter, and Sulu braced himself for the impact. He wondered if, as they always say, his life would flash before his eyes. He waited and then it came, danced before him, so quick that it was little more than an eyeblink.
It was a child's face.
Sulu snapped awake.
He sat in his room, bare-chested, chest heaving, for quite a while. His hands were flat on his mattress as if trying to reassure him that he was on firm ground instead of being in danger that it would begin to plummet under him.
He checked his chronometer and was surprised to see that it was only 2 A.M. He was wide awake, completely rested . . . if one could call being jostled awake by a horrifying nightmare restful.
He wiped the sweat from his bow and slid his feet to the floor. Then he pulled his robe from his closet and wrapped it around himself.
He padded out into the hallway and walked the short distance to the guest bedroom. He paused a moment, listening for the sound of steady breathing. Then he slipped into the room.
Light from the hallway cascaded through, illuminating the lower half of her bed. She had wound the sheet around her, but even so he could see that she was curled up in a fetal position. The curve of her back was rising and falling erratically. Her head was a bit twisted around and didn't look squarely on the pillow. Somehow it all seemed very uncomfortable.
Sulu went to her and gently started to readjust her head onto the pillow. And as he did so, he felt the pillow's wetness. Very damp, as if . . .
She'd been crying into it.
Coincidental? Or had he heard it distantly in his sleep and it had worked its way into his dream? The latter seemed the more likely somehow.
Crying herself to sleep. Why? Because her mother was gone? Because her father was sending her away? Because she had no home, no place to call her own?
She'd put on a tremendous show of strength, a fabulous show. But there was no dissembling in sleep, no bravado to cover inner fears. There was just a sleeping child with the remnants of her anxiety still damp on the pillow.
"Shields down," he murmured. And he wasn't sure if he was referring to her or to himself.
He went back to his room, took one of the extra pillows on his bed and brought it back to her. Removing the sopping pillow, he substituted the dry one. He slid it under her head gently, then readjusted the blanket around her. Doing so required momentarily moving her hands.
One of her small, delicate hands wrapped around two of his fingers and squeezed tightly.
He pulled gently, trying to disengage, but she wouldn't let go. She wasn't consciously aware of it at all . . .
Tenderly he wrapped the rest of his fingers around her hand, enveloping hers in his.
In her sleep, all unintending, she had launched her weaponry. It wasn't as devastating as a phaser, nor as destructive as a photon torpedo . . . but it cut far deeper and, in its way, was much more effective.
He stood there for some minutes, and saw that her uneven breathing had smoothed out. Her sleep was calm now. Whatever torments had been in her mind had apparently vanished, the strength of a father's hand enough to squeeze them into nothingness.
Once he was positive that she was sleeping soundly, he gently—ever so gently—disengaged his hand from hers. He watched her there some more, bathed in the light from the hallway, and then carefully backed out of the room, never taking his eyes from her.
He remained for a moment or two more, then went to the bay window in the living room. He stared up at the stars, thought about helming a starship through them.
Thought about standing at the side of a captain.
Thought about his own captaincy.
Thought about the Enterprise . . . about what he'd been working for all these years . . . about the mission . . . the credo . . .
Space, the final frontier . . .
How could he turn away from it? It would always be calling to him, pleading with him, scolding him like a spurned lover . . .
To explore strange new worlds . . .
Not to see planet after planet . . . tread on alien soil . . . wonder what new mystery was to unfold before his eyes . . .
To seek out new life . . .
And that was where he stopped.
New life.
A new life. And it was new. Six years old, good lord, that wasn't so much as an eyeblink in the history of the galaxy. Not even the beginning of a heartbeat in that endless body of time.
A new life, and he had not sought it out, it had sought him out.
A new life, and he was responsible for it.
Now . . . what the hell was he going to do about it?
* * *
Captain Morgan Bateson's image flickered slightly over the subspace patch. Sulu had begged a favor from Janice Rand, working the graveyard shift at Starfleet Communicore, to plug into a high-priority signal.
"You owe me for this, Sulu," she had said.
"Anything," he had replied.
"Fine. You make captain, you rescue me out of this lousy detail."
"Done and done," he had assured her.
She'd gotten it through on a priority signal, punching through local traffic, and getting him a direct real-time line to the Bozeman.
Captain Bateson, fingers steepled, regarded Sulu with an obvious air of puzzlement. "According to the incoming computer feed, Commander, it's somewhere in the neighborhood of 0500 hours where you are. Early riser?"
"Sometimes, yes, sir."
"Something is on your mind, I take it."
"Yes, sir." Sulu shifted uncomfortably, not exactly certain how to proceed.
Bateson nodded encouragingly. "Go ahead. I'm listening."
"I . . . regret that I will not be able to serve you as your second-in-command, sir. A circumstance has arisen that precludes my leaving Earth for the foreseeable future."
"I see." Bateson smiled. "Didn't get somebody pregnant, did you?" He was joking.
Sulu blinked in surprise. "Yes, sir." He paused. "Seven years ago."
Now it was Bateson's turn to look surprised. He recovered very quickly, however. "Well, Commander . . . I take it that either the mother has a gestation period exceeded only by the eight-year birth cycle of a Terwilligan Flogg . . . or else this was a fairly recent revelation."
"The latter, sir."
"The mother just sprung this on you?"
"The mother is dead, sir."
"Oh." Bateson pursed his lips slightly. "You could make other arrangements for the . . ." He paused. "Boy or girl?"
"Girl, sir."
"Girl. You could make other arrangements for her, I presume."
"Yes, sir. I choose not to."
"I see. You could also have simply informed me via communiqué through Starfleet Command."
"I know, sir. I also choose not to do that. I . . . feel I owe you a face-to-face explanation, sir."
"What you owe me, mister, is your service as my second-in-command," said Bateson sharply. "I did not make my choice lightly, and I dislike the notion of having to start from scratch."
"Yes, sir. However . . ."
"However, you feel you owe something to your daughter as well." His voice softened. "Must have been a difficult decision for you, Commander."
"None harder, sir."
"Then I'll be damned if I make it any more so for you." He sighed.
"I'm sorry about this, sir."
He actually chuckled slightly. "Save your sympathy for yourself, Commander. All I have to worry about is a temporary inconvenience. You have the far more serious situation on your hands. What's the girl's name, by the way?"
"Demora."
"Demora Sulu. I'll remember that. And you be sure she remembers the name of Morgan Bateson, whom she deprived of a perfectly good first officer."
"I will, sir."
"Good luck, Commander."
"And to you, sir."
"Bozeman out."
And just like that, it was over. The line was cut, the Bozeman and all the people aboard with their lives . . .
And Sulu's was about to begin.
* * *
Demora Ling rolled over and stretched, blinking against the sunlight coming in through the window.
She sat up, rubbing the sleep from her eyes, and got out of bed. The hem of her nightgown fell down to her ankles as she walked over to the window, yawned, and looked out.
The sun was high in the sky. Too high. They had a reservation for her on an early-morning shuttle. Her suspicion was verified a moment later when she checked the chronometer and saw that it was a few minutes before noon.
She ran out into the living room and found Sulu sitting there, calmly scanning the morning headlines while sipping a cup of tea. He looked at her blandly. "Finally roll out of bed, did you. You always sleep in like this?"
"It's noon," she said.
"Yes, I know. Do you drink tea? I don't have any kid's-type drinks, like hot chocolate or such. Sorry."
"It's noon," she repeated, as if she couldn't quite believe he was that oblivious of the time. "We . . . I have a shuttle to get to."
"We do?"
"And . . . and you have an assignment to get to."
Ah. Well, there you're right. But the Academy can wait a few days."
She rubbed her eyes, apparently to make sure that she was genuinely awake. "The Academy?"
"Yes, Starfleet Academy. When Admiral Kirk was offered a teaching position there, he made an open offer to myself and several other longtime associates. I've decided to take him up on it."
Her head bobbed up and down slightly, a physical reflection of each new piece of information that was entering her head. "That's . . . that's here."
"Right."
"Here in San Francisco."
"Right."
"Am I still going up to the place up in Washington?"
"Not if you don't want to." He paused. "Do you want to?"
In a very soft voice, she said, "No. I hate it." "Then why didn't you say so?" Even more softly, she admitted, "Because I didn't think you'd care."
"Of course I care. I'm your father."
"I know you are. I just . . . I didn't know what that meant. Not really. I'm still not sure."
He put down the teacup. The movement was clumsy, and he hoped it didn't betray his nervousness. Lord, his hands had been steadier when he'd been programming phaser blasts against Klingon ships that had them sighted.
"What it means," he said slowly, "is that after you have some breakfast, we go out and take a Lifeshot, so we can watch you grow up. We go buy you some clothes. Some toys . . ."
"Toys?" she said.
"Okay, a lot of toys. We stop calling the guest room the guest room, and start calling it Demora's room. We put the wheels in motion—if you'd like—for me to officially adopt you. We do right by you."
She seemed to want to say a hundred things at once. Instead the only word the child was able to get out, her eyes wide in wonderment, was "Why?"
He smiled. "A lot of reasons. Only two that really matter: Because I'm your father. And because I love you."
"Love me?" she said incredulously. "You don't even know me."
"I know. Isn't it the most stupid thing you've ever heard?"
"Yes," she said, her lower lip trembling.
He put out a hand to her, and she took it and started to cry just as she had the previous night, except this time there were strong arms to hold her and comfort her as she said over and over, "It's stupid it's stupid it's stupid . . ."
And somehow, Sulu felt the eyes of Ling Sui upon him.
Wherever you are, you crazy woman . . . I hate you. And by the way . . . thank you . . . thank you forever. . . .
# Chapter Eighteen
"DAD . . . CAN I GO with you to the Academy sometime?"
Sulu looked at Demora in surprise while, at the same time, never breaking stride.
The two of them were jogging briskly down Telegraph Hill, the way up always being a bit easier than the way down. The sun was still just in the process of coming up over the horizon, as it usually was during their early-morning runs.
In the early days, when Demora had wanted to run beside him, he'd had to completely alter his route to accommodate her. But over the years, as she'd approached her teen years, she'd had less and less trouble keeping up with him. Consequently he'd started going back to his old running paths. She'd continued to keep up with him, and he started to foresee a time when it would be all he could do to keep up with her.
"You want to come to the Academy?"
"That's what I said."
Her long hair swung across the small of her back like a pendulum. They were both wearing T-shirts and shorts as she displayed her ability to maintain pace with her father.
What Demora wasn't was tall . . . a source of great frustration to her, although Sulu kept assuring her that she was in for a growth spurt. Demora would teasingly ask him if he was anticipating a growth spurt for himself, and indeed would occasionally gibe him by calling him Tiny. She meant it affectionately, and he let her get away with it, although he swore that anyone else who ever tried to call him that would sorely regret it.
Indeed, her lack of height made her appear, at first glance, much younger than she was. Her face still had the softness of childhood. Fully dressed, she looked preadolescent. However, in the sweaty shirt plastered to her chest and the shorts, and the shorts revealing legs like those of a young colt, there was no mistaking the fact that she was a youthful woman on the cutting edge of maturity. Sulu noticed young men's eyes turning these days as they jogged along, and he had a sneaking suspicion that he wasn't the one being sized up.
They slowed to a stop at a street corner. Sulu started to stretch, massaging a muscle that was cramping. "You've never asked to before. In fact, the first time I mentioned it, you showed such disinterest I never brought it up again."
She shrugged (some things never changing). "I didn't think you really wanted me to."
He gaped at her. But then he thought better of his first reaction, because if there was one thing he'd come to learn, it was never to accept anything Demora said or did at face value. It had been a long and hard lesson for him. He was used to dealing with adults . . . and outspoken adults, at that, such as Leonard McCoy or Pavel Chekov. People who told you exactly where they stood.
Demora wasn't always as forthcoming. This had worried him at first, but Sulu—being thorough—had researched the subject. He'd read everything he could get his hands on, from recent treatises on child rearing, all the way back to material written centuries before. He remembered a confusing conversation he'd had with Chekov, wherein Sulu had been quoting certain philosophies on parenting and Chekov had asked him who was the authority Sulu was using.
"Spock," Sulu had told him.
Chekov had looked exceedingly confused. "Meester Spock? Vat does he know about children?"
"No, Dr. Spock."
"A doctor?" Chekov was even more befuddled. "Ven did he become a doctor? Does Dr. McCoy know?"
In any event, Sulu had learned not to believe the first thing Demora said . . . or, for that matter, even the second or third necessarily. Speaking with any child was less like a normal conversation and more like peeling an onion: many layers to slice through to get to the core, and not a few tears shed along the way.
"You thought I didn't want you to? Demy . . . come on. You couldn't have thought that. I've told you about it often enough. Encouraged you. You've heard Chekov and me discuss the old days whenever he comes over. So how could you possibly think that I didn't want to share it with you?"
Demora had her foot placed flat against a building and was stretching to touch her toes. She paused and looked to him. "Truth?"
"Beats lies."
She turned and leaned against the building, her arms folded across her budding breasts. "I've been hearing about Starfleet for so long, and how wonderful it is . . . I've almost been afraid of it."
"Afraid of it?" He said it half with a laugh, unsure of what she could possibly be talking about.
"What if I visit the Academy with you . . . meet the cadets, sit in on a class . . . and I find the whole thing . . . I don't know. Dull. Maybe the cadets will be jerks, or the subject matter will bore me stiff."
"Demy! It's a visit, not a career choice."
"It's stepping into your world for the first time. Oh, I certainly was off-planet enough with Mother. But it's . . . it's different somehow. I don't know why, but it just . . . is."
"But now you want to come."
"I've just been doing a lot of thinking lately. I miss Chekov, for one thing. He sends his letters from the Reliant, but it's not the same. It couldn't be. And also there's . . ."
"All right, then," Sulu said. "How about today?"
She looked surprised. "Today?"
"Why not today?"
"No reason not to. I just meant . . . some time in the future."
"Two hours from now is the future, isn't it? That's the wonderful thing about the future. It's whenever you want it to be."
"Okay. Fine. That would be . . . fine," said Demora.
"But Demora . . . promise me something."
"Sure, Dad. What?"
"You'll stay out of trouble."
"Dad!" She looked at him accusingly. "When have I ever . . .?"
"Let's not cite chapter and verse, all right?" he warned. "You know very well the number of times I've heard it from your teachers about your knack for getting in over your head. I want you to swear to me, on your honor, that you'll stay out of trouble."
"Sure. Whatever."
"I don't want 'whatever.'"
"All right, I swear."
"On your honor?"
"On my honor."
She smiled.
He frowned.
# Chapter Nineteen
MAKING ASTRONAVIGATION interesting was not an easy task. There were no subtleties, no deep philosophies, no sprightly discussions about the ethics of the situation or second-guessing the right or wrong of an action. There was just straight memorization and trying to teach students how to think without regard to such irrelevancies as "up" and "down."
So in order to prevent eyes from glazing over, Sulu would tend to intersperse his lectures with his firsthand experiences. This would invariably keep the students‣ interest, their minds sharp and entertained, so that they wouldn't feel overwhelmed in trying to grasp the many facts that would be necessary for them to survive.
He was in the midst of one now, amused—as always—by the reactions he was getting from his class. "So I brought the Enterprise around, full one hundred and eighty degrees . . . and the planet was in front of us again."
There was startled laughter . . . and some looks of outright incredulity . . . from the students.
"I thought that I had forgotten every single thing I'd ever learned about helming a ship," he continued. "I kept looking at the instruments, looking back at the screen, back at the instruments," and he demonstrated, his head bobbing as if it were on a spring, his eyes growing increasingly flummoxed.
"He moved the planet?" asked one cadet. "The whole thing?"
"The whole thing," affirmed Sulu.
"That's the most insane thing I've ever heard," said another.
Sulu figured that he should save for another time the anecdote about the giant hand gripping the saucer section and keeping the entire ship in place.
His eyes swept the room, looking for Demora. She'd been seated toward the back, her hands propping up her head. It was hard to tell if she was interested in what he was lecturing about. It was all somewhat advanced, after all. Not the sort of thing that was normal for a young girl to try and absorb, or even pay attention to.
She wasn't there. Her seat was empty.
He stopped talking for a moment, slightly concerned. Where the hell had she just vanished to? He wondered if she should halt, or even dismiss, the class, and go look for her.
But surely that was an overreaction. They were at Starfleet Academy, after all, not rowing in the Amazon or something. And she'd promised, on her honor, that she would not get into trouble. Demora knew how seriously Sulu took such oaths, and he had every confidence that she would do nothing to violate it.
* * *
Everywhere she looked, there was something new.
Galvanized doors, signs pointing the way to various labs and classrooms. Cadets would pass her and react with a brief smile, or a nod of the head. Plus the occasional puzzled frown, of course.
"Excuse me . . . where are you going?" she heard from behind her.
She turned to see two cadets, male and female . . . the latter a Vulcan. It was the Vulcan who had spoken to her.
"Just looking around."
"You should not be wandering around," said the Vulcan. "Who are you?"
"Demora Sulu," she replied.
The cadet at the Vulcan's side pulled at her sleeve. "See? She's Commander Sulu's daughter. Come on, Saavik, we're going to be late for class."
"All right, Peter." She cast one more uneasy glance at Demora. "I think it would be best if you returned to your father," she said before she and classmate Peter Preston moved off down the hallway.
Demora, naturally, put the encounter immediately out of her mind, and continued on her way.
A couple of cadets came through a pair of heavy-duty doors, and Demora slipped through them before they shut, so that she never saw the sign that read MARK IV SIMULATOR.
She did, however, notice the freestanding sign a little farther in that read, USE OF THIS FACILITY WITH AUTHORIZED SUPERVISION ONLY. She drummed on it a moment and then continued on her way.
She made her way down the hall, past windows overlooking the gardens. She saw a young man working down there, under the guidance of an older man. The young man was medium height, with closely cut red hair. The older man was bossy and—judging by the younger man's reactions—a bit of a grouch.
Demora watched for a few minutes, and then kept going.
She slowed and then stopped upon finding what appeared to be a large set of double doors. She stepped through them . . . and stopped, slack-jawed.
She'd heard about them, but she'd never seen one before.
It was the bridge of a starship.
Oh, she knew it wasn't really, of course. It was some sort of mock-up, a model. Probably designed to show students what they could expect when they finally made it through training and embarked on their career in space.
She entered it, looking around, fascinated by what she was seeing. Everything was lit up, flickering. There was even a starfield displayed on the monitor screen. It didn't take much for her to imagine herself out in the depths of space. At every station there were readouts of activities throughout the "ship."
Her hand brushed briefly across the command chair, but somehow it didn't seem to hold interest for her. Instead she found her attention drawn to the helm station, the site of so many of her father's stories. The adventures, the battles . . . the incredible sensation of having the mighty starship's heading and weaponry at your fingertips.
She sat down at the helm station, studying the controls. "Commander Demora Sulu, reporting for duty," she said, dropping her voice an octave and trying to sound official.
She started touching controls at random. "Heading at two-ten mark three," she said briskly. "No Romulans. No Kling . . . wait! I see one coming" She pushed a button. "B-kow! Got you! Hmm! They were guarding that planet! Scanning the planet surface . . . Captain! It appears to be . . . an entirely new race of little blue squishy guys! And . . ."
Suddenly she heard a rumbling. For a brief moment she thought there was an earthquake. Then her head snapped around and she saw the source: The large double doors through which she'd entered had just slid closed.
She froze and looked back at the controls. Had she done that? She didn't think so, but she'd been touching pads and controls pretty much with abandon. "Hello?" she called cautiously, in such a small voice that she almost couldn't hear herself.
Then the air around her crackled and she heard something. It was some sort of message, a voice speaking with tremendous urgency.
"Imperative," it said. "This is the Kobayashi Maru, nineteen parsecs out of Altair Six. We've struck a gravitic mine and have lost all power." The transmission was awful, almost impossible to make out. "Our hull is penetrated and we have sustained many casualties . . ."
Demora was frozen in her chair. It certainly sounded like a genuine transmission. Was anyone else hearing it? Of course, they had to be. Perhaps she was somehow picking up something coming through Starfleet Communicore. It wasn't all that far off, after all.
Kobayashi Maru. That name sounded familiar for some reason. Her father had mentioned it at some point, but she couldn't remember exactly when. He'd told her about so many adventures, mentioned so many ships, that sometimes they seemed to blur together. Which one was the Kobayashi Maru again . . .?
She looked toward the console from where the transmission was originating, as it continued, "Enterprise, our position is Gamma Hydra Section Ten."
Enterprise? The ship was talking directly to the Enterprise? That would explain it. The Enterprise was running training maneuvers in the immediate sector. That's pretty much what it was used for these days. Her dad had grumbled about it from time to time, saying that it was a remarkable waste of an incredible ship, and she deserved better. He always called it "she," with enough affection that occasionally Demora even felt a little jealous.
Was she going to hear the Enterprise's response? Or was this fluke picking up only one-half of the conversation?
She heard the even fainter voice of the commander of the Kobayashi Maru as he said, "Hull penetrated! Life-support systems failing! Can you assist us, Enterprise? Can you assist us—?"
Demora desperately wished she could be up there to help them. There was no doubt in her mind that they were going to be okay, however. If the Enterprise was on the job, they were as good as saved.
She imagined herself at the helm, bringing the Enterprise within range of the stricken ship. "Just stay calm," she said with authority. "The Enterprise is on her way. Captain Hikaru Sulu commanding, Commander Demora Sulu at the helm." She punched in several commands at random. "Won't be any problem at—"
The console exploded.
Demora was blown backward and out of her chair, hitting the deck. All around her the lights were blinking red, alert sirens screeching.
Oh my God, I broke it! Dad's gonna kill me! went through her terrified mind.
Another console blew up. Demora shrieked, trying to back away from it, and then another one went. Smoke was pouring everywhere, flames dancing all around. She didn't know where to look first. The petrified girl clutched the arm of the command chair. "Heellppppp!" she howled. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Get me out of here!"
And from what seemed an infinite distance, a voice said, "There's someone in there. Sir, I think there's someone in there!"
And another voice, stronger, deeper, more authoritative, said, "Open it up. There's not supposed to be anyone there. Open it up, dammit!"
There was the sound of gears shifting, and the double doors began to slide open.
She dashed for them, her legs pumping, her heart pounding. And she ran squarely into someone who appeared to be an instructor . . . at least, she thought he was. Her eyes were tearing from her fear and mortification, not to mention the smoke.
He halted her headlong flight by taking her firmly by the shoulders. "Who are you, young lady?"
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" She was frantic.
The red light from the alert was flickering across his face. "What's your name?"
"D . . . Demora . . ."
"Demora. What were you doing in there, Demora?"
"I was . . ." Her body was trembling. "I was pretending I was a helmsman . . . like my father. . . ."
"And your father is . . .?"
"Going to be so mad!" she wailed. "Excuse me! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" And she pulled away from him, running at full speed.
The man watched her go, and a technician came up beside him. "I'm sorry, Admiral Kirk. I swear, I had no idea anyone was in there. I'd never have run the pyrotechnics systems check if I'd known that . . ."
"It's all right, Tuchinsky," said Kirk. "She didn't seem hurt. Just scared half out of her mind. Find her, find out who she belongs to, and have her escorted out of the building, if you wouldn't mind."
Kirk shook his head as Tuchinsky headed off after the frightened young girl. He had a feeling it would be quite a long time before she stuck her nose where it didn't belong.
He glanced at the simulator and sighed. What an image that made: The Enterprise bridge with a kid at the helm.
"That'll be the day," murmured Admiral Kirk.
* * *
Tuchinsky didn't find Demora, try as he might, even after he searched the entire building. That was possibly because Demora was no longer in the building, which was fine by Tuchinsky. He went back to Admiral Kirk, told him the girl had scampered, and that was more than enough for Kirk. She'd probably gone running back to her parents, tail between her legs, with a valuable lesson learned.
Demora, meantime, was crouched behind a hedge.
She sat there, red-faced and mortified, her legs drawn up under her chin.
"Excuse me."
She looked up.
The young man whom she'd been watching through the window—the groundskeeper—stood over her, looking down with a grave expression. "There's more comfortable places to sit, and a staggering percentage of them won't be in my way," he said sharply. He didn't sound like the type of person who suffered fools gladly.
She didn't say anything. Instead she just got to her feet and began to walk away, her shoulders sloped.
"Don't do that," he snapped.
She stopped and turned, looking at him in confusion. "Don't do what?"
"That defeated look. You're not defeated. You don't know what defeated is. You're too young for that."
"I'm embarrassed. I screwed up."
He stepped forward, took her chin and brusquely snapped her head right and left. "Hey! What're you doing?!" she demanded.
"Looking for pointed ears or antennae or something like that. You got something like that?"
"No!"
"So you're human."
"Yes!"
"So you're a human and you screwed up. There's a news item for you." He shook his head and started to walk away.
"Who the hell are you?" she demanded.
"Boothby," he said.
"Boothby. First name or last name?"
"Who cares? Just shout Boothby. You either get me or my father, which is who you were looking for in the first place. My father's the groundskeeper here. I help him. Someday I'll be doing it myself. How's that for a legacy? A landscape filled with space cadets who tromp around on the grass or sit around being depressed." He shook his head. "Grumpy old man. Hope if I get like that, somebody just shoots me and puts me out of my misery."
Too late, thought Demora. Out loud she said, "I'm not sitting around being depressed."
"Good." He continued walking away.
And she shouted after him, "And in case you hadn't noticed, I'm not a cadet!"
"Not yet," he snorted, and disappeared around a corner.
* * *
A deathly hush hung over dinner.
Demora picked at her food as her father ate in total silence. "This food isn't cooked enough," she said tentatively.
"It's sushi. This is as cooked as it gets" was his flat reply.
She rolled her eyes. "I know, Dad. It was just a joke."
"I don't feel very humorous tonight, if that's all right with you."
"Will you look at me at least!" she said in exasperation.
He looked at her, his face hard and set.
"Okay, look somewhere else," she requested.
But he didn't. Instead he kept his gaze leveled at her as he said, "Tell me, Demora . . . how do you think I reacted when I heard that some girl got into trouble in the Mark IV simulator? That she needlessly endangered her safety? That she plowed into Admiral Kirk when she went running pell-mell out of the simulator? How do you think I felt about that?"
"I don't know."
"I think you do."
She blew air out of her mouth. "Angry. Embarrassed. I don't know."
He leaned forward and said, "You gave me your word of honor. Of honor, Demora. Do you have any idea how much that means?"
"I didn't mean to break my promise. It wasn't my fault! I . . ."
And he slammed an open palm down on the table.
Demora jumped, startled. In their years together, she had never, never seen him this angry. Indeed, hardly ever angry at all. His control, his calm, was truly remarkable. But it seemed to have deserted him now.
"It wasn't just a promise! It was honor! And here you are trying to make excuses for it!" He got up from the table so angrily that he banged his knee against it. It caused him to hobble slightly as he pointed at the portraits of ancestors which adorned his wall. "Honor wasn't just a word to them! Not just a cheap promise to be tossed around and broken when they didn't feel like sticking to it! They fought for honor! They died for honor! I trusted you, and you proved not worthy of trust!"
"What do you want from me, Dad?!" Demora shot back. "I said I screwed up! I said I was sorry! How many ways am I supposed to apologize, huh? What do you want me to do, throw myself on a sword because I made a mistake?"
"I want you to realize how much the concept means to me, and why I'm so angry and disappointed that you've lived half your lifetime with me without truly understanding it! I've tried to conduct myself with that philosophy my entire adult life, and it means nothing to you! Nothing! Honor is why I'm still here! Because I took responsibility for you, which was the only honorable course open to me!"
And it was at that moment that Sulu suddenly realized he'd said the wrong thing. Because Demora took a step back as if she'd been slapped. Her face looked cold and dark, and in a voice that cut to the heart, she said, "I thought you stayed because you loved me. Because you wanted to be with me, not because you had to be."
Sulu, one of the most accomplished tactical officers in Starfleet, suddenly found himself on the defensive. "It was both, Demy," he said.
She glared at him, the affectionate diminutive not having the desired effect. "I don't think it was both. I think it's just what you said it was."
"They go together. There's a poem: 'I could not love thee dear, so much, loved I not honor more.'"
"To hell with poetry." She pointed a trembling finger at the wall of portraits. "And to hell with them! You care more about a bunch of dead people than you do about me!"
"That's not true."
"It is!" She stomped her foot. "You should have just dumped me at that place up in Washington and been done with me!" And she stormed off into her room.
* * *
"Sounds like a problem," said Uhura.
Sulu looked at her image on the screen. Uhura was on Mars at the moment. As a lark, she had taken a brief leave of absence from Starfleet to take a job on a broadcast station on Mars's capital of Ares City.
Sulu was speaking via direct link to her home. "So what do I do?" he asked.
"You're asking me?"
"Well . . . you're a woman."
"Sulu! That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me." She flashed that high-voltage smile of hers.
"I'm not sure what to say to her."
"Tell her you know she's sorry, and you respect her feelings."
"I don't know if that's going to be quite enough. What's the best way to let a female know you love her?"
"Vertically or horizontally?"
He gave her a dour look. "Vertically. Horizontally, and we're playing out a Greek tragedy."
"Just tell her, Sulu."
"She might feel I'm just saying it to try and mend fences."
"Are you?"
He paused. "Of course not."
At that, Uhura paused. "Sulu . . . a suggestion. Protestations of love that are preceded by hesitancy are not the most convincing. 'Do you love me?‣ 'Ummmmm . . . yes.‣ You see how that can be a bit off-putting."
"I know."
"Talk to the girl. More important . . . listen to the girl.
Reassure her. Just . . . work your way through it. You're dealing with a budding teenager. The explosions you get from matter and antimatter combining are nothing compared to parents clashing with adolescents. Understood?"
"Understood." He nodded.
"Good. Now go make peace with your daughter. After all, she's the only one you've got."
He nodded as Uhura's picture blinked out. Then he rose, walked down the hallway, and knocked on Demora's door.
"Yeah?" came from within.
"Demora. I want to talk."
"Who is it?"
He glanced heavenward for strength. "It's your father." There was silence for a moment. Then the door slid open and Sulu walked in.
Demora was lying on the bed, head propped up on her hands. Out of reflex, Sulu glanced at the pillow. No tearstains. Well, at least they were past that part.
"Demy," he began.
"I want to be in Starfleet."
He still had his mouth open. It was left hanging that way for a moment before he remembered to close it. "Pardon?"
"I said I want to be in Starfleet."
He cleared off some scattered clothes from a chair and sat. "Since when, may I ask?"
"Since for a long time. But . . . because of two things. First . . . because even though it was fake, still . . . when I was sitting at the helm of the Enterprise," and she made quotation marks with her fingers around the word "Enterprise," and continued, "I felt as if I . . . belonged there somehow. And I was thinking about what it would be like to really be up there, out there . . . trying to help people, or explore space . . . I think it's an incredible way to spend your life."
"It is," he sighed. "And . . . the second reason?"
"Because," she said evenly, "I want to make you proud of me."
He stared at her. "That's not necessary. I mean . . . I'll be proud of you no matter what you do."
"I know. But I think I want to do this."
"Well, fortunately enough, it's not like this has to be decided today. It's food for thought at the moment. But I . . . appreciate the gesture."
She went to him then, and they embraced. He'd never felt closer to his daughter than he did at that moment.
And since he didn't see the sadness in her eyes, he didn't realize that he'd never been farther away.
# Chapter Twenty
"HE STOLE THE Enterprise?"
She stared at Janice Rand. They were in a park, seated on a bench, and Janice gestured for her to keep her voice down. When Demora had gotten out of school that day, Janice had been waiting for her. She'd met Janice a couple of times in the past, had brief and pleasant chats with her. None of those casual social interactions, however, had remotely prepared Demora for anything like this.
Demora was fifteen years old. The growth spurt had kicked in a couple of years earlier, as her father had long predicted. She was a half a foot taller, and her body no longer could be mistaken for preadolescent, even if she'd been clothed in a potato sack. Her face had also lost the babyish look, and now had the sculpted features of a striking young woman. Now, though, Janice was worried that the teen was on the verge of an apoplectic seizure that would preclude her ever seeing sixteen.
"He stole the Enterprise?" Demora said again. This time she managed to keep her voice to an appalled whisper. "What do you mean, stole. You can't just steal a starship. It's . . ."
Clearly she was having trouble fully grasping the notion. It was hardly surprising, considering the hellacious past couple of months they'd had. She'd heard chapter and verse about the routine training mission that had turned into a duel to the death with a twentieth-century madman named Khan. She'd remembered the blood draining from her face as Chekov had described (over Sulu's protestations) their nail-biting escape from the Genesis torpedo . . . an escape made only at the cost of Mr. Spock's life.
Maybe it had all been too much for him. Her father was out of practice for such life-and-death struggles.
"We can say it was stress," Demora said quickly.
Rand stared at her, confused. "What?"
"Stress. You know. After that training mission, and Spock's death . . . then he found out that they were planning to decommission the Enterprise, and he just . . . snapped. Temporary insanity."
But Janice was shaking her head. "Demora, it wasn't like that. It wasn't just some impulse thing. It was carefully planned."
"You mean he planned out a whole—"
"It wasn't just him."
"It wasn't." Demora paused a moment, her face clouding. "Let me guess: the usual suspects."
Rand nodded. "It had something to do with Spock . . . and with Dr. McCoy. I'm still a little hazy on the details. . . ."
"Oh my God," said Demora, her face in her hands. "But . . . but how? You can't just waltz into spacedock and leave with a starship. Shouldn't someone have tried to stop them?"
"Someone did try. Captain Styles of the Excelsior. But the Enterprise got away."
"Got away? From the Excelsior? How did . . .?" Her face went ashen. "They . . . they didn't fire on it, did they? Didn't get into a fight . . .?"
"No, no. Nothing like that. They just . . ." Rand cleared her throat. "They broke it."
Demora stared at her, not sure she'd heard right. "I beg your pardon?"
"They broke it."
"How do you break a starship?"
Janice waved her hands in exasperation. "They shot the hamster running on the little treadmill that makes it go. I don't know what they did! They broke it. The Excelsior went about ten meters and then the engines conked out. Captain Styles isn't real happy about it. Made him look like a fool. They're already calling him Styles Without Substance. No, not happy at all, that one."
Birds overhead, recognizing Demora as a customary easy touch for food, settled down near her. "Scram!" she shouted and shooed them away.
"Okay," she said after a moment, "okay . . . maybe this won't be so bad. No property's been really damaged. No one's been killed. Maybe this is salvageable. If . . . if Dad and the others just . . . just bring the Enterprise back . . . considering their record, maybe this can all go away. They just need a real good lawyer. Maybe that Cogley guy . . ."
Then she saw that Janice was shaking her head. "No Cogley?"
"That's not the problem. The problem is bringing back the Enterprise."
Demora's voice was deathly cold. "What . . . happened to the Enterprise."
"They broke it," said Rand.
"You mean broke it like shooting the hamster?"
"I mean broke it like into a million pieces. Admiral Kirk blew it up."
Demora, feeling ill, put her head between her legs. "Why did he blow it up?" she asked, her voice so faint that Janice could barely hear it.
"I don't know. I'm sure he had a reason."
"Of course he had a reason. The reason was to drive me insane!"
Clearly she was making no attempt to keep her voice down anymore. Passersby in the park glanced her way briefly and then hurried on about their business.
"Where's Dad now? Is he okay? He . . ." Suddenly she was struck by the horrible thought that maybe this was a long, labored way of breaking the news to her gently. . . .
"He's fine," Janice said quickly, patting her on the hand. "I swear, he's fine. He's on Vulcan."
"Vulcan? What's he doing on Vulcan?" "I'm a little confused on that part myself. Believe it or not . . . I think he's there with Spock."
"With Spock? Spock's dead."
"He . . ." Janice fished for words and couldn't find any good ones. ". . . he got better," she said.
Demora stood. "I'm going home now," she announced. "I'm going home . . . I'm going to crawl under the blankets . . . and when I wake up, I'll find out this was all an insane dream."
"Close. You'll go home and pack your stuff, and then you're coming to my place."
"Your place? Why?"
"Because the message your father managed to get out to me said that's what he wanted. Demora . . . you have to understand. Sulu, the admiral, all of them . . . they're criminals now. Wanted fugitives. They're under protection by the Vulcan Council, but they can't budge from the planet without risking immediate arrest."
Demora couldn't believe it. She felt as if her world had tilted at a forty-five-degree angle.
"It's not the kind of circumstance that allows a genuine freeflow of communication, you know? Sulu was able to get a brief message out to me, slipping it through Communicore. But that's the best he could do, and it's not likely we'll be hearing from him again until this whole business is settled."
"Which will be . . . when?"
"I don't know," said Janice Rand, not recalling a time in her life when she'd felt quite this helpless.
"All . . . all right. All right, Janice. I'll get my stuff . . . I'll lock up the apartment . . . and I'll room with you. If that's okay."
"That's fine," said Janice. "Really."
Demora stood, shaking her head. "I don't understand why . . . or how . . . he could have done this to me. I just don't."
"Actually . . . he asked me to relay something to you. Something he said he hoped would help you understand. He said to tell you that it was a matter of honor."
Demora sighed. "Yes. I had a feeling that's what he'd say."
# Chapter Twenty-one
THE END OF THE WORLD was nigh, and Demora Sulu knew beyond any doubt that she was going to die alone.
Janice wasn't there with her. This, in and of itself, was nothing unusual. Rand's days had been more busy lately since she'd been transferred to Starfleet Command. It had meant longer hours, but a step up in responsibility. And she did usually get home while Demora was still awake; indeed, oftentimes Demora would have dinner waiting for her. The situation made Janice laugh occasionally as she wondered just exactly who was supposed to be taking care of whom.
But Janice hadn't been home for nearly sixteen hours, and Demora . . . along with everyone else on the planet . . . was painfully aware why.
Pictures of the Probe had been broadcast across all Earth bands. Demora had had trouble taking it seriously at first; it reminded her of nothing so much as a giant pecan log. "Give me a fork and a really big glass of milk, I can take care of that thing no problem at all," she'd said.
But there were no jokes now, no amused observations. No safety.
No hope.
It had drawn closer and closer to Earth, its reason a complete puzzlement. It didn't seem to want to destroy anything. On the other hand, it didn't seem inclined not to destroy anything. It just . . . was. Speculation was that it seemed to be searching for someone or something, although Demora was damned if she could figure out what it was. In that respect, the Probe was like a small child tearing apart a room while searching for something. Even if the object (whatever it was) was eventually located, the result was a trashed room.
And Earth was on the verge of becoming a trashed planet.
She couldn't see it in the skies overhead, for it hung above the Earth's atmosphere. But she felt as if she could sense it. Sense its presence, its power. She heard it screech with a noise that chilled her. In response, the Earth seemed determined to tear itself apart.
Janice Rand, Demora knew, was busy coordinating Earth's emergency operations at Starfleet Command. A fat lot of good that was going to do. The Probe couldn't be slowed down or stopped. It was like a force of nature, and confronting it was like standing on a shoreline and spitting at an incoming tidal wave.
Demora hadn't wanted to die in Janice's apartment. Because when all was said and done—despite it having been Demora's place of residence for three months—it was still Janice's apartment. She wanted her home. She wanted to be in her place.
So that was where she had headed. It hadn't made tremendous sense when viewed with a dispassionate frame of mind. She was leaving one apartment to brave the wind, the rain, the trembling of the Earth's crust beneath her feet, all for the purpose of getting to . . . another apartment.
The only thing it accomplished was making her feel—rightly or wrongly—that she was doing something. Making some sort of headway, indulging in some sort of activity that was, ultimately, preferable to simply waiting around for the end. If (when) she died, at least she could say to herself, "I didn't die in someone else's home . . . I died in my own."
It was cold comfort, but when your planet was being shaken apart by a lethal probe, you took what you could get.
She went to the bay window and looked out. In the distance was the Golden Gate Bridge. She could see the waves crashing against it, getting higher and higher, and it seemed only a matter of time before the entire span came crashing down. And there she stood, helpless and alone.
And all she could think about was her father.
Part of her was relieved for him. She knew the trajectory of the Probe very well from the news reports, and was aware that it had passed nowhere near Vulcan. So he was safe. Hiding away in exile, with the Federation Council making pronouncements against him and his friends, and now they were going to have the last laugh. His accusers were trapped on Earth, and he was high and dry on an alien world. He was going to survive and, after all, what good was served if both of them died?
And the other part hated him. Hated him with a passion.
She looked at the photographs and representations of his ancestors . . . hers, too, of course. They stared at her with varying degrees of sullenness and inscrutability, and she felt a rage building up inside her.
All that talk about honor. About family. About commitment. And in the end, in the final analysis, what had it meant? What had any of it meant?
"Damn you," she whispered, and then she practically screamed, "Damn you!"
She ran to the wall and, her fingers curved into claws, she ripped at the pictures. She tore them off the wall, sending them flying everywhere. Her heart pounded against her ribs, and she yanked so violently that she sent herself tumbling over a chair and crashing to the floor. She lay there curled up, sobbing, feeling like a child again as she tore at the shag carpet with her fingernails.
"You abandoned me, you son of a bitch!" she howled, even though her voice couldn't even be heard above the crashing of the water outside. Rain was pouring down in torrents. It was becoming impossible to see anything at all.
Yes, abandoned her. Run off on an insane, criminal mission to help Spock. And he hadn't said anything to her about it, not a damned thing. He'd sat there, cool as a cucumber on what now appeared to have been the last night they'd ever spend together, and the most deeply moving thing he'd said to her was "Pass the rice." Hadn't said boo to her. Hadn't whispered a word of what he was going to do.
Because he still considered her a child. Still considered her "not worthy" somehow. That was it, of course. Four damned years ago, and he was still angry at her. She couldn't believe it. She was never going to live up to what he wanted, never be what he wanted her to be. Because he didn't want her to be human. It's just like that landscaper—Booby, or whatever the hell his name was. It was just like he'd said. She was human and she screwed up, but her father didn't expect her to be human. He expected her to be this . . . this perfect little thing, this robot, wind her up, set her loose, and watch her never do a single thing wrong and flawlessly live up to some code of honor that was centuries old and as cold and unforgiving as the water pounding outside.
So he hadn't trusted her, and he'd abandoned her without caring if he'd ever see her again. And he was off on Vulcan probably laughing his ass off while the entire world sank under the most cataclysmic flood since Noah had looked skyward and remarked that it looked like showers.
She heard the Probe, getting louder and louder. It was the only noise that managed to surpass the unbridled fury of the storm outside. There was a deafening screech over and over, and she screamed, "Shut up! Shut up! Just kill us already and get it over with, okay?"
The wind bashed against the bay window. It shattered, pieces flying everywhere. Demora was positioned behind a couch as it so happened, and that's what saved her life. Shards embedded themselves in the cushion, and a few landed in her hair. If she'd still been standing in front of the window, she would have been dead instantly.
The wind howled through the apartment, knocking over all the contents. Swords fell off the walls, antique guns went tumbling.
This was it. She knew this was it. And she seized upon the mostly demented notion that if she was going to die, then she was going to go down fighting. It didn't matter that the enemy was a soulless Probe orbiting the Earth . . . or the wind blasting her backward. It didn't matter that there was no thinking entity to combat, no villain to triumph over.
She would fight against death itself. She would fight against all the anger, all the disappointment in her life, all the fear that threatened to overwhelm her.
She crawled across the floor and grabbed a samurai sword, one that her father had told her once belonged to a great samurai ancestor. She imagined that she could feel strength flowing through the hilt. Her grip on it alone was enough to empower her.
She pulled it from its scabbard, and the scrape of metal was oddly satisfying. Then Demora staggered to her feet, the blade poised. She stood facing the window, staggering from the power of the gale.
Never in her life had she felt so completely melodramatic. But what the hell. There was no one else around. She was about to die, and if she was going to go, then let it be with some style.
"You want me?" she shouted at Death, waving her sword in the wind. "Come and get me!"
And then she saw it.
Death, streaking through the sky in the shape of a great dark bird. It was as if no doubt was being left. Death had made itself visible to the people of Earth, its massive wings moving slowly, like a massive bird of prey. . . .
Bird of . . .
"Wait a minute . . . what the hell?" Her eyes narrowed.
It was. It was a Klingon bird-of-prey. But what the hell was it doing here? The entire Klingon contingent had stormed out of the Federation Council and left Earth a couple of days ago. It had been on all the news. The ambassador and delegation had withdrawn in a snit because the UFP hadn't honored their demands for Kirk's head on a silver platter. At the time no one had doubted that, sooner or later, the Klingons would return, if for no other reason than to harass the council some more.
But there was no way that they would have chosen now to return. Nor could it have been by accident: A planetary distress signal had gone out, warning away anyone who might even think about heading toward Earth.
Yet here was a Klingon bird-of-prey, big as life, twice as ugly, crashing into the surging water beneath the Golden Gate Bridge, disappearing in the clouds and blasts of rain that were everywhere in this moment of ultimate cataclysm. Who in hell would be so totally devoid of sanity—or, perhaps, of fear—that they would pilot a warship directly into the heart of the storm, facing certain death and . . .
"Oh, my God," she whispered.
They—Dad, Kirk, and the others—they had stolen a Klingon bird-of-prey. That was one of the things the ambassador had complained about, according to news reports as the facts of the entire affair had come to light.
It was her father.
He'd come home to die with her.
Tears ran down her face as she thought, That is so sweet. . . .
Long minutes passed, during which time an odd calm descended on her. She watched the clouds rolling, watched the waves leaping ever higher, and yet there was a certain . . . rightness about it all. She'd found an inner peace, although her hands were gripping the hilt of the sword so tightly that her knuckles had turned white.
It was all going to come to a head within the next seconds, she was certain of that. What would happen? Would a giant wave crash into the building? Would the Earth simply open and swallow them? Would a beam of force blast them to bits?
She was so calm, she realized she didn't even have to wait to find out. Her father, in a final display of honor and integrity, had been willing to perform a final suicidal act rather than outlive his native planet. Perhaps it was an example that she should have the bravery to emulate.
She reversed the sword, put it to her chest, gripping it firmly and taking a deep breath. She tried to find the strength and resolve to drive it home. It was becoming easier and easier for her to concentrate on her intention, thanks to the wind dying down and . . .
"Dying down?"
Startled at the realization, she looked out the window and couldn't believe what she was seeing.
The storm clouds were blowing out to sea. It was as if someone had taken a vid of it and started rolling it backward. The Pacific was smoothing out, the waves lapping around the supports of the Golden Gate descending to their normal height. Demora watched the phenomenon with growing incredulity.
The sun was coming out. And high above, she saw a shuttle angling around and descending toward where the Klingon bird-of-prey had gone into the drink.
Within five minutes of the arrival of the bird-of-prey, the impending armageddon was not only no longer impending . . . it was, in fact, history.
"What happened?" she wondered out loud.
* * *
"What happened was, we were cleared."
It was Hikaru Sulu's first meal home in three months, and the events leading up to it had been nothing short of impressive.
Demora hadn't had a chance to see him at first. The shuttle that had plucked Sulu and the others from the water had brought them straight to Starfleet Headquarters. Suspecting that that's where they would be, Demora had headed straight over there. Her efforts to get in to see her father had been herculean. She'd tried every possible means of ingress, tried to talk her way past more guards than she would have believed conceivable. She offered every excuse, up to and including that she was dying and only had a very short time to live. ("Bring a doctor's note," one amused guard instructed.)
None of it had worked. Despite Demora's best tries, the Enterprise seven had been kept under wraps. The only ones who might have gotten in to see them were legal counsel, but the accused had all refused the option (Scotty had been the most outspoken about that: "Lawyers. As if we dinna have enough problems"), until the council of the UFP had been able to convene and discuss the situation.
The outcome of that discussion had been made public. It had been less than an hour ago when the renegades from the Enterprise had faced the council in closed session. Then the session had ended and the outlaws-turned-heroes had separated to return to home and loved ones.
When Sulu had walked in, Demora had been waiting for him. She'd made desperate endeavors to clean up the apartment, but there were still many signs of the damage that the storm had wreaked. Sulu hadn't cared, however. His booted feet had crunched on the broken glass in the carpet as he walked quickly to his daughter and embraced her.
"Did you miss me?" he asked her.
"Why, did you go somewhere?" she replied with her typical breeziness.
Now they sat at the hastily cobbled-together dinner that Demora had managed to prepare for them. Many systems were still out of whack. It was going to take some time for everything to be restored to normal. Sulu made a point of saying that he didn't care, that being with her was all that mattered.
"They said that due to 'extenuating circumstances,‣ they were forgiving us our transgressions, basically," Sulu explained to her.
"The circumstances being that you saved the Earth."
"I'd have to say that's correct. The only one they came down on was the admiral . . . and they busted him back to captain."
She winced. "That must have hurt."
"Not really. Between you and me, I don't think he was ever really happy as an admiral. As captain, he can—and will—be back in command of a starship. That's where he belongs."
"From everything you've said about him, I'd have to agree. Of course, the Klingons are still angry with him."
"True enough," Sulu agreed, twirling thin noodles onto his fork.
"Not a problem," said Demora. "All he has to do is save the Klingons from some big catastrophe, and then they'll forgive him, too."
"Part of me wants to say that that's too absurd for words," Sulu said. "On the other hand, I've learned never to underestimate the adm . . . the captain." He sighed and looked around the apartment. "My my, what a mess."
"I know. The storm was kind of hard on it."
He glanced at the far wall. "Even knocked down all the pictures of my family."
"Oh yes," she said quickly. "It was vicious. Just everything came down."
"Well, you did your best."
"Dad . . . I have to tell you something . . ."
He waited, eyebrows raised.
"When I saw your ship . . . I thought that that was going to be it for you. That there was no way you could possibly . . ." Her voice trailed off.
"Oh, come now, Demy," he chided her. "You should have more faith. I was at the helm, remember. It was my job to bring her in safely. I'm a helmsman, not a kamikaze. We came plowing into that bay with a plan and a crew to pull it off. I don't dispute that it was tricky, but believe you me, Demy . . . and you never have to worry about this . . . one thing I most definitely am not is suicidal."
He said it with amusement in his voice. Laughing at the concept. Laughing at her.
Sure, now, in the light of calm skies and the ebbing of her fears, it seemed laughable enough. But not at the time. Not only that, but her faulty reasoning had almost . . .
. . . almost . . .
"No, of course you're not suicidal, Dad. I wouldn't even suggest such a thing."
Her fork dangled over the noodles. There was so much she wanted to say. So much that angered her, frustrated her, frightened her. So many unresolved sentiments that had been brought to the surface by Sulu's long absence. She wanted to bring it up, but she didn't even know where to begin.
"Janice treated you well, I assume," said Sulu.
"Oh yes." She nodded. "Yes, very well."
"Good," said Sulu. He reached over and patted her hand. "I knew I could count on her. Just like I knew I could count on you to be a grown-up. You're getting so big, Demy."
"Thanks, Dad." She cleared her throat. "And it's . . . it's great to have you home. I can't begin to tell you how. And there's a lot I'd—"
The front door chimed. Demora started to rise, but Sulu said, "No, no, I'll get it." He went to the door as Demora remained in her seat.
Chekov walked in, brimming with excitement. "Now" was all he said.
Sulu looked surprised. "Now?"
"Now. Ve're to report to the spacedock shuttle immediately. I vould have called ahead, but comm is still out in this section of town."
"What's going on?" Demora asked.
Chekov crossed quickly to her and kissed her on the cheek. "Good to see you again, darling. Vat a mess, eh?" He turned back to Sulu. "So? Vat are you vaiting for?"
Despite Chekov's acknowledgment of her presence, she still felt as if she were invisible. "Excuse me. He just got back. Dad, you just got back. . . ."
He paused, and then took her by the hands. "Demy . . . I'm sure it won't be for too long."
"What 'it'? What's going on?"
"They're putting the captain back in charge of a starship. I told you that. Taking a guess, the Excelsior. And we're going to be his command crew . . . just for the shakedown cruise, that's all. I'm sure it won't be for too long."
She stared at him and thought, How can you be so sure? The moment you get out there, anything can happen at any moment. Isn't that what you've always said? Another probe, another madman, another threat . . . and it'll be another three months? A year? Five? You just came back!
He squeezed her hand tightly and said, "Demy . . . if you have a problem with it . . ."
But she could see it in his eyes. He didn't want her to say anything unless it was approval. He didn't want to hear everything that was going through her mind, not really.
And she knew, right then. Knew that all her suspicions, all her guilt since she was a kid, was justified. Given a choice between her and the stars, there was simply no contest. He was meant to be a creature in flight and ever since she had first shown up, she'd handicapped him. He'd been a crippled, wretched bird flapping around, as destined for a crash as that Klingon bird-of-prey had been. It was all her fault, and the guilt and self-recrimination hardened into a wall surrounding her heart.
And at that moment she swore herself an oath . . . that she would never again say or do anything to hamper him. Here was a man who had just helped save the Earth. Save the Earth, for God's sake. And she was going to start trying to tie him down again? To heap guilt on him, make him feel he owed her something? She saw the excitement in his eyes over the prospect of getting right back out there again.
More: She saw the future. Suddenly it revealed itself to her, clear as the new day that had dawned on the salvaged Earth. The explorer, the space adventurer within Hikaru Sulu had reawoken with a ferocious appetite. The years with her had been wasted ones. All the times he'd commented that saddling James Kirk with a teaching job was a waste of material, he could just as easily have been saying that about himself.
He would pursue more adventures, she knew that now. She saw him at the helm of a ship . . . hell, she saw him in a command chair. Fulfiling a destiny that had been sidetracked by the unexpected addition of a young girl. Sulu was meant to save planets, not be tied down to one.
And she would follow him. She would. Within two years she'd be eligible to enroll at Starfleet Academy. The final frontier pulled at her just as it did her father. Even more strongly, in fact, because joining Starfleet would enable her to become the only thing that he could ever respect: someone just like him.
"It's okay, Dad," she said, in the greatest acting performance of her life. "Really. It's okay. I'm not a kid anymore, like you said. If there's any problems, I've got Janice as back-up, but hey . . . gotta start being independent sometime. And after everything you've been through . . . you deserve it. Go. I'll be here when you get back. Hell, if you're gone long enough, I'll be through the Academy and be coming out after you."
Despite her resolve, just for a moment, she desperately wanted him to see through it. To validate for her their years together. To say, Don't be ridiculous. We could so easily have lost each other forever. I'm going to stay with you right here, by your side, and we're going to talk and heal our relationship and . . .
He held her tightly. "I knew you'd understand," he said.
She smiled gamely. "Hey, what are daughters for?"
Then it was another hug, a quick kiss, a hurried farewell, and he and Chekov were out the door. Demora sat at the table for a long time after that, staring at the cooling bowl of noodles. Then, of their own volition it seemed, Demora's hands reached out, grabbed the bowl, and hurled it against the wall. The bowl shattered, noodles all over the wall and sliding down it in a large smear.
It was a mess. But then again, what was one more mess in her life . . . more or less.
## SECTION FIVE
# LIFE AFTER DEATH
# Chapter Twenty-two
CHEKOV CAME OUT of the disciplinary hearing smarting a bit, but otherwise intact. Uhura, who had stood by him during the hearing, had given an impassioned speech which, frankly, had Chekov less than thrilled. She had painted him as so totally devastated by the shock of recent events—first his beloved captain, then his beloved goddaughter—that he had simply come unhinged. Temporary insanity, as it were. That was why, she said, he had hauled off and attacked Captain Harriman at Demora Sulu's memorial service.
The disciplinary committee conferred and finally settled for a slap on the wrist—an official reprimand (which Chekov had no problem with) and an official written apology from Chekov to Captain Harriman (which Chekov did have a problem with).
They walked back to his place, Chekov complaining all the way. "I'd like to apologize, all right," he said tersely. "Apologize vit a brick through that thick skull of his."
"Look, Pavel, you'd better own up to the fact that you got off lucky," Uhura informed him. "Lucky that you got a hearing board that was somewhat sympathetic to your state of mind. And lucky that Harriman decided not to press the matter. Otherwise it could have gone extremely badly for you."
Chekov gave a derisive snort, but Uhura could tell that he knew she had a point. By the time they got back to Chekov's home, Uhura was already suggesting language for the apology that Chekov was admitting he could live with.
Upon entering, Chekov immediately noticed that there was a message waiting for him. "You know where everything is." Chekov gestured.
"I know where the vodka is," replied Uhura. "That's about all you keep around here."
"I think of it as having priorities," he said archly as he punched up the message at his computer station.
Uhura managed to turn up some fruit juice, and she sat down on the couch to sip it delicately. "Chekov," she said after a moment, sounding fairly glum, "you want to hear something really depressing? I mean, I probably shouldn't be saying this, all things considered. But I think about everything we've accomplished . . . and what we're leaving behind. Except . . . the captain's dead. His son is dead. Sulu's daughter is dead. I have no family, nor do you or Scotty. I feel as if we're going, one by one, like characters in a murder mystery. And when it's all over, all we'll be are names in Starfleet texts somewhere. We struggled and risked so much, and in end . . . maybe we'll be remembered. But there will be no one left to really love us. Was it all worth it, Chekov? Was it?"
He didn't say anything in response. She turned. "Chekov?"
He was seated at his computer screen, and now he turned to Uhura and gestured quickly. "Come here."
"Were you listening to anything I said?"
"Not a vord. Uhura . . ."
"Well, I'm certainly glad I told you what was on my mi—"
"Uhura, now!" he said with such urgency that it brought her full attention upon him. She went quickly to him and bent over his shoulder to see what he was looking at.
There was an image of Sulu, frozen on the screen. "What's going on?" she asked.
"I'll play it again," he said. "Vatch."
Sulu stayed immobile for a moment more, and then he said, "By the time you receive this, I may very well have thrown away my captaincy. For all I know, I may even be dead. But it's important to me that you, Chekov, and you, Uhura, understand what I'm doing and why I'm doing it."
"He sent the exact same message to both of us, I'd guess," said Chekov. "That's vy . . ."
"I figured that out, Chekov," she said dryly.
"I refuse to accept the mystery of Demora's death so easily," continued Sulu. "I've barely eaten, barely slept . . . barely been able to function since I learned of it. Captain Harriman's quarantine action, while understandable—even regulation—is not one that I can tolerate. I can't wait around for months, even years, to find out why my daughter's life is ashes. Indeed . . . I can't wait around so much as a week. I have to know, for Demora's sake . . . and for mine. Because in those moments where I do barely drift to sleep . . . in those twilight seconds . . . I still feel like I hear her calling to me. I can't abandon her to an enigma. I can't.
"I am therefore intending to bring the Excelsior directly to Askalon Five. Doing this will be not only a direct violation of the quarantine regs, but directly ignoring the orders of Admiral LaVelle. I suspect the recriminations may be severe, but it cannot be helped. I have to do this. I have to.
"On the other hand, I knew I could not tell you . . . my friends . . . because I knew there would be no preventing you from joining me on this potentially career-ending quest. Only a couple of years ago, we came together to help Dr. McCoy rejoin Spock's soul to his body. We emerged from that situation unscathed, largely due to the potentially disastrous—yet, ironically, lucky—problem with the Probe. The timing of that bordered on the supernatural. If we'd arrived days earlier, we'd have been serving sentences on a mining colony somewhere. Days, even hours later . . . and Earth would have been destroyed.
"So it appears that Captain Kirk had some powerful gods watching over him. But it would seem that even those gods have finally abandoned him, and if they weren't there for him . . . it's a good bet they won't be there for us. Based on that, I cannot and will not risk your coming along.
"Instead I have decided to handle this matter in the way that Mr. Spock did in the Talos Four affair. By taking these actions on myself, by myself, to shield you from potential recriminations. It's my problem. And she was . . . my daughter.
"But it is important to me that you know and understand my need for subtrefuge, so that you won't think the less of me. Losing your respect would pain me almost as much as losing Demora . . . and," he said with a grim smile, "I don't think I can handle much more loss right now.
"So . . . that is the situation. It's my situation. Wish me good luck, and a hope that whatever gods protected James Kirk for so well and so long . . . cast a brief and favorable glance my way. Sulu out."
The picture blinked off, leaving Chekov and Uhura staring at the blank screen for a long moment.
"I cannot believe he did that," Chekov said. "I cannot believe he left us behind."
"I can," Uhura replied. "I can believe it, for the exact reasons he said. This is something he had to do. He needs to find peace of mind. And I guess he couldn't do that if part of his mind was on us."
"So vat happens now? Ve pretend that everything is normal? Go on with our lives?"
"That's right," said Uhura. "That's exactly what we do. Oh . . . and one other thing."
"Vat?"
"We pray."
She floated in a haze of confusion . . .
She thought she heard voices talking . . . unfamiliar voices . . .
There was liquid everywhere . . . she was submerged in some sort of gelatinous mass. She should have been drowning, but she wasn't . . . it filled her nose, her lungs, every part of her, but instead of suffocating her, it nourished her . . .
It was like being back in the womb . . .
. . . whose womb . . . someone's womb . . .
. . . her recollection was nonexistent, her awareness of who or where she was at best a distant thing . . .
. . . she wanted someone . . . someone to come to her . . . someone to save her . . . but she didn't know what or who she needed to be saved from . . . or who could possibly find her . . .
# Chapter Twenty-three
NO ONE HAD WANTED to be the first to say anything.
Not Anik of Matern, the first officer, who heard the order given. Not Lojur, the Kothan navigator who laid in the course. Not Lieutenant Shandra Docksey at helm as she sent the Excelsior hurtling in a direction that was not remotely akin to the one that she had thought she'd be following. Not even Commander Rand at communications.
Nevertheless, somebody had to say something. At first it looked like it was going to be Rand, thanks to her long association with Captain Sulu. But Anik took it upon herself to do it. She stepped forward on her delicate legs, cleared her throat and said, "Captain . . ."
He turned in his chair and looked remarkably calm. They both knew exactly what she was going to say, so it was just a matter of her saying it.
"The course you've indicated for us is not the course to Centrelis."
"Not necessarily, Commander," he said reasonably. Anik seemed momentarily confused, as if uncertain he'd heard the statement. "Sir . . .?"
"It's simply not the shortest route to Centrelis. I've decided we're going to take the scenic route."
"The . . . scenic route, sir?"
"That's right, Commander. Life is too short not to take time to savor the pretty things in life. Don't you agree?"
Docksey and Lojur exchanged glances.
Anik looked at him suspiciously. "Sir . . ."
"The course is as I ordered it, Commander. On my responsibility. Do you have a problem with that?"
"Sir . . . it's not whether I have a problem with it or not. It's whether Starfleet will have a problem with it."
"Are you lecturing me, Commander?"
The bridge had gotten very quiet. Anik had that ethereal look, but no one doubted her strength of character or spirit. She was not someone who would permit herself to be intimidated or pushed around.
Sulu met Anik's level gaze, and then said with exceeding calm, "I know what I'm doing, Commander."
"Yes, Captain. I think we all know what you're doing," Anik replied. "And it is my recommendation that—"
It was at that moment that the distress signal came.
"Captain," said Rand urgently. "Call for assistance coming in." It was a fair guess that never, in the history of Starfleet, had news of a ship in trouble been greeted with such relief. "Cargo ship Burton in sector two-nine-J, with a malfunctioning warp coil. They need to abandon ship and are requesting immediate assistance."
"Signal that—" He paused . . . looked at Anik . . . and then smiled. "Signal that we anticipated their request, and will rendezvous with them at . . ." He looked to Lojur, eyebrows raised questioningly.
"We can be there in"—Lojur checked his instruments—"forty-seven minutes, sir."
"In forty-seven minutes," Sulu said. "We will off-load the crew and cargo to Excelsior, and transport them to Starbase Nine."
"Yes, sir," she said, and turned to her comm board to relay the message.
As she did so, Sulu looked evenly at Anik. "Satisfied, Commander?"
There were a few things that occurred to Anik, but instead of saying any of them she just smiled thinly. "Perfectly, Captain."
* * *
The rescue went off without problems. The Burton was not unsalvageable. By the time the crew and cargo had been removed from the cargo ship, the warp-coil breach had poisoned the interior of the vessel. Still, it could easily be decontaminated, so the Excelsior took the ship in tow.
The crew of the Burton was duly impressed by the Excelsior. Most of the crew members had spent their entire careers on small ships, and had never seen anything like the Excelsior except in pictures. The crew of the Excelsior was polite and cooperative, and no one from the Burton would possibly have been able to guess that the Excelsior's crew was preoccupied and concerned with the situation regarding the captain.
In short order the starship arrived at Starbase 9, where the Burton's crew and cargo was removed with relative ease. All things considered, it was easily one of the more routine, even pedestrian, missions that the Excelsior had ever undertaken.
As it happened, it also turned out to be one of the costliest.
The Excelsior was still in orbit around Starbase 9, just finishing up the transfer, when Janice Rand turned from her communications panel and looked to Sulu. He was in his command chair, staring resolutely at the screen. He seemed as if he were ever so slightly out of phase: aware of the world around him and yet just a bit removed from it. But somehow he seemed to sense that Rand had to say something to him before she actually said it. He turned to face her before she'd had the opportunity to open her mouth.
"Incoming communication, sir. Admiral LaVelle."
The bridge crew reacted to this. LaVelle was pretty high up on the food chain. If, as they had already come to suspect, this little jaunt was unauthorized, then they were going to hear about it now. The immediate thought on all their minds was that Sulu was going to get up from his command chair and ask that the call be transferred to his quarters, where he could take it in privacy.
So there was collective, if unspoken, surprise when he said, "On-screen, Commander."
Rand, along with the others, had thought he would want the shield of his quarters to conduct the call. "Sir—?" she began.
But he was calm, certain. "On-screen, Commander." And, making sure that she knew he was aware of what was going through her mind, he added, "I have nothing to hide."
With a small uncertain nod of her head that seemed to say, Oooookay, if you say so, she transferred the signal to the main screen.
The image of Starbase 9 vanished from the screen, to be replaced by the concerned face of Admiral LaVelle. Even she seemed surprised to be on an open channel. "Captain Sulu, a more private forum might be preferable for you," she said.
"I have no secrets from my crew, Admiral," Sulu replied sanguinely.
"Very well. Then I'll simply ask you what the hell you think you're doing?"
"What I have to, Admiral. That's all anyone does," he said evenly.
"What anyone does in Starfleet is obey orders," said LaVelle. "Your orders have you going to Centrelis. And regulations having you staying away from Askalon Five. I commend you for stopping along your one-way voyage-to-court-martial to help the transport ship Burton. You must have known that the command of Starbase Nine would routinely inform Starfleet of the aid provided by Excelsior."
"Yes, Admiral, I was quite aware."
"So you gave up the additional time you might have had to reach Askalon Five before we found out about it. As I said, commendable. Out of respect to your act of self-sacrifice, I will give you this one opportunity to rectify the situation. I am perfectly willing to write up this little detour as a response to a distress signal. You can walk away from this incident with a nice little notation on your file. That will give us ample opportunity to go on with our lives and forget that there was any . . . 'irregularity‣ in anyone's conduct. What do you say?" she asked with a touch of hopefulness in her voice.
"I say I'm most appreciative of the offer, Admiral."
LaVelle nodded slowly. "You're continuing on your heading to Askalon Five, aren't you."
"Yes, Admiral."
"In that case, Captain, the penalties will be quite harsh, and immediate measures, with prejudice, will have to be taken. Do you understand that?"
There was deathly silence in the bridge upon that pronouncement.
"Yes, Admiral. I understand that you're doing what you have to," Sulu said levelly. "I guess that doesn't make you all that different from me, does it."
"It does in one major respect, Captain. You see . . . one of us isn't in trouble."
She allowed that pronouncement to hang there, and then her image blinked off the screen.
All eyes were upon Sulu, waiting for him to say something . . . anything. Waiting, preferably, for him to say something that indicated he was steering himself away from this potentially self-destructive course.
Slowly he surveyed his command crew.
"Who's going to relieve me of command?" he asked.
There was strength in his voice, challenge. A gauntlet thrown down, which no one was especially eager to pick up. Sulu seemed to radiate confidence and conviction.
"Listen to me carefully, people," he said. "I am not crazy. I have not lost my mind, nor have I become drunk with power. We've been down this road before, with far higher stakes. When I told Captain Kirk the location of the Khitomer conference, I was aiding and abetting a convicted criminal. I could have been brought up on charges of treason. But I acted out of loyalty and out of honor, being willing to betray my country rather than betray my friend. It's out of that same sense of honor that I act now."
"But sir," said Rand as gently as she could, "it's not the same. This is a useless risk of your career because . . . because . . ."
"Because Demora is dead."
"Yes, sir," Anik spoke up.
"That may very well be," Sulu agreed. "But her memory is still very much alive. And what I'm doing, I'm doing on behalf of her memory. That, and because I'm determined to find out what sort of circumstance on Askalon Five could have led to her death. She didn't simply take a wrong step and fall off a cliff, or die because some native creature leaped out from hiding and attacked her. Demora went berserk. She died naked and savage, shot down by her own commander. And I will know why." His voice began to rise with unexpected vehemence. "Not ten months from now, or a year from now, or six years from now. I will know right now. I owe her that. And if Starfleet feels they don't owe me that, then that will be between Starfleet and me. Do we understand each other?"
There was a long moment when everyone looked to each other to see how they were responding. It was as if the command crew needed to be of one mind so that they could function.
And then Anik said simply, "Aye, sir."
"Aye, sir," echoed Janice Rand.
One by one, the votes of confidence came. Sulu nodded to each one individually. And then he said, "Helm . . . best speed to Askalon Five."
"Best speed," echoed Docksey, even as she thought to herself, We are in so much trouble. . . .
The Excelsior whipped around and hurtled away from Starbase 9.
And light-years away, the call went out to the nearest starship in a position to stop them. . . . "
* * *
You really think you're going to be saved, don't you. You really think you have a prayer. . . ."
The voice floated through her head as aimlessly as she herself floated in the ooze. She tried to reject what she was hearing, but it permeated her at every level. There was no escape from it, no defense she could erect. . . .
"You're all alone. You're mine, just like your mother was, and this time you're not going to get away . . . you're going to stay mine, and maybe I'll let you out eventually before I wipe your memory and put you back so you can float in bewilderment some more, always wondering, always confused . . . maybe I've already done it . . . maybe I'm doing it right now and you're too muddled to realize it . . . you don't know up, down, or sideways, everything's gone, and you know what? We can give it all back to you and then take it away again, and you'll never know . . . you'll never ever know. . . ."
And the thought came to her, the thought of salvation . . .
and curiously that most fleeting of thoughts was not of her captain, of her shipmates, of anyone whom she considered a close friend. . . .
Like the child she had once been, one word drifted through her mind . . .
Daddy . . .
# Chapter Twenty-four
"FATHER, you can't be serious."
Admiral Blackjack Harriman paced the interior of his son's quarters. He nodded his head, his expression grim. "I'm afraid I am serious, son. Word came directly from Admiral LaVelle herself."
Captain Harriman looked confused. "They want us to go after Excelsior?"
"That's right, Johnny. And you are authorized to use any and all means to get Excelsior to back off, up to and including force. The fact is, Starfleet is simply unwilling to countenance these types of shenanigans and displays of disrespect. Kirk made a career out of it; his associates are simply not going to be allowed to continue that tradition."
"But . . ."
"Captain Sulu is in clear violation of regs, son," said Blackjack. "Not only that, but Sulu is acting in direct contradiction of LaVelle's orders. This simply cannot be tolerated, and this ship has been chosen to teach Excelsior a lesson. I admit that there's some irony involved . . . a vessel named Enterprise hunting down Sulu. But we can't worry about that. The order has been given and the duty is clear." Harriman stared at the far wall. "You're aware, Father, this is my fault. If—"
"We're not going through that again, son," said Blackjack. "That way lies madness. We're just going to get the job done."
He looked up at his father, his eyes narrowed to slits. "Tell me one thing, though. Why did Admiral LaVelle contact you, rather than me? This is my ship. If we're being given a new assignment, it should come through me."
"Admiral LaVelle and I go all the way back to the Academy, son." He shrugged. "Perhaps she simply felt more comfortable filtering the order through me. Besides, it's not contrary to protocol. I do happen to be the ranking officer on board. This was just Starfleet's call. It's not up to us to start second-guessing superior officers, son. That's what Sulu is doing. And that's how he's managed to land himself in a world of trouble. I assume we understand each other."
"Yes, sir. Perfectly."
But there was something in his voice. Something that the admiral found vaguely disturbing. As Captain Harriman headed for the door, Blackjack stepped partially into his way, just enough to block his exit. They looked at each other for a moment, and then the captain dropped his gaze, suddenly intensely interested in the tops of his boots.
"You're not going to have a problem with this, are you, son? I'd hate to think that you'd allow sentiment or some sort of," and his voice took on a distasteful edge, "weak-kneed attitude to cloud your judgment."
"My knees are just fine, sir, thank you," said Harriman tightly. "I know my orders, and I know my duty. Do you have reason to believe otherwise?"
"No."
"Then kindly step aside, sir, and let me do my job."
Blackjack nodded approvingly. "Yes, sir, Captain."
Harriman walked out the door, turned left, and headed briskly down the corridor. By the time his father caught up, Harriman had already reached a turbolift and was on his way to the bridge.
* * *
He stepped out onto the bridge. Dane snapped off one of her customary salutes. For some reason he felt even less tolerant of her quirks today than he did under regular circumstances.
"Mr. Magnus, plot course for Askalon Five," he said.
Magnus turned in his chair, making no attempt to hide his surprise. "Askalon Five, sir?" he asked.
"That's correct. I thought the order was clear enough. You understood it, didn't you?"
"Sir," Dane spoke up, "Askalon Five is under quarantine."
"No one is more aware of that than I am, Dane," said Harriman. "I am also acutely aware that I dislike repeating orders. You aren't going to require me to do that, are you?"
"No, sir," said Magnus with a shrug. "Course plotted and laid in, sir." He glanced over at Lieutenant Chaput next to him, a fire-headed helmswoman who looked no less confused than Magnus.
"Helm has the course, sir," Chaput confirmed. "Awaiting your orders."
"Best speed to Askalon Five, helm," said Harriman and, with a brisk rap of his knuckles, added, "Engage."
The Enterprise leaped into warp space, hurtling toward Askalon V with all due haste.
As it did so, Commander Dane took a step away from her station and said, "Captain . . . if I may ask . . .?"
"Why are we returning to Askalon?" He sat there for a moment, grim faced, and then said, "Because, Commander . . . we have orders. We are to intercept another starship which has taken it upon herself to go to Askalon Five, contravening both Starfleet orders and quarantine regulations. My precise orders are that we are to take whatever steps are necessary to make this vessel realize the folly of its actions."
"Does that include force, sir?"
"It does indeed."
There was silence for a moment. And then Dane said, "Captain . . . is this about Demora?"
"Considering that Captain Sulu is involved, I'd say that's a safe assumption."
And that was when Harriman heard something murmured from the direction of the science station. He turned slowly to face Lieutenant Maggie Thompson. "You have something to say, Lieutenant?" he asked.
"No, sir," she replied.
"I think you do. And I would appreciate your being forthright enough to say what's on your mind rather than muttering under your breath."
She looked at him with unmistakable defiance. "If they're going to try and do something to help Demora, then we should be helping them, not hunting them."
"Is it necessary for me to painfully remind you, Lieutenant, that Ensign Demora Sulu is deceased? I pushed the button that fired her ashes into the sun myself. She is beyond help, and Excelsior is beyond the bounds of acceptable behavior for a starship. But if you have a problem with that, and feel that you cannot function up to full capacity due to the emotional dynamics involved, then I cordially invite you to relieve yourself of duty."
"I would prefer not, sir," she said. The words were deferential, but the tone was most definitely not.
If Harriman took any note of that tone, he didn't let on. Instead he looked to the rest of the command crew. "That applies to the rest of you as well. If there's anyone here who feels they won't be able to perform to their usual high standards of excellence . . . I invite them to leave the bridge now. There will be no black mark against you, no stain on your record. But if any of you feel that this duty is going to be too emotionally . . . incendiary . . . speak up now."
No one did, of course . . . even though several of them did indeed want to get up and walk off. But it simply wasn't the sort of situation that permitted an indulgence of one's true feelings. Not for any of the bridge crew. Not even for the ship's commander.
"Sir," Dane ventured, "if we are to prepare for a possible battle situation . . ."
"I'm ahead of you, Commander. Signal yellow alert. Maintain battle readiness."
"Signaling yellow alert," Z'on said from his station.
Harriman realized that he'd been standing the entire time. Slowly he settled into his command chair, watching the stars fly past. And, allowing a bit of wistfulness to creep into his voice, he said, "It's moments like this when I wish I could be facing something simple . . . like a horde of rampaging Blumbergs."
Despite the seriousness of the situation, the comment actually drew smiles from several of the crewmen . . . and an utterly confused look from Lieutenant Chaput, who turned to Magnus and said, "A horde of what?"
"Don't ask," advised Magnus. "Believe me, if you know what's good for you . . . don't ask."
Chaput didn't ask.
# Chapter Twenty-five
ASKALON V filled the screen like a canker.
For long moments no one on the bridge of the Excelsior said anything. Sulu stared at the planet, certain that he could feel sensations of evil and foulness rolling off the world's surface. Would it be likely that he'd feel that way if Demora hadn't met her end there? Not likely. He was impressing his own views, shaped through the tragedy, upon the planet.
None of which stopped him from feeling basically repulsed just looking at the place.
The others regarded the planet as well, but they were seeing it differently than Sulu was. They looked at it and saw the world that was serving as the Waterloo for the captain whom they'd come to admire and respect. None of them had the slightest doubt that this decision was going to cost him dearly. Cost him his command, perhaps even his career. And in exchange for this high price, the reward was meager if not nonexistent. Nothing could bring his daughter back, and there was certainly no guarantee that even the answers he craved would be forthcoming.
Nonetheless, they stood in respectful silence.
"Commander Anik," he said after a time, "ready a shuttlecraft, please."
Anik nodded, feeling a bit relieved that another potential argument had been avoided. At least Sulu wasn't totally dismissing or ignoring the fact that the planet was under quarantine. When Captain Harriman and the rest of the landing party had beamed back aboard the Enterprise, the transporter had automatically screened and cleared them of any potentially harmful germs that they might have contracted on the planet . . . including the possible whatever-it-was that had had such a fatal effect on Demora.
But if Sulu was going down there, he was going to be exposed to whatever viruses or germs might be awaiting him. The smart thing to do, therefore, was to cruise the surface via shuttle while making preliminary readings, rather than simply beaming down into a conceivably lethal situation.
"Shuttlecraft Galileo will be ready for you in five minutes, sir," said Anik.
Upon hearing this, Janice Rand winced. Not the Galileo. Anything but the Galileo. Hadn't anyone noticed that the damned shuttle was jinxed? It was always crashing, burning, and making all manner of unfortunate and oftentimes catastrophic landings. She hoped that Sulu would ask for another craft.
"Excellent," he said.
Lord, he really did believe in tempting fate. Not willing to send Sulu off to disaster all by himself, Rand stood. "Permission to accompany you, sir," she said.
"I appreciate the offer, Commander, but no." He rose from his chair. "This is my responsibility. My decision. And my business. No one else is going to take a risk as a result of it except me."
She nodded, but she didn't look happy about it. Not unsympathetically, Sulu put a hand on her shoulder and said, "I appreciate the thought, Janice. Hold the fort. I'll be back before you know it."
"Will do, sir," she said gamely . . . wondering if she was ever going to see him again.
Sulu, meantime, turned to Anik. And in a low voice he said, "If I were Starfleet, I'd be sending another ship out to spank us. Keep sensors on maximum, and don't hesitate for a moment to back off. Leave me if necessary."
"Captain, we wouldn't . . ."
"You would and you should, if it means the alternative is standing your ground and fighting another starship. You have your orders, Anik. I expect you to carry them out."
"Yes, sir," said Anik, not looking especially happy about it.
He headed for the turbolift, and behind him various crew members echoed each other as they said, "Good luck." He stopped and nodded to them in response.
"Good luck to us all," he said. "I have no doubt we'll all need it."
* * *
He stopped at the armory, not wanting to take any chances. By the time he got to the shuttlecraft, Anik was waiting for him.
They stood facing each other, Sulu's arms draped behind his back. "Here to wish me bon voyage, Commander?"
"Sir . . . I am asking you one more time not to do this."
"And why are you asking me this, when you know I have already made up my mind?"
Anik looked somewhat self-conscious. "Because I'm being selfish, sir."
He raised an eyebrow. "Selfish?"
"Yes. Because when I was coming up through the Academy, the exploits of Captain Kirk and his command crew were already . . . there's no other way to put it, sir . . . legendary. And my greatest hope, my goal, was to be able to serve under one of those remarkable people. You people were . . . are . . . my heroes. So when your previous number one, Commander Valtane, requested transfer off the Excelsior . . ."
"Valtane was a good officer," admitted Sulu, "but the crew never warmed to him."
"Yes, well . . . his loss was my gain. You have no idea, Captain, how many strings I pulled, favors I called in . . . how hard I lobbied for this assignment. And I achieved my goal. I am living my dream. I try not to make a point of it because, frankly"—she shifted uncomfortably—"I don't consider it a terribly professional attitude to have. But there it is, and it's mine."
"So what you're saying is that you feel I'm taking a needless risk and, therefore, jeopardizing your dream."
"Yes, sir."
"Doesn't that seem a bit self-centered to you?"
"Yes, sir," she said again, not sounding the least bit repentant.
"Well, Commander . . . I guess you'll find that just because one rises to the rank of captain, that doesn't necessarily mean that one becomes any less self-centered." He paused. "I remember an incident with Captain Kirk, about ten years ago . . . he was Admiral Kirk at the time. We'd been caught completely flat-footed by Khan . . . you might have heard about it."
"I was in my last year at the Academy. The students who came back, who . . . survived . . . called it the training mission from hell."
"That's fairly accurate. In any event, we were helpless, taken off guard by the Reliant. Power out, weapons down. Not a hope in the world. And we got a subspace transmission from the Reliant . . . and I'll never forget this, as long as I live. Uhura turned to the admiral and said we were receiving terms of surrender. It was as if she'd spoken the foulest obscenity. Nobody moved. Nobody breathed. When the admiral told her to put it on-screen, it was as if we'd all been stabbed because this was James T. Kirk, and he didn't surrender while he was alive. And he wound up stalling for time and outsmarting Khan. He'd done it. Even though he blamed himself, called himself 'senile,‣ nevertheless . . . he sent the Reliant running. It was as if all was right with the galaxy once more. So I suppose . . . I learned that from him. To never surrender until the last card is played. And even though Demora is out of the game, I still have a few hands I'm going to play out. Do you understand?"
Anik sighed. "Not really, I guess, since I still would prefer you didn't have to go."
"I'd prefer it too." He headed toward the shuttle, then turned and said, "Anik. I should remind you that an attractive young yeoman served with Captain Kirk in his first five-year mission. One Janice Rand by name. She wasn't with him quite as long as I was, but . . . I suppose it could have been considered quality time. So if it's the spirit of us 'legends‣ that so motivated you, well . . . you'll find that there's legends everywhere you look. They are what we make of them."
She nodded and stepped back as Sulu climbed into the shuttlecraft Galileo. "Good luck, Captain. We'll be waiting for you."
"Keep a light burning," he replied as the door sealed him in. Moments later, the shuttlecraft lifted out of the bay and angled around and down toward the surface of Askalon V.
* * *
She heard the voices, and they sounded concerned.
They reached her as if from a great distance, and she sensed that, this time, they weren't directed at her. They were talking with each other, although she felt as if they were slowly moving toward her like the sun's rays creeping over the horizon. . . .
"They're in orbit. What are they doing here?"
"What do you think they're doing here?"
"He knows."
"He couldn't know!"
"He does, somehow he does."
"I say we take him. I owe him."
"Don't be an idiot. We have the girl. That was risk enough. He's a damned starship captain. There will be questions. . . ."
"Let there be questions. There's always questions. What there won't be is answers. I want him."
"No."
"I said . . ."
"I said no! We've indulged it this far! Any more would be suicide! I said . . . no!"
None of the conversation meant anything to her. It all blended together, one voice with another. All of it having a blur of incoherency to it.
But still . . .
But still . . .
Vague bits of comprehension began to creep back to her.
Self-awareness. Understanding. Slowly she became aware that she was more than just a mind floating in a pool of nothingness. She had a name. She had a being. She had a purpose.
She had to get out. . . .
# Chapter Twenty-six
THE SHUTTLECRAFT skimmed the surface of Askalon V. The ions in the atmosphere caused the vessel to buck under Sulu's hand, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle.
He had studied Harriman's reports on the event thoroughly, and was able to pilot the shuttle to the exact coordinates where the final, fatal encounter with Demora took place a week ago.
What he was pleased to see was that the surface of the planet was apparently going to cooperate in his investigations. Because of its thick, claylike texture, all the prints had remained exactly—or close to exactly—the way that they had been. He nosed the shuttle downward to within ten meters of the surface, then brought a tight view of the area up on the screen so that he could inspect the prints. Sure enough, there they were. Clear signs of a scuffle, with dirt kicked up, tossed around. He could see the remains of the distress beacon, which had been quite thoroughly smashed during the scuffle. Close up, he could even make out blood on the dirt, although he didn't like to think about whose it might be. It certainly backed up what Harriman had put in his report; it had been a vicious fight. The fact that Demora had been bare-handed . . . indeed, bare naked . . . had done nothing to lessen the ferocity of the encounter.
Naked and . . . barefoot.
He zoomed in the exterior monitors on the shuttlecraft, looking for signs of unclad feet. It took him a few moments to pin it down, but there it was. Footprints left behind by Demora's bare feet. He brought the shuttlecraft to a slightly higher elevation, so that he was now about twenty meters high.
There. There to the west, he saw the footprints leading off. He eased the shuttlecraft in the direction that the prints had come from in order to track them to their point of origin.
It took a few moments for him to backtrack, although not too long. Certainly a shuttle could cover distance much more rapidly than a woman on foot. Even if she was running, which Sulu could now tell that she had been doing. At least that's what she'd been doing at first, because her footprints weren't flat. Rather they were weight-distributed in such a way that clearly only the balls of her feet were making an impression. Not only that, but they were farther apart, the wider gait of someone taking long, loping strides.
He thought briefly of all the times they'd gone running together. What a nightmarish contrast this sordid world was to the times they had jogged side by side through San Francisco's sloping streets.
Then he noticed something else. He saw booted footprints coming in from the side and roughly paralleling the running prints of Demora. But the booted prints were going in the other direction.
From the size of the booted prints, Sulu suspected that they likewise belonged to Demora. And the angle that they came from would be consistent with the landing party's original arrival. In other words, Demora had come from the general area of the northwest, moved in this general direction . . . and then something had happened, reducing her to naked savagery, and she'd come hightailing it in a straight easterly direction until running into, and attacking, Harriman and his people.
So all Sulu had to do was get to the point where the encounter had been . . . find what happened there . . . and then he would have the answer.
Or at the very least, he'd have even more questions.
The shuttle continued its course. In the distance, Sulu spotted the ruined city that had been mentioned in Harriman's reports. What had the inhabitants been like, he wondered. Had some outlandish virus swept over them, turning them all into mindless berserkers such as what Demora had become? Had they been reduced to predator and prey, tearing each other apart until there was nothing left?
And what had happened to Demora, then, was some sort of residual disease left floating in the air?
But if that were the case, why hadn't Harriman and the others been affected? Why just Demora?
Why her?
Why her? Well . . . that was the question, wasn't it. That's what this was all about. Sulu had to admit that this was more than just an exploratory probe to find out what had happened. He was looking for some sort of cosmic answer. Something that would explain to him precisely why his little girl had been singled out to be overtaken by, and fall prey to, this awful demise.
In short . . . he wanted the universe to make sense.
He had traveled the stars for so long that he had almost begun to believe that he could see the barest meaning behind it all. Sometimes he thought that right there, just beyond human consciousness . . . there were the answers that every creature sought in order to understand. To seek knowledge. To boldly go, and all that. Just past the horizon line of understanding, he thought he could glimpse the start of comprehension.
And then Kirk had been snatched away . . . and then Demora had been taken from him . . . and just like that, the two great constants of his life had evaporated.
Nature abhors a vacuum.
The loss of Kirk, and now Demora, had left a great airless, souless void within him, and he was trying to fill it up again. Fill it with answers . . . with cognizance . . . with something, dammit. Anything.
The footprints stopped.
Sulu brought the shuttlecraft to a slow halt, hovering above the area that now seemed to serve as the origin point of the tracks.
At first glance, there was nothing particularly remarkable about this stretch of land. It was slightly hillier than other places, but the terrain was that same claylike texture. No shrubbery or brush, flora or fauna.
What there was was the beginning of the barefoot tracks . . . and the end of the booted tracks. Apparently Demora had gotten to this geographic point . . . removed her clothes . . . run back in the general direction of the landing party and tried to kill them. Right where they met, the dirt was a bit disturbed, although nothing too disorderly. As if there had been a very brief scuffle there.
There were no other prints around, which seemed to undercut the notion that some animal had bitten her, giving her an unknown and fast acting version of rabies. Still, it could have been airborne. How many diseases had been transmitted by insects, after all?
There was . . .
"Wait a minute," said Sulu.
Tracks, to and from. No other tracks around. No brush. No place to hide. His view in all directions was unobstructed.
"Where are her clothes?" he asked himself. "Where the hell are her clothes?"
The dirt around where the footprints intersected was in disarray, but it didn't seem dug up. So apparently she hadn't buried her clothes. She could have phasered them into nonexistence . . . but then where was the phaser? Could have set the phaser to self-destruct . . . but someone in the landing party would certainly have heard the blast, plus there would be some sort of scorch marks somewhere.
He used shipboard sensors to scan the area where the footprints came together. The atmosphere precluded reliable sensor scans from orbit, but here the readings were a bit clearer. Not much, though.
Sulu chewed on his lower lip for a moment, and then angled the shuttlecraft downward. He landed the Galileo not right on the spot where he was suspicious, but instead fifty meters away.
He sat in the shuttle for a long moment, his mind working, trying to anticipate. Then he leaned forward and began to program a course for the shuttlecraft to follow. He set distance, speed, angle. And then he said, "Computer."
"Working," replied the calm female voice.
He gave instructions in quick, clear sentences. The computer acknowledged the instructions in its inflectionless tone. The thing he liked about dealing with a computer was that it didn't bother to point out to him that the orders he was giving seemed, on the surface, crazy bordering on suicidal. There was no deep philosophical discussion. It was just a matter of, "Do this," to which the computer would respond, "Okay."
Sulu was all for spirited arguments, but every so often it was nice to have things go simply.
He ran an atmosphere check as a precaution and found nothing unusual. Nevertheless, just to play it safe, he placed a filtration mask over the lower half of his face. He took a deep breath to make sure that the mask was functioning as it was supposed to. Then he slipped on his field jacket to protect against the chill, opened up the shuttlecraft, and stepped out onto the terrain.
His feet sank a bit into it, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle. His phaser was strapped to his belt, and he was holding his tricorder as he studied the readouts.
The filtration mask went a long way toward alleviating the breathing problems that the landing party from the Enterprise had experienced. Nonetheless, the deceptively chilled wind that flittered across the planet's surface was certainly nasty enough to give him pause, even though he was wearing his field jacket. He stretched to work kinks out of his muscles as he felt his joints freezing up. Getting old, he thought.
Slowly, carefully, he walked over to the area where Demora had undergone her startling transformation. He circled it, frowning. There was something, according to the tricorder . . . something beneath the ground. He couldn't quite make it out, however. He was still getting interference with the tricorders scanning circuitry. But was it possible that it was still the atmosphere . . .?
No. No, he began to suspect the exact opposite. He walked the perimeter, clutching the tricorder as if it were a life preserver, or even the Holy Grail. Something was . . . was generating interference. Was mucking with the tricorder's ability to fully apprise him of the area.
He stepped closer to the footprints and where they intersected, taking care not to tread directly on them. He didn't want to obliterate them in case he needed to—
And the ground went out from under him.
He'd had no warning at all, except for the slightest grinding of motors from somewhere he couldn't pinpoint. The ground beneath him opened up quickly and he felt something tugging at his legs. Immediately he realized what it was: a rushing of air like a vacuum, as if he were being sucked down into some great black tube. In the brief time that he had to register an impression, all he could make out was blackness.
All that happened in just under a second and then Sulu disappeared. He cried out as he plummeted into the darkness, but the sounds of his shout were cut off as the ground closed up over him.
Not that there would have been anyone to hear him anyway.
He fell out of control, Alice down the rabbit hole.
Alice . . . the rabbit hole.
The amusement park planet . . .
Even as he fell, even as blackness surrounded him, his mind was racing as he realized . . .
. . . the amusement park planet in the Omicron Delta region . . . where things had come up from underground . . . where beings and objects were instantly manufactured . . . beings like the White Rabbit . . . and Alice . . . and the black knight, and that revolver with a seemingly infinite supply of bullets . . . and the samurai . . . and.
Demora . . .
The name whispered in his mind, and then he slammed to a halt as unconsciousness claimed him.
* * *
It was very still on the bridge of the Excelsior. Anik sat in the command chair, watching the screen steadily. The planet, its secrets still carefully maintained, sat on the screen as the starship orbited it.
The bridge crew went about their duties in a hushed, almost apprehensive manner. There was the usual hum from the instrumentation, the quiet chatter among the crew. But overall there was an air of restraint. Part of their attention was on their work, but most of their minds was on the surface with Captain Sulu.
"Any word yet from the captain?" asked Anik.
"No. But he's not overdue . . . yet," said Rand.
There followed another awkward silence. Finding it intolerable, Anik turned to Janice Rand, whose calm demeanor went a long way toward hiding her inner turmoil. "Commander Rand," she said slowly, "if you don't mind my asking . . . what was it like?"
Janice looked at her with a polite air of confusion. "It? What it?"
"Serving with Captain Sulu back when he was at helm. What was he like?"
"Oh . . . much like he is now. He had his hobbies. A plant named Beauregard that was his pride and joy. And his fencing. Once he became ill and went nuts, chasing people all over the place with a sword. It was . . . odd."
"And Captain Kirk? You were his yeoman. What was it like serving with him . . . with all of them."
Rand sat back slightly, and she smiled. "It was . . . a remarkable time. It was . . ." She blushed. "This will sound awful."
"Go on, Commander," Docksey prompted from helm. The crew was sharp and alert, but on the other hand there was nothing like calm chatter to keep everyone on even keel.
"We were . . . we were the best ship in the fleet. And the best crew. And we knew it somehow. Starfleet knew it, too, probably because we were able to prove ourselves time and time again." She smiled, remembering what it was like. Remembering the joy and excitement of exploration.
She rose from her station and went to Anik, crouching down with one arm resting on the command chair while adopting a masculine swagger. Anik grinned as Janice dropped her voice a couple of octaves and intoned in mock-serious fashion, sounding vaguely like a Starfleet admiral, "There's a problem that needs solving? A major threat to security? Only one man for the job, ladies and gentlemen: James Kirk. Only one ship to handle the situation: the Enterprise. Who do you want to have standing between you and a planet killer? It's the Enterprise. What, the Klingons are stirring up trouble and we need a starship to go in and show them what's what? It's the Enterprise. What's that you say? A giant amoeba is heading your way and a starship is needed to face insurmountable odds? It's the Enterprise."
And suddenly from the science station, Lieutenant Tom Chafin—a muscular, handsome Terran with thick brown hair—reported, "Commander Anik, a ship appears to be dropping out of warp. . . ."
"Confirmed," Lojur now put in. "Vessel bearing two-five-three mark four. It appears to be . . ."
Space warped ahead of them and a massive vessel slid into normal space ten thousand kilometers to starboard.
"One of ours. Federation starship, Excelsior class," continued Lojur.
"Which one?" said Anik.
And Janice Rand, back at her station, looked up from her communications board as an incoming hail identified them.
"It's the Enterprise," she said tonelessly.
# Chapter Twenty-seven
THE WORLD WAS BLACKNESS, and then a low mocking voice said, "So . . . it's been quite a while, hasn't it, L.C.?"
Sulu reached out, feeling the cool smoothness of the floor beneath him. Slowly he opened his eyes, then squinted against the intensity of the light. Around him he could hear a soft humming and burbling, as if he were surrounded by large vats of liquid.
He lifted his head up and looked around. He was surrounded by large vats of liquid.
Every so often, things were what they seemed. The vats lined the room, and there seemed to be hundreds of them. In either direction, they seemed to stretch unto infinity, like a tunnel. Sulu had no clue as to how large the place might be. At the far end he thought he spied some additional machinery, like a massive engine or power source of some kind, but he was too far away to make it out clearly.
The room itself had silver walls that curved upward into a cathedral ceiling, which seemed almost a mile high at its peak. In a way, the room had a feeling of a holy place, which struck Sulu as being slightly ironic.
Then he saw a pair of boots standing a few feet away. He craned his head and followed the track of the legs, up to the face. He knew, however, what he would see.
"Taine," he said.
His hair was longer, and he had a thick mustache tinged with gray. He'd gotten slightly jowly, but he still looked hard and lean, and the years had not diminished the cold fury in his eyes when he stared at Sulu. He was dressed in green, his pants flared at the cuffs, his shirt hanging loosely.
"You remember my name. I'm flattered."
"Don't be. I once had Vegan maringitis for a week and had to be hospitalized. I remember that name, too." He paused. "Are your flunkies still with you?"
"My associates, you mean? Rogers and Thor, yes. Ours has been a fruitful, if occasionally bumpy, partnership."
"And I was one of the bumps."
"Ohhh," said Taine softly, "you were a very large bump, yes, L.C. Oh, but it's not Lieutenant Commander anymore, is it. It's Captain, isn't it. Captain Sulu. Very, very impressive."
"What are you doing here?" he demanded. "And why did you do it?"
"Do what?" asked Taine, all innocence.
And Sulu felt his control slipping away. "Demora," he said in a harsh whisper. "Why did you . . . did you destroy her? What kind of creature are you that you would do that to . . . to . . ."
His hands convulsed in fury, and then he could hold himself back no longer. He lunged at Taine, hands outstretched.
He didn't get far. To be precise, he got all of a foot before a heavy hand clamped on the back of his jacket and lifted him clear of the floor. He had just enough time to think Thor before he was hurled across the room, crashing into one of the vats.
"Are you all right, Captain?" Taine asked with mock concern.
Rocky, Sulu tried to pull himself to his feet. He felt blood trickling down the side of his face, but he didn't wipe it away. He didn't want to acknowledge the dull ache he felt. "What are you doing here . . . and why did you kill her?"
Taine, leaning against one of the vats, laughed coarsely. "Her? Oh! You mean Demora! We didn't kill her, Captain."
"I know, Harriman did. But you changed her. You made her over into some . . . some beast. You were responsible!"
Thor, his massive arms hanging at his sides, stepped next to Taine. Taine was shaking his head. "You're not listening to me, Captain. No, not listening at all." He inclined his head slightly to Thor. Thor, apparently understanding Taine's desire, reached an arm into the vat that Taine was leaning against. He seemed to be fishing around for something, and then found it. He pulled it up and out. . . .
Her eyes were closed, her face almost unrecognizable since it was covered with the thick liquid that coagulated in the vat. Her hair, which Thor was gripping in his meaty hands, was thick with it as well.
She wasn't breathing.
Then, all of a sudden her lungs seemed to contract and she vomited up thick white liquid. It splashed out onto the floor, some of it getting on Taine's boots. He stepped back distastefully.
"Could this be who you're looking for?" asked Taine, chucking a thumb at her.
Sulu stared in disbelief, unable to speak. And then, finally, he managed to push out a word:
"Demora," he whispered.
She vomited once more, fingers clutching the edge of the vat spasmodically. Her eyes were caked shut with the liquid from the vat.
And then, the years falling away, sounding like a child of six, she said, "Daddy . . . I don't feel so good. . . ."
* * *
"Incoming hail from the Enterprise," said Rand tonelessly.
Anik of Matern didn't seem particularly inclined to jump to it immediately. She'd had a feeling that this moment was inevitable and, now that it had arrived, she was oddly calm. "Scan them, Mr. Chafin," she said.
"Scanning," said Chafin. After a moment, he announced, "They're on yellow alert. Their defensive systems are charged."
"They're hailing again," Rand told her. "They sound impatient."
Anik pursed her lips and stared at the screen a moment more. "All right. Put them on," she said.
The bridge of the Enterprise appeared on the screen. Captain John Harriman was there, standing, his arms draped behind his back. Anik immediately noticed someone else there as well, someone who didn't appear to belong with the rest of the bridge crew. It was an older man, an admiral. Then she recognized him: Admiral "Blackjack" Harriman. The captain's father.
Ohhh, this is not good, thought Anik.
"Excelsior, this is Captain Harriman of the Enterprise. I would have appreciated a faster response," said Harriman.
"Our apologies," Anik said evenly. "This is Commander Anik. May we be of assistance."
"Yes, you may. You can start by allowing me to speak with Captain Sulu."
"I regret that he's indisposed."
"Indisposed? How?"
"A flare-up of an old condition," deadpanned Anik. "He's . . ." She hesitated, looking briefly at Rand. Janice shrugged. Anik turned back to Harriman and said, "He's chasing people around with a sword. We hope to alleviate the situation shortly."
Harriman was silent for a moment. "Commander, I'm not interested in playing games," he said. "If you do not bring Captain Sulu to speak to me, I will go on the assumption that he on the planet's surface. Would that be a safe assumption, Commander?"
Anik said nothing.
"Commander . . ." Harriman said warningly.
"Captain Sulu . . . is not available."
Harriman sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. "All right, Commander . . . have it your way. The captain is not available. That being the case, I must warn you that I have been empowered by Starfleet to order you to leave this vicinity immediately."
"I . . . regret that I cannot comply at this time," said Anik.
"Why not?"
"Orders."
"Whose?"
"Captain Sulu's."
"Really," said Harriman, unimpressed. "Then I wish to speak to him, now."
"Captain Sulu is not available," Anik told them.
Harriman started to make a response, but abruptly Admiral Harriman stepped forward into the foreground. "Commander . . . this is Admiral Harriman."
"Good day, Admiral," she said evenly.
Janice Rand watched Anik with growing admiration. The Maternian looked fragile owing to her nearly transparent skin, but there was absolutely no denying her iron force of will. She was not one to be easily intimidated.
"I'm not interested in playing word games, Commander," he said brusquely. "It's important that you understand the dynamics here. I will tell you what's going on, and you can deny it if you wish, but I'll appreciate wasting no more of anyone's time. Captain Sulu has violated Starfleet orders and quarantine regs by bringing your ship to Askalon Five and then going to the surface himself. His behavior will not be tolerated. You're acting in good conscience as his subordinate, and that's fine. But now I am giving you a direct order as a Starfleet admiral: Return Captain Sulu to the Excelsior and then proceed to Starbase Nine, where Captain Sulu will be placed under arrest. Do you understand?"
Anik drew herself up straighter. "I do not know if that will be possible, sir."
"I suggest you make it possible, Commander. Because if you defy me, that will be on your own head. You have five minutes to retrieve him. Enterprise out."
The screen blinked out, but the Enterprise hung there in space, looking for all the world like it meant business.
"Commander Rand," Anik said softly, "raise Captain Sulu. At the very least, he should be apprised of the situation."
Rand nodded and immediately sent a signal to Sulu's wrist communicator . . .
. . . which was, at that moment, being ground underneath a large heel of an even larger foot.
* * *
On the surface of Askalon V, the shuttlecraft Galileo sat unmoving and, apparently, ineffectual.
Inside, the computer kept careful track of the passage of time.
* * *
Thor stepped back from the communicator, examining the busted equipment with pride.
Rogers, who had just entered the room, nodded approvingly. He had a very sizable phaser rifle strapped to his back, and it looked very impressive.
"We have an arsenal down here as well," Taine informed Sulu. "Some charming toys."
Sulu wasn't listening. He was crouched on the floor, clutching the gasping body of Demora to him. Nude, she had been trembling with cold, and Sulu had removed his jacket and wrapped it around her. Her teeth were chattering so violently she couldn't even say another word.
There was so much he wanted to say to her . . . so much he couldn't believe. He thought she'd been dead. He'd been at her funeral, for God's sake, her body reduced to ashes. He'd come to Askalon V seeking some sort of cosmic truth and understanding, and instead he'd gotten an insane riddle. She was alive, shaking in his arms, and he was so overwrought with emotion that he had no idea how to begin to handle it. He settled for patting her hair, feeling all the time as if he were treating her like a puppy. He couldn't let the depth of his feelings be displayed in these circumstances; not until he and Demora were safely out of it.
Rogers looked less than happy with the situation, and he gave Taine a sufficiently angry glance that Sulu could discern his mind-set immediately. "This whole thing is getting worse and worse," he muttered to Taine.
"You worry too much," Taine replied. "Their instruments won't be able to detect life readings, and his communicator is dead. If they send more people to look for him, they won't find him. And that will be the end of the illustrious career of Captain Sulu."
"You're insane," said Sulu.
Taine smiled slightly. "No. I'm in charge. So . . . do you remember years ago, Captain, when you expected me to explain to you the details behind my 'schemes.‣ Do you?"
"Yes."
"And I didn't, did I. However . . . time has passed. I've mellowed somewhat. Surviving the near-fatal crash of a shuttlecraft years ago tends to do that to you . . . tends to change your outlook."
"You don't have to tell me. I know what's going on." He tried to steady Demora's trembling.
"Really?" said Taine in surprise. "Now, that would be a switch. The hero giving the villain the secret behind the plot. Those are our respective positions, are they not? You the valiant hero, I the hissable villain. Tell me, O hero . . . what's going on."
"This . . . all this," Sulu said, gesturing to the vats and the vast room, "is similar to the mechanisms on an amusement-park planet where I took shore leave twenty-odd years ago. They create cellular castings of people or objects, with built-in mechanisms capable of reading the thoughts of the subjects and developing them to order."
"Close," said Taine. "Not quite, however. You have heard, I presume, of cloning?"
"Of course. Growing a genetic copy from a cell." He thought of Dr. McCoy's recent health problems. "Mostly it's used to supply new organs; organ banks with vital organs cloned from the originals keep them available for recipients."
"Not ambitious enough. Nowhere near ambitious enough. All this," Taine said, gesturing around, "was created, we believe, by an offshoot race from the same one who created that 'amusement park‣ planet you speak so fondly of. But they were a warlike, conquest-minded race. They were not interested in using their technology to develop harmless, cellular cast synthetic creatures. They wanted genuine, living, breathing beings. They wanted clones that they could develop into an army. An army of workers. An army of soldiers. Whatever they were needed for, they could do.
"The drawback with cloning has always been the length of time involved. If you want a twenty-year-old, you have to take twenty years to grow one. It doesn't spring up overnight, at least not in all modern science.
"But here . . . oh, but here . . . it does. As instantly as whatever you encountered on the amusement-park planet did."
Sulu cast his mind back, remembering how the samurai, for instance, had leaped into full-blown existence literally seconds after Sulu's thoughts had drifted that way.
"Sturdier, more dynamic . . . in every way, superior to the simple castings of the artificial beings. As near as we can determine, the practice of unrestrained cloning led to a great war on this world. By the time it was done, the city was in ruins, and only the clones survived . . . to die off after a time, or kill each other off.
"Because the clones were not perfect, you see. They had no restraint. They were uncivilized. They were ideal if you wanted an attack by a pack of mad dogs. Anything of greater restraint or finesse than that . . . and there were problems. I suspect that was their downfall Oh, this is all speculation, you understand." He made a dismissive gesture. "But speculation based on our research. Research made in other worlds, at other sites. Hints, references, all manner of indications as to where this world might be. When Ling Sui . . ."
"You mean Susan," corrected Sulu. For some reason the correction made him feel a little smug.
But Taine looked at him archly. "Ling Sui. Susan Ling.
Any of the other half-dozen names she used. I doubt she even remembered what her real name was anymore by the time she died." He leaned forward, looking at Sulu contemplatively. "You really know so very, very little. Don't you get it yet? Ling Sui and I were partners. Explorers. We went from world to world, working various digs, taking what we could find and selling it to the highest bidder. And in one world we found key information about the cloning technology hidden on another world.
"But Ling Sui decided to get greedy, to try and cut me out. She thought she would sell the information to the highest bidder all on her own. But I caught up with her . . . caught up with her in the city of Demora. You interfered and delayed things, but I eventually caught up with her. Oh yes, I did, before she could sell it."
And from around his neck he removed a locket. Sulu recognized it instantly: It was the locket that Ling Sui had been wearing. It glittered green at him, as green as her eyes had been.
"We . . . renewed our partnership shortly thereafter, for the brief time it took for me to retrieve what she had stolen from me. Ultimately, there were no hard feelings, even though we went our separate ways after that . . . she to continue exploring and turning up new things to sell. And myself on the quest that eventually led me here, a year ago. It took that long, Captain. It's rare that you see that sort of dedication. We've spent a year exploring everything that was down here, discoveries that would amaze you. Getting the equipment up and running. Producing experiments in cloning, using our own genetic material as the sample. Some experiments have been more successful than others, I'll grant you, and we had many early failures. But we've been learning. At this point we can grow a clone to full growth in just under two minutes. Unfortunately they're difficult—impossible—to control. Furthermore, their cellular makeup tends to decay after about ten Earth days and they decompose. Not good for the long term. But we're getting there."
"And what's your plan?" said Sulu sarcastically. "To conquer the galaxy with a horde of clone warriors?"
"Oh, hardly anything so grandiose. However, a Tholian faction is most interested. We've had initial contact with them, opened the lines of communication. They're taken by the notion of armies upon armies of clone warriors. Of course, the Tholians keep trying to give us deadlines, and complain when we don't meet them. They're such sticklers for punctuality."
"I never thought I'd say this," said Sulu, "but Ling Sui was fortunate to have passed away when she did. Certainly preferable to being caught up in any more of your insanity."
"We were two of a kind, Ling Sui and I. At core, we both understood that. You see, Captain . . . what you got involved with was nothing more than a heightened lovers‣ quarrel."
Sulu looked at him oddly. "Lovers‣ quarrel? You were trying to kill each other."
"Of course. In case you didn't notice, Ling Sui was not one for half measures. But the fact is that I had prior claim to her, Captain . . . not to mention subsequent claim. Or haven't you figured it out yet."
"Figured out what?"
And Taine grinned lopsidedly. "Demora is my daughter. Not yours. Mine."
* * *
Janice Rand looked up from the comm board. "No response, Anik," she said, making no effort to hide her concern.
"Scan for life-forms," Anik instructed.
"Scanning," said Chafin. "Not picking up anything. Could be interference. Could be . . ."
"Could be he's dead," said Anik tonelessly.
The Starship Enterprise sat there in front of them, looking like she meant serious business.
* * *
On the bridge of the Enterprise, the tension was rather palpable. And it was solidly between the admiral and the captain.
"Hope I didn't overstep my bounds, Captain," said the admiral formally. From his tone, he probably thought he was being tongue-in-cheek. To his mild surprise, however, Captain Harriman didn't seem to share in the amusement.
"I am aware that, as senior officer on this vessel, you have the privilege of stepping in where you see fit," said Harriman. "I would appreciate some restraint, however, when possible."
The admiral blinked in surprise, and then his eyes narrowed slightly. "I have no problem with that," he said flatly, "as long as you get the job done."
"Don't be concerned on that score, Admiral."
"Don't give me need to be, Captain."
Upon hearing the exchange, Magnus and Chaput exchanged slightly nervous looks.
Commander Dane shifted uneasily in her chair, and Science Officer Thompson suddenly became intensely interested in the readings from her station.
And both Harrimans turned attention back to the screen.
# Chapter Twenty-eight
SULU LAUGHED.
Demora was still clutching him, her mind whirling in confusion. But Taine's claim penetrated the haze. She looked up at Sulu with a mixture of befuddlement and fear, and she was even more puzzled when he started to laugh. Taine had a variety of responses in mind when he dropped the bombshell on Sulu, but that hadn't been one of them. "What's so funny?" he demanded.
"What's so funny? You're a fool, that's what's so funny."
"I'm not the one who raised the daughter of another man thinking she was my own."
"Neither am I. Doctors did a genetic testing on her when she first came to me. She's mine, Taine. I'm her father; it's incontrovertible."
Rogers looked to Taine, reacting with clear surprise. "You said—"
"Be quiet," he ordered Rogers and looked back to Sulu. "You're lying. I know she's mine."
"You're wrong. What, did you think I would spend all these years without knowing for sure? I've known since the first day who her father is. And it's not you."
"You're lying!"
Taine lashed out with one booted foot. Sulu raised an arm, managing to ward off part of the blow, catching it on his shoulder. He swayed, but didn't go down.
"She's mine," Taine said in a hoarse whisper. "I recognized her from the moment I saw her picture on the news broadcasts. You remember . . . the ones that went out everywhere when Kirk died. And there was Demora, big as life, shown clutching her fallen comrade next to her on the bridge of the Enterprise. The image of her mother, I knew it instantly. And sure enough, her name was reported as Demora Sulu. I laughed over that one, oh, how I laughed." He raised his voice, addressing his associates. "Didn't we laugh, gentlemen?"
Rogers was looking extremely discomfited, and Sulu couldn't blame him. Taine was acting more and more erratically, his sanity being called increasingly into question.
"Look, Taine," he began.
But Taine was paying no attention to him. "So when I discovered that the Enterprise was going to be in this sector, I put up a distress beacon I'd picked up during my wanderings and programmed it with Chinese, in the hope that her interest would be piqued. It was a long shot, I'll grant you, but I've spent my life taking long shots. And it worked. You can't argue with success."
"Or dementia," Sulu shot back.
As if Sulu hadn't spoken, Taine said, "We captured her, brought her down here, and replaced her with a clone . . . not quite with the alacrity of your 'amusement-park planet,‣ but speedily and effectively. Oh, given ten days or so the body would have fallen apart, the fakery revealed. But I was reasonably certain the body would be disposed of, either buried or cremated, so that our little secret remained safe."
Sulu was silent.
"Well, Captain? Nothing to say?"
"Only one thing: How long have I been down here?"
"Oh, under the impression that if you're gone for too long, someone will send help? I wouldn't stake too much to that if I were you. They won't find you down here; we're too well shielded. But in answer to your question . . . it's been precisely fifty-seven minutes. I hope that helps."
"Immensely," replied Sulu.
* * *
"It's not helping, Commander," Chafin said, turning from the science station. "I've boosted the gain to the sensor array, but we're still not detecting anything."
"Incoming hail from the Enterprise," said Rand.
Anik sighed. "Well, that was inevitable. On-screen."
Captain Harriman's image appeared. "You've been given more than enough time, Excelsior. Where's Captain Sulu?"
She drummed her long fingers on the armrest for a moment, weighed the options, and decided to go with the truth. "He's on the planet's surface, but we've been unable to locate him. No life-form readings, no communication. It is my intention to send down a search party."
"Negative," Harriman said flatly. "That will be in direct contravention of Starfleet orders and policy. I submit to you, Commander, the harsh reality that Captain Sulu may very likely already be dead. You weren't on that planet's surface, Commander. I was. Whatever happened to Ensign Sulu very likely has happened to her father as well. Perhaps, in his frenzy, he leaped off a cliff. In any event . . . you will not be sending anyone down after him."
"Captain, you are being unreasonable. . . ."
"Commander, I outrank you, and I have Starfleet's direct orders behind me. Now . . . are you going to comply? Be aware that refusal to do so will make you complicit with Captain Sulu's actions, and there will be severe penalties involved." He paused. "You have a promising career, Commander Anik. I don't suggest you toss it away now."
All eyes on the bridge were upon her. Anik didn't look back at any of them.
"Captain, I regret I cannot comply."
"Very well. You're relieved of command. Who's the next ranking officer there?"
There was deathly silence, and then Janice Rand rose from the communications console. "I am. Commander Janice Rand."
Harriman looked slightly pained. He knew who she was, knew the history that she and Sulu had. "Great," he murmured, as if he knew the answer before he even asked the question. "Commander Rand . . . can I expect you to act in accordance with Starfleet regulations and relieve Anik of command?"
Rand didn't hesitate. "I regret, sir, that you cannot."
"Yes, I surmised that would be the answer," he sighed. He stroked his chin thoughtfully. "Looks like we have a situation on our hands, doesn't it."
"Yes, sir, it does."
And suddenly as if in a tremendous hurry, Harriman said, "You have five minutes to reconsider your position. Use it wisely." And then the screen blinked off.
Anik, Rand and the rest of the bridge crew looked at each other in mild confusion. "That was rushed," said Anik.
"Now what?" asked Rand.
"Now?" Anik grinned lopsidedly. "I don't know about you, but I'll probably start updating my résumé. Apparently it's time for me to start considering a career in the private sector."
"That's an unnecessarily pessimistic view, Commander," said Rand.
Anik looked at her skeptically. "Seems to me, Commander—no offense—that you're a little old to be engaging in fantasies. What's the Earth saying? We've crossed the Ruby Cam."
"Rubicon."
"Whatever it is, we've crossed it. Continue to try and raise Captain Sulu. Ready transporter room to send down a search—"
And suddenly Docksey shouted, "Photon torpedo off to starboard!"
She was right. The Starship Enterprise had fired a photon torpedo directly at the Excelsior.
"Red alert! Shields up!" called Anik, hoping it would be in time. "All engines, hard to port! Brace for impact!"
The Excelsior responded instantly, shields flaring into existence a split second before the photon torpedo smashed directly into the starboard section of the Excelsior . . . and shattered harmlessly.
"No impact!" called Lojur.
"Oh, there was impact, all right," said Anik. "But they removed the warhead."
"Son of a bitch was trying to scare us," Rand said.
From helm, Docksey muttered, "Well, it worked."
"Maintain red alert. Docksey, give us some distance."
"Aye, sir. Arm phasers?"
"Not yet. And not until absolutely necessary." Anik shook her head in annoyance. "Fastest five minutes I ever heard of."
* * *
And suddenly as if in a tremendous hurry, Harriman said, "You have five minutes to reconsider your position. Use it wisely." And then the screen blinked off.
"Five minutes?" came a voice that sounded like it was choking on fury.
Carefully keeping his back to the Admiral, Harriman said, "Yes, Admiral. Five minutes."
"Captain, five minutes or five hundred minutes isn't going to make a bit of difference. These people are defying you and defying Starfleet. There is no strategic advantage to giving them extra time."
And now Harriman turned to face his father. "Strategic advantage?" he said incredulously. "Admiral . . . that's another starship. One of ours. We're not at war here."
"Oh, yes we are," said the admiral stiffly. "We are at war against disobedience. Against contempt for regulations. Against the theatrics and outright rebellion that James Kirk and the others like him stood for. He spread his philosophies to Captain Sulu, and Sulu gave it to his people. It's like a disease . . . a cancer, eating away at our discipline! You see where this leads, Captain? Anarchy! Defiance! Starfleet cannot function if its officers take it into their heads to do whatever the hell they want!"
"I will handle this in my own way, Admiral," Harriman said sharply.
The air was electric between them. And then, very softly, very deadly, the admiral said, "Captain . . . I am giving you a direct order. I want this situation handled now. Not five minutes from now. Now. Or else."
Harriman felt the blood draining from his face. "Is that a threat, Admiral?"
"Is that a threat? No. This is a threat." Blackjack Harriman turned to Chaput and said, "Helm . . . load an unarmed photon torpedo . . . the kind you use for probes. Then target and fire."
Chaput, stunned, looked to the captain. Captain Harriman was no less stunned. "What?"
"You heard me," said the admiral evenly. "It'll just be a warning shot."
"And the next one will be what? For real?"
"If that's what it takes," said the admiral. He turned and was face-to-face with the captain. "Don't make me have to relieve you of duty, Captain."
The muscles of Harriman's jaw twitched furiously. "Helm . . . carry out the order," he said.
"Aye, sir," said Chaput, trying to keep the apprehension out of her voice. "Torpedo locked but not loaded."
"Fire," said Harriman.
"Torpedo away," Chaput said tonelessly.
They watched the streak of light blaze toward the Excelsior. The starship tried to get out of the way, but there wasn't enough time or distance between the vessels. The torpedo collided with the starboard warp strut but, since there was no active warhead in it, it simply shattered against it.
"Their shields are up," Dane said from the sensor station.
"Good," the admiral said with satisfaction. "It means they're taking us seriously."
"Apparently this is your game now, Admiral," Harriman told him. "What did you have in mind for the next play?"
Ignoring the sarcasm in Harriman's tone, Blackjack said, "Now, Captain . . . you get to have your five minutes. But it won't be five minutes of them stalling. It'll be five minutes of them sweating. You're no longer dealing from weakness, son. Now you're dealing from strength."
"In some quarters, restraint is considered strength," Harriman said.
The admiral looked at him. "There's no crime handling people with kid gloves, Captain . . . just as long as they know there's a fist of iron inside it. And if you don't have the stomach to deal with this in the proper fashion . . . then I will."
* * *
On the surface of the planet, the shuttlecraft sat motionless. But now computer commands began to kick over, and the engines of the Galileo began to surge to life.
Slowly but steadily, the shuttle rose into the air.
* * *
Thor stood guard over Sulu and Demora, who were still on the floor exactly as they'd been left. Demora had stopped trembling, and was glaring at Thor balefully.
Rogers, meantime, had brought Taine over to another section of the vast room and was talking to him in a low and hurried voice. "Listen to me, Taine," he said. "I've stuck with you through thick and thin, all these years. I always felt I owed you for that time you saved my life back on Castalan Nine. You know that. But between you and me, you haven't been a hundred percent right ever since the crash in the Sahara. Most times you're fine . . . but lately it's . . ."
"What's your point?" said Taine.
"The point is, I think you've got to take a step back. This Sulu guy was a pain in the ass twenty years ago, and I'm the first to admit that I'm as much for painful and agonizing torture as the next sadist. But there's no real percentage in vengeance. This whole taunting thing . . . it's serving no purpose. And this girl you fixated on: Maybe you thought she was your daughter, and that's fine. Or maybe she just reminded you of Ling and, deep down, you felt like you wanted to have her for old time's sake. That's fine, too. I went along with things this far because you never steered me wrong. But Taine . . . Sulu's right. This is crazy. You want to kill them, kill them. You want to indulge yourself with the girl first, then do it. I'll hold her still if you need me to. But you are way over the edge here. You're exposing us to unnecessary risks. It's got to end. So end it."
"You want me to end it," said Taine.
"That's right."
Taine's hand flew, fast and sharp, and speared Rogers in the throat. Rogers gagged as Taine kicked out, catching him in the pit of the stomach and knocking him flat on his back. Before Rogers could sit up, Taine was standing over him with Sulu's phaser rifle cradled in his arms.
"You want me to end it? I could end you right now!" He whirled and aimed the phaser at Sulu and Demora. "You want them dead, Rogers? Fine! One piece at a time, though! I'll blast them apart one damned piece at a time!"
* * *
The shuttle angled sharply upward, its preencoded course laid in. It reached sufficient height, angled around 180 degrees . . . and then plunged downward in a nosedive.
* * *
And Sulu said quietly, in a voice that carried nevertheless, "She must have meant a hell of a lot to you."
"You shut up! You don't know anything!"
"I know more than you could possibly believe," Sulu said confidently. "I know all the things you regret. I know what she meant to you. I know that—"
"I said shut up!" Taine ordered. He approached Sulu, the phaser rifle aimed squarely at him. Sulu had brought the formidable weapon with him because he'd had no idea what to expect and—since he'd been on his own—he figured he would want to pack as much firepower as possible. Now it seemed as if that was going to be a major mistake. "I know why you're doing this," Taine continued. "You hope to make me so mad that I'll simply blow you out of existence. That's what you want, isn't it. A quick, easy painless death, molecules spreading into oblivion so that you never even feel a thing. Or maybe you think there's going to be another rescue. Someone will come plunging through the skylight and save you. Well, Captain, in case you haven't noticed . . ." He gestured upward. "There's no skylight. So what are you going to do now, eh?"
"Improvise," replied Sulu.
And the ceiling exploded overhead. Down, down through the cathedral ceiling smashed the shuttlecraft Galileo. Debris fell like hail as the roar of the shuttlecraft's engines filled the massive room.
Thor looked upward just in time to see a huge piece of masonry plunge toward him. He barely had time to throw up his hands in a vain attempt to ward it off before it fell on him, pinning him.
Sulu yanked Demora out of the way of falling rubble as it crashed around them. He heard a phaser whine and, moving more on instinct than anything else, lunged to the left. The phaser crackled over his head as he grabbed up a piece of rock and threw it desperately in Taine's direction.
The rock struck Taine squarely in the temple. He staggered, and the phaser rifle fell to the ground two feet away.
Seeing the opportunity, and knowing it might be their only one, Sulu lunged straight toward the rifle as chunks of the ceiling continued to rain down around him.
Thor intercepted him. Having shoved his way through the rubble, Thor knocked him back with a swing of his huge forearm. He moved after Sulu, rolling in like a thundercloud.
Demora leaped at the rifle and got there just as Taine grabbed it. The powerful weapon was caught between them as they pushed against it and against each other, their mouths drawn back in snarls . . . his contemptuous, hers fierce.
A blast from the phaser rifle ripped loose as Taine's finger found the trigger. It blew out a section of the wall, pieces of metal flying everywhere. One shard went flying in a deadly arc . . . and thudded squarely into the chest of Rogers, who had managed to dodge all of the other rubble only to look down and find a huge piece of metal protruding from his rib cage. He sank to his knees, surprised eyes glassing over.
The shuttlecraft sat serenely, having arrived at its destination and not programmed with any guidance beyond that.
Thor, like the thunder god after which he was named, hammered Sulu. Sulu managed to block a vicious punch that would likely have taken off his head, but a sweep of Thor's massive fist caught him on the side of his arm. The years had done nothing to diminish Thor's strength; if anything, he'd gotten stronger and faster. Sulu wished he could say that for himself.
Another blast ripped from the phaser rifle, and another. Shots were going all over, blasting machinery apart, sending sparks flying. At the far end, where one of the generators stood, a fire erupted.
Taine didn't seem to notice as he tried to rip the phaser rifle from Demora's fingers. But she would not let go. She couldn't have held on to it more strongly if she'd had it in a death grip.
He snarled into Demora's face, "You should have been mine!"
"You should have been sucking vacuum at birth!" shot back Demora, and she yanked at the rifle as hard as she could.
Thor stood over Sulu, who was trying to get to his feet. Explosions were rocking the cavern. Thor didn't seem to care. He had picked up a massive block of rubble, and he was about to raise it over his head and bring it slamming down on Sulu.
Only one thing stopped him.
Suddenly he didn't have a head.
A blast from the phaser rifle went squarely between his arms. His head vaporized, blown to ashes. The body remained there for a moment, as if knowing something was wrong but not being entirely sure what it might be. And then it sagged as Sulu rolled out of the way, allowing the body to fall to the ground. Then he got to his feet quickly and tried to get to Demora.
But he couldn't get near. The phaser rifle was still blasting in an arc, and it was all he could do to get the hell out of the way. Vats were blasted open, thick liquid pouring out of them . . .
. . . and bodies. Bodies tumbling out, and Sulu realized with a jolt of horror that they were clones. Clones of Demora. Clones of Taine, or Thor and Rogers. Naked and dripping, growling, trying to figure out where they were, what they were. It was as if Sulu and Demora had stumbled into an old-style horror film.
Demora suddenly rolled onto her back, still gripping the rifle, and Taine had no choice but to follow. And Demora, slamming her feet up into his stomach, sent him flying over her head.
But she lost her grip on the phaser rifle.
He landed in a rapidly growing pool of the white liquid, his grip on the phaser rifle still firm.
"You don't know anything!" he howled. "She was mine! She should have been mine and you ruined everything!"
Sulu didn't know which "she" Taine was referring to precisely, and it didn't much matter. All he knew was that he and Demora were too far away to do anything except be blown to bits.
And that was when a long piece of metal sliced across Taine's neck.
Taine grabbed at it, confused, reacting more to the sudden warmth jetting from him than from any sensation of pain. He turned, staggering, and saw Rogers directly behind him. Rogers, on the verge of death, but still with enough life in him to have pulled the metal from his chest and used it against Taine.
Taine tried to speak but his vocal cords wouldn't function.
"You . . . you killed us, Taine," Rogers gasped out. "I loved you like a brother . . . and you killed us . . . 'cause you had to have . . . what you couldn't . . . you idiot . . ."
He fell forward onto Taine, knocking Taine onto his back. His finger clutched spasmodically onto the trigger of the phaser rifle one last time and it blew skyward, ripping another gaping hole in the ceiling. Huge chunks of rubble, a mountain of it, fell onto both Taine and Rogers, entombing them.
All around Sulu and Demora, machinery was erupting, the phaser-rifle blasts having set overloads into motion that could not possibly be stopped. "Come on!" Sulu shouted, yanking Demora toward the shuttle.
Clones were starting to stagger to their feet, reaching for the two of them. Sulu kicked them aside and he and his daughter leaped into the shuttle. Within seconds the craft had attained altitude and was rocketing upward through the hole, away from the exploding cavern beneath them.
They'd gotten halfway up before they realized they weren't going to make it.
* * *
Admiral Harriman's face appeared on the viewscreen of the Excelsior. Without waiting for any niceties, he said flatly, "I assume you realize that we're quite serious, Commander."
"You've made your point abundantly clear, Admiral," Anik said.
"I notice you've brought your shields and weapons on line."
"You've left us no choice in the matter, sir."
Harriman's face reddened ever so slightly. "You indeed do have a choice, young woman. Surrender control over your vessel to Enterprise, and follow us to Starbase Nine."
"That is not an option, sir," said Anik. "With all due respect . . . I cannot and will not leave Captain Sulu behind."
Harriman shook his head. "It always amuses me when people do that. When they say, 'With all due respect,‣ right before they say something that's infuriating. With all due respect to you, Commander, if you choose to fight me on this, we will cripple your ship if necessary and take it in tow. Surrender."
Anik paused to consider the situation. She looked to the others, looked to Janice Rand . . . and thought about Captain Sulu.
"Sir," she said evenly, "I will thank you not to utter obscenities."
"Obscenities?" He had no idea what she was talking about.
"Yes, sir. Specifically, the word surrender. We don't surrender until the last card is played. But then again, that is a grand tradition of the Enterprise, isn't it, Captain Harriman." She made it painfully clear that the latter comment was addressed not to the admiral, but to his son.
"Commander Anik," said the admiral in a somewhat patronizing tone, "you're playing card games with an old pro. I wouldn't if I were you. You can't bluff an old poker man. Surrender. Failure to do so will cause you to be considered a hostile vessel. The consequences will not be pleasant."
And Janice Rand murmured something.
Anik turned to her. "What?"
"I was just saying," Rand said in a low voice, "that there's a more appropriate card game here than poker."
"That being?"
"Well . . . the polite name for it is 'I Doubt You.‣ The impolite name. . . . Well, I'm sure.‣ You've heard of it."
And a slow smile spread across Anik's face.
"Yes. I know the game. Risky, though."
"As Captain Kirk once said . . . risk is our business."
"Commander?" came the admiral's voice.
Anik turned to face the screen. As if the admiral weren't even on the screen, she said, "John . . . when I was second year in the Academy, I happened to eavesdrop on a group of fourth-year cadets."
The admiral tried to interrupt, saying, "This is of no relevance, Commander."
But she ignored him, continuing to talk directly to Captain Harriman. "They were talking about hopes and dreams . . . and one of them spoke of wanting to be a starship captain. To command the finest ship in the fleet, with all its proudest traditions. I always remembered him, John, although I never knew who it was . . . until now. I recognize the voice. So tell me . . . do you remember those traditions?"
Annoyed and fed up, the admiral broke in and said, "Last warning: Surrender, or we will fire upon you."
And Anik smiled defiantly. "Bull," she said.
She took a brief moment of pleasure in the admiral's jaw-dropping reaction—and a brief moment of prayer that the entire thing wasn't going to blow up in her face—before turning to Docksey and saying calmly, "Lieutenant . . . lower shields."
Docksey was wide-eyed. "What?"
"You heard me." Without repeating it, she faced Rand and said, "Sever communications. There's nothing more to say."
Rand nodded and touched her comm panel. The picture of the admiral vanished, replaced by the Enterprise.
"That took a lot of guts, Commander," said Rand.
"Thank you."
"And it will be an honor working in the prison mines by your side."
Anik nodded slightly. "If we live that long," she said.
* * *
Admiral Harriman trembled in outrage. He turned to his son and demanded, "Did you see that? Did you?"
Before the captain could respond, Magnus suddenly said, "Captain . . . their shields are down."
Blackjack couldn't believe it. "The arrogance. This is exactly what I was talking about, Captain. This outright, unabashed contempt! Well, we're going to make a damned example of them! That's what we're going to do! Helm! Lock phasers on the Excelsior."
Chaput hesitated, looking to Captain Harriman for some sort of cue. But he was completely stoic, staring unflinchingly at the unprotected vessel hanging in space before them. "Phasers locked," she said tonelessly.
* * *
"Commander, they've locked phasers on us," said Lojur.
Anik, the picture of tranquillity, sat in the command chair, fingers steepled. "Well, well . . . this is getting interesting."
"Shall I raise shields?"
"No," she said.
"Any orders?"
"Yes. Brace yourself."
* * *
"Have they raised shields?" demanded the admiral.
"No sir," said Magnus.
There was a long pause, and then the admiral said softly, "The unmitigated gall. They think I don't have the nerve." And then, very loudly, he said, "Helm . . . fire phasers."
# Chapter Twenty-nine
IN A HIGH TOWER in the ruined city, Sulu and Demora looked down and watched the hordes coming toward them.
In the mid-distance was the wreckage of the Galileo. The vessel had, unbeknownst to Sulu (not that it would have made a lot of difference) taken a partial hit from one of the phaser blasts. Systems damage had played havoc with both the Galileo's power and guidance systems. Consequently Sulu had barely been able to hold the vessel together to make it to the surface. The crash had been rough, although they had at least been able to walk away, or limp away, from the landing, thus making it a good one. Unfortunately, the subspace radio on board the shuttle had been one of the first things to suffer when the systems went down, so they couldn't even call for help.
And things had worsened, for geysering upward from below had been the clone army. Every single one as bestial, as savage as the clone of Demora had been. While floating in the sensory-deprivation liquid of their tanks, they had been helpless. Now, though, they were out . . . they were maniacal . . . and they were looking for someone or something upon which to vent their savagery. And the only things that had suited the bill were Sulu and Demora.
So they had run. They had run as far and as fast as they could, trying to keep one step ahead of the howling hordes. They made it to the city finally, and come to an unfortunate discovery.
The city was built on the edge of a cliff.
Sulu appreciated the fact that, strategically, it was a fairly sharp place to put a city. Attackers couldn't possibly come at you from the rear. Unfortunately it also meant there was nowhere else to go, and as the army of clones, numbering somewhere around five hundred strong, converged, Sulu and his daughter sought refuge.
They had climbed higher, higher, barely speaking a word, conserving their strength. Finally they could go no farther. They huddled in the highest tower, watching the swarm below. The clones rampaged through the city, looking for their victims. Their shrieks were animalistic, bordering on insane.
Demora drew closer to her father, peering down. They appeared to be in something similar to a bell tower, except there was no bell around. It opened on all sides, although there were pillars that provided support for the roof. They were hundreds of feet in the air. If they were lucky, the swarm would never find them. Somehow, though, they weren't feeling lucky.
"Was I . . . like that?" Demora asked, flinching as she heard the shrieking below. Once they'd staked themselves out in the tower, he'd taken the time to fill her in—as quickly as he could—about what had happened.
"It wasn't you, remember?" he said, putting an arm around her.
She looked at him wonderingly. "But you didn't know that."
"No."
"You thought I was dead."
He felt his eyes start to become hot, all the tears he'd been suppressing beginning to flow from him. Yet now they were tears of joy, of relief . . . at least for the moment, however brief it might be. Determinedly, he wiped them away. "Yes . . ." he whispered, "I thought you were dead."
"But you came out here anyway. Risked your career, your life . . . for nothing. For not even a hope."
"I . . . felt you. In my head. I couldn't sleep at night. I felt like you were calling me." He paused. "On the amusement-park planet . . . the equipment there could read your thoughts. The equipment here was related to that. Maybe because of . . . of who we are . . . you were able to reach me somehow." He shook his head. "Either that . . . or something within me just refused to accept it. I had to know. I had to know why you were taken from me."
She could hear them coming closer, and she closed her eyes as if that would eliminate the sound. "And now we're both going to die."
"I was dying without you. Dying with you would be preferable."
She turned to look at him, her eyes brimming with tears. "Oh . . . God," she moaned. "That's . . . that's so sappy." And then she hugged him so tightly that he thought his ribs would break. In a low voice, she said, "Dad . . . this is a bad time to tell you . . . but . . . but it's going to be the only chance I have, I think, and I want everything to be square. . . ."
He lifted her chin and looked into her eyes. "What is it, honey?"
"I really hated you."
He blinked. "I wasn't sure what I was expecting you to say, but somehow that wasn't it."
She forced herself to look away from him, feeling ashamed. "I hated you for what you did for me. For staying on Earth so you could be with me, rather than being in space where you belong. And then, just when I got used to that guilt, you started heading out again. And I should have been happy for you, except all I was was angry at you because I felt abandoned. And when I went to the Academy, part of the reason I went was to please you . . . except in the meantime all the resentment I'd had toward you began to build and build because I was keeping it all bottled inside me . . . and I began hating myself because I was pursuing a career in order to impress you. You have no idea what it's like to feel so many things, and to be ashamed of all of them."
He lowered his head. "I wish I could say that," he said, his voice hoarse.
"What?"
He looked at her. "I . . . I resented you. I did, I admit it. Because I wanted to have it all. I wanted to be there for you, for my child . . . and I felt as if I wanted my life back. And the older you got, and the more you reminded me of your mother, and the more I resented her for doing this to the both of us. I was . . . I was much colder to you than I should have been. I kept you distant, particularly later on when you needed me most. I spoke of honor and principles . . . as if love didn't figure in at all. There's so much more I should have done. Everyone wants to be a perfect parent, and no one has a clue how. And I had less than most."
"You did the best you could have."
"Maybe . . . but I didn't do the best I should have. I wish I could go back . . . take the Excelsior, slingshot around the sun, go back in time . . . and talk sense into myself."
"Do you think you'd listen?"
He sighed. "Probably not."
They were silent for a moment, close to each other.
"I'm so sorry," she said softly.
"So am I. More, because I don't have the excuse of youth to fall back on."
Then Demora reached into the pocket of the jacket. "Here," she said. "I yanked this off Taine while we were fighting. I guess . . . maybe you should have it."
It was the jade locket. He took it from her gently, studied it. In the rapidly dwindling light that filtered through the purple sky, the locket still managed to glitter with a light of its own.
"Very old-fashioned," he said.
"Mother could be that way."
He flipped the catch and it opened. There was a tiny picture, just as in the style of centuries ago.
It was of Sulu.
He stared at it. "This is the picture in my service record," he said. "How did your mother get a copy?"
"She was very resourceful," said Demora.
He closed the locket and started to hand it back to her. "You should keep this."
"No, Dad. I want you to have it."
"She was your mother. You should . . ."
And Demora started to laugh. He frowned at her. "What's so funny?" he demanded.
"We're arguing over who's going to keep a locket, totally ignoring the fact that we're probably both going to be dead soon! I mean, aren't there far more meaningful things we can argue about in the short time we have left?"
Sulu stared at her for a long moment . . . and then began to laugh. He had a very odd sort of laugh when he really cut loose. It sounded like an engine trying to rev up . . . a repeated "Uh! Uh! Uh!" On the rare occasions when he allowed himself to laugh like that, Demora would invariably imitate it . . . making him laugh all the more. Which was exactly what happened.
As barely human creatures scavenged the city, looking for something to kill, their intended prey sat hundreds of feet above and laughed.
# Chapter Thirty
"BELAY THAT."
Chaput's hand froze over the phaser control as her captain's voice stopped her a moment before she could open fire on the Excelsior.
Admiral Harriman turned and looked at his son. "What did you say?"
"Belay that order, Chaput," the captain said again. "Stand down from battle stations."
Blackjack advanced on his son. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"
"Taking back command of my vessel."
"The hell you are." He turned back to Chaput. "I order you to carry out my last order!"
"Don't do it, Chaput," Harriman said. And the tone of his voice was so firm that she tucked her hands under her legs and sat on them. "Admiral, I say again, I am taking back command of my vessel. You are relieved of duty."
Slowly Blackjack Harriman's face purpled. He stepped in close to Harriman. "There are specific regulations under which a subordinate officer can relieve a superior officer. Do you feel that any of them apply to this?"
"Yes, sir."
His voice became deep and dangerous as he said, "Which ones?"
"All of them. And one more." Harriman leaned in close said, "You've really pissed me off. Now get off my bridge." Blackjack's fists clenched and unclenched. "This is mutiny. This is nothing less than mutiny."
"Call it what you will. I say again, however . . . get off my bridge, or—"
"Or what? Or you'll order security officers to commit mutiny as well as remove me?"
And Harriman shook his head. "No. I'll do it myself."
Blackjack blew his stack. "You little ingrate! Do you have any idea the number of times I've interceded for you! The times I've protected you! You owe your command to me! And this is the treatment you feel is due me?" His voice grew louder, more outraged, and the captain simply stood there, arms folded, and took it without flinching.
The admiral turned away and sat in the command chair. Icily, he said, "Even Kirk never did something like this. Not even he treated a superior officer in such a high-handed fashion. You're worse than he ever was."
"We all have to aspire to something, Admiral. Will you leave the bridge quietly?"
The admiral leaned back in the command chair and cracked his knuckles. "Nothing is getting me out of this chair. Now advise your helmswoman to obey my orders. Either that or try to remove me . . . if you think you've got the stones."
"Very well," said Harriman, unperturbed.
The bridge crew held its collective breath.
And Harriman, calmly, touched the comm switch on the helm console and said, "Bridge to transporter room. Lock onto the command chair and beam the occupant, into the brig."
The admiral's jaw dropped and he tried to leap from the command chair, but it was too late. The admiral, vanished in a twinkling of light and hum of molecular displacement.
No one on the bridge could quite believe it. And then, after a moment of dead silence:
"Sir," said Dane finally, "that was utterly inappropriate. In all my years of discipline and background, in all my upbringing . . . I have never seen a display such as that."
"Your point being, Dane?"
"The point being, I thought it was a hell of a display. Because I wasn't sanguine about firing on Excelsior."
"Neither was I. I trust you'll testify to that effect at my court-martial?"
"Absolutely, sir."
"Thank you, Dane. I knew I could count on you. Now . . . Z'on, raise the Excelsior, pronto. Let's find out what the hell is going on down there."
# Chapter Thirty-one
THEY WERE COMING. Five hundred they numbered . . . beasts with nothing but instinct and a need to destroy. Failed experiments that bore the shells of human beings but the minds of wild animals. Naked and deranged, looking like three men who were dead, or one young woman who was crouched next to her father and shuddering as she looked down upon them. It was like watching ghosts, or one's worst nightmare heading one's way.
She watched the clones of herself rampaging through the streets.
"We're not going to die."
The bottom of the tower shuddered, and they heard triumphant howling from the horde below. Sulu and Demora had bolted the door below, but it had held only a brief time. They heard it crashing in.
Sulu and Demora looked bleakly at each other, Sulu no longer having empty promises of salvation to toss around.
"I don't want to die like that," Demora whispered. "Torn apart by them . . . I don't want to die like that."
He said nothing, but looked at her in a way that had no despair, no hopelessness . . . but instead pride, even defiance.
"There is a way out, isn't there," she said, knowing the answer.
And knowing that she knew, he simply nodded.
She looked down at the drop. She could see, far below her, the bloodthirsty mob pushing its way in. The tower continued to shudder beneath the pounding of their feet.
"It's not dishonorable, is it?" she asked.
"No."
"Because I know that's important. And I'd want you to be proud of me."
He smiled, keeping back the tears, to be strong for her. "I wouldn't mind having you proud of me, either."
The tower trembled, the shouts getting louder. A few feet away from them was the opening to the stairway that led down. A door was closed over it, but it wouldn't last more than a second.
"Dad . . . I never knew before that you had tests done to make sure I was your daughter. If . . . if they'd come back as negative . . . would you still have taken care of me?" She paused. "Feel free to lie in order to spare my feelings. I promise I won't hold it against you."
"Yes. I would have made you my daughter anyway. And I'd have loved you as much, and I couldn't possibly have been more proud of you than I am right now."
The horde grew closer and closer. Only seconds remained before they would burst out onto the uppermost portion of the tower, and that would be the end.
"Demora," said Sulu, "I am . . . honored . . . to die with you."
"To die would be a great adventure."
Sulu frowned. "I've heard that. Who said that? Ch'en Tu-hsui, wasn't it?"
"No. Peter Pan."
"Oh. Well then," and he rose to his feet, taking her by the hand. "Let's fly."
They stepped to the edge of the tower. The drop yawned beneath them. Beyond them was the horizon, the purple skies seemingly ready to welcome their soon-to-be-freed souls.
"Dad . . . I'm scared."
"So am I."
"Do you believe in life after death?"
"I believe in life before death."
"In that case . . . good job." "Same to you."
She took a deep breath and said, "I love you, Daddy."
"I love you, Demora." And he did . . . perhaps, for the first time, with all his heart.
They braced themselves, took one last look at each other.
And Demora leaped.
And Sulu didn't.
He did not let go of her hand, however. Instead he clutched on desperately as Demora swung down like a pendulum, slamming into the great stone tower. Sulu held on for all he was worth, still in the tower.
Demora screeched in terror, confusion, anger, dangling with only her father's frantic grip preventing her from plunging to her death. It took a few moments for her father's shouts of "Look! Look!" to penetrate, and then—even as she hung there—she twisted her head around to look where he was indicating.
A shuttlecraft was hurtling through the sky, glinting in the purple light, approaching them at high speed. At the pace it was going, it would be there in ten seconds.
Three seconds later, the first of the berserker clones smashed through the door. It was a clone of Taine, followed by several more of exactly the same vintage.
Both hands occupied with preventing Demora from falling, Sulu kicked out frantically. The kick knocked the clone back, sending him crashing into others coming in behind him. They were shrieking, howling, and they converged on Sulu from all sides.
Sulu kicked out again, knocking one off his feet. Another grabbed at Sulu's face and Sulu bit him, sinking his teeth in and drawing blood. But more were coming and Sulu was out of time . . .
And the shuttlecraft was directly beneath them.
Breathing a prayer, Sulu let go. Demora dropped five feet and slammed into the roof of the shuttle. She came near to skidding off, but then she managed to clamber back up. "Dad!" she screamed, "Dad!"
They were all over him now. Sulu couldn't pull free of them. His hand was outstretched to Demora, but they seemed separated by a distance of miles.
The door of the shuttlecraft suddenly slid open, and Captain John Harriman was hanging half out of the doorway. He was holding a phaser and, angling it upward, fired. He nailed one of the clones, blasting him backward, and then another, and for a moment Sulu was free.
Sulu tore clear and leaped over the edge of the tower. He thudded onto the roof a few feet from Demora and she reached out, grabbing him by the wrist to hold him in place.
Harriman was shouting into the interior of the cabin, "Gently, Anik! Keep 'er steady! We got 'em! Let's get down and get 'em inside."
The shuttlecraft began to descend gently to the ground, a safe distance from the city. As it went, Demora and Sulu lay flat on their stomachs, clutching each other's hands, gasping, looking at each other and hardly believing what had just happened.
Finally Demora managed to get a sentence out.
"Couldn't have spotted them two seconds earlier, could you."
# Chapter Thirty-two
"ARE YOU PLANNING to release me anytime soon, Captain," said Admiral Harriman in an icy tone.
John Harriman stood outside the brig, arms folded, leaning against the wall. "That depends. I think I'll debrief you first."
"Debrief me. There is nothing you could say, Captain, that could possibly serve as any sort of mitigating circumstance in your upcoming court-martial."
Harriman proceeded to tell him everything. The admiral's eyes became wider and wider the further along Harriman got.
When the captain was finished, there was a long moment of silence.
"So feel free to court-martial me, Father," said Harriman. "Bring everyone on the Excelsior up on charges too, if you wish. Of course, full testimony will be offered. As it stands, a rescue mission overseen by one Admiral Harriman, aided and abetted by a captain of some renown who is credited with, among other things, saving the Khitomer conference, not to mention the entire Earth . . . this rescue mission not only recovered a crew woman believed dead—said captain's daughter—but uncovered the illegal use of forbidden alien cloning technology which the Tholian faction was planning to put to use in schemes of conquest. If, on the other hand, you wish the record to show that said admiral was ready to fire on the famed captain's unprotected ship and abandon both captain and daughter, allowing the clone technology to continue unabated . . . well, sir . . . that is your choice to make."
Blackjack frowned. "Think you've got me boxed in, don't you, Captain."
Harriman nodded. "Yes, sir, I do."
"And you expect me to knuckle under."
"No, sir. Merely my fervent hope."
"Hunh." The admiral scratched his chin. "If I go along with this . . . I do not want you to think for one moment I approve of your actions."
"Understood."
"It's for the good of the fleet, you understand. And to make you look good."
"Yes, sir. I very much appreciate that."
Anik and Harriman walked toward the Enterprise transporter room. "So he went along with it," she asked.
"Of course he did. My father may be many things, but stupid he is not. Although I tend to think relations will be fairly . . . strained . . . between us for a while. But I can live with that. More importantly, Demora can live with that."
They walked into the transporter room. Anik turned and shook his hand briskly. "Captain . . . it's been an honor."
"The same to you, Commander. I believe Captain Sulu will be along with you shortly; he's just spending a few more moments with Demora."
"He's certainly entitled." She stepped up onto the platform.
"Uhm, Commander . . . one thing," he said.
"Yes?"
"That conversation you eavesdropped on. The one about my talking about honor and tradition and what I wanted from life. I remember having a conversation like that . . . but how in the world did you recognize or even remember my voice from that one fleeting moment ten years ago?"
"Oh, that." Anik laughed. "I made that up."
"What?" He gaped at her. "What?"
"I made it up. I never overheard you. I'm not even absolutely sure we went to the Academy at the same time."
"Then how did you know—?!"
She shrugged. "I guessed. Because everyone at some point in their fourth year sits around and talks about what they want out of life. So I figured it was worth a shot." She winked. "See you around, Captain."
Grinning and shaking his head in amazement, Captain John Harriman said, "Energize." Anik of Matern vanished and Harriman walked out of the transporter room, still chuckling.
Hikaru and Demora stood on the observation deck, staring out at the stars.
"You know," Demora said after a while, "most people can sit down and clear the air without having to face an impending death by rampaging clones."
"We're not most people," said Sulu. "For instance . . . why didn't you tell me you were upset about my going with Chekov up to our new assignment at the time it was happening?"
"Well . . . because you'd just saved the Earth by going back in time to get two humpback whales . . ." Her voice trailed off and she sighed. "All right. I see your point."
"Demora." He turned to her. "Have you considered requesting a transfer to the Excelsior? I happen to know you'd be favorably received by the captain."
"And I'd be worrying the entire time he'd be treating me with favoritism. Either that or he'd be overprotective of me. It doesn't sound like a good idea."
"It did for a moment," he sighed.
"Dad . . ." She hesitated. "Did you lie to me? About . . ."
"About that I would have taken you in even if I hadn't been your father? No. No, I wasn't. Because even if you weren't mine . . . you still would have been hers. And that would have been enough." He smiled. "But I'm still glad nonetheless."
He looked back out at the stars. "And I'm also relieved . . . that you weren't taken from me senselessly. I've spent my life trying to steer my way through the galaxy . . . to understand it. I'd like to think there's some order to it, some reason that things happen. That would give it a sort of elegance. That it is . . . at its core . . . a positive force. After all, Einstein said, 'God may be sophisticated, but He is not malicious.‣ I've always believed very strongly in the truth of that."
"Einstein. Hmmm," mused Demora.
"What's wrong."
"Well, didn't he also say that it was impossible to exceed the speed of light?"
This stopped Sulu for a moment. Then he shrugged. "Well . . . even Einstein had his off days."
He turned to her once more and hugged her tightly. "I love you, Demora."
"I love you too, Dad. Don't be a stranger."
"I won't. Not anymore."
He released her, reluctantly, and started to head for the door when Demora said, "Oh, and Dad?"
"Yes?"
"I stopped by my quarters earlier . . . and there was mail from you. Just . . . a chatty letter. You don't usually send chatty letters. What prompted that?"
He smiled. "Just thinking of you, sweetheart. Just thinking of you."
"Well it was nice. Keep doing it."
"Same to you, sweetheart. Same to you."
He walked out of the observation deck, leaving Demora to gaze at the stars.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
An Original Publication of POCKET BOOKS
POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc. 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
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Copyright © 1995 by Paramount Pictures. All Rights Reserved.
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|
The Celestial Searchers Young Astronomers club met for the first meeting of the school year Sept. 23 at the Glenwood Branch library. In its 21st year, the astronomy club has become a part of our community. Headed by Joel Goodman, affectionately dubbed “Stardoc,” the club is for kindergartners through sixth graders who have an interest in the cosmos. The club meets on the fourth Monday of each month at 7 p.m. Last month’s initial meeting touched on black holes. Parental involvement is encouraged and Goodman is a “stellar” head to this club. Interested? Contact Goodman at stardocjg@gmail.com. |
Does dancing make you question who you are?
As some people have pointed out before, dancing is sometimes seen as sinful, or something that should be repressed. I admit that before I started salsa dancing, I didn't think too much of going to bars at night, but now that after I've started doing it, I found my old beliefs challenged more and more.
Other things like confidence and physical ability have also changed. Before I believed that only some really naturally gifted people were the ones that were able to dance, now I understand that good genes only get you so far.
I think the biggest thing I've gotten out of dancing is the world of possibilities, that you really can conquer anything and be anything you want to be.
But it also has made me question things like my commitment to my job, which I thought was very important, but then realized that it wasn't. I have also heard about people leaving marriages because dancing made them realize how trully unhappy they were ( Edie the Salsa freak comes to mind ).
So the question, good or bad, is has dancing made you question what is important to you? How has it changed you? Do you have any regrets?
So the question, good or bad, is has dancing made you question what is important to you? How has it changed you? Do you have any regrets?
Click to expand...
I have absolutely no regrets since I started dancing, but then again, I have no regrets in life so far. It's something that I've had to work on a lot, but I figure that life is too short to harbour regrets and, if you can take something constructive or positive from the experience, then there should be no need to feel regret anyway.
Dancing has definitely changed me for the better. It has made me more confident and outgoing. I've now lost 70lbs. since I started back in the middle of February and I'm in better shape than I've been in at any time since my accident. I've also made some amazing friends, whom I wouldn't trade for the world...and I couldn't picture myself without.
I have definitely changed my perspective since I took up ballroom. I'm no longer living my life from my office chair. I'm living it from the dance floor instead! I don't live for a paycheque...I live for the music and the time I get to spend with those who are most imporant to me, as well as those magical moments that come from a "perfect" dance...you know the ones, where the song clicks, the partner clicks and you feel like there's nothing better in the world.
Yeah, my life has changed radically. Two years ago I was a geeky, self-conscious, unpopular, totally un-elegant teen who felt like she was worth less. Now I'm confident of my body, graceful, am gaining popularity (among men as well!) and I go out more. I'm not afraid to dance, not afraid of body contact, not afraid of expressing my feelings through my body. I realised most of the stuff you hear about dancing are wrong, and others are truer than you would think.
Like brujo, I realised talent or having turned out feet or a good body does not a good dancer make. Talent is simply being good at something, more so than others. That doesn't mean you love it, or that it makes you happy. If you love it, it makes you happy and you're better at getting it, then you're on the right track. But all that talent stuff is just propaganda. Sure, there were dancers in history that could dance like no other, that glowed when they were on stage, that managed to express their feelings so eloquently through their dancing that you couldn't stop looking.
But even they, who had IT,would practice until late hours and sometimes felt frustrated or conflicted. IT, in the words of brujo, can only get you so far. It's persistence and practice and so much love for dancing that makes us the dancers we are.
I learnt (actually, I'm still learning) that it's okay to make mistakes. I learnt that we're not perfect, but we don't need to be. What to my eyes is an imperfection might actually be the reason someone falls in love with me, or the reason I can feel what my body is doing. Imperfections make us human and real. Perfect is for Barbie.
I get out more. I'm not afraid to dance because "someone will say something". I dress more sexy, because I feel like it. I am liberated. I was introduced in a world of colour, and there's no way I'm going back to black and white.
I experiment. I don't judge so harshly. I don't think all the time and instead act on impulses. I live more. I blame myself less.
I was introduced in a world of colour, and there's no way I'm going back to black and white.
Click to expand...
- completely echoed my own thoughts on dance! I ran and checked my journal, and found I had written almost the exact same phrase about 6 months after I started dancing. Again, beautiful post; it’s nice to hear another young-ish person so moved by dance.
I would say that it definitely makes me happier when i'm dancing than when i'm not. Less... philosophical, I am totally more aware of my body - in a good way! I realize the weakness and strengths inherent in my body and more of WHY I have a difficulty with a step. It helps, because i get MUCH less frustrated. I wish i would have had this awareness back 15 years ago, when i was competitive gymnast. I have since realized that i never really had any technique doing gymnastics, i just used brute strength. That really doesn't work with dance.
as for the person who realized they were unhappy in their marriage, i feel so bad for them. I've realized how lucky I am to have a husband who supports me, even though he doesn't dance with me. He likes me dancing because i am a lot happier when i dance.
I'll bet the weight loss has helped you feel better physically as well as emotionally.
Click to expand...
Thank you so much, sweetheart.
It's amazing how much better I've been feeling. Prior to getting hurt at a club in the middle of October, I hadn't had back pain *at all* since May. This is unbelievable to me because I had doctors telling me that I'd be on medication and in pain for the rest of my life. I stopped taking the pain killers about 3 days after I got out of the hospital (I refused to be stuck on pills for the rest of my life) and the specialist that I went to see on Friday said he's amazed at the progression he's seen in my back. It's wonderful. ...and it's all dance too. I'll start at the gym for the first time in absolutely ages in the new year for strength building and tone purposes, so prior to that, this has all been due to dancing.
Dancing has definitely changed me for the better. It has made me more confident and outgoing. I've now lost 70lbs. since I started back in the middle of February and I'm in better shape than I've been in at any time since my accident.
A 45 minute lesson twice a week, a 2 1/2 hour long studio social once a week, 3-5 hours of high-energy salsa 2-4 nights a week and 3-5 hours of social ballroom 1-3 times a week. Add in solo practice in the basement as often as you can and vary as your schedule permits!
We have a few clubs that hold ballroom social dances. They aren't affiliated with any studios and anybody who's interested, regardless of skill level, can attend. It's like going out to a salsa club...just for ballroom.
Physically, it have improved my figure and posture, that's for sure.
Whether I have changed or not, not sure?
I am more relaxed in dancing, not as shy as I used to be, that's for sure.
I don't think I feel much different, but maybe because I also do other expression releasing activities (painting, handwork and other forms of exercise).
Some of my friends think that I have softened a bit after dancing, showing part of my feminine side. Maybe ? (I'll have to ask other people is they feel I have changed).
We have a few clubs that hold ballroom social dances. They aren't affiliated with any studios and anybody who's interested, regardless of skill level, can attend. It's like going out to a salsa club...just for ballroom.
It's quite nice actually. The venues usually have a nice, large floor. The crowd is usually older, but we don't mind. Actually, because the clubs usually have an older clientele, they close earlier than a normal club, so we just move over to a salsa venue after, if we're still up for more dancing.
It changed my outlook on my regular job. I am not as bored since I have another activity, a more relaxed activity to look forward to every week.
Click to expand...
Come to think of it, maybe this has happened to me as well. I'm complaining less about my new job and just getting the work done (even though I've been doing it for only two months). I've come to a realization that I have to work (because I just have to) as long as I have time and can afford to do what I like in my free time. |
// Copyright 2017 The Chromium Authors. All rights reserved.
// Use of this source code is governed by a BSD-style license that can be
// found in the LICENSE file.
#include "content/browser/background_fetch/background_fetch_job_controller.h"
#include <utility>
#include "content/browser/background_fetch/background_fetch_request_manager.h"
#include "content/public/browser/browser_thread.h"
namespace content {
BackgroundFetchJobController::BackgroundFetchJobController(
BackgroundFetchDelegateProxy* delegate_proxy,
const BackgroundFetchRegistrationId& registration_id,
const BackgroundFetchOptions& options,
const SkBitmap& icon,
const BackgroundFetchRegistration& registration,
BackgroundFetchRequestManager* request_manager,
ProgressCallback progress_callback,
BackgroundFetchScheduler::FinishedCallback finished_callback)
: BackgroundFetchScheduler::Controller(registration_id,
std::move(finished_callback)),
options_(options),
icon_(icon),
complete_requests_downloaded_bytes_cache_(registration.downloaded),
request_manager_(request_manager),
delegate_proxy_(delegate_proxy),
progress_callback_(std::move(progress_callback)),
weak_ptr_factory_(this) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::InitializeRequestStatus(
int completed_downloads,
int total_downloads,
const std::vector<std::string>& outstanding_guids) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
// Don't allow double initialization.
DCHECK_GT(total_downloads, 0);
DCHECK_EQ(total_downloads_, 0);
completed_downloads_ = completed_downloads;
total_downloads_ = total_downloads;
// TODO(nator): Update this when we support uploads.
int total_downloads_size = options_.download_total;
auto fetch_description = std::make_unique<BackgroundFetchDescription>(
registration_id().unique_id(), options_.title, registration_id().origin(),
icon_, completed_downloads, total_downloads,
complete_requests_downloaded_bytes_cache_, total_downloads_size,
outstanding_guids);
delegate_proxy_->CreateDownloadJob(GetWeakPtr(),
std::move(fetch_description));
}
BackgroundFetchJobController::~BackgroundFetchJobController() {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
}
bool BackgroundFetchJobController::HasMoreRequests() {
return completed_downloads_ < total_downloads_;
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::StartRequest(
scoped_refptr<BackgroundFetchRequestInfo> request) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
DCHECK_LT(completed_downloads_, total_downloads_);
DCHECK(request);
active_request_download_bytes_[request->download_guid()] = 0;
delegate_proxy_->StartRequest(registration_id().unique_id(),
registration_id().origin(), request);
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::DidStartRequest(
const scoped_refptr<BackgroundFetchRequestInfo>& request) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
// TODO(delphick): Either add CORS check here or remove this function and do
// the CORS check in BackgroundFetchDelegateImpl (since
// download::Client::OnDownloadStarted returns a value that can abort the
// download).
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::DidUpdateRequest(
const scoped_refptr<BackgroundFetchRequestInfo>& request,
uint64_t bytes_downloaded) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
const std::string& download_guid = request->download_guid();
if (active_request_download_bytes_[download_guid] == bytes_downloaded)
return;
active_request_download_bytes_[download_guid] = bytes_downloaded;
progress_callback_.Run(registration_id().unique_id(), options_.download_total,
complete_requests_downloaded_bytes_cache_ +
GetInProgressDownloadedBytes());
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::DidCompleteRequest(
const scoped_refptr<BackgroundFetchRequestInfo>& request) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
active_request_download_bytes_.erase(request->download_guid());
complete_requests_downloaded_bytes_cache_ += request->GetFileSize();
++completed_downloads_;
request_manager_->MarkRequestAsComplete(registration_id(), request.get());
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::UpdateUI(const std::string& title) {
DCHECK_CURRENTLY_ON(BrowserThread::IO);
delegate_proxy_->UpdateUI(registration_id().unique_id(), title);
}
uint64_t BackgroundFetchJobController::GetInProgressDownloadedBytes() {
uint64_t sum = 0;
for (const auto& entry : active_request_download_bytes_)
sum += entry.second;
return sum;
}
void BackgroundFetchJobController::Abort(
BackgroundFetchReasonToAbort reason_to_abort) {
delegate_proxy_->Abort(registration_id().unique_id());
std::vector<std::string> aborted_guids;
for (const auto& pair : active_request_download_bytes_)
aborted_guids.push_back(pair.first);
request_manager_->OnJobAborted(registration_id(), std::move(aborted_guids));
if (reason_to_abort != BackgroundFetchReasonToAbort::ABORTED_BY_DEVELOPER) {
// Don't call Finish() here, so that we don't mark data for deletion while
// there are active fetches.
// Once the controller finishes processing, this function will be called
// again. (BackgroundFetchScheduler's finished_callback_ will call
// BackgroundFetchJobController::Abort() with |cancel_download| set to
// true.)
Finish(reason_to_abort);
}
}
} // namespace content
|
M Radio 105 FM Pontianak is present in spreading information having broadcast format as information and entertainment radio (entretenimiento). Where the information provided is not just information in the form of news, but includes information sports, política, cultura, entertainment world both local, regional, national and international and do not forget the actual information that occurred in the kalbar itself. M Radio airs 24 hours a day by presenting a variety of programs to provide entertainment as well as the latest information as an accurate delivery medium for information needs of West Kalimantan community, especially pontianak city. |
Q:
Some encoded Javascript that I need in plain text
I'm having some issues trying to decode some javascript.. I have no idea what kind of encoding this is.. i tried base 64 decoders etc. If you can please help me out with this, here's a fragment of the code:
\x69\x6E\x6E\x65\x72\x48\x54\x4D\x4C","\x61\x70\x70\x34\x39\x34\x39\x3
Any ways I can get plain text from that?
Thanks!
A:
\xNN is an escape sequence. NN is a hexidecimal number (00 to FF) that represents a Latin-1 character.
Escape sequences are interpreted literally within a string. So:
"\x69" === "i" // true
|
New wave of “Terror-Scare” an old US Imperialist ploy to intensify military intervention for US military basing and economic interest
Jorge “Ka Oris” Madlo
Spokesperson
National Democratic Front of the Philippines
Mindanao November 6, 2010
There has been a series of “terror-scare” spreading in the country of late. The National Democratic Front of the Philippines in Mindanao (NDFP-Mindanao) views this chain of events along the following the lines:
1. The United States, being in the throes of a deep recession and trapped in the quagmire of wars of aggression in the Middle East, is looking up to the Philippines as its second front to secure its geo-politics in the Asia-Pacific, protect its economic interest and unhampered US military basing in the country. It had to install a more reliable ally — Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III – through a pre-programmed election and drum up a new wave of terror to justify its intensified military intervention.
2. Reminiscent of its old tactic that led to the terror events in the Philippines after the 9/11 attacks, this scheme is to justify the increasing presence of US troops in the country, and more aggressively launch the US counter insurgency strategy. Recently, some three thousand US soldiers have arrived to participate in joint military trainings in Luzon called CARAT and Phiblex, obvously, in blatant violation of our sovereignty. Hacienda Luisita of the Cojuangco-Aquino clan has even been targeted as the venue for these military exercises.
3. This wave of “terror-threats” and its subsequent violent “counter-terror” campaigns is a prelude to a full throttle attack against the revolutionary movement come January 2011. It comes as no surprise that AFP propaganda spin-doctors have maliciously rehashed the baseless “NPA-MILF-Abu Sayyaf” collusion angle.
Just recently, the AFP redeployed the 1st Marine Brigade from Basilan to Sarangani, in time for the resumption of the GRP-MILF talks, as leverage for the negotiation, and to help quell the growing NPA forces in the area. This big force will also secure the completion of US military base facilities in the SOCSKSARGEN area.
4. The US, in cahoots with other imperialists countries and its puppet Aquino regime have had staged a tactical ploy to make the Filipinos and the world believe of such a “terror threat.” Locally, the stage was set with the October 21 bus bombing in Matalam, North Cotabato, where the Aquino regime quickly attributed this to the Al-Khobar extortionist group and later connected it to the Jemaah Islamiah. And in a latest twist, a new terrorist group called the Jihadist Ulamah had to be conjured to lend credence to their terror-hype, to replace the bland Abu Sayyaf.
5. The idea of “security threats” poses no difference from the Glorietta bombing incidents in 2007 and in the Davao twin bombings in 2003 where the reactionary regime, in its interest to preserve US presence in the country, engineered the ploy. In fact, a bombing incident in May 2002 involving an FBI covert operative — Michael Meiring — posing as a treasure hunter exposed that the US had a hand in the bombings.
6. Despite denials from the Aquino regime that the “terror-scare” has nothing to do with the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), such security threat occurred at the height of reviewing the onerous Visiting Forces Agreement. The NDFP– Mindanao had earlier called on the people to oppose it and press the GRP to rescind this lopsided agreement. The Aquino government is set to have it reviewed and amended without the consent of the Philippine Legislature, making a mockery of its own constitutionally mandated Senate.
7. The US-Aquino regime has no plan to lift the terror tag against the CPP-NPA-NDF and these terror threats could be spitefully used as a license to amend the VFA for intensified anti-terror campaigns against the revolutionary movement. This usual terror line will only result to crackdown against the Moro people, political activists and political opposition block. The reactionary regime could also use this ploy as an excuse to derail the peace talks with the MILF and the NDFP.
As revealed in the US Counter-Insurgency Guide (US Coin Guide), there is no let up for the US in advancing its political and economic interests in the Philippines through the new puppet regime of Aquino.
Open opposition, both locally and abroad, to the US war of aggression is meted out with fascist brutality, such as arrests and prosecution, and even extra-judicial killings. In the US in fact, political activists have been subpoenaed and even arrested by the FBI to silence political groups opposed to imperialist wars.
Hence, the National Democratic Front of the Philippines in Mindanao (NDFP-Mindanao) calls on the Filipino people to expose and oppose whatever machinations the US imperialism carries out to sustain its presence here.
Source: Philippine Revolution |
Calogero AM, Viganò M, Budelli S, et al. Microtubule defects in mesenchymal stromal cells distinguish patients with Progressive Supranuclear Palsy. J Cell Mol Med. 2018;22:2670--2679. <https://doi.org/10.1111/jcmm.13545>
Alessandra Maria Calogero and Mariele Viganò contributed equally to the work.
Graziella Cappelletti and Gianni Pezzoli are Co‐last authors.
1. INTRODUCTION {#jcmm13545-sec-0001}
===============
PSP, also known as Richardson‐Steele‐Olszewski syndrome, is a sporadic neurodegenerative disease described for the first time in 1963[1](#jcmm13545-bib-0001){ref-type="ref"} and for whom there are not available treatments to date. PSP results in severe disability, as it is characterized by frequent falls, supranuclear vertical gaze palsy, pseudobulbar palsy and rigidity of the neck.[2](#jcmm13545-bib-0002){ref-type="ref"} Thanks to its wide spectrum of clinical phenotypes, now this pathology has been recognized as a range of motor and behavioural syndromes[3](#jcmm13545-bib-0003){ref-type="ref"} and related to multiple pathological mechanisms.[4](#jcmm13545-bib-0004){ref-type="ref"} The disease is characterized by a neurodegenerative process that involves the basal ganglia, the prefrontal cortex and the cerebellum, with accumulation of tau protein, hence the classification as tauopathy.[5](#jcmm13545-bib-0005){ref-type="ref"} Tau is a MT‐binding protein encoded by the *MAPT* gene into 6 isoforms that are commonly referred to as 3R or 4R (with 3 or 4 MT‐binding domains, respectively). Tau binds to and stabilizes MTs, and promotes MT polymerization.[6](#jcmm13545-bib-0006){ref-type="ref"} The binding to MTs is regulated by phosphorylation of many residues; indeed, when hyperphosphorylated, tau detaches from MTs and accumulates forming neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs). All tauopathies are characterized by the presence of aggregates of abnormally phosphorylated tau protein, although the isoforms that aggregate vary.[7](#jcmm13545-bib-0007){ref-type="ref"} Both hyperphosphorylation and accumulation of 4R tau protein in neurons and glia, in basal ganglia and in the brain stem, are characteristic features of PSP.[8](#jcmm13545-bib-0008){ref-type="ref"} In PSP, the abnormal phosphorylation of tau triggers its detachment from MTs, mislocalization from the axon to dendrites and accumulation of still‐soluble "oligomers."[9](#jcmm13545-bib-0009){ref-type="ref"}
MTs are cytoskeletal polymers built up by α/β tubulin heterodimers, which participate in many cellular functions, such as maintenance of cell shape, cell migration and intracellular transport. MTs show a dynamic behaviour, switching between slow growth and rapid depolymerization[10](#jcmm13545-bib-0010){ref-type="ref"} and are finely regulated by the incorporation of specific α/β tubulin isotypes, by a plethora of MT‐binding proteins and by tubulin post‐translational modifications (PTMs).[11](#jcmm13545-bib-0011){ref-type="ref"}, [12](#jcmm13545-bib-0012){ref-type="ref"} Notably, α‐tubulin PTMs have been correlated with different MT subsets: tyrosinated MTs are the most dynamic ones, whereas acetylated or detyrosinated MTs are associated with more stable pools. The wide range of PTMs might, alone or in combination, generate chemical differences that are sufficient to confer cellular functions on MTs. Tubulin PTMs have important roles in regulating not only MT dynamics, but also motor traffic. Interestingly, defects in MT‐based transport in neurons, which are often linked to the accumulation of aggregated proteins, are typical of many neurodegenerative disorders, including Alzheimer\'s[13](#jcmm13545-bib-0013){ref-type="ref"} and Parkinson\'s (PD) diseases.[14](#jcmm13545-bib-0014){ref-type="ref"} In addition, it has been shown that MT stability and PTMs of tubulin are impaired in human fibroblasts derived from patients with PD.[15](#jcmm13545-bib-0015){ref-type="ref"}
For PSP, there are currently no effective symptomatic or disease‐modifying treatments. In the last years, few clinical trials targeting mitochondria dysfunction, tau aggregation or MT stability have been performed or are ongoing.[16](#jcmm13545-bib-0016){ref-type="ref"} Besides other promising drugs, davunetide, which promotes MT stability, was effective as neuroprotective agent in a mouse model of tauopathy[17](#jcmm13545-bib-0017){ref-type="ref"} but it failed in a phase 2/3 clinical trial on patients with PSP,[18](#jcmm13545-bib-0018){ref-type="ref"} while TPI‐287, another MT stabilizer molecule, has recently entered a phase 1 clinical trial (Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT02133846). Among the ongoing trials, a therapy based on transplantation of undifferentiated human bone marrow MSCs has been proposed. MSCs are multipotent cells that can be isolated from many sources and whose therapeutic relevance is mostly due to their immunosuppressive and anti‐inflammatory properties.[19](#jcmm13545-bib-0019){ref-type="ref"}, [20](#jcmm13545-bib-0020){ref-type="ref"} Interestingly, beneficial effects of intravenous delivery of MSCs have been reported in rotenone‐treated mice, a PD model.[21](#jcmm13545-bib-0021){ref-type="ref"} Starting from encouraging pre‐clinical data, where MSCs show the ability to in vitro rescue 6‐hydroxydopamine‐damaged neural cell lines and to synthesize and secrete neurotrophines,[22](#jcmm13545-bib-0022){ref-type="ref"} we moved to a first pilot phase 1 study. In this trial, we had the dual aim to assess the safety of MSC therapy in a "first‐in‐man" context and the efficacy of autologous MSC treatment. Five patients have been treated in the open phase of our trial and at the end of this first step, we demonstrated the feasibility of autologous MSC administration in subjects with PSP and we recorded a clinical stabilization for at least 6 months (Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01824121).[23](#jcmm13545-bib-0023){ref-type="ref"}
To understand the real potential of patient‐derived MSCs, we performed in‐depth investigation of their biology. Specifically, we characterized the MT cytoskeleton of MSCs from patients affected by PSP, highlighting their characteristics in terms of MT stability and imbalance in α‐tubulin PTMs.
2. MATERIALS AND METHODS {#jcmm13545-sec-0002}
========================
2.1. Diagnostic criteria for PSP diagnosis {#jcmm13545-sec-0003}
------------------------------------------
The criteria used for the diagnosis of PSP followed in this study are as follows: 1‐diagnosis of "probable Progressive Supranuclear Palsy‐Richardson\'s disease subtype" according to current diagnostic criteria,[2](#jcmm13545-bib-0002){ref-type="ref"}, [24](#jcmm13545-bib-0024){ref-type="ref"}, [25](#jcmm13545-bib-0025){ref-type="ref"} including akinetic‐rigid syndrome: gradually progressive disorder with age at onset of 40 years or later, vertical supranuclear palsy and prominent postural instability with falls within first year of disease onset; 2‐positive MRI for PSP criteria[26](#jcmm13545-bib-0026){ref-type="ref"}; 3‐lack of response to chronic levodopa (at least 12‐month treatment).
2.2. Cell culture, subculture and cumulative population doublings {#jcmm13545-sec-0004}
-----------------------------------------------------------------
MSCs were obtained as previously reported in.[22](#jcmm13545-bib-0022){ref-type="ref"} Briefly, bone marrow was obtained after informed consent from aspiration of iliac crest and directly seeded in alpha‐modified Eagle\'s medium (alpha‐MEM; Macopharma, Mouvaux, France) supplemented with 10% high‐quality gamma‐irradiated foetal bovine serum (FBS) (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA), at the concentration of 50 000 white blood cell (WBC)/cm^2^, at 37°C in a humidified atmosphere, 5% CO~2~. After 72 hours, non‐adherent cells were removed by washing with PBS (Macopharma) with complete medium change. On day 14, MSCs at P0 were detached using 0.04 mL/cm^2^ of TrypLE^™^ Select Enzyme (1X) (Thermo Fisher Scientific) and reseeded in the same culture conditions at the concentration of 4000 MSCs/cm^2^. Medium was replaced twice a week. MSCs were subcultured until they reached a plateau in the growth curve. Population doubling was calculated for each MSC lineage using the following equation: population doubling = log10(N)/log10(2); where N is the number of cells harvested at the end of the culture/the number of seeded cells. To define the expansion potential of cells, cumulative population doubling (CPD) was calculated by recording the cell counts and cellular dilution factor at each passage. Cell counting was performed by Burker chamber using Trypan Blue (Fluka, Buchs, Switzerland) to discriminate dead cells. For biochemical analyses, cells at passage 2 (P2) or passage 5 (P5) were seeded in 6‐well plates at a density of 5000 cells/cm^2^, whereas for immunofluorescence staining, 5700 cells/cm^2^ were seeded in BD Falcon CultureSlide (BD Bioscience, Jose, CA, USA). Cells were obtained from both controls (N = 6, age: 66.0 ± 1.18 years) and patients with PSP (N = 10, age: 66.1 ± 1.54 years) (Table [1](#jcmm13545-tbl-0001){ref-type="table-wrap"}).
######
Demographic and clinical features of investigated subjects
Healthy controls PSP patients
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------ --------------
Number of individuals (Male/Female) 6 (3/3) 10 (2/8)
Age[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"} (years): Median (range) 66 (62‐70) 66 (57‐75)
Mean (±SEM) 66.0 (±1.18) 66.1 (±1.54)
Disease onset age (years): Median (range) 62.5 (54‐69)
Mean (±SEM) 61.6 (±1.25)
Disease duration[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"} (years): Median (range) 4 (3‐7)
Mean (±SEM) 4.5 (±0.45)
Laterality onset: Left/Rigth/Bilateral 1/1/8
Exposure[b](#jcmm13545-note-0005){ref-type="fn"}: Positive/Negative/n.a. 0/10/0
Smoke: Positive/Negative/n.a. 3/6/1
Familiarity[c](#jcmm13545-note-0006){ref-type="fn"}: Positive/Negative/n.a. 3/5/2
PSP‐RS[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"}: Median (range) 48 (35‐59)
UPDRS‐III[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"}: Median (range) 39 (32‐51)
Supranuclear vertical gaze palsy[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"}: Positive/Negative/n.a. 9/0/1
Pseudobulbar palsy[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"}: Positive/Negative/n.a. 9/0/1
Rigidity of the neck[a](#jcmm13545-note-0004){ref-type="fn"}: Positive/Negative/n.a. 10/0/0
Pseudobulbar palsy (item 3 PSP‐RS): Median (range) 3 (1‐5)
Supranuclear vertical palsy (item 4 PSP‐RS): Median (range) 12 (6‐15)
Postural stability (item 30 UPDRS‐III): Median (range) 3 (2‐4)
Neck rigidity (item 22 UPDRS‐III): Median (range) 2 (1‐4)
n.a., not available; PSP‐RS, PSP Rating Scale; UPDRS‐III, Unified Parkinson\'s Disease Rating Scale, part III.
At the time of BM collection.
Professional exposure to toxic or mutagen substances.
Familiarity for neurodegenerative disease.
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd
2.3. Morphometric analysis {#jcmm13545-sec-0005}
--------------------------
For morphometric analyses, 10 random images per well were captured using a Nikon Eclipse Ti‐S microscope (Nikon, Chiyoda, Japan), and analyses were made using ImageJ software (National Institute of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA) as previously described.[15](#jcmm13545-bib-0015){ref-type="ref"} For each cell, the maximum and minimum axes and the cell area were measured. The ratio between the maximum and minimum axis has been calculated. Only intact cells fully present into the image were considered.
2.4. Immunofluorescence {#jcmm13545-sec-0006}
-----------------------
After 48 hours, cells were washed twice with PBS and fixed with methanol at −20°C. The samples were been treated with 5% BSA for 15 minutes at room temperature and incubated with the following primary antibodies: acetylated α‐tubulin mouse IgG (clone 6‐11 B‐1, SIGMA‐Aldrich, Darmstadt, Germany), tyrosinated α‐tubulin rat IgG (clone YL1/2; Abcam, Cambridge, UK), detyrosinated α‐tubulin rabbit IgG (ab48389; Abcam), in PBS, 1% BSA for 1 hour at 37°C. After washing twice with PBS, samples were incubated with Alexa Fluor^™^ 568 anti‐rat (Abcam), Alexa Fluor^™^ 488 anti‐mouse (Abcam) and Alexa Fluor^™^ anti‐rabbit 568 (Abcam) in PBS with 1% BSA for 45 minutes at 37°C. Nuclear staining was made with 4′,6‐Diamidino‐2‐phenylindole dihydrochloride (DAPI) (SIGMA‐Aldrich). The coverslips were mounted in Mowiol^®^ (Calbiochem, Darmstadt, Germany)---DABCO (SIGMA‐Aldrich) and examined with an Axiovert 200 M microscope (Carl Zeiss, Oberkochen, Germany).
2.5. Cell extracts {#jcmm13545-sec-0007}
------------------
All cellular extracts were prepared in the presence of protease inhibitors (Protease Inhibitor Cocktail, P8340 SIGMA‐Aldrich). For preparation of whole‐cell extracts, cells were washed twice with PBS and scraped into SB1x (2% SDS, 10% glycerol, 5% β‐mercaptoethanol, 0.001% bromophenol blue and 62.5 mmol/L Tris, pH 6.8). Protein concentration was measured with Pierce BCA protein Assay Kit (Thermo Fisher Scientific). Equal amounts of each sample were separated by SDS‐PAGE. Cytosolic and cytoskeletal‐associated proteins were separated as previously reported.[27](#jcmm13545-bib-0027){ref-type="ref"} Briefly, cells were rinsed twice in PEM buffer (10 mmol/L EGTA, 1 mmol/L MgCl~2~, 88 mmol/L Pipes, pH 6.94), extracted for 10 minutes at room temperature with PEM buffer containing 0.1% Triton X‐100 and rinsed briefly in PEM buffer. The obtained Triton X‐100‐soluble fractions were diluted 3:1 with SB4x (soluble fraction). The insoluble material remaining attached to the dish was scraped into SB1x (insoluble fraction). Equal proportions of each fraction, representing proteins from the same number of cells, were separated by SDS‐PAGE.
2.6. Western blotting {#jcmm13545-sec-0008}
---------------------
Protein samples were separated by SDS‐PAGE and Western blotted onto PVDF membrane (Immobilon^®^‐P transfer membrane, IPVH00010; Immobilon^®^‐FL IPLL00010; Millipore, Darmstadt, Germany). Membranes were blocked with milk 5%, Tween 0.05% in Tris‐buffered saline (TBS) for 1 hour at room temperature. The membranes were probed over night at 4°C with the following primary antibodies: α‐tubulin mouse IgG (clone B‐5‐1‐2; SIGMA‐Aldrich), acetylated α‐tubulin mouse IgG (clone 6‐11 B‐1; SIGMA‐Aldrich), tyrosinated α‐tubulin rat IgG (clone YL1/2; Abcam), detyrosinated α‐tubulin rabbit IgG (ab48389; Abcam). The incubation with secondary antibodies for 1 hour at room temperature was performed using the following antibodies: anti‐mouse IgG HRP‐linked antibody (Cell Signaling Technology, Beverly, MA, USA), anti‐rabbit IgG HRP‐linked antibody (Pierce, Rockford, IL, USA), anti‐rat Alexa Fluor^™^ 568 (Abcam). Chemiluminescent signals were detected using Supersignal West Pico Chemiluminescent Substract kit (Pierce). Acquisition and quantification were performed by Chemidoc and Image Lab software (Bio‐Rad, Hercules, CA, USA).
2.7. Statistics {#jcmm13545-sec-0009}
---------------
Statistical analysis was performed using STATISTICA (StatSoft Inc., Tulsa, OK, USA), and significant differences of PSP MSCs vs control MSCs, or between MSC‐A and MSC‐B, or between either of these and control MSCs were assessed by Student\'s *t*‐test or one‐way ANOVA with Tukey\'s post hoc test, respectively. For statistical analysis of CPD at single passage between PSP MSCs vs control MSCs, two‐way ANOVA with Sidak\'s multiple comparison test was performed. A *P*‐value \<.05 was considered statistically significant.
2.8. Study approval {#jcmm13545-sec-0010}
-------------------
This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of Fondazione IRCCS Ca\' Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico (Authorization n.2795) and conforms to the declaration of Helsinki on ethical principles for medical research involving human subjects.
3. RESULTS {#jcmm13545-sec-0011}
==========
3.1. MSCs from patients with PSP show typical mesenchymal immunophenotyping but have late defects in proliferative capacity and altered morphology in culture {#jcmm13545-sec-0012}
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To have a comprehensive characterization of MSCs from patients affected by PSP involved in this study (Table [1](#jcmm13545-tbl-0001){ref-type="table-wrap"}), we first evaluated the expression of many verified and postulated MSC cell surface antigens by flow cytometry on cultured cell lines at passage 2 (P2) in culture. In accordance with our previous data,[22](#jcmm13545-bib-0022){ref-type="ref"} their immunophenotypic profile confirmed that they are positive for CD90, CD105, CD73, CD13, CD146, PDGFR, ALP, and negative for CD45, CD34, CD14, CD3, CD40 and HLA‐DR‐like cells from age‐matched healthy controls (Table [S1](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"} and Figure [S1](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). After that, we investigated the proliferative capacity of cultured MSCs by measuring the CPD (Figure [1](#jcmm13545-fig-0001){ref-type="fig"}). MSCs from healthy donors reached an average CPD value of 16 after 11 passages in culture, whereas the CPD of PSP cells reached the maximum value of 10.2 at passage 9, and then the curve started to decrease drastically. Moreover, the difference in growth kinetics between MSCs of patients with PSP and healthy controls became statistically significant starting from passage 5 (P5), showing that the in vitro proliferative capacity of MSCs from patients with PSP was significantly reduced.
{#jcmm13545-fig-0001}
Then, we analysed the morphology of cultured MSCs from patients with PSP and healthy controls at various time‐points after seeding (Figure [2](#jcmm13545-fig-0002){ref-type="fig"}). After 2 hours, cells adhered to the plastic substrate and were round. Six hours after seeding, cells started to lose their round shape and became elongated; moreover, many cellular projections were detectable. At later time‐points, cells clearly exhibited 2 different shapes: a fibroblast‐like morphology (arrow), or a large, flattened, polygonal or triangle shape (arrowhead), as previously reported.[28](#jcmm13545-bib-0028){ref-type="ref"} Despite the lack of any differences at first glance between healthy and PSP cells, detailed morphometric measurements, consisting in the evaluation of the ratio between maximum and minimum axis (Figure [2](#jcmm13545-fig-0002){ref-type="fig"}B) and the surface area (Figure [2](#jcmm13545-fig-0002){ref-type="fig"}C) of the cells, were performed. The measurements revealed increase in the maximum/minimum axis ratio overtime, as expected for elongating cells, but no actual differences between PSP and control cells. On the contrary, surface area was significantly increased in PSP cells compared to control cells at later time‐points after seeding. To exclude that these differences in cellular morphology could be masked by the large, flattened subpopulation of cells, we restricted morphometric analysis to the elongated and fibroblast‐like cells at later time‐points, and we obtained the same results as in the full population at 48 hours after seeding (Figure [S2](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). Thus, taken together, these data show that MSCs from patients with PSP behave differently in culture as compared to healthy cells.
{#jcmm13545-fig-0002}
3.2. MSCs from patients with PSP show imbalance in α‐tubulin post‐translational modifications {#jcmm13545-sec-0013}
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The observed changes in the morphology of PSP cells, compared to healthy controls, prompted us to investigate MT cytoskeleton in detail. First, we looked at MT architecture by immunodecorating cells at 48 hours after seeding. In particular, we focused on acetylated, detyrosinated and tyrosinated α‐tubulin localization. As reported in Figure [3](#jcmm13545-fig-0003){ref-type="fig"}, tyrosinated α‐tubulin was distributed throughout the cell both in control and PSP cells, being evident not only in the central region, where it accumulates, but also in the periphery. No evident differences were detectable between MSCs of patients affected by PSP and healthy controls. On the other hand, acetylated α‐tubulin localization was less widespread, being restricted mainly to the central region of the cell. Moreover, acetylated α‐tubulin accumulated around the nucleus, especially in PSP MSCs. In both control and PSP cells, acetylated α‐tubulin antibody immunodecorated short segments of MTs, while tyrosinated α‐tubulin antibody stains homogenously the MT network (Figure [S3](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}), as reported in other cell types.[29](#jcmm13545-bib-0029){ref-type="ref"} Detyrosinated α‐tubulin was not detectable in immunofluorescence assay (not shown).
{#jcmm13545-fig-0003}
Next, to investigate MT subsets in‐depth, we analysed the level of the various α‐tubulin PTMs in whole‐cell lysates of MSCs of healthy controls and patients with PSP by Western blotting and densitometric analysis (Figure [4](#jcmm13545-fig-0004){ref-type="fig"}). We analysed cells not only at P2 but also at P5 in culture, when cells started to proliferate differently compared to controls (Figure [1](#jcmm13545-fig-0001){ref-type="fig"}).
{#jcmm13545-fig-0004}
As reported in Figure [4](#jcmm13545-fig-0004){ref-type="fig"}B, at the earliest time‐point, PSP cells contained as much acetylated and tyrosinated α‐tubulin as cells of healthy controls. Detyrosinated α‐tubulin was not detectable by Western blotting analysis too (not shown). The lack of detyrosinated α‐tubulin in both PSP and controls may be reasonably due to the particular undifferentiated nature of stromal cells, as this modified form of α‐tubulin is associated with one of the most stable pools of MTs. The analysis performed at P5 showed enrichment of acetylated α‐tubulin in PSP cells and, in addition, a significant increase in tyrosinated α‐tubulin compared to control cells (Figure [4](#jcmm13545-fig-0004){ref-type="fig"}D).
Based on these data, we can conclude that the imbalance in α‐tubulin PTMs becomes evident overtime in PSP cells. As PTMs on α‐tubulin are not merely associated with pools of MT with different stability, but they are also involved in the maintenance of proper MT functions, their imbalance could have a strong impact on many cellular processes.
3.3. MSCs from patients with PSP show altered microtubule stability compared to controls {#jcmm13545-sec-0014}
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To verify whether the observed differences in tubulin PTMs between MSCs from patients with PSP and healthy controls correlate with altered MT stability, we investigated MT mass. By Western blotting and densitometric analyses (Figure [5](#jcmm13545-fig-0005){ref-type="fig"}), we evaluated the amount of α‐tubulin in the soluble fraction (ie the dimeric pool) and in the insoluble fraction (ie the polymerized MT fraction) of PSP and control cells. As reported in Figure [5](#jcmm13545-fig-0005){ref-type="fig"}B, at early passage (P2), the ratio between free α‐tubulin vs α‐tubulin incorporated into MTs (Dim/MT) was significantly increased in PSP cells compared to cells from healthy controls. These data mean that MSCs from patients with PSP undergo MT destabilization, suggesting that defects in the polymerization or depolymerization of MTs occur. On the contrary, at later passage (P5), a higher Dim/MT ratio was found in control cells compared to patients with PSP and, interestingly, compared to P2 controls. Although MT stability remains unmodified in patients with PSP, the behaviour of control cells changes overtime. This could indicate that cells isolated from patients are less prone to undergo MT rearrangements.
{#jcmm13545-fig-0005}
Investigating the distribution of Dim/MT ratio values among the patients, we observed that MSCs from the PSP group could be further divided into 2 subgroups: MSC‐A (including cells obtained from PSP\#1, \#3, \#7, \#10 patients) and MSC‐B (including cells from PSP \#2, \#4, \#5, \#6, \#8, \#9 patients) as listed in Table [S2](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}. As reported in Figure [5](#jcmm13545-fig-0005){ref-type="fig"}C, at early passage in culture, MSC‐B subgroup showed a Dim/MT ratio similar to the control group, while MSC‐A showed a significant increase in Dim/MT ratio compared to both controls and MSC‐B subgroup (about 2 folds). Thus, the analysis of MT mass disclosed the presence of 2 subgroups of PSP MSCs, one of which (MSC‐A) was characterized by early MT destabilization, whereas the other one (MSC‐B) seemed to be similar to the control group. On the contrary, looking at later passages in culture, we observed that MSC‐A cells did not show any change, whereas MSC‐B cells showed a significant decrease in Dim/MT ratio when compared to the control cells.
The assessment of the time course (P2 vs P5) indicated that Dim/MT ratio does not change overtime in both PSP MSC subgroups. Thus, the fact that healthy controls were characterized by an increase in Dim/MT ratio overtime indicates that culture conditions induce MT destabilization per se in control cells. Conversely, both MSC‐A and MSC‐B cells did not undergo these changes, suggesting that they are less sensitive to the potential stress induced by culturing. The 2 subgroups did not differ for any of the other investigated parameters (Figure [S4](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}).
All together, these data clearly reveal that MSCs from patients with PSP are characterized by defects in MT stability regulation compared to control cells. This suggests that polymerization (or depolymerization) of MTs may be altered in cells of patients affected by this neurodegenerative disorder. Although at early time‐points, a subgroup of PSP MSCs (ie MSC‐B) showed a similar distribution of α‐tubulin between free and polymerized pools compared to control cells, we can conclude that the lack of change overtime observed in both the 2 PSP MSC subgroups clearly supports the concept that defects in MT stability distinguish PSP MSCs.
4. DISCUSSION {#jcmm13545-sec-0015}
=============
PSP is a rare neurodegenerative disorder that affects various areas of the brain, including basal ganglia, brainstem, cerebral cortex, dentate nucleus and spinal cord regions, and that can affect not only neurons, but also glial cells.[30](#jcmm13545-bib-0030){ref-type="ref"}, [31](#jcmm13545-bib-0031){ref-type="ref"} The mechanism(s) that can lead to PSP are not yet understood, as well as its causes, that include both environmental (alkaloids) and genetic (*MAPT* mutations, haplotype) factors.[4](#jcmm13545-bib-0004){ref-type="ref"} The fact that an important hallmark of the disease is the presence of abnormal cerebral aggregates of tau protein, a MT‐binding protein, suggests that MT dysfunction may be an important element of the disease. Obviously, the difficulty of working on living cells obtained from the affected brain regions of patients with PSP limits the possibility to investigate the cellular mechanisms underlying the disease and prompts the search for reliable human cellular models of the disease. Here, we investigated MT system in MSCs of patients with PSP and disclosed significant defects in comparison with healthy controls. Showing the imbalance of α‐tubulin PTMs and the impairment of MT stability, this study demonstrates for the first time that MT dysfunction distinguishes PSP MSCs. It also highlights that this signature is detectable in non‐neural and undifferentiated cells such as MSCs.
From a general point of view, MTs are key elements of all the cells, being responsible for the maintenance of morphology, organelle trafficking and intracellular transport processes, but their importance is highlighted in cell types with a complex morphological architecture such as neurons or oligodendrocytes,[32](#jcmm13545-bib-0032){ref-type="ref"}, [33](#jcmm13545-bib-0033){ref-type="ref"} which are both involved in PSP disease. A growing amount of evidence supports the concept that MT loss, altered MT dynamics and axonal transport defects are linked to neurodegenerative processes,[34](#jcmm13545-bib-0034){ref-type="ref"}, [35](#jcmm13545-bib-0035){ref-type="ref"} and that MT stability could be a potential therapeutic target.[36](#jcmm13545-bib-0036){ref-type="ref"}, [37](#jcmm13545-bib-0037){ref-type="ref"} ^.^We investigated MT system in MSCs moving from the analyses of α‐tubulin PTMs to the evaluation of MT mass. Tubulin PTMs have the potential to generate chemical differences defining a "tubulin code" on MTs[38](#jcmm13545-bib-0038){ref-type="ref"}, [39](#jcmm13545-bib-0039){ref-type="ref"}, [40](#jcmm13545-bib-0040){ref-type="ref"} and, thus, complex molecular signals sufficient to control the interaction of MTs with several proteins, including MT‐interacting proteins (MIPs) and motor proteins. On this basis, they are emerging as crucial controllers of MT properties and functions beyond the well‐known role as markers of MTs with different stability. Firstly, we found that detyrosinated α‐tubulin is undetectable in MSCs. This finding supports the concept that their MT cytoskeleton is highly dynamic and lacks long‐lived detyrosinated MTs, as expected in cycling cells. In addition, the levels of tyrosinated α‐tubulin are higher in late passage MSCs derived from patients with PSP than in those derived from healthy controls. This could suggest that MT cytoskeleton is more dynamic in patients, tyrosinated α‐tubulin being found in the unpolymerized pool of tubulin and in neo‐synthetized MTs, or that cytoskeleton changes its ability to bind MIPs. Indeed, the C‐terminal tyrosine on α‐tubulin can act as a binary ON/OFF switch for the recruitment of MT dynamics regulators, such as kinesin 13 MCAK, which preferentially depolymerizes tyrosinated MTs.[41](#jcmm13545-bib-0041){ref-type="ref"} In addition, the C‐terminal tyrosine is also required for the recruitment of MT plus‐end‐interacting proteins, such as cytoplasmatic linker protein‐170 (CLIP170).[42](#jcmm13545-bib-0042){ref-type="ref"} Therefore, the increasing amount of tyrosinated α‐tubulin that we observed in PSP cells could, in turn, alter the interactions with various MIPs.
Here, we found that MSCs from patients with PSP are characterized by the loss of MT mass at baseline. The ratio between free tubulin and MTs is altered in PSP cells, tubulin being shifted towards the unpolymerized pool. This suggests that destabilization of MTs occurs in PSP cells at baseline. Interestingly, MT mass does not change overtime in cultured PSP cells, whereas it decreases in control cells, and this can be read as the inability of patient cells to efficiently remodel MT cytoskeleton during ageing in culture. Next, we found that PSP MSCs are heterogeneous in terms of initial MT mass leading us to identify 2 subgroups. However, this does not weaken the concept that MT mass regulation/dynamics differ between controls and PSP‐affected patients. Indeed, although one of the MSCs subgroups resembles controls in terms of initial MT destabilization, they are both characterized by the absence of changes overtime. This is a very intriguing point as the detailed clinical evaluation of patients, whose cells have been included into the 2 subgroups, does not uncover any difference (Table [S2](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). In addition, deeper investigating our patients for *MAPT* gene haplotype, we found that only one (PSP\#3, MSC‐A subgroup) shows an allele of H2 haplotype, thus indicating that there is not a correlation between H1/H2 haplotype distribution and Dim/MT ratio in any of the 2 MSCs subgroups (Table [S3](#jcmm13545-sup-0001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). In conclusion, the differences highlighted in the MSCs of the 2 subgroups seem to be not linked with PSP genetic factors or with the clinical features of patients, but could be the signature that might have the potential to drive more specific and in‐depth stratification of patients.
Speculating about the impact of MT defects on cell functionality, many are the MT‐dependent events in all cell types other than neurons and oligodendrocytes. Among them, intracellular trafficking is emerging as a key regulator of diverse processes such as cell division, migration and secretion, thus confirming that MT dysfunction could be really detrimental for cells. Defects in the secretion pathways could be linked to many neurodegenerative disorders as suggested by recent evidences reporting changes in the serum levels of modulatory factors in patients affected by PD,[43](#jcmm13545-bib-0043){ref-type="ref"} MSA[44](#jcmm13545-bib-0044){ref-type="ref"} and AD.[45](#jcmm13545-bib-0045){ref-type="ref"} Notably, specific properties of MSCs cells include the secretion of a set of factors/molecules to the extracellular space, the so‐called secretome, whose crucial role in anti‐inflammatory response makes them a promising therapeutic tool.[46](#jcmm13545-bib-0046){ref-type="ref"} Here, our detailed analysis of MSCs of patients with PSP unravels MT defects, reduced proliferative capacity and predisposition to ageing in culture conditions. Whether these defects can affect their secretory profile and therefore to their paracrine reparative effects is still under investigation, but the clinical use of early passage MSCs is strongly recommended when autologous MSCs are tested in phase 1/2 clinical trials. Notably, also in the clinical trial performed by our group based on the autologous use of MSCs in patients with PSP, the administered cellular products were composed by maximum passage 2 MSCs.[22](#jcmm13545-bib-0022){ref-type="ref"}
Peripheral tissues are a source of human living cells, and in the last few years, they have become reliable models for the identification of molecular alterations and possible therapeutic targets in neurodegenerative disorders. For example, skin primary fibroblasts are considered a good model system for PD[47](#jcmm13545-bib-0047){ref-type="ref"} and, interestingly, we have previously reported that fibroblasts of patients with PD are characterized by changes in MT mass compared to controls.[15](#jcmm13545-bib-0015){ref-type="ref"} Focusing on MSCs, they are relatively easy to obtain, to maintain and to expand in culture. The relevance of studying this cell type for unravelling defects linked to neuronal disorders is completely unexplored. For this reason, our detailed analysis of MT system is a starting point for moving to neuronal models obtained from patients that are actually not available (eg iPSC‐derived neurons). Beyond being a potential model for studying PSP‐linked dysfunction, MCSc could be used for drug screening. Indeed, Polioudaki et al[48](#jcmm13545-bib-0048){ref-type="ref"} showed that taxol and nocodazole, 2 well‐known MT‐interacting drugs, can induce moderate and reversible damage to MSCs of healthy donors. As we found that control and PSP‐derived MSCs are characterized by differences in MT system, it will be intriguing to evaluate if they differently respond to anti‐MT drugs. Thus, MSCs are also a very precious and promising tool for personalization of drug screening and therapies.
In conclusion, for the first time, our study unravels the characteristics of MT cytoskeleton in MSCs from patients affected by PSP, a rare neurodegenerative disorder, and demonstrates that these cells differ from healthy controls in terms of MT stability, α‐tubulin PTMs, cell morphology and growth. This is in accordance with a very recent study by a part of our group showing that mitochondrial dysfunction occurs in MSCs from patients with PSP.[49](#jcmm13545-bib-0049){ref-type="ref"} This suggests that the mechanisms leading to PSP might also affect undifferentiated non‐neural cells. Our results pave the way to the experimental use of alternative cellular models as in vitro system for deciphering the intracellular mechanisms of PSP and identifying novel pharmacological targets, thus ultimately helping in finding new therapeutic approaches to PSP as well as other still orphan neurologic diseases.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST {#jcmm13545-sec-0017}
====================
The authors have declared that no conflict of interest exists.
AUTHORS\' CONTRIBUTIONS {#jcmm13545-sec-0018}
=======================
A.M.C., D.C., L.L., M.C., R.G., G.C. and G.P. conceived the study and participated in its design. R.G, M.C. and G.P. recruited patients and collected clinical data. M.V. and S.B. isolated, cultured and characterized MSC. A.M.C. performed morphometry and immunofluorescence assays, analysed MSCs\' extracts and performed MT\'s profiling assays. D.G. and C.F. performed genotypic analysis. P.L. provided and characterized control samples. A.M.C. and G.C. wrote the manuscript with critical contributions from all the authors. All the authors participated in data analysis and interpretation, reviewed and approved the final manuscript.
Supporting information
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Click here for additional data file.
The authors thank all the patients and healthy individuals who participated to this study. The authors are grateful to Dr. Jennifer S. Hartwig for reading and editing the manuscript and apologize for each possible involuntary paper omission. The authors also thank Dr. Luigi Marino for his contribution to performing cell culture during his stay at the Cell Factory. Fondazione Grigioni per il Morbo di Parkinson, Milan, Italy, supported the research and the fellow to A.M.C. This work has also been supported by a research grant from Regione Lombardia---Independent Research, call 2012.
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Hot air breathing: effects of elevated wet bulb temperatures on tissue temperatures of the mouth.
Six healthy young men breathed room air or one of nine hot humid air conditions on separate days for one hour while walking on a treadmill (40% VO2 max). Inspired wet bulb temperatures ranged from 18.9 (room air) to 49.3 degrees C. Tissue temperatures in the mouth were measured by means of thermocouples placed on the tongue and hard palate. Analysis of variance on repeated measures showed significant increases in both tongue and hard palate tissue temperatures (p less than 0.001) as a result of increasing wet bulb temperatures; however, core temperature and heart rate were not affected (p greater than 0.05). Ratings of subjective discomfort increased proportionally with increases in wet bulb temperature of the inspired air. It was concluded that wet bulb temperature of inspired air is a valuable measure to uses in studying temperature responses of mouth tissues when inhaling hot humid air, particularly when investigating human tolerance levels in order to recommend federal standards for the design of breathing apparatus. |
Custodian is the transcript. Starboards are the monochromes. Spoors are peeking. Epiphenomenons may putatively govern on the mastodonic positivist. Cumbrian development has inside psychoanalysed. Peevishly strawy inspirator was the frail radical. Harebrained condom is being insignificantly miscomprehending Convert Multiple PDF Files To Text Files Software 7.0 license key with patch the dunkirk. Exquisitely behavioural missouri was the torosememe. |
Pages
Thursday, April 16, 2009
I changed the title of my blog because I will probably turn into that woman who inserts tidbits here and there about her kid...now that I'm going to have one. A little less coffee because contrary to popular belief that caffeine does absolutely NOTHING to the alien growth in your belly, it has been known to produce children that are hyperactive. I stopped drinking coffee as soon as I found out I was preggers. I solidified that resolve when I was 13 weeks and I saw it waving its little hand on the screen like it was experiencing an acid trip. Any kid with this much energy, this soon, doesn't need caffeine help.
You know how some people will blog obsessively about their significant other, almost to the point where they have convinced you that they don't love the person, they're just obsessed? Well, I'll try not to do that about my pregnancy/Babybottoms. I know how irritating it can be to go to a blog you read on the regular ONLY for them to be talking about their significant other YET AGAIN. I can only imagine some people are like that about their kids...like I said, I'll try. I don't think it'll be that hard to do considering, I don't write about the father of my child like that LOL.
Anyway, everyone say hello to Babybottoms. Hopefully, I find out if it's a boy or girl on Monday but the dad affectionately deemed the bun in my oven Babybottoms until then so that's what I'll be calling him/her until further notice. He/she will make random guest appearances, being that he/she likes to take over my life and force me to do what's most comfortable for them. Like right now...I have a desk full of work to do but for some odd reason my concentration is seriously thrown off and I can't manage to do anything but type meaningless banter. Blame the kiddo.
Moving on...my last blog I stated that I was looking for a BB gun to kill maim some birds. I spoke to my dad and it is times like this I wish he lived closer. I'd just go to his house and borrow his and that would be that. Plus, his BB guns are far better than I had imagined! I was looking at this mini uzi at Walmart...I would show a picture but my job be hating on weapons searches and threw up a firewall when I tried to save the picture. Anyway, the mini uzi shoots 130 FPS...my dads BB gun...shoots 600 FPS. Like I said, I'm not trying to kill these irritating suckabutt birds...with 600 FPS, someone's going to bird heaven. Of course he wasn't shooting birds with his...he was shooting dirty azz cats that used to spay our balcony. Trust me, THESE cats deserved EVERY BB in their hide. I referred to them as Satan's little henchmen cats. Anyway, I think I'm gonna get that uzi this weekend...although, my dad suggested I try an owl first because birds are scared to death of them. Not a real owl folks LOL. One of those gnome like owls that just sit there and look creepy. He also suggested I research bird calls...ummm, he was starting to do too much at that point so I cut that conversation real short.
Next subject at hand...I should be officially finished UNpacking this Saturday. My favorite volunteer who has rightfully earned her spot as Auntie (in my book; for the kid) will be coming over this Saturday to force help me to finish. I think this chick was Superwoman in another lifetime. Far be it from me to bestow unnecessary kudos but seriously, this woman is great. We live a good 35-45 minutes from each other and I promise you she has helped me more since I been pregnant than some folks who live 5-10 minutes from me. Words cannot express how grateful I am that she is a living, breathing soul who genuinely cares.
Next...I have a date with the beach coming up real soon and I can't wait. It wasn't a planned trip but it is/was much needed. I'm going by myself but I'll be meeting up with a friend once I arrive at my destination spot and my goal is to spend as much time laying on the beach as possible. As soon as I step foot off the plane, I'll be looking for food and sand. Since I can't drink at the moment, I'll also be looking for some virgin daiquiri's somewhere too. It is only going to be a weekend but the relaxation I plan to get cannot be compared to anything else at this point. I'll take what I can get, plus, I have to save as many vacation days as possible for when Babybottoms makes his/her grand entrance so no long trips until next year.
I think that's it for now. I had a more uniformed and theme filled blog written but for some odd reason my computer wants to act a donkey and reload pages I didn't ask it to...so I lost everything I had written. Therefore, this will have to do for now...hope everyone has a good Thursday!
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About Me
I'm a wordy, sarcastic, reasonable kind of woman. Big on thinking and all the other great attributes that manifest themselves as a result of being a brain (read: nerd @ heart). Considered a weirdo by some but last I checked most memorable people are...weirdos. |
Design & Development
Getting and Keeping Retail Tenants on a Weak Economy
Getting and keeping retail tenants in a weak economy takes a willingness to negotiate.
Courtesy Alliance ResidentialLive and Work: Alliance Residential is having success leasing units that double as live and work spaces in its 2115 Piedmont project in Atlanta.
When Phoenix-based Alliance Residential conceived 935M, a retail and apartment project in Atlanta, it envisioned a hip, urban restaurant in a 3,500-square-foot space on its ground floor. Four years later, that space still sits empty. “We haven’t been able to make any headway on a closing deal,” says Kellea Curns, vice president of operations in the Southeast for Alliance. “It’s not that we haven’t had interest. Closing a deal has become a problem because the market is so competitive.”
The company has broadened its definition of “hip” and “urban” in order to expand the universe of possible tenants for the space, but as of press time it still had not gotten any restaurateurs to sign on the dotted line for its 3,500 square feet. Alliance isn’t alone. While the apartment rental market has made tremendous strides in the past year, lease-up activity in the retail sector is still in the early stages of recovery. Consider that the national average vacancy rate for downtown retail space stood at 8.2 percent in 2010, down slightly from the high of 8.9 percent in 2009, according to Princeton, N.J.based NAI Global. Multifamily vacancy rates nationally are roughly half that, a dichotomy that’s made life difficult for apartment owners who double as retail landlords.
Even in the thriving Washington, D.C., market there are issues. What remains of Dallas-based JPI is still trying to entice restaurants to move into its 909 New Jersey Avenue development in the up-and-coming neighborhood around the Washington Nationals’ baseball stadium. Even in the best of times, renting apartment retail components can be challenging. There usually isn’t room for a large anchor tenant such as a Target or Best Buy, and parking is often more difficult. That leaves owners broadening their reach to find tenants and then offering incentives to lock them in. In fact, owners are modifying their agreements with tenants who moved in during the heydays of 2005 and 2006 to keep them in place.
Cutting a Deal
In fact, when it comes to paperwork and logistics, the retail leasing system makes renting an apartment look downright easy. Instead of generally providing a one-year lease with monthly rent (that may or may not include a month of free rent), the retail lease has more variables. As an example, a standard five- to 10-year lease may require the tenant to pay base rent plus a percentage of sales. If the tenant is new (and especially if it’s a restaurant), it will often require the building owner to put in a significant amount of money for tenant improvement (usually called TI) and rehab.
With a lot of variables in retail deals, though, there’s also a lot of room to negotiate. Unfortunately, to fill a space lately, the owner is the one offering the concessions. “In challenging areas, you’re talking about six months to possibly up to a year’s free rent or materially discounted rents,” says James N. Duncan, senior vice president and partner with McLean, Va.–based developer Jefferson Apartment Group (JAG), which is looking to lease the ground floor in its 14W project in the heart of Washington, D.C. “But for the right operator, you’ve got to be willing to give a great deal.”
In its Second Street project in Austin, Texas, Chicago-based AMLI Residential is, in some instances, rewriting deals to keep its original tenants in place. Some smaller boutique retailers moved in thinking they’d be making $50,000 or $60,000 a month. Instead, they’re at $20,000 to $30,000 a month, due to economic conditions.
“Some of our original tenants are unable to afford the rents they originally leased for,” says Taylor Bowen, executive vice president at AMLI. “Given these were first-generation tenants, and they required some TIs, leasing commissions, and up-front costs, it puts us in a difficult position, as it forces us to decide whether to restructure a lease to keep a viable tenant in the district or terminate their lease and look for another retail tenant.”
Without a better candidate waiting to fill the space, if AMLI decides to restructure a lease with a tenant, Bowen must first review past sales history, as well as the tenant’s future marketing plan, and ask for detailed financials to avoid committing to a tenant that may not be able to survive, even with a rent reduction. If a tenant once had good sales numbers, is temporarily having problems due to the larger economic conditions, and has the long-term potential to come back, Bowen will try to work with them.
Show Discretion
Balance retail rent levels with convenience for residents.
Owners have more to think about than whether a retail tenant can pay rent. Apartment buildings often have hundreds of residential units above ground-floor retail space, and if the people in those units find a retailer’s smell or noise offensive, it doesn’t matter how much that tenant can pay … even in a recession.
“If you had your druthers, you probably will pick someone better suited to residents than just getting the highest dollar and rent,” says James N. Duncan, senior vice president and partner with McLean, Va.–based Jefferson Apartment Group (JAG). “You have to be cognizant of not ruining what you have upstairs.”
When Duncan’s old group at JPI added Rasika, a well-regarded Indian restaurant, to its Jefferson at Penn Quarter in Washington, D.C., it spent extra money to protect against the smell of the food rising to the apartment units. That’s why it’s also important to bring in an experienced restaurant operator.
“It may not be worth it to take on a guy who hasn’t done it before,” Duncan says. “The sanitary factor and other concepts may hurt the building.”
The safer route is adding convenience for the people who live upstairs. Starbucks is always a winner, but while they’re safe, national chains often come in with their own terms, conditions, and leases. “That’s what’s more convenient about a dry cleaner or bank downstairs,” Duncan says. “They don’t always pay the highest rent, but it’s good for people who live upstairs.”
Duncan also likes hip, local retailers, from restaurants to coffee shops to boutiques and cupcake shops. But these groups come with risk. “Because you’re dealing with someone local, most likely, they won’t have the balance sheet to do their own improvements,” Duncan says. “We have to do them or give allowance.”
When Bowen does decide to restructure, the lease typically reflects lower base rents to where the retailer can survive, but with a higher-percentage rent provision. So if the gross sales improve, then the landlord keeps that extra amount of rent. “All of our leases incorporate triple net rents, which involves passing through a portion of common area charges, taxes, and insurance to the tenant,” Bowen says. “We’re trying to come up with ways to tie their rent to their occupancy costs, so if the economy and the retail sales environment improve, then the rent we receive will improve with them.”
However, AMLI still protects itself, even in the restructuring scenario, in case things change. “We ask for a minimum base rent and sometimes we put relocation and early-termination clauses in our lease amendments so we don’t encumber the space,” Bowen says. “If we decide to work with a troubled retailer to keep them in the space but think a better tenant might want the space, we can’t be hamstrung and unable to re-lease it. Using some or all of these various restructure options gives the tenant the ability to improve their business and remain in the space longer than they otherwise would, but also allows us, as the landlord, the ability to continuously bring additional tenants to the space that will enhance the district, our customers’ shopping experience, and retail in the city as a whole.”
Spread the Net Wide
When Alliance needed to change direction to find occupants for its space at Piedmont, it changed brokers. It’s not unusual for retail owners to get brokers. For instance, JPI hired a broker to find a tenant for its D.C. project and secured an upscale, local liquor store seeking a new location. That’s often the advantage of relying on brokers: They know what’s going on in the market and what retailers may be looking for new homes.
“[The liquor store owner] knew the area,” says Duncan, who used to work for JPI. “They wanted that second store, and this was a great space for them.”
Not all brokers are the same, though. Alliance started with a larger broker that Curns says didn’t have the “connections or expertise” in 935M’s Western Atlanta submarket. That didn’t work, so the company recently switched to a local operator that she says is “well connected” and knows the submarket.
“We’re really relying on the broker to utilize their networking and connections in this submarket to bring us some of the restaurants trying to break into the market that have a strong backing or are part of a healthy franchise that could just step right in,” Curns says.
Duncan doesn’t necessarily always wait for a broker, however. He has also gone to owners of stores and restaurants he may like, to sell them on moving into his spaces. “We have often gone to operators and said, ‘I’ve got this location. You should look at it for this concept that you’ve got,’?” he says.
Alliance is also getting more creative with its advertising by reaching out through Craigslist and other Internet avenues to find customers. Craigslist and LoopNet have been especially effective in the one place retail is thriving—the live/work sector. In two locations in Atlanta, the company has live/work spaces, ranging from 1,080 square feet to 2,415 square feet, which people like tax consultants, attorneys, and owners of hair salons find attractive. They rent the second floor and have retail space on the bottom floor with a storefront.
“We’ve sold [live/work] a lot faster than true retail space,” Curns says. “They’re paying one rent instead of one for home and one for work.” |
Resistance in human pathogenic yeasts and filamentous fungi: prevalence, underlying molecular mechanisms and link to the use of antifungals in humans and the environment.
Antifungal drug resistance is a multifaceted clinical challenge, and when present, a primary cause of treatment failure in patients with severe fungal infections. Changing epidemiology, increasing resistance rates and a narrow antifungal armamentarium may further underline the required attention on resistance particularly within the most prevalent invasive fungal infections caused by Candida yeasts and Aspergillus moulds. In Denmark, the resistance epidemiology remains to be fully elucidated. This thesis sought to address this demand as well as provide insight into the landscape of underlying molecular resistance mechanisms. Paper I and II both contributed to the understanding of FKS (β-glucan synthase) mediated echinocandin resistance in Candida species. Paper I covered a unique stepwise acquisition of a homozygous mutation in FKS1 of Candida tropicalis leading to an amino acid change corresponding to a well-known S645P in Candida albicans. Paper II presented a failure case due to Candida krusei displaying high-level echinocandin resistance likely attributable to an acquired D662Y amino acid substitution in FKS1. Intrinsic differences in FKS1 among Candida species may explain why the level of resistance both depends on the mutation as well as the species and cannot be easily translated to the level of clinical resistance. Intrinsic fluconazole resistance in C. krusei further substantiated the clinical implications of acquired echinocandin resistance. Paper III presented a rare multidrug resistance case in a series of isogenic C. albicans isolates, almost covering the entire spectrum of known resistance mechanisms in Candida and involved the proposal of novel resistance mutations. An A61E change in ERG11 was potentially involved in reduced susceptibility to long-structured azoles. Increased expression levels of azole efflux pumps were probably accredited to novel gain-of-function variants in the transcription factor TAC1 (R688Q and R673L). Echinocandin resistance was induced by the well-known S645P variant of FKS1 and polyene resistance was likely inflicted by a frameshift mutation in ERG2 leading to loss of function of the encoded protein and subsequent ergosterol depletion. The number of acquired resistance cases is increasing in our settings and Paper IV sought to illuminate whether antifungal resistance is overlooked in the current fungaemia programme. This involved the acquisition of post-treatment oral isolates from 193 candidaemia patients among which 114 received azoles (primarily fluconazole) and 85 received an echinocandin (and some both). Azole-exposed patients carried a significantly higher proportion of species less susceptible to fluconazole (primarily Candida glabrata) among colonising Candida compared to baseline blood isolates (p<0.001). A similar trend was seen for echinocandin-treated patients although not statistically significant. Interestingly, there was a high frequency of acquired resistance, 29.4% to fluconazole and 21.6% to echinocandins, among colonising C. glabrata isolates post treatment. These figures were both significantly higher compared to baseline blood isolates as well as oral isolates from patients with no or minimal exposure to either drug class. In contrast, acquired resistance among C. albicans oral isolates was rare (<5). Thus, the oral cavity may be an unrecognized reservoir of resistant Candida species, especially C. glabrata following azole or echinocandin treatment. This underlines the care of which therapeutic stewardship must be taken both for antifungal naïve patients, to avoid resistance development, as well as for patients previously exposed to antifungals. Paper V presented four fatal cases of invasive aspergillosis involving azole resistant Aspergillus fumigatus harbouring resistance mechanisms (TR34/L98H and TR46/Y121F/T289A), which are thought to derive from environmental fungicide use. The clinical concern is evident because the route of infection is through inhalation of potentially azole resistant spores. Still, recent environmental surveys were unable to detect azole resistant A. fumigatus in numerous soil samples but seasonal variations could be one explanation for this paradox. Paper VI was a retrospective laboratory-based study and aimed to elucidate the prevalence of azole resistance in A. fumigatus isolates from 2010-2014 in Denmark. This study also sought to uncover the underlying resistance mechanisms, primarily attributable to CYP51A mutations, and finally to assess the accumulated genotyping data. Among 1,162 A. fumigatus isolates, 94.5% were screened for azole resistance and a significant increasing trend was observed for the number of azole-resistant isolates to approximately 6% in 2014 (p<0.001) and 4% in corresponding patients (p<0.05). The underlying resistance mutations were diverse but still dominated by the TR34/L98H resistance mechanism responsible for >50% of all our azole-resistant isolates. The genotyping data of resistant and a selection of susceptible A. fumigatus showed high identity to foreign isolates (>15%). This could argue for the hypothesis on clonal expansion, which has previously been suggested for TR34/L98H clones in the Netherlands and India, but could also indicate an insufficient discriminatory power of such analysis. Still, a proposed A. fumigatus outbreak in a haematology ward was unresolved since no genetically identical isolates were recovered from patients and air samples, illustrating the ubiquitous nature of this organism. Overall, the main concerns are a changing Candida epidemiology towards species less susceptible to fluconazole combined with the rapid acquisition of echinocandin resistance, especially among C. glabrata isolates. For A. fumigatus, the concern is the emergence of azole resistant strains in the environment, displaying cross-resistance to clinical azoles, and thus posing unforeseen clinical challenges in the management of invasive aspergillosis. Collectively, these findings call for an increased awareness especially at clinical microbiology laboratories, which ideally would lead to susceptibility testing of all clinically relevant isolates by reference or validated methods. Moreover, novel diagnostic approaches for non-culturable pathogens are warranted and especially DNA-based detection by PCR may serve as a solid complimentary tool for improved diagnostics of invasive fungal infections. |
Your ego tends to blame others instead of understanding. Blaming is easier than opening up true emotions. Taking responsibility will not only break down this barrier from your true self it will make you and your relationships better. Do not let your ego point fingers for your own actions – to improve your life take accountability and reflect on your actions.
Shutting the world out and not being open is a huge part of your ego. Most people do not want to show weakness, yet feel so weak. In order to tackle a hardship you have to stop hiding from your problems and express yourself. If you are not being honest with others you are not being honest with yourself. The ego is a huge wall blocking you from a connection with yourself and others, “I’m okay” just seems easier than facing the truth. Connecting with your soul and letting out a good cry… |
Jmjd3 mediates blood-spinal cord barrier disruption after spinal cord injury by regulating MMP-3 and MMP-9 expressions.
The disruption of the blood-spinal cord barrier (BSCB) by matrix metalloprotease (MMP) activation is a detrimental event that leads to blood cell infiltration, inflammation, and apoptosis, thereby contributing to permanent neurological disability after spinal cord injury (SCI). However, the molecular mechanisms underlying Mmp gene regulation have not been fully elucidated. Here, we demonstrated the critical role of histone H3K27 demethylase Jmjd3 in the regulation of Mmp gene expression and BSCB disruption using in vitro cellular and in vivo animal models. We found that Jmjd3 up-regulation, in cooperation with NF-κB, after SCI is required for Mmp-3 and Mmp-9 gene expressions in injured vascular endothelial cells. In addition, Jmjd3 mRNA depletion inhibited Mmp-3 and Mmp-9 gene expressions and significantly attenuated BSCB permeability and the loss of tight junction proteins. These events further led to improved functional recovery, along with decreased hemorrhage, blood cell infiltration, inflammation, and cell death of neurons and oligodendrocytes after SCI. Thus, our findings suggest that Jmjd3 regulation may serve as a potential therapeutic intervention for preserving BSCB integrity following SCI. |
IGNProLeague Profile Joined April 2011 37 Posts Last Edited: 2012-02-03 22:13:50 February 02 2012 23:57 GMT #1
Hello Summoners! The IPL is proud to present the 32 team League of Legends online qualifiers for IPL4! The first place team will receive airfare and hotel accommodations to the live event. The top 4 teams from the qualifier will earn a spot in the 8-team championship bracket at IPL4 and receive a cash prize! Please note that there will be only four team openings at our live event, which are obtainable only through this online qualifier!
Registration does not guarantee entry into the qualifier bracket. Our tournament staff will choose participating teams to be in the qualifier bracket based on team ELO, player ELO, and previous tournament standings. At this time, we will only be accepting sign up from NA and EU based teams.
Once selected to participate in the qualifier bracket, a registration fee of $25 is required within three business days of notification. Failure to pay the registration fee will result in disqualification from the qualifier bracket and a new team will be chosen to fill the empty spot.
Unfortunately, we are not yet able to announce the date or venue of our live event yet, but it will take place in Las Vegas. All we can tell you is that it is coming up soon and these qualifiers were scheduled in a way that ensures that we have time for travel preparations to be made. If for any reason, a team who qualifies in these online qualifiers cannot make the trip to our live event, their team registration fee will be refunded and we will use the qualifier results to determine who will fill their team spot and receive the prize and tournament qualification instead.
When
Sign Ups: Sign ups begin immediately and will continue through February 10th.
Sign up here: http://esports.ign.com/lol/ipl4_signup
Round of 32: Feb 11th – Feb 17th. Teams will play their matches on their own accord, reporting the results to tournament staff.
Round of 16: Saturday, Feb 18th and Sunday, Feb 19th, 9:00AM PST (That is Saturday morning for North America, Saturday evening for Europe). Teams will play matches under the supervision of tournament staff. Matches will be broadcasted live, or recorded for later broadcast.
Round of 8, Semifinals, and Grand finals: Saturday, Feb 25th and Sunday, Feb 26th 12:00PM PST (That is Saturday afternoon for North America, Saturday evening for Europe). Teams will play matches under the supervision of tournament staff. Matches will be broadcasted live!
The Format
Teams are expected to check in 45 minutes before the start of the online qualifiers. Please be aware that these qualifiers can and will take a lot of time. Each round is a best of 3.
Servers: All games will be played by default on the North American server. We ask that teams remain on North America in order to ease the facilitation of the tournament, and only switch servers if both teams agree to it and it is deemed necessary to play without severe lag.
Note 1: There will be no age restrictions at all for IPL 4.
Note 2: Residents of the state of Vermont may not participate in the online qualifiers due to state law.
checking our Twitter, Stay up to date with IPL 4 Qualifiers, IPL TV, IPL Fight Club, and IPL Killing Spree bychecking our Facebook YouTube , and Twitch.TV
Hello Summoners! The IPL is proud to present the 32 team League of Legends online qualifiers for IPL4! The first place team will receive airfare and hotel accommodations to the live event. The top 4 teams from the qualifier will earn a spot in the 8-team championship bracket at IPL4 and receive a cash prize! Please note that there will be only four team openings at our live event, which are obtainable only through this online qualifier!Registration does not guarantee entry into the qualifier bracket. Our tournament staff will choose participating teams to be in the qualifier bracket based on. At this time, we will only be accepting sign up fromOnce selected to participate in the qualifier bracket, a registration fee of $25 is required within three business days of notification. Failure to pay the registration fee will result in disqualification from the qualifier bracket and a new team will be chosen to fill the empty spot., we are not yet able to announce the date or venue of our live event yet, but it will take place in Las Vegas. All we can tell you is that it is coming up soon and these qualifiers were scheduled in a way that ensures that we have time for travel preparations to be made. If for any reason, a team who qualifies in these online qualifiers cannot make the trip to our live event, their team registration fee will be refunded and we will use the qualifier results to determine who will fill their team spot and receive the prize and tournament qualification instead.: Sign ups begin immediately and will continue through February 10th.: Feb 11th – Feb 17th. Teams will play their matches on their own accord, reporting the results to tournament staff.: Saturday, Feb 18th and Sunday, Feb 19th, 9:00AM PST (That is Saturday morning for North America, Saturday evening for Europe). Teams will play matches under the supervision of tournament staff. Matches will be broadcasted live, or recorded for later broadcast.: Saturday, Feb 25th and Sunday, Feb 26th 12:00PM PST (That is Saturday afternoon for North America, Saturday evening for Europe). Teams will play matches under the supervision of tournament staff. Matches will be broadcasted live!Teams are expected to check in 45 minutes before the start of the online qualifiers. Please be aware that these qualifiers can and will take a lot of time. Each round is a best of 3.Servers: All games will be played by default on the North American server. We ask that teams remain on North America in order to ease the facilitation of the tournament, and only switch servers if both teams agree to it and it is deemed necessary to play without severe lag.: There will be no age restrictions at all for IPL 4.: Residents of the state of Vermont may not participate in the online qualifiers due to state law. |
Effect of reduced stereoscopic camera separation on ring placement with a surgical telerobot.
A custom, stereoscopic video camera was built to study the impact of decreased camera separation on a stereoscopically viewed, visual-manual task resembling some aspects of surgery. Twelve naïve subjects and one of the experimenters were first trained in a ring placement task using the stereo-laparoscope and subsequently switched to the stereo-camera, which was used with differing camera separations ranging from 100% of the laparoscope's separation to a biocular view corresponding to no separation (2D). The results suggest firstly, that stereopsis (i.e., use of 3D laparoscopes) improves surgical performance over conventional 2D laparoscopes, and secondly that camera separation may be reduced 20-35% without appreciably degrading user performance. Even a 50% reduction in separation resulted in stereoscopically supported performance far superior compared to the 2D condition. The results suggest that existing 3D laparoscopes which use 5-mm camera separation may well be significantly miniaturized without causing substantial performance degradation. |
Q:
A question on sequence of functions that diverges everywhere
I have been pondering over something for quite a sometime, and as a part of understanding it, I had to formulate a problem like the one given below. It is quite lengthy and in case it turns out to be totally absurd or trivially wrong, I sincerely apologize for that.
Let $s_n : (0,1) \to \mathbb{R}\quad \forall \; n \in \mathbb{N}$ be a set of smooth functions. The sequence of real numbers $\{s_n(x)\}$ is always positive and increasing for all $x \in (0,1)$. Let $D$ be a countable dense subset of $(0,1)$ and $h : D \to \mathbb{N}$ be an enumeration. The sequence $\{s_n(x)\}$ diverges and $$\{s_n(x)\} \in O(\log n) \forall x \in (0,1)\setminus D$$The sequence $$\{s_n(x)\} \in O(n^{\frac{1}{h(x)}}) \wedge \{s_n(x)\} \in \Omega(n^{\frac{1}{h(x)+1}}) \quad \forall \; x \in D$$Additionally $s_n(x)$ is smooth in $(0,1)$ and $s_n(x)$ has finite number of maxima and minima, for all $n \in \mathbb{N}$.
My question is : Is the set of all such sequences nonempty ?
This has been posted on MO as well here
A:
There are no sequences satisfying the required properties.
If there did exist such $s_n$, then $f_n(x)=s_n(x)/(1+\log n)$ would be a sequence of continuous functions tending to infinity at each point $x\in D$ and bounded at each point $x\not\in D$, contradicting the following statement.
Let $f_n\colon(0,1)\to\mathbb{R}$ be a sequence of continuous functions and $D$ be the set of $x\in(0,1)$ for which $\{f_1(x),f_2(x),\ldots\}$ is unbounded. If $D$ is dense in $(0,1)$ then it is uncountable.
This follows from the Baire category theorem. If $D$ is dense then, for each $n\in\mathbb{N}$, $\bigcup_{m=n}^\infty\{x\colon \vert f_m(x)\vert > n\}$ contains $D$ and hence is a dense open set. Then,
$$
D=\bigcap_{n=1}^\infty\bigcup_{m=n}^\infty\left\{x\in(0,1)\colon\vert f_m(x)\vert > n\right\}
$$
is a countable intersection of dense open sets (i.e., it is comeagre), so $D$ is uncountable.
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ABSTRACT: Bipolar disorder is a severe heritable psychiatric illness affecting 1% of the general population. The age of onset is generally in the late teenage years or early adulthood. Very little is known about specific risk factors that influence the incidence and age of onset of this disorder. In 1988 the NIMH established a Genetics Initiative in bipolar disorder with the goal of identifying susceptibility genes;this collaboration has identified several hundred families with multiple cases of bipolar disorder. As three of the initial collaborating sites (Indiana University, Johns Hopkins University, and Washington University at St Louis) we are now proposing to assess and follow adolescents, ages 12 -18 years, in these and similar families. This "at risk" group will be compared to a matched set of community comparison subjects. Three hundred study subjects and three hundred controls will be studied using established diagnostic instruments (KSADS- PL) for the adolescents and the parents (DIGS). Other instruments to assess behavior, temperament, family environment, and substance use will be employed. DNA will also be collected. The data will be stored in a database developed to facilitate longitudinal studies of clinical variables. Analyses will compare potential risk factors among the high risk group and the controls. Follow-up of the high risk group will begin in the second year of the study. It is hypothesized that three groups will be identified: 1) adolescents with behavioral symptoms or disorders who will manifest early-onset bipolar disorder;2) adolescents with anxiety symptoms or disorders who will manifest later-onset bipolar disorder;and 3) adolescents with minor mood symptoms or disorders who will manifest later-onset unipolar or bipolar disorder. All subjects will be characterized on the three dimensions of behavioral, anxiety, and mood symptoms;intermediate outcomes and major mood diagnoses will be evaluated in relation to baseline dimensional ratings. The ethical implications of this research will be studied by examining the effects of participation and any effect on self-esteem due to high risk status as well as the implications of the collections and potential use of genetic data for prediction of risk within families. Clinical data and DNA will be shared with the scientific community. |
Q:
Accessible web modals: Show or hide the "X" (close icon) at the upper right?
How do I handle the "X" at the upper right corner of my web site modals in order to make the modal as accessible as possible for users with screen readers but also for keyboard users?
As I see it, there are to ways to go:
Hide it from those users (since it till break the workflow)
by setting `aria-hidden=”true”, remove it from the tab order and simply let the user rely on the buttons at the bottom of the modal to close it?
Add an `aria-label=”Close dialog” and include the "X" in the tab order to make that close-feature more obvious?
Sure, there are a lot of other things one shall have in mind when creating accessible modals, but let´s stick to this simple topic for now.
A:
I always include an explicit Close button alongside the main call to action, to close the modal, which coexists with the tiny X in the top-right corner. Redundancy is not always a bad thing.
I have collated data from my user base that show just about everyone (regular users and those who need additional support) uses the explicit Close button rather than the tiny X.
However, both are in the tabbing sequence.
I add aria-label="Close dialog" on the X because it will be very useful for screen reader users who use JAWS or NVDA, and this is very easy to add to the html.
I also set aria-hidden="true"on the modal while the modal is inactive to ensure the user cannot tab to it, but only because we use CSS to hide the modal in the html (and if you hide it with CSS the users can still tab to it) - just remember to set it to false when you launch the modal, and remember to place the keyboard focus into the modal (use a little JS to do this). If you are using AJAX to inject the modal in to the html then you don't need the aria-hidden attribute.
|
Many heat transfer systems use hot fluids as a heat transfer medium. Such systems include a heat generator for generating heat, a heat transfer medium in thermal communication with the energy source, and a pump to move the heated medium to wherever the heat is needed. Because of its high heat capacity and its abundance, a common heat transfer fluid is water, both in its liquid and gas phase.
A variety of heat generators are in common use. For instance, in nuclear power plants, nuclear fission provides energy for heating water. There also exist solar water heaters that use solar energy. However, most heat transfer sources rely on an exothermal chemical reaction, and in particular, on combustion of some fuel. |
Johannes Vermeer (1632 - 1675)
was a Dutch painter who specialized in domestic
interior scenes of middle-class life.
Vermeer was a moderately successful provincial
genre painter in his lifetime.
He evidently was not wealthy, leaving his
wife and children in debt at his death,
perhaps because he produced relatively few paintings.
Vermeer worked slowly and with great care,
and frequently used very expensive pigments.
He is particularly renowned for his masterly
treatment and use of light in his work.
Vermeer painted mostly domestic interior scenes.
Almost all his paintings are apparently set
in two smallish rooms in his house in Delft.
they show the same furniture and decorations
in various arrangements
and they often portray the same people, mostly woman.
only 34 paintings are universally attributed
to him today,
though he is acknowledged as one of the greatest
painters of the Dutch Golden Age.
|
Kuryer Polski
The Kuryer Polski was the first Polish-language daily newspaper in the United States. It was founded by Michał Kruszka in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in June 1888.
History
Kruszka had come to the United States in 1880 and relocated in 1883 to Milwaukee, where he became an insurance salesman.
His real calling in life, however, was journalism, and he attempted to begin a Polish-language weekly Tygodnik Anonsowy (Advertising Weekly), soon followed by another weekly, Krytyka. With backing from a group of Polish labor leaders, Kruszka began a daily paper, Dziennik Polski, in 1887. All three papers failed financially in relatively short order. After borrowing $125 from friends, Kruszka made one final attempt with another daily called Kuryer Polski the following year. The paper proved to be a success.
Kruszka died on December 2, 1918.
Editorial views
Kruszka was passionate in his political views and used the Kuryer as a springboard for his ideas. He advocated labor reforms, independence for partitioned Poland, and representation for Poles within the local Roman Catholic Church hierarchy. His half-brother Wacław Kruszka, a priest, was a frequent contributor to the paper.
The aggressive Kuryer editorials eventually put it at odds with Milwaukee Archbishop Sebastian Gebhard Messmer. In 1906, Archbishop Messmer and his allies funded an alternative paper, Nowiny Polskie, which was more sympathetic to the official positions of the church. The new paper received endorsement from the Milwaukee Archdiocese, as well as from Pope Pius X himself, as the proper source of news and opinion for Milwaukee's Polish community. Michał Kruszka was, of course, outraged.
The battles between the two Polish-language papers became bitter and personal. The Kuryer attacked Nowiny'''s editor Father Bolesaus Goral as a drunk and alluded to improper sexual conduct by the priest. The Kuryer began to refer to the paper as the Nowiny Niemiecki (German News), a reference to those who dominated the Catholic Church in Milwaukee. Polish priests sympathetic to the Nowiny blasted the Kuryer from the pulpit, and criticized Kruszka's decision to send his daughter to public, instead of Catholic, school. The Milwaukee Polish Church War was in full swing.
On February 12, 1912, in a pastoral letter, Archbishop Messmer declared that anyone reading the Kuryer or the Dziennik Narodowy, Kruszka's paper in Chicago, would be denied sacramental absolution for their sins: "Should any such Catholic dare to go to confession and communion without confessing or telling to the priest that they still read or subscribe to the papers mentioned, let them understand that … they commit horrible sacrilege."
Kruszka filed a lawsuit in Wisconsin courts stating that the Archdiocese had severely damaged his business financially by this order. He lost the suit as the courts ruled that: "Recommending to the members what they should read under pain of expulsion of church communion is within the jurisdiction of every pastor and prelate of every church."
With the appointment of Father Edward Kozłowski as Auxiliary Bishop in Milwaukee, the conflict between the Kuryer and Archdiocese eventually subsided. Despite the sanctions from the church, the Kuryer continued to outsell the Nowiny by a large margin.
The Kuryer continued to publish until its closure on September 23, 1962.
References
Borun, Thaddeus, We, the Milwaukee Poles (Milwaukee: Nowiny Publishing Co. 1946)
Kruszka, Wacław A History of Poles In America to 1908 (Washington D.C.:Catholic University of America Press 2001)
Avella, Steven M. In the Richness of the Earth (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2002)
Kuznewski, Anthony J., Faith and Fatherland: The Polish Church War in Wisconsin, 1896-1918 (Notre Dame: Notre Dame Press 1980)
Edmund G. Olszyk The Polish Press in America'' (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press 1940)
External links
UWM Library Kuryer Polski Archives
Category:Polish-language newspapers published in the United States
Category:Polish-American culture in Milwaukee
Category:Media in Milwaukee
Category:Publications established in 1888
Category:History of Catholicism in the United States
Category:Non-English-language newspapers published in Wisconsin |
We may not all agree with Ms. Jameson’s former career, but she has built a successful business (she’s in the 1% folks). : She is the example of what free markets and capitalism can yield with hard work. : Yes, capitalism is an amoral economic philosophy. : If you cannot : accept that, you’re not a pure capitalist. : She knew her market and she deserves the right to speak her mind on the issues. She’s mainstream folks! : Furthermore, she’s right!
Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa is a conservative blogger based in Virginia. Besides contributing to Right Wing News, Vespa writes for RedState, PJ Media, Independent Journal Review, and his personal blog Noodle Pundit. He's also the 2013 recipient of American for Prosperity Foundation's Andrew Breitbart Award For Excellence In Online Activism and Investigative Reporting |
The ability of mu opioid receptor agonists to reduce intraocular pressure (lOP) in both human and animals has been firmly established. The mu-3 opioid receptors are opiate alkaloid selective receptors that are insensitive to opioid peptides. In response to stimulation by an opioid alkaloid like morphine, mu-3 receptor activation leads to the release of nitric oxide (NO). In the eye, NO is a physiological regulator as well as a pathological mediator not only in the vascular system but also in other ocular tissues including the retina and choroid. In addition the human outflow pathway and ciliary muscle have been shown to be enriched with sites of NO synthesis. The overall objective of the proposed project is to establish the presence and functional activity of mu-3 opioid receptors in outflow tracts of the rabbit eye. If present, functionally this type of opioid receptor may be involved in the regulation of outflow facility thereby regulating lOP. The proposed study will test the hypothesis that mu-3 opioid receptors are present in the outflow tracts of the eye where they regulate lOP through NO-mediated signaling events. Studies proposed to test the hypothesis include: (1) determining the effect of mu-3 opioid receptor activation on ocular hydrodynamics; (2) establishing the functional significance of mu-3 receptors in the conventional outflow pathway of the eye and ciliary muscle; (3) identifying a link between mu-3 receptors and NO dynamics in trabecular meshwork and ciliary muscle cells; (4) examining the effect of mu-3 receptor activation on signal transduction events related to NO actions in the eye (cGMP, Ca2+). Information obtained from this project could prove to be useful in the development of agents for the therapy of glaucoma. |
A RECORDING of an extraordinary telephone conversation between the disgraced former Fine Gael minister Michael Lowry TD and the Northern Ireland-based land agent Kevin Phelan has come into the possession of the Sunday Independent.
Central to the conversation is the sterling sum of £250,000 which Mr Lowry says he paid to Mr Phelan. Mr Lowry said on the tape: "I never declared it."
The conversation, which transpired when Mr Lowry rang Mr Phelan, lasted 12 minutes and 42 seconds. It took place on September 30, 2004.
It was recorded by Mr Phelan and a recording of the conversation was supplied to the Sunday Independent by him.
Kevin Phelan is a property consultant based in Omagh, Co Tyrone. His business includes identifying land parcels for purchase and development and then identifying suitable investors.
A number of these deals were probed by the Moriarty tribunal, but Mr Phelan declined by fax to appear as a witness at the last moment.
Since he is based outside the jurisdiction, he could not be compelled to attend.
In the recorded conversation, Mr Lowry constantly refers to a sum of either St£200,000 or St£250,000, which he says he paid to Mr Phelan and which Mr Phelan has confirmed that he received.
Mr Lowry seems extremely anxious to get Mr Phelan to confirm that he had nothing to do with an entity called Glebe Trust, described in the conversation by Kevin Phelan as his "family trust".
The tribunal, in its final report, said it could make only limited findings on one of the deals set up by Mr Phelan — the sale of Doncaster Rovers, an English third-division football club in 1998, for St£4.3m, because of the "suppression" of evidence. The tribunal made a number of adverse findings against Mr Lowry.
The tribunal found that Mr Lowry "did have an involvement in the Doncaster Rovers transaction". This was intended to "entail a payment to, or the conferral of a pecuniary advantage" to Mr Lowry by billionaire businessman Denis O'Brien, it concluded.
This has been strongly denied by both Mr Lowry and Mr O'Brien.
The tribunal was "unable to determine the precise nature" of Mr Lowry's interest in Doncaster Rovers and the "extent to which it was intended that he would benefit from it".
Glebe Trust owned a company named Westferry, which had been set up by Mr Phelan.
Westferry was sold to Mr O'Brien who then used it to buy Doncaster Rovers and the valuable site on which its grounds were located. Both Mr Lowry and Mr O'Brien maintain that Mr Lowry was not involved in that purchase.
These grounds were recently the subject of a sale agreement in a joint venture with Doncaster Council, involving a sum reported to be in the region of St£10m.
On Thursday, Friday and Saturday last week, we put a number of detailed questions to Mr Lowry based on the content of the phone conversation.
These were hand delivered to his Dail office and also sent by email.
We sought to contact him by phone calls, which were not answered, and by subsequent text messages. We made a phone call to his constituency office and sent messages via Facebook (on which he was active last week), as well as text messages and voicemail messages to his son, Councillor Michael Lowry Jr. At the time of going to press, Mr Lowry had not responded.
The Moriarty tribunal's report, in which the Doncaster Rovers sale featured significantly, was referred in March 2011 by the Garda Commissioner, Martin Callinan, to the Criminal Assets Bureau, led by Det Chief Supt Eugene Corcoran for review.
That review was completed and given to the commissioner.
Since October it has been with the Director of Public Prosecutions who is considering whether or not to launch a full-blown investigation.
On Friday, the Sunday Independent handed over a copy of the recording and supporting documentation and other recordings to officers from the CAB.
In the 12 minute, 42 second recorded conversation, Mr Lowry pleads with Mr Phelan: "I'm asking you Kevin, for fuck's sake, will you protect me just a small bit. For Jaysus sake, don't land me in it, I'm destroyed as it fucking is. I can't bring out that fucking 200 — that 250 — again. If that comes out I'm fucking ruined, I'm bankrupt."
Soon afterwards in the conversation, Mr Lowry can be heard saying: "I'm asking you — I'm fucking begging you.
Please don't, because I'm not — they can't find that 200. I never declared it."
Later, he goes on to say: "The 200 — the 250 — that I gave you, I paid that directly, I never put that through my books or my account or anything, nobody's going to fucking get it, so I've got, you know, I mean, I'm not even bringing that into it."
In the recording, Mr Phelan can be heard responding to Mr Lowry, telling him: "As far as I'm concerned, that 250 was my — represented my selling my shares, Glebe Trust shares and that, in Westferry.
I set up Westferry, it was my company, I have all the documentation for that company.
And it was owned by Glebe Trust." Mr Lowry then says: "But if you say that, if you say that, if you say that, if you say that that happened, what the 250 is for is for the sale of fucking Vineacre or Vineacre shares.
Because if you say the opposite, if you say the other, then I'm fucking, looks as if I had a beneficial interest in fucking Doncaster, which I hadn't." Vineacre is a company that was involved in another British land deal (in Wigan), set up by Mr Phelan, in which Mr Lowry does not dispute his involvement.
It featured recently in the media when Mr Lowry was asked why he had not declared this ownership in the Dail register of interests.
After a Sunday Independent story on the Wigan land, the Standards in Public Office Commission received 380 complaints and is currently investigating this matter.
At one stage in the conversation, Mr Lowry and Mr Phelan agreed that solicitors engaged by Mr Phelan should not be "appointed officially", as "the fucking office would be raided".
The voices of Mr Lowry and Mr Phelan are clearly identifiable on the recording and we have verified their authenticity.
The Sunday Independent also had the recording examined by a professional sound engineer, who was able to state that this was a recording of a single conversation and there was no evidence that it had been edited or otherwise interfered or tampered with in any way.
Efforts by the Sunday Independent to make contact with Mr Lowry at both his home and constituency office in Holycross yesterday were unsuccessful.
The Tipperary TD's house appeared to be unoccupied from early morning, while there was no sign of any activity throughout the day at his constituency office, which is located on the premises of his refrigeration company, Streamline Enterprises.
Phone calls to several of his closest political allies proved to be fruitless.
One of those contacted — a Mr Sean Fogarty — took particular exception to the Sunday Independent's intention to publish an article relating to Mr Lowry, saying: "So you're having another go at him are you? Why don't you go after Michael Fingleton or Sean FitzPatrick? Why is it always Michael Lowry?" Notwithstanding his objections, Mr Fogarty said he would endeavour to contact Mr Lowry on our behalf and inform him that we had a reporter in Thurles who would be available to meet at a time and place of his choosing to allow him an opportunity to respond to this newspaper's questions.
Mr Fogarty rang back a short time later to say he had tried several times to contact Mr Lowry but had been unable to reach him.
Another of Mr Lowry's political allies, Cllr Eddie Moran, also agreed to a request from the Sunday Independent to try to contact the TD on our behalf.
Approached by the Sunday Independent, a number of locals said they had not seen Mr Lowry in or around Thurles yesterday.
Indeed, the only place the embattled TD could be found was in the pages of the Tipperary Star newspaper, which carried a feature and a photograph showing Mr Lowry joining in the 100 th birthday celebrations for local resident, Catherine Dunne, at the Sue Ryder Centre in Holycross village.
Online Editors |
Informatie
Very interestingly that the companies for these are not chosen at random. The company name is supposed to have a connection with the character Historically or based on the anime.
Hoyo Uchigasaki for instance. It is where Masamune's Mausoleum is located.
Jurakudai Sasaki was the villa of Toyotomi Hideyoshi.
(Saito) Dossan is the name of Nouhime's father.
Hanabi Kura somewhat denotes the Family Crest of the Akechi being a Bellflower. |
Expression of annexins on the surfaces of non-metastatic and metastatic human and rodent tumor cells.
Annexins are a large group of calcium-dependent cytoskeletal- and membrane-associated proteins whose properties include cytoskeleton and phospholipid binding and mitotic signal transduction. Although annexin-like molecules have been reported on the external plasma membranes of certain cells, in general they are considered to be cytoplasmic proteins. We report here the heterogenous expression of certain annexins (I-VI) on the external cell surfaces of non-metastatic and metastatic murine (RAW117 large-cell lymphoma), rat (13762NF mammary adenocarcinoma) and some human (KM12 and HT29 colorectal carcinoma) cell lines but not on some other cell lines such as human (A375 and MeWo) and mouse (B16) melanoma. The implication of annexin cell surface expression in the metastatic process is discussed with respect to tumor cell adhesion. |
Image copyright Getty Images
Claims the government could delay the UK's departure from the EU have been described as "idle chatter" by a senior Brexit campaigner.
John Redwood said PM Theresa May wanted to "get on with it" and trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty - which officially begins Brexit.
Mrs May has said she will not invoke Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty this year.
It was widely thought it would be triggered at the start of next year.
Earlier Downing Street did not comment on press reports Article 50 might not be triggered in 2017.
Following the UK's vote to leave the EU, some Leave campaigners have been calling for Article 50 - which starts a two-year Brexit process - to be triggered immediately.
Mrs May, who is currently on holiday in Switzerland, has said this will not happen this year, and Brexit Secretary David Davis has predicted the trigger will take place "before or by the start of next year".
'Complex task'
Asked about reports in the Sunday Times that the planned timetable could be delayed, the prime minister's spokesman repeatedly said "Article 50 won't happen before the end of 2016" but refused to comment further.
Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Some Brexit campaigners want Article 50 to be triggered immediately
If Article 50 did not happen in 2017, it could mean the UK did not actually leave the EU until 2020.
Downing Street said Brexit was "a serious and very complex task".
"Brexit is a top priority," the PM's spokesman said, "it is important we deliver it and make a success of it."
Conservative MP and veteran Eurosceptic Mr Redwood told the BBC he did not "buy" reports of a delay, saying they were "idle chatter by people who don't know the prime minister's mind".
He said his understanding was that Mrs May did not want the issue dominating the next Parliament and wanted to "get on with it".
Brexit, he added, "can happen pretty quickly".
Over the weekend, former UKIP leader Nigel Farage said he would consider returning to the political frontline if Brexit was not delivered, tweeting that he was "starting to detect a lot of frustration" from people who had voted Leave.
It comes after a reported turf war between two of the ministers responsible for making Brexit happen - Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and International Trade Secretary Liam Fox.
According to a letter obtained by the Sunday Telegraph, Mr Fox launched a bid to take over some of the powers of Mr Johnson's department.
Mr Fox wrote to Mr Johnson to say responsibility for economic diplomacy should be moved from the Foreign Office to his International Trade Department.
Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Boris Johnson and Liam Fox both campaigned for Britain to leave the European Union
Responsibility for delivering Brexit is split between three cabinet posts and departments: Mr Johnson at the Foreign Office, Mr Fox at International Trade, and Mr Davis, Secretary of State for exiting the European Union.
The latter two departments were created in light of Britain's vote to leave the EU in the referendum on 23 June.
In his letter, Mr Fox suggested that it would be "rational" to hand control of the Foreign Office's overseas economic policy to his department so that it could "take clear leadership of the trade and investment agenda".
'Clear leadership'
He said it had become "clear" to him since taking up his new post that "existing cross-Whitehall structures have meant that HM Government has not taken the holistic approach it might have" in this area.
"For British trade to flourish there are clear requirements on us: to build the trade framework in markets through trade policy, to establish the conditions for trade and investment through foreign diplomacy, and to reap the harvest of those efforts," he said.
"The role played by economic diplomacy is crucial to delivery of the objectives I have been set by the prime minister as international trade secretary and I believe it is imperative that this capacity is fully aligned with government resources delivering trade and investment for the UK.
"If we are to have a rational restructuring I think there is a reasonable proposition to transfer the economic diplomacy function from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office into the Department for International Trade."
He said his proposal would enable the Foreign Office to "retain clear leadership on diplomacy and security", including oversight of the intelligence agencies.
Responding to the Sunday Telegraph story, a Foreign office spokesman said: "We don't comment on leaked documents.
"Alongside other Departments, the FCO are seconding a small number of staff with relevant expertise to the new Department for International Trade.
"This is all part of the cross-government effort to ensure we make a success of Brexit."
'Dysfunction'
Labour said "turf wars" were an inevitable consequence of Brexit policy being split between various departments.
Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry said Theresa May "created these three separate departments not because it made sense in terms of coordinating Whitehall's management of Brexit, but just to buy the loyalty of Liam Fox, Boris Johnson and David Davis".
She added: "Now we see the inevitable dysfunction and turf wars, as they fight between them to grab work that should have been co-ordinated out of the Foreign Office alone.
"It is high time that the Tories stopped fighting amongst themselves, started thinking about the good of the country, and focused on clearing up the mess that they have created."
Conservative MP and former Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt said the Foreign Office should retain responsibility for "all elements" of foreign policy, including its trade and economic policy, which he said the department took "very seriously."
Mr Burt told BBC Radio 4's The World At One it was "inevitable" there would be tensions as new departments tried to establish themselves.
He said Mr Johnson, Mr Fox and Mr Davis did not have a track record as "team players" but that they now needed to "put those personalities together". |
977 S.W.2d 122 (1997)
STATE of Tennessee, Appellee,
v.
Ruby Jenell CHAPMAN, Appellant.
Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee, at Jackson.
December 18, 1997.
Application for Permission to Appeal Denied September 14, 1998.
*123 Matthew M. Maddox, Huntingdon, for Appellant.
Charles W. Burson, Attorney General, Deborah H. Tullis, Assistant Attorney General, Nashville, Robert Radford, District Attorney General, Eleanor Cahill, Assistant District Attorney General, Huntingdon, for Appellee.
Application for Permission to Appeal Denied by Supreme Court September 14, 1998.
OPINION
TIPTON, Judge.
The defendant, Ruby Jenell Chapman, was convicted pursuant to guilty pleas entered on November 28, 1995, in the Carroll County Circuit Court of vandalism and theft of property valued less than five hundred dollars, both Class A misdemeanors. For her convictions, the defendant received concurrent sentences of eleven months and twenty-nine days to serve ten days in the Carroll County Jail with the remaining portion of her sentences to be suspended. The defendant appeals as of right from an order entered by the Carroll County Circuit Court denying the defendant's motion to declare that she had served her ten-day period of confinement after she was prematurely released for the birth of her child. We affirm the trial court.
The defendant and three codefendants were indicted for the Class E felony of vandalism of property worth more than five hundred dollars but less than one thousand dollars and the misdemeanors of assault and theft of property valued at less than five hundred dollars. Upon an agreement with the state, the defendant entered guilty pleas to misdemeanor vandalism and misdemeanor theft and agreed to the sentences that were imposed. Her convictions relate to the destruction of an automobile and the theft of a rifle.
The record reflects that at the guilty plea and sentencing hearing, the defendant was *124 seven to eight months pregnant with an expected delivery date of January 24, 1996. Because of her need to visit her doctor, the defendant requested that she be allowed to serve her sentence on weekends or to delay service for six months after she gave birth. The trial court denied the request, stating that if the defendant needed to see her doctor during confinement, a furlough could be granted. The defendant was ordered to start her sentence on December 1, 1995.
On December 1, 1995, the defendant reported to the Carroll County Jail and began serving her sentence at 6:00 p.m. On her third day of confinement, December 4, 1995, the defendant began showing signs of labor at approximately 1:00 a.m. The jailer and a deputy transported the defendant to Methodist Hospital in McKenzie, Tennessee, at 3:40 a.m. The hospital determined that the defendant had to be transported to a hospital in Jackson, Tennessee, because the baby was in breech. At 4:55 a.m., the Carroll County Sheriff's Department released the defendant from custody. The defendant was then transported to the hospital in Jackson, apparently by ambulance.
On January 8, 1996, the state made an oral motion to grant the defendant a medical furlough. Over the objection of the defendant's trial counsel, the trial court granted the state's motion, stating that "this was a matter, I think, that was addressed to the Court. . . . And I said she could be released under these medical conditions. There should have been an order to that effect." Because the defendant was not present at the hearing, the trial court continued the case to February 14, 1996, to determine when the defendant could begin serving the remainder of her sentence. On January 24, 1996, the trial court entered an order granting the defendant a medical furlough as of December 4, 1995, finding that it was necessary to release her from jail at 4:55 a.m. due to premature labor.[1]
On February 13, 1996, the defendant filed a motion and memorandum to declare her sentence served or, in the alternative, a motion for habeas corpus relief. A hearing on the motion was conducted on February 14, 1996. At the hearing, Lisa Byars, who was employed as a jailer for the Carroll County Sheriff's Department at the time of the defendant's incarceration and release, testified that the defendant began showing signs of labor at approximately 1:00 a.m. on December 4, 1995. She said that at that time she called the chief jailer and the nurse assigned to the Carroll County Jail, and they told her to observe the defendant. During this period, the defendant asked her whether she would be taken to the hospital. After obtaining approval from the chief jailer, Jailer Byars and another deputy transported the defendant to the hospital around 3:30 a.m. Jailer Byars stated that she stayed with the defendant and the deputy remained in the front part of the hospital. She testified that the deputy later informed her that he had spoken to the chief jailer who had determined that it was necessary to release her because she was in labor.
At 4:55 a.m., Jailer Byars released the defendant from the custody of the Carroll County Sheriff's Department. Jailer Byars stated that the reason the defendant was being released was because the defendant had to be transported to a hospital located in Jackson due to complications with her delivery. Jailer Byars said that she did not tell the defendant anything regarding the service of the remainder of her sentence.
The defendant testified that although she requested that she be taken to the hospital, she did not ask to be released from custody or to be given a medical furlough. However, on cross-examination she admitted that she expected to be released to obtain medical attention for her delivery.
The trial court denied the defendant's motion to declare her sentence served or, in the alternative, a motion for habeas corpus relief, setting forth several reasons for its decision:
(1) it was medically necessary that the defendant be granted a furlough;
*125 (2) the Carroll County Sheriff's Department was "acting in good faith and out of human concern" for the defendant when they granted a medical furlough; and
(3) the defendant's legal sentence had not expired.
The trial court ordered that the defendant be taken into custody to begin serving the remainder of her sentence. It is from this decision that the defendant appeals.
I
The defendant contends that the trial court erred by ordering her to serve the balance of her ten-day confinement in the Carroll County Jail. She asserts that she continued to serve her sentence after she had been released. This claim is based on her argument that she should have been given credit for time at liberty following her release from custody.
Credit for time at liberty is a legal doctrine that holds that "a convicted person is entitled to credit against his sentence for time he was erroneously at liberty provided there is a showing of simple or mere negligence on behalf of the government and provided the delay in execution of sentence was through no fault of his own." United States v. Martinez, 837 F.2d 861, 864 (9th Cir. 1988). Our supreme court noted the doctrine in State v. Walker, 905 S.W.2d 554, 556 (Tenn. 1995), but made no mention of its adoption in Tennessee.
In Walker, the defendants were each convicted of driving under the influence and sentenced to eleven months and twenty-nine days, all suspended except for twenty days. The defendants reported to the sheriff's office to begin their sentence, but were not taken into custody. They were told that there was no space available and that they would be notified when to report. After almost two years for one defendant and one year for the other, the sheriff's office told the defendants to report to the jail to begin serving their sentence. The issue in Walker concerned the status of a sentence after a defendant reported to the sheriff for the purpose of serving the sentence but was turned away by the sheriff on the basis of jail overcrowding. In its analysis, the court reviewed various doctrines used by other jurisdictions when a prisoner has been erroneously released, such as due process waiver, estoppel, and credit for time at liberty. 905 S.W.2d at 555-56. However, the court did not invoke any of those doctrines to resolve the case.
After concluding that there was no uniform standard applicable to a delay in the beginning of the execution of a sentence because of jail overcrowding, the court relied on statutory analysis of the sheriff's duties. As a result, noting that the sheriff has a duty to "execute the judgment of imprisonment by committing the defendant, as soon as possible, to jail," see T.C.A. § 40-23-103, and that the sheriff has the authority "to convey prisoners to the nearest jail `sufficient' for their safekeeping," see T.C.A. § 41-4-121, our supreme court held that when a convicted person is turned away after presenting him or herself for immediate incarceration, the sentence begins to run when the judgment of conviction becomes final or the person is incarcerated, whichever occurs first. 905 S.W.2d at 556-57.
II
Under the circumstances in this case, we do not believe that due process waiver or estoppel doctrine should be invoked. Likewise, the circumstances do not call for our adopting the doctrine of credit for time at liberty, especially given Tennessee precedent. In State ex rel. Johnston v. McClellan, 87 Tenn. 52, 9 S.W. 233 (1988), the defendant, sentenced to twenty-one years, was released early due to the misapplication of a new statute that allowed "good time" credits for prisoners. After a year at large, he was reincarcerated. Our supreme court ruled that the defendant was not entitled to credit for the time at liberty because imprisonment is "confinement in fact, not in legal or other fiction." Id. at 55, 9 S.W. at 234. It determined that even though the defendant was erroneously released, the time spent out of custody could not be counted towards his sentence. Id. This ruling reflects the common law rule that a defendant must be in prison for the term of the sentence regardless of any lapse of time out of prison. See *126 Martinez, 837 F.2d at 864 (9th Cir. 1988). Thus, under common law, a convicted person erroneously at liberty must, when the error is discovered, serve the full sentence imposed.
However, courts began examining the totality of the circumstances surrounding the nonservice of the sentence to determine whether reincarceration is fundamentally fair. See Johnson v. Williford, 682 F.2d 868, 873 (9th Cir. 1982). As a result, the due process waiver doctrine was used to prevent recommitment when the government has waived the right to recommit "when its agents' actions are so affirmatively improper or grossly negligent that it would be unequivocally inconsistent with `fundamental principles of liberty and justice' to require a legal sentence to be served in its aftermath." Green v. Christiansen, 732 F.2d 1397, 1399 (9th Cir. 1984). However, more than a mistake by someone in a ministerial capacity is needed to excuse a convicted person from serving his sentence under this doctrine. There must be no fault by the defendant, there must be more than simple negligence by the government, and the defendant's reincarceration must be "unequivocally inconsistent with `fundamental principles of liberty and justice.'" United States v. Merritt, 478 F. Supp. 804, 807 (D.D.C. 1979).
In other words, when reincarceration is fundamentally unfair, a due process violation occurs. As for the present case, though, we do not believe that the facts support a due process violation. The defendant was released from custody because of premature labor. The sheriff's actions in releasing the defendant to receive necessary medical attention, unavailable in his county, is not "so affirmatively wrong . . . that it would be unequivocally inconsistent with `fundamental principles of liberty and justice' to require" the defendant to complete her sentence. Walker, 905 S.W.2d at 557 (quoting Mobley v. Dugger, 823 F.2d 1495, 1496-97 (11th Cir. 1987)).
The doctrine of estoppel has been developed to prevent recommitment "where justice and fair play require it." Johnson, 682 F.2d at 871 (9th Cir. 1982). Estoppel has the following elements:
(1) the party to be estopped must know the facts; (2) he must intend that his conduct shall be acted upon or must act so that the party asserting the estoppel has a right to believe it is so intended; (3) the party asserting the estoppel must be ignorant of the facts; and (4) that party must rely on the former's conduct to his injury.
Green, 732 F.2d at 1399 (citing Johnson, 682 F.2d at 872). Given its basis of justice and fair play, we believe that estoppel is, likewise, based upon fundamental fairness through due process.
In any event, we do not believe that estoppel is warranted in the present case. When the defendant was released from custody in order to be transported to a hospital in a neighboring county, she was not told anything regarding serving the remainder of her sentence. In fact, she admitted that she expected to be released to be able to obtain medical care. The defendant has not suffered any injury through reliance on any statement or conduct of the sheriff's department. Thus, the elements of the doctrine of estoppel have not been met.
The doctrine of credit for time at liberty has been called an exception to the common law rule that the defendant must be confined for the term of his or her sentence, regardless of any lapse of time out of prison. See Martinez, 837 F.2d at 864. It is said to have evolved from White v. Pearlman, 42 F.2d 788 (10th Cir. 1930). See Green, 732 F.2d at 1400; Merritt, 478 F. Supp. at 806. In Pearlman, the defendant was erroneously released, even after he tried to bring the mistake to the warden's attention. After being at large for two years, the defendant was arrested and imprisoned. The court held that when a prisoner is released early, through no fault of his own, and without violating parole the prisoner's sentence continues to run while he is at liberty. 42 F.2d at 789. The Court stated that a prisoner cannot be required to serve his or her sentence in installments. Id.
The defendant in the present case asserts that she is entitled to application of the doctrine of credit for time at liberty so as *127 to have her sentence to confinement deemed completed. However, we do not believe that the doctrine applies under Tennessee law nor would it under the circumstances in this case.
First, we note that the present sentencing statutes preserve the core of the common law rule, save specified exceptions. The defendant, as a misdemeanant, is responsible for her "entire sentence undiminished by sentence credit of any sort except for credits" relative to pretrial jail credit, mental examinations and treatment, and either good time or work program credits. T.C.A. § 40-35-302(b) (emphasis added). By its terms, the statute confirms the common law rule by making the defendant responsible for her complete sentence regardless of any credits, save those specified. We acknowledge that the sheriff is obligated to execute the judgment of imprisonment by committing the defendant and to keep a confined prisoner in his or her custody. See, e.g., T.C.A. §§ 40-23-101, -103 and 41-4-101. However, this does not diminish the defendant's obligation to serve the sentence of confinement imposed. Under these circumstances, we view our supreme court's holding in State ex rel. Johnson v. McClellan to apply. Thus, the doctrine of credit for time at liberty does not exist in Tennessee.
In any event, we do not believe the doctrine would require relief under the circumstances in this case. At the time of sentencing, the trial court stated that a furlough would be granted to the defendant for medical purposes, a furlough authorized by law. See T.C.A. §§ 40-35-316 and 41-2-128. The defendant's initial hospitalization, necessary for the birth of her child, was under the Carroll County Sheriff's custody. At that time, the parties were notified of the need to send the defendant to a better-equipped hospital in another county because the fetus was in the breech position. Needless to say, this was an emergency medical situation with time being of the essence.
With this medical emergency, the sheriff's legal options were limited. Under T.C.A. § 41-4-121(a), the sheriff has legal authority to convey a prisoner to the nearest sufficient jail, including in another county, if his or her jail is insufficient for the safekeeping of a prisoner. In this sense, the inability of the county to supply immediate medical needs might fall into this category. In reality, though, the defendant was already in, and would remain in, the hands of medical personnel and a physical transfer of the defendant to another jail was impossible. Otherwise, the sheriff was left with the choice of seeking judicial order for a furlough or other release for medical purposes. See, e.g., T.C.A. §§ 40-35-316 and 41-2-128. Obviously, an early morning telephone call by the sheriff's office to the trial court would have resulted in a furlough authorization.
However, we do not believe that the failure to get specific furlough authorization from the trial court at the time of the defendant's "release" from the sheriff's custody reflects "negligence" in the release because of the medical emergency at hand. Rather, it was a release of necessity to save the defendant's and her child's lives. Also, with the defendant being aware that the trial court would grant her a furlough for medical purposes, but not for an extended time with the child, we do not see how she could reasonably expect or consider her time of confinement to continue running after her release. Thus, she would not be entitled to credit for time at liberty.
In consideration of the foregoing and the record as a whole, the judgment of the trial court is affirmed.
JONES, P.J., and SMITH, J., concur.
NOTES
[1] The order was signed by the trial court and the district attorney but not by counsel for the defendant.
|
We welcome our new Grand Master, who has always been a grand master really. We give you some insight on the best Science Fiction and Fantasy this year and next, and we explain why Gandalf is not a nice man. But he's a great wizard.
This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
We bend space and time to have Paul Cornell, all-around geek writerextraordinaire, join us to talk London Falling, how he bridged theMarvel-DC divide, and the next step in his plans for world domination.
Friends of Sword and Laser are doing VERY well. We're not saying that being a guest on Sword and Laser will guarantee you riches... but it seems like it might. Just saying. Also we have verification on the humanity of the Bibliomat. Also WARNING: there's cursing. But it's worth it. All that and Moria, on this episode.
I went to the Monkey's Paw this weekend when I was in Toronto. I took a video (albeit crappy) of it. I was thinking I could send you guys the book for your set, as the random book I received ended up being...."The Dictionary of Mysticism".
What do you think?
Thanks,
Caitlin from Canada
Tom Merritt
Awesome!
So..... person inside??
Caitlin O'Brien
to Tom, Veronica
....sort of. I put my money in, and it made some noises, but nothing came out. A guy at the front of the store yelled ""just a minute!"" and came back to load it for me. Once he was done, he gave me back my toonie and told me keeping it stocked is a full time second job. So, there was human involvment - just no human inside. Plus, when I was googling the address, I came across this video: http://jezebel.com/5965769/magical-used-book-store-dispenses-random-literary-treasures and it shows how it works.
I was pretty excited that something so relevant to the Sword and Laser came out.
---
Hey Tom & Veronica, just wanted to leave some feedback on the audio podcasts. I really like the new overall show balance you guys have got going these days with the news in the audio podcast, and also the more relaxed feel that you seem to have. The audio show is the perfect thing to listen to late at night with a glass of wine when you need to unwind. (I'm drinking a nice locally-made Ontario riesling, for the record.)
I love the idea of the audience being on the audio show, the ""plead your case"" scenario, especially in cases like Nick's. Have you heard back from him yet? Is he going to be on the show?
As always, I love all the show formats, audio and video. Have a great day!
Gordon S. McLeod
---
"Tom and Veronica,
I just wanted to say that I think you do a wonderful job with The Sword and Laser podcast and YouTube show.
I started listening to the podcast in 2009. Since then, you have introduced me to so many great books. I don't often read along with your picks, but I usually add them to my ""to-read"" list and have read many of them later on.
I've also really enjoyed the author interviews over the years. The author spotlights on the YouTube show are especially nice.
Oh, and I have to send a big thanks for convincing me to sign up for Audible. My commutes to work are sooooo much better now.
Thanks for everything and keep up the great work!
Happy holidays,
Mike"
---
ADDENDUMS
This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
We've been talking about it for years, but now it's actually going to be a real thing! That's right, we're officially announcing the Sword & Laser Anthology!
We'll be starting open submissions in March, but here's what you need to know:
1. We're looking for unpublished, new material.
2. Genres: science fiction, fantasy, and everything in between.
3. Word count preferably between 1500-7500 (though more or less will not disqualify you).
DON'T SEND US ANYTHING YET! We won't even LOOK at it until we announce the open call. Just start thinking about what you'd like to submit. We wanted to give you some warning, but you'll have time, we promise!
On this episode we breakdown the Tolkien estate case against Warner Brothers, debate the origins of the Ghallu, and even figure out the January book pick! Also Tom has a Snow Day. But it's not what you think. It's BETTER!
This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
It's a fun show this time. No, seriously, you should try to listen. We talk with Dave Gross, Lead Writer at Overhaul Games, and James L. Suttera co-creator of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Fiction Editor for Paizo Publishing. They share some great insights on the relationship of role-playing games to fantasy novels as well as just about the craft of writing itself. Also Veronica peer pressures Tom into drinking.
CALENDARINTERVIEWDave Gross, Lead Writer at Overhaul Games, developers of Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition. and James L. Suttera co-creator of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Fiction Editor for Paizo Publishing.This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
We sit down with Robin Hobb to discuss her penchant for pen names, what's she currently working on, and her epic trilogies, or are they a nonology? dodecology? We're not sure either, but regardless, enjoy!
Hey guys,I love your show. Can't wait for the Robin Hobb interview. Will that be on the youtube webcast and the audio podcast? I read Liveship, Tawny Man, Farseer, and the new Rain Wilds series. I had to Lem the Soldier Son....it was way too slow and a little boring....I didn't like the protagonist at all.
Anyway, I am really writing today about the email below. You guys are going to be in the money for all of the books you have bought from Amazon. I have had a Kindle for around 3 years and I am always disappointed about the pricing. The electronic version of a book should ALWAYS be less then the hardback/paperback but that is not always so.
It looks like some publishers are finally trying to put an end of the extreme pricing.What do you think?
Is the Youtube podcast ever going to go to Itunes as a videocast? I am not always in front of my computer / smart TV so it would be great if my IPod could play the video cast. You guys look great on a 55"" HD TV by the way.
Dear Kindle Customer,We have good news. You are entitled to a credit for some of your past e-book purchases as a result of legal settlements between several major e-book publishers and the Attorneys General of most U.S. states and territories, including yours. You do not need to do anything to receive this credit. We will contact you when the credit is applied to your Amazon.com account if the Court approves the settlements in February 2013.Hachette, Harper Collins, and Simon & Schuster have settled an antitrust lawsuit about e-book prices. Under the proposed settlements, the publishers will provide funds for a credit that will be applied directly to your Amazon.com account. If the Court approves the settlements, the account credit will appear automatically and can be used to purchase Kindle books or print books. While we will not know the amount of your credit until the Court approves the settlements, the Attorneys General estimate that it will range from $0.30 to $1.32 for every eligible Kindle book that you purchased between April 2010 and May 2012. Alternatively, you may request a check in the amount of your credit by following the instructions included in the formal notice of the settlements, set forth below. You can learn more about the settlements here:www.amazon.com/help/agencyebooksettlementsIn addition to the account credit, the settlements impose limitations on the publishers’ ability to set e-book prices. We think these settlements are a big win for customers and look forward to lowering prices on more Kindle books in the future.Thank you for being a Kindle customer.The Amazon Kindle Team
ADDENDUMSThis podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
Today we show you just why the audio podcast is different and more REAL than anything else you listen to. Then we calm down, sober up, time travel, and have a fascinating interview with G. Willow Wilson. Turns out, she is awesome. Find out why!
This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
With a movie adaptation coming to theatres on October 26th, we kick-off David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas, check in with the folks over on Goodreads, and giggle like schoolboys at the titles of a few of Tom's favorite pieces of pulp fiction!
Is science fiction exhauasted? It has a had a hard century's work. We'll examine that, invite you to read some banned books, and smell Veronica's feet. Don't let that last one put you off. We also kick off Cloud Atlas.
I have always been an avid reader but not a fantasy/sci-fi reader until I started to listen to your audio podcast, I came by the way of Buzz Out Loud. Listening to ya'll talk about the Game of Thrones so much made me decide I had to give a shot, well I started reading them in July and am over half way through the 5th book now we are also watching the HBO series. I wanted to thank you for introducing me to such a great series that I otherwise would have missed and to send you some pictures that I think of every time the talk about the old gods in the weirwood trees. http://www.flickr.com/photos/82006512@N00/8037943720/in/photostream/ These pictures are from Orr Park in Montevallo, Alabama were a local artist by the name of Tingle has been carving in the deadwood trees since at least 1993. Just had to share these pics with ya'll.
Love the show,
Laura Boggs
Montevallo, Alabama
ADDENDUMS
This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword. |
The new ad reservations include $3 million more for the remainder of August and nearly $77 million for September and October in the eight states, the aide said. The campaign is targeting Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania. In addition, Clinton is continuing to advertise in the Omaha market in Nebraska, one of only two states that awards its electoral votes based on performance in congressional districts.
The Trump campaign, by contrast, launched its first general-election TV ad last week, saying it planned to spend $4.8 million on a 10-day buy in four states: Florida, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
The Clinton aide spoke on the condition of anonymity to share campaign strategy more freely.
AD
AD
The disparity in TV ads reflects fundraising by Clinton that until recently had been far more robust than that of Trump, as well as a strategy by Trump to generate more exposure through television interviews and social media.
Before the new buys, Clinton’s campaign said it already had spent $70 million on TV ads in targeted states, not including other ads running nationally on cable. Clinton also is planning to air $15 million in radio ads in the fall, the aide said.
The advertising targets underscore which states the respective campaigns consider to be in play. The four that Trump is targeting are viewed as essential to his path to victory, while Clinton is investing in more battlegrounds than she necessarily needs to reach the requisite 270 electoral votes on Nov. 8.
AD
Back in mid-June, when Clinton began her first general-election ads, she also went on the air in Colorado and Virginia, two states from which she pulled back advertising amid growing confidence that the states are winnable for her.
AD
In Virginia, Clinton has a 14-point advantage, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll published last week. Some recent surveys in Colorado also have shown Clinton with a double-digit lead over Trump.
The Clinton aide stressed that targets and spending levels could continue to change as the race evolves. |
Muchowiec (disambiguation)
Muchowiec may refer to the following places in Poland:
Muchowiec, a district of the city of Katowice
Muchowiec, a village in Strzelin County, Lower Silesian Voivodeship (SW Poland) |
The ascending reticular activating system from pontine reticular formation to the hypothalamus in the human brain: a diffusion tensor imaging study.
The ascending reticular activating system (ARAS) is responsible for regulation of consciousness. Precise evaluation of the ARAS is important for diagnosis and management of patients with impaired consciousness. In the current study, we attempted to reconstruct the portion of the ARAS from the pontine reticular formation (RF) to the hypothalamus in normal subjects, using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). A total of 31 healthy subjects were recruited for this study. DTI scanning was performed using 1.5-T, and the ARAS from the pontine RF to the hypothalamus was reconstructed. Values of fractional anisotropy, mean diffusivity, and tract volume of the ARAS from the pontine RF to the hypothalamus were measured. In all subjects, the ARAS from the pontine RF to the hypothalamus originated from the RF at the level of the mid-pons, where the trigeminal nerve could be seen, ascended through the periaqueductal gray matter of the midbrain anterolaterally to the anterior commissure level, and then terminated into the hypothalamus. No significant differences in DTI parameters were observed between the left and right hemispheres and between males and females (p<0.05). We identified the ARAS between the pontine RF and the hypothalamus in normal subjects using DTI. We believe that the reconstruction methodology and the results of this study would be useful to clinicians involved in the care of patients with impaired consciousness and researchers in studies of the ARAS. |
var baseIsEqual = require('./_baseIsEqual');
/**
* This method is like `_.isEqual` except that it accepts `customizer` which
* is invoked to compare values. If `customizer` returns `undefined`, comparisons
* are handled by the method instead. The `customizer` is invoked with up to
* six arguments: (objValue, othValue [, index|key, object, other, stack]).
*
* @static
* @memberOf _
* @since 4.0.0
* @category Lang
* @param {*} value The value to compare.
* @param {*} other The other value to compare.
* @param {Function} [customizer] The function to customize comparisons.
* @returns {boolean} Returns `true` if the values are equivalent,
* else `false`.
* @example
*
* function isGreeting(value) {
* return /^h(?:i|ello)$/.test(value);
* }
*
* function customizer(objValue, othValue) {
* if (isGreeting(objValue) && isGreeting(othValue)) {
* return true;
* }
* }
*
* var array = ['hello', 'goodbye'];
* var other = ['hi', 'goodbye'];
*
* _.isEqualWith(array, other, customizer);
* // => true
*/
function isEqualWith(value, other, customizer) {
customizer = typeof customizer == 'function' ? customizer : undefined;
var result = customizer ? customizer(value, other) : undefined;
return result === undefined ? baseIsEqual(value, other, customizer) : !!result;
}
module.exports = isEqualWith;
|
Q:
is it ever possible for a sequence of real-valued smooth, non-diffeomorphic functions in $\mathbb{R}$ to jump across a repulsive fixed-point?
Let's say we have a real-valued smooth function $f(x)$, not diffeomorphic, which has an attractive fixed-points at $x=3$ and $x=5$ and a repelling fixed-point at $x=4$ . Is it possible that any sequence of iterated compositions of $f(x)$ could converge to $x=5$ if started from a point $y<3$ ?
A:
============================================
|
/**
* Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
* or more contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file
* distributed with this work for additional information
* regarding copyright ownership. The ASF licenses this file
* to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
* "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
* with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at
*
* http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
*
* Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
* software distributed under the License is distributed on an
* "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
* KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the
* specific language governing permissions and limitations
* under the License.
*/
package org.apache.curator.x.discovery.details;
import java.io.Closeable;
import java.util.Collections;
import java.util.List;
import org.apache.curator.framework.CuratorFramework;
import org.apache.curator.framework.CuratorFrameworkFactory;
import org.apache.curator.retry.RetryOneTime;
import org.apache.curator.test.BaseClassForTests;
import org.apache.curator.test.compatibility.CuratorTestBase;
import org.apache.curator.utils.CloseableUtils;
import org.apache.curator.x.discovery.ServiceDiscovery;
import org.apache.curator.x.discovery.ServiceDiscoveryBuilder;
import org.apache.curator.x.discovery.ServiceInstance;
import org.apache.curator.x.discovery.ServiceProvider;
import org.testng.Assert;
import org.testng.annotations.Test;
import com.google.common.collect.Lists;
@Test(groups = CuratorTestBase.zk35TestCompatibilityGroup)
public class TestServiceProvider extends BaseClassForTests
{
@Test
public void testBasic() throws Exception
{
List<Closeable> closeables = Lists.newArrayList();
try
{
CuratorFramework client = CuratorFrameworkFactory.newClient(server.getConnectString(), new RetryOneTime(1));
closeables.add(client);
client.start();
ServiceInstance<String> instance = ServiceInstance.<String>builder().payload("thing").name("test").port(10064).build();
ServiceDiscovery<String> discovery = ServiceDiscoveryBuilder.builder(String.class).basePath("/test").client(client).thisInstance(instance).build();
closeables.add(discovery);
discovery.start();
ServiceProvider<String> provider = discovery.serviceProviderBuilder().serviceName("test").build();
closeables.add(provider);
provider.start();
Assert.assertEquals(provider.getInstance(), instance);
List<ServiceInstance<String>> list = Lists.newArrayList();
list.add(instance);
Assert.assertEquals(provider.getAllInstances(), list);
}
finally
{
Collections.reverse(closeables);
for ( Closeable c : closeables )
{
CloseableUtils.closeQuietly(c);
}
}
}
@Test
public void testDisabledInstance() throws Exception
{
List<Closeable> closeables = Lists.newArrayList();
try
{
CuratorFramework client = CuratorFrameworkFactory.newClient(server.getConnectString(), new RetryOneTime(1));
closeables.add(client);
client.start();
ServiceInstance<String> instance = ServiceInstance.<String>builder().payload("thing").name("test").port(10064).enabled(false).build();
InstanceSerializer<String> serializer = new JsonInstanceSerializer<>(String.class, false);
ServiceDiscovery<String> discovery = ServiceDiscoveryBuilder.builder(String.class).serializer(serializer).basePath("/test").client(client).thisInstance(instance).build();
closeables.add(discovery);
discovery.start();
ServiceProvider<String> provider = discovery.serviceProviderBuilder().serviceName("test").build();
closeables.add(provider);
provider.start();
Assert.assertEquals(provider.getInstance(), null);
Assert.assertTrue(provider.getAllInstances().isEmpty(), "Disabled instance still appears available via service provider");
}
finally
{
Collections.reverse(closeables);
for ( Closeable c : closeables )
{
CloseableUtils.closeQuietly(c);
}
}
}
}
|
As promised, today we reveal the front and back covers for The Many Tortures of Anthony Cardno. Bear Weiter (who is also an author in the anthology) donated a load of hours formatting the book, designing the interior (which includes artwork by his lovely wife Marlyse Comte) and creating and tweaking the covers. I cannot thank him enough for his encouragement and his help over the past two months.
I also have to thank Michelle Moklebust and Lee Bloom for the photography on which the cover and interior illustrations were based. On Easter Saturday, we spent a good four hours and took several hundred photos — close-ups with all kinds of facial expressions, as well as “marionette” style photos for a possible different cover idea — so that I’d have a ton of material for Bear to work with. Michelle (also an author in the anthology) and Lee are to me, and while we worked, my niece Renee, Michelle’s son BJ and her nephew and niece Jake and Amanda laughed at us, offered ideas (especially Jake) and talked Doctor Who and other geeky fun. Thanks to all of you.
And now, without further ado … the front cover:
And the back cover:
UPDATE: The book is now available in print form from Amazon. Kindle edition is coming forthwith, and the print version will be available via Barnes & Noble and other outlets soon as well (and non-Kindle ebook format should follow shortly too).
Anthony’s favorite punctuation mark is the semi-colon because thanks to cancer surgery in 2005, a semi-colon is all he has left. Enjoy Anthony's blog "Semi-Colon," where you will find Anthony's commentary on various literary subjects. |
The present invention relates generally to the packaging of integrated circuits (IC""s), and more particularly to circuit boards or substrates for mounting and packaging IC""s.
Semiconductors are used for integrated circuits for electronic applications, including radios, televisions, cell phones, and personal computing devices, as examples. With the trend towards miniaturization of electronic devices, there is a trend towards making IC""s and the packages thereof smaller.
One result of the IC miniaturization trend is the development of ball grid array (BGA) and chip scale packages (CSP""s). These packages utilize surface-mount technologies in which the IC is coupled to a substrate by surface contacts rather than through-hole connections, as used in prior art dual in-line (DIP) packages, for example. A ball grid array package comprises a series of terminals on the underside of an integrated circuit that are substantially spherical in shape. These terminals may be arranged in multiple rows around the periphery of the underside of the integrated circuit. Because multiple rows can be used, a higher number of terminals can exist in a ball grid array package in comparison to some other technologies. Typically, a ball grid array is connected to a printed circuit board by soldering the balls to contacts on the printed circuit board.
Another type of surface mount IC package is a chip scale package. A working definition of the term chip scale package as used herein typically refers to a package that is about 1.2 times the size (length and/or width) of the IC chip (die) or less, or 1.2 times the area, e.g., for chip having an area of 100 square mil2, the package is around 120 mil2 or less, e.g., the package is slightly larger than the chip. A chip scale package permits an integrated circuit to be attached to a printed-circuit (PC) board face up or face-down, with the integrated circuit""s pads connecting to the PC board""s pads through individual balls of solder.
Preferred embodiments of the present invention achieve technical advantages as a substrate and package for an integrated circuit chip having a conductive ring around the perimeter of the contact terminals, which may be used as a ground or power ring.
In one embodiment, disclosed is a substrate for an unpackaged integrated circuit chip having surface mount contacts disposed thereon in a pattern. The substrate includes an insulating material and a conductive material disposed over the insulating material. The conductive material comprises a plurality of contacts arranged in a pattern corresponding to the integrated circuit contact pattern. The conductive material also comprises a conductive ring disposed around the periphery of the contact pattern. The substrate contacts are coupleable to the integrated circuit chip surface mount contacts.
In another embodiment, disclosed is a package for an integrated circuit chip having surface mount contacts disposed thereon in a pattern. The package includes a substrate having an insulating material and a conductive material disposed over the insulating material. The conductive material comprises a plurality of contacts arranged in a pattern corresponding to the integrated circuit contact pattern. The conductive material also comprises a conductive ring disposed around the periphery of the contact pattern. The substrate contacts are coupleable to the integrated circuit chip surface mount contacts.
In another embodiment, disclosed is a method of manufacturing a substrate for an unpackaged integrated circuit chip having surface mount contacts disposed thereon in a pattern. The method comprises providing an insulating material, disposing a conductive material over the insulating material, and patterning the conductive material to form a plurality of contacts arranged in a pattern corresponding to the integrated circuit contact pattern. The method includes forming a ring in the conductive material around the periphery of the conductive material contact pattern. The substrate contacts are coupleable to the integrated circuit chip surface mount contacts.
Advantages of embodiments of the present invention include providing a conductive ring around contacts of surface mount integrated circuit chip, which may be used for shielding or for providing power. Individual contacts or terminals may be completely surrounded by a ground signal, which is particularly advantageous for coaxial connections, high-speed applications, or sensitive signals. Groups of contacts or terminals may also be shielded, which is advantageous in certain design scenarios. A substrate having a conductive ring in accordance with embodiments of the present invention may be covered with an insulative material, and the insulative material may be coated with a conductive or dissipative material that makes electrical contact to the conductive ring to provide a completely electromagnetic interference (EMI)/radio frequency interference (RFI) shielded package. Advantageously, the conductive ring may be formed when the contact terminals and/or traces of the substrate are patterned. |
AION Linguistica
AION Linguistica is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the Università degli studi di Napoli “L'Orientale” and established in 1959. The current editor-in-chief is Alberto Manco.
History and scope
AION Linguistica was established in 1959 by Walter Belardi. The second series was published from 1979 until 2011 in the former “Dipartimento di Studi del Mondo classico e del Mediterraneo antico” and it was edited by Domenico Silvestri, while Alberto Manco assumed the secretaryship in 2000. The current editor-in-chief is Alberto Manco. Since 2012, the broader breadth of the new “Dipartimento di Studi Letterari, Linguistici e Comparati” widened the journal scope and therefore it is actually concerned with larger areas of Linguistics.
Among the authors contributing to the journal since its foundation there are Walter Belardi, Françoise Bader, Jürgen Untermann, Michel Lejeune, Francisco Villar, Giuliano Bonfante, Helmut Rix, Aldo Luigi Prosdocimi, José Luis García Ramón and many others.
External links
Official website
Università degli Studi di Napoli "L'Orientale"
References
Category:Linguistics journals |
The power of blub
Thomas Crimi writes:
I was forwarding your article on the Pirahã resistance to using exact numbers to a friend of mine; when I summarized it I noticed that in software development circles this phenomenon has been written about a few years ago by Paul Graham, which he called the Blub Paradox. 'Blub' is the name given for a middle-of-the-pack programming language (standing in for Java so as to be politically neutral). When some people rave about the great features of other languages (say, Graham's baby, Lisp), the Blub programmer shows complete indifference, not seeing how those features would make a practical difference day-to-day. Meanwhile, for any language worse than Blub, the programmer is able to rail on about how it'd be impossible to do useful work without feature X that Blub has. From a cursory google, it seems that this appears first in his 2001 article "Beating the Averages". The lesson of Blub is that even though we may feel superior to 'those' programmers, we all have our own blub and need to attempt to see what other things out there are worth learning.
Yes, I think that the Blub Paradox has considerable explanatory force, and I'm glad to learn about it.
But the political economy of such situations is uncertain, it seems to me. If your way of life (or your programing language, or your way of thinking about group properties) is working for you and your peeps, it's not obvious that it's generally a good idea to invest a lot of time and effort in trying to learn something different, just because some outsider tells you that you should. It might pay off, and then again it might not; and there are various costs, not least the potential personal or social disruption.
Standing pat might sometimes be the best choice, alas, even when the outsiders are right. Thus people who think that they understand statements like "women have more sensitive hearing than men", without translating them into claims about sampled distributions, are fools at best. But the damage that people do to themselves by continuing to use crude approximate semantics, conceived in terms of the properties of prototypes, might not in individual cases outweigh the costs of learning new thinking skills.
That would be true, for example, if most of the damage is due to bad social decisions (whether explicit public policy mistakes, or implicit market outcomes), which any one individual has little control over. As a result, if you invest in better understanding, you may just wind up writing whiny weblog entries about what's wrong with bestselling books and dominant software-engineering practices.
Posted by Mark Liberman at October 9, 2007 12:55 PM
|
Q:
WordPress - Promoting A Dev Build To Production
I recently took over a WordPress site with the following directory structure inside of /public_html:
wp_config.php
/wp-admin
/wp-content
/wp-includes
...
...
...
/development
The root (production) site is pointed to /public_html. Inside of /public_html, I have a sub-folder called /development. This subfolder has its own separate installation of Wordpress with a directory tree that looks like:
wp_config.php
/wp-admin
/wp-content
/wp-includes
...
...
...
You can access this WordPress instance via www.mywebsite.com/development. I am at a point where I would like to promote the development build to production.
What's the "WordPress" way of doing this? This is hosted on a machine that can be accessed via cPanel. I've noticed that while you can add "Addon Domains" and "Subdomains" via cPanel, you can't change the root public directory through cPanel. I would like to avoid SSHing into the machine and manually editing the httpd.conf file since that can cause conflicts with cPanel.
Is there a functionality in either cPanel or WordPress to automatically take what's in /public_html/development and replace /public_html with its contents?
A:
I ended up taking the .htaccess and index.php files from /public_html/development and using them to replace the same files in /public_html.
Once you replace the two files, open up index.php (inside of /public_html) and update
require( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/wp-blog-header.php' );
to
require( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/development/wp-blog-header.php' );
with development being the name of the subdirectory you got your index.php and .htaccess files from.
After you replace the above two files, go to your WP Admin console associated with the build you would like to promote to production and then click on "Settings" -> "General". Find the Site Address (URL) input and update the value from https://www.mywebsite.com/development to https://www.mywebsite.com.
|
KF Bylis
KF Bylis is an Albanian football club based in Ballsh, Mallakastër District. The club's home ground is the Adush Muça Stadium and they currently compete in the Albanian Superliga.
History
Early history
The club was formed in September 1972 as Ballshi i Ri, and they played in the Albanian Third Division between 1973 and 1976. But between 1976 and 1981 they were not allowed to participate in Albanian football due to laws restricting a single team from each district. They began playing once again in the Third Division in 1981, which they eventually won in 1986 and were promoted to the Albanian Second Division. The club played in the Second Division for 10 years between 1986 and 1996, where they were promoted following a successful 1995–96 season which saw the club score 124 goals and concede just 21, making it a national record which was even noted by prestigious French magazine France Football. However, despite their record breaking season they finished as runners-up in the league but still achieved promotion to the Albanian Superliga.
Golden days
In their debut season in the top flight of Albanian football the club finished in 14th place out of 18 teams. During the 1998–99 season the club finished in third place, just 2 points behind the eventual champions KF Tirana this earned the club a place in the UEFA Cup for the first time. In their first European experience KF Bylis played Slovakian side Inter Bratislava, whom they lost 5–1 to on aggregate. The following season they would again finish strongly, this time in 5th place, joint on points with 4th place side Vllaznia Shkodër, who they lost 4–3 to in the play-off for the UEFA Intertoto Cup place. In the 2000–01 season they finished 5th once again and earned a place in the UEFA Intertoto Cup, where they met Romanian side FC Universitatea Craiova the following season. They lost 4–3 on aggregate, after a memorable 3–3 draw away in Romania and a 1–0 home loss.
Recent history
KF Bylis then began to struggle, eventually getting relegated after a poor 2002–03 season which saw they finish second to last with just 26 points and 3 wins from 26 games. They were relegated once again to the third tier after the 2004–05 season in which they scored just 13 league goals in total. Between 2007 and 2009 the club achieved back-to-back promotions back to the Albanian Superliga for the 2008–09 season.
Besnik Kapllanaj was the club's president between 2006 and 2014 and owned a 75% share in the club, with the remaining 25% owned by the Ballsh Municipality.
On 15 March 2014 in a home tie against KF Laçi the club's president was involved in an altercation with the FSHS head of competitions, Besnik Çela. Kapllanaj hit the FSHF delegate Çela in the head with a baton which required him to be rushed to hospital due to the injury. Cela refused to start the game due to overcrowding inside the Adush Muça Stadium. Once some of the fans had left they began to throw rock into the stadium in disapproval of the FSHF's decision to not let them watch the match, which kicked off 20 minutes later than scheduled. Kapllanaj then allegedly caused a power cut so that SuperSport Albania cameras could not transmit the game live as was planned. In the closing stages of the game KF Laçi were awarded a penalty which caused crowd trouble, as they began to throw rocks onto the pitch. KF Laçi's president Pashk Laska instructed captain and penalty taker Erjon Vuçaj to miss the penalty intentionally to avoid further trouble and danger for his teammates. Following the final whistle Kapllanaj physically abuses KF Laçi's players by hitting them with a baton, as well as Besnik Çela, who later filed a police report against Kapllanaj once he left the hospital. On 19 March the club's president Besnik Kapllanaj resigned from his post hours before the verdict from the FSHF disciplinary commission, who punished him with a lifetime ban from sporting activities in Albania. The commission also expelled the club from the Albanian Superliga with 9 remaining games of the 2013–14 season, relegating the club to the Albanian First Division for the 2014–15 season as well as handing KF Laçi a 3–0 victory in the game which originally ended 0–0. The following day Kapllanaj turned himself in to the Fier police authorities after being charged for assault.
Recent seasons
KF Bylis in Europe
As of December, 2008.
QR = Qualifying Round
1R = 1st Round
Players
Current squad
Notable players
Had international caps for their respective countries. Players whose name is listed in bold represented their countries while playing for Bylis Ballsh.
''Past (and present) players who are the subjects of Wikipedia articles can be found
Agim Metaj
Julian Ahmataj
Klodian Asllani
Engert Bakalli
Endri Bakiu
Ferdinand Bilali
Edmond Dalipi
Klevis Dalipi
Bledar Devolli
Ilir Dibra
Amarildo Dimo
Johan Driza
Anesti Vito
Dashnor Dume
Stivi Frashëri
Alpin Gallo
Romeo Haxhiaj
Isli Hidi
Akil Jakupi
Patrik Bordon
Maringlen Kule
Gentian Muça
Olgert Muka
Oltion Osmani
Artion Poçi
Jetmir Sefa
Gentian Stojku
Daniel Xhafa
Fjodor Xhafa
Guy Madjo
Dimitar Kapinkovski
Kire Ristevski
Ndubuisi Egbo
January Ziambo
Peter Olayinka
James Adeniyi
Solomonson Izuchukwuka
Kehinde Owoeye
Historical list of coaches
Migjen Skënderi (1995-1998)
Vangjel Capo (1998)
Hysen Dedja (1999)
Shpëtim Duro (1999-2000)
Vasil Bici (2000)
Vangjel Capo (2001)
Petraq Bisha (2001)
Ilir Gjyla (2002)
Andrea Marko (21 Sep 2002 - 7 Dec 2002)
Migjen Skënderi (2003)
Kristaq Mile (2003-2004)
Faruk Sejdini (Jul 2007 – 15 Sep 2008)
Hysen Dedja (15 Sep 2008 – 4 May 2009)
Gerd Haxhiu (4 May 2009 - Jun 2009)
Ilir Spahiu (Jul 2009 - 13 Sep 2010)
Agim Metaj (2010)
Nikola Ilievski (13 Sep 2010 - 7 Mar 2011)
Agim Canaj (7 Mar 2011 - Jun 2011)
Naci Şensoy (Jul 2011 - Jun 2012)
Agim Canaj (Jul 2012 - 20 Nov 2012)
Naci Şensoy (20 Nov 2012 - Jun 2013)
Ndubuisi Egbo (1 Aug 2013 – 30 May 2014)
Roland Nenaj (1 Jul 2014 - 31 May 2015)
Agim Canaj (28 Jul 2015 - 8 Oct 2015)
Mauro De Vecchis (08 Oct 2015 - 23 Oct 2015)
Marenglen Kule (23 Oct 2015 - 29 Jan 2016)
Adnan Zildžović (29 Jan 2016 - Jul 2016)
Julian Ahmataj (Sep 2016 - Oct 2016)
Eqerem Memushi (14 Oct 2016 - 26 Jan 2017)
Artan Mërgjyshi (Jan 2017 - Apr 2017)
Marcello Troisi (Apr 2017 – May 2017)
Bledar Devolli (5 Aug 2017 - 4 Oct 2017)
Stavri Nica (Oct 2017 - Nov 2017)
Marcello Troisi (Jan 2018 – Feb 2018)
Veljko Dovedan (Aug 2018 -)
References
Category:KF Bylis Ballsh
Category:Football clubs in Albania
Category:Association football clubs established in 1972
Category:Mallakastër
Category:1972 establishments in Albania |
[Development of a multidimensional system for classification and management of health information: applying to clinical information].
The large amount of information in the medical area creates management problems, being necessary systematic methods for filing and retrieval. With information on the context of clinical records, methods must integrate controlled biomedical terminologies and desirable characteristics oriented to the structure, content and clinical results. The objective is to test the applicability and capacity for retrieval of a multidimensional system developed for classification and management of health information. Three hundred questions were randomly selected, by computerized method, from the questions received in six years (Medicine Information Service, Pharmaceutical Department, Coimbra University Hospitals). They were characterized and applicability evaluated by classified amount and need to alter the system, which is composed of various independent dimensions, incorporating concepts sometimes hierarchical. Questions retrieval was tested searching information in a dimension or between dimensions. All questions were classified: 53% are clinical cases with illnesses incidence in the genitourinary system; metabolic, nutritional and endocrine disease; cancer; infections and nervous system. In 81%, the object is a drug, mostly anti-infectious and anti-neoplastic agents. The therapeutic and safety areas had been the most requested, regarding the subjects: use, adverse reactions, drug identification and pharmaceutical technology. As to applicability, it was necessary to add some concepts and modify same hierarchical groups, that didn't modify the basic structure, nor had collided with the desirable characteristics. The limitations were related with the incorporated external classification systems. The search in the subject dimension of the concept drug administration retrieved 19 questions. The search between two dimensions: antiinfectious (external) and teratogenicity (subject) retrieved three questions. In the two examples, it was possible to retrieve information from any one of the levels of the hierarchy, from the most general to the most specific and even from external dimensions. The use of the system in this sample showed its applicability in clinical information classification and filing, retrieval capacity and flexibility, supporting modifications without interfering with desirable characteristics. This tool allows retrieval of patient-oriented evidence that matters. |
Archive Areas
EBBA 33861
National Library of Scotland - Crawford
The Cuckcoo of the Times. / Since Cuckcoo is but what mans born to, certain / The fault's not in the Woman, but his Fortune: / The Cuckcoo therefore hopes to please your mind, / And says it comprehends ev'n all Mankind.
The Cuckcoo of the Times. / Since Cuckcoo is but what mans born to, certain / The fault's not in the Woman, but his Fortune: / The Cuckcoo therefore hopes to please your mind, / And says it comprehends ev'n all Mankind. |
Archives For
Liev Schreiber
Chuck Wepner told me he is just happy to still be alive so that he can tell his story – and now it will be shown on the silver screen for all to see.
Wepner is a former professional heavyweight boxer who was known as “The Bayonne Bleeder” because he had one of the sport’s bloodiest faces. Most notably to that point, there was a fight between Wepner and Sonny Liston in which the New Jersey heavyweight required 72 stitches to his face.
But the match that changed Wepner’s life was his 15 round battle with the Heavyweight Champion of the World, Muhammad Ali. That fight yielded a $100,000 payday for the Marine Corps veteran (the biggest check of his career, although Wepner insisted to me that he would’ve fought Ali for free) and inspired a young man named Sylvester Stallone to write a screenplay called “Rocky.”
And in the new film “Chuck,” out Friday, the world gets to see not only the real-life fighter who inspired the iconic movie series but also the effect that it all had on his personal life – filled with ups and downs that were fueled by sex, alcohol and drugs and led to marital issues and a stint in jail.
However at Wepner’s insistence, the film needed to be family-friendly. He attributes that characteristic along with the task of finding a good lead character in why it took 12 years to make. And it wasn’t until Liev Schreiber that Wepner knew they had their man.
“It was actually (Liev) who asked to play the part,” recalled Wepner on the second floor of the Loews Regency on New York City’s Upper East Side. “Taking no money up-front, everything on the other end. That’s how much he loves the movie.”
Wepner also revealed that Naomi Watts, who plays his third wife, signed up for the same deal.
“They wanted to do this movie,” he said. “They put their heart and soul in it and that’s why the movie is good.”
Schreiber’s acting chops impressed the boxer, right down to his in-ring dialect. Wepner even allowed that the “Ray Donovan” star has a little New Jersey in him.
“He’ll use a little slang now and then, if you know what I mean,” the boxer joked. “He likes to drink. He likes to party. He likes the girls. |
Q:
How to identify and switch to the frame in selenium webdriver when frame does not have id and title
Can anyone tell me how I can identify and switch to the iframe which hasn't title and id.
I need to get into this frame in order to find another element in this frame for sending some text.
<div class="sceditor-container" style="width: 1359px; height: 300px;">
<div class="sceditor-toolbar">
<iframe frameborder="0" src="javascript:false" style="width: 1349px; height: 261px;">
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html style="height:100%">
<head>
<meta content="text/html;charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<link href="" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet">
</head>
<body contenteditable="true" style="height:88%">
<div> </div>
</body>
</html>
</iframe>
For this I wrote code:
WebDriver.SwitchTo().Frame(WebDriver.FindElement(By.TagName("iframe")));
WebDriver.FindElement(By.XPath("html/body")).SendKeys("text");
WebDriver.SwitchTo().DefaultContent();
But WebDriver can't find iframe element and as a result can't send text value into iframe element.
A:
To click and sendkeys use below code
WebElement loc=driver.findElement(By.XPath("html/body"));
Actions a= new Actions(driver);
a.click(loc).sendKeys("emailBody").perform();
To set the text in the iframe element you will have to first copy the text from the Body tag
WebElement emailBody = driver.findElement(by.xpath("/html/body"));
emailBody.getText();
Once Text is copied into emailBody, you can use it with element inside frame as below
WebDriver.FindElement(By.XPath("html/body")).SendKeys(emailBody);
Try below code to switch to frame and see what happens
driver.switchTo().frame(driver.findElement(By.xpath("//iframe[contains(@src,'javascript:false')]")));
Also you can try to access frame using its index, try
driver.switchTo().frame(0);
|
Q:
How to count fragments?
I have an activity and pager adapter in it which displays 3 fragments. The fragments are shuffled. I need to know the number of each page when I am swiping through them and that number needs to be displayed in a textView. For example, when I am in the first page number 1 is displayed, second page - number 2 and so on.
PagerAdapter.java
public class PagerAdapter extends FragmentPagerAdapter {
private List<Fragment> fragments;
public PagerAdapter(FragmentManager fm, List<Fragment> fragments) {
super(fm);
this.fragments = fragments;
}
@Override
public Fragment getItem(int arg0) {
return this.fragments.get(arg0);
}
@Override
public int getCount() {
return this.fragments.size();
}
public void setFragments(List<Fragment> fragments) {
this.fragments = fragments;
}
}
mainActivity.java
public class testActivity extends FragmentActivity {
@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.activity_pager_adapter);
initialisePaging();
}
private void initialisePaging() {
List<Fragment> fragments = new Vector<Fragment>();
fragments.add(Fragment.instantiate(this,fragment1.class.getName()));
fragments.add(Fragment.instantiate(this,fragment2.class.getName()));
fragments.add(Fragment.instantiate(this,fragment3.class.getName()));
PagerAdapter mPagerAdapter = new PagerAdapter(this.getSupportFragmentManager(), fragments);
Collections.shuffle(fragments, new Random(System.nanoTime()));
ViewPager pager = (ViewPager) findViewById(R.id.viewpager);
pager.setAdapter(mPagerAdapter);
}
@Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.menu_test, menu);
return true;
}
@Override
public boolean onOptionsItemSelected(MenuItem item) {
int id = item.getItemId();
//noinspection SimplifiableIfStatement
if (id == R.id.action_settings) {
return true;
}
return super.onOptionsItemSelected(item);
}
}
A:
If you want to be displaying the number in your fragment, use this
In your Activity
@Override
public Fragment getItem(int position) {
// Here you can add an argument that will be passed to the fragment
// In your case you need to pass the page number
Fragment fragment = this.fragments.get(arg0);
Bundle b = new Bundle();
b.putInt("page_number", position);
fragment.setArguments(b);
return fragment;
}
In you fragment do this
int number;
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
// Read the data that Activity passed to us
if (savedInstanceState == null) {
Bundle args = getArguments();
if (args != null) {
number = args.getInt("page_number") + 1;
}
}
else {
number = savedInstanceState.getInt("page_number");
}
}
@Override
public View onCreateView(LayoutInflater inflater, @Nullable ViewGroup container, @Nullable Bundle savedInstanceState) {
// Here you need to find your TextView and show the number
View v = inflater.inflate(R.layout.some_layout, container, false);
((TextView) v.findViewById(R.id.someTextView)).setText(String.format("%d", number));
return v;
}
@Override
public void onSaveInstanceState(Bundle outState) {
super.onSaveInstanceState(outState);
outState.putInt("page_number", number);
}
If you want to be displaying the number in your Activity, use this
private void initialisePaging() {
List<Fragment> fragments = new Vector<Fragment>();
fragments.add(Fragment.instantiate(this,fragment1.class.getName()));
fragments.add(Fragment.instantiate(this,fragment2.class.getName()));
fragments.add(Fragment.instantiate(this,fragment3.class.getName()));
PagerAdapter mPagerAdapter = new PagerAdapter(this.getSupportFragmentManager(), fragments);
Collections.shuffle(fragments, new Random(System.nanoTime()));
// !!! Change ME!!!!!
textView = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.someTextView);
ViewPager pager = (ViewPager) findViewById(R.id.viewpager);
pager.setOnPageChangeListener(new ViewPager.OnPageChangeListener() {
@Override
public void onPageScrolled(int i, float v, int i2) {
}
@Override
public void onPageSelected(int i) {
textView.setText("Position: " + i);
}
@Override
public void onPageScrollStateChanged(int i) {
}
});
pager.setAdapter(mPagerAdapter);
}
|
require 'puppet/version'
if Gem::Version.new(RUBY_VERSION.dup) < Gem::Version.new("1.9.3")
raise LoadError, "Puppet #{Puppet.version} requires ruby 1.9.3 or greater."
end
Puppet::OLDEST_RECOMMENDED_RUBY_VERSION = '2.1.0'
# see the bottom of the file for further inclusions
# Also see the new Vendor support - towards the end
#
require 'facter'
require 'puppet/error'
require 'puppet/util'
require 'puppet/util/autoload'
require 'puppet/settings'
require 'puppet/util/feature'
require 'puppet/util/suidmanager'
require 'puppet/util/run_mode'
require 'puppet/external/pson/common'
require 'puppet/external/pson/version'
require 'puppet/external/pson/pure'
# When running within puppetserver, the gettext-setup gem might not be available, so
# we need to skip initializing i18n functionality and stub out methods normally
# supplied by gettext-setup. Can be removed in Puppet 5. See PUP-7116.
begin
require 'gettext-setup'
require 'locale'
# e.g. ~/code/puppet/locales. Also when running as a gem.
local_locale_path = File.absolute_path('../locales', File.dirname(__FILE__))
# e.g. /opt/puppetlabs/puppet/share/locale
posix_system_locale_path = File.absolute_path('../../../share/locale', File.dirname(__FILE__))
# e.g. C:\Program Files\Puppet Labs\Puppet\puppet\share\locale
win32_system_locale_path = File.absolute_path('../../../../../puppet/share/locale', File.dirname(__FILE__))
if File.exist?(local_locale_path)
locale_path = local_locale_path
elsif Puppet::Util::Platform.windows? && File.exist?(win32_system_locale_path)
locale_path = win32_system_locale_path
elsif !Puppet::Util::Platform.windows? && File.exist?(posix_system_locale_path)
locale_path = posix_system_locale_path
else
# We couldn't load our locale data.
raise LoadError, "could not find locale data, skipping Gettext initialization"
end
Puppet::LOCALE_PATH = locale_path
Puppet::GETTEXT_AVAILABLE = true
rescue LoadError
def _(msg)
msg
end
def n_(*args, &block)
# assume two string args (singular and plural English form) and the count
# to pluralize on
plural = args[2] == 1 ? args[0] : args[1]
# if a block is passed, prefer that over the string selection above
block ? block.call : plural
end
Puppet::LOCALE_PATH = nil
Puppet::GETTEXT_AVAILABLE = false
end
#------------------------------------------------------------
# the top-level module
#
# all this really does is dictate how the whole system behaves, through
# preferences for things like debugging
#
# it's also a place to find top-level commands like 'debug'
# The main Puppet class. Everything is contained here.
#
# @api public
module Puppet
require 'puppet/file_system'
require 'puppet/etc'
require 'puppet/context'
require 'puppet/environments'
class << self
if Puppet::GETTEXT_AVAILABLE && Puppet::LOCALE_PATH
if GettextSetup.method(:initialize).parameters.count == 1
# Will load translations from PO files only
GettextSetup.initialize(Puppet::LOCALE_PATH)
else
GettextSetup.initialize(Puppet::LOCALE_PATH, :file_format => :mo)
end
FastGettext.locale = GettextSetup.negotiate_locale(Locale.current.language)
end
include Puppet::Util
attr_reader :features
end
# the hash that determines how our system behaves
@@settings = Puppet::Settings.new
# Note: It's important that these accessors (`self.settings`, `self.[]`) are
# defined before we try to load any "features" (which happens a few lines below),
# because the implementation of the features loading may examine the values of
# settings.
def self.settings
@@settings
end
# Get the value for a setting
#
# @param [Symbol] param the setting to retrieve
#
# @api public
def self.[](param)
if param == :debug
return Puppet::Util::Log.level == :debug
else
return @@settings[param]
end
end
require 'puppet/util/logging'
extend Puppet::Util::Logging
# Setup facter's logging
Puppet::Util::Logging.setup_facter_logging!
# The feature collection
@features = Puppet::Util::Feature.new('puppet/feature')
# Load the base features.
require 'puppet/feature/base'
# Store a new default value.
def self.define_settings(section, hash)
@@settings.define_settings(section, hash)
end
# setting access and stuff
def self.[]=(param,value)
@@settings[param] = value
end
def self.clear
@@settings.clear
end
def self.debug=(value)
if value
Puppet::Util::Log.level=(:debug)
else
Puppet::Util::Log.level=(:notice)
end
end
def self.run_mode
# This sucks (the existence of this method); there are a lot of places in our code that branch based the value of
# "run mode", but there used to be some really confusing code paths that made it almost impossible to determine
# when during the lifecycle of a puppet application run the value would be set properly. A lot of the lifecycle
# stuff has been cleaned up now, but it still seems frightening that we rely so heavily on this value.
#
# I'd like to see about getting rid of the concept of "run_mode" entirely, but there are just too many places in
# the code that call this method at the moment... so I've settled for isolating it inside of the Settings class
# (rather than using a global variable, as we did previously...). Would be good to revisit this at some point.
#
# --cprice 2012-03-16
Puppet::Util::RunMode[@@settings.preferred_run_mode]
end
# Load all of the settings.
require 'puppet/defaults'
# Now that settings are loaded we have the code loaded to be able to issue
# deprecation warnings. Warn if we're on a deprecated ruby version.
if Gem::Version.new(RUBY_VERSION.dup) < Gem::Version.new(Puppet::OLDEST_RECOMMENDED_RUBY_VERSION)
Puppet.deprecation_warning("Support for ruby version #{RUBY_VERSION} is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. See https://docs.puppet.com/puppet/latest/system_requirements.html#ruby for a list of supported ruby versions.")
end
# Initialize puppet's settings. This is intended only for use by external tools that are not
# built off of the Faces API or the Puppet::Util::Application class. It may also be used
# to initialize state so that a Face may be used programatically, rather than as a stand-alone
# command-line tool.
#
# @api public
# @param args [Array<String>] the command line arguments to use for initialization
# @return [void]
def self.initialize_settings(args = [])
do_initialize_settings_for_run_mode(:user, args)
end
# private helper method to provide the implementation details of initializing for a run mode,
# but allowing us to control where the deprecation warning is issued
def self.do_initialize_settings_for_run_mode(run_mode, args)
Puppet.settings.initialize_global_settings(args)
run_mode = Puppet::Util::RunMode[run_mode]
Puppet.settings.initialize_app_defaults(Puppet::Settings.app_defaults_for_run_mode(run_mode))
Puppet.push_context(Puppet.base_context(Puppet.settings), "Initial context after settings initialization")
Puppet::Parser::Functions.reset
end
private_class_method :do_initialize_settings_for_run_mode
# Initialize puppet's core facts. It should not be called before initialize_settings.
def self.initialize_facts
# Add the puppetversion fact; this is done before generating the hash so it is
# accessible to custom facts.
Facter.add(:puppetversion) do
setcode { Puppet.version.to_s }
end
Facter.add(:agent_specified_environment) do
setcode do
if Puppet.settings.set_by_config?(:environment)
Puppet[:environment]
end
end
end
end
# Create a new type. Just proxy to the Type class. The mirroring query
# code was deprecated in 2008, but this is still in heavy use. I suppose
# this can count as a soft deprecation for the next dev. --daniel 2011-04-12
def self.newtype(name, options = {}, &block)
Puppet.deprecation_warning("Creating #{name} via Puppet.newtype is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. Use Puppet::Type.newtype instead.")
Puppet::Type.newtype(name, options, &block)
end
# Load vendored (setup paths, and load what is needed upfront).
# See the Vendor class for how to add additional vendored gems/code
require "puppet/vendor"
Puppet::Vendor.load_vendored
# The bindings used for initialization of puppet
#
# @param settings [Puppet::Settings,Hash<Symbol,String>] either a Puppet::Settings instance
# or a Hash of settings key/value pairs.
# @api private
def self.base_context(settings)
environmentpath = settings[:environmentpath]
basemodulepath = Puppet::Node::Environment.split_path(settings[:basemodulepath])
if environmentpath.nil? || environmentpath.empty?
raise(Puppet::Error, "The environmentpath setting cannot be empty or nil.")
else
loaders = Puppet::Environments::Directories.from_path(environmentpath, basemodulepath)
# in case the configured environment (used for the default sometimes)
# doesn't exist
default_environment = Puppet[:environment].to_sym
if default_environment == :production
loaders << Puppet::Environments::StaticPrivate.new(
Puppet::Node::Environment.create(default_environment,
basemodulepath,
Puppet::Node::Environment::NO_MANIFEST))
end
end
{
:environments => Puppet::Environments::Cached.new(Puppet::Environments::Combined.new(*loaders)),
:http_pool => proc {
require 'puppet/network/http'
Puppet::Network::HTTP::NoCachePool.new
},
:ssl_host => proc { Puppet::SSL::Host.localhost },
}
end
# A simple set of bindings that is just enough to limp along to
# initialization where the {base_context} bindings are put in place
# @api private
def self.bootstrap_context
root_environment = Puppet::Node::Environment.create(:'*root*', [], Puppet::Node::Environment::NO_MANIFEST)
{
:current_environment => root_environment,
:root_environment => root_environment
}
end
# @param overrides [Hash] A hash of bindings to be merged with the parent context.
# @param description [String] A description of the context.
# @api private
def self.push_context(overrides, description = "")
@context.push(overrides, description)
end
# Return to the previous context.
# @raise [StackUnderflow] if the current context is the root
# @api private
def self.pop_context
@context.pop
end
# Lookup a binding by name or return a default value provided by a passed block (if given).
# @api private
def self.lookup(name, &block)
@context.lookup(name, &block)
end
# @param bindings [Hash] A hash of bindings to be merged with the parent context.
# @param description [String] A description of the context.
# @yield [] A block executed in the context of the temporarily pushed bindings.
# @api private
def self.override(bindings, description = "", &block)
@context.override(bindings, description, &block)
end
# @param name The name of a context key to ignore; intended for test usage.
# @api private
def self.ignore(name)
@context.ignore(name)
end
# @param name The name of a previously ignored context key to restore; intended for test usage.
# @api private
def self.restore(name)
@context.restore(name)
end
# @api private
def self.mark_context(name)
@context.mark(name)
end
# @api private
def self.rollback_context(name)
@context.rollback(name)
end
require 'puppet/node'
# The single instance used for normal operation
@context = Puppet::Context.new(bootstrap_context)
end
# This feels weird to me; I would really like for us to get to a state where there is never a "require" statement
# anywhere besides the very top of a file. That would not be possible at the moment without a great deal of
# effort, but I think we should strive for it and revisit this at some point. --cprice 2012-03-16
require 'puppet/indirector'
require 'puppet/compilable_resource_type'
require 'puppet/type'
require 'puppet/resource'
require 'puppet/parser'
require 'puppet/network'
require 'puppet/ssl'
require 'puppet/module'
require 'puppet/data_binding'
require 'puppet/util/storage'
require 'puppet/status'
require 'puppet/file_bucket/file'
require 'puppet/plugins'
|
Preliminary evaluation of a thermosensitive chitosan hydrogel for Echinococcus granulosus vaccine delivery.
The EG95 vaccine is effective in protecting grazing animals from infection with Echinococcus granulosus. Six male lambs were used in the study, two were each vaccinated subcutaneously with 50μg EG95/1mg Quil-A, two animals were each vaccinated with 50μg EG95/1mg Quil-A in 1% chitosan thermolabile gel subcutaneously, and two animals served as non-vaccinated controls. Two vaccinations were given at a 7 week interval. Two vaccinations induced a significantly higher antibody titre in the chitosan group compared with the Quil-A only group. The chitosan vaccine group also had a significantly higher antibody titre compared with a positive control sera from vaccinated and challenged sheep. Incorporating the EG95/Quil-A vaccine in a thermo-responsive chitosan sol-gel stimulated, after the second injection, a high level of antibody absorbance which remained high for at least one year. This response was significantly greater than the response to vaccine without the gel. |
Debt reduction, largely through rejigging its vast cable holdings, is the central task of top managers at Time Warner Inc after the $7.5 billion Turner deal, senior executives said on Wednesday.
The company, which last week took control of Turner Broadcasting System Inc, is in active discussions aimed at restructuring its troubled cable-television partnership with U S West Media Group, the executives said.
One Time Warner executive said the talks with U S West are likely to quicken and could yield a deal within months.
"We want to delever the company, lighten up on cable, and simplify the corporate capital structure," said one executive, speaking on a promise of anonymity.
The executives echoed Ted Turner, founder of Turner Broadcasting and now vice chairman of the combined company as well as its biggest individual shareholder. He has said he wants Time Warner's $17.5 billion debt halved.
Partners since 1992, when regional phone group U S West bought 25 percent of most of Time Warner's cable systems, its film studios and the HBO pay-TV service, the two companies have recently been preoccupied with major acquisitions.
Time Warner last week completed its takeover of Turner, a deal unsuccessfully opposed in court by U S West. And U S West is expected to close next month its $5.3 billion acqusition of Continental Cablevision, the third-ranked U.S. cable operator.
Time Warner now sees itself with the acquisition of Turner, producer of Cable News Network, The Cartoon Network and two studios, as primarily a programming group, the executives said.
Capital-intensive cable operations are less important and ripe for partial divestment, the executives said. Investment capital can be better used outside cable, the executives said.
"We look at the opportunities and, hey, we can't do everything," one executive said.
Time Warner earlier reported very strong operational earnings from its cable operations, largely on rate increases, but the company has also committed to spending at least $4 billion to improve its systems through 2000.
The executives declined to discuss possible terms of a U S West agreement but analysts have speculated Time Warner might swap selected cable properties for U S West's equity in HBO and the studios. A key question in such a deal would be how much debt would be taken off Time Warner's books.
Spin-off of properties is also possible, analysts have said. Time Warner is also said to be considering the sale of Castle Rock, one of the studios owned by Turner Broadcasting.
The executives said a deal with U S West was very important but failure to reach one would not stop the debt-reduction campaign.
A little-noticed deal earlier this year, in which Time Warner swapped some cable properties for a minority interest in a joint venture with Fanch Cablevision of Indiana and the Blackstone Group, could be a model for other cable transactions, the executives said.
"The objective of deleveraging is larger than U S West. The objective of lightening up on cable is larger than U S West," one of the Time Warner executives said.
Shares of Time Warner closed up 1-1/8 at 42.
-- New York Newsdesk 212-859-1713
|
Q:
What flour is best for diabetic person?
What type of flour is most effective at controlling blood sugar levels in diabetics?
A:
According to this article 20 Healthy Flours from Lowest to Highest Carbohydrates, whole grain or "flour from nut and plant sources that are low in carbohydrates".
The whole grain helps to lower the glycemic index (GI), meaning that sugars are released more slowly. Whereas the non grain flours have are lower in carbohydrate, meaning less will be converted to sugars.
Top 5 listed are
Walnut Flour
Almond Flour
Ground Flaxseed
Soy Flour
Spelt Flour
|
This invention relates to data storage for computers, and more particularly to an apparatus and methods for differential backup and restoration of data in a computer storage system.
Virtually all computer applications (or programs) rely on storage. This storage can be used for both storing the computer code and for storing data manipulated by the code. (The term xe2x80x9cdataxe2x80x9d refers to any information, including formatting information, executable code and data for manipulation by an application program.)
Storage technology has developed in a variety of different directions. Accordingly, a wide variety of storage systems are available. It has become impractical, therefore, for the person writing the computer application to also be responsible for detailed control over how data is stored on the storage system.
For this (and other) reasons, application programs typically run on an operating system (e.g., Unix. Windows, MS DOS, Linux, and the many variations of each). Once again, however, the operating system may be used with a variety of storage systems.
It would be highly inefficient to have to change the operating system, or the application programs, every time a change is made to physical storage. As a result, various layers of abstraction have evolved for viewing how data is actually stored in the storage system.
FIG. 1 illustrates one way of viewing the layers of abstraction. At the top level 10, the application program may assume that data is stored in a manner that has very little to do with how the data is placed onto the physical device. For example, the application may view the storage system as containing a number of directories and data files within the directories. Thus, in an application written for use in the Unix operating system, the application will assume that files are stored according to the Unix directory structure (including hierarchical directories and files located within the directories). This assumed organization of physical storage may have very little to do with how that data is actually stored onto the actual storage devices. This view may be referred to as the xe2x80x9clogical viewxe2x80x9d because of the separation between the logical view of data from the application level is divorced from any view of how the data is physically stored. A logical entity, such as a file, database or other construct, may be referred to at the logical level as a xe2x80x9clogical object.xe2x80x9d
The application level 10 interfaces with the file system level 12. The file system level is concerned with how files are stored on disks and how to make everything work efficiently and reliably. Thus, the file system level may be responsible for storing directory structure, and for breaking up files into constituent data blocks for storage onto a physical storage system. For example, in most implementations of Unix, each file has an associated I-node. This node may contain accounting and protection information and, additionally, a set of pointers to data blocks.
Relatively early in the development of computer systems, disk drives became a fundamental device for storage. Accordingly, computer operating systems have been developed assuming that memory will rely on input/output (xe2x80x9cI/Oxe2x80x9d) to a disk drive. The file system 12, therefore, may assume one or more xe2x80x9cvolumesxe2x80x9d which correspond to a physical storage unit such as a disk drive (or any other unit of storage), with data stored in blocks on the disk drive.
The demand for storage to be available for use by applications has sky rocketed. As a result, a number of separate physical devices may be required to accommodate the total amount of storage required for a system. In addition, storage systems are often changed or reconfigured.
To insulate the operating system from any changes within the physical device storage system, some mechanism is often employed to flexibly map a standard (volume) view of physical storage onto an actual physical storage system. The logical volume manager (xe2x80x9cLVMxe2x80x9d) 14 of FIG. 1 can help achieve this function by mapping the file system view of data storage into an intermediate layer.
Finally, the actual storage reading and writing (and, potentially, additional mapping onto physical storage devices) occurs within the physical storage system level 16, as illustrated in FIG. 1. Thus, for example, the logical volume manager may map the file system level view of data into volume sizes corresponding to fixed physical storage segment sizes for storage on a physical device (e.g, block sizes). The physical storage system level may then map the logical volume manager level volumes onto physical storage segments (e.g., hyper-volumes discussed below).
Logical volume managers have been implemented for use with the HP-UX by HP and by VERITAS operating systems, as examples. The Symmetrix line of storage systems, available from EMC Corporation, of Hopkinton, Mass., is one system capable of mapping hyper-volumes onto physical devices. (The Symmetrix product line of integrated cached disk arrays is described in numerous publications form EMC Corporation, including the Symmetrix model 55xx product manual, p-n200-810-550, rev.f, February, 1996.)
In the above examples, the mapping of application level data into actual physical storage occurs across four levels: application level to file system level; file system level to LVM level; LVM level to physical storage system level; and physical storage system level to the actual physical storage devices. More or fewer levels of mapping can be done. In some systems, for example, only one level of mapping is performed, e.g., mapping from the application level directly onto actual physical storage devices. In many systems, the mapping stage at the LVM level is omitted. Similarly, in many systems, no mapping is done at the physical storage level (e.g., data is stored directly onto actual devices corresponding to the format of the preceding level and without any further mapping onto physical storage components.)
FIG. 2A illustrates an example of the mapping that may be performed by the logical volume manager 14 and the physical storage system 16, to store data onto actual physical devices. The application/file system""s view of the storage system contemplates three separate storage devicesxe2x80x94volume A 20, volume B 21, and volume C 22. Thus, as far as the file system level 12 can discern, the system consists of three separate storage devices 20-22. Each separate storage device may be referred to as a xe2x80x9cvirtual volume,xe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cvirtual disk.xe2x80x9d This reflects that the operating system""s view of the storage device structure may not correspond to the actual physical storage system implementing the structure (hence, xe2x80x9cvirtualxe2x80x9d). Unlike the application level 10, however, the file system 12 perspective is as if the file system 12 were dealing with raw physical devices or volumes.
As far as the file system level is concerned, the virtual volumes may be divided up into xe2x80x9cpartitions,xe2x80x9d which are continuous segments of storage. These partitions are, in fact, xe2x80x9cvirtualxe2x80x9d partitions, because the partition may actually be stored across a variety of physical storage segments (e.g., hyper-volumes).
In FIG. 2A, the data is physically stored on the physical storage devices 24-26. In this particular example, although there are three physical devices 24-26 and three volumes 20-22, there is not a one to one mapping of the virtual volumes to physical devices. In this particular example, the data in volume A 20 is actually stored on physical devices 24-26, as indicated at 20a, 20b and 20c. In this example, volume B is stored entirely on physical device 24, as indicated at 22a, 22b. Finally, volume C is stored on physical device 24 and physical device 26 as indicated at 21a, 21b.
In this particular example, the boxes 20a-20c, 21a-21b and 22a-22b represent contiguous segments of storage within the respective physical devices 24-26. These contiguous segments of storage may, but need not, be of the same size. The segments of storage may be referred to as xe2x80x9chyper-volumes,xe2x80x9d and correspond to segments of physical storage that can be used as components when constructing a virtual volume for use by the file system. A hypervolume may be comprised of a number of xe2x80x9cdata blocks.xe2x80x9d A data block is a unit of storage (e.g., a 512 byte block) that is written or read at one time from the physical storage device.
Array management software running on a general purpose processor (or some other mechanism such as a custom hardware circuit) 23 translates requests from a host computer (not shown) (made assuming the logical volume structure 20-22) into requests that correspond to the way in which the data is actually stored on the physical devices 24-26. In practice, the array management software 23 may be implemented as a part of a unitary storage system that includes the physical devices 24-26, may be implemented on a host computer, or may be done in some other manner.
In FIG. 2A the array management software 23 performs the functions of both the logical volume manager 14 (if present) and the physical storage level 16, by mapping the file system""s virtual volumes 20-22 into segments that can be stored onto physical devices 24-26. The array management software 23 also performs the functions of the physical storage system level 16, by determining where to store the hyper-volumes 20A-20C, 21A-21B and 22A-22B.
The physical storage devices shown in the example of FIG. 2A are disk drives. A disk drive may include one or more disks of a recording media (such as a magnetic recording medium or an optical recording medium). Information can be written and read from this storage medium for storage purposes. The recording medium is typically in the form of a disk that rotates. The disk generally includes a number of tracks on which the information is recorded and from which the information is read. Each track may include more than one xe2x80x9cdata block.xe2x80x9d A data block is a unit of data that can be read as a single unit. A data block may be a 512 by the block of data, an 8 k segment on a 32 k track, or some other structure. In these examples, the size of the block is fixed. In other cases, the block may be of variable size, such as a CKD record. In a disk drive that includes multiple disks, the disks are conventionally stacked so that corresponding tracks of each disk overlie each other. In this case, specification of a single track on which information is stored within the disk drive includes not only specification of an individual track on a disk, but also which of the multiple disks the information is stored on.
To identify an individual data block, an address may include a specification of the disk, (which may consist of several xe2x80x9cplattersxe2x80x9d), a specification of the track within the disk (or xe2x80x9ccylinderxe2x80x9d), a specification of the head (or which of the platters comprising the xe2x80x9cdiskxe2x80x9d) and a specification of the particular data block within the track. The specification of the position of the data block within the track may, for example, be addressed as an offset, e.g., this is the third data block appearing on the track. Thus, an address of ddccceh:offset may specify a blockxe2x80x94disk dd, cylinder cccc, head h and the specified offset. The physical storage devices for use with the present invention may, however, be formed in any other geometry, addressed in any other manner or even constitute a different type of storage mechanism.
FIG. 2B illustrates one example of mapping between the top level of abstractionxe2x80x94the application levelxe2x80x94to the actual physical storage level. An application level file 200 includes visual information. This information is in the form of a conventional file and includes a series of bits.
When the application level file is mapped onto physical storage, the application level file may be converted into segments of the individual bits, e.g., segment 203. Thus, a segment of the application level file 203 is mapped (for example according to the general mapping structure described above with reference to FIG. 1) onto actual physical storage devices 204-206. In this example, the first segment of bits in 203 in the application level file 200 is mapped onto physical storage device 204, at a portion 208 of the physical storage device 204. As shown in FIG. 2B, the individual segments of bits in the application level file 200 may be mapped anywhere among a plurality of actual physical storage devices. The granularity of the segments of bits (e.g., segment 203) may correspond to one of a variety of different levels. For example, the granularity of the segments may be a 512 byte data block. In another embodiment, the granularity may correspond to the amount of data stored in a track of the physical storage device 204-206 (when the physical storage devices are disk drives).
FIG. 2C illustrates an example of a logical object 27 that includes six data blocks or logical block elements 27a-27f. The logical object itself may be any data structure or collection of data. For example, the logical object could be a database table, a portion of a file system file, or a complete file system file, or any other identifiable logical object. Each of the data blocks 27a-27f may be a fixed size data block, or a varying size data block such as a CKD record.
In the example of FIG. 2C, the logical object is stored on a physical storage device 28. In this example, the storage device includes a number of columns, each representing a track of a disk.
Each row of the physical storage device represents a physical data or block element within the applicable column/track. For example, row 28a, column 28b, stores a data block corresponding to the logical block element 27b. Track 28b would store physical data blocks that have the contents of logical block elements 27a and 27b. As can be seen from FIG. 2C, the logical block elements can be stored in any order on the physical devices.
While the physical storage device 28 is illustrated as a contiguous array, this need not be the case. For example, each of the tracks, such as column 28b, may be stored on a different disk drive or be part of a different hypervolume.
In a system including an array of physical disk devices, such as disk devices 24-26 of FIG. 2A, each device typically performs error detection and/or correction for the data stored on the particular physical device. Accordingly, each individual physical disk device detects when it does not have valid data to provide and, where possible, corrects the errors. Even where error correction is permitted for data stored on the physical device, however, a catastrophic failure of the device would result in the irrecoverable loss of data.
Accordingly, storage systems have been designed which include redundant storage capacity. A variety of ways of storing data onto the disks in a manner that would permit recovery have developed. A number of such methods are generally described in the RAIDbook, A Source Book For Disk Array Technology, published by the RAID Advisory Board, St. Peter, Minn. (5th Ed., Feb. 1996). These systems include xe2x80x9cRAIDxe2x80x9d storage systems. RAID stands for Redundant Array of Independent Disks.
FIG. 3A illustrates one technique for storing redundant information in a RAID system. Under this technique, a plurality of physical devices 31-33 include identical copies of the data. Thus, the data M1 can be xe2x80x9cmirroredxe2x80x9d onto a portion 31 a of physical device 31, a portion 32a of physical device 32 and a portion 33a of physical device 33. In this case, the aggregate portions of the physical disks that store the duplicated data 31a, 32a and 33a may be referred to as a xe2x80x9cmirror group.xe2x80x9d The number of places in which the data M1is mirrored is generally selected depending on the desired level of security against irrecoverable loss of data.
In a mirror group, the copies are xe2x80x9clinked.xe2x80x9d That is, any update to one mirror causes an update to each other mirror in the group.
FIG. 3A shows three physical devices 31-33 which appear to be located in close proximity, for example within a single storage system unit. For very sensitive data, however, one or more of the physical devices that hold the mirrored data may be located at a remote facility.
xe2x80x9cRAID 1xe2x80x9d is an example of data redundancy through mirroring of data. In a RAID 1 architecture, a number of different mechanisms may be used for determining how to access and update data to improve, for example, performance of the storage system. In any event, a RAID 1 architecture certainly has the ability to recover lost data. Unfortunately, the RAID 1 architecture multiplies the cost of physical storage by the number of xe2x80x9cmirrorsxe2x80x9d included in the mirror group.
FIG. 3B illustrates a solution that requires less added storage. In FIG. 3B, data is stored at locations 34a-34d. In this particular example, the physical device 33 includes parity information P1 at 35a, 35b. The parity information is generated by a simple exclusive-OR (xe2x80x9cXORxe2x80x9d) of the corresponding bits of data. Thus, the parity information P1 would be generated by XORing the corresponding bits of the data D1 and data D2.
A variety of mechanisms are known for distributing the parity information on the physical devices. In the example shown in FIG. 3B, all of the parity information is stored on a single physical device 33. In other cases, the parity information may be distributed across the physical devices.
FIG. 4 illustrates the concept that, within a given disk array, there is no need for all of the data to follow the same redundancy rule. In FIG. 4, a first group of storage segments on physical devices 40-42 form a mirror group 44. In the mirror group 44, the entire contents of a single logical volume (HV-A) are mirrored on three different physical devices 40-42.
In FIG. 4, a single virtual volume is stored on the fourth physical device 43, without any redundancy information, as indicated at 46.
Finally, a last group of data segments 45, on all four physical devices 40-43, implement a parity redundancy scheme. In this particular example, the parity information is stored in segments of memory on two different physical devices 42-43, as indicated at 47a and 47b.
The storage system of FIG. 4 contains redundant information that permits recovery from errors, including use of a mirror for data located at a remote facility, that also permits recoveries from catastrophic failure.
FIG. 5 illustrates one system for additional backup, which may be used or adapted in accordance with certain aspects of the present invention. In FIG. 5, a computer or client 50 performs its operations using storage system 52. The client 50 may be any conventional computing system, such as a network client available from Sun Microsystems, and running the Solaris operating system (a version of Unix), an HP client running HP-UX (a Hewlett-Packard client, running a Hewlett-Packard version of the Unix operating system) or an IBM client running the AIX operating system (an IBM version of Unix) or any other system with an associated operating system. The storage system 52 may be any conventional storage system, including a Symmetrix storage system, described above. The client 50 may be connected to many other devices over a network 56.
A backup storage system 54 is also attached to the network 56. The backup storage system 54 includes a backup storage device (which may be disk drives, tape storage or any other storage mechanism), together with a system for placing data into the storage and recovering the data from that storage.
To perform a backup, the client 50 copies data from the storage system 52 across the network 56 to the backup storage system 54. This process can be explained in greater detail with reference to FIG. 1. The storage system 52 may correspond to the actual physical storage 16 of FIG. 1. For the client 50 to write the backup data over the network 56 to the backup storage system 54, the client 50 first converts the backup data into file dataxe2x80x94i.e. gets the data from the physical storage system level 16, and converts the data into application level format (e.g. a file) through the logical volume manager level 14, the file system level 12 and the application level 10. Thus, an actual data file may be communicated over the network 56 to the backup storage device 54. When the backup storage device 54 receives the data file, the backup storage system 54 can take the application level 10 data file, convert it to its appropriate file system level 12 format for the backup storage system, which can then be converted through a logical volume manager 14 level and into physical storage 16.
This form of backing up data may be referred to as xe2x80x9clogicalxe2x80x94logicalxe2x80x9d backup. That is, the logical data is backed up on the backup storage device 54. The data to be backed up is presented independent of the manner in which it is physically stored on storage system 52 at the physical storage system level 16, independent of the file system level mechanisms on the client 50, and independent of how data is stored on the backup storage device 54.
The EDM (EMC Data Manager) line of products is capable of logicalxe2x80x94logical backup over a network, as described in numerous publications available from EMC, including the EDM User Guide (Network) xe2x80x9cBasic EDM Manualxe2x80x9d.
FIG. 6 illustrates one embodiment of an alternative structure for backup of data which may also be used in accordance with the present invention. In the embodiment of FIG. 6, a direct connection 60 is established between the storage system 52 and the backup storage system 54. In this embodiment, the backup storage system may be a system as generally described in EMC Data Manager: Symmetrix Connect User Guide, P/N 200-113-591, Rev. C, December 1997, available from EMC Corporation of Hopkinton, Mass. The direct connection 60 may be a high speed data channel, such as a SCSI cable or one or more fiber-channel cables. In this system, a user may be permitted to backup data over the network 56, or the direct connection 60.
While the method and apparatus of the present invention may be described with reference to the systems and concepts described above and in the discussion of the related art, this is not intended to be limiting. The present invention has broader application. Certain aspects of the invention may be applied to any storage system. Accordingly, the invention is only limited by the claims set forth below.
Whether the restore and backup process is done at a logical level or at a physical level, backups in the prior art require copying a complete file (or in some instances even more, such as an entire partition) for the backup. Methods of backing up and restoring data on the system of FIG. 6 are described in co-pending and commonly owned U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/052,579, entitled xe2x80x9cLogical Restore From A Physical Backup In A Computer Storage System,xe2x80x9d filed Mar. 31, 1998, and naming John Deshayes and Madhav Mutalik as inventors, and which is hereby incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
FIG. 7 shows a storage system 70 that may be used as the storage system 52 of FIG. 6. The client 50 may be connected to the storage device using a channel or bus 71. The channel for communication with the client 50 can be any suitable connection such as a Small Computer System Interface (xe2x80x9cSCSIxe2x80x9d) or Enterprise Systems Connection Architecture (xe2x80x9cESCONxe2x80x9d). While only one communication channel 71 into the storage system 70 is shown in FIG. 7, other channels may be included. (While the method and apparatus of the present invention may be described with reference to the storage system of FIG. 6 and the physical storage system (and associated features and methods) of FIG. 7, this is not intended to be limiting. The present invention has broader application. Certain aspects of the invention may be applied to any storage system.)
Within the storage system 70 is a host adapter 72. In this particular embodiment, the host adapter 72 is responsible for managing and translating read and write requests from the host computer (e.g., client 52 or backup storage system 54), which are based on the virtual disk structure (e.g., from the file system or logical volume manager level), into one or more requests corresponding to how data is stored on the actual physical storage devices 76a-76d of the storage system 70. Thus, in this embodiment, the host adapter 72 implements at least some of the array management software 23 functions of FIG. 2. The host adapter 72 can be implemented in any of a number of ways, including using a general purpose processor or a custom hardware implementation. In addition, multiple host adapters may be included to facilitate having additional I/O channels for the storage system 70.
The host adapter 72 communicates with the other components of the storage system 70 using bus 73. The bus 73 may be any suitable communication element, including use of SCSI, ESCON, and other bus protocols.
Access to the physical storage devices 76a-76d is controlled through the use of disk adapters 75a-75d. The disk adapter 75a-75d can also be implemented using a general purpose processor or custom hardware design. In the embodiment illustrated in FIG. 7, a disk adapter is provided for each physical storage device. A disk adapter can, of course, have more than one storage device attached to it. In addition, disk adapters may include secondary connections to the physical storage devices of another disk adapter. This permits recovery from failure of one disk adapter by shifting its functions to the second disk adapter.
In the embodiment of FIG. 7, reading and writing to the physical storage device 76a-76d through the disk adapters 75a-75d is facilitated through use of a cache 74. The cache 74 may be a random access memory having greater speed than the disk drives. When reading data, if the data is being temporarily stored in the cache, the read request can be fulfilled more quickly by taking the data from the cache 74. Similarly, when writing data, the data to be written can be stored in the cache. The other components of the system can proceed, while the data is written from the cache to the applicable physical storage device.
Any of a variety of mechanisms can be used to implement and manage the cache. An example of such a mechanism is included in U.S. Pat. No. 5,537,568, entitled xe2x80x9cSystem for dynamically controlling cache manager maintaining cache index and controlling sequential data access,xe2x80x9d issued on Jul. 16, 1996. Similarly, writes may be accomplished through the cache using any of a variety of mechanisms and strategies. One mechanism for writing from the cache is to store the data to be written in the cache, and mark a xe2x80x9cwrite pendingxe2x80x9d bit. When the write pending bit is encountered, the applicable data can be written to the disk. This technique is described generally in U.S. Pat. No. 5,341,493, entitled xe2x80x9cDisk storage system with write preservation during power failure,xe2x80x9d issued on Aug. 23, 1994.
The cache may be divided into more than one area. For example, the cache may include an area 74a for storing data being read or written from physical storage devices 76a-76d. The cache may further include a xe2x80x9cmailboxxe2x80x9d area 74b. The mailbox area 74b may be used to facilitate communications among the disk adapters 75a-75d and with the host adapter 72. For example, each disk adapter may have its own area within the mailbox 74b. Each of the disk adapters 75a-75d can post or read information from the applicable mailbox area 74b, to communicate status and other information.
A remote adapter 78 may also be attached to the bus 73 of the storage system 70. The remote adapter may be employed for communication with remote data facilities (xe2x80x9cRDFxe2x80x9d), for example, connection to another storage device to maintain a mirror redundancy group. One form of RDF link and method of implementation is described in various publications available from EMC Corporation, including SYMMETRIX Remote Data Facility Product Manual, P/N 200-999-554, rev. B, June 1995. RDF embodiments are also described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,544,347 (Yanai) which is hereby incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. It should be appreciated, however, that the present invention is not limited to the use of RDF or to a system that employs SYMMETRIX disk arrays, and can be employed with any of numerous other types of storage systems.
A service processor 77 may be coupled to the bus 73 of the storage system 70. The service processor 77 may include a display, keyboard and other I/O devices to permit an operator to use the service processor 77 for configuring the components of the storage system 70 and for running or initiating diagnosis and maintenance facilities.
According to one embodiment of the present invention, a computer system is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the computer system includes a host domain that has at least one host computer. The computer system also includes a storage domain, coupled to the host domain, that comprises a plurality of primary storage devices, a secondary storage device and a switched network coupled to the primary storage nodes and to the secondary storage node.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a computer system is disclosed that includes a plurality of host computers, each of the host computers constituting a different platform. The computer system further includes a plurality of primary storage devices, each being associated with at least one of the host computers. The system also includes a secondary storage device, coupled to a plurality of the primary storage devices, the secondary storage device being configured to receive backup data from each of the host computers.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of transferring, data from a primary storage node to a secondary storage node is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a connection is automatically established from one of the primary storage elements to a secondary storage element, for transferring data to the secondary storage element. Data is transferred from the primary storage element directly to the secondary storage element over the first connection.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of sending a copy of data from a storage element of a computer system is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the data is first formulated into an abstract block set. The abstract block set is transmitted. In this and other embodiments, the steps of formulating and transmitting may be performed sequentially or concurrently.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of storing a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the logical object is formulated into an abstract block set and stored.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the storage device includes a memory and means for transmitting an abstract block set from the memory.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a secondary storage system is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the secondary storage system includes a secondary storage media and means for storing an abstract block set on the secondary storage media.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a computer readable media storing a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the media includes a plurality of data blocks, each storing on the readable media a portion of data from the logical object, and a metadata segment, stored on the readable media, to identify the order of data blocks in the logical object.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of generating a backup for a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, data blocks of the logical object that have changed since an earlier point in time are identified. The identified data blocks are stored as a differential abstract block set.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the storage device includes a memory, means for identifying data blocks that have changed since an earlier point in time and means for transmitting a differential abstract block set from the memory.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of forming an updated abstract block set is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a full abstract block set is provided. A differential abstract block set is also provided. The full abstract block set and the differential abstract block set are combined to form the updated abstract block set.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of forming an updated backup of a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a first backup of the logical object is provided. A differential backup of the logical object is also provided, the differential backup including a plurality of backup data blocks that have changed since the first backup was formed. The backup data blocks are added to the first backup and metadata identifying an order of data blocks in the updated backup is added.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a secondary storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the storage device includes a secondary storage media and a controller programmed to combine a first backup and a differential abstract block set to form a full abstract block set.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of copying a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a set of storage segments of a computer storage device are identified, each of the identified segments including data from at least one physical block of a logical object. The identified storage segments are copied. According to this embodiment, at least one of the copied storage segments includes a plurality of the physical data blocks. Thus, the size of the storage segment is not necessarily the same as the size of individual physical data blocks.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of creating a backup of a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a set of backup segments is received, each backup segment including at least one physical block of a logical object. The received storage elements are stored, at least one of the storage segments including a plurality of the physical data blocks.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a computer readable media storing a backup copy of a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a plurality of data segments are stored on the readable media, each data segment including at least one datablock of the logical object, and at least one of the data segments including a plurality of the logical data blocks. This embodiment further includes a metadata segment, stored on the readable media, to identify data blocks of the logical object in the data segments. In this embodiment, the data segment may, for example, be a track including a plurality of fixed size blocks.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a computer storage system is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the system includes a computer storage device that includes a plurality of physical storage segments (which, in one embodiment, is a track) each storing at least one datablock. The system further includes means for identifying a set of storage elements, each storage segment of the set including at least one physical block of a logical object and means for transmitting the identified storage segments.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of backing up a logical object at a fixed point in time is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a set of storage segments that include logical data blocks of the logical object are identified. These storage segments are copied to a backup storage device, out of order from the order of storage segments or logical data blocks appearing in the logical object. During the copying step, if a storage segment that includes a physical block of the logical object is to be modified, that storage segment is immediately backed up. In this and other embodiments, the storage segments may (but need not) correspond in size to the size of data blocks.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a computer storage system is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the system includes a computer storage device that has a plurality of storage segments. The system further includes means for identifying a set of the storage segments that includes logical objects, logical data blocks; means for copying the identified storage segments, out of order from the order of logical data blocks and the logical object; and means for immediately copying storage segments to the backup storage device if an attempt is made to modify a physical block of the storage segment.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of copying a logical object to a primary storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a copy of the logical object is provided. Physical blocks of memory in the primary storage device are allocated for storing the logical object. A map of the data blocks of the copy of the logical object to the physical blocks of the primary storage device is created. The data blocks are copied to the physical blocks, based on the map.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of copying a logical object to a primary storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, an abstract block set copy of the logical object is provided. Physical blocks of memory are allocated in the primary storage device to store the logical object. The data blocks of the copy of the logical object are mapped to the physical blocks of the primary storage device and the data blocks are copied to the physical blocks based on the mapping.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a computer storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the device includes a memory including a plurality of physical data blocks. The device further includes means for storing the data blocks of an abstract block set to the physical data blocks, based on a mapping of the data blocks to a set of the physical data blocks.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of copying a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a set of storage segments that includes the logical data blocks are identified. The storage segments may correspond to the logical data blocks, or may be of a different size. The identified storage segments are copied to a second storage device, out of order from the order of logical data blocks in the logical object.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of copying a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a set of storage segments that includes the logical data blocks of the logical object are identified. The identified storage segments are copied to a second computer storage device in parallel. Metadata is provided to identify the order of data stored in the identified storage segments in the logical object.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of backing up a logical object that includes a plurality of logical blocks is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a first and a second backup media are provided. In one embodiment, each backup media is a digital storage tape. Logical blocks are written to the first and the second backup media in parallel.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a secondary storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the secondary storage device includes a plurality of storage components and means for writing portions of an abstract block set to the storage components, in parallel.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a method of restoring a logical object is disclosed. According to this embodiment, a first and a second portion of a copy of the logical object are provided. Data blocks stored in the first portion and data blocks stored in the second portion are read in parallel. The logical object is restored from the read data blocks.
According to another embodiment of the present invention, a secondary storage device is disclosed. According to this embodiment, the secondary storage device includes means for reading data from a plurality of storage components, in parallel, and means for providing the read data to another device as an abstract block set.
Each of the above disclosed inventions and embodiments may be useful and applied separately and independently, or may be applied in combination. Description of one aspect of the inventions are not intended to be limiting with respect to other aspects of the inventions. |
Q:
Having two arrays with similar item, how to remove these items in javascript?
My question in hand, is to create one new object which properties is setup by copying properties from another object, depending on condition. In fact, they are the value of the same object. To imitate the problem I face, suppose I have the following object:
var cars = {car1: ['fast', 'solar energy', 'light', 'fossil energy']};
then I want to have property car2, which is an array copying just those string item with 'energy' and remove all these item with 'energy' from car1, how to do it succinctly.
I have tried the following method but it seems a bit complex for me, and please forgive me as I am using angular, but the answer need not be angular:
cars['car2'] = [];
angular.forEach(cars['car1'], function(value, key) {
if(cars['car1'][key].indexOf('energy') > -1) {
cars['car2'].push(value);
}
});
angular.forEach(cars['car2'], function(value){
cars['car1'].splice(value);
});
Or Could anyone explain what as the title stated?
A:
You can use Array#filter()
var cars = {car1: ['fast', 'solar energy', 'light', 'fossil energy']};
var condition = "energy";
var arr = cars.car1;
cars.car1 = arr.filter(c=>!c.includes(condition));
cars.car2 = arr.filter(c=>c.includes(condition));
console.log(cars);
Or with Array#reduce()
var cars = {car1: ['fast', 'solar energy', 'light', 'fossil energy']};
var condition = "energy";
var finalObj = cars.car1.reduce((obj,c) => {
obj.car1 = obj.car1 || [];
obj.car2 = obj.car2 || [];
c.includes(condition) ? obj.car2.push(c) : obj.car1.push(c);
return obj;
}, {});
console.log(finalObj);
|
// Copyright (c) 2018 Cisco and/or its affiliates.
//
// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
// You may obtain a copy of the License at:
//
// http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
//
// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
// limitations under the License.
package cache
import (
"context"
"encoding/json"
"net/http"
"strings"
"testing"
"time"
"github.com/contiv/vpp/plugins/crd/cache/telemetrymodel"
"github.com/contiv/vpp/plugins/crd/datastore"
"github.com/contiv/vpp/plugins/crd/testdata"
"github.com/onsi/gomega"
"go.ligato.io/cn-infra/v2/logging"
"go.ligato.io/cn-infra/v2/logging/logrus"
)
const (
noError = iota
inject404Error = iota
injectDelay = iota
testAgentPort = ":8080"
)
type mockCRDReport struct {
rep *datastore.SimpleReport
}
func (mcr *mockCRDReport) GenerateCRDReport() {
mcr.rep.Print()
}
type cacheTestVars struct {
srv *http.Server
injectError int
log *logrus.Logger
logWriter *mockLogWriter
client *http.Client
telemetryCache *ContivTelemetryCache
tickerChan chan time.Time
// Mock data
nodeLiveness *telemetrymodel.NodeLiveness
nodeInterfaces map[int]telemetrymodel.NodeInterface
nodeBridgeDomains map[int]telemetrymodel.NodeBridgeDomain
nodeL2Fibs map[string]telemetrymodel.NodeL2FibEntry
nodeIPArps []telemetrymodel.NodeIPArpEntry
nodeIPRoutes []telemetrymodel.NodeIPRoute
report *datastore.SimpleReport
}
var ctv cacheTestVars
func (ptv *cacheTestVars) startMockHTTPServer() {
ptv.srv = &http.Server{Addr: testAgentPort}
go func() {
if err := ptv.srv.ListenAndServe(); err != nil {
// cannot panic, because this probably is an intentional close
ptv.log.Errorf("Httpserver: ListenAndServe() error: %s", err.Error())
gomega.Expect(err).To(gomega.BeNil())
}
}()
}
func registerHTTPHandlers() {
// Register handler for all test data
http.HandleFunc("/", func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) {
if ctv.injectError == inject404Error {
w.WriteHeader(404)
w.Write([]byte("page not found - invalid path: " + r.URL.Path))
return
}
if ctv.injectError == injectDelay {
time.Sleep(3 * time.Second)
}
var data interface{}
switch r.URL.Path {
case livenessURL:
data = ctv.nodeLiveness
case nodeInterfaceURL:
data = ctv.nodeInterfaces
case l2FibsURL:
data = ctv.nodeL2Fibs
case bridgeDomainURL:
data = ctv.nodeBridgeDomains
case arpURL:
data = ctv.nodeIPArps
case staticRouteURL:
data = ctv.nodeIPRoutes
default:
ctv.log.Error("unknown URL: ", r.URL)
w.WriteHeader(404)
w.Write([]byte("Unknown path" + r.URL.Path))
return
}
buf, err := json.Marshal(data)
if err != nil {
ctv.log.Error("Error marshalling NodeInfo data, err: ", err)
w.WriteHeader(500)
w.Header().Set("Content-Type", "application/json")
return
}
w.Header().Set("Content-Type", "application/json")
w.Write(buf)
})
}
func (ptv *cacheTestVars) shutdownMockHTTPServer() {
if err := ptv.srv.Shutdown(context.TODO()); err != nil {
panic(err)
}
}
func TestTelemetryCache(t *testing.T) {
gomega.RegisterTestingT(t)
// Initialize the mock logger
ctv.logWriter = &mockLogWriter{log: []string{}}
ctv.log = logrus.DefaultLogger()
ctv.log.SetLevel(logging.DebugLevel)
ctv.log.SetOutput(ctv.logWriter)
// Initialize report
ctv.report = datastore.NewSimpleReport(ctv.log)
// Suppress printing of output report to screen during testing
ctv.report.Output = &nullWriter{}
// Init the mock HTTP Server
ctv.startMockHTTPServer()
registerHTTPHandlers()
ctv.injectError = noError
ctv.client = &http.Client{
Transport: nil,
CheckRedirect: nil,
Jar: nil,
Timeout: clientTimeout,
}
// Init the cache and the telemetryCache (the objects under test)
ctv.telemetryCache = NewTelemetryCache(logging.ForPlugin("tc-test"), true)
ctv.telemetryCache.Processor = &mockProcessor{}
ctv.telemetryCache.ControllerReport = &mockCRDReport{rep: ctv.report}
// Override default telemetryCache behavior
ctv.tickerChan = make(chan time.Time)
ctv.telemetryCache.ticker.Stop() // Do not periodically poll agents
ctv.telemetryCache.ticker = &time.Ticker{C: ctv.tickerChan}
// Override agentPort
ctv.telemetryCache.agentPort = testAgentPort
// override default cache logger
ctv.telemetryCache.Log = ctv.log
ctv.report = datastore.NewSimpleReport(ctv.log)
ctv.report.Output = &nullWriter{}
ctv.telemetryCache.Report = ctv.report
// Run cache init
ctv.telemetryCache.Init()
// Init & populate the test data
testdata.CreateNodeTestData(ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache)
nodeKey := "k8s-master"
node, err := ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.RetrieveNode(nodeKey)
gomega.Expect(err).To(gomega.BeNil())
ctv.nodeInterfaces = node.NodeInterfaces
ctv.nodeBridgeDomains = node.NodeBridgeDomains
ctv.nodeIPArps = node.NodeIPArp
ctv.nodeL2Fibs = node.NodeL2Fibs
ctv.nodeLiveness = node.NodeLiveness
ctv.nodeIPRoutes = node.NodeStaticRoutes
// Do the testing
t.Run("collectAgentInfoNoError", testCollectAgentInfoNoError)
t.Run("collectAgentInfoWithHTTPError", testCollectAgentInfoWithHTTPError)
t.Run("collectAgentInfoWithTimeout", testCollectAgentInfoWithTimeout)
t.Run("collectAgentInfoValidationInProgress", testCollectAgentInfoValidationInProgress)
// Shutdown the mock HTTP server
// ctv.shutdownMockHTTPServer()
}
func testCollectAgentInfoNoError(t *testing.T) {
ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.CreateNode(1, "k8s-master", "10.20.0.2", "localhost")
node, err := ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.RetrieveNode("k8s-master")
gomega.Expect(err).To(gomega.BeNil())
// Kick the telemetryCache to collect & validate data, give it an opportunity
// to run and wait for it to complete
ctv.tickerChan <- time.Time{}
ctv.telemetryCache.waitForValidationToFinish()
gomega.Expect(node.NodeLiveness).To(gomega.BeEquivalentTo(ctv.nodeLiveness))
gomega.Expect(node.NodeInterfaces).To(gomega.BeEquivalentTo(ctv.nodeInterfaces))
gomega.Expect(node.NodeBridgeDomains).To(gomega.BeEquivalentTo(ctv.nodeBridgeDomains))
gomega.Expect(node.NodeL2Fibs).To(gomega.BeEquivalentTo(ctv.nodeL2Fibs))
gomega.Expect(node.NodeIPArp).To(gomega.BeEquivalentTo(ctv.nodeIPArps))
gomega.Expect(node.NodeStaticRoutes).To(gomega.BeEquivalentTo(ctv.nodeIPRoutes))
}
func testCollectAgentInfoWithHTTPError(t *testing.T) {
ctv.logWriter.clearLog()
ctv.telemetryCache.ReinitializeCache()
ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.CreateNode(1, "k8s-master", "10.20.0.2", "localhost")
_, err := ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.RetrieveNode("k8s-master")
gomega.Expect(err).To(gomega.BeNil())
ctv.injectError = inject404Error
// Kick the telemetryCache to collect & validate data, give it an opportunity
// to run and wait for it to complete
// ctv.tickerChan <- time.Time{}
ctv.tickerChan <- time.Time{}
ctv.telemetryCache.waitForValidationToFinish()
gomega.Expect(grep(ctv.report.Data["k8s-master"], "404 Not Found")).To(gomega.Equal(numDTOs))
}
func testCollectAgentInfoWithTimeout(t *testing.T) {
ctv.logWriter.clearLog()
ctv.telemetryCache.ReinitializeCache()
ctv.telemetryCache.httpClientTimeout = 1
ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.CreateNode(1, "k8s-master", "10.20.0.2", "localhost")
_, err := ctv.telemetryCache.VppCache.RetrieveNode("k8s-master")
gomega.Expect(err).To(gomega.BeNil())
ctv.injectError = injectDelay
// Kick the telemetryCache to collect & validate data, give it an opportunity
// to run and wait for it to complete
ctv.tickerChan <- time.Time{}
ctv.telemetryCache.waitForValidationToFinish()
gomega.Expect(grep(ctv.report.Data["k8s-master"], "Timeout exceeded")).
To(gomega.Equal(numDTOs))
}
func testCollectAgentInfoValidationInProgress(t *testing.T) {
ctv.logWriter.clearLog()
ctv.telemetryCache.ReinitializeCache()
ctv.telemetryCache.validationInProgress = true
ctv.tickerChan <- time.Time{}
time.Sleep(1 * time.Millisecond)
ctv.telemetryCache.validationInProgress = false
gomega.Expect(grep(ctv.logWriter.log, "Skipping data collection")).To(gomega.Equal(1))
}
func grep(output []string, pattern string) int {
cnt := 0
for _, l := range output {
if strings.Contains(l, pattern) {
cnt++
}
}
return cnt
}
|
Introduction {#s1}
============
RNA molecules tend to adopt a folded conformation through the formation of Watson-Crick base pairing between complementary nucleotides. The resulting so-called RNA secondary structure emerges to be a key player in the regulations of gene expression [@pone.0073299-Yu1]--[@pone.0073299-Wan1]. By surveying secondary structures in various genomes, previous studies have revealed that a large number of genomes are being transcribed to produce non-coding RNAs that generally contain a conserved secondary structure [@pone.0073299-Pedersen1]--[@pone.0073299-Washietl1]. The structural conformation of the molecule is often necessary for its functions. Precursor microRNAs (pre-miRNAs) are among the largest examples that illustrate the functions of secondary structure in non-coding RNAs. The pre-miRNA contains a ∼70-bp hairpin, which is recognized by the Dicer protein and then the loop region is removed to leave a dsRNA [@pone.0073299-Pasquinelli1], [@pone.0073299-Chendrimada1]. The secondary structure in pre-miRNA is conserved during evolution [@pone.0073299-Lee1]--[@pone.0073299-Mimouni1], suggesting an important role of structural conformation in miRNA maturation. Interestingly, in recent years, a considerable number of protein-coding RNAs have been reported to contain local secondary structures [@pone.0073299-Katz1]--[@pone.0073299-Kertesz1]. Some translational processes, including translation initiation [@pone.0073299-Gu1]--[@pone.0073299-Kudla1], co-translational folding of protein [@pone.0073299-Watts1], [@pone.0073299-Proctor1], are sensitive to the variation of local structural stability. Moreover, a strong association between structural stability and protein abundance was observed in yeast [@pone.0073299-Zur1]. These results suggest an important role of mRNA structural stability, which might be different from the roles of conserved secondary structures reported by previous studies. Besides its functions, numerous studies have focused on the evolution of RNA secondary structure [@pone.0073299-Mimouni1], [@pone.0073299-Pereira1]--[@pone.0073299-Lind1] and revealed several mechanisms to maintain the secondary structure, including lower substitution rate [@pone.0073299-Piskol1] and compensatory mutations [@pone.0073299-Cheng1].
Mutations that occur in the primary sequence might lead to a disruption of the paired regions, thus changing the *structural conformation* or *structural stability* of the molecule and impairing its original function. Various studies focused on the selective constraints in folded RNAs that are mostly located in non-coding regions [@pone.0073299-Mimouni1], [@pone.0073299-Piskol1], [@pone.0073299-Dutheil1]. They found a lower substitution rate in paired regions in comparison with that in unpaired regions [@pone.0073299-Piskol1]. Moreover, previous studies aimed at attributing the variation of GC content to the selection for high structural stability of RNA [@pone.0073299-Rocha1], [@pone.0073299-Carmel1]. The association has been observed in several types of non-coding RNA, such as miRNA. In miRNA, GC content is positively correlated with the organism\'s physiological temperature [@pone.0073299-Carmel1], suggesting a possible association between the base-pairing strength of miRNA-targets and the temperature of an organism. Unlike non-coding RNAs, multiple selective constraints, including structural stability [@pone.0073299-Gu2], [@pone.0073299-Tuller2] and translation efficiency [@pone.0073299-Gingold1], [@pone.0073299-Shah1], operate on mRNAs. Both two constraints influence the pattern of synonymous mutation. If there is selection on local protein-coding region for high structural stability, codons in such region might be under conflicting selective pressures: the codons promoting RNA folding with high structural stability might be translationally non-optimal. In this case, the locations of synonymous substitutions might be non-random with respect to the translational efficiency and structural stability. Knowledge of this conflict can further our understanding of constraints imposed on protein-coding RNAs. The initial studies of secondary structure, in mammals as well as yeast [@pone.0073299-Chamary1], [@pone.0073299-Stoletzki1], considered the thermodynamic stability of mRNA mediated by the changes in secondary structure, and revealed that C preference at the four-fold degenerate sites might be partly driven by the selection for RNA stability [@pone.0073299-Chamary1]. However, these studies did not focus on local protein-coding regions that form local secondary structures, exhibiting high structural stability. Numerous lines of evidence indicate that mRNA folding windows are small [@pone.0073299-Schroeder1], [@pone.0073299-Pan1]. Therefore, it is reasonable to investigate the substitution patterns of structural regions based on local folding instead of global folding. Moreover, the analysis of selective constraints on local structural stability of protein-coding region has not been performed in the genome wide scale. Therefore, the aim of this study is to analyze the natural selection related to the local structural stability from a genome wide perspective.
In recent years, there has been a sharp growth in evidence showing widespread secondary structures in protein-coding region. In our previous study, we found that most of these structures exhibit high structural stability, while their structural conformations are non-conserved across different species [@pone.0073299-Mao2]. We therefore identified the regions with high structural stability in *Escherichia coli* (HSR, high structural stability regions) using a loose threshold ([Figure 1](#pone-0073299-g001){ref-type="fig"}, [Table S1](#pone.0073299.s007){ref-type="supplementary-material"}-[S2](#pone.0073299.s008){ref-type="supplementary-material"}) [@pone.0073299-Mao2], and revealed that number variation of HSR is correlated with gene functions, probably involving the regulations on the rhythm of translation elongation. However, the evolutionary pattern of HSR is still undetermined in that study. In particular, it remains unclear that how the structural stability of HSR is maintained under the constraint that multiple selective pressures are imposed on mRNA local regions. The selective pressure on HSR might be relaxed compared with that on structural RNA (e.g. 5 s rRNA), because there is a higher probability that a second mutation restores the structural stability disrupted by the first mutation. It is also of interesting to investigate the difference in the patterns of compensatory mutations between HSR and structural RNA. Therefore, in current study, we focus on the natural selections on HSRs, and aim at addressing the following questions that might advance our knowledge of selective pressures on mRNA: 1) Does selection for structural stability of HSR favor synonymous codons with high G/C? 2) How does HSR influence the local substitution rate of mRNA? 3) Since it is the structural stability rather than the structural conformation that is conserved, is the pattern of compensatory mutations in HSR different from that in structural RNA?
{ref-type="sec"} for details), the secondary structures are non-conserved.](pone.0073299.g001){#pone-0073299-g001}
Materials and Methods {#s2}
=====================
Coding sequence (CDS) and orthologs {#s2a}
-----------------------------------
Protein coding sequences of *Escherichia coli* K12 MG1655, *Escherichia fergusonii* ATCC and *Salmonella enterica* subsp. enterica serovar Typhi CT18 were downloaded from the National Center for Biotechnology Information FTP server (<ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/genomes/>). Sequences with length \<200 nucleotides (nt) were excluded. In total, we obtained 4152, 4126 and 4246 coding sequences in *Escherichia coli*, *Escherichia fergusonii* and *Salmonella enterica*, respectively.
Definition of HSR {#s2b}
-----------------
HSR exhibits high structural stability, while not all HSRs have a conserved secondary structure. We thus identified HSRs on mRNAs only based on the minimum folding free energy (MFE) of local regions. The method was described previously [@pone.0073299-Mao2]. The main steps are as follows. First, we calculated the normalized MFE, z-score, along CDS. For each CDS, we shuffled synonymous codons among sites with identical amino acids, controlling for amino-acid sequence, codon usage bias, and GC content. This process was repeated 100 times to generate 100 random sequences. We calculated MFE along CDS and the corresponding random sequences using a sliding window with 50 nt (approximately equal to the length of region (40 nt) covered by ribosome during elongation) in length and a step of 10 nt. MFE in each sliding window was calculated by RNAfold [@pone.0073299-Gruber1]. Z-score was calculated by [equation (1](#pone.0073299.e001){ref-type="disp-formula"}):where is the MFE of native sequence, and are the mean and standard deviation of MFE of 100 random sequences, respectively. Second, we used the following criteria to define HSR: 1) if a region contains more than two continuous sliding windows, in which the z-scores were all below the threshold of -0.65 [@pone.0073299-Mao2], the region was defined as HSR. 2) If the percentage of the overlapping sites of two adjacent HSRs was higher than 50%, the two HSRs were combined.
Mutational robustness of HSR {#s2c}
----------------------------
Mutational robustness of HSR refers to the sensitivity of structural stability to point mutations. We used two measures to estimate the mutational robustness of HSR. The first measure is the mean relative change of MFE over all single point mutations [@pone.0073299-Tuller2]. The second is the number of key sites. Key site indicates those sites, mutations on which result in more than 15% (other thresholds were also considered) increase in MFE. The two measures were obtained by performing the following analyses. First, for each site in HSR, three mutational sequences were generated by replacing original nucleotide with the other three nucleotides. Second, the MFE of the four sequences (one native and three mutational sequences) was calculated. The relative change of MFE was computed by [equation (2](#pone.0073299.e005){ref-type="disp-formula"}):where is the MFE of the i^th^ mutational sequence. is the MFE of the native sequence. refers to the absolute value. Third, the relative changes at all sites were averaged and the number of key sites was computed.
As a control, for each HSR, we generated 30 random HSRs (rHSRs) by shuffling all synonymous codons with identical amino acid, maintaining amino acid sequence and codon usage. Moreover, the MFE of rHSR is similar to that of the corresponding HSR (located in MFE~HSR~±10% MFE~HSR~). The relative change of MFE and the number of key sites in random sequence are the average values of 30 random sequences.
Calculation of local translation efficiency {#s2d}
-------------------------------------------
We used tRNA adaptation index (tAI) [@pone.0073299-Reis1] to measure the local translation efficiency. tAI was calculated by [equation (3](#pone.0073299.e009){ref-type="disp-formula"}):where n is the length (codons) of HSR, w~i~ is the relative adaptiveness value of codon i, which was calculated according to the work of dos Reis et al. [@pone.0073299-Reis1].
Conserved HSRs and flank regions {#s2e}
--------------------------------
First, we obtained the orthologous relationship between *Escherichia coli* and *Escherichia fergusonii* from the KEGG database [@pone.0073299-Kanehisa1]. Only one-to-one orthologs were used in the analyses. In total, 3138 orthologs were extracted. Amino acid sequences of orthologs were aligned using MUSCLE [@pone.0073299-Edgar1]. The alignments were subsequently converted into mRNA sequence alignments. Considering that insertions and deletions (indels) strongly affect the positions of HSRs, we discarded the alignments with total indels \>10 nt. 2676 alignments were left. Second, we defined the conserved HSRs between the two species. For each HSR in *Escherichia coli* (HSR-eco), we searched for the homologous HSR near the corresponding region of orthologs in *Escherichia fergusonii* (HSR-efe). If HSR-efe was found and the percentage of overlapping sites between HSR-eco and HSR-efe was higher than 50%, the overlapping regions of the two HSRs were defined as conserved HSRs ([Figure 2A](#pone-0073299-g002){ref-type="fig"}). The other HSRs existing in only one species were defined as specific HSRs ([Figure 2B](#pone-0073299-g002){ref-type="fig"}). Two background regions: FAR and BAR (FAR: forward adjacent region, BAR: backward adjacent region) were extracted and used as controls. The three regions have the same length. Considering that the substitution rate and GC content in the first 200 nt are significantly different from that in other regions ([Figure S1](#pone.0073299.s001){ref-type="supplementary-material"}), we discarded the data set FAR-HSR-BAR if FAR is located in the first 200 nt of CDS.
{#pone-0073299-g002}
Estimation of substitution rate {#s2f}
-------------------------------
For each orthologs, all sub-alignments covered by conserved HSRs were concatenated. The concatenated alignments with length \<100 nt were excluded. In total, 1217 alignments were remained. The concatenated alignments of FAR and BAR were obtained using the same method. The estimation for synonymous substitution rate (dS) was performed using the CODEML program of the PAML package [@pone.0073299-Yang1] with runmode -2. Alignments with dS \>3 were excluded.
Identification of compensatory mutations {#s2g}
----------------------------------------
We only considered single point mutations to investigate the pattern of compensatory mutations occurring in HSRs. First, we reconstructed the ancestral sequences of *Escherichia coli* and *Escherichia fergusonii* using the maximum likelihood method [@pone.0073299-Blanchette1]. Alignments with idels \>10 nt were not included. The indels in ancestral sequences were inferred by parsimony method using *Salmonella enterica* as outgroup. Again, HSRs in ancestral sequences and the conserved HSRs between ancestral and extant sequences, termed ancestral-extant HSRs, were defined using the same method as described above. Ancestral HSRs containing indels were discarded. In total, 11583 pairs of ancestral-extant HSRs were obtained.
Second, we defined the *first mutations* in ancestral-extant HSRs. For this purpose, we generated the pre-first-mutated HSR by introducing one mutation to ancestral HSR based on the synonymous substitutions in ancestral-extant HSRs ([Figure 3A-3B](#pone-0073299-g003){ref-type="fig"}). The relative change of MFE between pre-first-mutated and ancestral HSRs was calculated by [equation (4](#pone.0073299.e010){ref-type="disp-formula"}):where is the MFE of mutated HSR. refers to the MFE of ancestral HSR. refers to the absolute value. Mutations with relative change \>10% were defined as the first mutations, and the corresponding mutated HSRs were termed *first-mutated* HSRs.
{#pone-0073299-g003}
Third, we identified the *second mutations* occurring in the first-mutated HSRs using the same method ([Figure 3C-3D](#pone-0073299-g003){ref-type="fig"}). The second mutation refers to the mutation that decreases the MFE of the first-mutated HSR (i.e. the relative change of MFE between the first-mutated and second-mutated HSR \<0, [Figure 3](#pone-0073299-g003){ref-type="fig"}). Moreover, the second mutations, which decrease MFE of ancestral HSR without the occurrence of the first mutation (in this case, the second-mutated HSR can be treated as the pre-first mutated HSR), were excluded. The left second mutations were defined as the *compensatory mutations* corresponding to the first mutation ([Figure 3](#pone-0073299-g003){ref-type="fig"}).
As a control, for each pair of ancestral-extant HSRs, we simulated random extant HSR by randomly generating the synonymous mutations on ancestral HSR based on the number of synonymous substitutions in ancestral-extant HSRs and the genomic frequency of codons in extant species. This process was repeated 30 times to generate 30 pairs of ancestral-random HSRs. The compensatory mutations in ancestral-random HSRs were defined using the same method as described above.
Results {#s3}
=======
High mutational robustness of HSR {#s3a}
---------------------------------
Mutational robustness is the ability of genotypes to display high tolerance against mutations, which is considered a fundamental feature of biological systems, from single molecules to gene regulatory networks [@pone.0073299-Visser1], [@pone.0073299-Kitano1]. To maintain its functions, HSR is assumed to evolve to keep a high level of mutational robustness. [Table 1](#pone-0073299-t001){ref-type="table"} summaries the two measures to estimate the mutational robustness. In total, we identified 6352 conserved HSRs between *Escherichia coli* and *Escherichia fergusonii* ([Table 1](#pone-0073299-t001){ref-type="table"}, [Table S3](#pone.0073299.s009){ref-type="supplementary-material"}), which are located in 2256 genes (84.3% of all orthologs). In addition, 4202 and 4306 specific HSRs were detected in *Escherichia coli* and *Escherichia fergusonii*, respectively. We found that both conserved and specific HSRs have lower mean relative changes of MFE over all point mutations on HSRs (paired *t*-test, all *p*-values \<10^−16^, [Table 1](#pone-0073299-t001){ref-type="table"}), compared with the corresponding random HSRs with the same features. Considering that the difference in MFE between the native and random HSR (the MFE of random HSR is similar, not equal, to that of the native HSR) might affect the relative change of MFE, we also calculated the mean absolute change. The difference remains significant (paired *t*-test, all *p-*values \<10^−16^, [Table 1](#pone-0073299-t001){ref-type="table"}). The results suggest that HSRs have high tolerance to point mutations. Moreover, we computed the number of key sites, which strongly decrease the structural stability of HSR. Again, we found a lower number of key sites in both conserved and specific HSRs in comparison with that in random HSRs (paired *t*-test, all *p*-values \<10^−16^, [Table 1](#pone-0073299-t001){ref-type="table"}, [Figure S2](#pone.0073299.s002){ref-type="supplementary-material"}), indicating that there is a tendency to adjust the folded conformation of HSR to reduce the number of the sites, which have significant effect on structural stability. Overall, these results indicate that HSRs evolve to maintain high mutational robustness.
10.1371/journal.pone.0073299.t001
###### Mutational robustness of HSRs.
{#pone-0073299-t001-1}
HSR classification Number of HSRs Absolute change of MFE (95% CI [b](#nt102){ref-type="table-fn"}) Relative change of MFE (95% CI) Number of key sites (95% CI)
------------------------------------------------- ---------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------ --------------------------------- ------------------------------
Conserved HSR 6352 0.423 (0.409, 0.437) 0.0148 (0.0143, 0.0154) 3.337 (3.273, 3.460)
Conserved rHSR [a](#nt101){ref-type="table-fn"} 6352 0.501 (0.493, 0.509) 0.0188 (0.0185, 0.0191) 3.940 (3.875, 4.006)
HSR-eco 4202 0.367 (0.351, 0.384) 0.0137 (0.0130, 0.0144) 3.501 (3.391, 3.612)
rHSR-eco 4202 0.439 (0.430, 0.449) 0.0187 (0.0184, 0.0190) 4.169 (4.094, 4.243)
HSR-efe 4362 0.368 (0.352, 0.385) 0.0138 (0.0131, 0.0146) 3.778 (3.664, 3.893)
rHSR-efe 4362 0.435 (0.425, 0.444) 0.0176 (0.0172, 0.0180) 4.357 (4.284, 4.430)
rHSR: random HSR, which was generated by shuffling synonymous codons among sites with identical amino acids, while maintaining amino acid sequence, codon usage bias, and GC content. In addition, the MFE of rHSR is similar (located in MFE~HSR~±10%) to that of native HSR. HSR-eco (HSR-efe): the HSRs only exist in *Escherichia coli* (*Escherichia fergusonii*).
CI: confidence interval.
Guanine preference at the third sites {#s3b}
-------------------------------------
Although high percentage of GC content promotes RNA folding with high structural stability because GC pairs are more stable than AT pairs, it is not obvious that HSRs maintain high structural stability by increasing G/C content during evolution. There are multiple selective pressures, including selections for RNA folding and translation efficiency, appearing to affect the patterns of synonymous mutation. Therefore, increasing GC content does not always benefit translational regulation. In particular, codon order in HSR instead of base composition might be adjusted to meet the requirements for structural stability and translation efficiency.
Here, we asked whether GC content in HSR is under selection for high structural stability. We analyzed GC content at the four-fold degenerate sites in the three regions: FAR, HSR and BAR. We found that HSR exhibits significantly higher G content than the other two regions (paired *t*-test, all *p*-values \<10^−16^, [Table 2](#pone-0073299-t002){ref-type="table"}). There is also a slightly increasing C content in HSRs (paired *t*-test, *p*-values \<0.01). These results indicate a selection for increasing G and C (especially for G) in HSRs. Meanwhile, by checking local translation efficiency measured by tAI, we found a trend towards increasing translation efficiency in HSRs (paired *t*-test, *p*-values \<10^−5^, [Table 2](#pone-0073299-t002){ref-type="table"}). Therefore, the possibility remains that the selection for translation efficiency might be responsible for the high G/C content observed in HSRs. To resolve this issue, we simulated random mutations on HSRs by replacing the nucleotides at the four-fold degenerate sites with other nucleotides. For each HSR, half of the four-fold degenerate sites were randomly selected and mutated to generate four types of substituted sequences: G-Seq (G rich sequence, replacing nucleotides with G, the same to others), C-Seq, T-Seq, and A-Seq. To exclude the effect of substituted positions, for each type of sequence, we generated 50 substituted sequences, and calculated the mean MFE difference between native and substituted sequences. We found that G-seqs have a lower mean MFE than native sequences (paired *t*-test, *p*-value \<10^−16^), whereas other three types of substituted sequences show significantly increased MFE (paired *t*-test, all *p*-values \<10^−16^, [Figure 4A](#pone-0073299-g004){ref-type="fig"}), suggesting that increasing A/T/C (especially for A/T) or decreasing G in HSR will decrease the structural stability of HSR. Interestingly, we found an opposite pattern when comparing local translation efficiency between substituted and native sequences. Only C-seqs have a higher mean value of tAI, which is approximately equal to that of native sequences (0.257 in C-seqs vs. 0.255 in native sequences). The other three types of substitutions significantly decrease the translation efficiency in HSRs (paired *t*-test, all *p*-values \<10^−16^, [Figure 4B](#pone-0073299-g004){ref-type="fig"}). In addition, considering that HSRs are G preference, G-seqs have a lower number of substitutions than the other types of sequences, which might influence the significance inferred from G-seqs, we thus performed a similar analysis using the HSRs with G content \<0.25. Similar results were obtained ([Figure S3](#pone.0073299.s003){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). Overall, these results suggest that the increased G content in HSRs results from the selection for maintaining high structural stability.
{#pone-0073299-g004}
10.1371/journal.pone.0073299.t002
###### Comparison of base composition among three regions.
{#pone-0073299-t002-2}
Species Regions MFE (kcal/mol) Base Composition tAI
--------- --------- ---------------- ------------------------------------------------ --------------- --------------- --------------- ---------------
ECO FAR −22.25 (7.55) 0.131 (0.072 [a](#nt103){ref-type="table-fn"}) 0.231 (0.092) 0.355 (0.105) 0.284 (0.093) 0.250 (0.033)
HSR −25.21 (7.73) 0.107 (0.068) 0.195 (0.088) 0.412 (0.106) 0.285 (0.088) 0.255 (0.033)
BAR −22.23 (7.47) 0.136 (0.075) 0.229 (0.096) 0.359 (0.108) 0.277 (0.089) 0.249 (0.034)
EFE FAR −21.57 (7.13) 0.151 (0.076) 0.252 (0.095) 0.333 (0.104) 0.264 (0.088) 0.282 (0.039)
HSR −24.73 (7.68) 0.130 (0.074) 0.213 (0.088) 0.385 (0.108) 0.271 (0.084) 0.286 (0.039)
BAR −20.94 (7.08) 0.155 (0.081) 0.249 (0.092) 0.332 (0.104) 0.263 (0.085) 0.280 (0.039)
The standard deviations are shown in parentheses.
Substitution rate variation {#s3c}
---------------------------
Mutational robustness is correlated with structural functionality and complexity. The results in previous sections showed that the number of key sites in HSR is lower than that in the corresponding random HSR. In addition, we compared base compositions of key sites and non-key sites, and found that key sites are G preference. About 70.2% key sites are G, while the percentage in non-key sites is about 24.7% ([Figure 5](#pone-0073299-g005){ref-type="fig"}). Note that HSRs with high percentage of G are sensitive to mutation, making it difficult to maintain high mutational robustness. In this case, one might expect lower dS in HSRs to reduce the harm of mutations. Indeed, we found a reduced dS in HSRs compared with that in the other two regions (Wilcoxon test, all *p*-values \<0.05, [Figure 6](#pone-0073299-g006){ref-type="fig"}). Moreover, we estimated the dS of the codons that contain key sites. Again, the dS is significantly lower than that of the other codons in HSR (Wilcoxon test, *p*-value \<10^−5^, [Figure 6](#pone-0073299-g006){ref-type="fig"}). Considering that the codons with key sites are G preference, which might affect the inferred substitution pattern, we randomly extracted the codons in other regions (non-HSRs), which are identical to the codons with key sites in HSRs. We estimated the dS of these "random" codons, and found a higher dS compared with that of the codons with key sites (Wilcoxon test, *p*-value \<10^−5^). Overall, the results that HSRs have lower synonymous substitution rate, especially for the codons with key sites, suggest a selective constraint imposed on HSRs to reduce the harm of mutations.
{#pone-0073299-g005}
{#pone-0073299-g006}
Compensatory mutations in HSRs {#s3d}
------------------------------
Distinct positions in structural RNA may not evolve independently because of shared structural or functional constraints. Considering the RNA with functional secondary structure, mutations on some sites (key sites) might disrupt the secondary structure, thus disabling its original function. Besides the strategy involving the reduction of the substitution rate on key sites (as suggested in previous section), another strategy is used to decrease the harm of the mutations on key sites. That is, a second (so called "compensatory") mutation occurs on the specific site to restore the original conformation [@pone.0073299-Cheng1], [@pone.0073299-Levin1], [@pone.0073299-Hancock1]. Previous studies on conserved secondary structure have revealed that the compensatory mutations should have a fitness equivalent to the wild type, resulting in an increasing of the substitution rate among these specific sites compared with that of key sites [@pone.0073299-Knies1].
By analogy with the conserved secondary structure, compensatory mutations might be observed in HSRs, although it is the structural stability instead of the structure conformation that is maintained during evolution. Indeed, we found that the dS of non-key sites is higher slightly than that of background regions (0.339 in non-key sites vs. 0.283 in FAR and 0.295 in BAR, [Figure 6](#pone-0073299-g006){ref-type="fig"}), suggesting a relaxed selective constraint on non-key sites in HSRs compared with that on key sites. Consequently, we asked whether the compensatory mutations occurring on non-key sites account for this result. We first compared the effect of observed synonymous mutations on MFE between the ancestral-extant and ancestral-random HSRs. We found that the mean relative change of MFE caused by synonymous mutations in ancestral-extant HSRs is significantly lower than that in ancestral-random HSRs (0.028 vs. 0.060, paired *t*-test, *p*-value \<10^−16^), indicating that the locations and patterns of synonymous mutations are non-random with respect to structural stability. This result also indicates a possibility that compensatory mutations occur to decrease the overall relative changes of MFE caused by mutations.
We then identified the compensatory mutations for each synonymous mutation that strongly increases the MFE of HSR. In two species, 2294 synonymous mutations (9.60% of all synonymous mutations) were extracted and treated as the first mutations ([Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}). In 41.70% of the first mutations in *Escherichia coli*, compensatory mutations were observed. The percentage is higher (*t*-test, *p*-value \<10^−16^, [Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}) than that in ancestral-random HSRs. A similar pattern was observed in *Escherichia fergusonii* ([Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}). Note that only single point mutations were used and the conjugated effect of two or more than two point mutations was not considered. The true percentage of the compensatory mutations could be substantially higher than the observed value.
10.1371/journal.pone.0073299.t003
###### Summary of compensatory mutations.
{#pone-0073299-t003-3}
Type Species Number of first mutations Number of compensatory mutations Percentage [c](#nt106){ref-type="table-fn"} (%) Paired/Unpaired [d](#nt107){ref-type="table-fn"}
----------------------------------- -------------------------------------- --------------------------- ---------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------
I[a](#nt104){ref-type="table-fn"} ECO [b](#nt105){ref-type="table-fn"} 1115 691 41.70 0.578
Random 1693.3 (34.6) 637.0 (28.8) 28.59 (1.08) 0.657 (0.045)
EFE 1719 842 33.92 0.520
Random 1668.8 (24.2) 639.7 (31.7) 28.77 (1.19) 0.614 (0.050)
II ECO 931 337 9.47 --
Random 607.0 (25.3) 823.5 (30.8) 67.6 (1.96) --
EFE 778 364 9.35 --
Random 695.8 (15.9) 950.2 (39.4) 67.9 (1.66) --
Type refers to the two types of first mutations. I indicates the first mutations, which increase the MFE of ancestral HSR; II indicates the first mutations, which decrease the MFE of ancestral HSR (see text for details).
ECO (EFE) refers to the pair of ancestral-extant HSRs in *Escherichia coli* (*Escherichia fergusonii*); Random refers to the pair of ancestral-random HSRs, which were obtained by randomly generating the synonymous mutations based on the number of synonymous substitutions in corresponding ancestral-extant HSRs and the genomic frequency of codons.
Percentage refers to the percentage of the first mutations, which decrease the MFE of ancestral HSR while compensatory mutations exist to partly restore this disruption. Two or more compensatory mutations were observed in a few first mutations. Thus, the percentage is lower than the ratio: Number of compensatory mutations/Number of first mutations.
Paired means that the first mutated base is paired with the second mutated base, while unpaired means that the two mutated bases are unpaired.
We classified all compensatory mutations into two types: paired and unpaired. Paired means that the first mutated base is paired with the second mutated base, while the unpaired means that the two mutated bases are unpaired. We calculated the ratio paired/unpaired and surprisingly found that the ratio is lower than the expected value in the two species (*t*-test, all *p-*values \<10^−7^, [Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}), which is different from the pattern inferred from the conserved secondary structure (the ratio is higher than the expected value) [@pone.0073299-Cheng1]. This result is consistent with the idea that structural stability instead of structural conformation in HSR is conserved during evolution [@pone.0073299-Mao2], [@pone.0073299-Tuller2].
In addition, we redefined the first mutations as the synonymous mutations that result in \>10% **decrease** in MFE of ancestral HSR. We performed a similar analysis as above based on the new first-mutated HSRs to test whether there are compensatory mutations that restore the MFE decreased by the first mutation. Interestingly, compensatory mutations were found only in 9.47% of the first-mutated HSRs in *Escherichia coli*, which is significantly lower (*t*-test, *p-*value \<10^−16^, [Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}) than that in random mutations. A similar pattern was found in *Escherichia fergusonii* ([Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}). The results suggest that only a few mutations that increase structural stability of HSR are subject to negative selection. Overall, the findings suggest that a compensatory mechanism exists to maintain the high structural stability of HSRs.
Discussion {#s4}
==========
mRNA is a key component of a complex regulatory network. It accommodates numerous regulatory signals delineated along the protein coding regions in an intricate overlapping manner [@pone.0073299-Shabalina1]. A worthy issue is that how these signals evolve to meet the requirements of the regulations on different levels of translation, and how the evolutionary patterns of these regulatory elements affect the observed evolutionary pathway of genome. In this study, we focused on one of the most important regulatory elements, mRNA secondary structure, and investigated their evolutionary patterns. HSR is a special region on mRNA containing a local secondary structure. A considerable proportion of mRNAs are covered by HSRs (about 30% on average). Therefore, base compositions and substitution rate of mRNA might be remarkably affected by HSRs.
In current study, we found that HSRs have high mutational robustness compared with random HSRs. It suggests that the folded conformation of HSR is adjusted to reduce the harm of mutation. We subsequently asked how the mutational robustness is maintained. Since base composition has strong effect on structural stability of HSR, we thus focused on the GC content of HSR. The results showed that HSRs are G preference, supporting the hypothesis that the selective constraint for high structural stability might partly account for high percentage of G in *Escherichia coli* genome. Note that the observed G contents in the other two background regions are higher than the other three bases. This suggests that there are other selective pressures imposed on mRNA, resulting in the variation of G content among sites, as suggested by the previous studies [@pone.0073299-Wan1], [@pone.0073299-Gu2], [@pone.0073299-Botzman1].
Our result is different from the claim in the work of Chamary et al. [@pone.0073299-Chamary1], which showed that mRNA stability partly drives C preference in *Mus musculus*. To explain the difference, we analyzed the relationship between the local stability and base composition of the 70 coding sequences used in their study. Again, we found that G content at the four-fold degenerate sites in HSRs is higher than that in background regions (0.276 in HSR vs. 0.238 in FAR, Wilcoxon test, *p-*value = 0.050, and 0.227 in BAR, *p-*value = 0.011, ). Although there is a universal excess of C over G, the difference in C contents among FAR, HSR and BAR is not significant (Wilcoxon test, all *p*-values values \>0.1, [Figure S4](#pone.0073299.s004){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). In addition, we compared the mean MFE of the four types of substituted sequences, and found that the pattern is similar with that in *Escherichia coli* ([Figure S5](#pone.0073299.s005){ref-type="supplementary-material"}). Note that global mRNA was folded in the work of Chamary et al. [@pone.0073299-Chamary1], which might be involved in the global regulation of translation, such as RNA decay. We focused on local structural stability, which regulates a series of co-translational processes. Therefore, the difference between the two studies might result from the different methods dealing with RNA folding.
Although high percentage of G promotes HSR folding with high stability, increasing G will decrease the mutational robustness of HSR. An efficient strategy is to keep low substitution rate in HSR, especially for the key sites. As expected, a lower dS in HSR was observed. This result is consistent with the findings in a recent work [@pone.0073299-Park1], which revealed a significant correlation between mRNA structural stability and synonymous rate, as well as structural stability and non-synonymous substitution rate [@pone.0073299-Park1]. Moreover, note that horizontal gene transfer (HGT) occurs frequently in *Escherichia coli* [@pone.0073299-Koonin1]. The results might be affected by HGT events. Therefore, we discarded the predicted HGT genes, obtained from the works of Garcia-Vallvé et al. [@pone.0073299-GarciaVallv1], and re-estimated substitution rate and GC content in HSRs. Similar results were obtained ([Figure S6](#pone.0073299.s006){ref-type="supplementary-material"}).
The dS in non-key sites is approximately equal to that in background regions. We proposed that compensatory mutations, occurring in about 40% first-mutated HSRs, partly account for this result ([Table 3](#pone-0073299-t003){ref-type="table"}). Moreover, we calculated the number of compensatory mutations, and found that two or more compensatory mutations were detected in more than 30% first-mutated HSRs ([Figure 7](#pone-0073299-g007){ref-type="fig"}). This result suggests a different type of compensatory evolution compared with that occurring in the structural RNAs, in which the compensatory mutation is site-specific, and co-evolution would be observed during evolution. In HSRs, however, the substitution patterns of a large number of sites are affected by key sites, making it difficult to detect an obvious co-evolution. In addition, we only considered single point mutations to detect the compensatory mutations. In fact, it is more likely that multiple mutations coordinate the folded conformation to restore the disrupted MFE. The conjugated effect of multiple mutations are worth pursuing at a deeper level.
{#pone-0073299-g007}
Supporting Information {#s5}
======================
######
**GC content and sequence identity along mRNA.** In the first 30 codons of mRNA, GC content (A) at the three positions of codon is significantly lower than that in other regions. The sequence identity (B) in the first 50 codons is different from the latter regions.
(TIF)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Number of key sites under different thresholds.** The number of key sites in native HSRs is significantly lower (paired *t*-test, all *p*-values \<10^−16^) than that in random HSRs when threshold \<0.2. In both native and random HSRs, the numbers of key sites are close to 0 when threshold \>0.2.
(TIF)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Comparison of MFE and tAI among four types of substituted sequences.** Four types of sequences refer to the substituted HSRs replacing nucleotides at the four-fold degenerate sites with A, T, G, or C, respectively. The mean MFE (A) and tAI (B) of native HSRs is indicated by dashes, respectively. The data was based on the HSRs with G\<0.25.
(TIF)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Comparison of base composition in three regions, showing G preference in HSRs.** The data were obtained based on 70 mRNAs in *Mus musculus*.
(TIF)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Comparison of MFE and tAI among four types of substituted sequences.** The data were calculated based on 70 mRNAs in *Mus musculus*.
(TIF)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Comparisons of synonymous substitution rates and base compositions in the three regions.** The data were obtained by excluding the genes detecting the horizontal gene transfer event.
(TIF)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Positions of HSRs in** ***Escherichia coli*** **.**
(XLS)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Positions of HSRs in Escherichia fergusonii.**
(XLS)
######
Click here for additional data file.
######
**Positions of conserved HSRs between** ***Escherichia coli*** **and** ***Escherichia fergusonii*** **.**
(XLS)
######
Click here for additional data file.
The authors are grateful to the two anonymous reviewers for their excellent suggestions.
[^1]: **Competing Interests:**The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
[^2]: Conceived and designed the experiments: YM GW ST. Performed the experiments: YM QL YZ. Analyzed the data: YZ JZ. Wrote the paper: YM GW ST.
|
Mission Index
Get a sample of the Clockwork gear shafts
The Clockwork have been getting tougher recently. We think it might be the gear shafts they are using. Can you get us a sample of the Clockwork gear shafts?
We believe that Tarang Chonk is running the facility I am sending you to.
Part 1: Get sample from the Clockwork(Seek Clockwork parts)Abandoned office @ Skyway City (Clockwork)
The doorknob has been removed, no doubt as part of the Clockwork's regular scavenging.
Objective: Among the rubble you found the gear shafts.
Clockwork gear shafts
These parts are obviously being used to create advanced Clockwork constructs.
Mission Complete: You found the Clockwork gear shafts.
I'm not familiar with this metal, but I'll get it analyzed. Thanks a lot, Red Tomax.
You say the Clockwork seemed to recognize you? That's so strange. Perhaps they share some sort of hive memory? After all the Clockwork King's remarkable innovations, I guess that shouldn't surprise me. |
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Tuesday, April 1, 2008
But at that moment the same monk who had been there before entered the inn, and with him two others, older then him. The servants of the monastery carried behind them willow baskets which contained bottles of wine and some tidbits. The two monks greeted the duchess and again reproached her for not going directly to the abbey. She explained to them again, that having slept during the day, she was traveling at night for coolness, therefore she did not need any sleep, and as she did not wish to awaken the good abbot nor the monks, she preferred to stop in an inn to stretch her legs.
After exchange of pleasant words, it was finally agreed, that after the morning mass, the duchess with her court would have breakfast and rest in the monastery. The monks also invited the noblemen from Masovia and Krakow, and Macko of Bogdaniec who was going to the monastery anyway, to deposit his wealth acquired in the war and as a gift from Duke Witold. This treasure was destined to buy back the Bogdaniec estate. Young Zbyszko did not hear the invitation, because he had rushed to his wagon which was guarded by his servants, to procure better apparel for himself. He ordered his chests to be carried to a room in the inn and there he began to dress. First he hastily combed his hair and put it in a silk net ornamented with amber beads, and in the front with real pearls. Then he put on a coat of white silk embroidered with golden griffins, he put on a golden belt from which was hanging a small sword in an ivory scabbard ornamented with gold. Everything was new, shining and free of spots of blood, although it had been taken as booty from a knight who served with the Teutonic Knights. Then Zbyszko put on trousers, one part had red and green stripes, the other part, yellow and purple, and both ended at the top like a checkered chessboard. After that he put on red shoes with long points. Fresh and handsome he went into the room.
As he stood in the door, his appearance made a great impression. The duchess seeing now what a handsome knight had vowed to Danusia, was still more pleased. Danusia jumped toward him. But either the hansom look of the young man or the sounds of admiration from the courtiers caused her to pause before she reached him, she suddenly dropped her eyes and joining her hands together, begin to wring her fingers in confusion.After her, others came closer: the duchess herself, the courtiers, the musicians and the monks. All wanted to see him. The young Masovian girls were looking at him as at a rainbow, each regretting that he had not chosen her. The older ones admired the costly dress. So, a circle of curious ones was formed around him. Zbyszko stood in the center with a boastful smile on his youthful face, and turned slightly, so that they could see him better. |
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ocular insert for dispensing drugs to the eye, and, more especially, relates to an ocular insert having an improved size and shape such that the device is easily inserted into and comfortably retained within the eye, but which nevertheless is markedly resistant to expulsion therefrom.
2. Description of the Prior Art
At the present time, diseases of the eye are usually treated by applying ophthalmic drugs in liquid or ointment form. To be effective in many cases, the application of drug should be substantially continuous. Such continuous delivery of drug is not obtained through the use of liquid or ointment dosage forms, even though they be applied at intervals during the day and night. Periodic application of these dosage forms results in the eye receiving a massive, but unpredictable, amount of drug at the time of application, but the drug is washed away rapidly by tears, leaving the eye without medication until the next application. Ointment dosage forms are presently available only in unsterilized form and this too presents a problem.
At a very early time, drugs were dissolved and dispersed in a water-soluble gel of glycerinated gelatin that was shaped to the form of a lamella or eye disk. These lamellae were applied to the inner surface of the eyelid to supply drug to the eye. In use, the glycerinated gelatin vehicle dissolved rapidly to tear liquid, producing the same type of effect as liquid dosage forms. Lamellae were not a sustained-release dosage form. It is understood that same are not used in this country, although they may be used to a small extent in Europe. Further information on these water-soluble dosage forms can be found in Remington's Pharmaceutical Sciences, XIII, pages 547-8 (Mack Publishing Co., Easton, Pa. 1965); Fishburn, An Introduction to Pharmaceutical Formulation, page 116 (Pergamon Press Ltd., New York City, N.Y. 1965); and U.S. Pat. No. 273,410, Mar. 6, 1883.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,416,530, granted Dec. 17, 1968, and assigned to the assignee of this invention, is directed to the invention of a drug-dispensing ocular insert that truly acts as a depot or drug reservoir, retaining the slowly releasing drug to the eye for prolonged periods of time. Such ocular inserts are fabricated of flexible polymeric materials that are biologically inert, nonallergenic, and insoluble in tear liquid. To initiate the therapeutic program, the ocular insert is placed in the cul-de-sac of the conjunctiva between the sclera of the eyeball and the lid. Since the polymeric material from which the ocular insert is formed is insoluble in tear liquid, it retains its integrity and remains intact during the course of therapy, acting as a reservoir to continuously release drug to the eye and surrounding tissues at a rate which is not affected by dissolution or erosion of the polymeric material. On termination of the therapeutic program, the ocular insert is removed from the cul-de-sac. Thus, a single such ocular insert provides the complete ophthalmic dosage regime for a particular time period, on the order of 24 hours or longer. Frequently repeated applications, as is necessary with liquids, ointments, or water-soluble lamellae, often requiring awakening the patient during the night, are avoided.
To provide for release of ophthalmic drug from the polymeric body of the ocular insert, U.S. Pat. No. 3,416,530 describes using polymeric materials which are perforated with capillary openings. While these capillary openings are effective to release drug to the eye, they add considerable complexity to the manufacture of ocular inserts; for it is difficult to control the size of these openings in large-scale manufacturing using various polymers.
An improved drug-dispensing ocular insert, or medication-dispensing tablet for a human eyeball, which even more truly acts as a reservoir for the continuous, prolonged and controlled release of drugs to the eye, and which is not dependent upon the size and number of perforations or pores in the polymeric body of the ocular insert, is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,618,604, granted Nov. 9, 1971, also assigned to the assignee of this invention. This '604 patented drug-delivery ocular insert to more controlledly deliver drug to the eye over a prolonged period of time, comprises a flexible body of polymeric material insoluble in tear liquid, being non-allergenic and biologically inert, and has an imperforate surface, the said body containing a drug which is dispensed to the eye in a therapeutically effective amount by diffusion through the polymeric material. This ocular insert is adapted for insertion in the cul-de-sac of the conjunctiva between the sclera of the eyeball and either the upper or lower eyelid, to be held in place against the eyeball by the pressure of the lid.
Compare also those drug-dispensing ocular inserts and accessory items therefor described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,626,940, 3,630,200, 3,656,481 and 3,710,795.
Nevertheless, certain individual wearers of the aforesaid drug-dispensing ocular inserts, albeit comfortable, and as same are designed to fit under but a single eyelid, have experienced varying difficulties in the regard of maintaining and retaining a given device in proper place under either the upper or lower eyelid while sleeping or during normal ocular motion. In these admittedly rare individuals, certain unspecified normal or abnormal ocular motions during daily wear, or the process known as Bell's Phenomenon while sleeping, whereby the eye has a tendency to roll upward, tend to result in the accidental expulsion of the device from the eye, thus proving annoying and/or depriving the wearer of the beneficial effects of the drug entity contained therein. |
Coordinated home care: the Massachusetts General Hospital experience.
The problem of post-hospital care remains a continued challenge, as many patients who no longer require expensive acute care facilities continue to occupy these beds, awaiting appropriate placement. The Massachusetts General Hospital Coordinated Home Care program, under the central administration of the Boston Visiting Nurse Association, has demonstrated that home care can be a viable, economically feasible alternative to institutionalization for carefully selected patients, when the appropriate medical and social needs can be met. Three major groups of patients have been effectively cared for: 1) patients with multi-system chronic illness; 2) patients with terminal malignancies; and 3) patients with catastrophic neurologic disease. The organization of the Coordinated Home Care program, the criteria for patient selection, and the issue of funding are reviewed. The impact of this program is examined in terms of its potential for better utilization of the Massachusetts General Hospital facilities, as well as the more appropriate coordination and use of existing health care resources in the community. |
UPGRADE YOUR CAR HIRE
ALICANTE FLY-DRIVE
Choose a car to suit your needs and explore the Costa Brava in comfort and style.
Car hire in Alicante
British Airways car hire, in partnership with Avis, includes all of the mandatorycharges that you'll need to drive away your car in Alicante.
• Unlimited mileage
• 24–hour customer support and roadside assistance
• Collect Avios on every rental
• Free additional driver for Executive Club members worldwide
Hire a car in Alicante and explore the beautiful Costa Brava coast, with its stunning beaches and striking mountains. Fly-drive holidays give you the freedom and flexibility to explore – get more from your trip with British Airways.
Choose a car that suits your holiday type, from a practical family car to a stylish vehicle that will turn heads. Combine a city break in Valencia or Alicante with a beach break in Benidorm or time spent exploring rural Denia and Javea. Save money when you book a flight + car package and earn Avios, which you can redeem on your next holiday.
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Head north to Valencia and take the coastal route. Pass through thriving Benidorm, with its dominant high-rise buildings, to Altea – a former fishing village reminiscent of past times. Catch sight of Calpe, a romantic village, and Denia with its sublime beaches and palm-lined promenade with cafes and designer shops. Valencia is the third largest city in Spain and is surrounded by rice fields and orange groves. More cultural than its neighbouring areas, there is plenty to see and do.
At the southernmost tip of Costa Blanca is La Manga, which can be easily reached from Alicante. Situated at the start of the Costa Callide ‘the warm coast’, the area's desirable climate makes it popular all year-round. La Manga offers an abundance of golf courses, including the famous La Manga Golf Course. Pass the attractive town of Torrevieja en route and spend some time at Mar Menor, Europe’s largest saltwater lake – its shallow, calm lagoon is a popular choice with families.
Head north along the coastal route taking in Villajoysa, a small fishing village. Carry on further northwards and catch a glimpse of the beaches of lively Benidorm, quaint Altea and picturesque Calpe. Visit the caves at Vall d'Ebo and then move on to the Blue Flag beaches of Denia. Absorb the town’s traditional Spanish feel, relax in the cafes and shop in designer boutiques. If you decide to stopover, the buzzing nightlife, great choice of dining and cosmopolitan port will keep you entertained.
Spend a day exploring the areas that surround Alicante. Head inland to see the Cuevas del Canelobre. You’ll pass scenic countryside and breathtaking mountain ranges on the way. These fascinating caves are situated 24km from Alicante and house the highest vaults in the whole of Spain. Their interior, which is often compared to that of a cathedral, has coloured lights that illuminate the rock and mineral formations. Afterwards go to charming Busot, which boasts unique views, a range of restaurants and hiking trails.
Enjoy a charming drive into the mountains to the small town of Guadalest, which has been declared a 'Monument of Historical and Artistic Value' and is a must for any fly-drive holiday to the Costa Blanca. This very pretty, historic town will entice you with its cobbled streets and whitewashed houses. Sightseeing options include El Castell de Guadalest, which boasts fantastic views of the village from its cliff top location. |
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Will not cremate my son until CM Akhilesh Yadav visits us: Martyr Sudhesh Kumar’s father
By NewsX Bureau
| Tuesday, October 18, 2016 - 18:37
First Published |
Tuesday, October 18, 2016 - 17:13
Uttar Pradesh: The family of Sepoy Sudhesh Kumar, who was martyred in firing by Pakistan along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir, on Tuesday, said that they want Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav to attend the last rites of Sepoy.
Brahmpal Singh, the father of late Sudhesh Kumar told media that he will cremate his son only when the Chief Minister arrives in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh as he (Yadav) should not discriminate between martyrs.
“I will cremate my son only when the Chief Minister arrives here as he (Yadav) should not discriminate between martyrs,” Brahmpal said.
"The Chief Minister had gone to a martyr's house in Etah as he was a Yadav, he should also come here as there should not be any discrimination between martyrs", he added.
Santosh Kumari, the mother of Sudhesh Kumar demanded a government job for the soldier’s widow.
"If we get financial help we will ensure proper education of his four year-old daughter so that she too can join the army and serve the country", Santosh Kumari said. |
Should patients with hypertension receive antithrombotic therapy?
The main complications of hypertension, i.e. coronary heart disease, ischaemic strokes and peripheral vascular disease (PVD), are usually related to thrombosis. Increasing evidence also suggests that hypertension fulfils the components of Virchow's triad, thus conferring a prothrombotic or hypercoagulable state, as evident by abnormalities of haemostasis, platelets and endothelial function. It therefore seems plausible that use of antithrombotic therapy may help prevent these thrombosis-related complications of hypertension. Indeed, hypertensive patients with an estimated 10-year CHD risk > or = 15% will have their cardiovascular risk reduced by 25% using antihypertensive treatment, but the addition of aspirin further reduces major cardiovascular events by 15%. Recent guidelines recommend the use of aspirin 75 mg daily for hypertensive patients who have no contraindication to aspirin, in one of the following categories: (i) secondary prevention - cardiovascular complications (myocardial infarction, angina, non-haemorrhagic stroke, peripheral vascular disease or atherosclerotic renovascular disease); and (ii) primary prevention - those with blood pressure controlled to < 150/90 mmHg and one of: (a) age > or = 50 years and target organ damage (e.g. LVH, renal impairment, or proteinuria); (b) a 10-year CHD risk > or = 15%; or (c) type II diabetes mellitus. However, some of the risks of aspirin administration, namely increased incidence of major bleeding events, may possibly outweigh the benefits, especially in low-risk individuals. |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for improving the loss ratio on a book of insurance. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for improving the loss ratio on a book of insurance such as a worker's compensation, general liability, products liability, property, professional liability or the like.
2. General Background of the Invention
Traditionally, entities such as businesses purchase insurance from licensed insurance companies or underwriters through their insurance agent. Insurance agents typically have access to many insurance companies through their markets. The agent and the business seeking insurance typically complete a standardized application for insurance coverage (for example, that form provided by Accord).
The application is typically transmitted via fax or electronically to underwriters who then determine if the risk falls within the underwriters' acceptable underwriting guidelines. If so, they determine a rate for one or more types of coverages, possibly with variable limits, and produce a quote and send it back to the agent. The agent then presents the quotes obtained from the market to his client (the business owner).
When the business owner and the agent decide to accept the quote, the agent binds coverage which in effect tells the underwriter that they accept the quote and would like coverage to begin on a certain date and time. The underwriter then produces a policy and sends it to the agent or business owner who is now the insured. The underwriter also produces an invoice and sends it to the agent or the insured. Usually with the invoice comes loss reporting instructions and other materials to assist the insured with being compliant with applicable laws.
During the policy period each insured enjoys the comfort of knowing that certain losses will be covered by the policy in exchange for conforming with the policy terms (paying the premium and acting in good faith).
With worker's compensation and general liability coverages, the premiums are determined by amount of payroll, by job classification, and by gross revenues. When applying for insurance for one year terms, these figures are typically estimated on the insurance application, and from those estimates, the underwriter's rates are applied and premium determined. After policy expiration, under the policy terms the underwriter has the right to audit the insured's actual payroll, gross sales, and/or proper classification to determine whether additional premium or refund is due.
While certain novel features of the invention shown and described below are pointed out in the annexed claims, the invention is not intended to be limited to the details specified, since a person of ordinary skill in the relevant art will understand that various omissions, modifications, substitutions and changes in the forms and details of the invention illustrated and in its operation may be made without departing in any way from the spirit of the present invention. No feature of the invention is critical or essential unless it is expressly stated as being “critical” or “essential.” |
Q:
Gluon Mobile Scrollable Dropdown Button
Is there a way to make the dropdown button contents scrollable? I have a lot of menu items that extend the dropdown list beyond the screen of the device.
try {
DropdownButton merchantChooser = (DropdownButton) this.view.lookup("#review-merchant-chooser");
VBox container = (VBox) this.view.lookup("#review-container");
TextArea area = (TextArea) this.view.lookup("#review-text");
StackPane sp = (StackPane) this.view.lookup("#review-wrapper");
Button btn = (Button) this.view.lookup("#review-submit");
Utility.setBackground(sp, Utility.bannerImg2);
Utility.setFadedBackground(true, container);
merchantChooser.getItems().clear();
if (MainView.merchants.isInitialized()) {
btn.setDisable(false);
MenuItem firstItem = null;
for (int i = 0; i < MainView.merchants.size(); i++) {
Label label = new Label(MainView.merchants.get(i).getName());
label.setWrapText(true);
MenuItem item = new MenuItem(label.getText());
merchantChooser.getItems().add(item);
if(i == 0)
firstItem = item;
}
merchantChooser.setSelectedItem(firstItem);
merchantChooser.setPrefWidth(200);
}
else
{
btn.setDisable(true);
}
btn.setOnMouseClicked(e -> {
//ENTER BACKEND POST HERE TO SEND REVIEW TO DATABASE!!
});
} catch (NullPointerException nex) {
System.out.println("Null pointer at AddReviewView");
} catch (Exception ex) {
System.out.println("Other exception in discount view");
System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
}
A:
If you have many items, maybe the DropdownButton is not the best control for the job. It doesn't provide a way to make it scrollable.
You can have a look at other options, like the PopupView control.
This control allows custom content, so you can add a ScrollPane with a VBox that will contain all the items. Instead of MenuItem controls, you can use regular Button ones.
This is a quick implementation, but it is also styled as the DropdownButton.
public BasicView(String name) {
super(name);
Button button = new Button("Click me", new Icon(MaterialDesignIcon.ARROW_DROP_DOWN));
button.getStyleClass().add("flat");
button.setStyle("-fx-border-color: lightgray; -fx-border-width: 0 0 1 0");
button.setContentDisplay(ContentDisplay.RIGHT);
PopupView popup = new PopupView(button);
VBox vBox = new VBox();
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++) {
Button item = new Button("item " + i);
item.setPrefWidth(100);
item.getStyleClass().add("flat");
item.setOnAction(e -> {
System.out.println("item " + item.getText());
popup.hide();
});
vBox.getChildren().add(item);
}
ScrollPane scrollPane = new ScrollPane(vBox);
scrollPane.setMaxHeight(200);
scrollPane.setPrefWidth(110);
popup.setContent(scrollPane);
button.setOnAction(event -> popup.show());
setCenter(button);
}
|
HerSexDebut: Sexy hot girls demonstrate in their first time sex video that there are no holes barred for them and there is no dirty fuck offer that they can resist if it promises porn fame and pleasure. |
ImElfin DVD Ripper for Mac is one of the best and comprehensive Mac DVD Ripper to edit and rip DVDdiscs to almost all other mainstream video and audio formats, including MP4, MKV, AVI, MPG, MPEG-4, MOV, WMV, MKA, WAV, AC3, MP3, etc.
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Make karaoke DVDdiscs from CD+G songs. Karaoke DVD Burner is a program to compile and burn DVD karaokediscs from CD+G disc and MP3+G files. Play your favourite karaoke on standard DVD player! Create DVDdiscs with hundred of songs!
The highlight is that other DVD applications only rip unprotected DVD movies , but Plato DVD to PSP Converter can rip almost DVD movies even they are CSS , REGION , MACROVISION ,SONY ARCCOS protected dvddiscs. |
Get Embed Code
Finally updated. This pack basically takes the enchantment font and makes it english. Most of these words seem to be randomized but could have some correlation. No other textures are changed although some may be in the future. If you wish to help me with this project or take it over, message me. |
Q&A: Dennis DeYoung, Styx Co-Founder
We talked with Styx co-founder Dennis DeYoung prior to his Saturday, July 8 Summerfest performance.
It’s been nearly twenty years since Dennis DeYoung performed with Styx. But that band’s lasting influence hasn’t left him. He’s performed under the banner “Dennis DeYoung: The Music of Styx,” playing hits from Styx as well as material from his solo career. We caught up with the singer to ask him how he feels about playing Summerfest’s 50th anniversary and why he still enjoys playing Styx songs, even as a solo artist.
How do you feel about coming back to play during Summerfest’s 50th anniversary?
Well, I get to drive up I-94. So there will be plenty of opportunities to get porn and cheese. That’s good, right? So I get to come up there and see all my friends up there in Milwaukee and try to avoid any ones I owe money to.
What is your history playing Summerfest?
I’ve played it maybe three or four times. So it’s great. The fact that I would even be considered as Dennis DeYoung, the solo artist, to come up to play the big stages up in Milwaukee, that’s a pretty big deal for me.
How has the festival changed or stayed the same over the last twenty years, from your perspective?
It miraculously seems to be getting bigger. I would say the quality and amount of acts that come there in the summertime, it was literally a who’s who of who’s been popular over the last thirty, forty years. So that’s a real festival by the lake there. And it’s not diminishing. Some of these fests, they come and go. But that’s a long time to sustain something like that.
You’re originally from Chicago. What’s your favorite non-performance thing to do in Milwaukee or Wisconsin?
When I’m in Milwaukee, I say I’m from your southern suburb. I think I’ve played in the state of Wisconsin more than any other state in the United States. The people of Wisconsin have always had a very fond place in their hearts for music that Styx made. Wisconsin is a state that’s been extremely kind to me. And here’s the most important factor: I’m also a Bears fan. Can you image how much they like me? [laughs]
I posted an editorial on my Facebook page a couple years ago. We all know Aaron Rodgers is a robot. He’s a cyborg, at least. He’s not real. So stop trying to fool us. You got it? Come on, Milwaukee people. I saw that he had a spade of interceptions the year before. They ran towards the sideline and I’m sure I saw a screwdriver go into his head. I’m just saying. Because they knew one of his wires was busted.
Why is playing the music of Styx so important to you all these years later?
When you start as a young punk and when something you do when you’re 25 has a lasting ability – over 40 years – and people come to see it and are willing to pay for it, I think that’s the greatest compliment in life. Places I play, wherever I go people come up to me. And they will thank me for coming to their town, as if I was doing charity work with the little sisters of the poor. They tell me how much my music has affected their lives in a good way. And I think, ‘Wow, this was a good career choice.’ How many people get to be my age and have that happen to them? Damn few. Music I was involved in writing and creating has had that effect on people through all this time. I gotta say, ‘Hey this could be worse.’
What can people expect from the show?
What I’ve done is a greatest hits Styx show. We’ll be playing the hits because the audience wants it. They demand it. It’s an opportunity for them to relive the happiest and most important times in their lives, when they were young and all things were possible. And our music was part of it, which is a great thing. I know how that feels, because that’s how I felt about the Beatles. So being able to provide that is in no small part important to people’s lives. It allows them the ability to escape from the sped-up crazy times we live in and reflect on a time that seemed more innocent.
What Styx song resonates with you the most to you these days?
When I go, [sings loudly and with purpose] ‘Lady, when you’re with me I’m smiling’ and people scream. That seems like mission accomplished to me. So every time I play the beginning of a song, people light up in their faces and it feels like it was yesterday. That’s an awfully special feeling. So to me, to go through the songs and say which is the most special to me, I’m happy that people like one of them, let alone 12 or 15 of them. That’s an accomplishment. And one I sometimes take too lightly. |
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Monitoring and control in multitasking.
The idea that conflict detection triggers control adjustments has been considered a basic principle of cognitive control. So far, this "conflict-control loop" has mainly been investigated in the context of response conflicts in single tasks. In this theoretical position paper, we explore whether, and how, this principle might be involved in multitasking performance, as well. We argue that several kinds of conflict-control loops can be identified in multitasking at multiple levels (e.g., the response level and the task level), and we provide a selective review of empirical observations. We present examples of conflict monitoring and control adjustments in dual-task and task-switching paradigms, followed by a section on error monitoring and posterror adjustments in multitasking. We conclude by outlining future research questions regarding monitoring and control in multitasking, including the potential roles of affect and associative learning for conflict-control loops in multitasking. |
Iton Meyuhad
Iton Meyuhad (, lit. Special newspaper) was a weekly magazine that existed between 1933 and 1952, published and the edited by Alexander Sauber. It mainly dealt with business and crime, and was considered the first newspaper in Israel that dealt with unsubstantiated rumors and gossip. It is also known for being the first newspaper in Israel that used color.
Most of the newspaper was written by Sauber himself, under different names. The titles were often strange and sensationalist. Other writers for the paper included Yitzhak Sadeh (as Y. Noded), Malchiel Gruenwald and David Almog.
In 1952, Sauber was invited to write for Yedioth Ahronoth, took the job, and stopped publishing Iton Meyuhad.
References
Category:Defunct magazines of Israel
Category:Hebrew-language journals
Category:Magazines established in 1933
Category:Magazines disestablished in 1952
Category:News magazines
Category:Religious magazines
Category:Religious Zionism
Category:Weekly magazines |
) = -3*t + 3. Let q be u(5). Let v be f(q). Let g be 1*(v - (3 + -2)). Calculate i(g).
5
Suppose 14*r - 26*r = -36. Let i(n) = n**3 + 2*n**2 - 2*n + 3. Calculate i(r).
42
Let g(v) = -13*v + 2. Let q = 6 - -6. Let t be (-2 - 3)*q/20. Let h(d) = -d + 1. Let r(m) = t*h(m) + g(m). What is r(1)?
-11
Let l(k) be the first derivative of -k**7/840 - k**6/120 + k**5/20 + k**4/6 - 3*k**3 - 22. Let z(d) be the third derivative of l(d). What is z(-4)?
-4
Let v(t) = t - 1. Let o be v(0). Let z(i) = i - 1. Let h be z(2). Let k(a) = -5 + h - 3*a + 5 + 0. Determine k(o).
4
Let i(a) = -26*a + 4*a + 7*a + 6*a + a**2 + 9 + 0*a**2. Determine i(6).
-9
Let r = -24 + 24. Suppose -11*a + 14*a - 18 = r. Let h(q) = -2*q. Give h(a).
-12
Let b(z) be the second derivative of -z**5/20 + z**4/12 - 4*z**2 + z. Suppose -21*k + 39*k = -23*k. Calculate b(k).
-8
Let b(s) = 4*s + 7*s + 8*s - 16*s - 4*s. Calculate b(-6).
6
Let c(v) = -v**2 + 1. Let y(f) = -f**3 - 11*f**2 - 4*f + 6. Let a(n) = -6*c(n) + y(n). Let t = 289 + -292. Calculate a(t).
-6
Let q(u) = -u**3 - 4*u**2 + 2. Let a = -68 + 48. Let n be a/(-6)*42/(-35). Determine q(n).
2
Let o(y) = y**2 - 11*y + 10. Let z be (80/30)/(3/9). Determine o(z).
-14
Let b(s) = s**2 - s + 3. Let q(h) = -h. Suppose -3*c - 5*i = -22, 2*c - 1 = 2*i - 13. Let a(t) = c*b(t) - 3*q(t). Calculate a(3).
0
Let z(d) = d**2 + 10*d + 6. Let c be (6 - 9)*4/3. Let p be (-1)/2*(c - -22). Calculate z(p).
-3
Let b(p) be the third derivative of -p**4/24 + 2*p**3/3 + 27*p**2 + 6. Calculate b(0).
4
Let n(t) be the second derivative of -t**4/12 + 5*t**3/6 - t**2 + 3*t. Suppose 5*f = 2*c - 4*c - 8, -4*f - 16 = 0. Let j be 152/24 - 8/c. Give n(j).
-2
Let b(d) = 5*d**2 - d. Let l be b(-1). Suppose l = -4*h - 2*h. Let y(g) = 2*g + 4. Let v(a) = a. Let w(o) = h*y(o) + 3*v(o). What is w(-6)?
-10
Let m = 74 + -74. Let t(j) = 1 - 9*j + m - 2 + 11*j - 17*j**2. Determine t(1).
-16
Let l(c) be the third derivative of -c**4/24 - c**3/6 + c**2. Let t be -10*3*(-12)/(-90). What is l(t)?
3
Let x(b) = 4*b + 7. Let w = 8 + -6. Suppose -2*n - w*n - 20 = 0. Calculate x(n).
-13
Let z(u) be the first derivative of u**4/4 + 7*u**3/3 + 3*u**2 + 5*u - 2043. Let g(v) = v - 6. Let k be g(6). Let f be 6*(-1 + k)/1. Determine z(f).
5
Let r(j) = -3*j. Let o(c) = 8*c + 1. Let z(d) = -2*o(d) - 5*r(d). Determine z(-7).
5
Let n(g) = -19*g - 15. Let o(z) = -18*z - 13. Let f(y) = 6*n(y) - 7*o(y). Calculate f(-3).
-35
Let s be 90/8 + 6/8. Suppose -3*r = r - s. Suppose -2*n - h = -0*h + r, -4*n - 21 = 5*h. Let u(j) = 8*j - 1. What is u(n)?
7
Let f(d) be the third derivative of -d**5/60 + 2*d**2. Let y(x) = x**2 - 3*x + 2. Let h be y(3). Suppose 0 = h*u - 4 + 6. Determine f(u).
-1
Let q(l) = 3 - 6*l - 10*l**2 + 15*l - 111*l**3 + 112*l**3. Give q(9).
3
Let m(a) = -a**3 - 11*a**2 + 6. Let n(l) = 3*l**3 + 32*l**2 - 16. Let q(k) = 17*m(k) + 6*n(k). Determine q(-5).
6
Let q(i) = 5*i**2 + 7*i + 9. Let u(t) = 4*t**2 + 6*t + 7. Let g(c) = 3*q(c) - 4*u(c). Calculate g(-2).
1
Let v be 4 - (6 - 2) - -2. Let l(m) = 3*m**2 - 4*m**v - 2*m + 0*m**2 - m. Determine l(-3).
0
Let c = 0 - 1. Let i(x) be the third derivative of -5*x**4/24 + x**3/6 - 54*x**2. What is i(c)?
6
Suppose 4*h + 4*w - 12 = -4, -5*h = 2*w - 22. Let q(p) be the first derivative of p**4/4 - 5*p**3/3 - 3*p**2 + 7*p + 73. What is q(h)?
7
Let j(u) = 3*u**2 - 2*u - 2. Suppose 48 = 27*b - 3*b. What is j(b)?
6
Let z(o) be the first derivative of 7*o**3/3 - 7*o**2/2 - 6*o - 706. What is z(-1)?
8
Let x(n) = -n**3 + 12*n**2 - 10*n + 5. Suppose -p = -o - 2*o + 34, 0 = 4*p + 4. Calculate x(o).
16
Let s(t) = 6*t**2 + 9*t + 30. Let k(n) = 2*n**2 - n + 3. Let p(b) = 2*k(b) - s(b). What is p(-3)?
-9
Let l(v) = -v**3 - 4*v**2 + 5*v - 3. Let n be (-35)/(-42)*-6 + 0 + 1. What is l(n)?
-23
Let l(q) be the first derivative of 11 + 0*q**3 - 9*q - 1/2*q**2 - 1/4*q**4. Calculate l(0).
-9
Let c(q) = -q - 2. Let r be c(-6). Let i(n) = -1. Let k(j) = j**2 - 3*j + 9. Let m(u) = 6*i(u) + k(u). Calculate m(r).
7
Let m be (-4)/10 + (-16)/10. Let p(k) be the third derivative of k**6/120 + k**5/60 - k**4/24 + k**3/3 + 2*k**2 + 58*k. Calculate p(m).
0
Let z(d) = 9*d**2 - 2*d - 1. Let i(s) = -s - 9. Let x be i(-11). Let c(p) = -p**3 + 2*p**2 - p + 4. Let y be c(x). Give z(y).
31
Suppose -6*a + 40 = -8. Let l(x) = 0*x + 11 + 0*x + 9*x - a*x. Determine l(0).
11
Let p(a) = -4*a + 1. Let c(k) = -k**3 - 7*k**2 - 11*k - 3. Let l be c(-5). Let z be (l - 0)/((-52)/(-78)). What is p(z)?
-11
Suppose 0 = -3*n + 139 - 154. Let z(s) = -s - 8. Calculate z(n).
-3
Let f(o) be the second derivative of o**4/12 + o**3/6 - o**2 - 7*o. Let j be 2/10 + (-5 - (-117)/15). Give f(j).
10
Let w(t) be the third derivative of t**6/60 + t**5/30 - t**4/8 + t**3/3 - t**2 - 51. Determine w(-3).
-25
Let f(n) = -4*n**2 - 2*n + 1. Let x be 18/(-6)*(1 - 2). Suppose -135 = -5*d + 5*h - 2*h, -x*d = -4*h - 81. Let p = d + -26. Determine f(p).
-5
Let i(b) = 4 - 12*b - 9*b + 20*b. Let r be i(10). Let a(l) = l**3 + 6*l**2 + 2*l + 1. Give a(r).
-11
Let z be -8*15/(-50)*-5. Let p(g) = -g**2 - 11*g + 4. Calculate p(z).
-8
Let g be (-29 - -19) + 14 + -5. Let n(j) = 1 - 8*j + j - 2. Determine n(g).
6
Suppose 5*g - 29 = 4*o + 4*g, -5*o + 4*g - 50 = 0. Let v = -26 + 60. Let p(d) = 11*d. Let k(y) = 2*y. Let u(f) = v*k(f) - 6*p(f). What is u(o)?
-12
Let l(n) = -n + n**3 - 38*n**2 + 0*n**3 + 3 + 40*n**2. Let i be l(-2). Let x(t) = -t**3 + 4*t**2 + 5*t + 3. Calculate x(i).
3
Let g(h) = -3*h. Let v(w) be the third derivative of w**4/24 - w**3/2 + 5*w**2. Let a(f) = f - 2. Let b(p) = 5*a(p) - 6*v(p). Let x be b(4). Calculate g(x).
-12
Let i be (0 - 1)/(-1 + (-91)/(-84)). Let m(l) = l**2 + 13*l - 5. Determine m(i).
-17
Let s(y) = y**2 + 3*y + 1. Let i be (26 - 29)/((-6)/(-4)). What is s(i)?
-1
Let d = 318 + -313. Suppose -2*p + 18 = p. Let h(g) = -1 - g**3 - p*g**2 + g**2 + 2*g**3 + g. Determine h(d).
4
Let v(n) = 3*n**2 - 3*n + 3. Suppose 2*t = 5*c + 1, 5*c = -5*t + 116 - 96. Give v(t).
21
Let m be ((-2)/(-3))/(-8*1/(-2)). Let b(n) be the third derivative of 0*n + 1/2*n**3 + m*n**4 + 0 - n**2. What is b(-2)?
-5
Let h(p) = 3 - 101*p - 5 - 101*p + 199*p. Let i = 0 + -2. Calculate h(i).
4
Let j(k) = -5*k**3 + 7*k**2 - 6*k + 2. Let h(r) = -4*r**3 + 6*r**2 - 5*r + 2. Let b(c) = -3*h(c) + 2*j(c). What is b(3)?
25
Suppose 39 = 8*a - 1. Let w(z) = -z**3 + 5*z**2 + z - 5. Calculate w(a).
0
Let p(k) = -11*k + 11*k + 980*k**2 - 989*k**2 + 9 + k**3. Calculate p(9).
9
Let q(z) = -z**3 - 10*z**2 - 9*z - 3. Suppose 24*w = 25*w + 9. Give q(w).
-3
Suppose -15 = 2*t + 3. Let l = -7 - t. Let b(x) be the second derivative of -x**4/4 - x**2/2 + 4*x. What is b(l)?
-13
Let f(p) = 1 - 12*p - 3*p + p. Let q = 0 - -1. Give f(q).
-13
Let h(z) = -3*z**3 - 2*z**2 - 2*z - 1. Let y = 17 + -18. Let v be h(y). Let d be (-2)/(-3)*6 + v. Let n(u) = -2*u + 8. What is n(d)?
-4
Let u(h) = 2*h**2 - 5*h - 3. Let o(l) = 15 + l**2 - 8 - 8 - 2*l. Let a(z) = 11*o(z) - 4*u(z). Suppose 0*j = -5*j + 5. What is a(j)?
2
Suppose 4*w + 12 = 0, 2*q - 2*w + 13 = 19. Let z(x) = -x - 1 + 5 + 3. Give z(q).
7
Let j = 134 - 141. Let c(i) = 4*i + 5. Determine c(j).
-23
Suppose -3*v + z = -2 - 2, -2*z - 8 = 0. Suppose c + 11 = -v. Let l = c + 7. Let k(b) = -b**3 - 4*b**2 - b - 1. Calculate k(l).
3
Let y(b) = 2*b**3 + 10*b**2 - 3*b + 7. Let f(g) = 5*g**3 + 21*g**2 - 6*g + 16. Let k(d) = -3*f(d) + 7*y(d). Give k(5).
36
Let t(g) = -11*g - 22. Let r be t(-7). Let d = 63 - r. Let y(l) = 2*l - 12. What is y(d)?
4
Let u = 10 - 5. Let q(o) = u*o + o**3 + 5*o**2 + 9*o**2 - 19*o**2 + 0*o**3 - 4. Determine q(4).
0
Let b(s) = 2*s**2 - 2*s + 2. Suppose -2*z - z = -2*z. Suppose z = 18*q - 15*q - 6. What is b(q)?
6
Let j(r) be the first derivative of -r**4/2 - 4*r**3/3 - r**2/2 + r - 21. Determine j(-3).
22
Let w(i) be the second derivative of -1/20*i**5 + 20*i - 9/2*i**2 - i**3 + 2/3*i**4 + 0. Calculate w(7).
-2
Let o(v) be the first derivative of v**2/2 + 11*v + 106. What is o(-4)?
7
Let s = -19 + 24. Suppose s*t - 55 = 5*j, -2*j = -j - 2*t + 10. Let l be ((-3)/(-9))/((-2)/j). Let c(h) = 2*h + 2. Give c(l).
6
Let x(d) = -d**2 + 7*d - 8. Let s be x(5). Let y(v) = v + 7*v + s - 5*v - 2*v. Calculate y(5).
7
Suppose 0 = -5*n + 18 + 2. Suppose n*g = 7*g. Suppose -3*d - 15 = g, 3*d = -t + 2*d + 1. Let p(r) |
Patients' attitudes about gifts to physicians from pharmaceutical companies.
Little is known about patients' awareness of and attitudes about gifts to physicians from pharmaceutical companies. During a 7-week period in summer 1994, we surveyed adults (18 years of age and older) in the waiting rooms of two family practice centers in central Missouri. Four-hundred eighty-six adults (83 percent participation rate) responded to a self-administered questionnaire that assessed awareness of and attitudes about representative gifts. Rates of awareness of specific gifts were 87.0 percent for free drug samples, 55.3 percent for ballpoint pens, 34.6 percent for medical books, 28.6 percent for baby formula, 22.4 percent for dinner at a restaurant, and 13.8 percent for a coffee maker. Of the 486 respondents, the following percentages were reported that "it is not all right" for physicians to accept specific gifts: dinner at a restaurant, 48.4 percent; baby formula, 44.2 percent; coffee maker, 40.7 percent; ballpoint pens, 17.5 percent; medical books, 16.9 percent; drug samples, 7.6 percent. In addition, 32.5 percent did not approve of their physicians accepting payment by a pharmaceutical company of medical conference expenses and from 28.0 percent to 43.4 percent disapproved of their physicians attending specific social events sponsored by pharmaceutical companies at a medical conference. Seventy percent of the subjects believed that gifts sometimes or frequently influence a physician's prescribing of medication; 64.0 percent believed that gifts to physicians increase the cost of medication. Beliefs that gifts influence prescribing behavior and beliefs that gifts increase medication costs were strongly associated with disapproval of each gift except for drug samples. Respondents distinguished between particular gifts; approval rates were high for gifts generally considered to be trivial or that have potential value to patient care; disapproval rates were relatively high for gifts that have some monetary value but have little or no benefit for patients. Opinions about gifts were related to perceptions of their effects on prescribing behavior and costs. |
Effects of left basal ganglia lesions on language production.
Three patients with lesions mainly confined to the left basal ganglia were studied with a series of neuropsychological and neurolinguistic tests. Two patients were nonfluent, whereas one presented with fluent spontaneous speech. All of them produced agrammatic sentences and lexical and semantic mistakes. Perserverations and echolalias were two further characteristic disorders of their speech production. The linguistic symptoms observed in these three patients suggest that the left basal ganglia play an important role (a) in regulating arousal and speech initiation, (b) in monitoring the semantic and lexical aspects of language, and (c) in switching from one linguistic element to the following during language production. |
Q:
Downloading treasury data with Pandas read_csv
I'm trying to download treasury data from this page using Pandas read_csv.
url = "http://www.federalreserve.gov/datadownload/Output.aspx?rel=H15&series=bcb44e57fb57efbe90002369321bfb3f&lastObs=&from=&to=&filetype=csv&label=include&layout=seriescolumn"
res = requests.get(url)
csvio = StringIO(res.content)
dataframe = pd.read_csv(csvio, header=5, index_col=0, parse_dates=True)
columns_dic = {"RIFLGFCY10_N.B":'BC_10YEAR'}
dataframe = dataframe.rename(columns=columns_dic)
print (dataframe.head())
The output looks a little strange to me:
BC_10YEAR
Time Period
1962-01-02 4.06
1962-01-03 4.03
1962-01-04 3.99
1962-01-05 4.02
1962-01-08 4.03
I don't understand why the header is split between two rows when I print it. Also, it's not clear to me that the dates are being properly parsed. Is there a way I can fix my call to read_csv?
A:
The header is split because of your index_col=0 argument. Try without an index column
In [20]: dataframe = read_csv(csvio, header=5, index_col=None, parse_dates=True)
In [21]: dataframe
Out[21]:
<class 'pandas.core.frame.DataFrame'>
Int64Index: 13379 entries, 0 to 13378
Data columns:
Time Period 13379 non-null values
RIFLGFCY10_N.B 13379 non-null values
dtypes: object(2)
In [22]: dataframe.head()
Out[22]:
Time Period RIFLGFCY10_N.B
0 1962-01-02 4.06
1 1962-01-03 4.03
2 1962-01-04 3.99
3 1962-01-05 4.02
4 1962-01-08 4.03
and the first column of data from the StringIO object becomes a column in the DataFrame, instead of becoming the index.
|
Hey guys,
As you all know, a lot of things have happened recently within the ACE project. We’ve rewritten
the complete management agent, added quite a few features to the server and squashed bugs.
With all of this work done I feel we should start working towards a new release now, but I’d
like to get everbody’s opinion and check if there are things we forgot about that really
need to make it into a new release.
One thing I would like to do is to upgrade to the latest Bndtools 2.2.2 version and enable
support for baselining. Baselining will give us a lot of tool support to ensure our code (bundles
and exported packages) is semantically versioned. To leverage baselining support there are
a couple of things we need to do:
* We need the to start putting @ProviderType and @ConsumerType annotations on all our APIs.
In fact, we need to “retrofit” this to our 1.0.0 release to ensure the baselining works
correctly. These annotations are not magically available, but we can add them to the global
build path (cnf/ext/defaults.bnd).
* We need to keep a copy of all released bundles (the latest version of each) in a repository
to baseline against. Because we don’t want our build to break when we’re off-line I propose
we put them in a local repository. We probably need to build those artifacts with the Eclipse
compiler to prevent problems that will otherwise occur because of differences between ecj
and javac so: checkout with Eclipse, build, collect all bundles from "generated" folders and
publish them into the releaserepo in cnf. We also want to add them to the -deps artifact so
people can easily get started with a release with baselining enabled.
If anybody else has input, speak up! :) WDYT?
Greetings, Marcel |
During August and September, esports competitions took the stage in two very different and significant places.
In August, esports had a presence at the Asian Games in Indonesia as a demonstration sport alongside swimming, track and field and other traditional athletics endeavors. Then in September, ...
The Japan Football Association has taken its biggest step yet in the country's burgeoning esports scene, joining the Japan Esports Union as co-host of the newly established esports competition in the cultural program at the 2019 National Sports Festival in Ibaraki Prefecture.
The inaugural Inter ... |
# Box Without Indices
## Screenshot
## License Information
Donated by [Cesium](http://cesiumjs.org/) for glTF testing.
## Additional Information
This version of the box model has all the indices in order 0-35. When you convert it to glTF, you need to remove the mesh.primitive.indices, so it just renders all vertices in order.
|
Sac stuff to the troll to make it bigger, keep mana open either on your board or with deathrite shaman to regen it...once you have enough mana, cast or bestow nighthowler (onto the troll) and swing for big damage!
Jarad also is an alternative as a win con, if you can get your bigger creatures out and use his ability to sac creatures dealing direct damage. This works pretty well with nemesis of mortals if you're in the game long enough to pull it off |
Effects of age and comorbidities on complication rates and adverse outcomes after lumbar laminectomy in elderly patients.
This is a retrospective cohort study using the National Inpatient Sample database. The objective is to report mortality and complications after lumbar laminectomy in the elderly. As the population continues to age in the United States, it is important to consider the surgical complications and outcomes in the elderly. A review of the literature reveals controversy over the safety of lumbar laminectomy in the elderly and disagreement over estimates of risks in this population. Outcome measures were abstracted from the National Inpatient Sample. Multivariate analysis was performed to analyze the effect of patient and hospital characteristics on outcome measures. A total of 471,215 patients underwent lumbar laminectomy without fusion for lumbar stenosis from 1993 to 2002. The in-hospital mortality rate was 0.17%, and the complication rate was 12.17%. Postoperative hemorrhage or hematoma (5.2%) and nonspecific renal complications (2.8%) were the most common complications. Complication and mortality rates increased with age and comorbidities with an 18.9% complication rate and 1.4% mortality rate in patients over the age of 85 with 3 or more comorbidities, 14.7% complication rate and 0.22% mortality rate in patients over 85 with no comorbidities, and only a 6% complication rate and 0.05% mortality rate in patient between 18 and 44 with no comorbidities. Multivariate analysis revealed increased odds of mortality with increasing number of comorbidities and complications in the greater than 85 year age group. Increasing age, number of comorbidities, complication rate, and female sex also increased the odds of discharge to institution other than home. Elderly patients with comorbidities are at a higher risk for complications and adverse outcome after lumbar spine surgery. The effects of age and comorbidities on patient outcomes have been quantified. This information is critical in counseling elderly patients about the risk of surgery in their age group. |
**Specifications Table**TableSubject area*Biology*More specific subject area*Proteomics*Type of data*Tables, output files, mass spectrometry files*How data was acquired*LTQ-Orbitrap Velos mass spectrometer (Thermo Scientific)*Data format*Raw, processed*Experimental factors*Formalin fixation, paraffin embedding, and storage performed following standard hospital procedures*Experimental features*High-temperature protein extraction in SDS-based reducing buffer, SDS removal using Detergent Removal Spin Columns (Pierce, Rockford, IL, USA), in solution reduction, alkylation and trypsin digestion. Peptide separation using a UltiMate 3000 RSLCnano LC system (270 min gradient).*Data source location*Tramariglio, Alghero (Sassari), Italy*Data accessibility*Data is within this article*
**Value of the data**•Proteomic profile of atypical carcinoid.•Largest collection of proteins identified from large-cell neuroendocrine carcinoma.•Data might be useful for further studies aiming at the elucidation of tumor biology.•Protein identification data can serve as benchmark for detection and verification of novel diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers of lung neuroendocrine tumors.
1. Data {#s0005}
=======
The proteomic profiling of atypical lung carcinoid (AC) tissue is presented, together with the largest collection of proteins identified from a large-cell neuroendocrine carcinoma (LCNEC) so far. A total of 1260 and 2436 proteins were identified in the AC and LCNEC samples, respectively, with FDR \<1%. Noteworthy, these data have been obtained using archival formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) samples, thus reinforcing the opportunity and reliability of employing such samples for clinical proteomic studies. Data files can be found at PeptideAtlas repository at <http://www.peptideatlas.org/PASS/PASS00375>.
2. Experimental design, materials and methods {#s0010}
=============================================
Two AC and two LCNEC FFPE tissue blocks were retrieved from the repositories of the Pathology Institutes at the University Hospitals of Verona (provided by AE) and Parma (provided by GR), after approval of the respective Ethical Committees. Standard hospital procedures had been applied for fixation in formalin, embedding in paraffin, and sample storage. Hematoxylin and eosin stains had been critically reviewed and the tumors had been classified according to the lung neuroendocrine tumors World Health Organization 2004 classification. The presence of at least 80% of neoplastic tissue was verified in each FFPE tissue block, and consecutive sections were cut.
Proteins were extracted from FFPE tissues as published [@bib1], and quantified using the EZQ Protein Quantification Kit (Molecular Probes, Eugene, OR, USA). Detergent Removal Spin Columns (Pierce, Rockford, IL, USA) were used to remove SDS, and eluates were subjected to in solution reduction, alkylation and trypsin digestion as previously described [@bib2]. ZipTip Pipette Tips (Millipore, Billerica, MA, USA) were employed to purify peptide mixtures.
An LTQ Orbitrap Velos (Thermo Scientific, San Jose, CA, USA) interfaced with an UltiMate 3000 RSLCnano LC system (Dionex, Sunnyvale, CA, USA), set up in a data dependent MS/MS mode as described elsewhere [@bib3], was used for MS analysis. Concentration, desalting, and separation of peptide mixtures was performed as in [@bib2], but using a 270 min gradient from 1 to 50% eluent B (0.2% formic acid in 95% ACN) in eluent A (0.2% formic acid in 5% ACN). The gradient was as follows: 1--10% Solvent B (3 min), 10--23% B (230 min), 23--50% B (37 min). Peptide identification was performed using Proteome Discoverer (version 1.4; Thermo Scientific) as described previously [@bib2].
Appendix A. Supplementary material {#s0020}
==================================
Supplementary material
This work was financed by Sardegna Ricerche through the program "Progetto Strategico Biotecnologie", by AIRC IG 2013 14696 to GR, and by grant 997/2010.0414 from Fondazione Banco di Sardegna to GF.
Supplementary data associated with this article can be found in the online version at [doi:10.1016/j.dib.2016.02.083](http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dib.2016.02.083){#ir0015}.
|
December 30, 2004
The Equal Opportunities Commission laments the shortage of women in “top jobs.” It reports that women account for only: 9.7 per cent of directors of FTSE 100 companies; 16.6 per cent of local authority chief executives; 8.3 percent of senior police officers; 9.1 per cent of national newspaper editors; and so on.
This report merely continues a long tradition for pseudo-egalitarians to inadvertently discredit the ideal of equality.
December 23, 2004
How fast did the UK economy grow in the third quarter? Newspaper reports like this say it grew 0.5 per cent.
In one important respect, they are all wrong. In fact, the economy boomed, with real GDP growing by 3.9 per cent in the quarter – an annualized growth rate of 16.7 per cent. It is only after seasonal adjustment that the economy grew by 0.5 per cent.
An inspection of the seasonally unadjusted figures – which are downloadable here – shows that the UK has had a recession every year for the last 40. GDP always falls in the first half of the year. Economic growth only happens in the second half. The economy only grows in the third and fourth quarters.
Even a non-agricultural economy, therefore, is highly seasonal.
This matters. For one thing, it corroborates the view – first rigorously proposed by Robert Lucas in the 1980s – that the welfare costs of recessions are small. After all, the UK has a recession every year, and no-one worries much.
Also, it’s well-known that the stock market is seasonal; the best returns on equities occur in the winter. Isn’t it at least possible that this fact is related to the seasonality of the economy? Maybe winter returns on equities are just a reward for taking economic risks which are masked by seasonal adjustment processes.
There are some very agreeable and beautiful talents of which the possession commands a certain sort of admiration; but of which the exercise for the sake of gain is considered, whether from reason or prejudice, as a sort of public prostitution. The pecuniary recompense, therefore, of those who exercise them in this manner must be sufficient, not only to pay for the time, labour and expense of acquiring the talents, but for the discredit which attends the employment of them as the means of subsistence. The exorbitant rewards of players, opera-singers, opera-dancers etc, are founded upon these two principles: the rarity and beauty of the talents, and the discredit of employing them in this manner.
December 22, 2004
David Hume was an anarchist (sort of). In A Treatise of Human Nature (1740), he wrote:
Though government be an invention very advantageous, and even in some circumstances absolutely necessary to mankind; it is not necessary in all circumstances, nor is it impossible for men to preserve society for some time, without having recourse to such an invention.
To Hume, government was unnecessary when people’s property was secure. And this was the case when there was significant equality or community spirit. Hume continued:
A Indian is but little tempted to dispossess another of his hut, or to steal his bow, as being already provided of the same advantages; and as to any superior fortune, which may attend one above another in hunting and fishing, ‘tis only casual and temporary, and will have but small tendency to disturb society…I assert the first rudiments of government to arise from quarrels, not among men of the same society, but among those of different societies.
I take two things from this. First, we associate the idea of the withering away of the state under conditions of equality with Marx. But wasn’t he just turning Hume on his head, by projecting Hume’s version of history into the future?
Second, shouldn’t we regard equality as a necessary condition for limited government, rather than as a consequence of big government?
December 21, 2004
Thomas Malthus was well aware of the Easterlin paradox, whereby economic growth doesn’t make us happier. In his Essay on the Principle of Population, written in 1798, he complained that Adam Smith:
Has not stopped to take notice of those instances where the wealth of a society may increase…without having any tendency to increase the comforts of the labouring part of it.
How can this happen? The answer we associate with Malthus is of course that the labour supply rises as demand for labour rises, thus keeping workers at the subsistence level. But this is not the whole story. Economic growth involves the transfer of workers from agriculture into manufacturing:
And this exchange of professions will be allowed, I think, by all, to be very unfavourable in respect of health, one essential ingredient of happiness, beside the greater uncertainty of manufacturing labour, arising from the capricious taste of man, the accidents of war, and other causes.
What’s more, greater prosperity would lead to a regression in culture and intellect:
From all that experience has taught us concerning the structure of the human mind, if those stimulants to exertion which arise from the wants of the body were removed from the mass of mankind, we have much more reason to think that they would be sunk to the level of brutes…than that they would be raised to the rank of philosophers by the possession of leisure…The general tendency of a uniform course of prosperity is rather to degrade than exalt the character.
December 20, 2004
It is to be lamented that the duty by stamps, with which the transfer of landed property is loaded, materially impedes the conveyance of it into those hands where it would probably be made most productive.
This could be very right. Andrew Oswald has pointed out a close correlation across countries between Nairus and home ownership rates. These guys have delved further into the link. But these are more sceptical.
December 19, 2004
Here’s an interesting flaw in human capital theory – the labour market position of people with Asperger’s syndrome. Many of these have high intelligence and great technical skills. They should therefore earn good money.
They don’t. This report from the National Autistic Society shows that only 12 per cent of people with Asperger’s are in employment at all.
This is hard to reconcile with human capital theory. It’s also hard to reconcile with the most interesting alternative to this theory – the notion of incentive-enhancing preferences, as described by Herbert Gintis and Sam Bowles.
Employers, they say, value a university education not so much for the skills it directly creates as for the attributes correlated with it. Graduates are more likely to be self-reliant, trustworthy and have “a good attitude.” And it is this that employers want.
Bowles and Gintis’ theory is slightly different from the better known credentialism, because they allow for the possibility that a university education can cultivate attributes employers want, rather than merely signal them.
However, although their theory can explain one interesting fact that neither human capital not credentialism can explain – the low earnings of mature students – it can’t explain the poor labour market conditions of people with Asperger’s, as these are typically enormously trustworthy and self-reliant.
So, what’s going on? Could it just be that what employers really want is just “people like us”? Isn’t this just what “good communication skills”, “a team player” and so on are euphemisms for?
Maybe those neoclassical economists who regard the workplace as merely somewhere where inputs are technologically transformed into outputs are missing a big point – that employment is about social control and conformity.
On this point, maybe economists have more to learn from Randle McMurphy than Gary Becker.
One of the first advocates of consumption taxes was Hobbes – Thomas, not Miranda. In Leviathan, written in 1651, he asked:
What reason is there, that he which laboureth much, and sparing the fruits of his labour, consumeth little, should be more charged, than he that liveth idly, getteth little, and spendeth all he gets: seeing the one hath no more protection from the Common-wealth than the other?
What would the taxes be spent on? We associate Hobbes with the notion that the state’s duty, above all else, was to guarantee citizens’ security. But he wanted more than this: “By safety here, is not meant a bare preservation, but also all other contentments of life.”
He went on to advocate that people be educated in law and ethics, and also that there be a welfare state:
And whereas many men, by accident unevitable, become unable to maintain themselves by their labour; they ought not to be left to the charity of private persons; but provided for (as farforth as the necessities of nature require) by the lawes of the Common-wealth. For as it is uncharitablenesse in any man, to neglect the impotent; so it is in the sovereign of a Common-wealth, to expose them to the hazard of such uncertain charity.
This applied to the ill and elderly. The unemployed, however, should be forced to work. And this required an interventionist state to promote economic growth:
And to avoyd the excuse of not finding employment, there ought to be such lawes, as may encourage all manner of arts; as navigation, agriculture, fishing, and all manner of manufacture.
But what if this failed to provide full employment? Here, Hobbes’ link with modernity breaks down:
The multitude of poor, and yet strong people still encreasing, they are to be transplanted into countries not sufficiently inhabited: where, neverthelesse, they are not to exterminate those they find there; but constrain them to inhabit closer together.
But what happens when the world’s land runs out?
And when all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is warre; which provideth for every man, by victory, or death.
My Arnold Kling-type question: at a time when there was little evidence for technical progress, how mistaken was this conclusion? |
The present invention relates to a seat cushion for vehicle seats, comprising at least one core part consisting of an elastic plastic foam.
An example of such a seat cushion is known from DE3928883C2. This cushion part is for a seat provided with a climatic zone and is supposed to feature good comfort with respect to seating and air-conditioning. But the known cushion part is constructed relatively expensively, because it consists of fairly many component parts. A first core part comprising a plastic foam material is arranged within a shell-shaped base element. A cover element is exchangeably arranged in a recess of the base element. This cover element possesses another core made of plastic foam material, whose hardness is supposed to be greater than the hardness of the other core. The cover element is equipped with hollows that are designed conically extended toward the top surface, which is turned away from the base element. On the bottom surface, which faces the base element, the cover element is designed with projecting parts that are separated from each other, a hollow space being formed between them. This hollow space extends continuously between the base element and cover element, and it is fluidly connected with the cushion part""s top surface by openings. A section of each opening extends through the cover element, core, and cover element""s case; these openings open into the hollows. Additional openings are formed on the perimeter of the cover element""s outer rim. Air channels, which are fluidly connected with the hollow space located between the base element and cover element, are designed on the base element. The air channels form exhaust openings through which air can escape from the hollow space, wherein this air can be loaded with moisture. A natural chimney effect is therefore supposed to eliminate moisture from the top of the cushion part and through the hollow space.
Besides this, so-called active climatic seats are also known (see U.S. Pat. No. 5,403,065, for example), in which electrical fans (ventilators) provide continuous air circulation in the seat area. Naturally, such systems are particularly costly and expensive.
It is the objective of the invention to create a seat cushion of the generic type mentioned in the introduction, which is distinguished by structural simplicity and simpler manufacturability resulting therefrom, while simultaneously offering optimum climatic and seating comfort.
This is achieved according to invention, that the side of the core part which faces towards the sitting surface and at least a sub-area of the sitting surface consist of several adjacent tubular sections which are molded to a base section of the core part on one side and basically extend perpendicularly in relation to the sitting surface.
Consequently there preferably exists only one single core part, wherein the foamed tubular sections, which basically extend perpendicularly to the sitting surface, define the carrying and supporting properties. These sections can be very simply adapted to the respective requirements for optimum vibrational comfort and optimum distribution of the sitting pressure, preferably by proper shaping alone; that is above all by designing the supporting tube cross sections and/or open lengths of the individual tubular sections. Certainly, it would fundamentally also be possible to introduce alternative or additional different foam materials with different physical properties.
For good climatic comfort, it is planned that the tubular sections feature holes that extend through the core part completely, including the base section, and consequently have open edges on both sides. The penetrating holes allow air and moisture to be exchanged throughout the core part effectively, advantageously without active means such as ventilators or the like. According to invention, we are therefore dealing with a purely passive air-conditioning system that is very simple and economical.
Additional advantageous design characteristics of the invention are contained in both the dependent claims and the following description. |
Where to stay in Kyoto
Exploring Kyoto
Known for its shrines and spring cherry tree blossoms, Kyoto is one of Japan's most beautiful cities. Having been the capital for more than 1,000 years and having never been bombed in WWII, it has retained many fantastic structures through a collection of intriguing districts backed by a ring of mountains.
Kyoto is a classic blend of ancient and modern, with the ordinary urban sprawl of downtown Kyoto contrasting against the ultra-modern Kyoto Station and other shiny structures. As a whole the town is quite staid, but delve a little deeper and you'll discover a wealth of beauty which sets it apart from the average Japanese center.
Central Kyoto is the most important part for tourists as it contains most of the shops, restaurants and hotels, along with the likes of the Imperial Palace. Off to the east is the ancient and fun Gion district, best known for its geishas and tearooms, and here you will also find the city's most beautiful temples and shrines.
Accommodations in Kyoto
There is a range of options for all travelers. The most popular hotel in Kyoto is the NEST AT NISHIKI, KYOTO, which has been booked 112 times from our Hotels.com verified guests. Our guests also highly recommended Kamuro-an in Kyoto as it has been reserved 7 times.
Sightseeing in Kyoto
The best things in Kyoto await travellers who choose to walk. So we recommend you try walking through small parts of the city in order to savour its atmosphere and life. During the right season, you can enjoy the famed cherry blossoms, which can be found in many parts of Kyoto. A walk along the Philosopher’s Path is a great way to soak in the natural beauty while taking a slow stroll.
You must definitely visit the Kyoto Imperial Palace which was once the home to noble families in court. Today, it has been torn down and converted into a huge park having more than 9000 trees, making it an ideal spot for relaxation and recreation. Three of the must visit UNESCO heritage spots include Toji and Nishi Honganji Temples and the Nijo Castle. The latter is famous for its Kano school sliding door paintings while Nishi Honganji houses Japan’s oldest Noh Theatre stage.
Transportation in Kyoto
There are many flight options to get into Osaka’s Kansai International Airport. Between Kansai Int’l airport and Kyoto, you have the option of choosing between trains, limo buses and taxis, though trains are the fastest. The Itami Airport also services Osaka and is the domestic airport of the city. You will likely fly in here when travelling to Kyoto from other Japanese cities. From Itami airport, take Limousine bus No 15 into Kyoto. From Tokyo, you can arrive at the JR Kyoto station by Shinkansen bullet train. |
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Role of 5-hydroxytryptamine1B receptors and 5-hydroxytryptamine uptake inhibition in the cocaine-evoked discriminative stimulus effects in rats.
Mesolimbic dopamine pathways play a critical role in the behavioural effects of cocaine in rodents. Nonetheless, research has also demonstrated involvement of 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT; serotonin) transmission in these effects. The present study investigated the ability of selective 5-HT1B receptor ligands and a 5-HT reuptake inhibitor to substitute for or to alter (enhance or antagonise) the discriminative stimulus effects of cocaine. Male Wistar rats were trained to discriminate cocaine (10 mg/kg, i.p.) from saline (i.p.) in a two-choice, water-reinforced fixed ratio (FR) 20 drug discrimination paradigm. In substitution tests, the selective 5-HT1B receptor agonist 3-(1,2,5,6-tetrahydro-4-pyridyl)-5-propoxypyrrolo[3,2-b]pyridine (CP 94253; 2.5-5 mg/kg, i.p.) and the 5-HT reuptake inhibitor fluoxetine (5-10 mg/kg, i.p.) elicited ca. 40 and 0% drug-lever responding, respectively. In combination experiments, CP 94253 (2.5-5 mg/kg) given with submaximal doses of cocaine (0.3-2.5 mg/kg) produced a leftward shift in the cocaine dose-response curve; pretreatment with CP 94253 (5 mg/kg) prior to a dose of cocaine (2.5 mg/kg) which elicited lower than 40% drug-lever responding, caused full substitution. Fluoxetine (5 and 10 mg/kg) given in combination with a submaximal dose of cocaine (2.5 mg/kg) produced a 100% drug-lever responding. Pretreatment with the 5-HT1B receptor antagonists N-[4-methoxy-3-(4-methyl-1-piperazinyl)phenyl]-2'-methyl-4'-(5-methyl-[1,2,4]oxadiazol-3-yl)-1,1'-biphenyl-4 carboxamide (GR 127935; 0.5-5 mg/kg, s.c.) and 3-(3-dimethylamino)-propyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[4-(4-pyridinyl)-phenyl]benzamide (GR 55562; 1 mg/kg, s.c.) failed to modulate the dose-effect curve for cocaine (0.6-5 mg/kg). On the other hand, GR 127935 (5 mg/kg) and GR 55562 (1 mg/kg) significantly attenuated the enhancement of cocaine discrimination evoked by a combination of CP 94253 (5 mg/kg) or fluoxetine (5 mg/kg) and cocaine (2.5 mg/kg). These results indicate that 5-HT1B receptors are not directly involved in the cocaine-induced discriminative stimuli in rats. On the other hand, they indicate that pharmacological stimulation of 5-HT receptors--that also seem to be a target for fluoxetine-mediated increase in 5-HT neurotransmission--can enhance the overall effects of cocaine. |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to electrical connectors and more particularly to an electrical connector for connection to an edge of a single-sided printed circuit board.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There are a wide variety of electrical connector assemblies which are adapted to be mated to an edge of a printed circuit board. Many of these edge connectors include a mating slot which receives a tongue portion projecting from an edge of a printed circuit board. Many such connectors also include fastening means, such as screws or bolts, for mounting the connector housing to the printed circuit board.
In most such electrical edge connectors which have elongated slots for receiving an edge portion or end of a board, a plurality of terminals are mounted in the housing along the slot, and spring contact portions of the terminals are biased against contact pads on either one or both sides of the printed circuit board. These types of connectors generally suffer from the disadvantage of connector tilting which may cause interruption of the electrical pathway or bending of the contacts. To overcome this problem, many connectors rigidly clamp the board within the connector slot against movement perpendicular to the plane of the board. Such clamping often includes the use of screws traversing holes found in the printed circuit board. Such through-hole clamping means is not suitable for certain manufacturing and assembly processes, such as oven/IR reflow soldering.
Rigidly clamping the connector to the printed circuit board causes a myriad of other problems. Such problems include the spring contact portions of the terminals losing their resiliency and, accordingly, the effective biased engagement with the pads on the printed circuit board. Additionally, problems arise from stress cracks produced in the areas surrounding the fastening means which lock the connector to the board. Such stress cracks may create open circuits if the crack traverses a printed circuit.
To avoid the problems associated with edge connectors, conventional header designs are typically surface mount connectors or right-angle connectors. Surface mount connectors usually use "hooks" to secure the connector to the printed circuit board. This design suffers greatly from connector tilling problems, similar to the previously described edge connectors, as well as problems associated with solder lead coplanarity control. These problems lead to connector manufacturing difficulties and poor solder joint formation during automated soldering processes to couple the solder leads to the solder pads of the printed circuit board.
Right-angle connectors also suffer the disadvantage of tilting as well as kinking of the solder leads which are used to assist in holding the connector upright.
To avoid tilting and kinking problems, these connectors generally utilize screws and mating through holes on the printed circuit board to rigidly couple the connector to the board. Thus, right-angle connectors suffer from the disadvantages set forth above regarding stress cracks as well as manufacturing and assembling difficulties discussed above.
The present invention overcomes the problems set forth above to provide a superior design substitute for surface mount and right-angle printed circuit board connectors. |
"Only four bottles will go on auction with 100 percent
of the proceeds going to the Russian LGBT Network in support of Chechen gay
rights – this is an IPA that makes an impact," a Mikkeller representative
wrote on Facebook, according to the Copenhagen Post.
"Stay gay (and thirsty)!" the post ended.
The IPA was created in collaboration with Chinese
microbrewery Great Leap Brewing.
The brew has generated approval on the brewery's Facebook
page, but some naysayers registered their complaints.
"Hi Mikkeller HQ you're probably brewing the best beers
in the world but you should just brew beer and not do politics. Thanks,"
wrote Gus Berthollier in a June 16 post.
Pride month has rung in firsts for LGBT officials in
Ireland, Serbia, and Nepal.
Ireland
In Ireland, Leo Varadkar formally became the country's prime
minister after a 57-50 vote June 14 in the Irish Parliament.
The opposition Fianna Fail party, led by Michael Martin,
abstained its 47 votes to allow Varadkar to take over as Taoiseach, or prime
minister, according to media reports.
Varadkar, 38, and leader of the Fine Gael party, is the
Emerald Isle's first gay and youngest person to serve in the high-ranking
position.
Former Prime Minister Enda Kenny told parliament before the
vote, "As the country's youngest holder of this office, he speaks for a
new generation of Irish women and Irish men, he represents a modern, diverse
and inclusive Ireland and speaks for them like no other."
Varadkar succeeded Kenny, who retired.
In his acceptance speech, Varadkar harnessed youthful energy
and vision for Ireland, arguing that the politics of the past were no longer
fit for the nation's purpose.
"The government that I lead will not be one of left or
right because those old divisions do not comprehend the political challenges of
today," he said, according to media reports.
Pulse, an Irish publication, reported that Varadkar is
regarded as relatively liberal on social issues, but criticized by opposition
parties for his "right-wing economic views."
The new prime minister is the son of an Indian-born father
and Irish mother. He was born in Dublin in 1979. In 2015, he came out publicly
in the run-up to the public vote to legalize same-sex marriage throughout
Ireland.
Before becoming prime minister, Varadkar was appointed or
elected to many government positions. He initially followed in his father's
footsteps becoming a doctor, however, he returned to his original interest in
politics that he took up as a teenager. He was elected as councilor in 2004. He
later was appointed to minister for transport, tourism and sport; health
minister; and minister of welfare. In 2007, he was elected to the Irish
Parliament, representing West Dublin.
Serbia
Last week, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic nominated
political newcomer Ana Brnabic, a gay woman, as the country's prime
minister-designate to lead the conservative southeast European nation.
Ultimately, it's a watershed moment for the conservative
Balkans as Brnabic, 41, could become the country's first out and first female
prime minister in Serbia's history, according to media reports.
Next week parliament, which is led by Vucic's populist
Progressive Party, will meet to formally approve or decline Brnabic's cabinet.
Brnabic, who has spent less than a year in Serbian politics,
isn't affiliated with any political party, but appears to be loyal to Vucic.
Last August, Brnabic was appointed as minister of public
administration and local government, reported the Telegraph. Prior to taking
the government position, she spent a decade working for international
organizations, foreign investors, local governments, and the public sector in
Serbia, reported First Post.
"I would like to thank the president for placing
enormous trust in my capabilities to lead the government," said Brnabic,
who has sought to slash Serbia's stifling bureaucracy as minister for public
administration, reported the Irish Times.
She vowed to work "honestly and with passion" for
"citizens who expect to feel the results of the government's work through
better quality of life," she added.
Brnabic doesn't believe that her sexual orientation is of
any importance and won't interfere with her work, she told RTV.
"I don't like when being gay is used as an indicator of
personality. Why is that important?" she said.
However, the decision to nominate Brnabic was difficult but
"reached in the interest of Serbia and its citizens," Vucic told
reporters.
A former extremist-turned-reformist, Vucic, who won the
presidency in a landslide election in April, has promised to boost LGBT rights
as a part of efforts to move Serbia closer to European Union membership,
reported ABC News.
"I believe Ana Brnabic has all the personal qualities
and expertise," Vucic told the media, according to the Times. "I am
confident she will work hard, show respect to political parties and work for
the benefit of Serbia with other ministers."
The move has infuriated conservative factions, the Christian
Orthodox Church, and ultranationalists who are pro-Russia, according to media
reports.
"Is it possible that the ruling majority has no other
candidate for the prime minister-designate but one imposed by the West, which
dictates all moves by this government?" the opposition Dveri party asked,
reported the Times.
Dragan Markovic Palma, an outspoken nationalist whose small
party is a member of the ruling coalition, declared, "Ana Brnabic is not
my prime minister."
His ideal Serbian prime minister is someone who "should
be a family man who knows what children are," the paper reported.
In Sputnik, a Russian media outlet, far-right conservative
Vojislav Seselj blamed the West for placing strong pressure on Vucic to select
Brnabic.
Born in Belgrade, Serbia, Brnabic, who is fluent in English
and Russian, completed her undergraduate studies at Northwood University in the
United States and received her MBA in marketing from Hull University in the
United Kingdom in 2001. She returned to Serbia, working in the wind power
industry and on multiple development projects funded by the United States
Agency for International Development, according to media reports.
Brnabic has won multiple awards recognizing her
accomplishments in business.
Currently, Brnabic is a board member of PEXIM Foundation, a
scholarship organization for Serbian and Macedonian students identified as
talent to help accelerate development in economic and social spheres, according
to media reports.
Nepal
Nepal has its first out transgender candidate, Aanik Rana
Magar, running for local office.
Magar, who identifies as third gender, filed her nomination
to run for ward eight of the Tilotama Municipality in Western Nepal as the Naya
Shakti Nepal Party candidate in the second phase local election, reported
Pahichan.
Nepal legally recognized the third gender in 2015.
The Naya Shakti Nepal Party was created by former Prime
Minister Baburam Bhattarai to encourage and give a vehicle for political
leaders to be publicly elected rather than by members of parliament, reported
Pink News.
Magar, a social worker and LGBT activist, perceives her bid
for office as a victory, whether or not she wins her seat. She said that her
campaign would bring visibility to gender and sexual minority communities in
Nepal.
"In the elections, victory or defeat is a normal
process, but I think my candidacy itself is a victory for me," she said, noting
that her candidacy would "provide a further boost for the members of the
community" and "contribute" to bring changes for the LGBT
community, reported Pahichan.
Nepal recently passed a new constitution, which included
protections against discrimination of LGBT people. The constitution was hailed
by the Washington, D.C.-based Human Rights Campaign as a "historic first
for a nation in Asia," reported Pink News. |
Few would disagree that the position of city councillor, let alone mayor, is one that carries supreme responsibility. This person is your voice on big and small decisions that affect your daily life, helps set priorities for our city, votes on billion-dollar budgets and contracts.
And yet, the application process for this job is less onerous than signing up to be a community volunteer.
You don't need a resume, references or a police record check.
There is possibly no other job where there's such an inverse relationship between the importance of the position and the bar of entry.
And that's a problem.
There's a more onerous process in place to be a community volunteer than to run for municipal office. (Giacomo Panico/CBC)
Low bar to entry
You shouldn't have to be rich or part of the establishment to run for office. A good political leader can come from anywhere, but that doesn't necessarily mean just anyone should be able to run.
We should have a system that doesn't prevent people from marginalized groups from entering the race, but at the same time only encourages people who are somewhat serious about the job.
That's not the system we have.
To run, you need to be at least 18 years old and eligible to vote in Ottawa. You need to show your ID, pay a $100 fee — $200 if you're running for mayor — and, new this year, file signatures from 25 people nominating you. (More on that last point in a moment.)
That's it.
That process led to 12 people running for mayor, most of whom were not remotely qualified. Nine of the 12 candidates, a full 75 per cent, got less than one per cent of the vote.
Candidates have access to our info
You might say, who cares? The voters will sift the serious candidates from the flakes. After all, that's the basis of democracy — voters decide who represents them from the options in front of them.
And that's a valid argument. But this system also presents some issues.
Candidates about whom we know almost nothing, who may have criminal records, have access to all voters' names and addresses.
First — and this is something not widely known — candidates have access to voters' lists in the ward in which they're running, and for mayoral candidates, everyone in the city.
Think about that.
Candidates about whom we know almost nothing, who may have criminal records, have access to all voters' names and addresses, which some people go to great lengths to try to keep private.
James T. Sheahan, for example, registered to run for mayor. He was not heard from in any way during the campaign.
Who is he? No idea. Does he know where you live? Maybe.
Low bar helps incumbents
Second, the more people who run, the more difficult it is for voters to get to know the candidates.
In Orléans, 17 people were on the ballot, making it tricky for electors to figure out what to do come voting day. Two of those candidates weren't even running — it was too late for them to take their names off the ballot — but they each got votes anyway.
Third, the low bar of entry is a huge help to incumbents, who usually have a built-in advantage from name-recognition alone.
When lots of people are running, the challengers split the vote, allowing an incumbent to win with a relatively small percentage of the vote.
In Alta Vista, for example, incumbent Jean Cloutier won with 32 per cent of the vote, only 201 votes ahead of second-place candidate Raylene Lang-Dion.
There were six candidates in that race, including one who runs perennially in every election and another who didn't campaign. Those two candidates' votes together could have put Lang-Dion over the top.
Now, there's no guaranteeing that the people who voted for the two last-place candidates would have voted for Lang-Dion. But it illustrates how a proliferation of candidates can often help put the incumbent back in office.
Hiding behind democracy
A large slate of candidates also helps incumbents at debates.
The more people who participate in an all-candidates' debate, the less time there is for contenders to challenge the incumbent.
Debate organizers, often volunteer-run community organizations, are loath not to invite all candidates for fear of a backlash.
Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson, right, refused to take part in a one-on-one debate with mayoral candidate Clive Doucet, left. (CBC News)
Worse, incumbents often refuse to participate in debates where all the candidates are not invited.
Even though he found debates with 10 other candidates "frustrating," Mayor Jim Watson refused an invitation by CBC Ottawa to battle contender Clive Doucet one-on-one.
In Toronto, incumbent Mayor John Tory did the same thing.
25-signature requirement meaningless
This election marked the first time that candidates were required to provide 25 nominations from people who were eligible to vote in Ottawa. The measure was supposed to provide some sort of hindrance to frivolous candidates.
It did no such thing. In fact, the new rule is virtually meaningless.
Elections officials are not required by the province to verify who the nominees are. But they couldn't check on the signators even if they wanted to, because the candidate registration period closes before the province sends out the preliminary voters' list.
Also, if somehow later in the campaign it's discovered that one of the 25 wasn't eligible to nominate a candidate, it doesn't matter. The candidate is still allowed to run.
More signatures, refundable deposit
The province had promised to review the rules put in place for this election before we go to the polls again in 2022.
It should consider raising the number of signatures needed to run for office. If someone wants to be your councillor, it's not too much to ask they collect 100 signatures — a majority of them from the ward they're running in.
To run for mayor of this G7 capital, the bar should be set much higher.
A higher nomination fee could be refunded if the candidate receives a certain number of votes. (Olivier Plante/CBC)
A minimum number of signatures should have to be collected from each of the 23 wards — if you want to be the mayor of this city, then maybe you or your team of supporters should visit all of it at least once.
And there should be penalties for not following these rules.
Charging a higher fee is trickier. You don't want to eliminate candidates based on financial measures.
Some observers have suggested a nomination fee of $1,000 that is refundable if the candidate receives a certain number of votes, say three per cent of the votes cast.
All of these rules should be up for public discussion, of course. But we can't let the status quo ride. Because these rules, which are supposed to be protecting democracy, in many ways are only serving to hinder it. |
(CNN) -- Apparently, "Anonymous" won't be accepting your friend request.
Members of the shadowy collective known for its politically motivated Web hacks and attacks are targeting Facebook for what they claim to be the social-networking giant's misuse of personal information.
"Your medium of communication you all so dearly adore will be destroyed," the speaker said in a YouTube video, which was posted July 16 but started circulating widely this week.
Using a voice modulator to disguise his (or her) voice, the speaker, who purports to represent Anonymous, invites viewers to "join the cause and kill Facebook for the sake of your own privacy."
"Everything you do on Facebook stays on Facebook regardless of your privacy settings, and deleting your account is impossible," the speaker says. "Even if you delete your account, all your information stays on Facebook and can be recovered at any time."
The video also makes the unsubstantiated claim that Facebook has been selling user information to government agencies and giving it to security firms so they can spy on people.
A Facebook spokesman declined comment Tuesday on the alleged Anonymous plot.
But the site has repeatedly said it doesn't sell information and doesn't share user information with any third parties that the user hasn't approved.
"We do not share your personal information with people or services you don't want," Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in an opinion piece for the Washington Post last year. "We do not give advertisers access to your personal information. We do not and never will sell any of your information to anyone."
The announced date for the "operation," November 5, is Guy Fawkes Day, a commemoration of the Gunpowder Plot in which Fawkes and others placed explosives under the British House of Lords in 1605.
Anonymous's most common mode of operation is launching distributed denial-of-service attacks. In a DDoS, multiple people use scripts to repeatedly access a website, slowing it badly or shutting it down if its servers can't handle the traffic.
But it's apparent that everyone who's part of Anonymous -- which rose to prominence for supporting whistle-blower site WikiLeaks -- isn't up for attacking Facebook.
"FYI - #OpFacebook is being organised by some Anons. This does not necessarily mean that all of #Anonymous agrees with it," read a Twitter post Tuesday morning from @GroupAnon, a feed that has consistently posted about the group's activities.
By its nature, Anonymous is loosely organized, with no clear leadership structure.
It also remains an open question whether the group could muster enough help to take down, or slow, a site that boasts 750 million users and routinely hosts tens of millions of them every day.
In December, the group tried and failed to take down another Web giant: Amazon. The online retailer, which booted WikiLeaks from its web-hosting service, is known to have massive amounts of server space -- as does Facebook.
In the past few years, Anonymous has taken credit for disrupting a number of prominent websites, including those of PayPal, Master Card, Visa and the Church of Scientology.
As recently as Monday, the group claimed credit for hacking the site of the Syrian Defense Ministry, replacing its content with an anti-government message and the Anonymous logo.
Protesters in Syria have been demanding reforms, including true democratic elections and an end to President Bashar al-Assad's regime. |
The US state of Georgia is delving into a claim that a misplaced electronic ballot box may have swung a key vote.
On November 3, in the county of DeKalb just east of Atlanta, LaVista Hills held a vote on whether to become a city. In a closely run race, the motion was defeated by 136 votes – less than one per cent of the electorate.
Leonard Piazza, who works in the county's office of voter registration and elections, claims a mislaid memory stick is proof the count was bungled – or worse, rigged.
On Thursday, he told Channel 2 Action News he found a memory card of the type used by the state's voting machines loose in the office, and fears votes stored on the device were not counted.
Citizens in the state use Diebold computers to vote in elections and referendums, their votes being electronically stored and counted.
Piazza claims that when he told his superior about the misplaced memory stick, and the possibility of uncounted votes, she refused to investigate it, and placed him on administrative leave.
On the orders of Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, a formal investigation is now underway into Piazza's claims: officials have confiscated the memory stick and one of DeKalb County's voting machines used in the LaVista Hills ballot.
"As Secretary of State I take any allegations of elections fraud seriously," said Kemp.
"Given the serious nature of these allegations, I have asked the Center for Election Systems at Kennesaw State University and the GBI [George Bureau of Investigation] to assist in this investigation. I asked the GBI to assist due to the alleged theft of secured memory cards and fraud allegations. Once completed, the investigation will be presented to the state elections Board. We will have no further comment until that time."
Meanwhile, Piazza himself has come under scrutiny. He previously worked for an election board in Pennsylvania before being let go. He sued his former employer over claims that he was removed from his job because he wanted to expose corruption in the voting system.
Piazza's boss Maxine Daniels says the whole thing is a case of a disgruntled employee making waves, and insists the vote was fair. ® |