Postcolonial Analysis

Instructions:

1. Before you read Salman Rushdie’s story, please make sure you’ve read through all of the resources for Weeks 12 and 13 and watched all of the videos.

2. Then read through the story at least once and choose one of the postcolonial issues or themes you think the story best responds to or that you found most interestingly represented in the story.

3. Then choose at least three different passages in the story that you think most directly address the postcolonial theme/issue you chose.

4. For each of your highlighted passages, explain what you think this passage is saying about/within your chosen theme--for example, the hybridity of postcolonial culture and its effects on postcolonial identities.

5. Then, after you’ve fully explained what you think is going on in this particular passage and what it’s saying/showing about your chosen postcolonial theme, explain how it connects to what you think the story’s overall point is about this theme or the overall view that the story represents of your theme.

6. Once you’ve completed the above analysis of three different passages, choose at least one of your classmate’s passages, and respond in depth to their chosen postcolonial them and their analysis of their chosen passage, what it says about this theme and what the overall point of the story is about this theme.

CHEKOV AND ZULU

I On 4th November, 1984, Zulu disappeared in Birmingham, and India House sent his old

schoolfriend Chekov to Wembley to see the wife.

‘Adaabarz, Mrs Zulu. Permission to enter?’

‘Of course come in, Dipty sahib, why such formality?’

‘Sorry to disturb you on a Sunday, Mrs Zulu, but Zulu-tho hasn’t been in touch this

morning?’

‘With me? Since when he contacts me on official trip? Why to hit a telephone call when

he is probably enjoying?’

‘Whoops, sore point, excuse me. Always been the foot-in-it blunderbuss type.’

‘At least sit, take tea-shee.’

‘Fixed the place up damn fine, Mrs Zulu, wah-wah. Tasteful decor, in spades, I must say.

So much cut-glass! That bounder Zulu must be getting too much pay, more than yours

truly, clever dog.’

‘No, how is it possible? Acting Dipty’s tankha must be far in excess of Security Chief.’

‘No suspicion intended, ji. Only to say what a bargain-hunter you must be.’

‘Some problem but there is, na?’

‘Beg pardon?’

‘Arré, Jaisingh! Where have you been sleeping? Acting Dipty Sahib is thirsting for his

tea. And biscuits and jalebis, can you not keep two things in your head? Jump, now,

guest is waiting.’

‘Truly, Mrs Zulu, please go to no trouble.’

‘No trouble is there, Diptyji, only this chap has become lazy since coming from home.

Days off, TV in room, even pay in pounds sterling, he expects all. So far we brought him

but no gratitude, what to tell you, noth-thing.’

‘Ah, Jaisingh; why not? Excellent jalebi, Mrs Z. Thanking you.’

Assembled on top of the television and on shelf units around it was the missing man’s

collection of Star Trek memorabilia: Captain Kirk and Spock dolls, spaceship models –

a Klingon Bird of Prey, a Romulan vessel, a space station, and of course the Starship

Enterprise. In pride of place were large figurines of two of the series’s supporting cast.

‘These old Doon School nicknames,’ Chekov exclaimed heartily. ‘They stay put like stuck

records. Dumpy, Stumpy, Grumpy, Humpy. They take over from our names. As in our

case our intrepid cosmonaut aliases.’

‘I don’t like. This “Mrs Zulu” I am landed with! It sounds like a blackie.’

‘Wear the name with pride, begum sahib. We’re old comrades-in-arms, your husband

and I; since boyhood days, perhaps he was good enough to mention? Intrepid

diplonauts. Our umpteen-year mission to explore new worlds and new civilisations. See

there, our alter egos standing on your TV, the Asiatic-looking Russky and the Chink. Not

the leaders, as you’ll appreciate, but the ultimate professional servants. “Course laid in!”

“Hailing frequencies open!” “Warp factor three!” What would that strutting Captain

have been without his top-level staffers? Likewise with the good ship Hindustan. We are

servants also, you see, just like your fierce Jaisingh here. Never more important than in

a moment like the present sad crisis, when an even keel must be maintained, jalebis

must be served and tea poured, no matter what. We do not lead, but we enable. Without

us, no course can be laid, no hailing frequency opened. No factors can be warped.’

‘Is he in difficulties, then, your Zulu? As if it wasn’t bad enough, this terrible time.’

On the wall behind the TV was a framed photograph of Indira Gandhi, with a garland

hung around it. She had been dead since Wednesday. Pictures of her cremation had

been on the TV for hours. The flower-petals, the garish, unbearable flames.

‘Hard to believe it. Indiraji! Words fail one. She was our mother. Hai, hai! Cut down in

her prime.’

‘And on radio-TV, such-such stories are coming about Delhi goings-on. So many

killings, Dipty Sahib. So many of our decent Sikh people done to death, as if all were

guilty for the crimes of one-two badmash guards.’

‘The Sikh community has always been thought loyal to the nation,’ Chekov reflected.

‘Backbone of the Army, to say nothing of the Delhi taxi service. Super-citizens, one

might say, seemingly wedded to the national idea. But such ideas are being questioned

now, you must admit; there are those who would point to the comb, bangle, dagger et

cetera as signs of the enemy within.’

‘Who would dare say such a thing about us? Such an evil thing.’

‘I know. I know. But you take Zulu. The ticklish thing is, he’s not on any official business

that we know of. He’s dropped off the map, begum sahib. AWOL ever since the

assassination. No contact for two days plus.’

‘O God.’

‘There is a view forming back at HQ that he may have been associated with the gang.

Who have in all probability long-established links with the community over here.’

‘O God.’

‘Naturally I am fighting strenuously against the proponents of this view. But his absence

is damning, you must see. We have no fear of these tinpot Khalistan wallahs. But they

have a ruthless streak. And with Zulu’s inside knowledge and security background …

They have threatened further attacks, as you know. As you must know. As some would

say you must know all too well.’

‘O God.’

‘It is possible’, Chekov said, eating his jalebi, ‘that Zulu has boldly gone where no Indian

diplonaut has gone before.’

The wife wept. ‘Even the stupid name you could never get right. It was with S. “Sulu.”

So-so many episodes I have been made to see, you think I don’t know? Kirk Spock

McCoy Scott Uhura Chekov Sulu.’

‘But Zulu is a better name for what some might allege to be a wild man,’ Chekov said.

‘For a suspected savage. For a putative traitor. Thank you for excellent tea.’

2 In August, Zulu, a shy, burly giant, had met Chekov off the plane from Delhi. Chekov at

thirty-three was a small, slim, dapper man in grey flannels, stiff-collared shirt and a

double-breasted navy blue blazer with brass buttons. He had bat’s-wing eyebrows and a

prominent and pugnacious jaw, so that his cultivated tones and habitual

soft-spokenness came as something of a surprise, disarming those who had been led by

the eyebrows and chin to expect an altogether more aggressive personality. He was a

high flyer, with one small embassy already notched up. The Acting Number Two job in

London, while strictly temporary, was his latest plum.

‘What-ho, Zools! Years, yaar, years,’ Chekov said, thumping his palm into the other

man’s chest. ‘So,’ he added, ‘I see you’ve become a hairy fairy.’ The young Zulu had been

a modern Sikh in the matter of hair – sporting a fine moustache at eighteen, but

beardless, with a haircut instead of long tresses wound tightly under a turban. Now,

however, he had reverted to tradition.

‘Hullo, ji,’ Zulu greeted him cautiously. ‘So then is it OK to utilise the old modes of

address?’

‘Utilise away! Wouldn’t hear of anything else,’ Chekov said, handing Zulu his bags and

baggage tags. ‘Spirit of the Enterprise and all that jazz.’

In his public life the most urbane of men, Chekov when letting his hair down in private

enjoyed getting inter-culturally hot under the collar. Soon after his taking up his new

post he sat with Zulu one lunchtime on a bench in Embankment Gardens and jerked his

head in the direction of various passers-by.

‘Crooks,’ he said, sotto voce.

‘Where?’ shouted Zulu, leaping athletically to his feet. ‘Should I pursue?’

Heads turned. Chekov grabbed the hem of Zulu’s jacket and pulled him back on to the

bench. ‘Don’t be such a hero,’ he admonished fondly. ‘I meant all of them, generally;

thieves, every last one. God, I love London! Theatre, ballet, opera, restaurants! The

Pavilion at Lord’s on the Saturday of the Test Match! The royal ducks on the royal pond

in royal St James’s Park! Decent tailors, a decent mixed grill when you want it, decent

magazines to read! I see the remnants of greatness and I don’t mind telling you I am

impressed. The Athenaeum, Buck House, the lions in Trafalgar Square. Damn

impressive. I went to a meeting with the junior Minister at the F. & C.O. and realised I

was in the old India Office. All that John Company black teak, those tuskers rampant on

the old bookcases. Gave me quite a turn. I applaud them for their success: hurrah! But

then I look at my own home, and I see that it has been plundered by burglars. I can’t

deny there is a residue of distress.’

‘I am sorry to hear of your loss,’ Zulu said, knitting his brows. ‘But surely the culpables

are not in the vicinity.’

‘Zulu, Zulu, a figure of speech, my simpleton warrior prince. Their museums are full of

our treasures, I meant. Their fortunes and cities, built on the loot they took. So on, so

forth. One forgives, of course; that is our national nature. One need not forget.’

Zulu pointed at a tramp, sleeping on the next bench in a ragged hat and coat. ‘Did he

steal from us, too?’ he asked.

‘Never forget’, said Chekov, wagging a finger, ‘that the British working class collaborated

for its own gain in the colonial project. Manchester cotton workers, for instance,

supported the destruction of our cotton industry. As diplomats we must never draw

attention to such facts; but facts, nevertheless, they remain.’

‘But a beggarman is not in the working class,’ objected Zulu, reasonably. ‘Surely this

fellow at least is not our oppressor.’

‘Zulu,’ Chekov said in exasperation, ‘don’t be so bleddy difficult.’

Chekov and Zulu went boating on the Serpentine, and Chekov got back on his

hobby-horse. ‘They have stolen us,’ he said, reclining boatered and champagned on

striped cushions while mighty Zulu rowed. ‘And now we are stealing ourselves back. It is

an Elgin marbles situation.’

‘You should be more content,’ said Zulu, shipping oars and gulping cola. ‘You should be

less hungry, less cross. See how much you have! It is enough. Sit back and enjoy. I have

less, and it suffices for me. The sun is shining. The colonial period is a closed book.’

‘If you don’t want that sandwich, hand it over,’ said Chekov. ‘With my natural radicalism

I should not have been a diplomat. I should have been a terrorist.’

‘But then we would have been enemies, on opposite sides,’ protested Zulu, and suddenly

there were real tears in his eyes. ‘Do you care nothing for our friendship? For my

responsibilities in life?’

Chekov was abashed. ‘Quite right, Zools old boy. Too bleddy true. You can’t imagine how

delighted I was when I learned we would be able to join forces like this in London.

Nothing like the friendships of one’s boyhood, eh? Nothing in the world can take their

place. Now listen, you great lummox, no more of that long face. I won’t permit it. Great

big chap like you shouldn’t look like he’s about to blub. Blood brothers, old friend, what

do you say? All for one and one for all.’

‘Blood brothers,’ said Zulu, smiling a shy smile.

‘Onward, then,’ nodded Chekov, settling back on his cushions. ‘Impulse power only.’

The day Mrs Gandhi was murdered by her Sikh bodyguards, Zulu and Chekov played

squash in a private court in St John’s Wood. In the locker-room after showering,

prematurely-greying Chekov still panted heavily with a towel round his softening waist,

reluctant to expose his exhaustion-shrivelled purple penis to view; Zulu stood proudly

naked, thick-cocked, tossing his fine head of long black hair, caressing and combing it

with womanly sensuality, and at last twisting it swiftly into a knot.

‘Too good, Zulu yaar. Fataakh! Fataakh! What shots! Too bleddy good for me.’

‘You desk-pilots, ji. You lose your edge. Once you were ready for anything.’

‘Yeah, yeah, I’m over the hill. But you were only one year junior.’

‘I have led a purer life, ji – action, not words.’

‘You understand we will have to blacken your name,’ Chekov said softly.

Zulu turned slowly in Charles Atlas pose in front of a full-length mirror.

‘It has to look like a maverick stunt. If anything goes wrong, deniability is essential.

Even your wife must not suspect the truth.’

Spreading his arms and legs, Zulu made his body a giant X, stretching himself to the

limit. Then he came to attention. Chekov sounded a little frayed.

‘Zools? What do you say?’

‘Is the transporter ready?’

‘Come on, yaar, don’t arse around.’

‘Respectfully, Mister Chekov, sir, it’s my arse. Now then: is the transporter ready?’

‘Transporter ready. Aye.’

‘Then, energise.’

Chekov’s memorandum, classified top-secret, eyes-only, and addressed to ‘JTK’ (James

T. Kirk):

My strong recommendation is that Operation Startrek be aborted. To send a

Federation employee of Klingon origin unarmed into a Klingon cell to spy is the

crudest form of loyalty test. The operative in question has never shown ideological

deviation of any sort and deserves better, even in the present climate of mayhem,

hysteria and fear. If he fails to persuade the Klingons of his bona fides he can expect to

be treated with extreme prejudice. These are not hostage takers.

The entire undertaking is misconceived. The locally settled Klingon population is not

the central problem. Even should we succeed, such intelligence as can be gleaned about

more important principals back home will no doubt be of dubious accuracy and

limited value. We should advise Star Fleet Headquarters to engage urgently with the

grievances and aspirations of the Klingon people. Unless these are dealt with fair and

square there cannot be a lasting peace.

The reply from JTK:

Your closeness to the relevant individual excuses what is otherwise an explosively

communalist document. It is not for you to define the national interest nor to

determine what undercover operations are to be undertaken. It is for you to enable

such operations to occur and to provide back-up as and when required to do so. As a

personal favour to you and in the name of my long friendship with your eminent

Papaji I have destroyed your last without keeping a copy and suggest you do the same.

Also destroy this.

Chekov asked Zulu to drive him up to Stratford for a performance of Coriolanus.

‘How many kiddiwinks by now? Three?’

‘Four,’ said Zulu. ‘All boys.’

‘By the grace of God. She must be a good woman.’

‘I have a full heart,’ said Zulu, with sudden feeling. ‘A full house, a full belly, a full bed.’

‘Lucky so and so,’ said Chekov. ‘Always were warmblooded. I, by contrast, am not.

Reptiles, certain species of dinosaur, and me. I am in the wife market, by the way, if you

know any suitable candidates. Bachelordom being, after a certain point, an obstacle on

the career path.’

Zulu was driving strangely. In the slow lane of the motorway, as they approached an exit

lane, he accelerated towards a hundred miles an hour. Once the exit was behind them,

he slowed. Chekov noticed that he varied his speed and lane constantly. ‘Doesn’t the old

rattletrap have cruise control?’ he asked. ‘Because, sport, this kind of performance

would not do on the bridge of the flagship of the United Federation of Planets.’

‘Anti-surveillance,’ said Zulu. ‘Dry-cleaning.’ Chekov, alarmed, looked out of the back

window.

‘Have we been rumbled, then?’

‘Nothing to worry about,’ grinned Zulu. ‘Better safe than sorry is all. Always anticipate

the worst-case scenario.’

Chekov settled back in his seat. ‘You liked toys and games,’ he said. Zulu had been a

crack rifle shot, the school’s champion wrestler, and an expert fencer. ‘Every Speech

Day,’ Zulu said, ‘I would sit in the hall and clap, while you went up for all the work

prizes. English Prize, History Prize, Latin Prize, Form Prize. Clap, clap, clap, term after

term, year after year. But on Sports Day I got my cups. And now also I have my area of

expertise.’

‘Quite a reputation you’re building up, if what I hear is anything to go by.’

There was a silence. England passed by at speed.

‘Do you like Tolkien?’ Zulu asked.

‘I wouldn’t have put you down as a big reader,’ said Chekov, startled. ‘No offence.’

‘J.R.R. Tolkien,’ said Zulu. ‘The Lord of the Rings.’

‘Can’t say I’ve read the gentleman. Heard of him, of course. Elves and pixies. Not your

sort of thing at all, I’d have thought.’

‘It is about a war to the finish between Good and Evil,’ said Zulu intently. ‘And while this

great war is being fought there is one part of the world, the Shire, in which nobody even

knows it’s going on. The hobbits who live there work and squabble and make merry and

they have no fucking clue about the forces that threaten them, and those that save their

tiny skins.’ His face was red with vehemence.

‘Meaning me, I suppose,’ Chekov said.

‘I am a soldier in that war,’ said Zulu. ‘If you sit in an office you don’t have one small

idea of what the real world is like. The world of action, ji. The world of deeds, of things

that are done and maybe undone too. The world of life and death.’

‘Only in the worst case,’ Chekov demurred.

‘Do I tell you how to apply your smooth-tongued musca-polish to people’s behinds?’

stormed Zulu. ‘Then do not tell me how to ply my trade.’

Soldiers going into battle pump themselves up, Chekov knew. This chest-beating was to

be expected, it must not be misunderstood. ‘When will you vamoose?’ he quietly asked.

‘Chekov ji, you won’t see me go.’

Stratford approached. ‘Did you know, ji,’ Zulu offered, ‘that the map of Tolkien’s

Middle-earth fits quite well over central England and Wales? Maybe all fairylands are

right here, in our midst.’

‘You’re a deep one, old Zools,’ said Chekov. ‘Full of revelations today.’

Chekov had a few people over for dinner at his modern-style official residence in a

private road in Hampstead: a Very Big Businessman he was wooing, journalists he liked,

prominent India-lovers, noted Non-Resident Indians. The policy was business as usual.

The dreadful event must not be seen to have derailed the ship of State: whose new

captain, Chekov mused, was a former pilot himself. As if a Sulu, a Chekov had been

suddenly promoted to the skipper’s seat.

Damned difficult doing all this without a lady wife to act as hostess, he grumbled

inwardly. The best golden plates with the many-headed lion at the centre, the finest

crystal, the menu, the wines. Personnel had been seconded from India House to help

him out, but it wasn’t the same. The secrets of good evenings, like God, were in the

details. Chekov meddled and fretted.

The evening went off well. Over brandy, Chekov even dared to introduce a blacker note.

‘England has always been a breeding ground for our revolutionists,’ he said. ‘What

would Pandit Nehru have been without Harrow? Or Gandhiji without his formative

experiences here? Even the Pakistan idea was dreamt up by young radicals at college in

what we then were asked to think of as the Mother Country. Now that England’s status

has declined, I suppose it is logical that the quality of the revolutionists she breeds has

likewise fallen. The Kashmiris! Not a hope in hell. And as for these Khalistan types, let

them not think that their evil deed has brought their dream a day closer. On the

contrary. On the contrary. We will root them out and smash them to – what’s the right

word? – to smithereens.’

To his surprise he had begun speaking loudly and had risen to his feet. He sat down

hard and laughed. The moment passed.

‘The funny thing about this blasted nickname of mine’, he said quickly to his

dinner-table neighbour, the septuagenarian Very Big Businessman’s improbably young

and attractive wife, ‘is that back then we never saw one episode of the TV series. No TV

to see it on, you see. The whole thing was just a legend wafting its way from the US and

UK to our lovely hill-station of Dehra Dun.

‘After a while we got a couple of cheap paperback novelisations and passed them round

as if they were naughty books like Lady C or some such. Lots of us tried the names on

for size but only two of them stuck; probably because they seemed to go together, and

the two of us got on pretty well, even though he was younger. A lovely boy. So just like

Laurel and Hardy we were Chekov and Zulu.’

‘Love and marriage,’ said the woman.

‘Beg pardon?’

‘You know,’ she said. ‘Go together like is it milk and porridge. Or a car and garage, that’s

right. I love old songs. La-la-la-something-brother, you can’t have fun without I think

it’s your mother.’

‘Yes, now I do recall,’ said Chekov.

3 Three months later Zulu telephoned his wife.

‘O my God where have you vanished are you dead?’

‘Listen please my bivi. Listen carefully my wife, my only love.’

‘Yes. OK. I am calm. Line is bad, but.’

‘Call Chekov and say condition red.’

‘Arré! What is wrong with your condition?’

‘Please. Condition red.’

‘Yes. OK. Red.’

‘Say the Klingons may be smelling things.’

‘Clingers-on may be smelly things. Means what?’

‘My darling, I beg you.’

‘I have it all right here only. With this pencil I have written it, both.’

‘Tell him, get Scotty to lock on to my signal and beam me up at once.’

‘What rubbish! Even now you can’t leave off that stupid game.’

‘Bivi. It is urgent. Beam me up.’

Chekov dropped everything and drove. He went via the dry-cleaners as instructed; he

drove round roundabouts twice, jumped red lights, deliberately took a wrong turning,

stopped and turned round, made as many right turns as possible to see if anything

followed him across the stream of traffic, and, on the motorway, mimicked Zulu’s

techniques. When he was as certain as he could be that he was clean, he headed for the

rendezvous point. ‘Roll over Len Deighton,’ he thought, ‘and tell le Carré the news.’

He turned off the motorway and pulled into a lay-by. A man stepped out of the trees,

looking newly bathed and smartly dressed, with a sheepish smile on his face. It was

Zulu.

Chekov jumped out of the car and embraced his friend, kissing him on both cheeks.

Zulu’s bristly beard pricked his lips. ‘I expected you’d have an arm missing, or blood

pouring from a gunshot wound, or some black eyes at least,’ he said. ‘Instead here you

are dressed for the theatre, minus only an opera cloak and cane.’

‘Mission accomplished,’ said Zulu, patting his breast pocket. ‘All present and correct.’

‘Then what was that “condition red” bakvaas?’

‘The worst-case scenario’, said Zulu, ‘does not always materialise.’

In the car, Chekov scanned the names, places, dates in Zulu’s brown envelope. The

information was better than anyone had expected. From this anonymous Midlands

lay-by a light was shining on certain remote villages and urban back-alleys in Punjab.

There would be a round-up, and, for some big badmashes at least, there would no longer

be shadows in which to hide.

He gave a little, impressed whistle.

Zulu in the passenger seat inclined his head. ‘Better move off now,’ he said. ‘Don’t tempt

fate.’

They drove south through Middle-earth.

Not long after they came off the motorway, Zulu said, ‘By the way, I quit.’

Chekov stopped the car. The two towers of Wembley Stadium were visible through a gap

in the houses to the left.

‘What’s this? Did those extremists manage to turn your head or what?’

‘Chekov, ji, don’t be a fool. Who needs extremists when there are the killings in Delhi?

Hundreds, maybe thousands. Sikh men scalped and burned alive in front of their

families. Boy-children, too.’

‘We know this.’

‘Then, ji, we also know who was behind it.’

‘There is not a shred of evidence,’ Chekov repeated the policy line.

‘There are eyewitnesses and photographs,’ said Zulu. ‘We know this.’

‘There are those who think’, said Chekov slowly, ‘that after Indiraji the Sikhs deserved

what they got.’

Zulu stiffened.

‘You know me better than that, I hope,’ said Chekov. ‘Zulu, for God’s sake, come on. All

our bleddy lives.’

‘No Congress workers have been indicted,’ said Zulu. ‘In spite of all the evidence of

complicity. Therefore, I resign. You should quit, too.’

‘If you have gone so damn radical,’ cried Chekov, ‘why hand over these lists at all? Why

go only half the bleddy hog?’

‘I am a security wallah,’ said Zulu, opening the car door. ‘Terrorists of all sorts are my

foes. But not, apparently, in certain circumstances, yours.’

‘Zulu, get in, damn it,’ Chekov shouted. ‘Don’t you care for your career? A wife and four

kiddiwinks to support. What about your old chums? Are you going to turn your back on

me?’

But Zulu was already too far away.

Chekov and Zulu never met again. Zulu settled in Bombay and as the demand for

private-sector protection increased in that cash-rich boom-town, so his Zulu Shield and

Zulu Spear companies prospered and grew. He had three more children, all of them

boys, and remains happily married to this day.

As for Chekov, he never did take a wife. In spite of this supposed handicap, however, he

did well in his chosen profession. His rapid rise continued. But one day in May 1991 he

was, by chance, a member of the entourage accompanying Mr Rajiv Gandhi to the South

Indian village of Sriperumbudur, where Rajiv was to address an election rally. Security

was lax, intentionally so. In the previous election, Rajivji felt, the demands of security

had placed an alienating barrier between himself and the electorate. On this occasion,

he decreed, the voters must be allowed to feel close.

After the speeches, the Rajiv group descended from the podium. Chekov, who was just a

few feet behind Rajiv, saw a small Tamil woman come forward, smiling. She shook

Rajiv’s hand and did not let go. Chekov understood what she was smiling about, and the

knowledge was so powerful that it stopped time itself.

Because time had stopped, Chekov was able to make a number of private observations.

‘These Tamil revolutionists are not England-returned,’ he noted. ‘So, finally, we have

learned to produce the goods at home, and no longer need to import. Bang goes that old

dinner-party standby; so to speak.’ And, less dryly: ‘The tragedy is not how one dies,’ he

thought. ‘It is how one has lived.’

The scene around him vanished, dissolving in a pool of light, and was replaced by the

bridge of the Starship Enterprise. All the leading figures were in their appointed places.

Zulu sat beside Chekov at the front.

‘Shields no longer operative,’ Zulu was saying. On the main screen, they could see the

Klingon Bird of Prey uncloaking, preparing to strike.

‘One direct hit and we’re done for,’ cried Dr McCoy. ‘For God’s sake, Jim, get us out of

here!’

‘Illogical,’ said First Officer Spock. ‘The degradation of our dilithium crystal drive means

that warp speed is unavailable. At impulse power only, we would make a poor attempt

indeed to flee the Bird of Prey. Our only logical course is unconditional surrender.’

‘Surrender to a Klingon!’ shouted McCoy. ‘Damn it, you cold-blooded, pointy-eared

adding-machine, don’t you know how they treat their prisoners?’

‘Phaser banks completely depleted,’ said Zulu. ‘Offensive capability nil.’

‘Should I attempt to contact the Klingon captain, sir?’ Chekov inquired. ‘They could fire

at any moment.’

‘Thank you, Mr Chekov,’ said Captain Kirk. ‘I’m afraid that won’t be necessary. On this

occasion, the worst-case scenario is the one we are obliged to play out. Hold your

position. Steady as she goes.’

‘The Bird of Prey has fired, sir,’ said Zulu.

Chekov took Zulu’s hand and held it firmly, victoriously, as the speeding balls of deadly

light approached.