The Trouble With Tribbles Part 3

*Look, I'm not the only one who had reservations about Spock. NBC was a little scared too. At one point, they had considered getting rid of his pointed ears and arched eyebrows because they thought that audiences might be repelled. They even made up and sent out publicity brochures with Leonard Nimoy in normal make-up, un-Vulcanized you might say. But by that time, Spock had begun to prove himself to be one of the show's strongest drawing points, so the idea was dropped. Later on, n.o.body at NBC would admit that they had ever been anything but 100 percent in favor of Mr. Spock being an alien-they had known Roddenberry was right all the time. The buck was pa.s.sed so fast they wore it out.

*I say this as a joke. TV producers don't steal. It isn't worth the trouble; it's just as easy to hire the writer as it is to steal from him-but the possibility of such an accusation is one of the main reasons why they won't read an un-agented ma.n.u.script. There are too many amateurs willing to believe that a story with even the slightest similarity was plagiarized from theirs; they cannot conceive that ideas are not unique, and they will sue at the hint of a resemblance. So producers return their ma.n.u.scripts unopened. A shame, because a lot of good people lose out too, but lawsuits are a b.l.o.o.d.y nuisance.

*Absolutely no relation at all to the STAR TREK episode of later that season, "Tomorrow Is Yesterday." Although, I must admit, the similarity of the two t.i.tles did give me pause to think-but what the h.e.l.l. What's a t.i.tle or two among friends?

*The retelling of it here does not do it justice, believe me. You can't shrink sixty pages down to six without losing something in the translation.

And that's how it all started.*

*Reacting to Gene c.o.o.n's comment that what I had written was ideally a $2-3,000,000 movie, my agent suggested that I turn the story into a movie outline. Just change the name of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p and all of STAR TREK'S characters to something else. I did, but it never sold. Then I tried to turn it into a novel-but that project bogged down too. The .rst eighty pages of ma.n.u.script of Yesterday's Children seemed to be heading in a totally different direction. After thinking about it for most of 1968 and '69, I decided to write the novel it was turning into instead of trying to preserve the one I had started with. The book sold to Dell at the end of '69, and I turned in the .nished ma.n.u.script a year later. Dell published it in July of 1972. The last I heard, some studio was interested in buying the movie rights to it...

CHAPTER THREE.

"The Protracted Man" and "Bandi"

Before I went to meet Gene c.o.o.n, my agent carefully primed me on what to expect.

"David," he said. "Don't expect anything at all. He's got all his script a.s.signments made for this season; he can't give you anything but encouragement. All he wants to do is talk to you and tell you more about the show. What he'll probably do is tell you to wait and see if the show is renewed for a second season, and if it is, then submit stories for it, because then he'll be in a position to consider them seriously.

I listened carefully, took it all in and practiced nodding my bead at the right places.

Then I drove down to Hollywood for my prearranged appointment with Gene c.o.o.n. Needless to say, I felt like Dorothy being ushered into the presence of the Wizard of Oz. That Gene c.o.o.n was on a twenty-foot throne surrounded by pillars of lightning and thunder didn't help much either. (That was a subjective view, of course, but it was one of those situations where I kept looking behind me to see if I was leaving a trail of little brown puddles.) I don't remember what his .rst words were. I was too awed by the effect of seeing them materialize in puffs of .ame.

He told me he had been impressed by my outline, "Tomorrow Was Yesterday," and wanted to know where I had gone to school and what I had studied. I told him I had spent two years at the University of Southern California studying Cinema, and was working for a B.A. in Theatre Arts at San Fernando Valley State.

Apparently, that satis.ed him as to the seriousness of my desire to write for television and movies, for he said, "David, I can't promise you anything at all. I've got all my script a.s.signments made for this season; I can't give you anything but encouragement. But I did want to talk to you and .nd out a little bit about you and tell you more about the show. Now, if we're renewed for a second season-we won't know until February-then I want you to submit some more stories to us, because then we'll be in a position to consider them seriously."

Then we talked about possible story ideas, to see if I was thinking along the right track. One of the ideas I suggested was about small furry creatures that bred like crazy until they took over the Enterprise. Gene just smiled and shook his head. "Sounds cute, but it would probably cost too much. We'd have to build the creatures. No, think of something else."

And that was that.

I thanked him profusely for the opportunity to talk to him and promised to pray nightly for the show's renewal. He didn't insist that I back out of his of.ce, bowing repeatedly; special dispensation had been granted.

Afterwards, on my way home, I realized I had done a dumb thing. I had forgotten to ask permission to visit the set.

Oh, well. If things worked out all right, I'd get plenty of opportunities later on.

Besides, as it happened, I'd had a quick glimpse of one of the actors. After the meeting, Ande, Gene's secretary, went digging for a copy of The Star Trek Guide for me. (Another bonus!) While she was doing that, I was gazing distractedly out the window...only to be startled by Leonard Nimoy, in full Vulcan make-up, calmly riding his bicycle down the Desilu back-street. My .rst real look at Mr. Spock-and he was doing something totally human. But I guess it was logical...

By now, the school situation was such that I was catching occasional episodes of the show-and liking it. Heavens! I was turning into a Trekkie.

And so was the girl I was hanging around with at the time. Actually, hanging around isn't the right way to describe what we were doing-nattering and grommis.h.i.+ng comes a lot closer.*

Well, what do you expect from a couple of ex-rabbits? (Holly had also been in Winnie the Pooh. She had been an a.s.sociate rabbit, while I had been the head bunny. She's only slightly crazier than me.) We were both intrigued with the possibilities of my selling a story to STAR TREK, and in the next three months, we spent a lot of time talking over various story premises and how well they .t into the concept of the show as outlined in The Star Trek Guide. That was my bible.

By January, I had .ve story premises that I thought were suitable for STAR TREK.

One of them, I've forgotten. Which may be a blessing. It must have been so wretchedly handled that my subconscious mind has since suppressed all memory of it, and in one of my rarer moments of lucidity, I must have destroyed the last remaining copy. The only thing I do remember was that it involved the capture of the Enterprise by a superior force and Captain Kirk had to play a game of chess for their freedom-using the of.cers and crew of the Enterprise as the chess pieces. (The crucial decision involved his knowing sacri.ce of one of his of.cers in order to save the rest of the crew. I think the parallel I was trying to draw had something to do with the decisions a commander must make in battle. Sometimes they aren't nice.) The second premise was about a giant s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p-destroying, berserker machine. It was uncomfortably similar to an idea that Norman Spinrad was working on (The Doomsday Machine) although I didn't know it at the time. My berserker was defeated by a careful use of illogic. Of course.

Two of the other premises were called "The Protracted Man," and "Bandi." I include them here, but with the caution that they are premises only, and not fully developed outlines. A premise is exactly that-a premise from which to develop a story.

Furthermore, these premises were written by a dreadfully inexperienced twenty-two-year-old-only my incredible enthu-siasm and self-con.dence kept me from spotting the many .aws and inconsistencies in them.

The Protracted Man (A story premise by David Gerrold, February 1967.) The Enterprise is temporarily a.s.signed to aid a group of scientists who are in the .nal stages of a very important experiment. If the experiment succeeds, it will make it possible to cut down the traveling time from one part of the galaxy to another.

Even though faster-than-light travel is already possible (as evidenced by the Enterprise itself), the galaxy is so vast that many journeys are still impracticably long. To get from one side of the galaxy to another, even at the Enterprise's top speed, would take several years.

Consequently, this experiment is of considerable importance to the United Systems. If it succeeds they will be able to expand their explorations and colonies to the farthest reaches of the galaxy.

Basically, the idea is to set up a self-sustaining s.p.a.ce warp through which a s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p can take a "shortcut" from one part of the galaxy to another-a sort of tunnel in the sky. It is a long-distance matter transport, achieved by a wrinkle in the very fabric of s.p.a.ce.

Naturally, to set up this warp will require a great deal of energy and the math involved is so complex and sophisticated that it took a good many years just to program the computers for it. But all of these problems have already been solved and as the story opens, the scientists are in the .nal stage of preparations.

Because it will take a great amount of energy to actually fold the substance of s.p.a.ce, the power will be drawn from a nearby star. The star itself has no planets and is of no conceivable use to anyone; it's a deserted backwater of the galaxy. Great energy screens have been constructed to tap its output of light and energy. They are like great sails hanging against the night.

But none of this needs to be shown. The Enterprise is light years away from the center of the action.

The Enterprise is a.s.signed to be a retriever. Once the warp is established, a volunteer will pilot a shuttlecraft through it. In a matter of seconds he will travel across four light years. The Enterprise is waiting to pick him up at his exit point. (This is a duty much akin to that of an aircraft carrier that picks up an astronaut after his capsule splashes down at sea.) The Enterprise is hanging patiently in s.p.a.ce. They are in the .nal stages of the countdown. Across the subs.p.a.ce radio they can hear the many different voices of the warp technicians.

Four light years away a switch is thrown, and aboard the Enterprise, they watch as the exit point of the warp takes shape several hundred miles off their bow. (This distance is a necessary safety factor.) Slowly, the warp takes shape. It is a great .ickering bright .eld against the darkness of s.p.a.ce. (I envision a kind of hazy grid, wavering and slightly out of focus, superimposed against the backdrop of s.p.a.ce. The three color negatives should be printed out of synch to give it a weird color effect. This is essential to the plot, but more about it later.) However, something goes wrong. Perhaps it is a solar .are-up, or perhaps the great amounts of energy cause the dilithium crystals of the warp generators to fracture. In any case, the warp starts to .icker and seems to be s.h.i.+mmering out of control.

The chatter on the subs.p.a.ce radio indicates that the source of the trouble is at the other end, but it is too late to stop the experiment-the shuttlecraft is already on its way through.

Indeed it is. Kirk and the others on the bridge can see a dim shape wavering within the warp, caught there, unable to escape. It is like a .y in a cosmic web.

Mr. Spock, who has been waiting in the transporter room, in case of just such an emergency, quickly activates the transporter. He is going to try to rescue the pilot of the shuttlecraft by beaming him aboard the Enterprise. But as the transporter beam is activated, the warp starts to fade and seems about to .icker out of existence.

At .rst, Spock is unable to sense any life within the warp, then his sensors seem to go crazy, reporting con.icting data about the number of men in the warp. Although there is only supposed to be one, the transporter reacts as if there are several. Quickly, however, Spock does lock onto something-just as the shuttlecraft explodes within the warp in a bright, multicolored .ash.

The transport platform .ickers. Something starts to take shape, but it is not one man, as expected-it is three! Yet, the three men seem strangely incomplete. As they take shape, it is possible to see that one of the three .gures is a yellow phantom, one is red and one is blue. (One for each of the three color negatives.) The three .gures look at each other, then step together and unite to become one man, a normal man in normal color.

Something has gone terribly wrong. Apparently, the trans-porter has pulled the man out of the warp before he had come completely through it. It has affected him in some unknown way. As he steps down from the transporter platform, he seems to s.h.i.+mmer and as he moves, he shatters into his component colors.

(This is an easy effect to achieve-and probably the most inexpensive and effective of all special effects. The three color negatives are printed one or two frames out of synchronization. As long as the background does not move, it will appear normal, but any people within the shot will appear to shatter into their component colors every time they move. Later in the story, as the effect becomes more and more p.r.o.nounced, the negatives are printed further and further out of synch. To show the protracted man in the same shot with an unaffected person, use a split screen or superimpose him.) The affected man is quickly con.ned to the sick bay, where a puzzled Dr. McCoy scratches his head and tries to determine what has happened to him.

On the bridge, Kirk watches as the warp is shut down. It fades from the screen. He turns the controls over to a crewman and goes down to the sick bay to see the affected shuttlecraft pilot.

In the sick bay, McCoy's instruments seem to have gone crazy. They are registering normal readings, not for one man, but for several identical men. As if one man has been superimposed upon himself three times.

Spock nods knowingly and says: "It is a logical development in view of the nature of the experiment." Kirk and McCoy look at him, waiting for his inevitable explanation. Spock, being the Science Of.cer, quickly theorizes: "The experimental warp is a fourth dimensional energy .eld. The fourth dimension is time. Because the man was extracted from the warp before he was completely through it, he has been s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d along his time dimension."

Spock continues. The man has become a protracted man. He exists across a time span of one complete second, as opposed to a normal person who only exists during one nanosecond. Thus, he exists on several planes of existence. He exists a half second ahead of a normal person, and a half second behind. The crew of the Enterprise is able to perceive three of these planes of existence.

Because of the Doppler effect, the existence that is a half second behind appears as a red phantom, the existence which is a half second ahead appears as a blue phantom. The yellow phantom is on the same plane of existence as the crew of the Enterprise. Therefore, when the man moves, the blue phantom moves .rst, followed by the yellow, then the red. (Perhaps there are other existences beyond these, but re.ecting back light rays beyond the range of ordinary human vision.) McCoy asks Spock, at the end of this lengthy explanation, what will happen to the man. Spock starts to explain about entropy and certain other big words, but McCoy interrupts and asks him to put it into words of one syllable. Spock stares at him and comments that there are times when the good doctor can be most unscienti.c.

However, Spock continues, the man will probably stay in this state if he is left undisturbed. If his time-protraction is disturbed by any major upheaval of the local continuum, it could have disastrous effects. Either he will be snapped back to normal-or his time protraction will be increased.

Kirk asks Spock to explain. Spock theorizes that the man is in a very delicate state. Any disturbance will probably stretch him further and further along his time axis.

"What kind of disturbance?"

"I have no idea, Captain. It would probably be something along the lines of a disturbance of the basic fabric of s.p.a.ce. Our warp drive might even have that kind of effect on him."

They go into the sick bay and talk to the man for a little bit. He sits up on the edge of the bed. Because he is still only a couple of frames out of synch, he can still perceive normal time, but when he speaks, he speaks with three voices. (This can be done by having the actor dub over his lines twice, or by using three tracks, each one in synch with one of the color negatives.) However, the man is pretty well shaken up by his experience. The man, whom I shall call Jones (for convenience's sake), reports that he perceives everybody in much the same way as they are perceiving him, although stationary objects seem to be normal.

Kirk is faced with the problem of what to do about Jones, but there is a complication to the problem. Jones' brother is a crewman aboard the Enterprise. Naturally he is worried and concerned about his time-protracted sibling. He is waiting for Kirk outside the sick bay.

He wants to know how soon they can cure his brother. How soon can they return him to normal?

Kirk replies: "We don't even know if we can."

Crewman Jones looks at him for a long moment then asks to see his brother.

Kirk lets him into the sick bay, but with that one exception, n.o.body else is to enter the sick bay. It is off limits to all unauthorized personnel. They do not know if the effect is contagious (it could be) or if it is permanent or temporary. Worst of all, they are not even sure that they can return Jones to normalcy.

When Kirk returns to the bridge, he discovers from Mr. Scott that there is a power drain on the s.h.i.+p's matter-antimatter generators. The drain is localized in the sick bay. Apparently, the time protraction is an energy vacuum and draws power from the closest available source-in this case, the matter-antimatter generators.

Perhaps that is the answer to the problem. If Jones can be isolated from all energy sources, perhaps the time protraction will end and he will snap back to a normal condition.

In the wardroom, they talk to Mr. Scott about this possibility. He is doubtful that it can be done.

Spock suggests, "Wouldn't some kind of s.h.i.+elding work?"

Mr. Scott sees what Mr. Spock is suggesting. "I have some steel foil. It's collapsed steel-an inch thickness is equivalent to six inches."

"Do you have enough to s.h.i.+eld the reactors?"

Scott shakes his head. "No, Captain. This stuff is so dense that we couldn't afford to carry that much. It would outweigh the rest of the s.h.i.+p."

"Well, so much for that idea-"

"But I do have enough to s.h.i.+eld Jones," Scott suggests.

And that is the plan. A small cabin is quickly lined with the foil. It looks and handles very much like ordinary aluminum foil, but as a s.h.i.+elding it stops radiations.

Jones is transferred to the s.h.i.+elded cabin and almost im-mediately the lights start to fade and the arti.cial gravity seems to lessen. All over the s.h.i.+p, reports come in that the power levels are falling.

"What's happening?" demands Kirk.

Spock answers, "Apparently, Captain, Jones' time protraction is stronger than we thought. He's drawing the power he needs right through the foil."

"But why so much?"

"Apparently, it takes a great deal of power to get through that foil. He's drawing it from the Enterprise. He's not conscious that he's doing it-he's just doing it. It's the time protraction."

Kirk orders Jones to be brought out of the uns.h.i.+elded cabin and returned to the sick bay. As they do so, they notice that his time protraction seems to have increased. By now, his time span covers a full second and a half. (Before, he was only two or three frames out of synch. Now, he is twelve to twenty-four frames out of synch. The blue phantom is twelve frames ahead of the yellow, the red is twelve frames behind.) And the protracted man is very upset and dazed. He is confused because he perceives things that others can't. He is surrounded by multicolored phantoms of Kirk and Spock and McCoy all moving and talking and gobbling at once. It is very disturbing. He can no longer communicate with them.

Crewman Jones, the brother of the affected man, has noticed the increased protraction, and he is also upset.

Back in the wardroom, Kirk discusses the problem with his of.cers. Apparently, they cannot s.h.i.+eld Jones, but they must cut him off from all available power.

Spock suggests, "The logical thing to do would be to shut down the Enterprise's generators."

The others just stare at him.

Mr. Scott says, "That's impossible."

Spock just looks back at him and says, "Why?"

Mr. Scott explains, "Think of it, man! A s.h.i.+p without power is totally helpless. No gravity, no light, no heat, no air circulation, no defenses-nothing."

Spock suggests that they turn off the power for a short time only; a stars.h.i.+p can maintain for at least half an hour before the life support situation becomes critical. That would be time enough to snap Jones out of his time protraction.

Scott shakes his head again. They are too close to a nearby star. The star puts out a good deal of hard radiation. The only thing protecting them from it is an electro-magnetic force .eld. If they shut down the power, they shut down the screen that de.ects 99 percent of the radiation away from the Enterprise.

Spock suggests that they move the s.h.i.+p to a spot where the radiation is suf.ciently low to permit this. A few light years away from any stars should more than do it.

Although doubts are expressed, they agree on the plan. The sooner they activate it, the better. The power drain of the protracted man has increased.

Kirk gives the order to move ahead at Warp Factor One. Almost immediately, McCoy is on the intercom, screaming: "Jim, you'd better get down here!"

In the sick bay, the strangest thing has happened. There are dozens of red and yellow and blue phantoms in the room, running and b.u.mping into each other. Some escape into the corridor and go running up and down the halls, startling the crew of the Enterprise. Perhaps some of the phantoms are even negative images.

"What is it, Spock?" ask Kirk.

"I think I understand, Captain. We have to stop, immediately!"

Kirk orders a full stop. Gradually, the phantoms reunite, until the protracted man is back to only three. But his time protraction has increased until he spans a full three seconds. (Perhaps he is now sixty frames out of synch, thirty ahead and thirty behind.) Although the visible images are only a second out of phase, the non-visible images of Jones extend a good deal further. Spock is able to calculate this discrepancy and he reports that Jones' time protraction has been rapidly increased by their going into warp.

What had happened was that the Enterprise's warp drive folds s.p.a.ce in upon itself. It is a local disturbance of the basic continuum. Because Jones was in the center of it, his time line was folded back in upon itself over and over, and consequently, they saw many different phantom Joneses. When they came to a stop and the warp unfolded, it further stretched his time protraction.