Name: The Fate of the Phoenix
Authors: Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Publication Date: 5/1979
Publisher: Bantam Books
Page Number: 262
Historian’s Note:
Immediately after The Price of the Phoenix
Cast of Characters: Captain James T. Kirk and Prince James T. Kirk Commander
Spock Dr. Leonard H. McCoy
AKA “Bones” Lieutenant
Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”
Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu Lieutenant Nyota Uhura Dr. Joseph M'Benga Nurse Christine Chapel Ensign Pavel Chekov The Romulan Fleet Commander Subcommander Tal Omne
Other Omne Trevanian Elder Hegarch of Voran Dynasty Younger Hegarch of Voran Dynasty The
Romulan Commander-in-Chief Doyen of the Thorvan League Maroc
Maia Roblein R.A. Roblein Rovan Varal of Voran V'Rlee
Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701,
Phoenix ships, unnamed Romulan scout ship, unnamed Romulan heavy battle cruiser,
unnamed Romulan dreadnought
Planets: Voran, Razar, and Thorva
My Spoiler filled summary and review: This book begins shortly after the authors’ last book, “The Price of the Phoenix” ends. If the reader has not read it, that will not matter for the narrator gives a brief summary of events. The crew has been rocked by the adventure especially the Captain and First Officer. The two wonder if they will ever be normal again. Kirk now has a duplicate and there is a general fear that Omne, if he lives, can now make himself look like Spock. (Why they fear this I have no idea it foreshadows this story but I don’t remember that being in the last book, more on that in My Additional Thoughts section.) The duplicate Kirk now called James has gone to live in the Romulan Star Empire as the boytoy of the Lady Fleet Commander they first encountered in “The Enterprise Incident.”
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| Now the mistress of the clone Kirk |
As the crew of the Enterprise continues their recovery elsewhere things are a foot. A high-ranking Federation administrator who was about to resign after the death of a loved one now has that very same loved one returned to him somehow by a mysterious benefactor. Not only is this fellow not retiring he announces that there will be a major conference. This conference will be hosted by the Federation member Voran the capital and largest planet of the Voran Dynasty Hegemony. The entire Hegemony joined the Federation as a group which gave their monarch control of a huge chunk of Federation territory near the Romulan Neutral Zone. If they were to give up on the Federation, it would be a crippling blow putting the UFP in a distant disadvantage with both the Romulans and the Klingons. The tone of the conference will be does the United Federation of Planets live up to its promises, the Prime Directive, and address the topic of secession. Omne’s involvement couldn’t be clearer if there was a sign that said, “Omne’s not dead and he is behind all this.”
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| Federation conferences what can go wrong? |
It turns out that the Federation
isn’t the only major intergalactic power with a large interplanetary
sub-state. For the Romulan Star Empire
that is the Thorvan League of Planets, ruled by a constitutional monarch
called, the Doyen. The Fleet Commander
has a history with the Doyen, when she captured one of her ships doing
something they should not have been. The
League’s legislative body agreed that the Doyen is in her debt. The Fleet Commander is looking for a power
base if she is to stand against Omne without the support of her high
command.
It turns out that the Doyen has her own boytoy. The Fleet Commander and the Doyen have a secret meeting/party where they exchange boytoys for the evening. The clone James finds the whole thing a bit degrading but goes along with the kinky spirit of it. The other boytoy is named Trevanian. The Fleet Commander decides to invoke her right to demand a hostage and tells the Doyen that Trevanian will be that hostage. This enrages the Doyen who demands they fight a duel of honor. The duel doesn’t have to be to the death, but it can end that way. The two fight the boytoys as the prize. The Fleet Commander proves to be the better fighter and as a consequence Trevanian is going to be their guest. The Fleet Commander did this not only to ensure Doyen loyalty but to protect James’s identity. The hostage is allowed a kinsman. He is talked out of it so they can say James is Trevanain and the real Trevanian is the kinsmen. Doyen is said but will remain loyal.
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| Clone Kirk, not the only Romulan boytoy |
Captain Kirk himself is made the top ambassador this conference by the Federation. This is somewhat odd, for one the Federation would typically send an actual ambassador. Maybe Starfleet Command felt all the first contacts and ad hoc negotiations gave him the skill they needed? Kirk does an actually good job at defending the Federation’s positions. He briefly meets with the old dying Hegarch and his young heir. It is at this point the Romulan Fleet Commander shows up. Running into her must be awkward for personal reasons, as his other self is her boytoy. Kirk is also not sure whose she is on in this conflict or her possible motivations. Calling into question the wisdom of allowing his other self to go live with her.
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| Whose side is she on? |
Half-way through the conference,
the attendees get to meet the new Regent of the Voran Dynasty Hegemony. And the Regent is Omne. Back from his apparent death, and now the
leader of the subsection of the Federation looking leave, it is as if he has
already won. He even gets to enjoy
humiliating Kirk. As Omne’s position as
Regent requires Kirk the Ambassador to great him as “my lord.”
Omne’s victory is short lived however when there is an assassination attempt at the conference by an individual who looks just like Spock. The real Spock is severally injured and almost died, but is ironically saved by Omne. Trevanian is also injured and is kidnapped by the fake Spock, with “James” going after them. After the smoke clears Omne explains that the fake Spock was a hybrid phoenix duplicate of both himself and Mr. Spock, with the Omne personally dominating. Omne had created him to use against Kirk but the hybrid other has Omne’s ego as well. The Other, as Omne calls him, now has an agenda of his own and has the intelligence of both personalities at work.
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| Spock injured |
Kirk is forced to from an alliance
with Omne, who a few chapters ago Kirk was moaning that Omne was the worst
thing that ever happened to him, and the Lady Commander. Omne is aware where the Other is heading. Omne has a secret headquarters inside and
anomaly that would spell doom for most ships. Omne has a special “Phoenix” ship
that can travel through it. Kirk, the
Fleet Commander, and Spock all go on the mission with the Enterprise to follow behind with Mr. Scott in command.
The party goes out to stop the
Other, who also has a Phoenix ship, while entering the anomaly they find a
Romulan scout ship also in pursuit the pilot is James, who is trying to get his
fellow boytoy back from the Other. That
ship is destroyed but they are able to rescue James. While James is in pain Kirk feels it as
well. Omne then tries to see if he can
meditate and use it to reveal the Other.
This fails and Omne briefly regresses to an earlier point of his life
when he wasn’t such a jerk, this only temporary and the memories all come
back.
The Commander-In-Chief of the Romulan Star Empire shows up with a fleet of ships looking for the Fleet Commander who he suspects has betrayed the Empire to the Federation. However, he becomes slightly outgunned when the Doyen shows up with her own fleet angry over the loss of her personal boytoy. Although the Imperial government has more ships overall it does not have more ships here at the moment. The two leaders exchange words when the Fleet Commander’s flagship arrives under the command of Subcommander Tal. Tal tries to reason with both the Commander-in-Chief and the Doyen that the Fleet Commander is not a traitor and will get back the Doyen’s boytoy. The Enterprise is stuck in the middle of all of this.
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| Subcommander Tal tries to reason with everyone |
Kirk, Omne, and company have
arrived at Omne’s world that he uses for a homebase. They must beam a good
distance away from the location of the Other.
So, this landing party of mostly-enemies-now-reluctant-allies have to go
over the mountain and through the woods to Omne’s headquarters they go. They find their way there and confront the
Other. Each side tries to outwit the
other, however the Other seems to have the upper hand. The Other agrees to release Trevanain in
exchange for him to be able to banish the non-hybrid Omne to another
dimension. They complete the exchange,
but Omne has a trick up his sleeve and grabbed Captain Kirk so they both were
transported. Angered but not able to do anything,
the remainder of the party leaves the planet and returns to the Enterprise
outside the anomaly, where the starship is still in the middle of a Romulan
stand still. Spock and the Fleet
Commander decide they will return to see if they can rescue Jim. They decide to leave James behind, if they fail,
he will have to become Captain Kirk again.
Trapped in the other dimension Omne finds Kirk struck with amnesia and
not much use to their cause. Omne knows
a way out of this place and leads the demented Kirk there. However, they run into the Other who has
traveled to stop them. Then we have the
Omne vs. Omne showdown. Their final
stand takes place over a bridge, that is over a deep cavern like the ones from
“What are Little Girls Made of?”. The
bridge begins to collapse Omne escapes it but the Other and Kirk aren’t so
lucky. At this moment the inner Spock of
the Other takes over and throws Captain Kirk to safety, while he falls to his
death.
Kirk and Omne use the Other’s
technology to transport themselves back to safety. However, Kirk gets back first and quickly
grabs a phaser and gets the drop on Omne.
Turns out the Captain, never had amnesia it was just a ploy to trick
Omne to let his guard down. Kirk won’t
kill Omne for he owes him for helping him.
He will use the Phoenix technology to make another Omne. With his ego Omne can’t cooperate with a
duplicate of himself. He needs to
dominate, the Other proved that. With
the anomaly about to collapse anyone left on the planet will be trapped there
for quite some time. Omne agrees to
exile over duplication. He and Kirk
disagree whether or not this is his Elba or St. Helena.
Kirk returns to the Enterprise, the
situation with the Romulans is resolved, Kirk also contacts the young Hegarch. The new monarch now seems quite capable away
from Omne. When told the Regent wouldn’t
return, he is quite pleased and will remain in the Federation. Everything seems good but Omne’s trigger
transporter that he used to escape last time, is used to kidnap the clone
James. With James now trapped in exile
with Omne the end has a bitter taste.
The Fleet Commander resolves to find her boytoy somehow. The epilogue has Omne in exile meeting a
mysterious someone. It may be James or
someone else.
Additional thoughts: Okay one of the biggest
challenges of this book is just getting past the premise. A quote often attributed to the great Alfred
Hitchcock “you can get someone to believe the impossible but not the
improbable.” I have no problems with the
future spaceships that travel faster than light, aliens we can have sex with to
make babies, and exact clone duplicates.
I cannot get on board with allowing Kirk’s duplicate, with all his
knowledge, to go live with the Romulan Fleet Commander as her personal
boytoy. Not only do I find close
friendliness and trust with her weird and unnatural, but just the risk
of allowing the duplicate to fall into the wrong hands is way too much for me
to accept. It just strikes me as some
kinky sex fantasy the writers came up with after watching “The Enterprise Incident.”
Also, after surgically altering the Kirk duplicate to look Romulan going so far as altering his blood so it would color green, why didn’t they give him a Romulan name to use most of the time? Why is he still “James.” Is that how the Fleet Commander introduces him to people? “Who is that?” “Oh, it’s my little boytoy princeling James.”
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| The Romulan James |
Spock is duplicated again. This is not exactly original thinking. We first saw this in “Spock Must Die,” then
in the Animated Series episode “The Infinite Vulcan,” and once more in “Ni Var.” This story does have a special
twist with this clone being a hybrid of Spock and the main bad guy. Speaking about this however the story begins
with Kirk and Spock seemingly aware that a duplicate potentially exists. Kirk goes so far to say he can never trust
Spock again because he won’t know if it’s Spock. I do not remember this in the
original story. When reading this I went
back and checked my original review over in case I had just forgotten. Not finding a mention there I started reading
other reviews of that book and still no mentions. I don’t really want and won’t read that book
a second time for something I am probably not going to find. So this is either a complete retcon or so
lightly covered in the first book that no one noticed.
Despite its clear flaws the book
isn’t terrible there are some redeemable moments. It also forces us to look at the villain
differently as he temporally changes sides.
It reminds me of Terminator 2 thirteen years before it came out. In the first story you introduce a seemingly
unstoppable bad guy and barely stop him.
In the second you introduce a more impressive bad guy and have the
former villain team up with the hero. It
allows some new insights into the villain.
I assume Omne accepted Kirk’s
amnesia story because of his own bout with the condition earlier in the story. Either way it was funny to see Kirk win by
simply “playing dumb.”
I assumed the other Kirk was going
to die at some point. After all they
can’t have two Kirks running around.
Instead he is just lost somewhere.
The Fleet Commander is on the case thought because a good boytoy is hard
to find.
Should it be canon: No, for the reasons I stated
above. The story’s very premise is
overly ridiculous to be taken seriously.
Even as the alternate time line the story would be wonky.
Cover Art: The cover is not overly impressive. It just has Kirk on his knees before a giant
in the shadows who is clearly Omne.
Final Grade: Final Grade 3 of 5
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