The Entropy Effect

Sulu could not tell from the far-away, introspective look on Kirk’s face how the captain would react now. Perhaps he was only trying to keep anger in check.

“Mr. Sulu,” he said, “what happens if she doesn’t accept your application, or if Starfleet has already assigned new people?”

“Captain Kirk . .. this is something I’ve got to try to do, whether it’s Captain Hunter’s squadron or some other.”

For the first time since Sulu had come in, Kirk smiled. Sulu had never been quite so grateful to see that expression on anyone in his life.

“I don’t know how Hunter will respond to your application, either, Mr. Sulu,” Kirk said. “But if she refuses it she’ll be a long time looking for anyone half as good.”

The process went faster than Sulu ever imagined possible. He was granted an immediate temporary transfer to Aerfen . At first he wondered if perhaps he had been accepted out of desperation, because the fighter was so short-handed. It was possible that Hunter did not really want him on her ship. But Kirk assured him, and Captain Hunter reassured him by her manner, than he was accepted on his merits both past and potential, and that the transfer would be permanent as soon as the red tape threaded its convoluted way through the bureaucratic machinery. So at six hundred hours, barely five hours after he had spoken to Kirk, he stood in the middle of his emptied room, a full duffel bag and a small box of miscellaneous stuff at his feet, and his antique sabre in his hands.

Carrying it, he left his cabin, walked quietly down the corridor, and knocked softly on Mandala’s door. The answer was almost instantaneous.

“Come in!”

The lock clicked free; he went into the darkened cabin.

“What’s the matter?” Mandala had her uniform shirt half over her head already, assuming an emergency for which she would be needed.

“It’s all right,” Hikaru said. “It’s just me.”

She looked out at him from the tangle of her shirt. It covered the lower half of her face like a mask, and

pulled loose strands of her hair across her forehead.

“Oh, hi,” she said. “You don’t look like you’ve come to get me to help repel an invasion.” She pulled her shirt off again, tossed it on a chair with her pants, and waved the light to the next brightest setting. The gold highlights in her red hair gleamed. When she was on duty she never wore her hair down like this, in a mass that curled around her face and shoulders and all the way to the small of her back. In fact Hikaru supposed he was one of the few people on board who had ever seen it down.

Mandala’s smile faded. “On the other hand you look like something’s wrong. What is it, Hikaru? Sit down.”

He sat on the edge of her bunk. She drew up her knees, still under the blanket, and wrapped her arms around them.

“Come on,” she said gently. “What’s the matter?”

“I did it,” he said. “I applied for a transfer to Hunter’s squadron.”

“She accepted you!” Mandala said with delight.

He nodded.

“You ought to be turning cartwheels,” she said. “It’s just perfect for you.”

“I’m beginning to wonder if I made a mistake. I’m having second thoughts.”

“Hikaru, the Enterprise is a great assignment, but you haven’t been wrong in thinking you need wider experience.”

“I wasn’t thinking professionally. I was thinking personally.”

She glanced away, then back, looked straight into his eyes, and took his hand.

“You see what I meant,” she said. “About getting too attached to anybody.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know how you feel. I didn’t even mean to talk about that. I just came to say goodbye, and to give you my sabre. It takes me over the mass allowance.”

Mandala accepted the sabre with the dignity due to it: it was an old sword, and a finely-made one.

“Thank you,” she said. She bent her head down, resting her face against her knees, and he thought she was crying.

“Mandala, hey, I’m sorry—”

Shaking her head violently without looking up, she grabbed his wrist to stop the apology. When she did raise her head, he saw that she was laughing so hard she was in tears.

“No,” she said. “ I’m sorry. It’s beautiful, I’m not laughing at the sabre, only I am, sort of, if I were quick enough on my feet I’d give you—” She glanced around. “Ha, there!” She pulled the heavy ring off the middle finger of her right hand. It was a naturally-formed circle of a stone like ruby, very much the color

of her hair, even to the same golden highlights, at the facets. Except when she was practicing judo, she always wore it. She slipped it on his little finger.

In shooting for her promotion to lieutenant commander, one of the subjects Mandala studied was psychology, including its history. Smiling, she told Hikaru about another century’s theory of sex and symbols: swords and sheaths, locks and keys. When she was finished, he laughed with her at the quaint ideas of a different age.

They looked at each other soberly.

“Did you mean it, what you said before ...”

“I very seldom say anything I don’t mean,” Mandala said. “ Haveyou changed your mind?”

“I... I don’t know.”