Name: Yesterday’s Son
Author: A.C. Crispin
Publication Date: 8/1983
Publisher: Pocket Books (Star Trek #11)
Page Number: 189
Historian’s Note:
This story takes place two years after the event s in “All Our Yesterdays” and before the events in “Yesteryear.” Book 1 in the Yesterday Saga!
Cast of Characters: Captain James T. Kirk Commander
Spock Dr. Leonard H. McCoy
AKA “Bones” Lieutenant
Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”
Lieutenant Commander Rex Colfax
Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu Lieutenant Nyota Uhura Nurse Christine Chapel Ensign Pavel Chekov Ensign
Teresa McNair Ensign Juan
Cordova Ensign David Steinberg Admiral James Komack Commodore Robert Wesley Dr. Anna Vargas Zarabeth Zar T’Pau Commander Tal many unnamed Federation Marines, Federation
scientists, and Romulan soldiers
Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, USS
Lexington NCC-1709, Starbase 11, ChR Glory
Quest, numerous unnamed Starfleet and Romulan ships.
Planets: Guardian’s homeworld now called “Gateway,”
Vulcan, and Sarpeidon
My Spoiler filled summary and review: The adventure begins with a young woman; named Ensign Teresa McNair who discovered something while studying archeological images from the destroyed planet Sarpeidon. It appears to be a cave painting of a Vulcan. She shows this to Mr. Spock asking if there were any Vulcan expeditions at that time. Spock calmly tells the Ensign that there are many such historical coincidences such as Pan in Earth legends.
The Enterprise arrives at Starbase 11 for a much needed overhaul. Spock at this moment requests leave time from Kirk. Since Spock doesn’t normally request leave like this Kirk immediately knows that Spock has some sort of trouble of a personal nature, and as always Spock feels that his personal problems should be faced by him alone despite the fact that he has friends who would walk through a radiation infected engine room for him and he them. Kirk then demands on going. Spock tries to argue otherwise but it is useless if he wants to go on the mission Kirk is going coming along. Spock tells him that he is convinced he fathered a son with Zarabeth as the Vulcan in the cave paintings dated to that time period. That Vulcan was also a long haired child so it could not have been him. With Sarpedion and its time device destroyed Spock wants to use the Guardian of Forever.
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| Spock's one time girlfriend |
Spock contacts T’Pau on Vulcan and explains the situation; with her great authority Spock is able to secure access to the Guardian. When he returns from the Enterprise to meet up with Kirk they find McCoy now insisting on coming along too. They try to argue but McCoy points out they need his medical knowledge to help both Zarabeth and her son. Kirk tries to point out that Spock only has secured permission for two, but Spock actually got it for three because he predicted McCoy’s behavior. (I love that part.)
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| T'Pau can secure access to anything |
The three arrive at the Gateway planet and are greeted by Dr. Anna Vargas head of the expedition to explore
the planet and the Guardian. She is
excited to meet the discoverers and the only people ever to use the Guardian. She is amazed they got permission to do so
again. They explain they are trying to save a child who is a relative of Mr.
Spock, who is trapped in the past. When the three are alone with the Guardian,
Spock speaks with it. He is able to
confirm that the Guardian can send them back to Sarpedion of five thousand
years past. Spock gets the Guardian to
focus on the lifeform that most resembles Spock’s. With that they jump through the great donut
again.
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| Once again using the Guardian |
Back in the ice age of Sarpedion, this time at least they are in the
summer; McCoy notices how strange the star looks. He describes it as looking like it could blow
at any moment. The three take comfort in
the knowledge that it won’t be destroyed for another five thousand years. That night they set up a tent and sleep in
it. When they wake up they wonder around
and have to dodge some predators. They
find a person has been watching him.
They catch up to this individual and discover that he is the person they
have been looking for. It appears they
have miscalculated for they thought they came for a small child but they
traveled to a time where Spock’s son is twenty-eight Earth years old. They explain who they are and the man is very
excited to meet his father. He
introduces himself as Zar. Zar’s mother
explained that his father came from a different point in time and space. When they ask about Zarabeth he explains that
his mother was killed in an accident some ten years ago. He has been alone since.
Zar takes them back to the cave the Spock and McCoy shared with Zarabeth
during their adventure here. Zar
explains his life to the three. There
becomes a tense moment where Spock asks Zar to stop calling him “father” as he
doesn’t think it’s right a “stranger” calls him that. Zar is taken aback but complies. They let them know they mean to return with
him using the Guardian of Forever. Zar
packs his bag and they cremate Zarabeth’s body that Zar kept in a type of cold
storage.
As they return, Dr. Vargas is
surprised to see an adult when she was expecting a child. However, science he lived as a caveman in an
ice age, Dr. Vargas now had a number of questions about his life style, all of
which Zar happily answered. They return
to the ship and Dr. McCoy gives him a check-up, gives him all the necessary
vaccines, and a shave and haircut. Zar
strongly resembles his father but given their closeness in actual age it is
decided that he will claim to just be Spock’s relative. Zar express a desire to use the Guardian to
save his mother but Spock basically explains the grandfather paradox to him. Spock says it’s easier to express in a
mathematical formula than with words.
McCoy is uncertain how Spock and Zar’s relationship is going to
progress.
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| Zar looks like a younger version of his father |
Zar takes to life on the Enterprise
like a fish to water. Spock creates
an educational program for him that he quickly aces. His intelligence rivals that of his
father’s. Kirk bunks him with two
security officers and Zar gains their friendship fast. He learns of Vulcan culture and can
reasonably present as one. However,
Spock is still treating his son more as a responsibility that is his obligation
than a person whom he deeply cares about.
Zar confronts Captain Kirk about this and the Captain tells Zar about
the circumstances that led to his birth.
He also told Zar that the time device on Sarpeidon had affected Spock so
that he was emotionally unstable when he sought comfort in the arms of Zar’s
mother. Zar is disappointed an expresses
that Spock views him as some sort of bastard what Vulcans call a “Krenath.”
Zar goes into delayed teenage rebellion
mode. After finishing one of his lessons
he gets himself a meat sandwich from the recreation room and eats in right
front of Spock. McCoy tells Kirk the
Spock was very upset by his action. There
is no time to follow up on this because the Romulans have entered the Gateway
planet’s solar system. When they get
there Kirk sends down a landing party to protect the scientists from the
Romulans and prevent the Romulans from getting their hands on the
Guardian. The Romulans already have land
troops and they attack the expedition.
All are killed including two who were bunkmates of Zar. As they die, Zar feels their deaths. He gets extreme pain, interrupting a
conversation he was having with Ensign McNair about images of relics from his
homeworld. His reaction is similar to
Spock’s in “The Immunity Syndrome.” It
takes a while but Zar recovers.
With the Romulans on the ground and winning, the ship’s senior officers, plus Zar, are all coming up with nightmare scenarios once the Romulans have discovered the time portal. Zar asked if it how they would know if they haven’t already used it, if history altered he reasoned wouldn’t their reality alter round them. Lt. Uhura is one who brings the conversation back to reality. She points out that if the Romulans knew what the Guardian was it would represent a security breach so high up in the Federation that they would have to already know that such a breach exists. She points out the most likely scenario is the Romulans have noticed starships on regular patrols here and that has peaked their interests in the planet’s potential secrets.
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| Romulans taking an interest in what the Federation is hiding |
The Enterprise crew discovers
that the Romulans on the planet have set up a cloaking device on the ground
hiding the Guardian from the sensors. Kirk
decides he might have to destroy the Gateway world to prevent it from falling
in the wrong hands. To avoid this he
sends Spock on a mission with Zar, possibly violating regulations since Zar is
a civilian. However Zar’s telepathic
hunting abilities that Spock himself doesn’t have particularly the power to
broadcast fear into others maybe vital to stopping the Romulans. While on the mission Spock and Zar get a
chance to speak father to son. He tells
Zar of their family history about how he is only half-Vulcan so Zar himself is
a quarter. Most importantly he explains
to him that “Krenath” actually refers to parents who have wronged their child
not the children themselves. Later the
two will mind meld, a process Spock earlier refused.
A Romulan fleet enters orbit, with only the USS Enterprise, and the USS Lexington to hold them off. A task force from Starfleet is on their way but won’t be here for another hour. Since they can’t beam through shields Kirk and the landing party is stranded. Commodore Bob Wesley is going to have to team up with Scotty to fight the Romulans.
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| Two starships getting ready for a fight! |
While trying to sabotage the Romulans’ cloaking device Zar ends up
killing a Romulan guard leading to a disagreement about the proper use of
killing and violence. (Personally, I am
on Zar’s side on this one.) Either way
they fail to destroy the cloaking device and must report that failure to
Captain Kirk. Kirk and Spock decided to give it one more try, but Spock nerve
pinches Zar so that he will stay behind.
This mission is a failure to as Kirk and Spock are both captured.
The Captain and First Officer were now the prisoners of Commander Tal,
who as Subcommander had faced off against them in “The Enterprise Incident.” He is mad at what the two did to his previous
commander so he will take some new pleasure in this assignment. Tal demands to know why this planet is
important and what they are hiding on it.
He begins to torture Captain Kirk hoping that one of the two will then
tell him.
Zar recovers and he successfully rescues his father and Captain. He does this without killing Tal which
pleases his father. The Starfleet task
force arrives under the command of Admiral Komack, all the Romulans on the
planet are captured. Everything seems to
be over except Zar has some news. He is
going to back to his home planet and time.
When asked why Zar explains that he was looking over some images from Enterprise’s computer with Ensign McNair
and discovered that around this time his planet was supposed to undergo a
social transformation that he will lead.
As they try to argue Zar pointed out that they didn’t think it was odd
that his mother spoke English? He has to
go back to preserve the time line and allow his people to enjoy 5,000 years of
civilization that they might not otherwise have. With that he returns through the Guardian of
Forever, back to his homeworld and time but much farther south geographically.
Back on the ship Kirk and Spock
are talking and Kirk tells Spock that he doesn’t know how to view Zar. As someone who is alive on the other side of
a portal, or a person who died around 5,000 years ago. Spock shows the Captain and image from Sarpeidon.
It’s an image of a Vulcan man giving the
“live long and prosper” salute next to an image of the Enterprise.
Additional thoughts: Out of all the books I have reviewed for this blog so far, this one is by
far the greatest. This story set the
standard for what a great Star Trek novel could be. The model that the author
provides is one that was replicated by others in the four decades sense. That model is you start with an episode from
the show, in this case “All Our Yesterdays,” and use the strengths of the
written medium to explore that episode’s concepts in way the sixty -minutes
–with-commercials format wasn’t able to.
Include elements from other famous episodes as in this case The Guardian
of Forever from “The City on the Edge of Forever.” Finally bring the characters on an
interesting and thought provoking adventure such as they have never been on
before.
What ends up making this so great is it not only tells its own great
story but it adds richness to the original material. I had always thought of “All Our Yesterdays”
as a good episode, but I had my issues with it.
In my review of it for this blog I wrote the following:
“In this episode we encounter Mr. Atoz who has sent his entire planet’s
population back to the past. Your mind
will quickly go numb at all the possible butterfly effects flying around. How the Atavachron time travel device
survives all these time alterations I have no clue. It was amazing not to mention lucky for them
to dodge all these potential temporal paradoxes to continue to sending their
massive population to the past. Now the
Atavachron did require its subjects to go through a preparation where their
cells and brainwaves were to match their intended time period. This is interesting because we have seen our
characters go back in time and have never required such a thing.”
I continued to go through and
nitpick every little part about it. What
this book did is it created in me a greater appreciation for the episode than I
had before I read it. Although I just
re-read this book for my blog, I originally read this back in middle
school. I think knowing about this story
made my subconscious grade “All Our Yesterdays” higher than I might have
otherwise. However let me be clear: this
book makes the original source material better by being part of it.
The author’s mastery of these characters is evident in her writing. There are such great small character moments throughout the book. My favorite is after Kirk forces his way on to the mission Spock goes ahead and reserves three seats because he knows Dr. McCoy will try to force himself on as well so he might as well prepare now. Speaking of McCoy, I also like how the author makes him Zar’s best mentor on the ship.
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| McCoy was Zar's best mentor |
Another rich character moment is also not a positive one. It seems that Spock seems to inherited toxic father traits from Sarek. It is often the case that children who were abused grow up to become abusers themselves. Spock’s seems to have inherited his father’s disposition in dealing with the “disappointing child.” Spock looks out for him and takes care of him but only as a duty and keeps him at arm’s distance to prevent any attachment from forming. The low point was near the beginning when he demanded that Zar not call him “father.” Now I understand that Spock was expecting a small child and is somewhat shocked to see his son fully grown up, which is no excuse he really needs to get over it.
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| Was not the best role model in terms of fatherhood |
I also enjoyed McCoy chiding Kirk as things are getting more intense with the Romulans that he is starting to remind him of Matt Decker from “The Doomsday Machine.” The best character moment comes when Uhura brings the senior staff back to reality when they were all in a panic about the Romulans using the Guardian of Forever.
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| Uhura, "I will let you know when you're all being stupid!" |
There may be many flaws with Vulcan culture but how they treat the “Krenath”
versus how humans have historically treated “bastards” is not one of them. In fact, their approach could teach humanity
a number of lessons historically.
I did love the use of Tal from “The Enterprise Incident.” It makes sense that he would have this intense hatred for Kirk and Spock considering their actions against him and his commander in that episode. Unfortunately for him, like the Romulan Fleet Commander in that episode, he ends up a prisoner of Starfleet.
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| Tal returns! |
Zar’s final fate explains a lot of the Earth/Sarpeidon similarities. Not
only was Zarabeth and others great speakers of English, the medieval period
that Kirk found himself in were almost identical to our own. It even included witch hunts. Now this was probably because they were
limited in the costume department in the cost-cutting third season. Having Zar help the planet in its cultural
revolution has a lot of that making since retroactively. I just wish he told his people that witches
were not real. It would have caused
fewer headaches down the road.
So I never saw the Guardian as a
user friendly time machine. There is
just two much of an x-factor with it being an intelligent entity. Also I thought Spock was a little plot stupid
when he didn’t bother to ask the Guardian to make sure to send them back to
Zar’s childhood. Instead he tells the
Guaridan to find the lifeform like himself and now he encounters his son almost
as old as himself. Before they used
Spock’s tricorder to determine the right jumping point they didn’t ask the
Guardian for the moment. I also wondered
when the Romulans showed up, why didn’t anyone suggest asking the Guardian not
to let the Romulans through, sense the Guardian always pulls them back when the
mission is over its not unreasonable to assume it could discriminate against
certain users..
An error regarding the USS Lexington, its registry number is NCC-1709 not NCC-1704. Also since Bob Wesley is a Commodore, when the Enterprise and the Lexington were in battle shouldn’t he have had overall command?
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| Commodore Bob Wesley |
It is interesting a year after fans saw Spock live out his final moments
and die saving everyone in The Wrath of Khan we get these books that are so
Spock-centric. First was Black Fire that
was all about our Mr. Spock, and now we have a follow up to one of Spock’s most
famous episodes. It’s almost like the
writers were protesting the loss of such a great character.
Should it be canon: Yes, my god yes!
Cover Art: The
cover has Spock’s face on the bottom of the viewer’s left. Spock is facing the viewer. Behind him is the
Guardian of Forever. The Guardian of Forever is showing the image of Sarpedion’s
ice age. Next to Spock and in front of
the Guardian is Zar facing toward the viewer’s right side. We see the entire right side of Zar’s
face. The cover does lie a little
bit. Spock’s collar is clearly from his
uniform from “The Wrath of Khan” but this story doesn’t take place during that
time period rather it takes place in the fifth year of the original five-year
mission.
Final Grade: Final Grade 5 of 5
