Name: Mindshadow
Author: JM Dillard
Publication Date: 1/1986
Publisher: Pocket Books (Star Trek #27)
Page Number: 252
Historian’s Note: Sometime between The Counter-clock Incident and The Motion Picture
Cast of Characters: Captain James T. Kirk Commander Spock Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA
“Bones” Lieutenant Commander
Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty” Lieutenant
Commander Varth Regev Lieutenant
Hikaru Sulu Lieutenant Nyota
Uhura Dr. Joseph M'Benga Dr. Emma Staenz Lieutenant Ingrid Tomson Lieutenant Mohamed
al-Baslama Lieutenant Giorgo
Mikahlis Lieutenant Mohamed
Jahma Lieutenant (junior
grade) Reems Nurse
Christine Chapel Ensign Pavel
Chekov Ensign Lyle Ensign Rachel Lanz Admiral
James Komack Ambassador Sarek Amanda Grayson Tela’at Stalik T'Pala Natahia Grower Mahali various unnamed Growers unnamed Romulan pirate various unnamed Romulans
Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701,
Starbase 12, Galileo II NCC-1701/7, unnamed and unclassified small Romulan
fighters
Planets: Aritani and Vulcan
My Spoiler filled summary and review: The adventure begins with a landing party from the Enterprise visiting the planet Aritani. The Aritanians are former space faring people who surrendered advanced technology to live a simple life with nature as independent farmers. So, they are like the Amish except they are from an alien world, and they don’t follow and real strict religion. Unfortunately, they are now under attack from an unknown enemy who is destroying their villages and killing their people. The Federation has offered to help. Kirk explains that they are not here to change their way of life. Although they would love to have them as Federation members Starfleet helps is free regardless. Their leader Natahia is skeptical but desperate.
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| Trying to help a reluctant people |
Spock wants to explore the nearby
hills as his tricorder as he tries to find out more about the natural minerals
of the planet to see if he can explain why they have been attacked
recently. When he doesn’t return, they
go out looking for him. They find him
and it appears that he has fallen down a steep hill and is severely injured
with broken bones all down his left side.
Most importantly his injuries to his head have resulted in severe brain
damage. Spock’s status as a Vulcan/Human
hybrid complicates potential treatment.
While Spock is being treated,
Aritani is under attack again. Even
though there was a shield up the enemy fighters managed to get through. They devastate Aritani and the Aritanians. It is clear from the attackers’ ships that
they are Romulans. What the Romulans
want with the planet and how they were able to get through the shield are
mysteries. The incident kills Natahia’s
faith that Starfleet is able to protect her people and she requests they
leave. If the Romulans kill all of them
so, be it so long as they are living their true lives. 
Romulan attack!!
Back on the Enterprise, a
neurologist named Dr. Emma Staenz has been transferred to the ship and given
Mr. Spock’s case. Her prognosis is
bleak; his injuries are affecting his logical thinking and have caused the
Vulcan mind rules to vanish. He is now
incapable of controlling his telepathic abilities which cause him great
pain. Staenz recommends Kirk to find a
temporary replacement for Mr. Spock.
Kirk and Staenz work out
together. It turns out the good doctor
grew up on a high gravity planet giving her great strength for a person her
size. She is more than a match for
Captain Kirk, as he ends up hitting the deck more than she does. There also might be something darker about
her because when she is alone with Spock, she tries to force a mind meld and
starts a suspicious line of questioning.
She and Dr. McCoy start to see each other romantically. 
Trying to treat Mr. Spock
When the pirates return the Enterprise
is able to capture a pirate ship.
The Romulan pirate will not cooperate refusing to answer any questions
posed to him. In Sickbay Spock is
getting somewhat better. His voice comes
and goes; he has a hard time remembering people’s names and ranks but does
enjoy hearing music. Spock is aware of
his condition and is unhappy about it.
Things are starting to go bad. First, the Romulan prisoner is murdered, and
the murder was made to look like suicide.
Second, it appears that Mr. Spock has attempted suicide himself. When he awakes Spock claims not to remember
but denies trying to commit suicide. He
requests to be sent home to Vulcan and McCoy approves. Staenz objects to
sending him away, leading to her first lovers quarrel with McCoy. She, however, relents. 
Spock has not been himself
Their shuttlecraft, Galileo II,
nearly crashes like its famous namesake predecessor, but they get out of it
okay. Their trip is delayed as Scotty
has to make repairs. While they are
gone, back on the ship Kirk is injured in a workout routine with Staenz. While she is treating him, he kisses her and
then passes out. It looks like a love
triangle brewing. The next morning, Lt.
Tomson, the Enterprise’s current chief of security, tells the tired
Captain that her primary murder suspect is Scotty. Like the last time Scotty was accused of murder, Kirk doesn’t believe it. However,
he has to let her issue an arrest warrant when he fails to appear on time.
Spock returns home to discover his
parents have taken in a young Vulcan woman.
Like Spock, T’Pala is half human/half Vulcan although the reverse with a
human father and Vulcan mother. Her
mother died and she was raised by her father she hopes to join the Vulcan
diplomatic service and serve under Sarek.
Her father’s status as a criminal makes this difficult.
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| Spock being treated at home. |
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| Spock has a difficult recovery |
Back on the ship, McCoy and Staenz
make up and are on romantic terms. Kirk
is hosting a “Journey to Babel”-type of conference to deal with the Aritani
situation. The new first officer,
Lieutenant Commander Varth Regev, is very useful when it comes to dealing with
the Tellarites. Scotty returns and is
arrested and immediately cleared since he had an airtight alibi. This conference truly resembles the Babel
Conference, when two ambassadors are murdered.
Kirk becomes suspicious of the exact nature of Staenz’s mission. He discovers that she is actually a Starfleet
Intelligence Agent working for Admiral James Komack. A device is discovered on Regev showing him
to be a Romulan spy.
Back at home Spock drops his
medication and starts to recover he relearns the mind rules in record
time. His recovery is halted by an
attempted assassination on him and his father.
They are saved by T’Pala, who revels she had been working with the
Romulans who came to her after she had been rejected for her career and felt
isolated from Romulan society. She had
told them of Spock’s recovery and they attacked, but she felt close toward
Spock’s family, so she saved them.
Before Spock loses consciousness, he sees her commit suicide with a
phaser.
Since T’Pala disintegrated herself, Spock is blamed for the attack on his father which they think is a murder/suicide. Kirk upon hearing this now wants to head to Vulcan, Staenz tries to talk him out of it, but Kirk is determined to help Spock. When they get to Vulcan Kirk and McCoy go down to see Spock. When he wakes up, they explain the situation to him. Since Sarek is expected to recover Spock is not concerned about the blame as Sarek is expected to recover and will explain everything to the authorities. Spock knows why he was injured; he had to jump to avoid certain death if the Romulans had caught him. Spock tells Kirk and McCoy that the drugs Staenz gave him were delaying his recovery and increasing his symptoms not helping him. It turns out Staenz knew this would happen as she is co-author of a paper that describes its effects on Vulcans. Staenz is a double agent Romulan spy. Regev was framed. By the time they learn this she has escaped, injuring the chief of security in the process.
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| Back in disguise |
The Enterprise heads back
to Aritani where Regev managed to locate the Romulan base. Kirk disguised himself as a Romulan again,
and he and Spock beam down to see if they could expose and sabotage the place. While
there they run in Staenz again, whose real name is Subcommander Tanirius. It turns out she is a triple agent and that
her true allegiance is not the Romulan Preator or the Federation but rather a
reform movement in Romulus that seeks to bring down the tyrannical imperial
government. She helps the two of them escape and sets the base up for
destruction. After they get back to the
ship the base is destroyed but six fighters escape leaving our mystery lady’s
fate up in the air. McCoy is hopeful
that she is okay. The Aritani accept the
Federation’s help and defending their home.
Additional thoughts: This was one of the best Star
Trek books that I had read in a while.
One of the main things I liked about the story was that even though the
author invented some interesting characters they didn’t displace the main Star
Trek cast from the story. The story
was an exciting traditional Star Trek adventure that took advantage of the book
format to give us more depth.
While reading the book I referred
to myself the people of Aritani as the “space Amish” since they turned their
backs on technology to live like the world never developed past the 19th
century. I had to question Captain
Kirk’s judgement when it came to placing the crew on shore leave on this
planet. They Aritanians barely wanted
the Federation’s help do really want to send down multiple landing parties of
people whose sole purpose is recreation?
I thought it was creative to have
Spock’s status as a Vulcan/human hybrid make it difficult for his injuries to
be diagnosed and treated. The fact that
Vulcan brains and human brains function differently makes it hard to plot the
proper course of treatment. Do you treat him more as a human or Vulcan? One might think Vulcan, but Spock’s
right-handedness suggests otherwise.
Scotty accused of murder again. Poor Mr. Scott, all he tries to
do is help, yet people often want to accuse him of killing people. Good thing
for him is this time it was much easier to prove that he didn’t do it.
McCoy falls hard for women, doesn’t he? He only knows them for a short time, and he gets all committed and remains in love with them for quite some time. He should learn to let go more, like his good buddy Captain Kirk.
 |
| A short while |
 |
| For some time |
I found the “Vulcans don’t
apologize” to be a bunch of baloney. We
see them apologize all the time. How
else are they going to admit fault and take responsibility for their actions
especially if those actions unintentionally caused someone harm. Also, sometimes people have legitimate
excuses for things like tardiness, how would any society function if they were
not able to address them.
Lieutenant Commander Varth Regev turned
out to be a more interesting character than I originally thought. I really like the way he handled the
Tellarites situation. It was a neat
reveal that it turned out to be a Starfleet intelligence officer the whole
time.
T’Pala was such a sad and tragic case. The Vulcan/human hybrid with nowhere to turn.
It was easy to feel for the poor girl when she told Spock that no Vulcan male
wanted to bond with her. All she wanted
to do was fit in and this was precisely what was not allowed. She had no home anywhere and that led to her
being manipulated by the Romulans. It
was easy to understand why Spock and his family felt for her and he continued
to cover for her so she could have dignity in death. It is too bad that Spock didn’t meet her when
he was healthy and in control. She could
have been his perfect mate.
Finally, the Emma Staenz reveal was
perfect. The best twists in a story are
ones you don’t see coming yet seem obvious when you look back on it. Her advanced strength for her size makes more
sense when you remember that Vulcan/Romulans have enhanced strength. I was constantly guessing throughout the book
to what side she was truly on, and every time I thought I figured it out the
author would pull out some new information that made me realize I was wrong but
maybe I was right before, most likely I was wrong there too.
Should it be canon: I see nothing in this story that
should prevent me from being canon in official Star Trek lore. Given the story is great I love to add it to
official Star Trek canon.
Cover Art: We have Spock’s left side profile on the
viewer’s right and in front of Spock’s face are Kirk, McCoy, and Emma Saenz.
Behind all of them is a mountain range.
Final Grade: Final Grade 5 of 5
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