Star Trek by Kevin Killiany

replicated a folio for you,” Bart explained. “It’s just like the one I use for writing to Anthony. I figured you might like writing to Commander Corsi.”
    â€œWriting to—I’ll be seeing her in a week or so.”
    â€œI know that,” Bart said. “I also know that when I write letters to Anthony they don’t actually go anywhere until I see him again and can put them in his hand. But when I’m thinking about him, writing to him is the best way I know to feel as though he’s there with me.”
    â€œOh.” Stevens picked up the folio and hefted it. “Thanks. I’ll have to try that.”
    Lacking a shoulder bag, he set the folio on the edge of the table at his elbow.
    Bart reached into the bag again and drew out his own folio. Eyeing the location of Stevens’s, he placed his carefully on the edge of the table at his own elbow.
    Catching his friend’s questioning look, he waved his hand, indicating their precisely symmetrical surroundings.
    â€œJust in case,” he explained.

Chapter
9
    T he next day, instead of bringing her the usual survival rations and water, Spot and Lefty led Corsi through a number of tunnels, all of which looked familiar. At last they entered a large room, completely open along one wall. Corsi realized a wooden room so wide and deep could only be in the main trunk of the tree. She wondered how much of this carving out it could take.
    There were several raised surfaces coming directly out of the floor, like truncated pillars that reminded Corsi of mesas rising out of the desert. As the number of chiptaurs lounging about them registered, she realized she’d been literally correct. The truncated pillars were tables.
    â€œA restaurant?” she guessed.
    Her two companions, evidently agreeing with whatever they thought she’d said, led the way to a table near the open wall. They were no more than a dozen meters from the ground, Corsi saw, overlooking a clearing she didn’t recognize.
    â€œLovely,” Corsi said, “And I’m starving. But without my tricorder, I’m not sure what foods of yours I can eat.”
    This seemed to please Spot and Lefty. They settled in. Tucking their four legs beneath them, they each leaned their upper torso forward to rest the elbows of their lower arms on the table. They both indicated with their free hands that Corsi should also sit.
    Corsi looked around the restaurant and saw they were being politely ignored by the other diners. The few whose eye she caught nodded politely before turning their attention back to their own tables.
    More significantly, a row of chiptaurs was approaching from a different entrance, laden with bowls of food and wooden plates.
    â€œYou called ahead for reservations, didn’t you?” she asked Lefty.
    The chiptaur chirped, making what Corsi was fairly sure was an encouraging gesture.
    She sat, tailor fashion, ignoring the scream of protest from her left knee and thigh. The tabletop was a little too high for comfort and a bit too far away for convenience. However, with the table being a solid pillar, there was no way to slide any closer and the chiptaurs had evidently not developed booster-seat technology.
    Come to think of it, how come I haven’t seen any children ?
    Her thought was interrupted by the arrival of the waitstaff with bowls of fruit and vegetables, some raw and some steaming, and cauldrons of soup and water. These they placed in the center of the table. Wooden platters, two sorts of wooden bowls, wooden utensils that looked remarkably like human forks and spoons, were set in front of each diner.
    Glancing around, Corsi saw similar communal arrangements on the other tables. The chiptaurs were continuing their practice of behaving as though she were just like everyone else. Fair enough, provided their food didn’t kill her.
    Bobbing politely, the servers withdrew.
    For their part, her two companions continued to make their