Star Trek(50)

Hemnask smiled. “You don’t need to explain plurality of viewpoints to a Rigelian, Admiral. No formal apology is necessary.” She took a step closer, softening her voice. “But your personal apology is most gracious, and most appreciated. It is gratifying to feel . . . welcomed.”

Her big green eyes held his, and he smiled back. “You are certainly welcome, Director.” After a moment, he caught himself and turned to Jahlet. “Both of you.”

She gave the other two a knowing look. “I thank you, Admiral. But if you will excuse me, I must consult with our government. You and Director Hemnask will have to carry on your dialogue without me, if that is all right with you.”

“It is, Boda,” Hemnask told her. “I’m sure the admiral can keep me entertained.”

Hoping to live up to that expectation, Archer took Hemnask for a walk on Babel’s esplanade, a public area beneath a transparent dome affording a view of the stars above. The esplanade was home to a variety of shops whose vendors had come from many worlds to cater to the diplomats and reporters attending the conference. “This Babel is quite a place,” Hemnask told him as they strolled among the shops, casually looking over their exotic wares and inhaling the eclectic aromas of their foodstuffs. “So many different peoples . . . it reminds me of the Colonies back home. Yet so few are in your Federation.”

“Well, not yet, anyway,” Archer replied. “Maybe someday.”

“Hmp.” She gave him a teasing look. “Councilor Thoris would accuse you of cultural imperialism.”

“We’re only seeking partnership.”

Hemnask smiled. “Aren’t we all?”

She stopped at a clothing kiosk run by a middle-aged Mazarite man, who gushed about the privilege of being visited by Jonathan Archer himself. Archer resisted his offer of a free suit, but Hemnask laughingly prodded him to play along and let himself be measured, if only to see holograms of various options. He found them all uniformly garish and embarrassing, but he didn’t have the heart to tell Hemnask, who seemed quite impressed by them. She put in an order for a pair of dresses herself.

But once they left the shop, she grew pensive. “Are you all right?” he asked.

She sighed. “I’m . . . concerned. I wonder if Thoris may have been right.”

“That the Federation’s bad for Rigel?”

“That Rigel’s bad for the Federation. That we aren’t ready for it. It can’t be a coincidence that this raid on the archive happened now. We have our own factions who fear new races and new ideas. Perhaps this attack shows that we are not as united as the image we project to the galaxy.”

Archer touched her shoulder lightly. “But the First Families aren’t part of your community.”

“And maybe that’s symptomatic of something—that we haven’t been able to make peace with those who are right in our midst.” She shook her head, causing her hair to tumble appealingly. “They’re Zami, just as I am. We have a kinship—and kinship is paramount to our people.” A bitter scoff followed. “But we are so far from being able to build common ground. Not with the likes of the First Families.”

Archer clasped her shoulder more firmly, sensing her need for comfort. “Sedra . . . there’s something personal between you and the Families, isn’t there?”

She gave him a grateful look, calming under his touch. “Yes, Jonathan, there is. My own . . . shameful secret that’s in those archives along with everyone else’s. A secret I keep not to protect myself, but to protect my mother,” she continued softly, for his ears only. “Who, before she came to Five and married Gorvel Hemnask . . . was the kept woman of a minor scion of the Thamnos clan, one of the leading First Families. Who, when she fled . . . was already pregnant with me, and not by choice.”

“My God,” Archer breathed. “Sedra, I’m so sorry.”

She stared and gave a confused chuckle. “That’s sweet, but . . . why do you apologize? You bear no culpability.”

“Uh . . . well, it doesn’t just mean ‘I apologize.’ It means . . . I feel sorrow. I sympathize.”

“Ah. I understand. Thank you. But I long ago accepted that how I was conceived did not diminish who I am, or who my mother is. It only diminishes the man who did it to her.” She sighed. “Yet not everyone would agree, so I keep it private, for her sake.”

“You’re certainly entitled to.”

Hemnask reached out and snagged an elaborate necklace hanging in another kiosk, letting its multicolored beads slide between her fingers. “We’re so proud of this community we’ve built on trade. But it’s really about enlightened self-interest, held together only by a mutual craving for profit and a tenuous balance of secrets and extortion.” Hemnask turned back to him. “Maybe you’re asking too much from Rigel, expecting us to be like you. You have your holdouts, but you formed a union   with no commercial incentive, no threats. You came together out of trust and mutual friendship. And perhaps that makes you overly ready to trust us, when you should not.”