Chapter Twenty – Epilogue

It was almost midnight. The lights were dimmed and the corridors empty as McCoy walked into the recreation room. His lips quirked carefully upwards in a sly grin as he spotted Kirk and Spock, the room's only occupants in the corner. He walked up to the table and plucked down next to Kirk. "I do believe I told you to hit the sack?"

"I couldn't sleep, Bones," Jim murmured.

McCoy sighed and smirked. "I should haul your sorry ass to sickbay, Jim," he said grumpily.

"The captain is no longer in need of medical attention," Spock reasoned. "That would be highly illogical."

Bones rolled his eyes and turned to the Vulcan indignantly. "The captain is exhausted, bruised and battered all over the body, held together by micro sutures and his vitals are not back to normal, on top of that he's white as a ghost," he said.

Jim smirked and then grimaced as he reached up to make a draw on the chessboard in front of him. Spock arched a curious eyebrow as the captain made a move he hadn't considered.

A cunning, almost daring smile, crossed the captain's features as he leaned back in his chair.

"A very interesting move, Jim," Spock commended.

"I thought you might say that," he mused softly.

"So, what happens now?" Bones drawled wearily. Just seeing the chess board made his head hurt.

Jim turned to face his friend and CMO. "Our new orders just come through. As of twenty-hundred-hours tomorrow the Vulcan ship V'Nara is relieving the Enterprise of her duties at Babel. The Pegasus, after being repaired, will travel directly to Coridan and take care of business there."

McCoy huffed. "So, we're back to finding new civilizations to argue with?" he asked sarcastically.

"What's the matter, Bones?" Jim asked jovially. "I thought you'd like some normalcy."

"I do hope you'll remember you're restricted to light duties only, Jim," he cautioned grumpily. "On a second thought, I might change my mind about the light duties and have you taken off duty if I find out you're not properly rested."

"Our first task is to map a region the size of half the Sol system and draw up a structure for stellar charts," Jim said with a smirk. "I don't expect to run into trouble anytime soon."

Bones rolled his eyes. "Now you've jinxed us," he complained lightly.

"Doctor McCoy," Spock began seriously. "The term jinxed bear no meaning. It is simply a term used by superstitious people."

The good doctor turned to the Vulcan indignantly. "Just because you can't explain it logically doesn't mean-"

"Gentlemen," Kirk broke in lightly.

The whine of the intercom sounded through the room. Jim gingerly got out of his chair and pushed the button on the nearby wall. "Kirk here," he said wearily.

"Sir, Ensign Blake here," the young man from the delta shift said worriedly obviously not expecting to talk to the captain directly. "I'm sorry to disturb you, sir, but I think you need to come to the bridge."

Kirk nodded toward Spock and they quickly began to move toward the door. Curious, McCoy got up and followed them.

"Report," Kirk demanded as he entered the bridge.

Spock quickly headed up to his station.

"Sir," the lieutenant, who sat in the captain's chair, acknowledged as he moved to give the captain room. Everything went black for a just a few seconds, we heard a faint noise and now we can't seem to access the logs."

"Memory banks have been deleted," Spock reported, his voice devoid of emotions. "Correction, only the sequence associated with the rescue of Ambassador Sarek and his wife."

Kirk gripped the armrest a little tighter and clenched his teeth in frustration.

"Are you sure?" Scotty said with a frown. "That doesn't make sense. Who would do such a thing and why?"

"Mr. Spock," Kirk said, his voice suddenly cold. "You have the bridge. I'll be in my quarters."

"Captain," he acknowledged.

Kirk strode through the hallways in a brisk pace and then walked straight up to his small vidscreen, placed a call and sat down.

The moment later a man in his early fifties, smart and lean, replaced the blackness of the monitor. "Hello, Jim," he greeted with a cocky grin. "I was wondering how long it would take."

"I know you were there," he said succinctly. "You and your, so called, nomadic people."

O'Halloran shrugged. "On Risa?" he asked innocently. "Yeah, for the first time in years I had a few days off and I might have had one too many of those lovely bluish drinks."

Kirk was not the least amused by his class-mate's reply.

"Come on, Jim. You know what it's like, working for Starfleet," he added jokingly. "I hear you've been keeping busy out there on Babel. I even read a newspaper claiming you almost got yourself killed."

This time a faint upward curl graced the captain's lips. "Still buying news on paper, the old-fashioned way. I am amazed it's even offered nowadays."

"It'll always be available. Besides, I don't trust news over the network. I read an article about 85 percent of the mumbo-jumbo being falsified," he drawled cynically.

"How did you get there?" Jim asked seriously, steering the conversation back on track.

"It's in the past now, Jim. Let's leave it there," O'Halloran reasoned, his voice suddenly colder.

"We saw them too. Even if section 31 erased the memory banks of the Enterprise and, if I'm to guess, certain files have disappeared from Babel, Sarek and his wife saw them too, some of my officers saw them. We've brought it out in the open. What would be gained by trying to deny we never saw the altered Klingons?"

"These are dangerous times, Jim. Those are dangerous people. The world isn't ready to deal with them," he said cryptically.

"You knew about them, didn't you?" Kirk pushed darkly. "You could have stopped this."

"No," O'Halloran replied quickly. "We had nothing but rumors. We had no idea there was a connection between them, the Orion Syndicate and the Coridan affair."

Silence settled over the link for a moment as both of them contemplated about the words spoken.

"As for section 31, Jim. It exists only in your imagination. We're just part of the security branch, operating under orders on remote locations. We're not agents without consciousness that kills innocents for the greater good. That is an image created by those who worked undercover during the beginning of the coalition and the United Federation of Planets. Didn't you hear Admiral Archer, then Captain Archer, announce that no such branch exists in the Starfleet organization?"

"I am not the only one imagining it," Kirk cautioned.

O'Halloran smirked. "Shadows exist, Jim, they always will. Sometimes they help you, sometimes they expose you to danger. Don't make the shadows your enemy."

James T Kirk sighed in frustration as the call disconnected and the transmission was lost. He ran a tired hand through his hair and closed his eyes. He couldn't wait to get out of the way of politics and games, of mistrust and deceit. He longed for a fresh start, mapping a new region suddenly seemed appealing. To set foot where no one had ever gone before.

OOOOOO

The end

A/N: Thank you so much for your patience and for your feedback. It's been a pleasure writing Star Trek (TOS) for the first time.