THE ROMULAN WAR

B ENEATH THE R APTOR’S W ING

OTHER STAR TREK: ENTERPRISE BOOKS

Last Full Measure

by Michael A. Martin & Andy Mangels

The Good That Men Do

by Andy Mangels & Michael A. Martin

Kobayashi Maru

by Michael A. Martin & Andy Mangels

—STAR TREK—

ENTERPRISE ®

THE ROMULAN WAR

B ENEATH THE R APTOR’S W ING

M ICHAEL A . M ARTIN

Based upon Star Trek ®

created by Gene Roddenberry

and Star Trek: Enterprise

created by Rick Berman & Brannon Braga

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ISBN 978-1-4391-0798-0
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For Majel Barrett Roddenberry (1932–2008), a grand lady who left us far too soon.

For Tim Dechristopher, an “auction hero” whose singular act of courage confounded the (thankfully defunct) Bush Administration’s unconscionable eleventh-hour attempt to despoil vast tracts of Utah public land.

And for Sergeant Matthis Chiroux, a warrior of conscience who drew from the terrors of war the determination and grace to work for the ideals of peace.

Deliver up the crown, and to take mercy
On the poor souls for whom this hungry war
Opens his vasty jaws; and on your head
Turning the widows’ tears, the orphans’ cries,
The dead men’s blood, the pining maidens’ groans,
For husbands, fathers, and betrothèd lovers,
That shall be swallowed in this controversy.

— Henry V
William Shakespeare

The best weapon against an enemy is another enemy.

—Friedrich Nietzsche

HISTORIAN’S NOTE

The bulk of this story is set in the second half of the year 2155— and into the first half of 2156 (ACE). The destruction of the civilian freighter the Kobayashi Maru (Star Trek: Enterprise—Kobayashi Maru ) set off a series of events that will forever shape the history of Starfleet, United Earth and her allies ( Star Trek: Enterprise ).

TOMORROW

2156

PROLOGUE

Thursday, July 22, 2156
Late in the month of Soo’jen, the Year of Kahless 782
Qam-Chee, the First City, Qo’noS

FLANKED BY A PAIR of scowling guards, Jonathan Archer led the way into the center of the dimly illuminated, vaulted chamber. An oddly heterogenous mélange of smells—the ghosts of old sweat mingled with leather, incense, and the coppery tinge of blood, along with vague notes of freshly turned earth and lilac—assaulted his nostrils as he came to a square-shouldered stop before the ranks of empty High Council benches that bracketed the Chancellor’s equally empty seat.

He fought down a surge of worry that the urgent errand on which Starfleet, UESPA, and the United Earth government had dispatched him as a special envoy might already have ended in failure. Did we get here late? Or early? He prayed silently for the latter as he took in another lungful of the slightly moist, too-warm alien air.

Making a slow half turn to his right, he regarded the stoic woman who stood at his side, dressed, as he was, in a standard blue Starfleet duty jumpsuit. Her characteristically dignified bearing betrayed no trace of worry or any other emotion—including the olfactory distress Archer knew she must have been experiencing. It had taken at least two years of living aboard Enterprise before Commander T’Pol’s sensitive Vulcan nose had become accustomed to some of the much milder odors to which she’d had to adapt in order to live aboard Enterprise.

He’d sometimes ribbed her good-naturedly when her nose would wrinkle in the presence of his beagle. Today, however, he felt no such urge. I hoped to hell the last time I had to come here really was the last time I’d have to come here. The captain paused to take a mental count of each of his previous visits to this ancient, forbidding hall, and came to a stop at three. Let’s hope that the fourth time’s the charm, he thought, drawing in a long, deep breath through his mouth.

But the way the chamber smelled was far less germane to his aversion to this place than were the bruises and scars he’d acquired here, courtesy of an extremely disgruntled Klingon general. Besides, after the ugly turns Earth’s efforts to stop the advancing Romulan fleet had taken lately, Archer would embrace any potential allies, even if they drank methane and farted sulfur.

A reassuring staccato tattoo of hard footfalls began echoing from the far end of the room, approaching from beyond the High Council benches and the Chancellor’s thronelike central chair. Within moments, a dozen or so members of the High Council had taken their places on the benches from which they deliberated the Klingon Empire’s gravest matters of politics and war. The room filled with the low murmur of conversation between the various representatives of the Klingon Empire’s great Houses.

Chancellor M’Rek, his beard seeming longer and grayer than Archer remembered, took his seat a moment later, the dour-visaged Fleet Admiral Krell standing at his side. Archer noticed immediately how closely the scowl Krell favored him with resembled the expressions he’d already seen on the faces of his and T’Pol’s escorts. Like the dour Klingon guards, Krell’s forehead was as smooth as Archer’s, completely bereft of the intricate topography of cranial ridges that M’Rek and all the members of the Council displayed so proudly.

Just as clearly, Krell had neither forgotten nor forgiven the role that Archer and his chief medical officer had played in that unhappy circumstance, irrespective of the incalculable number of Klingon lives those actions might have saved across the Empire.

Krell’s probably also still cranky about having to let Phlox stitch his arm back on after that last little tiff he and I had, Archer thought as a transitory phantom twinge shot across a long-healed broken rib in accompaniment to the memory. Let’s hope this meeting stays civil.

The Chancellor, wearing a warrior’s full armor and a ceremonial cloak of office, raised one mailed fist above his head. The members of the Council responded immediately by falling silent.

M’Rek focused his attention on Archer, his craggy brow ridges and snow-white eybrows casting shadows that turned his eyes into twin cavern fires. “Speak your business, Captain,” he said, his voice booming and reverberating through the entire hall.

“First, thank you for allowing us to speak with you today, Chancellor,” Archer said, doing his best to remember everything he’d been told about observing the necessary diplomatic niceties.

M’Rek acknowledged Archer’s expression of gratitude, while seeming simultaneously to dismiss it, with a single curt nod. “I am a very busy man, Archer. Speak.”

But Krell interjected before Archer could open his mouth. “This Earther and his logic-chopping Vulcan lap targ have come before you today for only one reason, Chancellor. The RomuluSngan have sharpened their ghojmeH and placed its edge against his planet’s throat. He comes to us because he is desperate.”

”Mevyap!” M’Rek barked, suppressing both Krell and the rising gabble of voices from the Council benches. As the noise swiftly faded back into silence, his steely gaze never wavered from Archer’s.

After pausing for the space of a handful of heartbeats to gather his thoughts, Archer said, “I don’t deny that the war hasn’t been going well for us lately, Chancellor.”

“That is good,” M’Rek said, nodding again as he idly stroked his beard. “A lie would have been a poor way to begin this dialogue, especially given your history with us.

“We have been observing your world’s accelerated ship-building efforts from Qo’noS for some time now. Just as we have observed the RomuluSngan fleet venturing ever deeper into your territory from their fortress in the Calder system, and their other forward operating bases. They have been making so much scrap of many of your new vessels, Captain—di’DeluS-class, I believe you call them.”

”Daedalus,” Archer said quietly. The name conjured images of fire and hubris, of watching, both hapless and helpless, while a dream ignites, crashes, and burns to ashes.

“And I have observed that your vaunted NX-class starships have fared only slightly better, Captain,” Krell said, a sneer on his lips.

Archer fought to keep his demeanor neutral, even though Krell’s words had jabbed a wound that had remained open for the past several weeks—ever since Columbia NX-02 had vanished from the Onias sector without a trace, along with all hands, including his ex-lover, Captain Erika Hernandez.

He only just resisted an urge to ask Krell how his surgically reattached arm was feeling.

“I find it curious, Captain,” M’Rek said, “that your Starfleet has chosen to build so few new vessels like your Enterprise. They are obviously of a newer, better design than your so-called Daedalus ships, or even those of your Intrepid-class. Not to mention faster and far more extensively armed than anything else your Starfleet is flying.”

They’re also a hell of a lot more expensive and labor-intensive to build than the oldDaedalus-class design, Archer thought. Although he would have jumped at a chance to swap Starfleet’s present complement of hastily built—and even more hastily retrofitted—Daedalus-class vessels for so many NX-class starships, he knew that the prospect was about as realistic as finding a lamp containing a genie authorized to grant him three wishes. Under the current dire circumstances, Earth simply couldn’t afford to allow the perfect to become the enemy of the adequate. Irrespective of all the reversals Starfleet’s Daedalus-heavy ship complement had experienced lately, Archer understood better than most how long it took, from keel-laying to champagne ceremony, to get a single new NX-class vessel out of spacedock and into service. Three or more new Daedalus ships could be launched in that same span of time.

“Starfleet has had to make certain... adjustments,” Archer said. “Based on the realities of the war.”

“A war that you are losing,” said Krell. “Thanks in large part to the scruples of your Vulcan ‘friends.’”

T’Pol chose that moment to speak up. “I have lived among humans for more than five years, Admiral. During that time I have learned from experience that it would be unwise to underestimate them. Particularly when they are as determined as they are at present.”

Judging from the involuntary movement of his left shoulder—very near the bat’leth incision that had briefly relieved him of his left arm— Archer could see that it had taken Krell considerably less time to learn the folly of underestimating even a single determined human.

But he could also see from Krell’s deepening scowl that the Klingon fleet admiral’s pride was healing far more slowly than had his physical wounds, if at all.

“T’Pol is right,” Archer said, taking care to address the more levelheaded M’Rek. “We’re not about to give up, no matter how grim things might look. But we’re not too proud to ask for help. And that’s why we’re here—to make a formal request that the Klingon Empire enter the war on Earth’s behalf.”

Krell answered with a short burst of derisive laughter even as the High Council members fell to murmuring urgently among themselves. “You and your Denobulan lackey leave countless numbers of us afflicted with this,” the admiral said, placing a gauntleted fist against his smooth cranium. “Then you steal privileged information from this very hall. And now you expect us to save you from the RomuluSngan?”

The Council members immediately initiated a chaotic chorus of shouts and catcalls that made the British House of Commons back on Earth sound like a sewing circle at a small-town public library. M’Rek again signaled for silence. It came, though less swiftly than before.

Archer knew that there was little point in trying to deny the essential truth—at least from Krell’s perspective—behind the admiral’s charges. These people value honesty, he thought, and decided that now was the time to lay all his cards on the table.

“That’s right, Admiral. Yes. In spite of everything, I’m asking you to help us defeat the Romulans. Please.”

Archer’s words hung like smoke in the otherwise silent room as the Council members awaited a response from the stone-faced Chancellor.

Krell sneered again. “So your Starfleet decided to use as its errand boy a captain so cowardly that he would turn tail and leave a defenseless ship’s crew to die, rather than place his own vessel at risk.”

I said the same thing to Admiral Gardner myself, Krell, Archer thought as the room erupted in renewed noise. Let’s hope he was right in shooting down my objections.

“That accusation is most unfair, Admiral Krell,” T’Pol said as order and decorum gradually returned to the room. “Saving that ship was simply not a realistic possibility.”

“No, T’Pol,” Archer said to her quietly. “It’s entirely fair. I just have to learn to live with it.” He felt more certain now than ever before that his failure to save the Kobayashi Maru would remain an albatross around his neck for the rest of his life.

Archer turned back toward M’Rek, facing him squarely as he tried in vain to read the Chancellor’s craggy, impassive face.

“I declare a recess,” M’Rek said, his eyes narrowing. “The Council will deliberate and consider your request. And though I must salute your courage in coming here despite all we know of your record, I must question the wisdom of your leaders in dispatching you to deliver it.

“Go now, Captain, and await our decision. But do not be hopeful.”

With that, the guards stepped forward. T’Pol fell into step beside Archer as he allowed the soldiers to lead them back toward the heavy wooden doors through which they had entered.

Back in the anteroom that fronted the Great Hall, Archer knew there would be little to do but wait. And hope, despite the chancellor’s doubtless well-meant warning.

Hope is pretty much all Earth has left at this point, he thought.

“Do you believe the Klingons will decide to enter the conflict?” T’Pol said, standing with her arms crossed as Archer searched in vain for a place to sit in the wide, empty corridor.

He shrugged. At length, he said, “Regardless of what Shran or Krell might tell you, I’m no warrior. When I took command of Enterprise, I was an explorer. What the hell happened to those days anyway?”

T’Pol’s protracted silence only made him wonder if he had wasted the last few years of his life pursuing the vain hope of bringing peace and security to this mostly lawless jungle of a galaxy.

TODAY

2155

ONE

Day Thirty-Seven, Romulan Month of K’ri’Brax

Tuesday, July 22, 2155

I.K.S. Mup’chIch, near Alpha Centauri

“WE HAVE ESTABLISHED simultaneous control over both of the thhaei warships, Commander,” Centurion T’Vak said in excited tones as he leaned over one of the awkward bridge consoles on the seized Klingon vessel. “The arrenhe’hwiua telecapture system continues to function flawlessly.”

Commander T’Voras sat back in his chair—a chair built to Romulan specifications, the sole concession to pure comfort he had allowed himself since he had seized this rattletrap battle cruiser from its vermin-infested klivam crew. Taking control of a ship operated by those bumpy-headed savages had been far more challenging than today’s mission had proved to be so far. He savored the relative ease with which the ships constructed by the Romulan Star Empire’s Vulcan cousins evidently could be taken by remote means.

He knew he could scarcely imagine how greatly the Empire’s military would benefit from reverse engineering these highly advanced Vulcan starships. But he understood well enough just how much their acquisition would bolster his own career and the wealth and status of his family.

“Very good, Centurion,” T’Voras said, steepling his fingers before him in an effort to keep his thoughts focused and to ward off over-confidence. After all, if the Vulcans somehow managed to recover control over their communications equipment, they could both summon and receive assistance very quickly this deep inside Coalition territory. “Secure our prizes for towing back to Romulus. And make certain that the crews aboard both vessels are dead before we get under way. We don’t need any mishaps on the way home.”

“It will be done, Commander,” said T’Vak.

T’Voras decided then to allow himself one luxury in addition to his padded chair—a small, triumphant smile.

Early in the month of re’Ti’Khutai, Year of ShiKahr 8764

Tuesday, July 22, 2155

Vulcan Defense Directorate Vessel T’Jal, Near Alpha Centauri

The main bridge viewer abruptly succumbed to a wash of static, failing along with the main bridge lights. Despite the suddenly dimmed illumination, Captain Vanik could see the young subaltern’s eyes widen momentarily in an unaccustomed display of emotion.

He could hardly blame the young officer, of course, considering that circumstances—not to mention Vulcan’s commitment to defending her Coalition allies from alien attack—had just forced her to take part in firing upon Vulcan vessels that had been hijacked by an extraordinarily pernicious and lethal adversary.

“Our life-support functions have just shut down, Captain,” Subaltern T’Pelek said, recovering her equanimity as her training reasserted itself. “Along with the helm and the propulsion and tactical systems. I can access neither the backup systems nor the tertiary redundancies.”

It was a most vexing and logic-defying problem. Vanik had planned to solve it from a safe distance after the T’Jal’s sister ship, the Toth, had experienced an apparently identical shipwide systems failure only a few lirt’k earlier. Unfortunately, whatever effect had just immobilized both vessels had a far longer reach than Vanik had realized.

“Contact the rest of the task force,” Vanik said, swiveling his seat toward the comm station. Most of the task force had already gone to warp, bound for Vulcan, but they could be recalled very quickly to render aid.

“Captain, the communications grid is not responding either,” Communications Officer Voris said a moment later after checking his board. “The subspace bands are presently unavailable to us.”

“Another vessel has just appeared on the sensors,” Altern Stak reported from one of the forward science-monitoring stations that was apparently still functional. “It fits the profile of a Klingon battle cruiser.”

Another Klingon vessel, Vanik thought, not surprised to find that the threat that the T’Jal and the Toth had been dispatched to address still lurked nearby, like a hungry le-matya stalking the sunbaked plains of Vulcan’s Forge in search of prey.

“Why did we not detect this vessel earlier?” Vanik asked, his tone measured.

“It is difficult to tell, Captain,” said Stak, still staring into his hooded viewer. “The orbits of a number of dark, icy cometary bodies intersect this vicinity. Perhaps the Klingon vessel was concealed behind one of these bodies.”

And deployed its weapon against both us and the Toth from that place of concealment, Vanik thought. It was reasonable to assume that this was the very same weapon that had just induced a pair of D’Kyr-class Vulcan ships to wipe out a peaceful human convoy near the Alpha Centauri system, leaving the Vulcan Defense Force no choice other than to destroy two of its own vessels and crews.

“The Klingon vessel is changing position, Captain,” Stak said. “Accelerating toward us.”

“Helm and propulsion remain off-line,” T’Pelek said.

“Is there any way to contact the Toth?” Vanik asked, addressing Voris.

“Negative, Captain.”

It occurred to Vanik only then that he had never experienced quite such dire circumstances, either during his earlier tenure as commander of the science vessel Ti’Mur or during his six preceding decades of service to Vulcan’s space-exploration efforts.

“Continue attempting to raise the Toth, Subaltern,” he said. “I need to confer with Captain L’Vor to learn what countermeasures she is taking to prevent the capture of her ship.”

At that moment a transitory burst of light brightened Altern Stak’s side of the bridge. It had already faded by the time Vanik had turned to face the young science officer, whose features were frozen in a curiously un-Vulcan expression of dismay.

Vanik realized exactly which countermeasure Captain L’Vor had employed even before Stak said a word.

“The Toth has exploded, Captain. And the Klingon vessel has not yet opened fire.”

Logical, Vanik thought. If their desire is to capture rather than merely to kill.

It was also logical to assume that L’Vor would not have acted out of panic, but merely out of the prudent necessity of preventing an enemy from acquiring sensitive Vulcan technology.

“Altern Stak,” Vanik said as he arrived at a decision that was as unfortunate as it was both logical and inevitable. “Prepare our log buoy for launch.”

“Immediately, Captain,” Stak said.

The air was beginning to smell dank and stale to Vanik, although he knew that the failure of the life-support system had occurred far too recently to have allowed the ship’s atmosphere to degrade significantly. But he also knew that the T’Jal would be a silent, life-hostile flying tomb soon enough if Stak failed to carry out his next order.

“And try to determine whether we can activate our autodestruct system,” Vanik said, quietly grieving for every katra lost this day. “As the commander of the Toth just did.”

TWO

Friday, July 25, 2155
Enterprise NX-01, Gamma Hydra sector

THE READY ROOM DOOR CHIME buzzed like an ugly accusation.

Jonathan Archer tossed the padd he’d been reading toward the top of his desk. It landed squarely on the cockeyed stack of paper printouts that had accumulated between his computer terminal and a framed photograph of Trip Tucker and himself, taken years ago during a fishing junket in the Gulf of Mexico. Though he wasn’t eager to speak with anyone at the moment, he felt grateful for any opportunity to postpone dealing with the padd’s contents, or the other paperwork beneath it.

“Come,” he said after jabbing a thumb at the desktop intercom beside the stack. The door opened a moment later with a faint pneumatic hiss.

Commander T’Pol stepped across the raised threshold, her Vulcan features as impassive as ever, her hands behind her back. Immediately behind her was Lieutenant Malcolm Reed, who carried himself far more tensely than T’Pol did; his demeanor was that of a man tiptoeing across a minefield.

The door closed behind his visitors, and Archer swiveled his desk chair toward them without making any move to rise.

“T’Pol. Malcolm. What can I do for you?”

“We haven’t come to make any specific request of you, Captain,” T’Pol said, then glanced briefly in Malcolm’s direction.

Reed cleared his throat. “Actually, Captain, we came to see if there’s anything we can do for you.” He looked as though he’d have preferred to be inventorying the armory’s stock of photonic torpedoes or rewiring his tactical console to having this conversation.

Not again, Archer thought, trying to keep his all but omnipresent frustration out of his voice. “All right, Malcolm. I appreciate the sentiment. Really. But I think I’ve already been getting quite enough of that sort of thing from Phlox, thank you. The last thing I need right now is my senior officers... nursemaiding me.”

Now Reed looked as embarrassed as T’Pol looked perplexed, his English reserve standing out in such sharp relief against the executive officer’s Vulcan stoicism that Archer almost succumbed to an urge to chuckle.

Almost.

“Captain, it’s been three days since the, ah, incident with the Kobayashi Maru,” Malcolm said, apparently mastering his discomfiture, if only barely. “But we’ve hardly caught a glimpse of you in all that time.”

Archer felt a scowl coming on, and decided not to try to stop it. “A captain has to keep a certain distance between himself and his crew. You both know that.”

Reed and T’Pol paused to exchange another quick but significant glance before they both trained their gazes back upon Archer in an ocular crossfire of concern.

“Captain, may we speak freely?” T’Pol said.

“Of course,” Archer said, leaning back in his chair.

T’Pol raised an eyebrow at Malcolm, who then picked up the figurative talking stick, though not without some apparent reluctance.

“We understand that a captain needs to keep his professional distance,” said the tactical officer. “But we don’t think he can afford to become a complete recluse either.”

Archer nodded. “All right. Noted. I’ll try to make a little more time to walk the decks before we reach the Tarod IX outpost. By the time we get there everybody aboard this ship will be far too busy to waste their energies fretting about my delicate feelings, anyway.”

Malcolm looked relieved. “Thank you, Captain.”

“No problem. You both worry too much. What’s our ETA at Tarod IX, anyway?”

“We will enter sector thirty of Coalition space in a little less than twenty-four hours on our present heading, Captain,” T’Pol said. “The Tarod system lies approximately two hours inside the region.”

“And we’re already prepared to receive refugees and wounded from the Tarod outpost,” said Reed.

Archer nodded again, feeling the muscles in his jaw beginning to harden. Prepared. If I was really prepared, we might have made it to Tarod IX before the goddamned Romulans attacked.

And the crew of the Kobayashi Maru might not be part of a floating debris cloud right now.

It was the same thought he’d had every time he’d made eye contact with Travis Mayweather over the past three days. Enterprise’s young helmsman had grown up on the Horizon, an Earth Cargo Service freighter that was very much like the Kobayashi Maru—and might well have met a similarly unhappy end a week or more ago. Although no wreckage from the Horizon had yet turned up anywhere along her route, the ambiguous nature of the Mayweather family vessel’s disappearance nevertheless gave Travis’s gaze a vague air of silent, sullen accusation.

Of course, the ensign’s eyes weren’t the only ones aboard that seemed focused in summary judgment of Archer’s failings, real or perceived. He couldn’t help but notice the whispers. And the earnest, quiet conversations that abruptly ceased whenever he entered one of the ship’s common areas.

Places he’d since begun studiously avoiding as much as possible, perhaps before he’d even realized he was doing it.

Archer suddenly noticed Malcolm regarding him with an expression that commingled sympathy with puzzlement.

“Sir?” Reed said.

“Yes, Malcolm?”

The weapons officer reddened noticeably.

“You said something about not being able to look Ensign Mayweather in the eye anymore,” T’Pol said quietly, an expression of quiet understanding replacing her earlier perplexity.

Christ, Archer thought. Now I’m mumbling to myself.

“I assume—” T’Pol said, interrupting herself momentarily to exchange another quick glance with Reed. Again facing Archer, she continued: “We assume that you are still blaming yourself for what happened to the E.C.S. Kobayashi Maru.”

“Admiral Gardner himself told the news services that you didn’t have a choice in the matter,” Malcolm said. “You had to save Enterprise. You had to save your crew. Everyone on Earth understands that by now.”

But I should have found a way to save the Maru, too, Archer thought. You can’t convince me that everybody on Earth isn’t also saying that under their breath.

“Captain,” T’Pol said, “We all understand that if you had stayed to fight off the hostiles that were attacking the freighter, they would have used their new weapon to seize Enterprise by remote control.”

Malcolm nodded enthusiastically. “And nobody needs to tell you what would have happened after that.”

“That doesn’t change anything for the people aboard the Maru,” Archer said. Although he understood that a remotely hijacked Enterprise would almost certainly have become a deadly weapon in the hands of the freighter’s destroyers—people who could have used his ship to destroy countless other Earth vessels, and doubtless also would have reverse engineered Earth’s most advanced propulsion and weapons technologies—none of it made any difference to Archer, at least not emotionally.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get the plaintive memory of the last words of the Kobayashi Maru’s Captain Kojiro Vance out of his head.

“Vance begged me to save his ship and his crew,” Archer said. “And I failed him.”

“You didn’t have a choice, sir,” Reed said.

“It was a no-win scenario, Jonathan,” said T’Pol. Her use of his first name was almost startling, a sign that his first officer was doing her utmost to reach him on a purely emotional level despite her devotion to her Vulcan principles.

Archer raised his hands in a gentle warding-off gesture, directed at his officers. “All right. Message received. Thank you. Like I said, I will bolster crew morale by walking the decks at my first opportunity.” He paused to rub his chin, and noticed for the first time just how scratchy his jawline had become over the past three days. Summoning up a smile that he hoped would convince them both that their work here was done, he added, “I’ll even shave first so as not to scare the horses. Now get back to work before I tell Phlox you’ve been working his side of the street.”

Reed returned Archer’s smile, albeit at somewhat lower wattage, before exiting the ready room and leaving Archer alone with T’Pol.

“That goes for you, too, T’Pol,” Archer said. “Really, I’m fine.”

She raised an eyebrow. “I believe I have lived among humans long enough to know when they are... shading the truth. You are still in turmoil.”

A tart rejoinder about minding one’s own business sprang to his lips, but he bit it back. She was his executive officer, and his business was hers as well—especially when so much of it was personal, and shared by them both.

“Trip,” he said at length.

T’Pol’s perplexed expression abruptly returned. “Pardon me, Captain?”

“I can’t help but wonder if I would have found a way to save both Enterprise and the Maru if Trip were still here.”

She nodded as understanding appeared to dawn on her. “I see.”

“If you weren’t a Vulcan, I probably wouldn’t have admitted that to you. The last person I’d want to offend is my exec.”

“But I am Vulcan, Captain. Therefore I take no offense. But I do understand how valuable the relationship is to you.”

Archer felt his eyebrows go aloft. “ ‘Is’? Present tense, T’Pol? I’d say there’s a pretty damned good chance that Trip is dead. For real this time, I mean.”

T’Pol shook her head. “I am confident that I would know it if Commander Tucker were dead.”

“Vulcan optimism?”

“It is an empirical fact. As is the fact that Trip’s absence is not the only thing distressing you.”

She nodded in the direction of the uneven stack of paperwork on his desk and the padd that lay across the top, its display still showing the document he had been reading when she and Malcolm had entered the ready room.

He reached across his desk, picked up the padd, and rose from his chair. “T’Pol, you and Malcolm have both put a lot of energy into vindicating my decision to leave the Maru behind. But not everyone on this ship feels the way you do. Over the past three days I’ve received fifteen formal transfer requests. So far.”

T’Pol nodded slowly. “I am aware that some members of the crew are... uncomfortable with the outcome of the Kobayashi Maru affair. Unfortunately, some of those individuals have decided to apply for reassignment.”

Archer scrolled the padd’s display until it showed the names of the authors of the two most recent reassignment requests, then handed the device to T’Pol. Although her Vulcan demeanor was usually as impermeable as Enterprise’s hull plating when polarized, T’Pol’s eyes widened in incredulity when she saw the names.

“You must not have been aware that Travis Mayweather and Hoshi Sato have just joined the ranks of the uncomfortable,” Archer said. “Dismissed, Commander.”

Holding the padd, T’Pol quietly exited the ready room, leaving Archer alone with his thoughts. He sat heavily in his chair and picked up the framed photograph, ignoring the stack of papers beside it as it tipped over, partially spilling onto the deck. Trip Tucker was holding a duranium-reinforced fishing rod in one hand, with his other arm around Archer’s shoulders. A huge marlin, Trip’s catch of the day, hung above the pier in the background.

Good times. Simpler times. Far better times than these.

I saved my crew, he thought. But at what cost?

THREE

Three days earlier

Gamma Hydra sector, near Tezel-Oroko

CHARLES TUCKER BRACED HIMSELF for the inevitable impact, squeezing his eyes shut tightly. The little escape pod’s proximity alarms set up an earsplitting wail as the comet fragment lumbered inexorably toward the forward window that he could no longer see. He felt certain that no amount of luck or skill could enable him to evade the looming kilometers-long chunk of ice and rock.

Trip tried to focus past the pain of the blows and scrapes and bruises he had taken during his escape from the Romulan ship—a vessel he had sabotaged before dragging its unconscious commander along with him into the nearest escape pod—but without much success.

He decided to concentrate instead on a comforting mental image of T’Pol, confident that his aches and pains would soon enough no longer be an issue.

Why the hell is this death thing taking so goddamned long?

A faint sensation suggestive of columns of ants marching across his skin offered a partial answer to that question. He opened his eyes in time to see the front of the escape pod crumple like so much paper toward him, around him—and through him—even as a curtain of deep blue light intruded, washing away the linked inevitabilities of mass, gravity, and inertia. His nervous system on autopilot in spite of himself, he raised his insubstantial arms protectively before his equally ethereal face.

Transporter beam, Trip thought as the escalating brightness of the indigo nimbus all around him reached a momentary blinding peak, briefly turning the lightless frozen interior of the comet fragment through which he now tumbled into a multicolored crystalline kaleidoscope before fading away into imperceptibility on retinas grown too intangible to catch any light whatsoever.

The bluish illumination returned abruptly an instant later—as did the inevitabilities of mass, gravity, and inertia. The escape pod chair in which he had been seated had not materialized beneath him, and he found himself dumped unceremoniously onto the hard, unyielding surface that he immediately recognized as the broad, round stage of a transporter, albeit one that looked far more advanced than the similar though smaller unit he had used on numerous occasions during his tenure as Enterprise’s chief engineer.

Trip lifted his head groggily, sniffing at the air; it was breathable, but thinner and hotter than he was used to. In the absence of the transporter’s light show, Trip saw another figure, a man whose appearance was as Vulcan—in point of fact as Romulan—as Trip’s own. He lay sprawled unconscious across the stage beside him, a wound on his temple slowly oozing dark green blood.

Sopek, Trip thought, then amended the Vulcan name to the one the man had been using during his operations inside Romulan space: Ch’uivh.

The pain Trip had thought he’d soon be past forever returned to his consciousness in full measure, enhanced by the uncomfortably hot and rarefied air. Ignoring it as best he could, he tried to struggle to his feet but succeeded only in getting as far as a wobbly kneeling posture.

A sharp, authoritative voice rang out before Trip could determine the exact direction from which it had originated.

“Do not move.”

Trip instinctively raised his hands, making the universal I-am-not-a-threat gesture.

A uniformed young man approached from before a low console located near a bulkhead. A second uniformed figure, a woman, stood behind this console; Trip assumed she had been the one responsible for the delicate hair’s-breadth rescue that he and Ch’uivh had just received. But the most significant detail that Trip noticed about his rescuers was the nasty-looking weapon clutched in the hand of the young man approaching the transporter stage.

The next thing he noticed was that both the man and the woman had dark hair arranged in nearly identical bowl cuts, upswept, vaguely sinister-looking eyebrows, and ears that tapered delicately upward into elegant points that evoked ancient legends of demons and pitchforks.

Trip’s heart sank. I should have figured on Ch’uivh having a backup ship parked nearby.

But something about that notion didn’t add up, though he couldn’t quite focus his attention solidly enough to place it. The uncomfortable environmental conditions weren’t helping, and neither were his aches and pains. All he could do was focus on the uniforms that both his “hosts” wore—drab, utilitarian paramilitary garments that didn’t look like anything he’d seen during the entire time he’d spent on Romulus.

He wondered whether these people served in something roughly equivalent to a Romulan merchant marine fleet, or if they belonged to a Romulan dissident splinter group like Ch’uivh’s Ejhoi Ormiin organization, from which Trip had only barely succeeded in escaping with his life.

And then there was the matter of their foreheads, which were far smoother than any forehead he’d seen on Romulus....

“State your name, please,” said the young man with the pistol.

Trip tipped his head to give the single remaining universal translator he carried in his left ear the best chance of functioning properly; the device’s slight delay made him wonder if it was about to fail, leaving him in the linguistic lurch.

After spending a silent moment debating just how much he should reveal about himself, Trip finally spoke, his tongue feeling thick in his mouth. “I’m called Cunaehr. I... rescued this man from his ship before it was destroyed.” His hands still raised, he nodded toward the unconscious figure of Ch’uivh.

The man with the weapon raised an eyebrow in apparent curiosity as he came to a stop about two meters away from the transporter stage and regarded Ch’uivh. “I will summon medical help for this man.” A moment later, the woman behind the transporter console appeared to be doing just that.

“Where am I?” Trip asked, still taking care not to make any threatening moves.

“You are aboard the cargo ship Kiri-kin-tha,” said the armed young man, the barrel of his pistol never wavering.

“Cargo ship,” Trip said, not immediately recognizing the vessel’s name. “Romulan?”

The man raised both eyebrows this time. “Vulcan,” he said, apparently puzzled as to why anyone might mistake a Vulcan ship for a vessel used by the Romulans.

“Vulcan,” Trip said, momentarily stunned. “Not Romulan.” Well, that certainly explains the air in here, he thought as he felt a sweat beginning to break out across his forehead.

A huge, involuntary grin split Trip’s face, but he worked hard to suppress it, along with the tide of relieved laughter he felt building immediately behind it. He wondered how long it would take these people to drop him off back home on Earth.

The other man’s bemusement suddenly made sense to him. To the best of Trip’s knowledge, the Romulans were still utterly mysterious and faceless to virtually everyone outside their Empire, including the vast majority of Vulcans. That fact probably accounted for Trip’s host’s failure to take any obvious notice of the one overt physical feature that distinguished Trip from him: his prominent, if artificial, Romulan brow ridge. For all he knew, that caveman brow wasn’t entirely unknown on Vulcan, where the ancestors of modern-day Romulankind originated.

After a pause to catch his labored breath, Trip said, “Take me to your leader.”

After his armed escort shepherded him into the spartan conference room, Trip’s first impression of Captain T’Vran was that she looked to be about twice T’Pol’s age. Trip knew, of course, that a Vulcan’s age was a difficult thing for humans to gauge; for all he knew, she could have been two hundred, or maybe even older.

T’Vran had seated herself across a low metal table from Trip. The alert and watchful eyes of two other people regarded him with obvious suspicion—the lone male guard, who continued to stand sentinel just inside the room’s hatchway, and another Vulcan woman, also of indeterminate age, who sat silently on the narrow bench that lined the room’s farthest wall.

These people are a lot more like the Romulans than they realize, Trip thought as he turned his attention back to T’Vran while mopping his sweaty brow with one of the battered sleeves of his Romulan-style traveling tunic. A slight wave of dizziness touched him, but it disappeared so quickly that he couldn’t tell whether it was a result of his injuries or the cargo ship’s oppressively hot and thin atmosphere.

“My apologies, Cunaehr, for having taken so long to properly welcome you aboard the Kiri-kin-tha,” Captain T’Vran said.

“I understand, Captain,” Trip said, nodding. “Running a cargo vessel as big as this one seems to be must keep you very busy. Thank you for taking me aboard. Now if you don’t mind, I’d like to ask you for another favor.”

She raised an eyebrow in a manner that made him feel a sudden acute longing to see T’Pol again. “A favor?”

“I need to arrange passage to Earth.”

T’Vran regarded him as though he had just said something unutterably absurd. “Curious,” she said, steepling her fingers in a manner that made him wonder whether all Vulcans did that. “Why would someone who has so obviously just come from the sphere of influence of the Romulan Star Empire wish to travel to Earth?”

Trip quietly kicked himself for not having anticipated this reaction. “You must think I’m some sort of spy.”

“Given the current state of hostilities between Earth and Romulus, I do not know precisely what to think of you, Cunaehr. You are clearly like no Vulcan I have ever met.”

Trip certainly couldn’t argue with that. After all, he was even less Vulcan-like than his old turncoat “friend” Ch’uivh was.

That thought reminded Trip to check up on him. “Where is the other man who was in the escape pod with me?” he asked.

“Doctor Sivath is seeing to his injuries presently in our infirmary,” T’Vran said evenly. “He has not yet regained consciousness, but the doctor will advise me immediately should his condition change. Now please explain why you wish to go to Earth, particularly during a time when that world is at war with the very people who built the ship from which you and your associate escaped.”

Fair question, he thought. She doesn’t know who I really am. Fighting off another wave of dizziness, Trip opened his mouth to speak, finally ready after all these months of fruitless deep-cover spying to tell her the plain, simple truth.

He abruptly stopped himself when he felt the eyes of the other Vulcan woman silently boring into him. He turned his head to confirm that she was indeed still watching him. Snap a holopic, why don’t you? he thought. It’ll last longer. His frown did nothing to discourage her.

But her raptorlike gaze encouraged him not to turn all his cards face up, at least not yet. How do I really know these people are Vulcans? If I can work undercover, then so can the Romulans. He wouldn’t have put it past Admiral Valdore to stage a fake Vulcan rescue as part of some Byzantine plan to trick him into giving up things that an ordinary interrogation might never yield.

All right, Trip thought, more determined than ever to bring his spy career to an end. So I’m gonna have to play Cunaehr a little longer than I’d hoped. At least till I’m sure who I’m dealing with here.

“Are you all right, Cunaehr?” T’Vran said. “You do not look well.”

Trip willed away another wave of light-headedness. “I’ll be fine, Captain.”

The eyebrow lifted again. “Then you should be able to answer my question: Why do you wish to go to Earth—particularly now, when that world is under direct threat of Romulan attack?”

Romulan attack. Her words echoed in his head, which was beginning to feel as though it were stuffed with cotton. Romulan attack. Of course, Earth itself wasn’t under Romulan bombardment just yet. But he knew it would happen, just as soon as the Romulans had gathered sufficient personnel and matériel to launch assaults from their newly acquired beachheads.

Unless somebody did something about it before they were ready.

“The Romulans are conducting large fleet movements right now,” Trip said. “They have a toehold at Calder, and they’re already trying to get another one at Alpha Centauri. If they’re not stopped, they’ll be able to send whole battle groups to Earth, and to the rest of the Coalition planets.”

T’Vran answered with a coolness that made Trip believe that butter wouldn’t have melted in her mouth. “And you seem to believe that you—alone—can do something about this.”

“Well, somebody’s gotta do something about it!” Trip said, his arms flailing as he abandoned any pretense of Vulcan reserve.

“I assure you, Cunaehr, the Vulcan High Command is already well aware of whatever fleet movements the Romulan Star Empire may or may not be undertaking at the moment,” T’Vran said, her brow creasing into a single barely perceptible furrow.

“That’s good to hear. So what the hell do they intend to do about it?”

“I do not know.”

And you sure as hell wouldn’t tell me if you did, Trip thought as spots began to swim before his eyes, prompting him to blink rapidly to chase them away.

A small runnel of sweat trickled from his brow down into his collar. “You don’t believe anything I just told you,” he said. “Do you?”

She stared at him for a protracted moment before responding. “I do not wish to insult you, Cunaehr. But I do not find you to be a credible source of information.”

Trip couldn’t help but wonder whether the woman staring at him from the bench had made a similar assessment. Looks like we’re at a standoff here, he thought. T’Vran can’t trust me because I came here straight from a Romulan escape pod. And for all I know she and the lady giving me the stink eye are just a couple of glorified Romulan interrogators.

He knew that this occasion would require a leap of faith. And he understood that he would have to be the one to take it.

And he suddenly knew in which direction he had to leap.

Making a studied effort to calm himself, Trip leaned forward slightly across the round conference table. “Let me prove that you can trust what I tell you,” he said.

“How do you propose to do that?” T’Vran said.

“You’ve just about accused me of being a Romulan. But I know something that no Romulan could ever know. Something you can verify independently with your superiors.” He hiked a thumb over his shoulder. “If you’ll send the guard out of the room, I’ll tell you what it is.”

He half turned to assess the reactions of the guard, as well as the silent, staring Vulcan woman on the bench. Both appeared to tense perceptibly, despite their Vulcan calm.

Turning back to face T’Vran, he said, “So how about it, Captain?”

“All right,” she said, absolutely no fear or apprehension in her tone. Trip didn’t doubt she could take him in a fair fight, with or without the assistance of the staring woman. With a nod, the captain dismissed the guard. The armed man stepped out into the corridor, and the hatch closed behind him.

The staring woman continued to watch, sitting as motionless as though her body had thrown down roots.

“She is authorized to hear any secrets you may choose to reveal,” T’Vran said in response to Trip’s silent query. “What did you wish to tell me?”

He nodded, and took a deep breath. In addition to the air being far too hot and thin, something seemed to be going wrong with the ship’s inertial dampers as well. “There’s a man,” he said, struggling to keep his thoughts focused. “This man served as the keeper of the—ah, what do you call it—the katra of Surak during the last few days Administrator V’Las was in power.”

T’Vran nodded, her demeanor somehow grimmer even through her mask of nonemotion. “Those were dark times indeed. What do you know about this keeper of Surak’s katra?”

The entire room seemed to be slowly turning, even as it began to grow dark at the edges. “He’s a human. And I know his name: Jonathan...”

The lights dimmed entirely before Trip got to hear the rest of his own words.

FOUR

Saturday, July 26, 2155

Enterprise NX-01, en route to Tarod IX

THE BRIDGE WAS QUIET as the time of the shift change drew near. Which was why the amber light in the lower left-hand corner of her bridge comm console immediately attracted Ensign Hoshi Sato’s attention.

Checking her chronometer, she saw that more than half an hour remained before she was to have her private meeting with Captain Archer. Reassured that she had time at least to scan through the latest dispatches from Earth’s most influential media organization, Hoshi placed the tiny receiver in her right ear and toggled the activation switch. The recording that had just arrived via the subspace bands immediately began spooling onto one of her small comm screens.

Newstime, Hoshi thought. She settled back in the comm station’s padded chair, expecting to see the latest news of the unfolding Romulan conflict, just as the civilian world back home on Earth was receiving it.

What she didn’t expect to see was Enterprise orbiting a half-sunlit Earth. Judging from the latticework of support structures visible on the screen’s right side, the image must have been made aboard the McKinley drydock station, or perhaps the Obama facility.

“This is Newstime, with Gannet Brooks,” intoned the familiar deep voice of the same faceless male announcer Hoshi had first heard back in grade school. Hearing it now, particularly during times as stressful as these, was always a comfort.

As Enterprise continued her slow, stately tumble around humanity’s homeworld—and the angular logo of the Solarcorp News Service—a more spontaneous-sounding female voice replaced the canned male one. “This is Gannet Brooks, with all the news that’s under the sun. Although the reports remain sketchy, Starfleet’s Starship Enterprise— one of Earth’s most advanced interstellar vessels—has been involved in what Starfleet’s public relations officials describe as a ‘skirmish’ in the distant Gamma Hydra sector.”

Hoshi suddenly noticed a presence beside her, and looked up to see Lieutenant Reed standing at her elbow, watching the small comm screen along with her.

“Do you mind turning the sound up a bit, Ensign?” Reed said. “I’d like to see why Newstime thinks we’re headline news.”

It was obvious to Hoshi that Reed’s remark was intended as tongue-in-cheek, his dry British sense of humor coming to the fore. Just as it was crystal clear that there could be only one reason why Gannet Brooks would consider Enterprise particularly newsworthy this week.

After all, it wasn’t every day that one of Starfleet’s most prominent captains abandoned a distressed civilian vessel and its crew in order to save his own ship.

Deactivating her earpiece, Hoshi brought the sound up so that Reed could listen along with her to Brooks’s report. Her finger remained poised over the mute switch, however, just in case Captain Archer returned to the bridge unexpectedly.

“Starfleet Command’s Admiral Samuel W. Gardner insists that Captain Archer was well within the bounds of command discretion in his decision to abandon a civilian freighter in distress. The vessel in question, a Tau Ceti IV registered Earth Cargo Service neutronic fuel carrier called the Kobayashi Maru, fell under attack several days ago and was ultimately destroyed, along with a crew of eighty-one and some three hundred colonist passengers, by several hostile ships described variously as either Klingon or Romulan in origin. According to Admiral Gardner, Enterprise was in imminent danger of being captured, and the starship’s advanced technologies would have fallen into the hands of a hostile power.

“But other anonymous sources inside Starfleet have been considerably less kindly disposed to Captain Archer’s decision to withdraw from the Gamma Hydra sector massacre. Among these—”

“I think I’ve heard enough,” Reed said, and Hoshi responded by turning the sound down slightly below the threshold of hearing while a montage of stock images of Enterprise persisted on the screen.

“That goes for me, too,” said another voice from the bridge’s center. Hoshi turned in time to see Ensign Travis Mayweather looking sullenly toward her from his helm station. His usual good humor had been sparse at best ever since the Kobayashi Maru incident, and the news report—no doubt a painful reminder of the recent disappearance of his own family’s freighter—clearly wasn’t helping his mood any.

Worse, Mayweather’s foul temper made her wonder if some of those “anonymous sources inside Starfleet” to whom Brooks had spoken might not be billeted right here, aboard Enterprise.

You’d think that anybody who’d get that upset would at least have the decency to quietly apply for a transfer the way I did, she thought, disgusted. It sure beats stooping to telling tales out of school to the press about the captain.

As the ship’s comm officer, it was certainly within the scope of her abilities to find any surreptitious crew communications with Earth that might be buried deep in the subspace radio logs. But she had already decided not to take that step during her remaining time aboard Enterprise, unless and until the captain expressly ordered her to do it. Crew morale was bad enough right now without exacerbating matters by releasing a toxic cloud of suspicion into the ship’s atmosphere.

She deactivated the monitor screen, hoping to banish Enterprise’s tarnished reputation along with the starship’s image. Maybe there are some things we’re all better off not knowing.

Archer had been dreading the meetings he was about to face, but he knew he couldn’t afford to put them off any longer; if he didn’t sit down now with each of the crew members who had requested transfers—before Enterprise reached Tarod IX, where he and the entire crew would immediately get buried neck-deep in the next wartime crisis—there was no telling when he’d get around to doing so.

He had to admit, though, that Ensign Hoshi Sato looked at least as uncomfortable as he felt. I guess it’s not every day that an ensign gets to deliver a vote of no confidence directly to her captain’s face in his own ready room, he thought, feeling glum.

Archer watched in silence as Ensign Sato squirmed quietly in the seat on the other side of his desk.

“Why, Hoshi?” he asked at length.

She looked confused by the directness and ambiguity of the question. “Sir?”

“I thought you were happy here, Ensign.” He knew he couldn’t continue to ignore the proverbial elephant in the room, so he decided to tackle the matter directly. “But since the Kobayashi Maru incident, I can certainly understand why you might— “

“That had nothing to do with my decision to move on, Captain,” she said, interrupting him, which was something he was very nearly certain she had never done before. A look of horror crossed her smooth, youthful face as she realized what she’d done.

“It’s all right, Hoshi,” Archer said, trying to sound encouraging. “I’m relieved to hear you say that. Now tell what this is really about. Please.”

Her brow creased slightly as she looked into one of the room’s upper corners while she gathered her thoughts. A moment later, she fixed her gaze back upon Archer and said, “I don’t feel particularly useful here, sir.”

That surprised him even more than her previous statement had. “I don’t understand.”

“There’s nothing for me to do here, Captain,” she said, an edge of frustration sharpening her tone. “Professionally speaking, I mean. I’m a linguist, and a ship devoted to exploration can provide a linguist with more than enough challenging work. But that’s all changed now that Starfleet’s main priority has shifted to defense and war.”

“Where will you go?” he asked, spreading his hands before him. “It’s not as though the exploration game is going to look any better on any of Starfleet’s other ships of the line. Not while the war is going on.”

She nodded. “I’m thinking of going back to Earth.”

“What can you do on Earth that you can’t do out here?”

“Every human language provides a window into each culture’s distinctive way of being human,” she said after a pause. “Whenever any indigenous Earth language disappears, it’s a loss comparable to the extinction of the humpbacks a hundred years ago. Except that the loss is a matter of disappearing memes rather than genes.”

“I suppose that’s true. So exactly what’ll you be doing?”

She brightened somewhat. “I’ve been offered a fellowship with an academic project devoted to preserving and teaching Earth’s indigenous languages. The planet has been on its way to becoming a linguistic monoculture since before Cochrane discovered the warp drive. It would be a shame to let any more regional dialects go extinct.”

Archer sat very still, staring off into space as he allowed Hoshi’s words to sink in for an unmeasured interval.

“Hoshi, Starfleet is going to need your linguistic expertise now more than ever,” he said at length. “And that’s because of the war, not in spite of it.”

Her eyes widened. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“Your linguistic talents have helped us get inside the heads of aliens more times than I can count,” he said. “We’re going to need to bring that kind of talent to bear against the Romulans if we’re going to have any hope of anticipating their next moves.”

“I don’t feel I’ve been very much help to you lately, Captain,” she said, the corners of her mouth turned downward. “I couldn’t help you save the Kobayashi Maru.”

It always comes back to that, doesn’t it? he thought. Aloud, he said, “Some problems just don’t have a solution that’s going to make everybody happy. Or even let everybody survive.”

“I suppose not.” Her voice was barely audible.

“But having our most talented people out here on the front gives us our best chance,” he said, leaning forward across his desk. “Hoshi, you put your finger on it yourself when you used the word extinction. If the Romulans win this war, then the human race will have much bigger worries than protecting Earth’s linguistic diversity. There’s a hell of a lot more at stake here than saving our memes, Ensign. So here’s the bottom-line reality: I need you. Earth needs you. But it needs you here, not doing language botany in some rain forest while the Romulans do to Earth what they’ve already done to Coridan.”

Hoshi sat stock-still, blinking rapidly as she considered his plea. He hoped for everyone’s sake that she was conjuring images of Coridan’s still-burning oceans.

“All right, Captain,” she said finally. Favoring him with a weak smile, she said, “You’ve convinced me. At least for now, while the Romulans are a threat. Is it too late to withdraw my transfer request?”

He answered her with a grin and leaned back in his chair. Making an expansive gesture at the skewed piles of paperwork and padds on his desk, he said, “I’m afraid I’ve been too swamped lately to file it properly.”

“Thank you, sir,” she said.

He nodded, still grinning. “Dismissed, Ensign. And please tell Ensign Mayweather I’d like to have a word with him.”

“Yes, sir,” she said with a nod before she disappeared through the hatch.

The feeling of dread that had filled his belly prior to his meeting with Hoshi abruptly returned, along with a bedrock certainty that Travis would prove far less persuadable than had Hoshi.

Less than a minute later, Travis Mayweather was seated in the very spot that Hoshi had just vacated. And though the young pilot had somehow managed to keep his facial muscles as disciplined as T’Pol’s, there was no mistaking the fire that burned behind his eyes. It was understated and silent, but it spoke volumes.

“I don’t suppose there’s any point in my trying to talk you out of leaving Enterprise, Ensign,” Archer said, not willing to prolong the agony any longer than absolutely necessary.

“No, sir,” Travis said. His gaze was focused intently upon the wall just over Archer’s shoulder.

Archer rose from his chair and walked past Travis, pacing the narrow confines of his ready room. “All right. But I’m not letting you go without a forthright answer to one question.”

“Sir?”

Ducking beneath a beam, Archer stopped and faced his helmsman. “Why? And don’t bother asking me for permission to speak freely. You have it already.”

Travis looked uncomfortable, as though he had not thought through a response to that question because he had never expected Archer to ask it.

After a span of a couple of dozen heartbeats, the young man rose from his seat and stood at attention. “Sir, in light of what happened to the Kobayashi Maru, I cannot in good conscience remain aboard this ship.”

You mean, in light of what I did to the Kobayashi Maru, don’t you, Travis? Archer thought.

Or maybe this was really about whatever mysterious fate may have befallen the Horizon.

Archer decided that in the end it didn’t matter. After all, he was neither a psychologist nor a grief counselor. He knew that if Phlox had failed to dissuade Travis from his decision, then there was a good chance it was neither a youthful existential crisis nor a passing whim.

Besides, the captain knew that he couldn’t afford to entrust the safety of his ship and his crew to any bridge officer who couldn’t stand behind him one hundred percent—even if he did believe deep down that the ensign wasn’t all that out of line to blame him for the Maru incident.

With a determination born of resignation, Archer stalked back toward his desk, from which he took one of the several padds he had left stacked there. Several quick jabs brought up Mayweather’s transfer request, which he completed with a final savage stabbing motion of his right thumb.

“All right, then, Ensign,” Archer said, unceremoniously tossing the padd back onto his desk. “Your request is hereby approved. I’ll see to it that you’re picked up for Starfleet reassignment at our next rendezvous opportunity. Until that time, I’ll expect you to maintain a standard duty schedule.”

Travis nodded. Archer had half hoped that the younger man would bank the angry fire behind his eyes. But unlike Hoshi, he betrayed no sign of any last-minute change of heart.

“Understood, sir. Thank you, sir.”

Archer’s jaw hardened as he answered with a curt nod. “Dismissed, Ensign.”

And fair seas, he thought sadly as Travis vanished through the hatchway that led back to the bridge.

Archer couldn’t sleep. And apparently neither could Porthos, his loyal beagle, who leaped up into his lap as he sat on the side of his bunk, trying with only middling success to commit some of his thoughts about the past few days to text.

“I hope you’re not just trying to let me down easy before handing me your transfer request,” Archer said, laying the padd aside so he could stroke the dog’s short fur. Porthos’s only response was to lick his master’s face.

Setting Porthos aside, Archer rose from the bunk and cinched his bathrobe tighter about his waist. He reached into one of the pockets and tossed a dog treat toward the beagle’s sleeping corner, and Porthos wasted no time pouncing on it.

“All right, Porthos,” Archer said with a weary sigh. “If I don’t follow through on my promise to T’Pol and Malcolm and go for a jog around the decks, I’m liable to start talking to myself.”

Although the hour was late, Archer took the time to change into a fresh duty coverall, though he still hadn’t bothered to shave. The intercom whistled just as he was stepping through the hatchway into E deck’s outermost corridor. The brisk, no-nonsense tones of the gamma-watch commander, Lieutenant Donna O’Neill, followed half a heartbeat later.

“Bridge to Captain Archer. We’re receiving a real-time priority subspace communication from Starfleet Command.”

“Thanks, D.O. Go ahead and pipe it down here.”

A moment later he was seated behind the small desk in his quarters, staring anxiously at a gold Starfleet crescent-Earth-and-chevron standard.

The gray, careworn visage of Admiral Samuel William Gardner soon displaced the graphics. “Jonathan. Sorry I wasn’t reachable when you called. I’m glad to see I’m not disturbing you by getting back to you so late in the ship’s day.”

Archer smiled wryly. “Don’t worry about that, Admiral. I’m not real big on sleeping these days anyway.”

“Or on shaving, I can see. Looks like you’re running a pirate ship.”

“Reprimand received, Admiral. I’ve been a bit preoccupied lately, and it’s only going to get busier once we reach the Tarod IX outposts and start picking up the survivors. Can you talk about the current tactical situation?”

Gardner nodded. “Starfleet Command agrees with your assessment that the Vulcan ships that attacked the Calder II outpost were under the control of the Romulan Star Empire. The Romulans are obviously in the process of perfecting a new weapon capable of remotely hijacking the starships of their adversaries.”

Archer thought that “perfecting” was an excellent choice of verbs; the Romulans almost certainly would have destroyed or captured Enterprise had this new weapon already successfully made it through its shakedown phase prior to the attack on the Kobayashi Maru.

“Maybe the Romulan attack against Alpha Centauri was only a feint, Admiral,” Archer said. “I think what they really wanted in the short term was Calder II, which is much more strategic for them in terms of relaying their supply lines from their own core planets to the heart of Coalition space.”

The admiral idly stroked his neatly trimmed gray beard. “Agreed.”

“The Romulans are probably building a rapid-strike base on Calder II even now,” Archer said. “From there they’ll be getting ready to take on Andoria, or Vulcan, or even Earth. And if they go after Earth, they’ll be gambling that we won’t have enough of the new NX-class ships ready in time to stop them.”

Gardner frowned. “Even using Calder as a matériel base, it’ll take the Romulans some time to get their supply lines up and running and secure. Their new weapon notwithstanding, they’ve dealt with Enterprise enough to understand how formidable our NX-class starships can be. They’re taking a gamble that we won’t be able to meet them force for force before they get can use their new beachhead to maximum advantage.”

“Maybe it is a gamble on their part, Admiral. But unless you know something I don’t, it’s a damned good gamble. You know as well as I do that Enterprise and Columbia are still the only NX-class starships Earth has in service right now. And nobody’s heard from Columbia in nearly four days.” For perhaps the thousandth time, Archer prayed silently that Captain Erika Hernandez and her crew hadn’t fallen into the very same Romulan trap that Enterprise had so narrowly avoided.

The admiral’s fair skin grew even paler, until it was nearly a match for his crewcut and close-cropped facial hair. Archer could see immediately that he didn’t need to remind Gardner that Enterprise’s next two warp-five sister ships—Challenger NX-03 and Discovery NX-04— were both still a good month away from being ready to leave San Francisco’s orbital shipyards. Nor did he need to mention that the launch dates of Atlantis and Endeavour were several months further down the calendar still, and that was assuming that the construction teams experienced no setbacks.

“I wish I could say you were wrong, Jonathan,” the admiral said at length. “But it looks like we might have to start relying on the older ship designs, like the Intrepid and Daedalus types, to a much greater extent than most of the admiralty ever anticipated. Provided, of course, that the fleet yards can figure out how to incorporate your father’s basic warp-five engine design into the mix without slowing down the production process.”

Though he recognized, as the admiral clearly did, that this was a tall order, Archer nodded silently. He wondered whether the vicissitudes of war were about to transform the sleek, forward-looking NX-class into a technological dead end that people would someday view only as a charming museum curiosity, like the Trylon and the Perisphere from the 1939 New York World’s Fair.

“Well, I can think of one fleet that’s already built and ready to go,” Archer said. “Not to mention better equipped to handle the Romulans than we would be even if we spent Earth’s entire gross domestic product on starship construction for the next five years.”

“The Vulcan Defense Force,” Gardner said, nodding.

“Why haven’t the Vulcans stepped up to the plate yet, Admiral?” Archer said.

“They did stop the attack on Alpha Centauri cold, Jonathan.”

“But they didn’t lift a finger to keep Calder and Tarod out of Romulan hands. I know they can’t be everywhere, but their fleet is spread a hell of a lot less thinly than ours. Especially now that Vulcan and Andoria aren’t at each other’s throats any longer.” Since Trip had taken Enterprise straight into the middle of the Vulcan-Andorian crossfire last year and thereby defused that conflict, Archer had expected the effort to pay off in a “peace dividend” of a somewhat more tangible nature than the mere signing of the Coalition Compact.

Now would be a good time for the Vulcans to make at least a down payment on that dividend, Archer thought, biting down a resurgence of the bitterness that years of Vulcan obstruction to humanity’s space exploration efforts had engendered in him. We’ll need all the force we can muster if we’re going to have any chance of heading off the threat of a Romulan beachhead.

“Administrator T’Pau is visiting Earth now, to address the Coalition Council and answer questions about Vulcan’s defense posture vis-à-vis the Romulans,” Gardner said, sitting straighter at his desk, evidently winding up the conversation. “So get some rest before you get to the Tarod outpost, Captain. That’s an order. In the meantime, I will do everything possible to persuade T’Pau to send every available Vulcan military ship to Calder II as quickly as possible. Gardner out.”

Let’s hope T’Pau is in a listening mood, Archer thought as he settled back in his chair and watched the screen on his desk shift back to the default image of the Starfleet logo. Vulcans might be renowned for their logic, but they don’t get nearly enough credit for their stubbornness.

The whistle of the desktop intercom interrupted Archer’s gloomy musings. He jabbed the button with his index finger. “Archer here. Go ahead.”

The voice on the other end of the comm unit commingled excitement with apprehension. “Lieutenant Reed here, sir. I hope I’m not disturbing you.”

Archer chuckled. “Not at all, Malcolm. It’s a relief to learn I’m not the only insomniac aboard. What can I do for you?”

“I have some good news, Captain,” Reed said, the excitement in his voice quickly overhauling the apprehension. “At least potentially. I’ve been analyzing the various systems aboard Enterprise that the new Romulan weapon seems to have affected during the Kobayashi Maru incident. And I’ve noticed a peculiar pattern that might give us a way to plan an effective countermeasure.”

In spite of his dour mood, the news gave Archer some hope. “Sounds promising, Malcolm. Let’s go over it tomorrow.”

“Very good, sir. Reed out.”

Archer stood, stretched, and moved back toward the door. Maybe there’s still time for a quick jog, he thought. Then maybe a catnap before—

The intercom sounded again. “Bridge to Captain Archer,” said T’Pol, speaking in her customary even tones.

Archer sighed, then moved back to the desk and toggled the channel open one more time. “Go ahead, Commander.”

“Captain, we are approaching Tarod IX. Starfleet and MACO triage teams are assembling presently.”

Archer raised an eyebrow and did a quick calculation in his head. “We beat the schedule by at least six hours. Looks like Mike Burch in engineering deserves a commendation. What’s the condition of the outpost?”

“There has been no response to our hails. According to the medium-range sensors, the Romulan attack here was quite severe.”

Jogging, napping, and even shaving would have to wait. “Thank you, Commander. I’m on my way. Go to Tactical Alert, just in case there are still Romulans lurking in the system.”

“Aye, sir. Assuming that we can find them before they find us.”

Not about to debate that assumption, Archer closed the channel without replying and left his quarters almost at a run.

The good news, Phlox discovered to his enormous relief, was that there were indeed survivors to be found at the Tarod IX outpost following the Romulan sneak attack that had reduced it to smoldering ruins.

The bad news was that he had never seen so many injured people crammed into his sickbay, not even when he’d been swamped with some fifty wounded patients at the Matalas refugee camp. Within an hour of Enterprise’s arrival in orbit of Tarod IX, the main treatment area had already begun to burst at the seams. The influx of dozens of wounded civilians forced him to expand even his basic triage operations out into E deck’s corridors, and he quickly filled up two cargo holds with lower-priority patients. And he’d had no choice but to dragoon all available Starfleet and Military Assault Command Organization personnel who’d had even rudimentary first aid training into service as ad hoc corpsmen, nurses, and medical technicians.

As the doctor finished taking a diagnostic reading on one of the growing multitude, he looked up from his handheld scanner in time to see Master Sergeant Fiona McKenzie helping a pair of her MACO troopers struggle a fully laden stretcher through the transparent aluminum doors and into the sickbay’s crowded periphery.

“What’s her condition?” Phlox said as he moved past several burn victims whose condition seemed to have stabilized, at least for the moment. His newest patient was an unconscious young woman, human like all the rest. Her hair was singed, her skin all but broiled in places.

Phlox closed his eyes tightly for a moment, but opened them immediately to ward off an unbidden memory of the seventeen corpses he’d found very early in his medical career. The encounter had occurred on the bridge of a cargo vessel whose crew had died messily in a shipboard explosion while orbiting his native Denobula Triaxa, and Phlox had the misfortune of being part of the first response team.

He was determined never to allow another such death tableau to plague the memories and dreams of anyone else, if there was anything he could do to prevent it.

“Radiation burns,” said Corporal Matthew Kelly, one of the two MACOs who had done most of the heavy lifting on the stretcher. “Hypothermia, too, probably because she ended up exposed to the elements after the Romulans blew apart the structure she was found in. She’s also got some lacerations or punctures on the torso.”

“Administer ten cc’s hyronalin,” Phlox said. “And I need to take a good look at her other injuries.”

Corporal Ryan, a trained MACO corpsman, dutifully injected the woman through a relatively unscathed patch of skin on her neck. McKenzie and Kelly quietly left to see to other wounded people while Ryan stayed behind to assist Phlox in slicing off the remnants of the burned woman’s distressed, blood-soaked garments.

He didn’t need his scanner to see from the woman’s blue lips and gray skin tone that her body temperature had fallen dangerously because of direct exposure to the harsh conditions of Tarod IX, whose average temperature reflected its extreme distance from its primary star. Nor were the severity of her lacerations, apparently created by flying debris or shrapnel, a great mystery. Luckily for the patient, some of the larger fragments that had penetrated the woman’s abdomen seemed to have put pressure on the very blood vessels they had severed, thus preventing her from bleeding to death immediately. And the extreme cold she’d experienced since the Romulan attack may also have operated in her favor by causing a vasoconstrictive reaction that slowed down her circulatory system.

Phlox stepped to one of his worktables and reached into a small glass box he kept between the self-contained habitats in which his prized Pyrithian bat and his Regulan bloodworms lived. A moment later he stood beside the new patient, the wriggling, warm pulsations of a clutch of small alien life-forms dangling from his hand. As he brought the medicinal creatures toward the woman’s abdomen, her eyes opened and she drew a single deep breath that she promptly converted to a single sharp scream and a quick stream of terror-stricken words.

“What the hell are those things?” the woman said as she tried to sit up before the large but gentle hands of Corporal Ryan and her own pain dissuaded her. “They look like leaches!”

“Not leaches, ma’am,” Phlox said, using his most soothing tones. “Osmotic eels.” Very gently, he laid the eels directly on the worst of her abdominal wounds and began another scan, preparatory to attempting to remove the largest pieces of shrapnel embedded in his patient. “They should stop the worst of your bleeding very quickly, and may speed up the restoration of your core temperature. Once we’ve taken care of that, we can begin the process of removing...”

His voice trailed off as he noticed that the touch of the osmotic eels seemed to have caused the woman to faint dead away. A quick scan revealed that her vital signs were steady, though still faint.

Phlox soon moved on to another wounded patient, whose blood-spattered bandages were being changed by Ensign Malvoy. The ensign’s dark blue Starfleet duty uniform was almost equally bloodied, though from without rather than from within. I came here as a researcher and an observer, Phlox thought, sighing. Not to become a battlefield surgeon.

The notion made him feel like just another piece of ordnance in somebody else’s war. He suddenly felt no more enlightened than those of his countrymen who allowed themselves to be drawn into ugly conflicts against the Antarans, Denobula’s traditional enemy.

That is most definitely not what I signed on to Enterprise to do.

The sickbay doors opened again.

“Doctor! More incoming!” shouted McKenzie. Phlox caught a glimpse of something black, red, and glistening following immediately on her heels.

He closed his eyes once more, then opened them again, relying on the brute force of his intellect to restore and maintain his focus. He told himself that now was not the time for recriminations or regrets.

It was time to save as many lives as possible, for as long as the captain he had sworn to serve needed him to continue doing it.

As the time of his appointment in the captain’s mess drew near, Archer stepped into the bridge turbolift, T’Pol following only a few paces behind.

“I have confirmed that our guests are ready to meet with us, Captain,” T’Pol said.

Archer nodded, though he continued to stare quietly at the moving lights that marked the turbolift’s rapid descent from A deck to E deck.

During almost the entirety of the rescue and recovery operation, Archer had remained on the bridge, coordinating shuttlepod and transporter operations from the captain’s chair through the gamma-shift bridge watch. But although the constant stream of firsthand reports he’d received from T’Pol, Reed, Mayweather, O’Neill, and MACO Master Sergeant McKenzie had prepared him intellectually, nothing could have braced him for the emotional impact of what awaited him beyond the turbolift doors.

A heterogeneous group of at least a hundred ragged men, women, and children stood in lines or leaned against walls or sat on the deck all along the curve of E deck’s main corridor. They were, or had been, scientists and engineers, both Starfleet and civilian. They were also doctors, soldiers, energy-extraction specialists, administrators, and frontier laborers, though sorting such details out under the current circumstances was next to impossible, not to mention irrelevant. All Archer knew for certain was that if he lived another century he would never forget the gaunt faces and haunted eyes of these people the Romulans had displaced from the Tarod IX outpost—those that hadn’t been vaporized outright during the Romulans’ initial strike, and hadn’t needed immediate life-sustaining surgery. These survivors were mostly silent, stifling their desultory conversations as Archer and T’Pol advanced slowly through their nearly stationary ranks, moving from Enterprise’s core toward the saucer’s forwardmost starboard-side section. They looked, variously, stunned and shell-shocked and angry and grief-stricken, and smelled of sweat and blood and fear.

The captain couldn’t help but wonder how many of them fully understood yet that the Romulans had just transformed their homes and workplaces into rubble, vapor, and frozen ash—pulverized remnants that even now were being driven far and wide across Tarod IX’s frigid scarps and canyons by the planet’s merciless, eternal winds. As he passed them, Archer could feel the quickly accumulating weight of their gazes falling upon his back, hard stones of summary judgment cast by an army of the unquiet dead—a quiet chorus of lost souls who had received damnation unjustly.

Enterprise got here as quickly as possible, he reminded himself, just as he had already done more times than he could count already. No other ship could have saved this many survivors. And no matter how badly I might want to stop these Romulan bastards before they attack, there’s only so far I can bend the laws of physics to do it.

He only wished he could force his gut to accept that as easily as his brain could.

T’Pol followed Archer through the hatch that led into the captain’s mess. The door closed behind them again as they stepped toward the large table that dominated the room. Two humans, a man and a woman, sat on the table’s far side, while Chef busied himself setting up the formal dining linens and cutlery. Framed by the stars and the dim glow of Tarod IX visible through the wide transparent aluminum window behind them, the destroyed outpost’s senior surviving military and civilian leaders watched blankly as Chef worked.

The male human guest appeared to be about the same age as the captain, while the woman might have been ten or perhaps even twenty years older; since both humans were obviously under stress and lacked rest, their true age was difficult to assess. The man wore a rumpled civilian suit with slightly singed sleeves and a soiled collar, while the woman wore an olive drab MACO duty uniform that had clearly seen some hard service. Both of their faces bore extensive bruises and cuts, though none of these appeared to be immediately life threatening.

Chef withdrew, presumably to get whatever refreshments he was about to serve, as the man and the woman both rose and took turns making introductions and shaking Archer’s hand. T’Pol took a step backward, not eager to encourage either of the humans to attempt to touch her. The gesture wasn’t one of revulsion; being a touch-telepath like the vast majority of Vulcans, T’Pol simply regarded the unbidden physical touch of a stranger as an intolerable intrusion. Fortunately, neither of the outpost’s leaders appeared to have taken offense at her reticence.

Once the introductions were completed and everyone had taken their seats around the table, T’Pol said, “If your injuries are causing you discomfort, our sickbay is at your disposal.”

A deep frown creased the hard face of the MACO woman, who had introduced herself as Colonel Manetta Lundy. “Thank you, Commander. But your sickbay is a bit crowded now with people who have real injuries. Once your medics have taken care of them, we’ll be happy to have our hangnails seen to.”

“Same goes for me,” said the civilian male, who had called himself Yutaka Shima. He turned a hard glare in Archer’s direction. “In the meantime, we’ll try not to dribble blood onto your fine table linens here.”

T’Pol refrained from replying, and observed that Archer was doing likewise as Chef reentered the room bearing a large metal platter heaped with bread, vegetables, meat, and pitchers filled with cold water and Terran fruit juices. The contrast between the immaculate white table settings with the ragtag condition of two of the diners suddenly became both stark and absurd in T’Pol’s eyes. But whatever fault she might have found in their manner, the obvious toughness of these humans and their tenacity in the face of almost certain death struck T’Pol as anything but absurd.

Chef exited once again and Archer made an expansive gesture toward the food. “Go ahead and eat, please. We can debrief you about the Romulan attack later, if you prefer.”

Yutaka Shima merely eyed the rice, steamed vegetables, and Terran animal flesh on his plate for a long moment, as though he were grappling internally with temptation. “I thought the last thing I’d ever eat would come out of one of those damned emergency ration packs,” he said at length.

“Shima, those were all my people had to eat after the Romulans knocked out the power systems,” Colonel Lundy said, scowling at the contents of her own plate. “And e-rats are all we MACOs are going to eat for the duration of the crisis. At least the ten percent or so of us who are still able to eat anything.”

Although Archer neither flinched nor winced at the colonel’s almost accusatory tone, T’Pol thought he seemed to deflate ever so slightly.

“Colonel, I’m sorry,” the captain said very quietly.

Lundy pushed her plate brusquely toward the table’s center, forcing T’Pol to lunge forward to prevent Chef’s floral centerpiece from toppling over and dumping water everywhere.

“Frankly, Captain, I’m not interested in hearing how sorry you are,” the colonel said, folding her arms before her. “Just see to it this food gets to some of those civilians out in the corridor.”

Archer frowned. “Care to decide which ones?”

Lundy scowled. “Excuse me?”

“Were there any particular individuals in the multitude we just rescued that you had in mind?” Archer said, speaking softly but matching the colonel’s scowl with a hard glare of his own. “Or are you just making a grand gesture? Look, Colonel, I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am about what happened to the outpost, but—”

“And again, Captain, I don’t want to hear it,” Lundy said, interrupting.

T’Pol was about to interject something about common courtesy when Shima spoke up. “Manetta, I wouldn’t mind hearing just how sorry the captain is.”

Archer sat in silence, facing the unblinking stares of the two bedraggled outpost leaders, though it must have felt like a fusillade from Enterprise’s forward phase cannons.

Silence descended upon the room until the captain broke it. “What exactly are you trying to say, Mister Shima?”

“I think you understand perfectly well what we’re saying, Captain,” Shima said, pushing himself back from the table. “We called Starfleet for help as soon as we knew we were under attack. But you took your goddamned sweet time getting here, didn’t you?”

Archer’s stony manner might have impressed a Vulcan master. “Starfleet’s resources are spread rather thinly, Mister Shima. Particularly now. I’m sure Colonel Lundy is well aware of the logistical realities of interstellar defense.” He nodded in Lundy’s direction.

“Oh, and I’m sure she’d be good enough to explain them to me,” said Shima. “And that will make everything right, won’t it? Please do us all a favor, Captain, and spare us the patronizing lectures.”

Lundy seemed both cooler and more disciplined than her civilian counterpart, if no less angry. Her eyes locked upon Archer, she said, “I might be just a lowly frontier ground-pounder to Starfleet, but I’m well aware of this: Enterprise is one of the two fastest Earth ships now in service. And neither of those fancy warp-five ships were fast enough to do anything about the Romulans before the attack, when it might have done some good.”

“Even if Starfleet had a dozen NX-class ships ready to fly right now, it wouldn’t be enough,” Archer said, his patience apparently fraying around the edges. “Starfleet can’t be everywhere at once, Colonel. Any more than your MACO forces can.”

Lundy seemed to take this in thoughtfully while Shima fumed in silence. “Maybe Starfleet doesn’t deserve all the blame,” the MACO leader said as she turned and extended an accusing finger in T’Pol’s direction. “After all, the Vulcans had a hand in this, too.”

“Pardon me?” T’Pol said, not at all certain she had heard the colonel correctly.

“Some crimes are pretty hard to pardon, Commander,” Shima said, almost growling the words.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Archer said through gritted teeth.

“Something I might call complicity,” Lundy said. “Or simple negligence, if I could afford to be charitable about it. Either way, it amounts to the same thing: our orbital sensors picked up a Suurok-class vessel on the outskirts of the Tarod system.”

“There was a Vulcan military ship nearby at the time of the attack?” Archer said, his brows rising.

Lundy nodded, her mouth drawn into a grim slash. “There was. And it could have reached the planet in plenty of time to engage the Romulans before their dirty work was done.”

Although T’Pol found this news surprising, she also found that it hadn’t left her at a loss for words. “The initial reports from the outpost described a fairly large Romulan force. It is likely that one ship could not have stood against it. Even a Suurok-class vessel might have been overwhelmed.”

“Maybe,” Lundy said. “Maybe not. We still don’t know how much of the Romulans’ success against us was overwhelming force and how much was the simple element of surprise.”

“In any case, it would have been nice to have our alleged Coalition allies at our backs,” Shima said. “They might have made a huge difference in the outcome of the attack.”

The temperature in the room seemed to be dropping rapidly, forcing T’Pol to suppress a shudder. “Or they might simply have been destroyed by a superior force,” she said evenly.

“Well, it’s all academic now, isn’t it Commander?” Lundy said, her gaze radiating hostility and her brow nearly as crumpled as that of a healthy Klingon. “We’ll never know what would have happened because our loyal Vulcan allies tucked tail and ran about thirty seconds after we hailed them. How the hell are you going to answer for that, Commander?”

“All right,” Archer said, his tone growing low and dangerous. “Whatever hardships you’ve both endured, whatever decisions the Vulcans on that ship may have made—I’m not going to sit here and let you use my first officer as a piñata. I’m not going to tolerate any more of this... Vulcan bashing aboard my ship.”

Archer’s words hung in the air. The two other humans at the table seemed transfixed as the moment stretched. T’Pol knew that there had been a time not so very long ago when Jonathan Archer was the last person she would have expected to defend a Vulcan. Only a scant four Earth years earlier, the captain had frequently accused the Vulcan government of deliberately retarding Earth’s efforts to explore the galaxy. But a great deal had happened during the intervening years, not least of which was Archer’s brain having played host, however briefly, to the living katra of Vulcan’s most revered leader.

“No one is bashing anybody, Captain,” Colonel Lundy said in a frosty tone. “We have merely pointed out that our Vulcan ‘friends’ were derelict in their duties under the Coalition Compact’s mutual protection clause, if not directly involved in the attack.”

Archer rose from his chair. “I swear to you, Vulcan could never have been involved in anything like this,” he said, speaking with a degree of restraint that T’Pol doubted he could have managed had Surak himself not shared his cranium for a time. “On my honor as a Starfleet officer.”

Lundy laughed bitterly, her face a mask of incredulity as she, too, stood and pushed her chair back behind her. “Your ‘honor,’ Captain? I doubt that’s worth much more than half a pre-U.E. Australian dollar.”

Although T’Pol didn’t understand the reference completely, she understood that currency dating back to the time before all of Earth’s disparate nation-states had confederated beneath the aegis of the United Earth government had to be all but worthless today—a fact that was consistent with the present demeanor of her captain, whose hands were balled into fists at his sides.

Moving with as much quiet grace as she could muster, T’Pol also rose to her feet. Although she was doing her utmost not to appear aggressive or threatening, she readied herself to undertake a quick series of harmless but immobilizing V’Shan moves in the event the colonel were to allow her obviously violent emotions to get the better of her.

Before Archer could respond to the colonel’s harsh words, Shima rose as well. “Maybe you ought to ask the crew of the Kobayashi Maru exactly what your ‘honor’ was worth to them, Captain,” he said, glaring at Archer after casting a contemptuous glance at his untouched plate. “Thanks for the banquet, by the way,” he added before stalking toward the door. Lundy wasted no time following him.

“I don’t understand,” T’Pol said, puzzled by their guests’ refusal to partake of a table stocked with perfectly wholesome—not to mention badly needed—food. “Where are you going?”

Shima disappeared through the hatchway, favoring T’Pol with neither a reply nor a backward glance.

“Out into the corridor,” Colonel Lundy said, pausing momentarily in the open hatchway. “There’s got to be some e-rats floating around here somewhere.” And with that she followed Shima.

T’Pol found that she was still staring incredulously at the hatchway several seconds after it had closed, leaving her alone with the captain.

He continued standing in place, looking profoundly sad.

“Most illogical,” she said at length.

Archer shook his head, and finally found his voice. But the anger she had heard in it earlier had vanished, replaced by a deep weariness.

“No, T’Pol. It’s not illogical at all.” He dropped heavily into his chair at the table, prompting T’Pol to retake her own seat.

“But they should be eating and recovering their strength,” she said. “Particularly after what they have just endured.”

The captain made a brief sound that T’Pol identified as a chuckle, though she could detect no humor behind it. “They’ll take care of themselves, by and by. But they’re leaders first. And being a leader means that the people you’re responsible for have to be your first priority. Those two just aren’t up to sharing a boat ride with Jonah right now.”

“Jonah?” T’Pol said, her confusion escalating. “Boat ride?”

Archer sighed and assayed a wan smile. “Let’s just say I’m not exactly perceived as a good luck charm at the moment.”

T’Pol began to contemplate the irritating human penchant for speaking in opaque metaphors when she noticed the faraway look in Archer’s eyes. It was a look she had seen often over the past four days.

Being a leader means that the people you’re responsible for have to be your first priority, she thought, recalling Archer’s words.

“You are considering again what you regard as your failure to save the Kobayashi Maru,” she said, not asking a question.

His eyes narrowed slightly. “Is there really another way to consider it, T’Pol? Other than as a failure?”

She tried to ground herself emotionally before replying, so as not to respond to the captain’s intensity the way a Vulcan lyre’s passive strings tended to vibrate in sympathy when the main ones were plucked. “Perhaps not. Particularly if you insist on discounting your success in saving the lives of everyone aboard Enterprise. I trust I need not remind you that Starfleet Command has not overlooked that success. And as you yourself pointed out to our guests, Captain, we are only a single ship.”

He looked no more encouraged than he had before. And his forlorn expression prompted her to wish, against all logic, that she could offer him something other than empty platitudes. The fault lines of stress she saw on his forehead and in the muscles of his cheeks and jaw seemed nearly intense enough to pull him apart. That small flash of insight made her wonder whether she had finally spent enough time among humans to begin to understand their peculiar predilection for metaphor, simile, and analogy—even as it made her ponder humanity’s apparently rather dim prospects of mustering sufficient unity to meet the escalating Romulan threat.

They must find that unity, she told herself. Colonel Lundy and Mister Shima notwithstanding. With the certainty of gravity, she understood that the only alternative would be the sundering and scattering that her own people experienced during the brutal wars the ancient Vulcans fought during the time of Surak.

And the fate of the ancestors of those who even now march beneath the raptor’s wing.

FIVE

Columbia NX-02, near Alpha Centauri

“THEIR TRACTOR BEAM has locked onto us, Captain,“ Lieutenant Karl Graylock said. The chief engineer’s German-accented words were muffled more than usual by the still balky shipboard comm system. “Hull stresses are staying within the error bars... so far. I’ve got my repair teams deployed preemptively, though. And Major Foyle and his MACOs are standing by to assist. Just in case the tractor tears our bumpers off.”

“Good work, Karl,” Captain Erika Hernandez said, brushing a few stray strands of her straight black bangs away from her eyes. Apart from her slightly unruly hair, she tried to set a textbook example of command comportment for her bridge crew, sitting ramrod straight in the chair at the center of Columbia’s busy A-deck nerve center. Four days after a Romulan sneak attack had left the starship crippled and adrift, the discipline of preserving appearances had become more important to morale maintenance than ever before.

“Keep the hatches battened down and tell our friends we’re ready to go home,” she said.

Hernandez’s exec, Commander Veronica Fletcher, stepped toward the captain and came to a stop alongside the command chair. “Back to Earth, to lick our wounds,” the fair-haired young woman said quietly in her New Zealand twang. “And we have to accept a tow from the Vulcans, no less. We’re never gonna live this down.” She shook her head ruefully.

Hernandez allowed a grim smile to cross her lips. “Maybe. But I’ll wager that the Vulcans have a hell of a lot more to be embarrassed about right now than we do.”

Fletcher’s brow crinkled like a dented hovercar fender. “How do you figure? We just discovered how easy it is for the Romulans to sneak right up onto the human race’s back porch. That’s a pretty damned mortifying thing, if you ask me.”

“Granted,” Hernandez said, nodding in concession to her exec’s point. “But we weren’t the ones whose ships got hijacked and turned into Romulan weapons.” Not eager to encourage her second-in-command’s tendency to accentuate the negative, she refrained from adding the word “yet.”

“I suppose that particular badge of shame would have to go to the Vulcans,” Fletcher said. “Still, I don’t see anybody sneaking up on them.”

That’s the nature of sneaking, Hernandez thought. Nobody sees ’em—until after they come up out of the weeds. Aloud, she said, “I think we can count on Starfleet and the MACOs to do everything possible from here on in to make sure humanity doesn’t get caught with its collective pants down again.”

“Saying that’s a lot easier than doing it,” Fletcher said, folding her arms before her. “And a lot of the doing could depend on our using something faster than the Pony Express to get our after-action reports in front of Starfleet Command.”

Hernandez leaned against the command chair’s right arm as she considered Fletcher’s words—and her unspoken implication that embarrassed Vulcans might not be entirely forthcoming to Starfleet about a Romulan seizure of Vulcan vessels. As things stood now, until Columbia’s subspace radio was back in operation, those all-important classified after-action reports would reach Earth no faster than Hernandez herself could get there.

“Captain!” The sharp exclamation came from the forward portside communications station, where Ensign Sidra Valerian was feverishly working at her console. Hernandez rose from her seat and approached Valerian, and Fletcher followed at her side.

“What is it, Ensign?” Hernandez said. “Please tell me you have some good news for me for a change.”

A broad grin of triumph split the redheaded comm officer’s face as she answered in tones that evoked the scent of the Scottish highlands. “The subspace transceiver array’s finally back online, Captain.”

The comm officer’s grin went metastatic, cloning itself on the exec’s face. “I guess even we can’t roll snake eyes every time.”

Just four days earlier, Karl Graylock had described the charred remnants of the comm system as so much irreparable junk, commenting that a four-and-a-third-light-year-long spool of twine stretched tightly between two aluminum cans would have given Columbia a far better chance of raising Starfleet Command.

Hernandez took a couple of deep breaths, centering herself. Transports of joy weren’t any more appropriate on the bridge than was a display of despair. After all, the fickleness of luck was an integral part of life in the space service.

“Ensign, get me Admiral Gardner, and pipe the call into my ready room,” she said, then strode quickly toward the bridge’s starboard side. Before the damned thing frazzes out on us again, she appended silently as she opened the access hatch that led to her private office.

SIX

Sunday, July 27, 2155

Gamma Hydra sector, near Tezel-Oroko

THE LIGHT OF A PAIR of blazing red stars appeared very suddenly before him, searing his eyes like twin branding irons.

Several heartbeats later, Tucker became aware not only that he had eyes, but also that he was keeping them shut tightly against the remorseless illumination. And those facts, in turn, made him aware of the fact that he was aware.

Which probably means I’m still alive, he thought as his rebooting brain doggedly tried to follow the chain of logic that was emerging like the steps of some arcane geometric proof.

After several more indeterminately long moments passed, Trip discovered that he could open his eyes without squinting. Almost simultaneously, he found that the blazing binary star system that had forced them shut had fused into a single orb that next transformed itself into a lone, circular light fixture mounted on the ceiling almost directly over his head.

He found himself lying flat on his back in an austere stainless steel–lined room, while two dour-faced Vulcan women watched him intently. A third figure, apparently an armed male security guard, stood at rigid semiattention a few meters behind them.

Recollections of an interrupted meeting rushed back to him as he recognized one of the two women.

“Captain T’Vran,” Trip said as he struggled to get into a sitting position, stopping about halfway there by leaning on one arm. “Did I miss anything important?”

“You lost consciousness,” the captain said.

Trip pushed himself the rest of the way up, surprised to discover that he felt neither dizzy nor feverish, though his brain was still working a bit more sluggishly than he would have liked.

“That much I was able to figure out for myself,” he said. “How long was I out?”

“Nearly five full days have elapsed since you succumbed to your injuries and had to be brought to the Kiri-kin-tha’s infirmary,” T’Vran said. Nodding toward the somewhat gray-haired woman who stood beside her, she added, “You have been under the care of Doctor Sivath during your... indisposition.”

“Infirmary,” Trip said, turning his head to the left and the right to take in the half-dozen or so other diagnostic beds arranged around the room. All of them were unoccupied except for the one on the opposite side of the chamber.

His old “friend” Ch’uivh—who also sometimes went by the Vulcan name Sopek—lay on that one, apparently unconscious. Trip noticed only then that the woman who appeared to have been studying him so intently during his earlier meeting with T’Vran was seated in a chair near that bed.

Her eyes were riveted upon him, just as in their previous nonen-counter. Some sort of political officer? he wondered briefly before brushing the matter aside, at least for the moment.

“How is my... colleague doing?” Trip said, gesturing toward the man who lay motionless on the other bed.

The woman the captain had identified as Doctor Sivath spoke up, her tone surprisingly warm yet still businesslike. “He is unconscious, and might remain so for another several days, depending upon the rate of progress his own internal healing processes achieve. However, his condition has stabilized.”

The captain turned toward the security guard and dismissed him; after he had left the infirmary, she faced the doctor again. “Doctor Sivath, have you confirmed your initial findings regarding the origins of the unconscious man?”

Sivath hesitated, apparently not sure about how much she ought to reveal in Trip’s presence. Trip noticed that the woman observing him from Sopek’s bedside had likewise tensed, as though prepared to demand a little bit more discretion from the captain.

“I have,” Sivath said with an obvious unease. “His readings are a close match to the Romulan baseline figures from the intelligence files.”

“So he’s a Romulan,” T’Vran said, raising an eyebrow in Trip’s direction. “Not a Vulcan at all.”

“If the intelligence files are correct, yes,” said Sivath.

Trip could see now that T’Vran was watching him as carefully as was the scowling-but-still-silent observer who sat beside Sopek’s bed. The captain’s trying to shock me into letting slip just how much I know about Sivath’s other patient, he thought. He was well aware that T’Vran was treading on extremely sensitive ground.

“And what of the origin of your more recent patient, Doctor?” T’Vran said, her gaze still fixed upon Trip.

“As you suspected, Captain,” the doctor said, also looking at Trip, “this man is neither Vulcan nor Romulan.”

Uh-oh, Trip thought.

“Please explain, Doctor,” T’Vran said.

The physician nodded. “For one, his blood is red rather than green. Only the Cymbeline blood burn can produce such a symptom in a Vulcan, and only in the disease’s terminal stages. This patient exhibits no such sign of infection.”

Trip recalled the sulfatriptan drug he had been using to maintain his blood coloration artificially ever since he had started operating behind Romulan lines. The last time he had taken a booster had been a couple of weeks ago, shortly after the night those young punks had tried to jump him in downtown Dartha, the Romulan capital. He thought the drug shouldn’t have worn off so completely already, but that was obviously what had happened. I guess your mileage may vary, he thought.

T’Vran took a step toward Trip, who was beginning to feel more like the subject of an interrogation than a guest.

“Please explain to me how a red-blooded human got so far away from his home planet,” she said, her tone even though her eyes were cold and flinty. “And more importantly, Commander Tucker, why have you been operating in secret inside the Romulan sphere of influence?”

A feeling of vertigo seized Trip’s guts, as though the gravity plating had failed or a huge hole had suddenly opened beneath his bed, casting him into a limitless freefall.

“Oh, shit,” was the only response Trip could formulate as the realization began to sink in that his cover was now well and truly blown. “How did you find out?”

“Besides the doctor’s examination of your body’s decidedly non-Vulcan internal arrangement?” T’Vran said, now sounding almost amused, at least for a Vulcan. “You told me your name just before you lost consciousness.”

Trip’s cheeks flushed hot with shame. I can’t believe I did that. Aloud, he said, “Must’ve gotten bonked on the head a lot harder than I realized.”

“I have repaired the subcranial trauma you suffered during whatever incident prompted you to take an escape pod into a cometary debris field,” said Sivath.

But not in time to keep me from making a stupid rookie mistake, Trip thought bitterly. “Thank you,” he croaked.

“Do not be distressed, Commander Tucker,” T’Vran said. “You became delirious and appear to have revealed your real name only inadvertently. It happened while you were explaining why I should believe your claim that a number of large-scale Romulan assaults are imminent.”

Maybe I wanted to blow my cover, Trip thought. After all, hadn’t he always hoped to put this Romulan spy business behind him as soon as possible? Hadn’t he always held out the hope, however slender, that he would eventually be allowed to go home, to reclaim his life?

“I must confess that I doubted you,” T’Vran continued. “Until you revealed that you knew the identity of the human who briefly carried the katra of Surak. After I had you taken to the infirmary, I checked your story about the Starfleet captain known as Jonathan Archer against the records of Vulcan’s V’Shar bureau.”

T’Vran paused as she nodded in the direction of the woman seated beside Sopek. The woman’s eyes narrowed slightly, indicating clearly that the captain had just revealed significantly more about her than she would have preferred.

The exchange also confirmed Trip’s suspicion that the woman was some sort of intelligence spook or political officer.

“I have conveyed your warnings about the Romulans to my government,” T’Vran said. “Although I must admit that I am still not sanguine about our having found you in an escape pod, in the company of one of those selfsame Romulans.”

“Spying on ’em isn’t the same as working with ’em,” Trip said.

T’Vran nodded, looking almost weary. “Indeed, Commander. Perhaps I am merely approaching my tolerance for spying and subterfuge, necessary though they may be.”

The captain exchanged a quick but significant glance with the woman Trip was coming to think of as his V’Shar minder.

“Regardless of the merits of your... activities,” T’Vran said as she turned back toward Trip, “I do not wish to accept any further responsibility for your safety in this dangerous region of space than I already have. I have therefore decided to return you to Earth, or at least to the nearest Starfleet vessel or United Earth consular facility we encounter between the Gamma Hydra sector and your home planet.”

The vertiginous, queasy sensation that had grabbed Trip by the viscera earlier suddenly abated, replaced by a feeling of liberation that bordered on elation. It surprised him, since he understood, intellectually at least, that the dynamics of his situation had not changed at all during the past few moments. The secret of his human identity was blown. And his primary handler during his operations behind Romulan lines, Tinh Hoc Phuong, remained dead, as did Doctor Ehrehin i’Ramnau tr’Avrak, the premier Romulan warp scientist, upon whom he had been assigned to spy when he had first arrived in Romulan space, months ago. His primary mission, which was to contain, subvert, and/or steal the warp-seven drive the Romulans were even now still in the process of developing, had ended in ostensible failure.

Nevertheless, he felt supremely relieved.

Failure or not, I’m finally at the mission’s finish line, Trip thought. And I didn’t have to die to limp across it in last place. I’m finally going home. I can get my life started again, see my family, finally let my parents and my brother and my nephew know that I’m alive. Maybe I can even see T’Pol again for more than half an hour at a time.

From the beginning of what amounted to his exile on Romulus, he’d tried to tell his superiors in Section 31, mainly Harris and Stillwell, that he was a far better engineer than he was a spy. Now, just maybe, he could afford to relish the prospect of resuming his suspended career in Starfleet, which needed his services in the former capacity much more than the latter, thanks to the current Romulan hostilities.

“Captain T’Vran,” said a voice from the far side of the room. Trip noticed only then that the woman who had been sitting near Sopek’s bed was now on her feet and walking quickly toward the captain and the doctor.

“Yes, Sub-Commander Ych’a?” T’Vran said as the doctor seemed to retreat a few steps, evidently at least as uncomfortable in the spy’s presence as was the captain.

“I must speak with you, Captain,” said the spy. “In private.”

After a moment’s consideration, T’Vran nodded, then activated a communications device to call security back into the room.

As T’Vran and Ych’a exited the infirmary, leaving Trip to the ministrations of Sivath and the same lone male security officer whom the captain had dismissed a few minutes earlier, he wished to continue his spy mission just a little bit longer—but only as a fly on the wall in whichever compartment T’Vran and Ych’a were planning to use for their conversation.

T’Vran knew that Ych’a had requested a private meeting mainly to vent her displeasure at the revelations the captain had made in front of the human in Sivath’s infirmary. She neither cared about that nor felt inclined to listen to the V’Shar officer’s complaints.

While the hatch was closing behind them as they both stepped inside the captain’s quarters, T’Vran turned on Ych’a before she could utter so much as a syllable of recrimination.

“Sub-Commander, please explain why you have altered the Kiri-kintha’s official log,” T’Vran demanded, her voice uncolored by any emotion save resolve, at least in her own ears.

T’Vran suppressed any appearance of having enjoyed Ych’a’s fleeting display of discomfiture. It was obvious that the V’Shar agent had expected her tampering to go undetected. Just as it was obvious that no one aboard the cargo ship, other than Ych’a and T’Vran herself, possessed the clearance codes necessary to engage in such alterations of official ship’s data.

As was her wont, Ych’a seemed to simply sidestep T’Vran’s question. “We cannot afford to send Commander Tucker back to his home planet,” she said. “Both your report to the civilian shipping ministry and your official log clearly indicated your intention to do just that. Therefore I redacted any such references in those documents prior to their transmission to Vulcan.”

T’Vran paused for several seconds to center herself before responding. “I see. And precisely why is it, in your judgment, that we ‘cannot afford’ to repatriate the commander?”

Ych’a appeared slightly surprised, as though the captain were demonstrating a disappointingly poor grasp of the intuitively obvious. “Because he is entirely too valuable as an intelligence asset.”

Such is ever the way with those who live by means of subterfuge—and even worse tactics, T’Vran thought, keeping the disgust she was feeling out of sight. Aloud, she said, “I trust that I need not remind you that no matter what intelligence Mister Tucker may have gathered about the Romulans, any V’Shar coercion that you may be contemplating would constitute a gross violation of the Coalition Compact. I will not tolerate any such activity aboard this vessel.”

“I require no such reminders, Captain,” Ych’a said, shaking her head slowly as she took a seat on one of the low chairs arranged in front of the captain’s desk. “It is clear that we have misunderstood each other once again.”

Although the captain thought, I believe we understand each other well enough, Sub-Commander, only a single word came to her lips as she sat behind her desk.

“Indeed.”

“My purpose,” Ych’a continued, “is not to wring information from the Terran. Rather, I wish to persuade him to employ his already proven skills voluntarily in the gathering of new information.”

T’Vran allowed one of her eyebrows to rise. “What sort of information, specifically?”

“I am speaking of information pertaining to the intrigues presently taking place within and around Administrator T’Pau’s new government.”

T’Vran placed her hands together, her index fingers raised in opposition to one another as she considered Ych’a’s words. That intrigues of some sort might be occurring within the new reformist Syrrannite government came as no surprise, given the fundamental nature of the changes the new leadership had to make in order to transition successfully away from the dark, warmongering days of the ousted and exiled V’Las’s reactionary administration.

And she also understood how hard it could be to cleanse Vulcan of V’Las’s lingering influence, given the furtive habits of his loyalists, some of whom still had to be embedded deeply in the intelligence trade.

“I will presume that you wish to involve yourself in the intrigues you mention in order to assure Administrator T’Pau’s success,” T’Vran said.

“A corrupted intelligence network is a liability to any government,” Ych’a said.

“I see,” T’Vran said. It had not escaped her notice that Ych’a had not really answered her question. “Do you have direct evidence of corruption within the V’Shar?”

Ych’a regarded her in a calculating manner, as though assessing how much she might safely reveal. “I do.”

T’Vran found the intelligence officer’s answer surprising, both for its content and for its uncharacteristic probity. However, while affronts to logic such as the maladministration of the V’Las regime weren’t unheard-of on Vulcan, it was exceedingly rare for a Vulcan to succumb to simple greed. Ych’a had to be referring to something else entirely.

“What manner of corruption?” T’Vran asked.

“Infiltration,” the V’Shar agent said at length.

“By whom?”

Ych’a answered in a voice scarcely above a whisper. “The Romulans. Their covert influence may even extend beyond a few agents in the V’Shar, perhaps even reaching the highest echelons of the current government.”

Although T’Vran had heard rumors that V’Las may have dealt in secret with representatives from the Romulan government, she had never given those stories much credence. The notion that Administrator T’Pau’s hierarchy might have similar flaws was all but unthinkable.

“You cannot know this with certainty,” she said after a protracted moment.

“Intelligence is not a science of certainties,” Ych’a said. “Only probabilities. However, I believe I know quite enough to justify being suspicious of anyone who presently works inside the Vulcan power structure.”

“I assume this has some bearing on the reason you do not wish to return Commander Tucker to his home planet,” T’Vran said, already fairly certain she understood Ych’a’s objective.

“Indeed,” Ych’a said with a brisk nod. “Commander Tucker could prove invaluable to my ongoing investigations on Vulcan.”

T’Vran frowned. “How? How much could he possibly know of our world and our culture?”

“Accumulated knowledge is not always as important as the capacity to learn and adapt quickly. In fact, it is what Commander Tucker lacks that may make him effective. He has no ambitions within Vulcan’s power structure, and he has already managed to survive for several months while working under deep cover in Romulan territory. Therefore he could prove to be uniquely qualified to root out whatever corruption—or Romulan influence—may presently be at work on Vulcan.”

Although the idea had first struck T’Vran as absurd, she had to admit that it had some merit. In addition, she could easily see an energetic human like Tucker proving valuable to the cause of persuading a reticent Vulcan government to continue carrying out its current covert efforts to defend the Coalition from the Romulans—initiatives, like the Tezel-Oroko listening post that the late Kobayashi Maru would have helped to equip had the freighter not been destroyed recently, to which T’Vran was privy thanks to her working relationship with Ych’a.

Despite the increasing appeal of Ych’a’s logic, however, she found that one fundamental matter still bothered her profoundly.

“Could you not simply have asked me to alter the logs and reports, rather than doing it yourself?” T’Vran asked the agent.

Ych’a appeared puzzled by the question. “There was no need to waste time consulting you in advance. I knew you would agree with me.”

Though she couldn’t fault Ych’a’s answer solely on the basis of logic, T’Vran was anything but pleased by it—it seemed tantamount to surrendering to the notion of rule by spies. Rather than debate the matter further, however, she answered with but a single word.

“Logical.”

“I will speak to Commander Tucker,” Ych’a said, then rose from her chair and departed without waiting to be dismissed.

Sitting alone in her quarters, T’Vran wondered if the V’Shar agent took Mister Tucker’s cooperation for granted, as she had that of the Kiri-kin-tha’s commander.

Tucker wondered idly whether the Vulcan term for “efficient quarters” translated to “Starfleet brig” in English.

For perhaps the fiftieth time, he took in the tiny confines of the quarters Captain T’Vran had issued him after Doctor Sivath had released him a few hours earlier. Although he thought he’d gotten used to cramped quarters during his nearly four-year stint as chief engineer aboard Enterprise, his current billet would barely have qualified as a closet aboard an NX-class ship. The spartan chamber came equipped only with a low, narrow cot, a small, rolled-up mat—he’d been told that Vulcans traditionally used them for meditation—and sanitary facilities that could be described as “bare bones” by only the most charitable of appraisals.

I’d have to go out into the corridor to change my mind, Trip thought as he sat on the edge of the cot. These guys don’t believe in wasting a single cubic millimeter, do they?

Of course, Trip’s impression that his quarters resembled some sort of penal holding cell had only been reinforced by his recent discovery that somebody had locked the room’s single door from the outside some time after the security guard had conducted him here.

Maybe there’s a metal cup in here somewhere, he thought as he eyed the small stainless steel washbasin in the corner. I could start banging it against the walls to get somebody’s attention.

A sharp buzzing tone sounded, startling him. He realized a heartbeat later that it might be some sort of door chime, signaling a visitor.

“Come on in, I’m decent,” he said.

The room’s small, lone hatchway abruptly unsealed itself, sliding obediently open. Captain T’Vran and her silent shadow Ych’a walked into view on the other side of the open hatchway. As Trip got to his feet out of respect for the captain, he noted the presence of another dour armed guard out in the corridor a few paces behind the women. The presence of the guard convinced Trip that the door that had kept him contained in his quarters had not been locked by accident.

“Circumstances have forced a change to the ship’s itinerary,” Captain T’Vran said without preamble.

“I’m fine, Captain,” Trip said. “Thank you for asking.” Vulcans. Cripes.

“Pardon me?” T’Vran said, raising an eyebrow in a way that reminded him of T’Pol.

He shook his head impatiently. “Never mind. I hope your schedule change won’t delay my getting back to Earth by very much. I’ve got a life I’m itchin’ to return to, not to mention a whole pile of Starfleet back pay.”

For several seconds, T’Vran’s face became a study in silent perplexity. Then she said, “Ych’a will explain the particulars.”

Trip felt a scowl starting to darken his face, and he didn’t try to stop it. “All right. Come on in and let’s talk. There’s plenty of room, as long as we don’t all try to exhale at the same time.” If this place had mice, they’d be hunchbacked, he added silently.

Once both women had cleared the room’s inner threshold, the hatch closed smoothly between them and the guard in the corridor, assuring the privacy of their conversation. Neither Vulcan seemed concerned by the closeness of the walls, any three of which Trip could have touched simultaneously.

“First things first,” Trip said, trying to seize a measure of control of the situation. “When do we get under way for Earth?”

“Not for some time, Commander,” Ych’a said.

Trip could feel his scowl beginning to deepen. “Let me give you a refresher on what’s already happened today,” he said after a moment’s pause to compose himself. “My cover’s blown, all right? So my mission’s over. That means there’s no reason for me to stay out here in the ass end of nowhere.”

“I have no desire to disseminate your real identity, Commander, either to the Romulans or to the Vulcan government,” Ych’a said, apparently not fazed in the least by what he’d just said. “Nor do I wish to unduly delay your repatriation.”

Trip found that only mildly reassuring. “Then take me home.”

“Before I can do that, Commander, I will require your help,” Ych’a said.

Trip folded his arms before him, forcing her to take a step backward and into a near collision with one of the walls. “Lady, it sounds like you’re trying to set a pretty big obstacle in my path. Why the hell should I help you?”

She answered with confidence, as though she had rehearsed what she was going to say. “Because the security of both our worlds is at stake, Commander. And because I suspect that you would show little hesitation in offering your assistance freely had the same request come to you from our mutual associate, T’Pol.”

“You know T’Pol?” Trip asked, suspicious but definitely intrigued.

“We worked together in the V’Shar for many years,” Ych’a said with a curt nod. “We renewed our acquaintance much more recently aboard this very ship, which took her part of the way into Romulan space—in an effort to rescue you, I am told.”

So she’s calling in whatever markers she thinks she has to get what she wants, he thought, mentally preparing himself to modify his initial position of flat refusal, at least a little.

“All right. I’m listening. Make your pitch.”

Ych’a nodded again. “In light of the dire threat the Romulan Star Empire presently poses to both our worlds—and to the entire Coalition, by extension—Vulcan’s government is in great need of your covert services while you are still officially considered dead by your own people.”

Most of my own people, he thought.

Shaking his head, he said, “The only problem with what you’re asking is that my espionage days are over. Besides, I’m an engineer, not a spy. And Starfleet needs me to help build and maintain its ships right now more than Vulcan needs me to listen in on the Romulans’ phone calls.”

“You will be sent home, Commander Tucker,” T’Vran said. “Eventually. But not yet.”

“I have crafted the new cover identity you will use until that time,” Ych’a said. “You will adopt this identity after undergoing some supplemental plastic surgery to enable you to pass as a Vulcan, at least visually.”

Trip touched his forehead and moved his fingertips across the sharp terrain created by his surgically implanted Romulan brow ridge. His pointed ears and upswept eyebrows would attract no attention on Vulcan if he left them exactly as they were now.

He didn’t object to another round of relatively painless cosmetic surgery per se. He had just hoped to have his ears bobbed at the same time his forehead was restored to its normal contours.

“You will become a man named Sodok, one of my oldest associates,” Ych’a continued. “Your new persona will be that of a Vulcan frontier merchant whose diverse dealings encompass such commodities as dilithium, kevas, and trillium—as well as, on occasion, information.”

Thanks to his recent “posthumous” occupation as a deep-cover intelligence operative, Trip knew well that information was a commodity that was often infinitely more valuable than merchandise of any other type. But he was also sure that he wanted nothing further to do with trafficking information, even as he realized that any chance he had of returning to Earth was contingent on the goodwill of these Vulcans, to whom he still owed a debt for his rescue.

My dying, for real this time, was just about guaran-damned-teed, he thought bitterly. Until they swooped in and plucked me out of TezelOroko’s Kuiper belt.

Trip felt as though the entire universe had begun shifting around him again, just as it had during the moments immediately preceding his passing out during his first meeting with Captain T’Vran. He had grasped the slender reed of hope that he might soon regain his old life and career, only to have that lifeline summarily cut, and for God-only-knew how long. And all to adopt yet another fake identity on the fly, in the service of alien puppet masters who could decide to keep stringing him along indefinitely, parsecs away from anything he really recognized and understood.

And the bitterest part of it was the realization that there was nothing he could do but accept it.

He took a couple of steps backward and dropped onto the edge of his cot to contemplate his painfully altered circumstances. After a measureless interval, he looked up at the two Vulcans, both of whom were regarding him with something that resembled curiosity.

“All right,” Trip said. “Let’s start by filling in some of the gaps in my knowledge.” If the spy trade had taught Trip anything, it was that it’s the things you don’t know that are likeliest to catch you unawares and kill you. “Just what the hell is kevas anyway?”

“You will be given ample training in the various trade goods your cover vocation will require you to handle,” Ych’a said. “And, of course, we will make certain both of your ears are implanted with the most advanced universal translator units available. Doctor Sivath discovered that only one of your ears was so equipped.”

He nodded. “Okay. You Vulcans are nothing if not thorough. Which reminds me, I’ll need a bit more than superficial plastic surgery if I’m going to live among you green-blooded folk undetected.”

Ych’a and T’Vran exchanged a brief look that Trip instantly translated to mutual puzzlement.

“I do not understand,” Ych’a said.

Remember, it’s always best to be as literal as possible with Vulcans, he reminded himself.

Aloud, he said, “My blood is red. Your Doctor Sivath might call it a copper deficiency. Anyway, when I was working in the belly of the beast on Romulus, I was taking a special sulfatriptan drug from Earth to turn my blood green. But I’m fresh out of the stuff at the moment.”

Ych’a finally appeared to understand. “And you are hoping to acquire additional supplies of the drug on Vulcan.”

“I seriously doubt that anyone on Vulcan ever developed a drug specifically designed to turn blood green,” T’Vran said. “I assume I needn’t point out the redundancy inherent in such a thing on a planet of green-blooded people. However, I will ask Doctor Sivath to research it for you.”

Ych’a nodded. “If Doctor Sivath cannot secure the drug for you, perhaps one of your trade missions as Sodok will yield a supply.”

“I certainly hope so,” Trip said. “And I hope it happens before anybody figures out where ‘Sodok’ really came from just because I accidentally cut myself shaving.” He rubbed his long-neglected chin, and noticed only then that it felt about as rough as a wire brush.

“Until then, Commander Tucker,” Ych’a said without a trace of irony, “I suggest you consider growing a beard.”

Before Trip could deliver a rejoinder, a high-pitched tone sounded, nearly beyond the range of human hearing. Trip noticed immediately that it wasn’t out of the Vulcan aural spectrum, however, when both T’Vran and Ych’a reacted to it, the captain by engaging the small comm device she was carrying and Ych’a by giving the captain her undivided attention.

“Captain T’Vran, this is bridge watch officer Sinak,” said the tinny voice that issued from T’Vran’s comm device. “You instructed me to alert you about any significant findings in the Tezel-Oroko system.”

So we definitely haven’t left the system yet, Trip thought. Are they searching for survivors from the Kobayashi Maru? Or looking to salvage whatever she was carrying on her way to the listening post the Vulcans were trying to set up here?

He decided there was no reason that the Vulcans couldn’t be doing both at once.

“Yes, Altern Sinak,” T’Vran said. “Have you detected any Romulans?”

“No, Captain. But we remain ready to leave the system at maximum warp should any appear, per your orders. However, we have found a strong duranium signature coming from the surface of one of the outer system’s cometary bodies.”

“Could it be an escape pod?” T’Vran said, even as Trip wondered if somebody had made it off the Kobayashi Maru before the Romulans destroyed it, or if someone besides Sopek and himself managed to escape from Sopek’s ship just prior to its demise.

“Our scans have been inconclusive so far, Captain,” Sinak said. “We have detected the presence of kelbonite precipitates in the object’s surface layers.”

Trip blinked. “Kelbonite. Is that anything like kevas? Or trillium?”

A subtle narrowing of the eyes was the only reply either woman deigned to offer Trip for his impertinence.

“Kelbonite would tend to interfere with the ship’s sensors, would it not?” T’Vran said to her subordinate.

“It would, Captain,” said Sinak. “It could also significantly impair the operation of our transporter and tractor beam.”

“Please stand by for further instructions, Altern Sinak,” T’Vran said. “Captain T’Vran out.” She touched the small comm unit in her hand, closing the channel to the bridge.

“If an escape pod has indeed landed on one of the system’s cometary bodies,” Ych’a said soberly, “then you may need to send a reconnaissance and recovery team out to investigate it directly.”

Nodding, T’Vran said, “I regret that I can see no alternative. Unfortunately, the Kiri-kin-tha is a merchant ship, not a military vessel. Our auxiliary vessels were designed primarily for delivering cargo rather than for rescue and recovery operations. And very few members of my crew possess the training necessary to perform such operations, even if our equipment were adequate to the task.”

“In that case, Captain, I request that you allow me to undertake the mission,” Ych’a said with no hesitation that Trip could detect.

T’Vran paused and displayed a thoughtful expression before replying. “If an escape pod has indeed landed on that cometary body, it may hold injured people who cannot wait for the conclusion of a lengthy deliberative process.”

These people must get paid by the syllable, Trip thought. They’re wordy even when they’re trying to say they’re in a freaking hurry!

“Very well,” the captain said. “This is somewhat irregular, but in this instance urgency demands it.”

“I will leave immediately,” Ych’a said as she moved toward the hatchway, which slid obediently open in response to her approach. Pausing over the threshold, she looked back at T’Vran and Trip and said, “I have one request before I depart, Captain.”

“What do you require?” T’Vran asked.

The V’Shar agent pointed directly at Trip. “I want Commander Tucker to assist me.”

Trip’s eyebrows rose involuntarily. Well, I did want to get out of this teensy little footlocker they call ‘guest quarters,’ he thought. Guess I should start being a little more careful what I wish for....

SEVEN

Enterprise

“ERIKA!” ARCHER SAID TO the image of the dark-haired, olive-skinned woman a heartbeat or so after it appeared on the monitor screen sitting atop his ready-room desk. “Damn, but you’re a sight for sore eyes! I was beginning to think the worst.”

“Those Vulcan ships that attacked us near Alpha Centauri knocked out our subspace radio, and we only managed to get it back up and running a little while ago,” Captain Erika Hernandez said. “They gave us a run for our money, but Columbia is quite a bit tougher than the bad guys gave us credit for. Notwithstanding our having to accept a tow home for the rest of our repairs.”

Archer’s relief at this long-distance reunion gave way, at least in part, to renewed worry. “I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume that the Romulans were really the ones loading the tubes and pushing the ‘fire’ button.”

“I’ll go out on that limb with you, Jon. But you can certainly color the Vulcans embarrassed.”

“Let’s hope their getting caught with their pants down like that spurs them into taking some serious action against the Romulans,” Archer said, leaning forward in his chair.

A look of unease crossed Hernandez’s face. “That might be a bit optimistic,” she said.

“Why do you say that?”

“I just checked in with Admiral Gardner.”

He vented some of his impatience by drumming his fingers on the desktop. “Did he have any news from Vulcan?”

“Let’s just say he didn’t leave me filled with hope,” she said, sounding both weary and sad. “He left me with the impression that he might have more to say about the Vulcans once the Coalition Council finishes with today’s closed-door meeting. I’m told Administrator T’Pau herself is addressing the assembly.”

Archer sat in silence, absorbing her words. He’d known Erika Hernandez, both as a lover and a Starfleet colleague, long enough to trust her instincts implicitly.

“I’ll call you back later,” he said at length. “I think I’d better go straight to Gardner and try to find out what’s going on.” It certainly beat waiting around for new orders and dispatches from Starfleet Command.

She nodded, and he saw an ironic twinkle in her eye. “All right. In the meantime, let’s make plans for dinner—say, at the Lotus Blossom?— for the next time we’re both in town, Jon. Eventually.”

“Eventually,” he said, smiling, though he could think of a few alternative restaurant choices. But there would be plenty of time to argue later about whether or not the 602 Club up in Mill Valley laid out a better table than Tommy’s place in Chinatown. “I’ll put the date in pencil for now.” He knew that she was perfectly aware that Enterprise was still months away from Earth, even at maximum warp—and that was assuming that fate had no unforeseen detours or delays in store for either of them. Regardless, it felt good to imagine a time, however distant, after which this whole Romulan business would finally be behind them both.

A few minutes later the image of Admiral Sam Gardner replaced that of Columbia’s commander. The admiral’s dour expression told him that whatever news he might have to share wouldn’t be good.

Archer wasted no time on pleasantries. “Has T’Pau finished addressing the Council yet, Admiral?”

“Just a few minutes ago,” Gardner said, his manner almost funereal.

Archer swallowed, fearing he already knew the answer to his next question. “So how many ships are the Vulcans going to send to help us rout the Romulan beachhead at Calder?”

“A nice, round number,” the admiral said, his tone growing strained and bitter. “Zero, to be precise.”

Archer shook his head in frustration. “They’re digging in deeper and deeper on Calder II every day. More ships, more shipbuilding hardware, and more troops. If we wait much longer, we might never pry that entire system out of their claws.”

“Starfleet Command and the MACO chiefs made the same arguments, Captain,” Gardner said. “It didn’t seem to make much of an impression.”

“Do they think there’s a higher priority defense objective than Calder?” Archer wanted to know. “A Romulan base at Calder puts the enemy in Vulcan’s backyard just as much as it puts them in ours.”

Gardner frowned deeply. “You’re misunderstanding me, Jonathan. The Vulcan government has declined to send any ships out to defend any Coalition worlds beyond Vulcan’s own holdings.”

Archer had expected to have problems with the details of Vulcan’s tactical decisions. What he hadn’t expected was that T’Pau’s military strategy might cause him to question her sanity. The defense of Vulcan’s motivations that he had mounted before the leaders of the Tarod IX outpost was suddenly beginning to ring very hollow.

Through a thickening haze of incredulity, he said, “Why?”

“Administrator T’Pau has declined to answer that question as well,” Gardner said. With a sigh, he added, “Now I have to figure out what I’m going to say about this when the press comes calling.”

Archer answered with a humorless chuckle. “I think I’d rather face the Romulans.”

“Be careful what you wish for, Captain.”

Archer ignored the comment, bitterly aware that he was likely to be up to his ass in Romulans very soon regardless of any decisions made on Vulcan. “What’s the rest of the Coalition saying about this, Admiral?”

“It’s pretty much what you’d expect, at least so far. One of the founding worlds of the Coalition of Planets has just abrogated the Coalition Compact’s common defense provisions, big-time. The delegations from Alpha Centauri, Andoria, and Tellar are already grousing loudly about Vulcan leaving its partners in the lurch while the Romulans assemble their invasion force right across the street. Within another hour or two, I’d expect the Centauri, the Andorians, and the Tellarites to join with United Earth in lodging formal diplomatic protests.”

“Let’s hope they can sustain that much unity when the Romulans come a-calling,” Archer said.

“I need you back at the home front before it comes to that,” said the admiral. “I want Enterprise to make best speed for Earth. I know you’re at extreme range right now, so the sooner you get under way, the better. In the meantime, Starfleet will be pulling out all the stops to upgrade our systemwide defenses, and do whatever we can to keep the rest of the Coalition safe from further sneak attacks.”

Archer acknowledged Gardner’s orders, and both men signed off.

After relaying Enterprise’s new course and speed orders to Travis Mayweather, who hadn’t yet had an opportunity to debark for his next assignment, Archer wondered whether or not “the rest of the Coalition” included Vulcan.

Disturbing.

As emotional as that characterization was, it was the most accurate description T’Pol could make of the effect that the messages she had just received from Vulcan had had upon her.

As she left her quarters on B deck, took the turbolift down three levels, then strode along the outer starboard-side corridor of E deck, she could think of only one person aboard Enterprise, save perhaps Doctor Phlox, with whom she could discuss the contents and implications of that message.

She stopped before a closed hatchway and touched the door-chime control on the companel mounted on the wall beside it.

“Come,” came Jonathan Archer’s voice through the companel. The hatchway slid open an instant later, and she stepped over the threshold and into the captain’s quarters.

“I must apologize for visiting you so late, Captain,” she said.

Captain Archer was still in his duty uniform, though it was in a noticeably rumpled state after the lengthy day he had put in. Sitting at the foot of his bed, he idly stroked the neck fur of the small Terran canine with which he shared his quarters.

“Don’t apologize, T’Pol. In fact, I was about to interrupt whatever you were doing.”

“Regarding Administrator T’Pau’s announcement, I presume.”

The captain nodded. “I was hoping you might shed a little light on why T’Pau has decided to sit out the war, now that you’ve had a little time to think about it.” He stopped stroking the dog and gestured toward a nearby chair. “Please, have a seat, Commander. You’re making Porthos nervous. And sometimes that makes him, ah, well, fart.”

Finding the animal to be fragrant enough without the addition of any further olfactory variables, T’Pol wasted no time assuming a seated, if ramrod-straight, posture.

“I must confess that I have thought about little other than the administrator’s decision since I learned of it,” she said, clasping her hands tightly in her lap.

Archer resumed scratching the dog. “It didn’t make any sense to me a few hours ago when Admiral Gardner broke the news, and it still doesn’t add up now.”

“I am not privy to all of the factors that went into Administrator T’Pau’s decision-making process,” T’Pol said, trying not to sound desperately noncommittal.

“You’re a Vulcan,” Archer said, frowning slightly. “Not to mention a former intelligence agent for the V’Shar. So you’re better equipped than anybody else here to figure out why the leader of your planet’s new government would take any action that might tear the Coalition to pieces—or worse, lead to a Romulan conquest.”

“I will use my own sources to attempt to discover whatever I can about the reasoning behind T’Pau’s redeployment of Vulcan’s offworld strategic assets, Captain,” she said, meeting his frowning gaze head-on.

“That seems like a fancy way to say ‘withdrawal,’” Archer said. “T’Pau must have a Ministry of Euphemisms in that new ‘reformist’ government of hers.”

Ignoring the captain’s obviously facetious comments, T’Pol said, “Regardless, Captain, it seems I will soon have an opportunity to investigate the inner workings of Administrator T’Pau’s government in considerable detail.”

Archer’s frown only deepened. “What are you talking about?”

Deciding there was no point in avoiding the reason for her visit any longer, T’Pol said, “I have just received messages from Vulcan, both from the High Command and the civilian government. They have ordered me to return to Vulcan.”

Archer’s frown gave way to shock. Gently nudging the canine aside, he stood up. “As part of T’Pau’s decision to withdraw Vulcan’s ‘strategic offworld assets.’”

“‘Redeploy,’” T’Pol reminded him. “But you are essentially correct.”

Archer looked pale and bereft, like a man who had absorbed entirely too much loss in much too short a time. And that, T’Pol thought, was exactly what Jonathan Archer was, whether he understood it himself or not.

“Are they sending a ship out here to pick you up?” Archer said after sitting heavily back upon the edge of his bed.

“The High Command says it has insufficient offworld assets to send a transport ship to bring me home,” T’Pol said, hoping that this detail would provide her captain with some temporary solace. “Pursuant to Administrator T’Pau’s new redeployment orders.”

“We’re months away from Earth this far out,” Archer said, staring into the middle distance as though reviewing star charts of the core Coalition systems in his head. “But we’ll pass Vulcan on the way home. The High Command must be expecting us to drop you off there.”

T’Pol nodded. “That is my conclusion as well. I believe my superiors in the High Command are not highly motivated to expedite my return.”

An ironic smile began to displace Archer’s gloomy expression. “I understand completely. Starfleet Command frequently considers me a pain in the ass, too.”

T’Pol could see that now was the time, as the humans liked to say, to “drop the other boot.”

“I am refusing my redeployment orders, Captain,” she said, struggling to keep her voice affect-free and uninflected.

“What?”

“I intend to formally resign my commission in the Vulcan Defense Directorate in favor of my honorary Starfleet commander’s commission.”

Archer looked surprised. “Are you sure that’s wise?”

“No,” she said, seeing no reason to answer with less than perfect candor.

Archer rose to his feet again. The animal, which had been attracted back to his lap like iron filings to a magnet, issued a low growl of annoyance.

“You’re taking quite a gamble with your career, Commander,” Archer said.

T’Pol nodded. “Perhaps. But my place is here, at your side.”

Until Trip returns—if he returns—you have no one else, she thought. Besides, she felt a show of loyalty on such a scale as this was necessary in the interests of ameliorating whatever residual distrust the captain might harbor toward her since she left on an unauthorized voyage into Romulan space to rescue Trip some ten days earlier.

“I want you to go to Vulcan,” Archer said, snapping her out of her reverie.

His words had taken her completely by surprise. “I’m sorry?” she said.

“You heard me, Commander.”

“You’re not satisfied with my performance as your executive officer?” she said, confused.

“Of course I’m satisfied,” he said, his frown returning for a moment before settling down to a more benign expression. Spreading both his hands before him, the captain added, “Look, I appreciate your wanting to stay aboard Enterprise. Hell, I’ve come to depend on you a whole hell of a lot over the years, particularly now that Trip is... wherever the hell he is right now.

“But I need somebody I can trust working for me on Vulcan,” Archer said, looking into her eyes as he gently laid his hands on her shoulders. “Somebody who can at least help me figure out what T’Pau is really thinking. Somebody who might, if we’re lucky, help me persuade her to change her mind about leaving Earth and the rest of the Coalition to twist in the Romulan wind.”

Though she still wasn’t exactly sanguine about the prospect of leaving her captain’s side, T’Pol knew that she wouldn’t have to do so during Enterprise’s months-long voyage to and past her homeworld. And she also felt fairly certain that he was probably right about her having a better chance than any other Enterprise crew member of changing T’Pau’s mind—slim though that chance might prove to be, given the strength of the administrator’s will.

“Logical,” she said, already beginning to plan how best to approach Vulcan’s new leader, who would almost certainly be back in her office in ShiKahr by the time Enterprise reached Vulcan. “I accept your assignment. Assuming, of course, that T’Pau does not reverse her decision before I arrive.” Despite all logic and precedent, she still fervently hoped that the administrator would soon reconsider her actions.

“Never underestimate the power of Vulcan stubbornness, Commander,” Archer said, grinning as he walked over to his desk and toggled open a channel on the comm unit.

“Archer to bridge.”

“O’Neill here, Captain.”

“Please amend our course slightly, Lieutenant. Until further notice, I’m planning to make a quick stopover at Vulcan on our way back to Earth. Archer out.”

“Acknowledged.”

The meeting concluded, her course of action resolved, T’Pol bid the captain good night and stepped back out into the E deck corridor and began making her way through the nearly deserted, night-illuminated corridors toward the turbolift positioned nearest her quarters on B deck.

What if T’Pau remains intractable? she thought as she entered the turbolift. In that event, she would have to leave the ship, regardless of how badly the captain needed her at his side.

Could the Coalition go on if Vulcan’s estrangement became permanent? She was finding it difficult to remain positive in the face of such a grim scenario.

Once back in her quarters, T’Pol stared out the large oval port at the distant, uncaring stars. She picked out a specific pinpoint of light that lay almost directly along Enterprise’s present heading now that Lieutenant O’Neill had evidently implemented the captain’s order for a course adjustment. The ship’s present speed, which the streak distortions of passing stars revealed to be approximately warp five, had blue-shifted the pinpoint from its normal orange to a hot, yellow-white brilliance.

The ancient Vulcans had called this object Lanka-Garukh, after the Night Flyers, the sibling nocturnal birds of prey from some of Vulcan’s oldest myths. The humans knew the very same star—actually a visual binary pair as observed either from Vulcan or Earth, twin co-orbiting orange dwarfs rendered indistinguishable now by Enterprise’s current extremely distant vantage point—by such names as Bessel’s Star, Piazzi’s Flying Star, and, most recently and commonly, 61 Cygni.

Cygni, in their constellation Cygnus. How ironic that the humans named those stars after a bird they consider both beautiful and graceful, she thought. She wondered if the porcine Tellarites who hailed from the binary system’s primary habitable world would find the comparison flattering or insulting, though she thought it likely that not many of them who worked outside the rarefied cloister of academia or diplomacy were even aware of it.

But it didn’t matter. At the moment, T’Pol regarded the humans of Earth and the Centauri settlements, the Andorians—and, yes, even the Tellarites—as a good deal more graceful than her own countrymen.

Perhaps the Coalition will ultimately lose Vulcan as a member, no matter what Captain Archer and I do to prevent it, T’Pol thought as she imagined herself floating freely amid the stark beauty of the silent, far-flung stellar fires that lay so far beyond the window. But whatever happens on Vulcan, the captain can still count on me. Just as Earth can still rely on the Alpha Centauri colonies, the Andorians, and even the decidedly unswanlike Tellarites.

Assuming that Vulcan’s present course of action had not already damaged beyond all repair the very fabric of trust from which the Coalition Compact itself had been woven.

EIGHT

Vulcan Diplomatic Compound
Sausalito, Earth

FOREIGN MINISTER SOVAL MEDITATED while standing stock-still in the empty courtyard garden, watching the silver starlight as it spilled from an unusually cloudless, almost crystalline sky. His only complaint was that the season that residents of Earth’s San Francisco Bay area euphemistically called “summer” was so frigid, at least by Vulcan standards. That chill, as well as Earth’s excessive barometric pressure, had necessitated the subtle genetic modifications that the Vulcan Science Academy had introduced into the Vulcan plants that grew in the diplomatic compound’s sprawling garden. Cinching his diplomatic robes more tightly around his torso against the creeping chill, Soval put aside his discomfort and resumed concentrating on the boundless sky above the garden.

Despite the cold, Soval enjoyed being out in the courtyard on Sausalito’s rare fog-free nights, long after the human staff had gone home and the Vulcan diplomats and aides had retired to the warmth of their quarters. On many such past solitary occasions, which he had arranged to occur sometimes as early as sunset and on other occasions as late as midnight, he particularly enjoyed watching the large natural satellite the humans called Luna as it made its stately transit across the sky.

Unlike mighty T’Rukh, which dominated the sky of an entire Vulcan hemisphere—rather than a moon that circled a point near its primary world’s center, T’Rukh was a co-orbital world that was tidally locked, along with Vulcan itself, to a common center of gravity external to both bodies—Luna nevertheless presented an impressive face, both for its ancient natural scars and its artificial construction projects, particularly when it was at full phase and low over the horizon. The full moon seemed to grow fourfold on such occasions, an optical illusion that evoked memories of T’Rukh’s magenta-striated face covering nearly a third of the sky, shimmering over the ruddy, sun-baked plain of Vulcan’s Forge.

Tonight, however, the relentless waxing and waning of Luna’s phases had reduced the body to a faint silver crescent, which had passed below the horizon more than four hours earlier. Luna’s current absence left the serene starscape overhead with only San Francisco’s nocturnal skyline, visible from the Vulcan diplomatic compound as a faint golden glow in the south just beyond the mouth of San Francisco Bay, to compete with it for visibility.

Looking steeply upward, Soval focused on the confluence of northern summer constellations that the humans called the Summer Triangle, a figure made up of the bright stars that the humans had named Altair, Vega, and Deneb. He knew that Altair and Vega, the triangle’s southernmost points, were close enough to the core of Coalition space to be at serious risk from Romulan incursions sooner or later, and he wondered how much longer those two systems could afford to maintain their present state of blissful neutrality.

Soval tried to draw strength from the permanence and placidity of the twinkling alien patterns overhead, using it to focus his thoughts on the coming meeting—a meeting for which he had begun to prepare late this afternoon, immediately after Administrator T’Pau had delivered her fateful address to the Coalition Council.

He wondered momentarily whether his Andorian and Tellarite diplomatic counterparts, those with whom he was scheduled to meet tonight, were undertaking similar preparatory rituals of their own at this very moment. Or had Ambassador Gora bim Gral of Tellar already arrived at the nearby Andorian diplomatic compound, thereby rendering both himself and Andorian Foreign Minister Anlenthoris ch’Vhendreni too self-conscious to engage in such meditations?

The realization suddenly struck him that he still did not know whether Minister Thoris or Ambassador Gral engaged in such activities, despite the close working relationship the three of them had begun to develop during the months that had preceded and followed the signing of the Coalition Compact.

Soval hoped he would have an opportunity to rectify that lack, despite the tumultuous events of this day. Lowering his gaze from the stars, he saw that the time was fast approaching for him to leave for his late-night meeting.

Then the minister heard something.

As near as he could tell, the sound had come from somewhere in the darkness beyond the orderly ascending rows of low hla-meth herbs and rillan gourds, flowering favinit and plomeek plants, and alem-vedik desert salt weeds, and i’su’ke and g’teth berry bushes, towering gespar fruit trees, and ic’tan conifers that dominated the courtyard’s center.

He heard it again, and he suddenly realized it was a footfall. Even though Soval was certain he had been the only one still moving about outside the compound’s main buildings.

“Who’s there?” Soval called out, peering into the darkness at the garden’s center. Despite the diplomatic compound’s tight security, he still felt some apprehension, a justifiable concern that some angry, determined human might make it past the detection systems and alarms in order to deliver some sort of reprisal because of Administrator T’Pau’s decision. The previous year’s troubles with the Terra Prime terrorist group, which had prospered briefly because of the distasteful human xenophobia that had arisen during the more than two Terranyear period that had elapsed since the Xindi sneak attack, remained green in his memory.

“Do not be alarmed, Minister Soval,” a familiar voice answered. Administrator T’Pau, dressed in unadorned diplomatic robes, stepped out of the darkness on the walkway that bisected the garden, flanked by a pair of her aides. “On such a clear night, I thought I would find you out here.”

Soval nodded, doing his best to conceal his surprise from his planet’s highest official. “You know me well, Administrator. I am honored by your visit. I thought you had already departed for Vulcan.”

“I will be returning to my duties in ShiKahr very shortly,” T’Pau said as she came to a stop beside Soval on the garden’s periphery, followed by her aides. “But I wanted to speak with you before getting under way for Vulcan.”

He glanced briefly at his chronometer. “I regret that I have little time to devote to such a meeting, Administrator. I must leave momentarily for an emergency conference with the Andorian and Tellarite delegations.”

“I know,” she said with a nod. “I have made a point of learning in advance of any such meetings, since I suspect that my address to the Council was the proximate cause of the emergency.”

Soval remained silent, though he made no move to deny the essential correctness of her assertion. Administrator T’Pau’s address to the Coalition Council earlier today had made his duties infinitely more complicated than they had been before.

“In fact,” she continued, “your meeting tonight is the sole reason for my delaying my departure.”

“You might have called me in advance so that I might have prepared a properly respectful reception,” Soval said, trying not to sound chiding, though without complete success.

She shook her head emphatically. “The sensitive nature of what I must tell you now requires considerable discretion and obviates the need for such formalities. Walk with me, Minister Soval.”

Other than the involuntary momentary elevation of both of his eyebrows, Soval succeeded in tamping down his surprise; it was highly unusual, after all, for the head of the Vulcan government to micromanage details that had already been delegated to diplomatic specialists. Surprise rooted his feet to the concrete-and-cobble walkway for a moment, during which T’Pau signaled her aides to remain where they were. She started to walk away from him along the pathway, forcing Soval to trot for a moment to catch up before falling into step beside her.

“You have concerns about the content of my coming discussions with Thoris and Gral,” he said quietly as they walked, not asking a question.

Even in the scant starlight, he could see that her eyes were hard and resolute, unusually so for one so young. “That remains to be seen, Minister. But I do have questions. The foremost of these concerns your objective tonight.”

He would have thought that his objective should have been obvious. “I will attempt to persuade the governments of both Andoria and Tellar to do their utmost to help Earth defend itself from the Romulans,” he said, clasping his hands behind his back as he continued forward at her side.

“In order to make up for Vulcan’s absence from the front lines at Calder and other potential Romulan beachheads,” she said, articulating his purpose at least as well as he could have done.

“Yes,” he said, gratified by her evidently clear understanding of the many obstacles and difficulties that his task would almost certainly entail.

“Then it is indeed fortunate that I managed to reach you prior to the start of your meeting,” she said, coming to a stop. “Because you must argue precisely the opposite proposition.”

Soval came to a halt as well. This time he couldn’t have been more surprised if Earth’s yellow star had suddenly begun to rise in the west, or if the local gravitational field had abruptly reversed itself.

“I do not understand,” he said. “The Romulans pose a danger to the entire Coalition, but most particularly to Earth and Alpha Centauri. The humans’ technological and military infrastructure is nowhere near as ready for a full Romulan assault as are Vulcan, Andoria, and Tellar. Since we are opting out of the fight that we all know is coming, it will be incumbent upon the other Coalition members to compensate for our absence.”

“No,” she said, and resumed walking.

Once again, he trotted to catch up and continued forward at her side. “I do not understand.”

After a pause to look over her shoulder, T’Pau began talking as she walked. “I must speak of something that I cannot allow even my closest aides to overhear.”

“And that is?” Soval’s surprise and curiosity was beginning to give way to frustration, which he pushed firmly down.

“The relationship, both genetic and cultural, that Vulcan shares with the Romulans,” she said. “I know that you are among the few who are aware of this fact.”

A mind-meld decades ago with one of his diplomatic mentors—a man who had seen much of the closing phases of the century-long Vulcan-Romulan War—had given him personal knowledge of the intimate connection between the two peoples. Ever since experiencing this revelation, Soval had regarded it as a source of terrible embarrassment. He had always been vigilant about keeping it quiet, but never more than he did at the moment; should it ever get out, the fact of the Vulcan-Romulan connection could only strain Vulcan’s Coalition relationships further, very likely past their breaking point.

“It is entirely possible that I am the only one currently working in Vulcan’s diplomatic service that knows,” he said, keeping his voice low. He assumed that T’Pau became aware of Vulcan’s Romulan connection only after her ascension to the office of administrator, which would have given her instant access to the classified files that V’Las and his predecessors had left behind.

“The knowledge of Vulcan’s common ancestry with a people as violent and passion-bound as the Romulans is a terrible burden for those of us who carry it,” T’Pau said.

“Agreed,” Soval said.

“And the burden has grown more profound for me personally as I have continued advancing along the path of Kolinahr attainment since I took office.”

Having spent so much of his life learning to empathize and deal with often over-emotional aliens, Soval had never seen the discipline of the Kolinahr to completion. Nevertheless, he found it all but impossible to imagine anyone successfully achieving the Kolinahr—and its attendant abandonment of every last vestige of emotion in the pursuit of the Syrrannite ideal of pure Surakian logic and peace—while bearing the weight of the massive emotional millstone that the administrator carried.

“I believe I understand, Administrator,” he said.

“Good,” she said as she brought them both to a stop again. “But there is another matter that you might not understand at the moment. It is the reason you must act contrary to your instincts and urge Andoria and Tellar not to engage the Romulans directly.”

“I am listening,” Soval said, still highly doubtful but willing to be convinced, if only out of respect for T’Pau’s office.

“I trust you are aware of the new Romulan weapon that can take control of other vessels remotely.”

“I am.”

“Then you may or may not also be aware of the Vulcan fleet’s high degree of vulnerability to this Romulan weapon.”

He nodded. “I presume this vulnerability is a technological analog of the close genetic and cultural relationships we share with the Romulans. Similar genes and memes giving rise to similar technologies, and therefore similar technological vulnerabilities.” He was keenly aware that this issue was as charged as that of the Romulan connection itself; were outworlders, even Vulcan’s Coalition partners, to discover the strange similarities between Vulcan and Romulan technologies, they might begin to ask questions that would inevitably lead to other embarrassing revelations of Vulcan-Romulan relatedness— and do far more damage to Vulcan’s alliances than T’Pau’s address to the Council had inflicted.

“Exactly right,” said T’Pau, resuming her forward motion. “There is a good deal more you need to know about the Romulan weapon, however—specifically the differing degree to which our Coalition partners are vulnerable to it. For example, the Andorian and Tellarite fleets share much of our vulnerability, no doubt because of reverse engineering both societies have sponsored over the years in order to duplicate Vulcan technological refinements.”

Keeping pace alongside T’Pau’s slow, stately stride, Soval was beginning to see where she was heading. “And we cannot warn them of this with complete candor without inviting... unwelcome lines of questioning.”

“Correct. And conversely, ships from Earth and Alpha Centauri have so far proved far less vulnerable to remote-control attacks than those of any other Coalition world.”

Soval found that surprising, given the relatively backward state of human technology when compared to that of Vulcan, or any other nonhuman Coalition world. “That is fascinating,” he said. “We have always seen the Terrans’ technological backwardness as their greatest liability in a galaxy filled with hostile powers like the Romulans.”

“Regardless of the Terrans’ relative vulnerability to one particular Romulan weapon, their essential backwardness has not fundamentally changed,” T’Pau said. “Make no mistake. The Terrans have not yet had enough time to establish a sufficiently robust galactic military posture to counter the Romulans successfully.”

Soval saw no need to be lectured on that subject. He knew very well that the human race had tended to allow its reach to far exceed its grasp ever since their Zefram Cochrane flew his first warp-driven ship. Even far more recently, despite the horrendous shock the paranoid and aggressive Xindi delivered to the human species only two years ago, Earth remained a wide-eyed innocent on the interstellar stage.

With no small amount of regret, he thought, Perhaps they would be in a better position to defend themselves had we not worked so assiduously for most of a century to contain them, to protect them from their urge to charge out into the galaxy before they were ready to face its many dangerous unknowns.

But was anyone ever truly ready for that?

“You have just constructed a strong argument against urging our allies to leave Earth to its own devices against the Romulans,” Soval said. “And I must point out that even Starfleet technology is not entirely invulnerable to the new Romulan weapon’s effects, despite its lesser degree of compatibility either with our own technology or with that of the Romulans.”

“The universe issues no guarantees of survival, Soval,” she said.

“Regardless of the Romulan weapon, we should find a way to aid the Terrans,” he said, sidestepping the truism. “Or at least encourage our allies to do it in our place. It will do Vulcan no good should the Romulans succeed in conquering or exterminating humanity. Their lives are already short enough as it is.”

“And that is one of the traits that will save Vulcan from its own inertia,” she said with an emphatic nod. “Should the human species survive the next several years, that is.”

“I do not understand,” Soval said. He was beginning to wonder when a gift for bizarre non sequiturs had become a prerequisite to attaining the lofty post of planetary administrator.

“You pointed out yourself that the humans possess relatively short life spans,” she said, speaking in a manner that he had always associated with that of a patient and methodical teacher. “The obverse of this, of course, is the much lengthier Vulcan life span, which is not an unalloyed advantage. Whether we wish to face it or not, our longevity has freighted Vulcan society with a strong tendency toward what a human sociologist once described as ‘social ossification.’”

Although he had nothing but respect for the authority of her office, Soval was beginning to tire of being lectured by one so young.

“Attanasio Ewan Hodgkin,” he said, taking care to avoid correcting T’Pau’s misperception that Doctor Hodgkin—a biologist by training— had been anything more than a dilettante in the sociological disciplines. Despite Hodgkin’s obvious brilliance, Soval considered him somewhat presumptuous for attempting to apply his so-called “law of parallel planetary development,” formulated during his studies of Loracus Prime’s insect life, to the “soft” sciences of anthropology, history, and sociology that were relevant to the galaxy’s countless and varied sapient races.

“I have read the paper to which you are referring, Administrator. Hodgkin coined the term ‘social ossification’ to describe the tendency of individual Vulcans to stay in the same career positions for lengthy periods, sometimes extending to centuries.”

“He correlated the phenomenon with a predilection for extreme rigidity of opinion among Vulcans,” T’Pau said. “A rigidity that has manifested itself in countless deleterious, if subtle, ways in our society.”

Soval hadn’t been entirely persuaded when he’d first read the paper, and he remained just as unconvinced now. “I must admit to finding Hodgkin’s core idea intriguing. I noticed, however, that his assertions were notably lacking in specific examples.”

She nodded, conceding the point. “Perhaps. But events much more recent than Doctor Hodgkin’s paper are replete with such examples. Among these I could list the Vulcan Science Academy’s continued obduracy in admitting to the possibility of time travel—even when presented with conclusive positive evidence supporting the phenomenon’s existence. Or the shameful acts of illegal spying my predecessor’s reactionary government committed against the Andorians at P’Jem. Administrator V’Las and his functionaries evidently learned nothing from the P’Jem blunder, since they later tried to provoke a needless, bloody war against Andoria. And they almost certainly would have succeeded in doing just that had a group of ‘illogical’ humans not intervened to resolve the situation in favor of peace.”

It had not escaped Soval’s notice that Captain Jonathan Archer, or at least members of his crew, deserved the le-matya’s share of the credit for the positive resolutions to the crises T’Pau cited. In fact, he had come to believe, in no small part because of his association with Archer during recent years, that the highly energetic human species more than compensated for whatever it lacked in individual longevity with ambition and inquisitiveness. Despite their naïveté, immaturity, impetuousness, and myriad other failings, it was clear to Soval that a great destiny awaited them—a destiny from which Vulcan’s more advanced but less dynamic civilization could benefit only by doing at least whatever was minimally required to nurture it.

“With respect, Administrator,” he said, “you have merely constructed yet another cogent argument in favor of maintaining and strengthening our ties to the Terrans. Vulcan society might well not survive its inherent tendency toward social inertia without them.”

“I agree completely,” T’Pau said.

Then perhaps, he thought, I might yet persuade her. He decided, using a metaphor he’d picked up from one of Prime Minister Samuels’s aides during a visit to Candlestick Park, to “swing for the fences.”

“Then allow me to be so bold as to assert that First Contact with Earth may have been the best thing to happen to Vulcan since the time of Surak’s Great Awakening nearly two millennia ago,” he said.

“Ambassador Solkar has said as much himself,” T’Pau acknowledged.

Soval couldn’t have asked for more authoritative corroboration. Not only had Solkar served in Vulcan’s diplomatic corps longer even than Soval, he had also presided over Vulcan’s side of the historic encounter that Terrans now celebrated as First Contact Day on the fifth day of every April. Solkar, who had commanded the science vessel T’PlanaHath on that day, now nearly a century past, was the first Vulcan to clasp hands in friendship with the pioneering human warp-drive scientist Zefram Cochrane.

“Then I must ask whether it is logical to risk humanity’s short-term survival in the face of a Romulan threat that clearly has them overpowered before the war has even gotten truly under way?” he said, pressing his advantage. “Is not taking such a risk the same as gambling with the long-term survival of the Vulcan people as well?”

T’Pau stopped again, and looked up toward the sky in a contemplative fashion. “I cannot find fault with your logic, Minister,” she said, suddenly replacing her teacher persona with something else, something that Soval found far more honest and open, perhaps even vulnerable. “You know that I have advocated humanity’s best values since my administration began.”

After coming to a stop at her side he nodded, well aware of the controversy Vulcan’s youthful new administrator had engendered back home with her strong promotion of social policies designed to infuse Vulcan society with some of the Terrans’ greatest strengths, such as a pending initiative intended to limit the number of decades any individual Vulcan would be permitted to pursue any one career path. Despite the initiative’s well-publicized exceptions—designed for certain diplomats, scientists, and perhaps other specialists whose vital work on Vulcan’s behalf might be undermined by the rigid application of a term-limit rule—extremely conservative elements on Vulcan had been scandalized by such radicalism, particularly from a leader who professed a strong personal devotion to full Kolinahr attainment.

As when he decisively won a debate against Ambassador Gral of Tellar, Soval restrained his sense of triumph and spoke with as much humility as he could muster. “With respect, Administrator, if you cannot fault my logic, then why can you not see your way clear to applying it?”

Soval heard neither doubt nor hesitation in her reply. “Because it is illogical to prioritize a long-term goal above that of immediate survival. I remain convinced that the risk to Vulcan posed by direct engagement with the Romulans is simply too great to justify, Soval. Such a conflict would not only jeopardize all the recent progress Vulcan has made in moving closer to Surak’s ideals of strength through peace, but it could also create a potentially even greater threat to Earth, as well as to Vulcan’s other Coalition partners.”

Soval frowned. “How so?”

“Are you willing to risk walking away from the path of logic and toward that of embracing the violence that nearly saw our ancestors consumed in nuclear fire?” she asked, her earlier didactic tone returning. “Suppose that the Romulans had managed to capture the Vulcan ships that our forces had to destroy? The Romulans would have reverse engineered those vessels in fairly short order. That single encounter might have increased their capabilities by an order of magnitude or more.”

The thought gave Soval pause, and introduced a coldness to his spine that had little to do with the chilly Sausalito evening. But he still couldn’t justify leaving the Terrans to their own devices in the face of the Romulan threat, any more than he would allow a Vulcan child weakened by disease or hunger out into the sun-scorched, predator-infested desert of Vulcan’s Forge to face the life-or-death kahs-wan survival ritual. For all his faith in humanity’s strengths, he understood its vulnerabilities all too well—vulnerabilities for which he felt intensely responsible, given Vulcan’s role during the past several decades in restraining Earth’s attempts to establish itself in the galactic neighborhood and beyond.

Soval remained convinced that T’Pau’s path would lead to incalculable suffering. Unfortunately, he also had to acknowledge that his own plans would yield similar results back home. The Romulans would see to that, even if the Coalition were ultimately to prevail.

Looking up at a black basin of stars that seemed nearly close enough to touch, Soval said, “We have tried to contain them almost from the moment they acquired superluminal flight. We owe them.”

“Indeed. However, we may have already paid that debt without realizing it.”

Soval couldn’t begin to understand her meaning. “How?”

“The technological backwardness we enforced on the Terrans may have enhanced their chances of dealing successfully with the Romulans’ new weapon,” T’Pau said, her words delivering an icy irony, yet absolutely no trace of humor. “And that advantage, intentionally conferred or not, must suffice. Vulcan’s security, and by extension that of the entire Coalition, demands that my decision stand.”

“Another choice must be possible.”

“None that aren’t more expensive than Vulcan can afford, Soval. But I do have faith in humanity’s ability to rise to the occasion, even under such dire circumstances as these. The humans have survived narrow passages before, just as we Vulcans have. And like us, they have emerged stronger on each occasion.”

Every sentient species had been tempered and honed by adversity, and sometimes had to overcome apparently insuperable obstacles. But such crises were much easier to discuss in a bloodless, academic manner when viewed retrospectively rather than prospectively.

“I often wonder what the humans will have achieved a century from now,” T’Pau continued. “That span of time is relatively inconsequential to us. But to them, it is long enough to replace their present population almost completely—as well as long enough to heal virtually any wound they might sustain today.”

“I, too, often wonder about the future,” Soval said. “Even as I wonder whether any humans at all will survive to see the next century. Or Vulcans, for that matter, should Earth fall to our Romulan cousins.”

“The humans will endure,” T’Pau pronounced, her smooth, youthful face a grim mask of determination. “I have faith that the humans will lead this alliance within a century’s time, or perhaps even sooner. And with our continued guidance, someday their vigor and vision may bring about the peaceful, galaxy-spanning society that Vulcan has always held as an ideal and yet somehow never achieved.”

She stopped again, facing her minister and bringing him to a halt as well. “They are like us, Soval—only far less susceptible than V’Las has proved us to be to the corruption that accompanies great power. Perhaps this is because they die so much sooner than we do, even without the curse of war to cut their lives short before the end of their natural spans.”

A twitch along her jawline revealed the barely constrained maelstrom of emotion she struggled to govern, albeit imperfectly, in spite of her devotion to the Kolinahr.

“Administrator, your ‘faith’ seems to be grounded more in emotion than in logic,” Soval countered, trying to communicate his adamant firmness while remaining respectful and deferential. “Vulcan cannot simply remain idle while Earth burns, regardless of the cost to us.”

Raising an eyebrow, T’Pau said, “Vulcan’s withdrawal from the front lines of combat will leave us anything but idle, Minister. I will see to it that you are given ongoing briefings on our alternative strategic plan as it evolves.”

Once again, she surprised him. “ ‘Alternative strategic plan’?”

“It is the real reason I have decided to delay my return to Vulcan,” she said. “You and I will present that plan during a joint meeting tomorrow with the United Earth government’s civilian and military leaders, along with the other Coalition representatives. We will lay out the broad strokes of that plan together, since it has taken shape sooner than I had originally expected, thanks to the labors of the Vulcan Science Academy.”

She reached into a fold of her robe and extracted a small padd, which she handed to him. “This contains the new tactical plan’s most pertinent briefing materials. Study them closely after your meeting this evening. In the meantime, you must resist doing what your emotions tell you to do. You must dissuade the Andorians and the Tellarites from trying to take our place on the front lines.”

Soval thought he could feel the planet shifting beneath his feet, though he knew he was merely reacting to the rapidly accelerating pace of change. He had no doubt that it would accelerate further before any of the current crises were resolved.

“I am not at all sanguine about the outcome of any attempt to ‘dissuade’ my Andorian and Tellarite counterparts,” he said as he flicked the padd’s actuator and scanned its table of contents briefly before tucking it into his robe and fixing his gaze back on T’Pau. “Thoris of Andoria has always distrusted me, at least to some extent, Administrator. Your official pronouncement today can only have exacerbated that situation.”

“Of that I have little doubt,” said T’Pau without any perceptible trace of emotion. “Nevertheless, I trust your expertise.”

“My expertise has never included the mastery of a communication style sufficiently blustering and insulting to impress Gral of Tellar. Besides that, both diplomats take their respective worlds’ Coalition Compact obligations very seriously—particularly those concerning mutual defense. They will both be most difficult to ‘dissuade.’”

“Regardless, you must convince them of the unacceptable danger inherent in engaging the Romulans,” T’Pau said. “Both Tellar and Andoria share much of Vulcan’s vulnerability to the new Romulan weapon. You must make them understand this. Without revealing anything else, of course.”

Despite his lingering personal reservations about T’Pau’s decided course of action, Soval could see no alternative to bowing to the inevitable, other than simply resigning his post. And he wasn’t about to do that, particularly during a crisis. Besides, he hadn’t had time to give her “alternative strategic plan” a fair hearing.

“Of course, Administrator,” Soval said. “I shall do my utmost to persuade Thoris and Gral to press their governments to do as we have done. Without revealing anything... inconvenient, of course.”

T’Pau glanced down momentarily at the pocket into which Soval had tucked the padd she had given him, then met his gaze head-on. “Tell them that there are ways to fight without fighting. And that we will work cooperatively to discover them together.”

Then she turned and walked back toward her aides, who were just barely visible along the distant edge of the deeply shadowed garden. A few moments later, he stood alone again in the courtyard with only the stars, the deep shadows, and the rows of Vulcan plants for company.

The minister withdrew the padd from his robe and began studying its contents. He could see immediately that a great deal of work lay ahead of him once he finished up tonight’s meeting, for which he was now running quite late.

Just as he could see in T’Pau’s new understated strategic vision reason to harbor grave doubts about its potential for success.

He began to move in deliberate fashion toward the entrance to the center of the compound, through which he had to pass in order to depart for the nearby Andorian diplomatic compound. His feet felt leaden, as though the gravity had just increased by half.

Soval contemplated the many difficulties that lay ahead, not least of which would be the task of persuading the Andorian and Tellarite delegations not to exacerbate the Romulan situation by pitting their spacefleets against the enemy’s new remote-hijacking weapon. He could only hope that neither world would choose to interpret the Coalition’s founding document—specifically its mutual defense provisions—as some manner of suicide pact.

Just as he could only hope that T’Pau’s “alternative strategic plan” wouldn’t inflict permanent damage to the Coalition alliance—and to whatever unrealized promise it might yet hold for the long-term prospects of galactic peace.

NINE

Gamma Hydra sector, near Tezel-Oroko

IT WAS THE THIRD TIME, by Trip’s count, that Ych’a had bluntly asked him exactly what he’d been up to during his months-long sojourn behind Romulan lines. He had ducked the question entirely the first two times in an effort to avoid dividing his concentration; the unfamiliar Vulcan control console before him had demanded his full attention from the time he and the V’Shar agent had run the little auxiliary vessel’s preflight checklist back aboard the Kiri-kin-tha.

Now that the icy comet fragment finally loomed before the Vulcan workpod as a mass of dull gray shadow made visible through the wide forward window only by the little vessel’s forward beacons, Trip felt even less inclined than before to deal with any distractions.

Apparently resigned to receiving no response to her questions, Ych’a said, “Your mission must have involved the Romulan Star Empire’s ongoing initiative to create its own warp-seven-capable stardrive.”

Still trying to operate the thruster verniers with as much delicacy as he could summon, Trip struggled to appear neither impressed nor worried by her perspicacity. Still, he couldn’t help but wonder how much Ych’a actually knew and how much she was merely speculating.

“Why do you say that?” he said, finally allowing himself to indulge his own curiosity, at least a little.

Her reply was so smooth as to seem almost practiced. “Because the Romulans are currently on a par with Earth, at least in terms of space-warp technology. That places your species in a perilous and vulnerable mutual balance of power. The sudden introduction of a high-warp engine to either side would alter that balance irrevocably—and more than likely fatally for whichever society lagged behind.”

“I’d say that’s pretty freakin’ logical,” he said as noncommittally as possible, his gaze still riveted to the contours of the rapidly approaching ice body, as revealed by the searchlights, while his hands busied themselves at the console before him. “Now it’s my turn to pry. Why are you out here in the Gamma Hydra sector? And why are you keeping the Kiri-kin-tha out here on a long snipe hunt when you and I both know that Captain T’Vran has a lot of other stops to make?”

Out of his peripheral vision he saw her gesture toward the cometary body, whose edges had already outgrown the forward window’s limits. A gently curving glint of metal on the surface, now at most a single klick away, seemed to confirm the duranium signature the freighter’s sensors had picked up.

“I am here to search for survivors,” she said. “Such a search can take a good deal of time, as I’m sure you’re aware.”

“Finding survivors would take a fair amount of time,” he said, nodding, “not to mention finding whatever high-tech gear my old pal Sopek’s ship might have been smuggling. Or maybe you’re really here to make sure that whatever gadgetry the V’Shar paid the Kobayashi Maru to haul to the covert Vulcan listening post on the edge of Romulan space doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.”

Hands like mine, he thought, already very familiar with Vulcan’s long-term efforts to “moderate” and “manage” Earth’s initiatives to spread out into the galaxy. After all, Earth’s unanticipated acquisition of Vulcan technology could not only tip the balance of power between Earth and Romulus, but it also had the potential to change fundamentally the dynamic of Vulcan’s historic “elder brother” relationship with Earth.

Ych’a’s stony silence, along with her sudden minute interest in the console before her, told Trip that his dart had landed very near the bull’s-eye.

What a relief it’s going to be to put all this cloak-and-dagger bullshit behind me, he thought, returning his full attention to his deceleration and landing procedures. Once this pointy-eared Mata Hari gets this one last spy mission out of me.

“The computer has locked onto the duranium signature,” Ych’a said as she studied a graphic display on her console. “Although it appears to be at least partially buried in surface ice, its sensor profile remains consistent with that of an extremely small auxiliary spacecraft. Most likely a larger vessel’s emergency escape pod.”

“Yeah, but is it one of ours or one of theirs?” Trip asked, pausing to glance at his own console, which now was displaying the same definitive yet not quite crystal-clear graphic Ych’a had just been analyzing.

“It is impossible to tell at the moment,” she said. “My hails have received no response.”

“Well, let’s hope we find a friend waiting for us down there who can’t talk to us,” Trip said. “Instead of an enemy who won’t.”

“We shall know which it is in fairly short order,” she said. “The object is now less than half a mat’drih away, and we are closing rapidly.”

He nodded, now dividing his attention only between the indicators on his console and the pockmarked icescape that was rushing headlong toward the window. “About five-hundred meters, then. Do you want to do the honors, or should I?”

“You have given me no reason to doubt your piloting abilities as yet, Commander Tucker,” she said.

There’s always a first time, he thought as he entered a quick sequence of commands into his panel. The view of the ice body changed, revealing a horizon that faded into the blackness of space as he positioned the little ship’s belly level with what he was quickly coming to think of as the ground below.

Ych’a counted down with a nerve-wracking calmness until the workpod—which had not been designed for such maneuvers—came to a stop with a single teeth-rattling wunk.

“We’re down,” Trip said, just barely resisting the urge to heave a sigh of relief.

The tension that had gradually ratcheted up during the descent finally slackened its hold on both his spine and bowels as Trip’s body realized that he had successfully cheated Isaac Newton yet again.

“Well done, Commander,” Ych’a said. “You set us down approximately point-zero-eight mat’drih from the object. Your knowledge of Vulcan technology is indeed impressive.”

“I’m a quick study,” Trip said as the hull’s last lingering reverberations slowly damped out and the console before him confirmed that the pod had neither suffered damage nor lost any atmosphere, despite the roughness of the landing. “It comes in handy when you have to improvise. Like when you have to perform a search and rescue mission in a little auxiliary pod that’s probably not rated for any duties that are much more hazardous than going outside the Kiri-kin-tha to inspect her paint job.”

Ych’a nodded somberly as she started to remove the seat restraints that crisscrossed her thin Vulcan environmental suit, the twin of Trip’s own attire except for its smaller size and rounder contours. “That has not escaped my notice, Commander,” she said, apparently unfazed by the abruptness of Trip’s stop.

That is why she brought me along on this mission, after all, he reminded himself as he extricated himself from his own restraints and rose from his seat. She needed to test me a bit. See what I’m really made of. He didn’t doubt that the V’Shar agent possessed sufficient ability as a small-craft pilot to have landed the pod ably enough herself, and perhaps even with a good deal more finesse than he had mustered.

Ych’a wasted no time turning to a nearby equipment rack and retrieving what they both needed in order to exit the pod safely. She handed him a helmet that felt considerably lighter than it appeared, even though his inner ear and the heft of his own limbs confirmed that the little vessel’s gravity plating was still set at an approximately Vulcan-normal value. He took a pair of supple synthetic-fiber gloves out of his helmet before donning his headgear, and put on the gloves once he’d locked the helmet firmly into place on his suit’s polyalloy neck-ring.

Already completely outfitted in her EVA gear, Ych’a leaned over her console momentarily and pressed a toggle. A moment later, she shook her head in Trip’s direction, her slightly bulbous helmet exaggerated the motion.

“Whoever is in that pod still is not answering hails,” she said.

Trip leaned over his own console and initiated a final scan of the nearby target object, whose interior remained stubbornly obscure.

Doubting he’d get any argument from Ych’a, he said, “Maybe we’d better bring a couple of phase pistols along with the first-aid kit. Just in case.”

As far as the man knew, his life might have begun mere days earlier, or perhaps even hours. It was rather difficult, after all, to gauge the passage of time from the inside of what was essentially a small sterile room, in the absence of a sun or moons or any illumination save the dull green radiance of the little compartment’s emergency lights, its handful of faintly glowing instrument panels, and the few unblinking, uncaring stars that he could see through one of the room’s three tiny windows.

And it was even more difficult to reckon time, the man thought, when one hadn’t the faintest knowledge of the reason for his imprisonment, or why a forehead wound that he could not recall having acquired persistently seeped bright green blood, even after he had bandaged it.

He wished he could at least remember his own name. And why a dead man had shared this cramped space with him. Immediately after he had first awakened in this hellish place, he had risen from the padded chair on which he’d found himself recumbent and discovered the corpse, which lay slumped in a pool of congealing emerald-hued blood in another of the small chamber’s three couchlike chairs.

He had immediately decided that the dead man must have been a soldier of some sort, judging by his torn and scorched martial maroon-and-gray tunic, trousers, and boots, all of which suggested some manner of uniform, as did the holstered sidearm. Bolstering this perception further was his own clothing, which bore a close resemblance to the garments on the corpse in the chair, right down to the pistol on his hip.

Where have I seen a soldier before? he had wondered, immediately suspicious of the certainty he had felt, especially in such a patently uncertain environment. All he knew for certain beyond the similarities between his clothing and accoutrements and those of the corpse, had come via the dully reflective surface of one of the metal walls, which had revealed that he and the dead man bore a superficial physical resemblance to one another—both men had dark, bowl-cut hair, upswept eyebrows, and conspicuously pointed ears.

He wondered if his forehead injury might have caused the yawning chasm in his memory. He couldn’t be sure, and knew he had to face the possibility that he might never be sure, at least not to the degree to which he’d believed that the dead man, and by extension he himself, had been military men. He only knew that he had spent his first several hours of consciousness in the little room’s chill semidarkness— perhaps as much as a full dayturn—watching the corpse through the steam that rose from his own breath. He felt almost as though he was observing some solemn funerary rite, though he could access no conscious memories of any such custom.

Was this man a close comrade in arms? he thought, tormented by his inability to remember such fundamental things. Did he rescue me from whatever caused my injury? Perhaps the dead man had dragged him unconscious into this small chamber for his own safety before succumbing to his own wounds.

Which might mean that this room was no mere room, but rather a shelter or bunker of some kind. He knew it couldn’t be an underground chamber, otherwise the stars he could see through one of the tiny windows wouldn’t have been visible.

A lifeboat, perhaps.

Maybe I’m marooned somewhere in deep space, he thought, awed by the notion that he might be very, very far from whatever world he and his dead companion had called home. Perhaps the gravity beneath my feet is really being generated by hidden machinery and a power cell, and not by a world.

On the plus side, quite soon after awakening, he had found the uncomfortably cool, silent-as-death chamber—or lifeboat—to be well stocked with various provisions. A series of easily opened lockers beneath the wall consoles had yielded a generous supply of water containers, several changes of clothing, a quartet of what appeared to be pressurized suits, and a medical kit, as well as a large stack of sealed, metal-foil envelopes, each of them filled with a brown puttylike material that proved edible, if unappealing. He reasoned that these were emergency rations of some sort, and wondered if the supply of potables, which the death of the soldier in the other chair had effectively doubled, would outlast the hidden batteries that maintained the atmosphere and chill ambient temperature against the airless, glacial cold he sensed lying in wait for him in the star-scattered darkness outside. He knew those batteries could not last indefinitely, any more than his limited stockpiles of food and water could.

After having considered these vexing issues for perhaps the thousandth time, the man looked down at his own clothing, which was nearly as charred and distressed as the garments on the corpse.

Was I really serving in some sort of military unit? he thought, looking back over at the dead man. Could he and I have been fighting in a war before we both ended up here?

If the answer to that question proved to be “yes,” then he knew he might be vulnerable to far more immediate perils than cold, starvation, or vacuum. An armed enemy or enemies attired in distinctive uniforms of their own might even now be stalking him. Such adversaries might decide to make short work of him, were they to find him and his dead compatriot in their present attire.

Rather than be a target, he shed his uniform, replacing it with one of the unadorned olive-drab jumpsuits he had found in the locker near the food and water stockpiles. Once he had completed his wardrobe change, he placed his old garments in a neat pile on the far side of the room, away from any of the consoles.

Standing in the room’s center, he raised the pistol he had formerly kept in a hip holster and pointed it at the stack of clothing, his thumb pressing control studs as if the nerves, muscles, and tendons that drove it possessed memories of their own. Let’s see what this weapon can do, he thought just before he opened fire.

Several heartbeats later he stood stock-still, marveling at the film of fine ash on the floor that had replaced his target. Another quick blast had reduced the ashes, essentially, to their constituent atoms.

He turned toward the dead man in the chair. The corpse’s uniform had to follow the first one into oblivion. And on top of that, a dead body couldn’t simply be left where it was indefinitely.

Who was he, really? he thought, wrestling down a sense of deep regret. My best friend? A sibling?

“Rest easy, whoever you were,” he said as he raised his weapon again and took careful aim so as not to hit anything but the corpse and the chair beneath it. “And return to the cosmos.”

After four squeezes of the trigger, the grim task was done. He was alone. And as heartbeats stretched into eternities, he was slowly becoming convinced that there might be no enemy stalking him after all. He even began to entertain the notion that he might be the only sentient creature alive in the universe, and that his erstwhile corpse-companion had merely been a figment of his imagination.

THUMP.

The sound abruptly snapped him back to reality.

Not alone, he thought, trying to parse the sound, which had come from outside.

But outside, the infinite space that lay beyond the chamber’s metal walls had appeared to be nothing but airless emptiness. He remembered, from some dark and hidden well of memory, that a vacuum could not conduct sound.

Just as he remembered that hull metal could.

THUMP.

He moved swiftly toward one of the walls and found the control panel where he had discovered a set of illumination controls. Holding his pistol at the ready with one hand, he killed the ship’s interior lighting with the other.

Darkness enfolded him a half-heartbeat after he noticed a quick, furtive movement through an ostensibly empty window.

Something is out there. He clutched the pistol in a two-handed grip as he approached the wall that harbored a man-high oval that he had come to think of as a sealed hatch. A series of faint clanks, bumps, and reverberations seemed to be coming from the hatch’s other side. He wondered if he had sufficient time to don one of the chamber’s four pressure suits before whatever was outside succeeded in prying its way in. Galvanized into action, he began moving purposefully through the darkness toward the garment storage locker.

An explosive peal of thunder sounded behind him then, followed by a gale-force wind that sent him tumbling backward into a fathomless, inky void.

TEN

Monday, July 28, 2155
Coalition of Planets Headquarters, San Francisco

ERIKA HERNANDEZ HAD FOUND it humiliating to have to allow the Vulcans to tow Columbia home from Alpha Centauri. But after she’d heard Administrator T’Pau and Minister Soval present their “alternative strategic plan” in a classified closed-door meeting with the senior civilian and military leadership of the United Earth government, as well as the diplomatic delegations of Alpha Centauri, Andoria, and Tellar, Hernandez felt as though the Vulcans had intentionally rubbed salt into her wounds. And Administrator T’Pau’s swift and unapologetic beam-up to her orbiting diplomatic vessel immediately after the initial presentation’s conclusion had done little to improve Hernandez’s opinion of what she had just heard.

Once T’Pau had vanished from the council chamber’s central rostrum, Minister Soval stood alone, facing the unsympathetic mass of Vulcan’s allies, who sat in the room’s semicircular ranks of plushly upholstered chairs. As Soval braced himself against the rising tide of understandably dour glares and disappointed mutterings of some of the most august personages of Coalition space and beyond—Earth’s Prime Minister Nathan Samuels and Interior Minister Haroun alRashid, the Martian Colonies’ special representative Qaletaqu, Ambassador Jie Cong Li of Centauri III, Draylax’s observer Grethe Zhor, Starfleet’s Admirals Samuel William Gardner and Gregory Logan Black, and MACO General George Casey numbered among them— Hernandez almost felt sorry for the Vulcan foreign minister.

But only almost, she decided as she rose from her seat in the rear ranks and became one of the first of the assembled participants and observers to give full-throated voice to her initial reaction.

“So that’s your ‘alternative’ plan, Minister Soval?” Hernandez said loudly. “Your plan to assist Earth against Romulan invasion amounts to helping us install a colossal, interplanetary burglar alarm?”

Prime Minister Samuels scowled in her direction as he rose to speak, and neither of the admirals looked particularly happy with her when they turned their gazes in her direction. Hernandez sat, chastened at having spoken out of turn despite the grin she received from the MACO general. The chamber had already fallen silent except for the frantic whisperings being exchanged between the diplomats and their aides.

But instead of answering her with a reprimand of his own, Soval surprised her by tackling her question head on. “It is a warp-field detection grid, Captain,” he said, correcting her in tones that radiated an unexpectedly high patience-to-condescension ratio. “As Administrator T’Pau and I have already indicated, our technicians will begin assisting immediately with the installation and testing of all the essential components—here and at Alpha Centauri. Once the networks are completed and active, no unauthorized vessels should be able to enter either system without tripping the in-system subspace early warning alarms.”

His expression hard, Admiral Gardner rose and addressed the Vulcan. “Speaking on behalf of Starfleet Command, I appreciate Administrator T’Pau’s decision to lend Earth and Alpha Centauri your turnkey warp-detection technologies, along with the advisers we’ll need to run and maintain them.”

Vulcan advisers who will watch us like birds of prey to keep us from ripping apart and reverse engineering their precious high-tech gear, Hernandez thought.

Soval nodded toward the admiral as he clasped his hands contemplatively before him. “On behalf of all of Vulcan, Admiral, you are quite welcome.”

General Casey stood up, facing Soval. “Now that you’ve both satisfied the social niceties here, let’s discuss what’s wrong with your plan. Namely, the fact that this alarm system of yours isn’t likely to give us more than a few minutes’ advance warning of any given Romulan attack, assuming they approach the inner systems at warp five or faster.”

“Even a single minute can be critical, General,” Soval said, unperturbed by the general’s barely constrained frustration. “And I suspect that the survivors of the Romulan attacks on Calder II and Tarod IX would be inclined to agree with me.”

“That’s true enough, Minister Soval,” said Admiral Black, who had not deigned to rise from his chair. “I won’t turn away any extra nanosecond of heads-up I can get. But even assuming your detection grids really do succeed in preventing the Romulans from catching us with our pants completely down around our ankles, Starfleet will still be on its own in repelling the invasion fleets that are coming, sure as gravity. For years now, Starfleet’s capabilities have been slowly expanding.”

Damned slowly, Hernandez thought, fighting down a surge of bitterness. Mostly because the Vulcans have always seemed so bent on “protecting” us. Until now, that is.

“But we’re still limited in the amount of territory we can patrol and protect,” Black continued. “Compared to Vulcan, Starfleet has only a handful of starships at its disposal, and even Tellar and Andoria can’t make up for Vulcan’s absence while defending their own home systems. So what you’re telling us is that we have us to protect two entire systems with next to nothing.”

“The systems in question are at least adjacent ones, Admiral,” Soval said coolly.

“That’s pretty cold comfort,” Casey growled. He banged a clenched fist hard against the back of his chair, rattling it.

Thoris of Andoria and Gral of Tellar rose almost as one from their seats on opposite sides of the cluster of Starfleet and MACO brass.

“Admiral Black and General Casey’s analysis is correct,” Thoris said, glowering at Soval. “My government will find Vulcan’s position no more palatable than they do.”

“I must concur,” Gral said, which made Hernandez realize in a rush that she had never expected to hear that particular phrase pass the Tellarite’s lips. “My government cannot undertake Vulcan’s military obligations in addition to its own.”

Thoris nodded. “Nor can mine.”

Gral’s voice rose to a near shout. “Tellar will expect the Vulcan government to honor its Coalition defense commitments fully and completely.”

“As will Andoria,” Thoris said, his tone rapier sharp.

Soval responded with calm surety. “And Vulcan shall do so. As fully and completely as is practical for us.”

“Sounds like a lot of logic-chopping and plain old-fashioned bullshit to me,” Casey said, his lips curling into a snarl.

“General!” The prime minister’s hard glare matched the sharpness of his reprimand.

Casey stood silently in the suddenly becalmed room as he strove to master his anger. “My apologies, Minister,” he said at length, nodding brusquely in Soval’s direction before retaking his seat.

Soval remained standing at the podium, apparently at a loss for words. Although the Vulcan’s expression remained as impassive as ever, Hernandez thought a tiny fracture was finally beginning to appear in the minister’s heretofore impregnable wall of equanimity. But whether that was really the case or not, she knew Soval had to be aware that his government’s capriciousness had all but swept away whatever goodwill might have existed between him and his colleagues—even, or perhaps especially, Gral and Thoris.

Whatever passed between those three last night obviously didn’t help matters any, she thought, recalling the scuttlebutt that Ensign Valerian had shared with her during the morning bridge shift.

But as Soval stepped aside on the dais, relinquishing the podium to a dour-faced Nathan Samuels, Hernandez realized that the United Earth’s prime minister had to be in the least enviable position of anybody in the room. He’s the guy who has to make the hardest decision of all, she thought, noticing for the first time how much the man seemed to have aged over the past few months. And on behalf of the entire human race, no less.

After all, the only leverage Samuels had over the Vulcans was to threaten to dissolve the Coalition for which he had already worked so hard and sacrificed so much.

His eyes bordered by dry, fatigue-laden arroyos of orange-peel skin, Samuels said, “Earth has no choice other than to accept Vulcan’s help on Vulcan’s own terms.”

And with that, the meeting swiftly adjourned amid a furiously rising gabble of mutters, shouted complaints, and repeated gavel-slams. Hernandez wasted no time maneuvering herself toward one of the chamber’s rear doors, navigating past the tables and chairs through a gathering haze of unreality.

Had she just witnessed the beginning of the final unraveling of the Coalition of Planets? Had Vulcan’s effective withdrawal sundered the allies in a way that even the virtual destruction of Coridan Prime had not?

Just as she reached the doorway that led to the outer vestibule, she noticed a large figure standing in her way.

“Captain,” Admiral Gardner said. “You and Columbia will take the point for Starfleet in getting this Vulcan burglar alarm system up and running. Do you think you and your crew are up to the task?”

Do bears poop in the woods? she thought, even as she realized that the only reason Gardner had assigned this job to Columbia was the fact that Enterprise was still several months away from Earth.

“We’re all over it, Admiral,” Hernandez said with a grin, grateful for an opportunity to focus on something other than the grim, demoralizing future that almost certainly lay ahead.

ELEVEN

San Francisco, Earth

KEISHA NAQUASE ROLLED OVER IN BED, gathering the sheets around her. “So the Vulcans plan to patrol two whole solar systems with some sort of... burglar alarm system?”

“I shouldn’t have told you any of this,” the man said, rolling over beside her and propping himself up on one elbow. “Just forget I said anything about it, okay?”

Naquase got out of bed and began searching the floor for her garments, which were strewn about along with the components of the man’s blue Starfleet uniform, coverall here, boots and undergarments there. The lights weren’t on, but the morning sunlight that filtered through the gauzy drapes made them unnecessary.

“Uh-uh. Sorry,” she said, dressing hastily as she began mentally composing the story she was going to file. “I’m more than happy to oblige you in a lot of other ways, dear heart, but I’m afraid that silence simply isn’t among them.”

Gannet Brooks marched right past the intern’s cubicle and straight into Nash McEvoy’s office. Standing over her editor’s cluttered desk, she cleared her throat loudly when he didn’t look up immediately from the writing padd on which he was working.

“Shouldn’t you be on your way to the spaceport already?” McEvoy said a few heartbeats later, blinking at her in surprise over the top of his thin transparent aluminum glasses. “You’re risking letting your next interview victim escape all the way to Mars.”

“I don’t have to leave for another hour. The spaceport’s in New Mexico, not New Berlin,” Brooks said impatiently, then tossed her own padd onto the small piles of printout flimsies that adorned McEvoy’s desk. “Looks like Keisha Naquase has scooped me yet again. Nash, why didn’t you warn me you were going to run this?”

She jabbed a finger toward the padd that sat between them on the desktop, where it mutely displayed the headline VULCAN DEFENSE PLAN FALLS FAR SHORT.

“I guess I’m just not in the habit of reporting to my reporters, Gannet,” McEvoy said in a faintly scolding tone. “The question you ought to be asking is why you seem so surprised to learn that Vulcan’s only contribution to the defense of the entire human species is a pair of interplanetary burglar alarms.”

“They’re actually fairly complex networks of long-range sensors, if you want to get technical,” Brooks said. “It might even work.”

“So why didn’t I see a piece from you about that?” McEvoy asked, spreading his hands in a gesture that looked like a calculated display of helplessness.

“Because unlike some correspondents I could name, I like to confirm my facts before I run with a piece. I couldn’t get anything solid about exactly what went on during that closed-door Coalition delegate meeting yesterday, only hearsay.”

“I suppose that’s why they call things like that ‘closed door meetings,’” McEvoy deadpanned, scratching the bridge of his long nose. “Looks like Naquase found a way through the shroud of official secrecy that you somehow missed.”

“Or maybe she just decided that running with the hearsay was good enough,” Brooks said, trying and failing to keep the disdain she felt out of her voice. “It wouldn’t be the first time, you know. Like that completely unfair hatchet piece she did last week about Captain Archer.”

McEvoy scowled and held up a hand, either to call for silence or to ward off a blow he feared might be coming. “Hey, I approved that piece, remember?”

“Nobody’s judgment is perfect, Nash,” she said, hoping to cushion her words somewhat by affecting an I’m-joking-but-not-really grin. “Not even yours.”

“Rubber and glue, kiddo. Besides, Naquase’s perspective on Archer was entirely fair. Did he or did he not order Enterprise to flee from the Gamma Hydra sector, leaving a civilian freighter crew to die?”

“We still don’t know what actually happened, Nash,” she said. “I’d bet my life that the real truth is a little bit more complicated than the raw red meat Naquase served up.”

He shrugged. “Maybe. But certainly not in the eyes of the public. You ought to understand that by now.”

She paused for the space of time it took to count slowly to five. “I understand that it’s a reporter’s job to try to get the public eye focused somewhere above crotch-level. You ought to understand that by now.”

He leaned back in his chair, which creaked loudly in protest. “Oh, please, Gannet. Is this a harangue about journalistic ethics now? I thought you were pissed off about being scooped.”

“I am pissed off about being scooped!”

“Look, you’ve scooped Naquase at least as often as she’s scooped you. You know how these things work. Sometimes you get the bear, and sometimes the bear gets you.”

“I’m trying to enjoy a nice, steaming mad-on here, Nash. Please don’t wreck that by trying to be encouraging.”

He shrugged again. “All right. Then let’s get back to the journalistic ethics thing. Don’t you suppose that Vulcan’s local diplomatic service would have already issued an official denial by now if Naquase’s reporting was really as sloppy as you think it is?”

Brooks nodded, though only grudgingly. “She’d just better have one hell of a holovid prepared for tonight at eleven to back this up. Especially if she expects to keep her audience focused on the lemons instead of how to make ’em into lemonade.”

McEvoy’s brow crinkled in a show of confusion. “So you’re a food writer now, too? What are you talking about?”

She counted slowly to five once again before replying. “I’m talking about how you and Naquase both always seem to advocate retreat.”

He blinked at her uncomprehendingly. “Retreat?”

All right, Nash, she thought. You asked for it.

Aloud, she said. “Yes, retreat. Naquase has never been the same since the Xindi attack, and I think you’ve let it affect you a hell of a lot more than you’re willing to admit.”

He glanced down at his wrist chronometer. “Don’t you have a jump-pod to catch?”

“Don’t try to distract me. Naquase’s pieces always say in a thousand subtle and not-so-subtle ways that humanity had better keep its collective head down in order to avoid bringing still more wrath down from the heavens. Now, I’m not going to try to convince anybody that the Vulcans have covered themselves in glory so far during this Romulan crisis, because they haven’t. But I’ve spent enough time reporting from the final frontier to know that trying to run away from what’s out there is no solution.”

“Even when what’s out there absolutely scares the crap out of you?” McEvoy said. “Even when the big brother you thought had your back ditches you when the school bully comes looking for a fight?”

She grinned again, but this time it felt a little more genuine. “Especially then.”

He looked thoughtful for a moment, then straightened in his chair. But instead of going from there straight into a defensive rant, he surprised her.

“You’re right,” he said quietly, looking down at the padd on his desk. “I am scared. Damned scared. Maybe more scared than I’ve ever been in my entire life. I probably felt that way even before the Xindi attack, which might be why I never left Earth, even for a vacation trip.”

Brooks nodded. She strongly suspected that Naquase, who had never ventured any farther from Earth than Lake Armstrong on Luna, felt precisely the same way, even if she would never admit it to a rival reporter.

“But I also recognize that not everybody feels the same way I do,” McEvoy said, still staring broodingly at the padd. “And I’m grateful that at least some people are willing to go out and meet whatever scariness is out there head-on.” He looked up at her then, pushing his glasses back up the bridge of his nose so that his gray eyes looked almost cartoonishly large. “People like that guy you told me you got involved with for a while on Draylax. The one who later got a piloting job on Enterprise under Archer.”

“Travis Mayweather,” she murmured.

She conjured a fond memory of the easy smile of her old flame, with whom she had renewed her acquaintance just six months ago, though with bittersweet if unsurprisingly impermanent results. Brooks had first met Travis around a decade before that, during one of the E.C.S. Horizon’s many brief stopovers on one of the frontier planets she had been writing about at the time. She had noticed right away that they both possessed a kindred wanderlust, though that very trait they held in common could only pull them in different directions, literally putting a light-years-deep gulf between them. And Shakespeare thought he knew all about star-crossed lovers.

Awareness suddenly returned to Brooks that Nash McEvoy was still talking. “But mostly,” he was saying, “I’m glad that people like you aren’t afraid of what’s out there, in the Deep Dark Big Bad. Because that’s why I chose you. But if anything happens to you because I sent you out there...”

As he choked audibly and trailed off, Brooks nodded, his unexpectedly sincere and sober tone taking her by surprise. While she had always acknowledged the mortal danger that might await her during her imminent outbound tour of humanity’s interstellar frontier zones—some of which had already become hot spots in Earth’s rapidly escalating conflict with the so-called Romulan Star Empire—she had been looking forward to her departure with far more anticipation than fear. It had simply never occurred to her that her editor might feel only fear on her behalf.

McEvoy’s voice returned, gathering just enough strength to let him say, “Maybe you’ll come to your senses and come back here where it’s safe during your first layover at Bradbury Spaceport.” His eyes looked huge and moist, and it wasn’t because of the glasses.

“Hey, Nash,” she said, trying to sound encouraging. “If we don’t get out there into space and get our arms and heads around whatever dangers might be waiting for us out there, then whatever Big Bad we might be hiding from now will eventually come to us.”

She glanced at her own wrist chronometer. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a hopper to catch and an interview to conduct.”

As she exited Nash McEvoy’s office, she wondered if her editor’s vivid imagination and worrywart tendencies might inflict far more terror upon him than anything she was likely to encounter out on the far fringes of human habitation.

But somehow she tended to doubt it.

TWELVE

Gordon Cooper Interplanetary Spaceport

Upham (Sierra County), New Mexico, Earth

MARTIAN REPRESENTATIVE QALETAQU already knew how Chief Katowa was going to react to the news he was about to bring them from Earth, the land of his tribe’s ancestors. But he didn’t feel quite prepared to share that knowledge candidly with the woman who sat facing him in the next row of chairs in one of the private spaceport’s small transit lounges.

Gannet Brooks, the journalist with whom he had agreed to speak while he awaited the arrival of his interplanetary transport, adjusted the controls on her ear-mounted cam as she finger-combed her long brown hair. Despite the noisy presence of the dozen-plus other travelers in the lounge—many of them parents shepherding young children—the female journalist remained focused on Qaletaqu like the rubidium lasers on a Martian mohole-borer.

“Representative Qaletaqu, I would like to assess the Martian take on today’s news,” Brooks said. “How do you expect the Martian Colonies to react as a whole?”

Trying to maintain his best media “game face,” Qaletaqu sighed thoughtfully, stroked his smooth chin, and gazed out the broad, curving windows that faced the vast expanse of spaceport tarmac, upon which a pair of shuttlepods sat. A silver dot cleaved the clear sky above a flat desert beyond the landing field, a landscape that reminded him of the Sinai Planum just southwest of his tribe’s settlement, nestled deep in the Valles Marineris.

“What news are you talking about specifically?” he asked at length.

Her brow striated slightly into a gently scolding frown, as if to indicate that she hadn’t followed him all the way here on the continent-hopper from San Francisco just to quiz him about the number of fouls called during yesterday’s football match in Buenos Aires.

“I am referring to the news that the Vulcans may have just decided to throw us collectively to the wolves,” Brooks said. “Or to the Romulans, take your pick.”

Who have these journalists been talking to, anyway? Qaletaqu wondered, though he decided asking her that would be an exercise in futility. Like spies, newsfolk usually developed their own informal anonymous intelligence networks, some of which included people with access to classified information, and perhaps even to a covert record that someone had made of a supposedly secret closed-door meeting.

As he watched the silver dot grow steadily larger and lower until it resolved itself into a gleaming, squarish transport vessel on its landing approach, he wished he could choose the wolf over the Romulans, just as Brooks had suggested. After all, he could at least imagine the prospect of understanding the wolf, with whom the human race might stand a chance of coming to some sort of accommodation. But the Great Spirit only knew whether or not the faceless aliens known as the Romulans reasoned the way human beings did, assuming that such a thing was even knowable. After all, during his forty-one years Qaletaqu had known more than a few human beings who had not been particularly good at reasoning.

Turning away from the window, Qaletaqu smiled at Brooks, practicing the manner in which he planned to deliver his formal report to his father and the assembled members of the tribal council once he got back to Mars. “I think you might be overstating matters at least a little,” he said. “After all, Vulcan has agreed to provide significant material support for the defense of both the Sol and Alpha Centauri systems.”

“You’re referring to the systemwide warp-field detection grids the Vulcans have offered to help us install, both here and at Alpha Centauri,” she said. “Although some in my profession have described these measures as mere burglar alarms.”

Burglar alarms, Qaletaqu thought, shaking his head sadly. He was already willing to bet money that this early description of Vulcan’s defense initiative was going to stick. That did not bode any better for the future of Coalition unity than did Vulcan’s disconcertingly hands-off reaction to the growing Romulan threat.

“What the Vulcans are providing is significantly more sophisticated than a ‘burglar alarm,’” he said. “Would I rather have half the Vulcan fleet posted across the system to discourage the Romulans? Of course I would. But that’s not going to happen. And politics is the art of the possible, after all.”

“Still, I imagine most people on Earth are going to be profoundly disappointed by Vulcan’s decision,” Brooks said. “Do you expect the people you represent in the Martian Colonies to react any differently?”

With Mars significantly more vulnerable to any outsystem attack simply by virtue of its being millions of miles closer to the edge of human habitation in its native solar system—Jupiter Station was currently the only outpost of any significant size between Mars and the Alpha and Proxima Centauri settlements—the people of the Martian Colonies, from high officialdom right down to the grunt-level terra-forming laborer, were all but certain to be furious. Though Qaletaqu knew that Brooks hailed from San Francisco, he also knew there was little chance that she could be ignorant of this simple reality.

“Can I assume that was a rhetorical question?” he asked.

She nodded, conceding his point. “Perhaps the proper question is this one: What will the confederated government of the Martian Colonies do in response to Vulcan’s decision?”

He chuckled. “Just what do you think we can do?” She had to know as well as he did that Mars, though nominally autonomous despite the bloody, half-century-past war for independence that had preceded the Fundamental Declarations of the Martian Colonies, had become over the years essentially a political satellite of the United Earth government. The recent signing of the Coalition Compact had only further marginalized Mars in favor of the far more populous political centers on Earth and Centauri III, earning the Red Planet such sardonic sobriquets as “the cosmic Canada.” The voice of the people whose ancestors had once rocked Earth’s economy by initiating the Gundersdottir’s Dome Rebellion and a series of Red Planet general strikes had become simply another voice in humanity’s ever-expanding interstellar choir.

Hell, we’re so unimportant that even our official Coalition delegates have to take commercial flights, Qaletaqu thought wryly.

“All right,” she said, nodding. “I know that Mars isn’t in any position to twist Administrator T’Pau’s arm with gunboat diplomacy, or even trade sanctions. But some of your countrymen have a lot of political clout just the same. For example, Katowa, your father.”

He sighed again and turned back toward the window. The transport vessel he had seen approaching earlier was on the ground now, and was making its way toward the jetway that connected with the transit lounge. An announcement on the public address system confirmed that the vessel would shortly be ready for boarding even as the other passengers present began to queue up before the counter that stood beside the jetway door.

“Katowa is the chief of the independent Martian Hopi-Pueblo nation you come from, isn’t he?” Brooks prompted.

Qaletaqu nodded. “He is. But the Assembly of the Martian Colonies is not a dictatorship, and neither is our tribal government.” Like the Iroquois confederacy of eastern North America, Mars’s Hopi-Pueblo nation—an amalgam of southwest tribes that had found relocating to austere Mars preferable to surrendering their hard-fought sovereignty to the United Earth—could have taught even the Jeffersonian-era founders of the Enlightenment a thing or two about the democratic process and fair, responsive governance.

“True enough,” Brooks said. “But Chief Katowa wields a considerable amount of influence with the Martian population.”

And Qaletaqu knew that Katowa was going to be anything but pleased by the report he was about to make about Vulcan’s actions visà-vis the Sol system’s defense. Troubled by thoughts of what his father might do, he rose from his seat. He took a couple of steps toward the boarding line before stopping and facing the journalist, who had also gotten to her feet.

“No comment,” he said. “Thanks for letting me speak my piece for the record, Miz Brooks. Now if you’ll excuse me.” And with that he slung his small carry-on bag over his shoulder and strode toward the jetway counter, past which most of the boarding queue had already moved.

It wasn’t until he had moved onto the jetway itself and was passing through the open passenger airlock hatchway that he noticed Brooks following a few paces behind him.

He stopped abruptly on the airlock threshold and faced her, a hard frown of annoyance involuntarily creasing his forehead.

“I’m sorry, Miz Brooks, but the interview is over. I really have to get back to Mars now, and I’d like to do so in peace, if you don’t mind terribly.”

It was only then that he noticed that she, too, had a small duffel slung over her shoulder.

“Sorry, Mister Representative,” she said, looking slightly abashed. “I promise to leave you alone. But only until our transport reaches Bradbury Spaceport on Mars.”

His eyes widened involuntarily. “Our transport?”

Grinning, she said, “Like I said before, I want to assess the Martian reaction to Vulcan’s decision. And after that, I’m heading out to see just what it is we’ve been hoping the Vulcans would help defend us from.”

Be careful what you wish for, Qaletaqu thought as he sighed and shook his head yet again. Then he continued through the hatchway and began searching for his seat.

It was going to be a long, long flight home.

THIRTEEN

Middle of the month of re’T’Khutar, YS 8764
Monday, July 28, 2155
Outer ShiKahr, Vulcan

“TELL MINISTER KUVAK THAT I HAVE an urgent matter to discuss with him,” Silok said to the minor functionary who had appeared on the other end of the visual connection. A matter so urgent, in fact, that Silok did not wish to wait for the span of time it would take for him to travel from his austere home office on the quiet outskirts of Vulcan’s capital to the busy cluster of administrative offices that comprised the core of the city’s government district.

Almost immediately, the young woman’s affectless visage vanished from the screen, presumably because she was summoning the official with whom the recently installed head of Vulcan’s V’Shar intelligence service sought an audience. Silok waited as the moment stretched, trying without success to force his mind into a neutral, meditational state. Unlike many of his colleagues, however, patience had never come naturally to him, and today was no exception, despite the outer appearance he so carefully maintained.

Unfortunately, the official post he had occupied since the earliest days of the T’Pau administration had done little to ameliorate his own perceived dearth of forbearance, even as his expertise and knowledge had grown. Although more than half a year had already passed since he had replaced Stel—whose tenure as Vulcan’s intelligence chief and head police investigator had ended abruptly and in disgrace along with the rest of the corrupt V’Las regime—Silok felt no more in control of the evershifting landscape of interstellar intelligence now than he had on his first day on the job.

But at least today he knew that he had solid news to report—news of such importance that it had to be brought directly to the attention of the highest available officials in Vulcan’s government as quickly as possible.

The image of Minister Kuvak, his dark eyes attentive beneath a bowl of graying hair, appeared on Silok’s desktop screen.

“Silok,” Kuvak said with no other preamble than a curt nod. “I am told that you require my assistance.”

“Is this channel secure?” Silok said, wishing to waste no more of either his time or the minister’s than was absolutely necessary.

“A moment,” Kuvak said, looking down as he entered a command into his own communications terminal. His sharp gaze meeting Silok’s yet again, the minister said, “You may speak freely now.”

Silok nodded. “Thank you, Minister. One of my field operatives has discovered conclusive evidence of Romulan shipbuilding and related research activity in a clandestine facility located near the Achernar system.”

Kuvak appeared to mull the revelation over momentarily before he replied. “Indeed. Achernar is rather remote, even from Romulus.”

“Not so remote, evidently, to prevent an expanding Romulan Star Empire from having grown dependent upon Achernar’s resources, particularly in the agricultural and mining sectors. Acquiring new outlying provinces also means acquiring new material obligations, prime of which are hungry new imperial subjects. However, Achernar’s relative remoteness from the imperial core worlds of Romulus and Remus no doubt served to obscure it from the V’Shar before now. And it may also keep it from receiving undue attention from the domestic dissident factions that we know to be operating presently within the Romulan Star Empire.”

“What kind of research are the Romulans conducting there specifically?”

“Sources indicate they are close to a high-warp breakthrough. Should their research initiatives succeed—and eventual success is inevitable given the resources the Romulans are dedicating to these efforts—they could be mass-producing vessels capable of speeds of warp six or even warp seven within the year.”

Kuvak absorbed Silok’s grim assessment stoically, with only a slight crease in his forehead betraying the intensity of his reaction.

“We must neutralize this Romulan facility,” he said at length.

“I agree completely, Minister. The only question is whether to do it overtly, using the Vulcan Defense Force, or to employ subtler means as an alternative.”

“Administrator T’Pau is still en route to Vulcan from Earth,” Kuvak said. “She is expected back in ShiKahr in ten days’ time.”

“Then the decision is yours pending her return, Minister.”

“Administrator T’Pau’s philosophy regarding the use of the military could not be more plain, even in her absence. And a Vulcan military strike on a Romulan facility could only draw Vulcan directly into the conflict that Earth presently faces.”

“The very conflict from which Vulcan has just publicly withdrawn.”

“Precisely, Chief Investigator Silok.”

“You could contact Administrator T’Pau vis subspace,” Silok said. “And confer with her directly.”

Kuvak slowly shook his head. “Such a long-distance communication cannot be secured as reliably as can our domestic comm lines. Until she returns, I must act in her place to avoid any chance of letting the Romulans know what the V’Shar has discovered.”

“I understand, Minister Kuvak.”

“I trust that the V’Shar stands ready to employ the ‘subtler means’ to which you have already referred?”

It seemed to Silok that the importance of the intelligence agency in his charge had just increased exponentially, not only for his own world’s peace and security, but also for that of all of Vulcan’s allies.

“The V’Shar can do whatever is required,” Silok said. “However, the necessary preparations could take as long as half a year to complete.”

“By which time the Romulans’ mass-production efforts will be unlikely to have come to fruition. Correct?”

“Correct, Minister. I trust that I need not remind you that Administrator T’Pau will have returned long before the full preparations are complete.”

Kuvak appeared to frown ever so slightly, as though irritated. “But not before the relevant personnel are assigned and the appropriate orders are issued—in the subtle manner we have all come to expect from the V’Shar, of course.”

Silok nodded very slowly, taking in Minister Kuvak’s meaning. “I understand, Minister.”

“And I understand the logic of thoroughness and stealth,” Kuvak said, his expression growing even sterner than was customary. “However, I trust I need not caution you what a mistake it would be to underestimate the capabilities of the Romulans. Including their alacrity. You must do everything possible to expedite your handling of this matter, short of compromising its success.”

An idea suddenly occurred to Silok as he recalled a report he had just received from a field operative working in the Gamma Hydra sector. “I agree completely,” he said. “And I believe I may already have the ideal intelligence assets nearly in position and ready to deploy. You can trust my agency to treat this problem with the utmost urgency.”

And secrecy, he thought as Kuvak’s image vanished. It was clear to him that no one other than himself, Kuvak, and the field operatives involved needed to know anything at all about the Achernar affair, including the very fact of its existence. The list of personnel with a “need to know” was to be a short one indeed.

And it had not escaped Silok’s notice that Kuvak had pointedly excluded Administrator T’Pau from that list.

FOURTEEN

Vulcan Cargo Ship Kiri-kin-tha

“THINK HE’S GONNA MAKE IT, Doc?” Trip asked.

Doctor Sivath turned her steely gaze upon the unconscious Vulcan man who lay supine upon the infirmary bed, then checked a reading on her handheld scanner before nodding once in apparent satisfaction. “He seems to be recovering well from his crash injuries,” she said. “As well as from the stunning he received during his ‘rescue.’”

Ych’a, who was standing beside Captain T’Vran on the opposite side of the bed from where Trip and Sivath stood, responded before Trip could get out a word. “Unfortunately, circumstances forced us to fire our weapons, Doctor. He appeared to be preparing to open fire on us when we encountered him.”

Sivath looked unimpressed by Ych’a’s story, though Trip was prepared to back it up completely, having wielded one of the phase pistols in question. T’Vran displayed an unreadable, typically Vulcan expression, keeping her own counsel.

“Nevertheless,” the doctor continued, “I expect this man to make a complete recovery.”

Ych’a nodded, then focused her gaze upon Trip. “Commander Tucker, Doctor Sivath has confirmed your contention that this man is indeed a Romulan rather than a Vulcan. As is our previous... guest.”

“Like I already told you, he’s a centurion in the Romulan military,” Trip said, hiking a thumb toward the insensate man. “His name is Terix. And I’d make damned sure never to let him out of my sight if I were you.”

“I never doubted you, Commander,” the V’Shar agent said. “And I fully acknowledge your warning.”

Trip favored her with a sidewise grin. “Glad to hear it. I know trust doesn’t come easy to you folks, especially when you never know when you might find a Romulan hiding in your midst.” Or a human who’s been hiding among the Romulans, he added silently.

He focused his attention back upon the pointed-eared man slumbering on the infirmary’s sole occupied bed—which, Trip suddenly realized, meant that all the other beds were now empty, a fact that he confirmed with a couple of quick turns of his head.

“What happened to Sopek?” he said, all at once unsure whether to root for the double agent’s recovery or for a new notch on the grim reaper’s holster.

“Our other... guest regained consciousness during your extravehicular excursion, Commander,” Captain T’Vran said. “He has since been released from Sivath’s care, and therefore has passed into mine. I have placed him in guest quarters, under guard.”

“The captain has also agreed to expedite his delivery to the proper authorities by putting the Kiri-kin-tha on a direct course for Vulcan,” Ych’a said. “Once there, Mister Ch’uivh will be processed and interrogated, and thereafter a magistrate will determine his long-term disposition.”

Tiny spiders with liquid-nitrogen-drenched feet trod quickly up and down Trip’s backbone in reaction to Ych’a’s euphemism-couched words. Considering the brutal meat-hook realities of what he already knew about the inner workings of intelligence services, he couldn’t help but wonder whether Sopek/Ch’uivh was in fact being interrogated surreptitiously right now in some soundproofed chamber deep in the bowels of this very ship. But whatever Sopek might be doing presently—or whatever someone might be doing to him—Trip could at least console himself with the thought that the man wouldn’t pose an immediate threat to anybody so long as he wasn’t running around loose and unsupervised.

A low groan from the bed abruptly forced Trip’s train of thought onto a different track.

“Centurion Terix is regaining consciousness,” Sivath said, stating the obvious.

The Romulan groaned again and began to open his eyes, which were blinking rapidly in protest against the harsh ceiling lights before coming fully open. Once they opened, he began to make a close study of the faces of each of the four people who stood surrounding his bed.

“Where am I?” Terix said as he tried to force his elbows to support his weight.

“You are aboard the Vulcan cargo vessel Kiri-kin-tha,” T’Vran said. “I am Captain T’Vran. My ship’s physician, Doctor Sivath, is treating your injuries.”

Terix stared at the captain, his mien radiating incomprehension. “Injuries?” He reached up and touched the neat swath of bandages that wreathed his skull just above his pointed ears.

“You have sustained some minor cranial trauma,” Sivath said as the injured man made another attempt, successful this time, to draw his body up into a sitting position.

“It may have occurred when your escape pod crashed,” Ych’a said. “After you left the Romulan ship.”

“Escape pod?” Terix said, still confused. When the only response Ych’a made was a silent nod, he turned slightly and looked straight at Trip. “Romulan ship?”

Trip braced himself for the angry outburst that was all but certain to follow; after all, Terix’s last memory of him would have been their confrontation on Taugus III, during which the centurion had very nearly succeeded in killing him.

But he saw no recognition whatsoever in the Romulan’s dark eyes, only a confusion that bordered on desperation.

Apparently Sivath had made much the same observation as well. “Can you tell us your name?”

“No. No, I can’t,” Terix said at length, his eyes wide, reflecting his no doubt disconcerting self-discoveries.

“Do not be overly concerned,” Sivath said as she slowly ran a scanner past her patient’s head. “The blunt-force cranial injuries you have sustained appear to have induced some memory loss.”

“Head-bonk amnesia,” Trip said, finding the whole notion just a little too convenient to believe. Romulans were nothing if not clever. It wouldn’t be hard for a soldier as determined and wily as Terix to have faked his disorientation enough to trick a freighter’s doctor and even her instruments. Hell, he thought, God only knows how many Romulans I fooled into accepting my fake Romulan bona fides.

“Is this memory loss permanent, Doctor?” T’Vran said.

“It is too soon to tell, Captain,” said the doctor, shaking her head. “I must run several more tests.”

“Please proceed,” said T’Vran.

A staccato series of beeps distracted Trip at that moment, drawing his attention toward Ych’a, who was removing a palm-sized device from the inside of her jacket.

“Captain T’Vran,” she said, pocketing what was evidently a small communications device. “I have just received a priority message from Vulcan. If you will excuse me...”

T’Vran nodded, and Ych’a immediately exited the infirmary.

As Sivath began fetching various diagnostic instruments, Trip took a step toward her. “If you don’t mind, Doc,” he said, “I’d like to have a few words with your patient here while you’re running your tests.” If he’s just faking this and knows how to trick your equipment, he thought, then I want to find that out sooner instead of later.

Sivath paused in mid-motion, setting aside a blinking medical gadget that Trip didn’t immediately recognize. “In point of fact, Commander, I do mind. This is a place of healing, not an interrogation room.”

T’Vran stepped between him and the doctor just as the infirmary hatchway opened behind him. Trip heard heavy footfalls as at least one person entered the chamber from the corridor beyond.

“Security will conduct you back to your quarters now, Commander Tucker,” T’Vran said in a tone that invited no debate.

I guess I’m a “guest” here in exactly the same way Sopek and Terix are “guests” here, Trip thought. As he had come to expect, his door remained locked from the outside.

He continued pacing back and forth, imagining he was wearing a groove in the duranium-steel deck plating of the small quarters T’Vran had issued him. If I keep at this long enough, he thought wryly, maybe I can turn that groove into an escape tunnel.

According to the chronometer on the room’s tiny worktable, he had been cooling his heels for only an hour when the door chime finally sounded.

“Come.”

The hatchway that led out into the corridor slid open, admitting

Ych’a.

“Do you mind asking the captain if she’ll issue me bigger quarters?” he said. “I’m gonna need a little more room if I’m gonna entertain visitors properly.”

Ych’a spoke as though she hadn’t heard a single word he’d said. “Commander, please accept my apologies for having been called away back in the infirmary.”

“If you only got off the comlink just now,” Trip said, “then there must be some big news brewing in the home office.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You are perceptive. I have received new orders because of a newly discovered development deep inside the Romulan Star Empire.”

Trip’s eyes narrowed involuntarily. “What kind of ‘development’ are you talking about?”

“One that suits the unique background and skill set of your old Romulan persona,” she said. “As well of those of your new Vulcan identity.”

Sodok, the Vulcan trader, Trip thought.

“I’m listening,” he said, though he’d have far preferred to hear her say, “you’ll be back on Earth by next week.”

“Operating as Sodok, you will have two essential functions. The first of these, as I envision it, is to assist me in exposing and neutralizing the corrupt elements and spies we suspect are operating inside Vulcan’s intelligence community.”

“That sounds like old news,” Trip said, folding his arms before him and leaning against one of the room’s too-close walls. “I take it you’re breaking things down for me this way because your bosses just handed you a brand-new directive.”

She nodded. “Again, that is perspicacious of you, Commander.”

“I hope that’s a good thing,” he said with a shrug. “Unless what you really just said is that you think I sweat a lot.”

“Your new medium-term mission,” she said, again stepping effortlessly around his banter, “involves an assignment of critical importance.”

“How critical?”

“Critical enough to ensure the security of Earth, Vulcan, and every other member of the Coalition of Planets.” Her voice never deviated from glacial calm, and Trip could almost believe that her pulse had done likewise.

He couldn’t say the same of his own. “That sounds pretty damned critical.” After a contemplative pause, he added, “And just how long do expect this thing to last?”

She looked upward and into the middle distance of one of the blank, disconcertingly near walls, apparently performing a brief mental calculation.

“It is always my preference to err conservatively in making such estimates,” she said.

“Which would make you a fine engineer,” he said, an edge of irritation creeping into his voice. “How long?”

“This operation could take upwards of a Terran year to come to full fruition.”

The weight of her words struck him right in the belly with the force of a flying anvil.

Once he’d recovered his breath, he said, “No. God. Damned. Way.” A recognizable emotion finally broke the placid surface of her countenance: mild surprise.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me! You’re asking way too much of a guy who’s just trying to get home.”

“Even though what is being asked of you could assure the security of your home planet for decades to come?”

He tossed his hands into the air. “How do I know this delicate operation of yours really has anything to do with that?”

Taking a single defensive step backward, she said, “I understand the intensity of your desire to return to your former life and career, but—”

“You have no idea, so don’t go down that road,” he said, stomping firmly on her words. “Listen, I was willing to pitch in for a few weeks on my way back to Earth, if that meant I’d be helping out one of T’Pol’s old friends.”

“How very magnanimous of you,” Ych’a said.

“But I have absolutely no intention of squandering an entire year of my life—or however much time this goddamned spy business is gonna use up—to yet another deep-cover adventure behind enemy lines. Sorry, but as Sam Goldwyn once said, you can include me out.”

Trip’s rant seemed to have stopped her short—but only for a moment.

“Are Agent Harris and Captain Stillwell aware of how strongly you feel about returning to Earth?” she said very quietly.

Trip had to work hard to keep his jaw from falling open at her casual mention of his ultrasecret—and supersecretive—Section 31 superiors. Then he decided that playing games with her by pretending ignorance would probably be an exercise in futility.

“How do you know about the bureau?” he asked at length.

Ych’a now seemed to display traces of another emotion, or at least something that looked to Trip a lot like self-satisfaction. “I know that the strategic goals of your Terran intelligence services are congruent with those of the V’Shar—at least insofar as Vulcan and Earth’s mutual Romulan problem is concerned.”

It seemed very strange to Trip that Vulcan’s leaders didn’t try to take a far larger share of the ownership of this particular “mutual” problem than they had allowed Earth and Starfleet to assume. After all, humans weren’t the Romulans’ genetic and cultural cousins as the Vulcans were.

But how many Vulcans are even aware of that? he wondered.

“And because of our shared interests,” Ych’a continued, “your superiors have already agreed to... loan your services to us, at least for the duration of the new mission the V’Shar must undertake inside Romulan space.”

If she was telling the truth, her superiors were acting in a pretty damned high-handed fashion. On the other hand, his superiors had talked him into colluding with them in faking his own death—which made them equally high-handed, almost by definition.

In spite of a rising wave of despair at the prospect of yet again indefinitely postponing his return to the land of the living, Trip felt the left corner of his mouth draw itself up into something that felt a little like a wry grin.

“Are you sure my bosses agreed to this ‘loan’ out of a shared sense of purpose?” he said. “Or is it more likely that they rolled over for it because they have no more power than I do to force you to do anything else with me?”

Trip could have sworn he saw the mirror image of his own grin trying to appear on Ych’a’s face. “Does that distinction really matter?”

He paused to think about that for a moment. “I guess it really doesn’t, when you put it that way.”

As his profound feelings of disappointment began to give way to a kind of resignation, he plopped himself down into a half-recumbent position on the hard, narrow cot that spanned the length of the back wall.

“So, tell me exactly which of our common ‘strategic goals’ am I gonna be stuck dealing with?”

“The Romulans have constructed a secret shipbuilding facility near the planet Achernar II,” Ych’a said, her tone glissading gracefully back into a businesslike lack of affect.

Trip searched his memory of the star charts and stellar atlases he had studied during his sojourn in Romulan space, mentally comparing the alien place names he had encountered to their common Coalition equivalents.

“Achernar II,” he said after a few moments of concentration, during which he recalled that the maps also sometimes called the planet Achernar Prime. “It’s tucked away deep inside the faraway boonies of Romulan space, but it’s not formally aligned with the Romulan Star Empire.”

“Correct,” Ych’a said. “But the planet does support a thriving multispecies trading colony that services many of the economic needs of several adjacent sectors of space, with a special emphasis on the extraction and sale of dilithium and other valuable mineral commodities.”

Ych’a’s description of the place brought to mind images of the Yukon Territory or California during the Gold Rush era of three centuries past, the sort of rough and lawless environment to which he’d first been exposed in old flatvid films before experiencing something very much like it firsthand nearly two years ago, while scouring the Delphic Expanse for the Xindi who had attacked Earth.

“Sounds like a good place to hide whatever secret research the Romulans might be doing nearby,” he said. “They can keep it out of sight but still maintain fairly easy access to raw materials.”

Ych’a answered with another firm nod. “Again, correct. According to the V’Shar’s analytical division, pursuing this strategy has put the creation of a viable warp-seven-capable bird-of-prey-class vessel very nearly within the Romulan military’s reach.”

The chill-footed spiders abruptly returned to Trip’s spine, arranging themselves into an energetic Radio City–style kick line. “How long before they can pull it off?”

“A handful of your Terran months, at most,” Ych’a said, her shoulders rotating in a gesture that strongly resembled a shrug. “Hence the current close alignment between our intelligence service and yours. This Romulan research initiative presents a clear danger to both Vulcan and Earth, as well as to the other member worlds of the Coalition of Planets.”

As badly as he wanted to go home, and to leave the shadowy world of espionage behind forever, Trip couldn’t help but agree. “Okay,” he said. “This thing has got to be stopped. The odds against Earth are bad enough right now without the Romulans getting their hands on Vulcan-level warp technology.”

“Which is why Vulcan intends to do everything possible to prevent such a catastrophic upheaval in the relative balance of power between Earth and Romulus,” Ych’a said.

“But Vulcan’s gonna do it using the V’Shar from behind the scenes,” Trip said, not asking a question. “Instead of going after the Romulans directly with the whole Vulcan fleet.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Of course. We are a logical people, Commander. And subtlety is part and parcel of logic.”

Tucker wasn’t sure how to take that. He was sorely tempted to point out that subtlety might not have been the ideal way to meet a challenge like the invasion of Calder II, which as far as he could tell had already become a Romulan beachhead right on the Coalition’s back porch.

Instead, he said, “You know, Vulcan could just decide to share its warp-drive technology with Earth. That would sure as hell short-circuit everything the Romulans are doing to try to change the balance of power.”

Ych’a appeared unsurprised by Trip’s idea, which led him to believe she had already given the issue a fair amount of consideration. “Such a move would be neither subtle nor logical, Commander.”

“Maybe,” he said, matching her earlier shrug with one of his own. “On the other hand, if the Romulans’ warp-seven project actually succeeds, Vulcan might find that it’s finally run out of better options.”

“That is certainly possible, Commander. However, it is also a moot point at present. And we should both do everything in our power to see that it remains so.”

“I understand,” Trip said with a grudging acquiescence that did little to ameliorate his frustration. After all, there was no getting around the reality that such decisions were never made at Ych’a’s pay grade, let alone his.

“All right, Ych’a. Neither of us wants to find out what’ll actually happen if the Romulans pull this thing off,” he said. “At least not badly enough to actually let it happen.”

“We must work together to neutralize their warp-seven project,” she said, nodding. “As quickly and as completely as possible, given the months of preparation that may be required. Whatever the cost.”

Even if that cost turns out to be another Calder outpost or three in the meantime, he thought, grimly aware that a warp-seven-capable Romulan fleet could open up new beachheads all across Coalition space exponentially faster than before.

“Maybe now would be a good time to talk details,” Trip said.

“Such as?”

“Such as exactly how you and I are going to take down an entire Romulan shipyard without a Vulcan flotilla at our backs,” Trip said, already finding the scope of the mission ahead more than a little daunting.

“The plan is relatively simple,” she said, as deadpan as ever. “You will sneak inside and blow it up—with some help from the enemy.”

And with that she reached into her jacket and withdrew a small padd, which she placed in Trip’s hand as he stood mute, trying to process her words, slack-jawed in spite of himself. Then she exited, leaving him alone with the padd.

Trip activated the device with his thumb and began reading its contents. He very quickly became so engrossed in the detailed intelligence report on Achernar and vicinity that he could almost forget the close resemblance his current surroundings bore to a jail cell.

Almost.

It felt to Ch’uivh like an eternity since he had placed the tiny listening device against the inside of the locked door to his quarters.

It had been a fortunate circumstance, though not a surprising one, that the freighter’s security crew hadn’t bothered to scan his boot heels for the hidden compartments in which he’d stowed a few critical pieces of electronic and chemical gear; this was, after all, a working merchant ship rather than a military vessel.

But it is strange, Ch’uivh thought as he listened for signs of movement out in the corridor, that Ych’a didn’t do a thorough search herself.

Just as he was beginning to wonder if the V’Shar spy was slipping, he heard the telltale sounds of booted footfalls on deck plating that signaled the departure of the guard who had been watching the secured hatchway to his quarters and the arrival of her replacement.

Right after the shift change is always the best time to take a security guard by surprise, he thought as he waited for the locking device to succumb at last to the silent ministrations of the molecular solvent that he had slathered onto the hatch. The solvent, which was a mixture of chemical components he had carried in separately inside his hollow heels, would have made short work of any flesh it encountered. Therefore Ch’uivh took the thin mattress off the room’s narrow cot and braced it against the door before shoving it open.

A moment later he was standing out in the corridor amid the chemically seared hatch and mattress, facing one extremely surprised-looking Vulcan male whose sidearm holster and uniform patch revealed him to be a member of the Vulcan Kiri-kin-tha’s small cadre of security personnel.

And not particularly well-trained security personnel at that, Ch’uivh thought a few scant heartbeats after that, as he gingerly lowered the young guard’s still twitching corpse to the deck plating. The slain man’s neck was bent at an awkward angle, his mouth frozen into an oval of terminal surprise. Ch’uivh dragged the body into his otherwise empty quarters, then knelt beside it long enough to recover the fallen guard’s sidearm.

As he made his quiet way down the empty corridor he thought, Perhaps I should have asked for directions to the nearest shuttlebay before I did that.

“Captain, security reports that Crewman Sitok has been found dead.”

Seated in the chair located in the precise center of the Kiri-kin-tha’s bridge, Captain T’Vran found the almost shrill timbre of the bridge communications officer’s voice very nearly as surprising as the content of his words. She spared a moment to observe the reaction of Ych’a of the V’Shar, who stood nearby, a single raised eyebrow providing the sole clue to her reaction.

“Where did this happen?” T’Vran said as she rose and approached the bridge comm station. She was grateful for the equanimity with which she was able to shroud her own voice.

“Uncertain,” said the comm officer. “Sitok’s body was found inside the quarters issued to one of our recent guests. One of the two that was recently released from the infirmary.”

“Ch’uivh,” Ych’a said in matter-of-fact fashion.

Sopek, T’Vran thought. “Where is our... guest presently?”

“Security found no one in the room other than Sitok’s body,” said the comm officer.

“Inform security that I want the ship searched thoroughly,” T’Vran said. “They are to institute a room-by-room, deck-by-deck search, with armed personnel deployed in pairs, as well as a thorough series of scans using the ship’s internal sensors.”

As the comm officer busied himself relaying her orders, T’Vran turned to face Ych’a, who had remained in her seat, where she studied the small display on a handheld communications device.

“Security has confirmed to me that both Mister Sodok and our most recent guest are still precisely where they are supposed to be, Captain.”

T’Vran nodded a silent acknowledgment, relieved to hear that at least Commander Tucker and the amnesiac Romulan centurion, the man Tucker had identified as Terix, were, respectively, in secure quarters and in the ship’s infirmary.

“How long has Sitok been dead?” T’Vran asked the comm officer.

“Doctor Sivath is presently on her way to make a precise determination,” the officer at the comm console said as he continued silently relaying internal communications.

“Ch’uivh most likely would have acted immediately after the guard’s shift change, Captain,” Ych’a said. “A significant fraction of the ship’s day has already passed since that time. Might I suggest you begin your search with a complete accounting of the Kiri-kin-tha’s complement of auxiliary vehicles? The ones you keep moored against the outer hull would be particularly relevant.”

It took only a handful of fleeting lirt’k later for Ych’a and the ship’s small security contingent to confirm what T’Vran already knew.

“It appears that one of your hull-mounted shuttles is missing, Captain,” said the V’Shar spy. “It is therefore safe to assume that your ‘guest’ has already placed a great deal of distance between himself and this vessel. It is doubtful that a man of such evident resourcefulness will be easy to find.”

T’Vran nodded, her gaze fixed upon Ych’a’s. “I require a word with you in private,” she said, prompting the spy to nod, pocket her comm device, and follow T’Vran into her small private office, located just off the bridge’s starboard side.

“I am... uncomfortable participating in your V’Shar schemes,” T’Vran said once the hatch had closed behind them, assuring their privacy.

“Your participation will be entirely deniable,” Ych’a said.

T’Vran already knew this, of course. Nevertheless, she remained as uncomfortable as ever with the notion of using lies as weapons—even against liars. Crewman Sitok’s blood was on her hands, just as surely as it was on Ch’uivh’s and Ych’a’s.

At length, she said, “Do you think your associate Ch’uivh may have considered it overly convenient that the vehicle he took was already completely powered up and provisioned for a long flight?”

Ych’a dismissed T’Vran’s concerns with a slow shake of her head. “Ch’uivh has never been sufficiently logical regarding such matters,” the spy said. “Even when he was masquerading as the Vulcan Captain Sopek.”

“Perhaps that accounts for the many difficulties he has encountered since he first began associating with the Ejhoi Ormiin dissidents, and some of the other adversaries of the Romulan Star Empire’s central government,” T’Vran said. “That man has always been far too easily manipulated for his own good. It will be fortuitous for us all if your ‘old friend Sodok’ proves not to be so blindly trusting.”

“Agreed, Captain,” Ych’a said. “We shall see.”

FIFTEEN

Tuesday, July 29, 2155
Sol 25 of Martian Month of Leo

THE THING GANNET BROOKS LIKED BEST about Mars was the lightness of the place, a feeling she could only describe as a kind of buoyancy.

That sensation of lightness returned to her gradually today as the transport vessel’s gravity plating finished making its slow adjustment from an Earth-normal one g to the thirty-eight percent that prevailed on the Red Planet’s surface, which still lay thousands of kilometers away. In the meantime Mars loomed ever larger, having grown before Brooks’s eyes from a ruddy, coin-sized disk until it had become the pockmarked sphere that now dominated the broad transparent aluminum ports of the transport’s “walking lounge.”

The haze of atmosphere was clearly visible now along the periphery of the daylight crescent that Brooks could see from the vessel’s present angle of approach, apparently thickened somewhat since she had last visited this place three years earlier. Either the Martian terraforming project was making far faster progress than anyone had anticipated, or else she was letting her imagination run away with her again. That same imagination led her to almost feel an enormous rush of wind parting her shoulder-length brown hair as the transport skimmed uncomfortably close to the gray, rocky bulk of Phobos, which reminded Brooks of nothing so much as a gigantic, acne-scarred potato. The Stickney crater yawned wide across the body’s lumpen surface, like a hungry maw nearly nine klicks wide and capable of making a quick meal of the transport on its way into the sixty-seven-hundred-odd kilometer-deep gulf of cisphobian space that separated the larger and innermost of Mars’s two moons from the planet itself.

Makes sense that something named after an ancient legend about fear would put images like that in my head, she thought as the planet transformed yet again before her eyes, this time changing from a globe suspended against an infinitely large velvet blanket of emptiness to a very real place that a human being could relate to, a place that was familiar despite its obvious alienness.

Less than four hours later, Brooks made her second Martian landing approach of the day, this time on a local private skimmercraft she had boarded a little more than an hour after disembarking from the interplanetary transport at Bradbury. Because it was designed to fly only in the rarefied Martian atmosphere, the skimmer was configured quite differently than the vessel that had brought her here from Earth. It resembled one of the old-style airplanes that had ruled Earth’s skies for much of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, although this craft’s wings possessed far more lift-generating surface area than those of any terrestrial plane or glider, a feature made necessary by the relative insubstantiality of the atmosphere. The thinness of the Martian air also placed a fairly low ceiling on the skimmer’s maximum altitude, which Brooks estimated to be perhaps two-thirds that of a twentieth-century commercial jet. But even though the skimmer had to stay well inside the bounds of suborbital flight, and was presently descending at a far shallower angle than the interplanetary transport had, the aerial view it presented of this cold, rusty desolationscape of a world looked even more spectacular to Brooks than the view she had had from space.

“Glorious, isn’t it?” Representative Qaletaqu said from a seat on the opposite side of the skimmer’s modest passenger compartment, which was empty except for the two of them.

“Now I think I understand why you went into politics,” Brooks said, unable to tear her gaze away from the exterior view. “You’re telepathic.”

She heard him chuckle gently in response as she watched the rough southern highlands of Margaritifer Terra rolling away behind the skimmer’s belly as the craft headed nearly due west into the rising sun. The oddly diminished orb’s yellow rays scattered across the boulder-strewn eastern edge of Ophir Planum and glinted against the large pressure-dome habitats to the south. Her eyes moved north to follow the long, sinuous gouge of the Valles Marineris as it snaked its way back into the night that still enveloped the rugged highlands of Sinai Planum, Syria Planum, and the mighty space-scraping peak of Olympus Mons, all of which still lay below the approaching western horizon. As still more of the ancient Martian terrain rolled toward the skimmer, the horizon formed an ever-retreating line that appeared weirdly foreshortened because of the planet’s relatively small size, the relentlessly unfolding red-and-ocher landscape taking on the aspect of a forced-perspective painting.

“Thank you again for agreeing to show me your hometown,” Brooks said as she turned to face the Martian Colonies’ official representative to the Coalition Council. “It’s really very gracious of you—particularly after I ambushed you right before we left Earth.”

He smiled beneficently. “I’m more than happy to help a journalist who doesn’t seem hell-bent on making us all look like a bunch of ignorant hicks,” he said.

And it probably doesn’t hurt that he knows that Mars will be my last stop in the Sol system for the foreseeable future, she thought as she paused to contemplate the next leg of her outbound “frontier tour” with a mixture of anticipation and apprehension. He had to know as well as she did that the war correspondent beat she was heading out to cover could well take her on a one-way journey.

“I just want to write an honest account of how people are dealing with this Romulan conflict,” she said as she looked back toward the hazy sunrise, which now illuminated the upper reaches of the approaching Mariner Valley’s eastern extremity with a clarity she had never seen before, even in the high-definition holopics taken by aerial drones. “I intend to report from the home front all the way to the farthest-flung human settlements I can reach.”

And that’s because people need to know everything they can about whatever threat these Romulans really pose, she thought. Not to scare them away from deep space the way Naquase would, or send them packing back to Earth to hide under the bed. But to show them there’s nothing out there that we can’t find a way to deal with.

Or maybe even come to terms with.

“I’m curious,” he said. “Why did you pick Mars instead of the Luna colonies?”

The question surprised her. “Mars always seemed like the best offEarth starting place I could ask for to kick off a frontier tour like this one.”

“But why? I mean, Luna seems like a much rougher place than Mars, at least as frontiers go. At least Mars has an atmosphere, even if you can’t quite breathe it yet.”

Brooks reluctantly turned away from the vast, rapidly approaching canyon, facing him again. “I’ll grant you that your chances of surviving a rip in your suit are marginally better any place where there’s no hard vacuum waiting to boil your blood in your veins. On the other hand, Luna can never lull you into a false sense of security because it looks so much like Wyoming or New Mexico.”

“True enough,” he said. “But you go outside the Moon habs with a bad suit, it’ll all be over pretty darned fast.”

She nodded. “Also true. But on Luna you’re never more than a few hours away from the best medical care Earth has to offer, assuming that whatever mishap you’ve had doesn’t kill you outright. Besides, an airless place like Luna can’t whip up a funnel cloud that picks up enough iron-oxide dust to generate a high-voltage static charge. I saw one of those things discharge directly into a man once during a sudden windstorm near Sagan Station. It hit him like a Jovian lightning bolt. His suit’s electronics failed on the spot, and his helmet blew out like it was made of papier mâché. The only difference between dying that way and ripping your suit open in the Tycho crater is how long it takes you to die.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, his dusky features taking on a pensive cast.

Not eager to absorb anybody’s unsolicited sympathy, she continued with her original point. “Besides, I’ve visited the New Berlin colony a few times, as well as a couple of the other Lunar habs. I know that Luna used to be a legit frontier, at least once upon a time. But it’s turning into a posh low-g retirement resort. It’s a place where old folks who can never re-acclimate to Earth-normal gravity get to play golf all day under the Alan B. Shepard Dome without worrying about breaking a hip if they happen to take a fall. And their great-grandchildren on Earth are still close enough for regular visits.”

“Shows how long it’s been since I’ve been to Luna,” Qaletaqu said. “Here on Mars, we’ve come to think that Earth regards us as another Canada. Looks like the Moon has become another Florida.”

Brooks allowed a wry snicker to escape her lips. “It’s also a tourist trap. Did you know there’s a hotel and casino right smack in the Sea of Tranquillity now?”

He scowled. “No. But I hope they haven’t messed up the old Apollo landing sites. We learned our lesson about that sort of thing here when the workers at the Utopia Planitia settlement nearly backed over the Viking 2 lander with one of the mohole borers.”

“It looks like the Lunar Schooners had a similar experience,” she said. “At least all the artifacts and bootprints that Armstrong and Aldrin left behind are right there in the hotel lobby, on display in a vacuum chamber surrounded by a bunch of red velvet ropes. Uggh.” She shuddered theatrically.

She turned back toward the window as the skimmer plunged over the lip of the immensely broad, four-thousand-kilometer-long canyon, whose eastern side, now probably more than one hundred fifty klicks distant, had already retreated over the horizon. The skimmer then dived into the valley’s frost-and-fog-shrouded vertical expanse, spaces some seven kilometers deep that the approaching dawn had yet to penetrate. A pattern of approaching lights quickly emerged from the mist as the skimmer descended into the disconcerting darkness that obscured the canyon floor despite the persistent presence of a brightening purple-and-salmon sky directly overhead.

It took nearly a minute for Brooks to realize that the lights she saw weren’t intended to guide the skimmer to a landing strip on the ground. She grasped this fact at the same instant she realized that the lights weren’t even on the ground; rather, they were nestled all along the expanse of the vertical face of the rough southern wall of the Valles Marineris, like the windows of a steel-and-glass high-rise building melded seamlessly with the natural contours of Mars.

“Welcome to Popé Pueblo, Miz Brooks,” Qaletaqu said, speaking a place name that evoked images of the cliffside cavern dwellings in which his Anasazi, Hopi, and Pueblo ancestors had dwelled during pre-Columbian times in the deserts of North America’s southwest. “You’re about to visit the jewel of the Mariner Valley, and the home of my people—for now, at least.”

Brooks paused for a moment to wonder just what he meant by that. But before she could ask, the skimmer’s wheels made percussive but not violent contact with the kilometers-long ribbon of pressed regolith tarmac on the canyon floor. Her weight shifted forward distractingly against her seat restraints as the pilot began the final deceleration that would bring the vehicle to a slow, rolling stop.

Gannet Brooks’s first impression of the vast subterranean complex built by the citizens of Popé Pueblo—known as “Canyontown” to the locals—was that they had done an incredible job of living off the land.

According to the background Qaletaqu’s office had provided, this was no mere metaphor. The interiors of the Canyontowners’ pressurized, cliffside cavern dwellings had been hewn directly out of the red-brown Martian rock, thick stone walls being a survival necessity because the planet’s relatively insubstantial atmosphere provided essentially no protection against incoming radiation. The radiation-resistant windows through which the Canyontowners looked upon the still mostly untamed Martian surface were synthesized from the local minerals as well. The very air they breathed and the water they drank were likewise reconstituted, both from the Martian environment and the inhabitants’ own waste, abetted by the huge, industrial-scale atmosphere-processing units they had mounted along the canyon floor, the first place on the planet expected to provide a breathable-air, shirtsleeve environment, assuming that the Martian terraforming project continued at its present pace for at least the next few centuries.

The Canyontowners’ basic “build it here out of whatever’s handy” ethos allowed them to elevate their self-sufficiency to a fine art, with the vast majority of their food coming from the ranks of ultravioletshielded greenhouses they had arranged along the canyon lip, as well as from underground nurseries whose full-spectrum lights drew their power from the areothermal heat released through the mining moholes that the Dytallix-Barsoom Resource Extraction Corporation had sunk deep into the Red Planet’s thick mantle.

Brooks’s second impression of the Canyontowners was gained as Qaletaqu conducted her on a tour of the underground city’s brightly lit main street. Its charmingly anachronistic-looking array of apparently mom-and-pop, proprietor-run businesses were interspersed with a number of recognizable corporate franchises—starting with a tavern and hotel whose retro architecture and dungaree-clad habitués could have been taken directly from an old vid about North America’s Wild West. The Canyontowners themselves seemed paradoxically wild in their habits and culture, despite the obvious discipline the construction and maintenance of a safe, livable, and prosperous habitat such as Popé Pueblo in an environment as unforgiving as Mars required.

The first solid evidence of this dichotomy that she witnessed directly was the bar fight that broke out right before her eyes as she and Qaletaqu walked along the concrete walkway between the tavern and the storefront office of the Dytallix-Barsoom Resource Extraction Corporation. The tavern’s swinging doors had flown open just ahead of a pair of scuffling workmen, whose movements followed a weirdly elastic trajectory dictated by the low Martian gravity. Qaletaqu wasted no time plunging into their midst in order to separate the men, sending them on their respective ways once he’d determined that neither man had sustained any serious injuries and had extracted their mumbled pledges to cause no further trouble, at least for the rest of the day.

Brooks had expected Qaletaqu to offer a bouquet-and-fruit-basket-full of embarrassed apologies immediately after the fracas was done and the instigators had moved on. Instead he surprised her by commenting that since neither man had any critical duties to perform before sobriety returned, no harm had been done. Then he simply resumed the tour of central Canyontown to which he had been treating her, as though a bar fight that spilled into the street was the most ordinary occurrence imaginable. He must be messing with my head on purpose, she thought as she walked mutely beside him along Popé Boulevard. She decided right then and there not to let herself appear to be surprised in the least by any other strangeness she might see here. Grateful at least for this little bit of local color for her next news feature, she followed him across the empty, bare-rock street beneath the simulated sun that hung suspended from the high, cathedral-like ceiling.

They came to a stop on the concrete walkway that fronted what appeared to be a cluster of public buildings. Qaletaqu gestured toward an A-frame building that was unlike all the flatter, squatter structures that dominated central Canyontown. Standing directly between the office of the local sheriff and the town hall, both fashioned from stone slabs anchored in place jointly by gravity and Martian adobe, the peak-roofed building in the middle resembled a log house of the sort built by a number of ancient North American native tribes. Upon closer examination, however, it turned out to be composed of a local pressed-regolith concrete that had been formed, textured, and painted to resemble genuine wood, which was doubtless an exceedingly rare commodity on the treeless and still all-but-lifeless Red Planet.

In a voice filled with reverence, Qaletaqu explained that this place was the consecrated site of the local habak, or religious shrine, a sacred place where the Canyontowners came to seek guidance in the form of visions from their animal spirit guides and the shades of their dead ancestors.

When they aren’t brawling in the tavern, she thought, but refrained from saying aloud.

An hour or so later, after she had booked herself a room over Ahota’s Public House, Canyontown’s sole tavern, Brooks quietly took a seat in the back of the establishment’s smoky but surprisingly spacious game room. From the careworn condition of some of the furniture and fixtures, she concluded that the place must have been experiencing something of a slump recently, perhaps because the specter of war was never particularly friendly to the tourist trade of any nation or world.

Brooks watched as about two dozen of the locals, whose ages ranged from teen to elderly, slowly filled the room’s obviously temporary complement of plastiform folding chairs, which someone had arranged in three rough concentric circles around a forlorn-looking pool table. Quietly studying the primarily Native American but nevertheless highly variegated faces arrayed about her, she wondered whether the anarchic behavior she had seen so far today had been merely a fluke. She already strongly suspected it wasn’t, however, as she watched the grizzled old man who had taken the seat beside her busily typing on a square padd that had a larger than usual display, probably to accommodate his failing eyesight. The old man told her, without being asked, that he was working on a political manifesto. The elderly but strong-looking woman seated at his other side interrupted him long enough to explain that he’d been working diligently on this very same manifesto every day of the past twenty-two years. The old man then interrupted the interruption to describe his work as a reimagining of the Fundamental Declarations of the Martian Colonies, using a political vocabulary that made it sound like a weird and probably explosive mix of classical Marxism, post–World War III Meltdown Nihilism, Grange Populism, and grab-up-the-guns Ayn Rand Objectivist-Libertarianism. He finished his rhapsodic description by saying that his document, while still a work in progress, promised to deliver the long-sought-after goal of proving the ultimate perfectibility of human nature.

Good luck with that, she thought from behind her politest smile. She refrained from pointing out that a perfected human nature wasn’t likely to be of much more help against the Romulans than would the Canyontowners’ streak of eccentric, colorful independence.

As the old man returned to his work, Brooks continued to study the rest of the faces in the crowd. They displayed a panoply of diverse emotions ranging all the way from eager anticipation to stuporous boredom, but all of them living, breathing manifestations of that independent streak. Brooks considered using that singular characteristic as the primary angle for the profile she was going to write about these people. Based both on what she’d observed so far and the backgrounders she had read, she assumed that the Canyontowners’ ornery self-reliance shared an origin with the formal name the place had received from its Hopi-Pueblo expat founders—Popé Pueblo—when they had established it in 2109. A quick search of the local infonets right after she’d checked into her room revealed that Popé was the name of the Native American tribal leader who’d led the 1680 revolt against the Spanish conquerors who had dragged his people into forced labor in Mexican mines.

Brooks wondered if she was already becoming used to the weirdness of this place, so far from the mainstream of ordinary Earthbound human experience, yet so much closer to humanity’s cradle than Alpha Centauri, Tau Ceti, Altair, or any of the human species’ other long-term habitations. If human weirdness turns out to correlate positively with distance from Earth, she thought, then I’d better learn to anticipate strangeness and adapt to it a lot faster than I’ve been doing.

Of course, Brooks had already half expected something strange to come out of today’s public political meeting—a gathering that Qaletaqu himself had called in order to brief the people of his tribe on the report he was to deliver tomorrow morning under the Ares City Dome before the full Governing Council of the Confederated Martian Colonies—which wasn’t being held in the nominally official town hall across the street. And she received further confirmation of the weirdness of today’s meeting even before Mars’s official Coalition representative formally called the oddly informal proceedings to order.

This occurred when the local mining and areothermal power magnate who ran the Dytallix-Barsoom Resource Extraction Corporation, a grizzled, overall-clad man whom the two dozen or so people present called Kolichiyaw, abruptly rose from the folding chair between the two occupied, respectively, by Kwahu, Canyontown’s sheriff, and Cheveyo, the shaman in charge of Popé Pueblo’s communal habak.

“Where you off to, Kolichiyaw?” the sheriff said, polishing the star-shaped badge pinned to his black lapel with a soiled white sleeve. “The town meeting’s about to start.”

“I need a drink,” Kolichiyaw said, thrusting out his jaw belligerently. To Brooks’s eye, the BREMCO executive had already had more than enough to drink. “I’ll be right back.”

Still seated near the sheriff, Cheveyo the shaman shook her head. “You know the rules, Koli. There’s no drinkin’ at the town meetings.”

“The holy lady’s got it right, Kolichiyaw,” Sheriff Kwahu said. “Booze and politics don’t mix.”

Kolichiyaw stopped, turned around, and shook his head truculently. “No. Sobriety and politics don’t mix. Especially now that we’ve gotta worry about these Romans sneaking up on us on their way to Earth.”

“Romulans, Koli,” Kwahu said as he rose slowly from his seat. “They’re called Romulans.”

“Whatever. I’m goin’ to get a drink now. Be right back.” With that, the mining chief resumed his course for the bar.

“No,” Kwahu said, loudly enough to bring nearly all the ambient chatter in the room to a halt. “You’re not. If you have anything more to drink, you’d best head straight home instead of back here.”

Brooks watched as Kolichiyaw stopped in his tracks and faced the sheriff yet again. “Look, Kwahu, I really don’t see the problem with me grabbing a little drink, and then coming right back here with it ’fore the meetin’ starts.”

Kwahu shook his head and sighed sadly, then opened his coat momentarily, just long enough to reveal the presence of a rather nasty-looking pistol. The weapon still seemed disconcertingly handy despite the sheriff’s having allowed the flap of his coat to fall and conceal it again.

“Here’s the problem, Koli, at least as I see it,” Kwahu said languidly. “You break the no-drinking-at-public-meetings rule, and I’m going to shoot you. Okay?”

Brooks studied Kolichiyaw’s face very closely. The mining magnate stared back at the sheriff defiantly, his jaw muscles looking as taut as suspension bridge cables bearing far too much weight.

Though Brooks had sought a little local color to illustrate her journalistic portrait of Mars, she hoped not to find blood red on her painter’s palette. A frisson of real fear began surging through her, making her hyperalert to every motion, every facial tic, every nuance of behavior from the men who stood on either side of the standoff.

A tall, rail-thin woman dressed entirely in black rose from the chair positioned almost directly beneath the dart board and approached Kolichiyaw, coming to a stop directly at his side. Apparently unconcerned by the escalating tension between Kolichiyaw and the sheriff, she drew a small object from her pocket from which she extended a long metal strip, perhaps as wide as a human thumb. With the fluid motions of an expert, she anchored one end of the metal strip to the polished stone floor with her foot while extending the strip vertically by hand until its end came to a stop just about parallel to the crown of Kolichiyaw’s tousled head.

“Powaqa, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Kolichiyaw said, now looking profoundly irritated. “This is a damned inconvenient time to measure a man for a new suit.”

The woman reeled the metal strip most of the way in, then took a quick horizontal measurement of Kolichiyaw’s shoulders.

“Not if it’s the suit he’s likely to be buried in,” she said.

“Goddamned corporate royalty,” the old man beside Brooks said as he cast a scowl in Kolichiyaw’s direction. “Think they own the whole damned planet, while we just live on it like the fleas on a big, red, dusty dog.”

“What’s it gonna be, Koli?” Sheriff Kwahu said, tempered steel behind his voice now, his gaze as hard as the local granite.

Despite the obviously sincere warning, neither Kolichiyaw nor the tall, slender woman he had called Powaqa made any move to remove themselves from harm’s way.

Brooks leaned toward the old man who sat beside her, still— amazingly—typing his manifesto. Hiking a thumb toward Powaqa, she said, “Who is she, the town tailor?”

“Yup,” the old man said without looking up from his padd.

Plagued by stereotypical images of the black-clad frontier town morticians for whom pistol-wielding gunfighters created so much business in those ancient Wild West films, Brooks was relieved to hear that Powaqa was merely a clothier.

“She’s the undertaker, too,” the old man continued, grinning as he typed. “Saves a lot of time.”

Qaletaqu entered the room at that moment, rapidly approaching the pool table at the room’s center.

His shoulders suddenly slumping, Kolichiyaw’s defiant manner collapsed into a heterogeneous mixture of resignation and the grumblings of a little kid caught misbehaving. After spending another heartbeat or two in sullen silence looking at the sheriff, he spared a glance at Qaletaqu before meekly taking his seat. The undertaker-cum-tailor did likewise, but not before casting a brief glance at Brooks—a conspicuous stranger in Canyontown, after all—which warned her that Powaqa probably saw her as a potential customer, visitors to Mars sometimes being insufficiently detail-oriented to survive that first (and potentially last) hike outside the safety of the pressurized habitats.

“All right,” Kolichiyaw muttered as the sheriff sat beside him. “Let’s get this damned thing over with before those last three whiskeys start to wear off.”

Okay, so these people do have a few rules, Brooks thought as the air filled with convivial greetings for Qaletaqu, who wasted no time hopping up onto the pool table, an astonishingly graceful-looking move in the weak Martian gravity. They just don’t believe in standing on ceremony over the really trivial ones.

It was now becoming crystal clear to her that the truly important rules—such as the ones that required people to stay sober in extremely unforgiving environments such as airlocks, the Martian surface, and local political conclaves—had to be enforced to a fault in order to ensure the long-term survival and continued smooth functioning of the entire settlement. It makes sense, she thought. Especially considering that these people have managed to survive for nearly half a century out here on the ragged edge of human existence.

That thought reminded Brooks that Canyontown’s almost entirely Hopi/Pueblo population, around twenty-thousand strong at present, had descended from North American desert cliff dwellers, people who had also “lived on the edge,” quite literally, for millennia. Some of these same people had adapted that heritage to the clusters of high-rise towers that had arisen all over the Earth during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries; they had become the iron workers who fearlessly walked the narrow paths of steel beams and girders that crisscrossed the skylines they’d helped to fill with iconic monuments of steel and glass.

It was no wonder that these people could eke out a living in a precarious place like Mars, whatever changes the act of adapting to such environments might wreak upon them. Brooks wondered if living on the edge might not be in their very blood, just as their fierce streak of independence, a trait they had first demonstrated to the ancient Spaniards, seemed to be.

Mars doesn’t hold any terror for them, she thought. It’s only encouraged a healthy respect for a world that could kill them all in a heartbeat if they were to allow themselves to get careless or cocky.

Could part of that respect have arisen from the recognition that Mars was one of the few places left in the solar system where such an independent people could truly be themselves? She couldn’t help but wonder when the Canyontowners’ notions of personal and political sovereignty would force them to move on yet again in search of another new home, perhaps orbiting a star that no other human had ever approached.

Using the pool table as a platform, Qaletaqu raised his hands to call for silence. It was clear from the generally warm reaction across the room that the planetary representative to the Coalition Council was one of Canyontown’s favorite sons.

“Before we get sidetracked into discussions of potholes and the new pooper-scooper law,” he said once the room had fallen more or less silent, “let me start with the one topic I know is on everybody’s minds—the Romulans.”

He paused to allow good-natured laughter and murmurs of assent to cross the room back and forth in a series of waves before he continued.

“Unless you’ve been stuck at the bottom of a deep hole on Deimos for the past two Sols, you already know that the Vulcans have decided to leave this entire system essentially undefended except for some sort of detection grid that they assure us will give us advance warning when unauthorized warp-driven ships approach. Vulcan’s Coalition delegation gave every assurance that the thing will work as advertised.”

“Ha!” the old man with the manifesto in his lap called out.

“I share your skepticism, Ahota,” Qaletaqu said, taking the interruption completely in stride and prompting Brook’s belated recognition that the crazy old-timer was the tavern/hotel’s owner. “But we really don’t have a lot of choice other than to take the Vulcans’ assurances at face value.”

“The problem with doing that,” Sheriff Kwahu said, turning his chair around backward so he could drape himself over the back as he sat, “is that we’re liable to get considerably less advance warning than Earth does.”

“It’s nobody’s fault that Mars is a few million klicks closer to the system’s edge than Earth is,” Kolichiyaw said with a theatrical shrug. “Hell, I always thought that was a big part of this godforsaken dust-ball’s charm.”

A low chuckle passed through the gathering.

“That’s true enough,” Qaletaqu said, slowly walking along the pool table’s length as though it were a stage. “But we’re still stuck with the fact that we have a lot less leverage over Vulcan than either Earth or the Centauri do. And they couldn’t persuade Vulcan to reconsider its decision, even working together.”

A brown-skinned, deeply wrinkled man with flashing eyes and iron-colored, shoulder-length hair rose from a seat in the back of the room.

“We do have at least one other option,” the older man said. Brooks noticed that every head in the room turned attentively toward him, a courtesy that not even the town sheriff received without displaying his shooting iron.

“And what option is that, Katowa my father?” Qaletaqu said. His tone sounded outwardly respectful, though Brooks sensed that the representative was waging a mighty internal struggle to maintain it.

Katowa.

Brooks recognized the name from her background research. This regal-looking man was Qaletaqu’s father, the ceremonial chief of the Martian Hopi-Pueblo nation, a man who had served for many years as the Martian Colonies’ official representative to the United Earth government, prior to its having become one of the founding members of the Coalition of Planets. According to his official bio, Katowa had restricted his activities to Mars during recent years as his advancing age had made him increasingly intolerant of Earth’s much higher gravity. Brooks knew that although Katowa was not the designated head of Canyontown’s government—and therefore could not make any decisions for Canyontown by fiat—she also knew that he was regarded across Mars as one of the planet’s wisest heads, and certainly commanded the respect of everyone in the room.

Katowa walked slowly toward the pool table as he responded to his son’s question. “It is the only option that does not require our meek acceptance of whatever mere scraps others deign to hand to us, Qaletaqu my son.”

“Right on!” Ahota called out. “We’ve been on Mars long enough! Time to pull up stakes and move on!”

Ahota’s wife shushed him with a swift elbow to the ribs.

“With respect, Ahota,” Qaletaqu said, “we still have much work ahead of us here in remaking this world into something the spirits of our ancestors would recognize.”

Katowa came to a stop at the pool table’s edge, his hands clasped before him as he gazed up at Qaletaqu, dark eyes as patient as the ages, and yet filled with an awful urgency.

“The Romulans may not allow that, my son,” the chief said as he carefully stepped up onto the pool table’s surface via a chair placed beside him by the sheriff. “The conflict that is coming is a sign from the spirit world that the time has come once again for the tribe to seek a new home.”

Qaletaqu spread his hands before him in a placating gesture. “We already have a home, father. It is the Valles Marineris.”

“Mars has never been more than a temporary camp site,” Katowa said with a slow shake of his gray-maned head. “The galaxy abounds with new worlds that the spirits of our ancestors would recognize far more readily than they would this one, Qaletaqu. Worlds that need not be remade from scratch. Worlds upon which our tribe might at long last establish a permanent home among rivers and trees and living things, where the very skies do not conspire to kill us.”

Well, running away is certainly one way of dealing with the Romulans, Brooks thought. But out in the wide wicked galaxy, that tactic will work about as well as it would on the local playground bully.

Unfortunately, a whole lot more people, both on Earth and off, were all but certain to embrace this wrong-headed idea, so long as opinion makers like Keisha Naquase—not to mention Chief Katowa—insisted on promoting it.

But Qaletaqu appeared to see this issue the same way Brooks did.

“The tribe has lived here for less than half a century, as measured in the years of our ancestors,” he said. “Frankly, that’s little more than a rounding error compared to the way they reckoned time. They used to consider the future ramifications of their every decision out to seven generations.”

“Had the Romulans menaced our ancestors,” the old man said, “their progeny might never have made it all the way to the present generation.”

“The Great Spirit has never granted us guarantees, Father, only opportunities.”

“Agreed. We should seize the best possible opportunity for the tribe’s continued survival.”

Qaletaqu looked disappointed, but not deterred. “Wouldn’t a decision to leave now, rather than to stay and help all the other tribes of humanity to fight the war that’s coming, merely be capitulation to yet another conqueror? I think the spirit of Popé would not be pleased.”

Katowa stood in silence, facing his son, apparently absorbing and considering his sharp words. Brooks thought those words had cut him deeply, judging from the moisture she saw gleaming in the old man’s eyes.

“I stand by my recommendation,” the old chief said at length. “But I will defer to the wisdom of the vote of the Canyontown Commission.”

Which meant, so far as Brooks understood it, the adult population of this tavern’s game room. She already knew that Katowa’s opinion carried tremendous weight with Canyontown’s rank-and-file citizenry.

What she didn’t know and wouldn’t discover, at least not before what looked to be a very close vote was counted and counted again, was whether or not Katowa could sway a prosperous, settled people into becoming a band of nomads with a future at least as uncertain as the one that included joining the war against the Romulans.

Brooks was relieved to see that Qaletaqu’s view held the day, if only by a whisker. It was only after the second count had been completed— the first count had resulted in a tie—that she realized she had been holding her breath.

Katowa and approximately half the room took in the news of their defeat stoically. The last thing these people were, after all, was a collection of whiners.

“So we Canyontowners will stay right where we are,” Qaletaqu said afterward, in a tone of peroration that clearly signaled that the day’s business was very nearly done. “We’ve invested far too much sweat and blood in this valley, and in this planet, to simply abandon it. We’ll make the most of every last split-second of advance warning the Vulcans can give us before the Romulans come. After all, they’ll have to get past the patrol zones of both the Titan outpost and Jupiter Station before they reach the cold far shore of the inner solar system.

“And once they get here,” Qaletaqu said with a fire behind his eyes that Brooks found both inspiring and frightening, “we’ll give ’em a fight that’ll make our forefather Popé proud.”

The next day, as another interplanetary transport carried her on toward the next stop on her outbound tour, Gannet Brooks reviewed the audio recording she had made of Qaletaqu’s words as she looked out one of the aft observation ports. The cold, rocky world in whose deepest places the determined people of Canyontown had built a home was a rapidly retreating red-and-brown crescent.

Popé, she recalled, had prevailed against the invading Spaniards, overcoming long odds with moxie, determination, and careful planning. But the people who had followed him into battle had eventually succumbed to infighting and disunity. She breathed a silent prayer of hope that the Martians, particularly the Canyontowners, would do better.

Just as she fervently hoped that they wouldn’t inadvertently vindicate Keisha Naquase’s peace-at-any-cost philosophy by getting themselves wiped out in the conflagration that was coming.

SIXTEEN

Wednesday, July 30, 2155
Vulcan Cargo Ship Kiri-kin-tha, en route to Vulcan

THE STERILE, BRIGHTLY LIT ROOM came back into existence around him yet again, though he still remembered nothing clearly other than the fact that he had already fallen asleep and woken up here, on a medical bed, several times before. But he still could recall very little that had preceded the first time he’d seen this place.

Just as he couldn’t remember ever having awakened here entirely alone except for the woman who called herself Ych’a sitting at his side, practically hovering over him.

“Terix,” she said. “I’m glad to see you are awake again.”

Terix.

They kept telling him that was his name. It sounded familiar in his ears, yet somehow alien, at least in contrast to many of the other names he’d heard spoken on this ship since his arrival here. Terix. Whether it belonged to him or not, it was a name, probably as good as any other, and it gave him something positive to hang on to.

“Terix,” he said, sitting up in the infirmary bed.

She fixed him with a knowing gaze. “It sounds strange to you,” she said, not asking a question, “when I speak your name.”

For such a stoic woman, he found her perspicacity very surprising. “Yes. Yes, it does.” He frowned. “But why should that be?”

“That is because, strictly speaking, it isn’t really your name.”

His feeling of surprise leveled out, transforming into a deep wariness. “That isn’t what you told me before.”

“That is because I could not afford to reveal the whole truth to you until I could do so in private. Since no patients require treatment presently, Doctor Sivath and her staff are occupied elsewhere. Therefore, this is my first opportunity to be fully candid with you.”

He vaguely recalled someone telling him that Vulcans never lied. That notion grappled in the depths of his hindbrain with a lingering sense of distrust.

“All right,” he said, and swung his legs over the side of the bed. His bare feet were touching the cold floor, but he remained seated, dressed in a loose-fitting infirmary gown and a single tangled blanket. “Go ahead and be candid.”

She nodded. After a pause to look over her shoulder, apparently to assure their continued privacy, she met his stare head-on and said, “Although you have been operating as Terix of Romulus for the last fourteen years, your real name is Tevik of Vulcan.”

“Operating?”

“You have been carrying out a long-term deep-cover assignment on Romulus for the V’Shar, Vulcan’s principal intelligence agency.”

He ran his fingertips over the prominent ridge that crossed his brow and subtly jutted over his eyes. “ I am a Vulcan and not a Romulan?”

She nodded. “That is correct. Your Romulan appearance is the result of cosmetic surgery. It is easy enough to verify, should you require proof.”

He also supposed it would be equally easy for Ych’a to rig a medical scanner so that it would support whatever “facts” she wished him to believe.

A people who cannot lie, yet they have a spy bureau, he thought as he began to perceive just how difficult it was to know how far he ought to extend his trust.

Finally he decided to accept Ych’a at face value, at least until and unless she gave him a good reason to withdraw that acceptance.

“That won’t be necessary,” he said at length. “But I do have some questions.”

“Undoubtedly,” she said.

“I feel... intensely conflicted emotions. I thought Vulcans were not subject to such things.”

“Vulcans experience essentially the same emotions as do other humanoid species. We have developed many psychological and physiological mechanisms to control and suppress them, however.”

He thought he was beginning to understand. “But Romulans have not.”

“Correct. And many of your emotional suppression systems have been medically modified, just as both your external appearance and your memory engrams have been altered.”

Memory? This was all going to take some time to sort out, let alone accept. “To enable me to pass among Romulans as Terix?” he said.

“Yes. Some of your emotional dysfunction may also stem from the same recent head injuries that have at least temporarily prevented you from accessing many years of your memories.”

He felt his eyes narrow involuntarily. “My own Vulcan memories? Or memory engrams prepared for me by this... V’Shar intelligence bureau?”

“At present, you appear to be unable to access either set of memories to any significant extent. Doctor Sivath believes this may be the result of the action of a built-in Vulcan neurological defense mechanism.”

“Defense mechanism,” he said, trying to match the flatness of her affect despite the spiral of confusion he felt rising within his breast.

“Your mind needs to determine which of the two conflicting identities locked in your brain’s memory engrams is genuine: that of Tevik of Vulcan or that of Terix of Romulus.

“Once your mind resolves that conflict, your brain should respond by bringing the appropriate memories—and identity—to the surface almost immediately. Disconnected fragments of your artificial memory engrams may linger for some time thereafter, until they are finally subsumed and overwritten by the genuine ones.”

The prospect of laying his last lingering doubts to rest was an attractive one indeed. “How can this be this done?” he asked.

She closed the distance between them until they were almost nose to nose. Her hands, fingers extended almost like claws, extended toward his face. He tried not to flinch or display any fear as her fingertips made contact with his temples. The effect was jolting, like a mild electric shock.

“Therapeutic mind-melds, conducted in a series,” she said. The feeling of electricity briefly intensified before it began giving way to a rising wave of euphoria.

“My mind to your mind,” Ych’a said.

The wave rose further still until it engulfed him, crashed over him, and carried him away.

SEVENTEEN

Jupiter Station

GANNET BROOKS CURSED QUIETLY after the transport vessel’s captain had announced the unscheduled one-day layover at Jupiter Station, a development that she’d assumed had something to do with the ominous vibrations and noises she’d noticed right around the time the ship had passed the large, nearly round minor planet Vesta.

But that was only the bad news, and it wasn’t altogether bad at that. After all, Brooks now had an opportunity to try for on-the-fly interviews with Jupiter Station’s usually isolated staff. Like the lonely keepers of Earth’s ancient lighthouses, or the scientists in the Antarctic outposts of previous centuries, these folks were almost sure to be eager to share their perspectives about war, peace, and who knew what else.

But Brooks put those plans on hold the moment she looked out the window beside her seat. Despite the overpowering multi-hued vista of Jupiter that dominated her view of space, she couldn’t help but notice that an NX-class starship was docked alongside the landing slot that her own transport was approaching.

Enterprise? she thought as her eyes searched the starship’s battle-worn blue-gray hull for markings. She wondered whether Travis would have time for a sit-down interview over dinner. Better yet, he might get her access to Captain Archer, who might be eager to share his side of the Kobayashi Maru incident with her audience.

No, not Enterprise, she realized a moment later as she recalled that the NX-01 was still quite far away from Earth. It’s Columbia. Probably picking up or dropping off equipment related to the new Vulcan defense grid.

It was all Brooks could do not to run down the gangway once the transport’s stewards had opened the inner airlocks, allowing the small craft’s dozen or so passengers, mostly well-heeled tourists from Earth and Mars, to disembark.

She had known enough starfarers, both in and out of Starfleet, during her journalistic career to know that the bar was her best starting place. Within perhaps ten minutes, she was rewarded with the sight of several people dressed in identical dark blue Starfleet coveralls.

Brooks decided to approach the nearest uniformed person, a young woman with flaming red hair who was sitting alone at a table near the room’s center, finishing up a sandwich and a tall glass of beer.

Pausing for a moment to study the rank insignia on the woman’s collar, Brooks said, “Mind if I join you, Ensign?”

The officer took a final swallow of beer, pushed her mostly empty plate to the side, and gestured noncommittally at the chair on the small table’s opposite side. “Go right ahead,” she said, speaking in a brogue that evoked images of the Scottish highlands. “I’m afraid I can’t stay long, though.”

Brooks sat, nodding. “Ah. Setting up the warp-field detection grid must be keeping you pretty busy.” Extending her right hand across the table, she added, “My name is Gannet Brooks. I’m a journalist from Newstime.”

A look of recognition ignited behind the young woman’s eyes, replacing the momentary glare of suspicion that had preceded it. “Sidra Valerian,” she said, apparently granting Brooks at least a little provisional trust. Valerian rose slightly from her chair momentarily as she grasped Brook’s proffered hand. “I’m the chief communications officer aboard the Starship Columbia.”

“Do you mind sharing some of your thoughts about the Romulan conflict with my audience?”

Ensign Valerian appeared to mull that over for a moment. “On or off the record?”

Brooks smiled slyly. “Entirely up to you. And if your captain wants to chime in as well, on or off the record, then so much the better.”

After another several heartbeats of silent contemplation, Valerian returned Brooks’s smile and waved to a passing waiter who was carrying a number of exotic-looking fluted bottles.

Before getting comfortable, Brooks reached into her pocket, her fingers immediately closing around the reassuring rectangular shape of her official Newstime credit chit.

EIGHTEEN

Day Three, Month of re’T’Khutai
Wednesday, July 30, 2155
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

“ADMIRAL, I HAVE UNCOVERED some of the details regarding Thhaei’s plan to help the humans repel the surprise attacks against their homeworld and colonies,“ Commander T’Voras announced from the small viser that sat atop the massive sherawood desk.

Not entirely surprised by this news, Admiral Valdore i’Kaleh tr’Irrhaimehn continued slowly running the laser sharpener along the gleaming edge of the dathe’anofv-sen, his Honor Blade, before returning the weapon reverently to the display rack mounted on his office’s rear wall.

Curious as to how his own vantage point on the Thaessu—the Vulcan cousins of the Romulan people—might differ from that of one of his most accomplished ship captains, Valdore turned to face the image hovering over his desk.

“Tell me,” he said.

“The Thaessu are assisting the hevam of Earth and its outsystem holdings in the installation and maintenance of systemwide sensor networks,” T’Voras said, his manner pleasingly crisp and disciplined. “Their purpose is to provide advance warning of the approach of hostile warp-driven vessels.”

“Precisely how much early warning are you talking about, Commander?”

“I can only estimate, Admiral. But given the necessity of coming out of warp with sufficient error margins to avoid colliding with our targets or overshooting them, the warning network could give the Earthers upwards of several dierha to prepare for our arrival.”

“That could constitute a significant fraction of a Terran day,” Valdore said, trying to come to terms with a rumor that was looking increasingly like a bitter reality. The human journalist Naquase’s initial reports about this very subject, which had reached the ears of the Tal Shiar even as they had saturated the Coalition’s public newsnets, appeared to be based upon something more tangible than hearsay.

T’Karik’s balls, he thought as he began to spin new alternative strategic and tactical scenarios on the fly. Our misbegotten leaf-eating relations really could cost us the element of surprise. And we’re going to need that if we are to claim a decisive and early victory, even with the advantage of the arrenhe’hwiua telecapture weapon.

T’Voras continued, “I have to assume, Admiral, that similar warp-detection grids could soon protect other Coalition worlds. Perhaps even all of them.”

“I agree, Commander,” Valdore said with a stern nod. “We must take no unnecessary chances.” Praetor D’deridex’s incessant tantrums and ceaseless demands notwithstanding.

“Perhaps a revision of our attack timetable is in order then, Admiral.”

Valdore raised an eyebrow inquisitively. “A revision?”

“I recommend that we move up our assault on Earth. We should attack immediately, Admiral.”

“That operation will depend greatly on our strategic assets on Isneih Kre,” Valdore said, frowning as he considered the world that the hevam called Calder II. He had been hearing entirely too much of this sort of thing from the Empire’s ever more irrational—not to mention militarily inept—praetor. “Our force buildup in the Isneih system is far from complete.”

He paused momentarily as he considered a third alternative.

“Then I will await your orders, Admiral,” T’Voras said, signaling that he was finished both with his report and with his military recommendations.

“Thank you, Commander. I will brief you and the rest of the flag-rank command staff with an alternative battle plan very shortly. Valdore out.” And with that he toggled a switch atop his desk, causing T’Voras’s image to vanish.

He activated another switch. “Nijil, this is Valdore.”

The life-sized head and shoulders of Valdore’s chief technologist manifested over the desk like an apparition a moment later.

“What can I do for you today, Admiral?” said the scientist, who wore his customary unsmiling, almost wary expression.

Speaking with a spareness and efficiency born of long practice, Valdore explained the potentially devastating change that the Vulcans had just wrought to the tactical landscape.

“You told me recently that one of your research staff has achieved a breakthrough of sorts,” Valdore added once he had finished bringing Nijil up to date.

His eyes grown large with alarm, the technologist said, “We have indeed recently broken significant new theoretical ground, Admiral.”

Valdore scowled. “Theoretical. Nothing practical?”

“Admiral, many engineering problems still remain to be solved before either the cloaking device project or the avaihh lli vastam will be ready for full deployment. We are still six khaidoa away from full production readiness, at least.”

“You’re talking about half a fvheisn or more!” That was at least half the time it took for Romulus and Remus to tumble jointly about Eisn, the bright yellow star that sustained both worlds.

“Conservatively, Admiral. It was all in the morning departmental update report.”

Valdore muttered a curse and gave the chief technologist a brusque dismissal before switching off the viser by pounding his fist on the switch.

Departmental update reports, he thought, fulminating. Who in all the hells of Erebus has the time to wade through all of that kllhe’mnhe? With the Coalition planets, particularly the Earthers, expanding relentlessly into the formerly sacrosanct far Avrrhinul Outmarches that abutted the core territories of Romulan space, an obsessive commitment to paperwork was something the admiral simply couldn’t afford.

Regardless, Nijil had told him what he’d most needed to know: a reliable warp-seven stardrive remained out of the Romulan Star Empire’s reach, as did a practical cloaking device capable of shielding his ships from detection.

He mulled over Nijil’s unpleasant revelations, his mind racing as it resumed the strategic and tactical improvisations he had begun spinning during his conversation with T’Voras.

Then the idea came to him. It arrived more or less fully formed, as though one of the ancient gods of his ancestors had whispered it directly into his ear.

Now he could see a way to incorporate T’Voras’s recommendation with the untoward news that both the commander and Doctor Nijil had brought him. The new scheme would of necessity involve some degree of delay to the large-scale invasion plans, but would neither interfere with the fleet’s current spate of small-scale, morale-sapping raids nor bind the Empire’s military to Nijil’s whimsically elastic schedules. But most significantly, it still augured a relatively swift and sure Romulan victory over both the humans and their Coalition allies.

Unless, of course, he thought, a certain troublesome Praetor tries to intervene at an inopportune time.

NINETEEN

Wednesday, August 6, 2155
Jokhang Temple, Barkhor Square
Lhasa, Tibet, Earth

KEISHA NAQUASE’S EXHALATIONS STEAMED in the cold, rarefied air of the plaza, and her breathing sounded labored in her own ears as she walked. Pointedly trying to avoid casting a longing eye on the comparative warmth and comfort of the ornate compound nearby—an ancient temple-and-monastery complex known to the locals as “the White House of the Buddha”—Naquase wasted as little time as possible broaching the topic that was uppermost on her mind.

“Your Holiness,” Naquase said as she made a slight adjustment to the small but conspicuous cam she wore on the right side of her head. “My audience would very much like to hear your thoughts about the coming Romulan threat.”

The unlined face of Lian Hua An Gyatso, the eighteenth incarnation in the unbroken line of enlightened beings known across the planet and beyond as the Dalai Lama, displayed an attentive, thoughtful expression as she walked beside the journalist, her saffron robes gathered tightly about her. Then she came to a stop, placed her hands behind her back, and stared at the horizon.

After a lengthy pause, the wad of bubblegum that had temporarily paused in its agitations inside the Enlightened One’s mouth issued a resounding crack. The sharp report echoed like an old-style pistol shot across the sea of seventh-century paving stones that fronted the elegantly ornate four-story temple and quite possibly rattled the teeth of the small, mixed group of human monks and Vulcan wisdom-seekers that Naquase had seen meditating as she’d passed through the willow grove in the walled enclosure called the Jowo Utra.

A look of confusion abruptly wrinkled the teenaged Asian girl’s otherwise unlined countenance. “You want my thoughts about the what now?”

This response brought Naquase up short. The last time she had met the one tagged with Buddhism’s most revered title, the person in question had been a wizened old man whose quiet, studious manner had made his status as the carrier of seventeen lifetimes worth of experience and wisdom genuinely plausible, even to a nonbeliever.

The current Dalai Lama, however, had not only just placed Naquase’s admittedly tenuous regard for Buddhism’s axiom of reincarnation in serious jeopardy, but had also made the journalist speculate that the teenager might be living proof that the universe was ruled by a supreme being whose wicked sense of humor included a penchant for practical jokes. After all, hadn’t Voltaire once said that God was merely a comedian playing before an audience that was afraid to laugh?

“The Romulans,” Naquase repeated with a patience that she hoped did not yet sound as labored as her breathing felt.

A look of recognition suddenly crossed the young holy woman’s face, and she chewed her gum again several more times, making loud smacking sounds in the process.

“Oh. Yeah. Romulans. Sorry,” she said, still chewing. “Spiritual enlightenment and stuff doesn’t leave me a whole lot of free time to look at the news, y’know?”

Easy, Keisha, Naquase thought, casting her eyes momentarily upon the dignified and beautiful gilt-roofed structures that dominated the center of the ancient, twenty-five-thousand-square-meter temple complex. This place made it through the reign of the Bönpo king and the Mongol raids. It’ll survive until the monks find Dalai Lama Number Nineteen.

“That’s perfectly understandable, Your Holiness,” Naquase said, not wishing to risk alienating either her interview subject or the billion-plus Buddhists who might hear her words.

“You’re talking about those new aliens or whatever that nobody’s actually seen yet,” the Dalai Lama Lian said, just before loudly cracking her gum once again.

Naquase nodded even as she struggled to avoid staring in appalled fascination. “The Romulans, Your Holiness. They’re already keeping the United Earth government and Starfleet intensely busy right now making war preparations. Even sight unseen.”

“Oh, yeah,” Her Holiness said. “By the way, could you just call me Lian from now on, instead of using all this ‘Your Holiness’ stuff?”

Naquase paused to swallow. It seemed to be getting harder to keep her breathing under control. “All right. Um, Lian. How will the Romulan threat affect you and your... adherents?”

“You mean, how will the Romulans affect us as pacifists?”

Naquase quickly concluded that this girl was a lot smarter than she appeared to be. Of course, she’d almost have to be. “Exactly,” she said.

Dalai Lama Lian Hua An Gyatso put her hands together before her, her neck and shoulders bobbing in a motion halfway between a bemused shrug and a prayerful bow.

“My take on these Romulans is probably quite a bit different from yours,” she said at length.

“Really?” Naquase said, once again surprised. “You’re familiar with my work?”

Lian popped her gum. “Well, like I already told you, I only get to, you know, take a peek at the news every once and a while. But it’s not as though the monks keep me walled up in a tower someplace. Does that surprise you?”

Naquase shook her head. “Not really. But I am surprised to hear that your take on the Romulans differs so much from mine. Are you endorsing United Earth’s policy of sending our Starfleet and MACO forces to build garrisons across the galaxy?”

The Dalai Lama coughed and sputtered, then paused for a moment to recover her breath. “Sorry. You almost made me swallow my gum there. No, of course I don’t want United Earth to turn the galaxy into, you know, some sort of armed camp. But I don’t think we’ll get anywhere by, you know, trying to hide under the bed, either.”

“Then it sounds as though you believe that fighting is going to be inevitable.”

“The only thing that’s inevitable is fear,” the young holy woman said. “Especially when the thing you’re scared of is something you haven’t even seen yet. But maybe the only reason we’re all so scared right now is because we still haven’t seen the face of this, you know, boogeyman or whatever the Romulans really are.”

“We already know that they’re hostile. Calder II, Alpha Centauri, and Tarod IX taught us that.”

The new Dalai Lama half-shrugged, half-bowed again. “Actually, all we really know is that the Romulans, you know, attacked those places. But what we don’t know is why.”

“Does the why of things really matter all that much when the stakes are life and death?” Naquase said. “Maybe even life and death for an entire sentient species?”

“Maybe the why is the only thing that does matter,” Lian said. “I mean, maybe the Romulans are, you know, acting out because all the human settlements we’re always setting up Out There are scaring them. ’Course, we won’t ever be able to figure that out if all we do is run away.”

“Are you saying that United Earth may have no choice other than to face the Romulans?”

“Face ’em, yes. Fight ’em, no. If the Romulans are, you know, the thinking creatures we like to believe we are, then we’ll work something out.”

Naquase smiled. “Maybe we’re actually on the same page on this issue after all, Your Holiness.”

“Lian,” corrected the Dalai Lama, snapping her gum.

“Lian. Sorry.”

Looking somber, the young holy woman said, “We’re only almost on the same page, though. I mean, I can remember you saying we probably never should have started, you know, spreading out into the galaxy in the first place.”

Naquase nodded. “Let’s just say I’ve had my doubts about that ever since the Xindi attack.”

“Same as a lot of people. But we prolly shouldn’t be making any jeye-normous decisions about the future while we’re afraid. And didn’t having starships and people out there, on the frontier or whatever, head off a follow-up attack that would have blown up the whole planet? We found a way to head the thing off other than, you know, war, because the Xindi seem to think the same way we do.”

“Point taken,” Naquase said. “But what if it turns out we can’t deal with the Romulans on that level? What if we end up having no choice other than fighting to the finish in order to survive?”

Naquase knew that she wanted peace fervently. But she also knew she was no pacifist, at least in the sense that she’d meekly allow an enemy to slaughter her people merely to maintain some state of ideological purity. On that issue, at least, she knew that she and Buddhism’s most revered spiritual leader had to part company.

Apparently lost in thought, the eighteenth Dalai Lama pulled a tissue from the pocket in the front of her robe and spat her gum into it. It was only after the holy young woman had tucked the tissue away that Naquase noticed the cool fires blazing in her dark eyes.

Those fires directly evoked the memory of her predecessor’s gaze. When she spoke, the words sent a chill down Naquase’s spine that had nothing to do with the cold morning air.

“Then the human race isn’t half as smart as we like to think it is.”

Enterprise, en route to Earth

”Then the human race isn’t half as smart as we like to think it is,” the eighteenth Dalai Lama said, exhibiting a wisdom far beyond her apparent years.

Seated before the communications console on Enterprise’s quiet bridge, Ensign Hoshi Sato quietly absorbed the final two minutes of Keisha Naquase’s latest report from the home front, watching the video on her station’s flat screen and taking the audio in through her earpiece. She felt reasonably confident that humanity wouldn’t disappoint Earth’s reputedly most enlightened soul.

But the Romulans might be a different story, she thought.

An amber light began flashing on her console at that moment, prompting her to tap the adjacent incoming message button, followed by the standard acknowledgment signal control. Then she turned toward the bridge’s center, where Commander T’Pol was seated in the captain’s chair staring over Ensign Travis Mayweather’s shoulders at the starscape displayed on the forward viewer.

“The Andorian transport vessel Gankerev has just hailed us,” Sato said. “They anticipate docking with us within the hour, and I have acknowledged.”

“Thank you, Ensign,” the Vulcan said. “Ensign Mayweather.”

Travis turned his chair away from the starscape until he faced both T’Pol and Sato, his face as expressionless as the Vulcan’s. “Commander?”

“I understand that the purpose of our rendezvous with the Gankerev is not merely to bring us additional supplies,” T’Pol said.

“That’s right, Commander,” the pilot said with a tense but otherwise affect-free nod. “I’ll be going aboard her before she leaves. The captain of the Gankerev has agreed to ferry me to my next assignment, so I should be aboard Discovery in time to help with her launch from the San Francisco yards three weeks from now.”

Thanks to all the quiet and not-so-quiet private conversations she’d had with Travis since the Kobayashi Maru incident about his future career plans, Sato was intimately familiar with Discovery, the still-under-construction fourth starship in Starfleet’s warp-five-capable NX-class. The recent escalations in Earth’s defense posture resulting from Vulcan’s decision to play “hands off” regarding the Romulans had forced Starfleet to pull out all the stops in hastening Discovery’s readiness for space.

T’Pol nodded to Mayweather in emotionless acknowledgment. “If you wish to leave the bridge now to make your final departure preparations, I will call Crewman Beaton to take your post for the remainder of your shift.”

“That won’t be necessary, Commander,” Travis said with a shake of his head. “I’m off duty in forty-five minutes anyway, and I’m already packed and ready to go.”

Despite Travis’s repeatedly stated determination to leave the service of a captain he’d claimed no longer to believe in, Sato realized that even now she held out the irrational hope of bringing about a lastminute change of heart regarding his decision to leave. Not even the awkward silences at the party that she, Malcolm, and Doctor Phlox had thrown in his honor yesterday afternoon—a somber crew-mess gathering from which the captain had been excluded at Mayweather’s specific request—had convinced her that keeping Travis aboard Enterprise wasn’t really the lost cause it might appear to be. Hoshi had simply chalked Travis’s emotional distance up to the boomer habit of avoiding overly emotional farewells, a fact of life to anyone born in space and reared in the itinerant, socially isolating business of interstellar cargo.

She took heart, at least, in the fact that Captain Archer hadn’t been on the bridge at this moment to hear his outgoing helmsman speak so casually of leaving Enterprise behind forever.

Three-quarters of an hour later, as she watched him leave the bridge with scarcely a word, Hoshi wondered if Travis could have kept such a tight lid on his emotions had Archer walked in.

TWENTY

Thursday, September 11, 2155
New Byzantium, Alpha Centauri III

DESPITE THE PRESENCE of a teeming crowd hundreds deep, the first thing that Gannet Brooks noticed as she entered the spaceport lounge was the peculiar pattern of shadows that the destination display screen cast across the highly polished tile floor. Courtesy of the Alpha Centauri system’s bright but setting yellow “A” star—whose horizon-distended light painted the scene beyond the polarized tarmac observation windows, beneath both the dimmer “B” star and the red dwarf Proxima’s comparatively dim stellar pinpoint—those shadows fell simultaneously in multiple directions under an unwinking electronic display that read DESTINATION: EARTH.

The next thing that seized Brook’s attention was the raw fear she saw in the eyes of so many of the people who waited here for the incoming Earth-bound transport. Despite their brave talk, these people—like the apparently narrow majority that had decided instead to remain behind to defend their homes and businesses—were all terribly afraid. This fear was of a quality that Brooks had never observed before, not even during the aftermath of the horrendous Xindi sneak attack of ’Fifty-Three, during which a swath of particle-beam destruction from a tranquil spring sky obliterated some seven million human souls in a matter of seconds.

No. The fear she observed today was different on some fundamental level. Even though the families she saw huddled in the lounge—men, women, and children clutching duffels, blankets, food containers, and toys as they waited anxiously for the transport ship upon which so many had pinned their hopes of escaping the implacable harm that was coming—were as human as she was. They were as human as those survivors of the Xindi assault who had subsequently sutured a deep scar on Earth’s global psyche, principally by getting right to work stitching up a planetary laceration that stretched from Florida to Venezuela.

It wasn’t that the survivors of the Xindi attack on Earth hadn’t been scared, of course. Brooks remembered the fear quite vividly, could still smell and taste it, particularly on occasions such as these, when fearful people surrounded her. The ’Fifty-Three attack had driven some into radical xenophobic fraternities like Terra Prime, which had employed terror tactics in a thankfully failed effort to rid the Sol system of all extraterrestrials—and in the process had nearly succeeded in destroying the Coalition of Planets, along with its promise of galactic peace.

We weren’t any less afraid then than any of these people are right now, Brooks thought after she had finished conducting a brief interview with a careworn, middle-aged man named Manfred who had told her he intended to stay and fight, come what may, once the transport arrived and his wife and two little daughters were safely aboard it. We were just less inclined to start talking exodus after the Xindi hit us. Or to send our children light-years away just to keep them safe.

She moved on to speak with a shell-shocked-looking woman in singed clothing who identified herself as Charis Idaho. Ms. Idaho had little to say other than that she had just lost nearly every member of her immediate family in a Romulan attack on a freighter convoy, a disaster that had occurred two days before. Brooks breathed a silent prayer of hope that neither Manfred nor any of his loved ones were about to suffer a similar fate.

“Mom’s going back to Earth, at least until all this blows over,” said a wiry, prematurely hardened teenage boy who stood beside the chair upon which Charis Idaho was perched like a frightened bird. The boy, who Brooks belatedly realized was Charis’s son—and perhaps the only other surviving member of the Idaho family— had a hypervigilant, only-barely-restrained manic air about him, and his clothing looked as distressed as his mother’s. He stared at Brooks for a moment from behind shaggy blond brows with eyes grown old before their time, then looked away, retreating behind a quasi-military emotional wall.

“Your mother’s going to Earth,” Brooks said, careful to prod gently. “Aren’t you going with her?”

Charis’s eyes grew huge and moist, supplying Brooks with a definitive answer before the boy found the words to respond.

“I’m taking the Delta Pavonis transport an hour from now,” he said, staring off in the direction of the setting “A” star.

“Delta Pavonis,” Brooks repeated. She knew that the Delta Pavonis system lay about nineteen light-years away from Earth, though she wasn’t quite certain how far it was from the Centauri colonies. “What’s at Delta Pavonis?”

“Basic MACO training,” he said, standing a little straighter as he spoke. Although he was tall for his age, at that moment he looked to Brooks like a little boy playing soldier.

“That’s a long way off for basic MACO training,” she said. “Earth’s a lot closer.”

“United Earth asks too many questions, don’t they, Colin?” Charis said, addressing the boy in tones steeped in a cocktail of bitterness and regret. “Starting with ‘How old are you, son?’”

Brooks felt she was beginning to understand. “Ah. The recruiters must be a lot less fussy about following the rules so close to the, ah, hostilities.”

“Delta Pavonis is a key forward base of the Military Assault Command Organization,” the boy said. “Which is good for quick deployments. Much closer to the action.”

That last word had made Charis flinch visibly, though the boy, Colin, appeared not to have noticed.

“Earth could start getting a lot less fussy soon enough, Colin,” Charis said, clearly unconvinced that Earth deserved to be considered some sort of safe haven for humanity.

“Only if we fail, Mom,” Colin said. His somber tone told Brooks that he hadn’t dismissed failure as a more than likely outcome. Perhaps he even expected to die. “Only if we fail.”

Brooks thought she was beginning to see the key difference between humans from Earth and their Centauri cousins. It was the difference between being attacked at home, in humanity’s cradle, and being challenged on a remote frontier world, a found place that could, at least in theory, be replaced easily enough by some other found place.

But Earth could never be replaced. No new Earth was likely to be found. It was an irreplaceable treasure. It had to be defended, guarded with as much blood and as many resources the task might require, whatever terrors might challenge it.

The challenge that the Xindi had presented to Earth was both faceless and terrifying, as was the challenge that the Romulans now posed out here and beyond. On Earth, against all odds, the Xindi crisis had been averted before it had encompassed the entire planet and threatened the existence of all human life on Earth. But out here, across a four-light-year-plus-deep gulf that separated the local human race from its birthplace, nobody could guarantee those same long odds would play out in Homo sapiens’s favor ever again. Just as nobody could guarantee even the possibility of making peace with the Romulans, a foe that had already made inroads into Coalition space—and would very likely have by now begun invading and occupying both Alpha Centauri III and Proxima Centauri II if not for the timely intervention of the Vulcans, who had since retreated to the sidelines.

Brooks was beginning to see that the Centauri people, rather than being significantly more fearful than their Terran cousins, were merely more mindful of the unreliability of long shots and miracles. Perhaps the inherent uncertainty of life on the frontier had made them more pragmatic than panicked, more realistic than romantic—particularly in a universe that demonstrated each day that the house nearly always wins in the end, no matter how conservatively one might bet.

After wishing the Idahos well, Brooks moved on, drifting through the crowd, a ghost among the ghosts, absorbing the comments of those who would speak to her, whether on or off the record. She could all but smell the fear and regret of the fleeing, as well as the fatalistic determination of those who claimed to be staying, having come merely to bid loved ones farewell, perhaps for the last time.

After a large, squat transport vessel had settled on the tarmac, its thrusters cooling, a small ground crew gave the vehicle’s exterior a desultory examination before entering the craft to make the final prelaunch preparations. No passengers disembarked, since Alpha Centauri had by and large become an origin point rather than a destination.

Perhaps fifteen minutes later, after the last of the farewells had been said, the tarmac stood empty. Brooks sat watching the empty stretch of asphalt from a lounge that was now considerably less crowded. Across the wide waiting area, Colin Idaho sat a patient vigil, apparently unaware that she was watching him. He gazed inscrutably in the direction of the two dim stars that remained visible in a sky that had purpled like some vast, world-encompassing bruise. She wondered if he was facing Delta Pavonis, or if he even knew how to pick it out of the sky, with or without a set of charts.

She knew only that he now had no place else to go.

Be safe out there, kid, she thought, despite a rising certainty that life was about to get far more dangerous for everyone, and particularly so for those headed ever deeper into the interstellar dark, as she was.

Clutching her small duffel to her side, she joined the boy’s vigil without moving a muscle, waiting in sympathetic silence for the next outbound transport.

TWENTY-ONE

Thursday, October 16, 2155

U.S.S. Yeager NCC-76

Kappa Fornacis III Deneva

ONLY A SPLIT-SECOND after their seeming emergence from nowhere, the three gaudily painted Romulan birds-of-prey had struck hard and without any warning whatsoever. Commander Julia Stiles hadn’t been surprised by the Romulan’s ferocity. She was flabbergasted, however, by the fact that they had somehow managed to catch the Deneva colony unaware.

How the hell did they get past that Vulcan warning grid? she thought as she checked the six other uniformed bodies that lay sprawled on the deck or across burning consoles for signs of life.

All dead. Every last one of them, including Captain Gerhard, whose corpse lay pinned beneath a fallen support beam. Coughing in the ozone-tinged air, Stiles acknowledged with a calmness born of equal parts training and shock that she was now in command of a Daedalus-class starship for the first and probably last time simultaneously.

Belay that kind of thinking, Commander, she told herself. She imagined the thought to have come from outside herself, in Gerhard’s voice, even though the rational part of her mind knew to a certainty that the captain would never issue another order. Instead of dwelling on such grim realities, she decided to take maximum advantage of whatever lucidity she might have retained since the sneak attack.

From the controls on the command chair, she ran a quick check on the ship’s internal communications grid, which appeared to be as dead as the bridge’s main viewscreen. At least the bridge’s death throes appeared to have stopped the ear-splitting blare of the emergency klaxons, which had activated when the dim emergency lighting came on, moments after the initial hull breach that had been reported from the lower decks.

Those decks had held the bulk of the mixed group of Starfleet, MACO, and civilian personnel who had been assigned to patrol, test, and, if necessary, make repairs to the network of sensor nodes in the outer Kappa Fornacis system.

A network that had evidently failed utterly in its purpose. Somehow, the Romulan ships had managed to get all the way to the asteroid belt beyond the orbit of Deneva, apparently making use of the dense metallic bodies of which the belt was comprised to conceal their presence until—literally—the last second before their assault on the Yeager.

At least the Romulans have stopped pounding holes through our hull, Stiles thought.

The pain in her ankle made her wince as she moved on to the forward tactical console, which smoldered in the absence of a functioning fire-suppression system. Then she stumbled and nearly fell as the gravity plating lurched nauseatingly. At the same moment the hull directly overhead groaned like an anguished ghost, providing an uncomfortable reminder that a hard vacuum lurked just beyond the top of the Yeager’s spherical primary hull.

After she’d tried and failed to access every major system on the ship, Stiles concluded that the Yeager was little more than a still-twitching corpse. The Romulans left us for dead, she thought. And it’s not because they’re being cocky.

She knew, of course, what else that meant: The Romulans must have already moved on to Deneva proper. With the Yeager no longer standing in the breach, that beautiful blue world, from Lacon Township to all the other human settlements and outposts that stretched across the paradisiacal Summer Islands Archipelago, now lay defenseless at the Romulans’ feet.

If they have feet, that is, she thought as she worked console after console frantically, like a doctor continuing to try to save a code-blue patient long after the vital signs had stopped.

The partially melted communications console rewarded her stubbornness by lighting up and displaying an image, apparently being generated by the secondary external sensor array.

A procession of half-shadowed, box-shaped metal objects was making its way through the blackness of space, with the glowing azure crescent of Deneva slowly growing in the background. The bright yellow rays of Kappa Fornacis, Deneva’s primary star, glinted off the slight curvatures of the small duranium-composite hulls.

“Yes!” Stiles shouted in triumph, stabbing a clenched fist into the air. Somebody—several dozen somebodies, from the look of it—had made it to the escape pods and had managed to launch the emergency vehicles manually.

Then a shadow hove into view from across the blue planet’s terminator, drawing the attention of the Yeager’s automated backup sensors. Stiles watched with a slow sinking feeling in her gut as a shape that appeared much larger than any of the escape pods grew steadily as it approached those who had fled the dying Yeager. With the Denevan sun at its back, the new arrival was all but invisible except for its silhouette.

Until it turned and displayed the fierce red plumage that had been painted on its belly, abruptly killing and burying the euphoria Stiles had felt when she had first glimpsed the escape pods.

A talon of amber fire reached out from the ventral hull of the returning bird-of-prey.

An escape pod abruptly exploded into so much drifting shrapnel, transforming abruptly from a solid object to a cloud of debris, like dust motes suspended in sunbeams.

Despite her best efforts to remain calm, Stiles let out a scream as the renewed but strangely unhurried Romulan onslaught claimed a second pod. She regained but little of her equanimity as a third shattered and mostly vaporized, followed by another, and another, and another. The attacker’s pace seemed methodical and deliberate, like a child choosing targets at a carnival shooting gallery. The Romulans evidently considered the other two birds-of-prey to be more than adequate to the task of seizing this still only lightly settled human colony, so much so that the remaining vessel could afford to play with its victims, like a cat taking its sweet time to kill a captured mouse.

The hull overhead groaned again, in even more anguished fashion than before. This time, however, an explosion followed, a din louder than any emergency klaxon she had ever heard. The gale-force wind that came with it immediately peppered her with a hail of loose debris as it bore her ceilingward and beyond.

And spared her from having to witness any further carnage.

Tellarite cargo vessel Skev
Near Kappa Fornacis

Christ, but this has to be the toughest room I’ve ever played, Gannet Brooks thought moments after she began the interview in Captain Shav’s cabin.

The grizzled, hirsute freighter captain had been obliging enough when she’d offered him a rather generous fee in exchange for passage to one of the hinterlands of Coalition space. Once she took a seat on one of the two low, futonlike cushions on the deck, however, his demeanor had changed radically. She wasn’t keen on sitting on the floor, but at least she felt cooler there than she had while standing anywhere else aboard the ship. The average temperature of Shav’s homeworld, Tellar, must have been somewhat higher than that of Earth.

“I seem to encounter your kind out here with increasing frequency every time I make a freight run through this sector,” Shav said, his beady eyes staring out querulously from beneath his shaggy, overhanging brows. “You hairless anthropoids must breed like Altairian blowflies.”

Brooks was grateful for the several encounters she had already had with Shav’s species, for which rudeness, insults, and even invective were all simply the coin of the realm. She understood that by Tellarite standards, Shav was being downright gracious.

“Your snout is obviously well acquainted with the dungheaps from which those blowflies take their nourishment,” Brooks said with a polite nod, delivering what she’d hoped was the equivalent of a polite verbal curtsy. “But I am gratified to see that your interest in insect mating habits has not kept you too busy to continue making your rounds across the far reaches of Coalition space.”

“I have a business to run,” Shav harrumphed. “The freight must get through.”

“Even though Romulan ships have recently started stepping up their attacks on freighters and convoys all over the sector?”

“Profits often increase as a function of danger. This is one such time.”

“So you’re saying that the only effect the war has had on you is to increase your business?”

Shav bared his white, tusk-like teeth. “What war? It might look like a war from beneath the mud puddles where most of your race hides, but out here the Romulans don’t seem to be any more troublesome than the occasional band of pirates have proved to be.”

Brooks had conducted enough interviews to recognize high-octane bullshit when she smelled it; bluster, after all, was nearly as important to the Tellarite cultural identity as were insults.

“Really? Even after Calder II and Tarod IX became Romulan military bases in Coalition space?”

Shav waved a three-fingered hand in a gesture of dismissal. “Faugh. Your Vulcan friends have outfitted all the Coalition systems with their warp-field detection devices. And once they finished with that, they set up detectors in so many of the outlying systems that the Romulans can’t so much as sneeze without somebody hearing them.”

“So you’re not worried.”

Shav leaned forward and grinned lasciviously. “Worrying might etch unattractive lines onto my face.”

Brooks answered with a polite sneer. Then a high-pitched squeal stepped on her verbal rejoinder, startling her off her futon in the process. The sound reminded her of the unearthly ululations made by the hog callers at a rural county fair she had attended as a child.

It wasn’t until Shav had got his stubby legs beneath him and had walked over to a communications panel mounted on the wall that she realized the sound had signaled an incoming message.

“What?” Shav barked once he’d shut off the com squeal.

“Come to the bridge, Captain,” one of Shav’s subordinates growled in annoyed tones.

“Why?!” said the captain, sounding unhappy.

“We’ve received a distress call from a ship adrift near the Terran colony world of Deneva. Several sentients are aboard, most of them injured. All are human.”

Shav tossed both of his blunt, stumpy hands into the air in frustration. “Faugh. Let the military handle it. What the hell am I paying taxes for anyway if I have to do their job as well as my own?”

“The ship is rapidly losing atmosphere, Captain. The nearest military ship is still hours away. But we could be there in minutes.”

Shav scowled, and Brooks thought she could see some of the worry lines that the captain had sought to prevent creasing the visible portions of his already wrinkled face.

“Why in the Great Sty are they losing atmosphere?” the Tellarite captain said.

“According to the distress call, they barely escaped a mass attack on Deneva.”

“An attack by whom?”

“Romulans, Captain.”

Shav’s scowl only deepened, along with those beauty-spoiling worry lines. He paused to scratch his flat, porcine nose as he stared at the wall speaker, obviously turning the matter over in his mind.

Brooks could certainly understand Shav’s reluctance to dive headfirst into a hot spot in the Romulan-human conflict. To a large extent she shared it. But for the sake of her fellow humans, she hoped that Shav wouldn’t succumb to the impulse to “chicken out” right in front of her.

Hoping that he would take from her next words the encouragement she intended, she said, “It’s a lucky thing for us humans that you don’t find the Romulans to be all that troublesome.”

Of the eight uniformed MACO soldiers Shav had taken aboard, six of them had already expired by the time the freighter’s crew had stretchered them into the Skev’s modest infirmary.

Taking care to stay in a corner and out of the way of the furious-looking Tellarite medical team, Brooks noted that the dead seemed to have succumbed either to the weapons burns and blood loss they had sustained during their encounter with the Romulans, or to the effects of cold and decompression that had followed the failure of their charred and battered escape craft’s environmental system. But as far as Brooks could tell, none of these men and women would have survived for as long as they had but for the efforts of the civilian pilot, now among the dead, who had brought them aboard her vessel moments before making a hasty departure from the besieged surface of Deneva.

Once the medical staff had finished stabilizing the two survivors, Brooks asked one of the medics on duty for permission to speak with the lone MACO who had regained consciousness. Grudgingly, the pig-faced medic allowed her a few minutes to sit beside the young man, who identified himself as Corporal John Sheehan.

“Were you on Deneva as part of a Starfleet contingent?” Brooks asked, once the young trooper—who she could see now was really little more than a boy, an effect accentuated by his red buzz-cut hair and rather prominent ears—had given his permission.

“No,” Sheehan said, still flat on his back on one of the medical beds amid a forest of bandages, flexible tubes, and fluid-filled bags. “I was part of the Deneva garrison. Almost finished with my first one-year tour. Hey, do these pig-faced guys really know anything about treating humans?”

She offered him a gentle smile. “Until the rendezvous with the hospital ship Barnard later today, we’ll have to consider the Skev the best doctor shop in town.”

He laughed, gallows humor being a standard survival tool in any MACO trooper’s kit. “We have a few ground bases in this sector, especially on strategically important planets. Just in case the Romulans somehow make it all the way down to dirtside.”

“Looks to me like they did,” Brooks said. “Any idea how?”

Sheehan shrugged, which prompted him to wince in pain. “My guess is the Vulcans sold us a lemon. Damned Romulans figured out how to game the whole early-warning thing. We were up to our eyeballs in a Romulan assault force before we even knew what was going on.”

Must have been beamed down from orbit, she thought. Like that transporter gadget they have aboard Enterprise.

Unable to contain her curiosity, she said, “Did you see any Romulans up close?”

His eyes grew large and distant. She presumed he was reliving sights, sounds, and smells that she was grateful never to have experienced herself.

“I did,” he said very quietly. “Shot two of ’em down, right after they broke through our perimeter.”

“What do they look like?”

His expression told him that her question had struck him as a non sequitur. “Under their helmets, you mean? Sorry, I didn’t want to risk taking the time to peek. Adams tried to do that, and he got a nice new cauterized skull-piercing for his trouble.”

“I’m so sorry,” Brooks said, and meant it.

A stricken expression crossed Sheehan’s oddly young-old face. “Where are the rest of the guys in my unit?” he said, his tone shifting from grim to plaintive.

Brook’s first impulse was to explain that one of the doctors would soon bring him up to speed, wrapping all the bad news in sugar and a trained bedside manner.

But this wasn’t Earth. Whether it was appropriate or not, she couldn’t bring herself to leave this poor kid to the tender mercies of the Tellarites.

Very slowly and quietly, she told him the truth. Through her tears, she read the list of names she had assembled from the MACO dog tags the medics had taken from the bodies of the dead.

Afterward, she returned to the quarters Shav had issued her, far too exhausted at the moment to try to complete the interview she had begun with the captain. All she could think about was the poleaxed expression she had seen on Corporal Sheehan’s face before she’d left the infirmary. The enemy, by contrast, still lacked any visible countenance at all.

Brooks sat cross-legged on the futonlike bed, activated her padd, and began to write, despite the fact that she could find only a handful of words that might describe every human face she had encountered out here on the war’s ragged edges, at least so far.

Fear. Grief. Horror. Anger. Even hatred.

But fear still predominated by far, and no doubt would continue to do so at least until the Coalition figured out how to plug the hole the Romulans had apparently found in the defense grid around Deneva.

TWENTY-TWO

Tellarite Defense Frigate Miracht

Near Deneva

“NOW ENTERING STANDARD ORBIT, CAPTAIN,“ said Ensign Agram, the helm officer.

Captain Prev nodded brusquely, clutching the arms of his chair with three-fingered death-grips. “Any sign of the attackers?”

“They’re all down on the surface, mostly clustered in and around the main city on the northern continent,” said Lieutenant Ragaav, the tactical officer, who was working the main sensor console.

“Survivors?”

Ragaav shrugged. “I’m only picking up debris in orbit. If anyone remains in need of rescue, they are also down on the surface.”

And the next nearest Tellarite military vessel can’t get here for nearly another quarter-turning, Prev thought, his apprehension mounting. But as master of the Miracht, a Phinda-class vessel that sported one of the most advanced suites of offensive and defensive weaponry in Tellar’s star navy, he knew he could be confident of the outcome of any battle, so long as they attacked hard and fast, before the Romulans got the chance to get any of their craft back up into orbit.

“It’s a good thing we didn’t withdraw from the Romulan front the way the Vulcans suggested,” Prev said. So much for their “alternative strategic plan.”

Ensign Runkaar, the gunner, let out an impatient squeal, her six fingers twitching just above the fire control board. “Your orders, Captain?”

“Standard strafing pattern, Ensign,” Prev said. “Execute.”

Functioning like a single well-oiled machine, Prev’s bridge crew worked in unison, entering commands into their consoles at a furious pace.

Nothing.

“I said execute!” Prev said, rising from his chair.

Agram cursed and banged one cloven fist into the center of his helm console. “Helm has failed, Captain!”

“Negative control over the weapons fire control systems,” Runkaar said, her squeals now taking on an edge of frustration. “Defensive systems are failing as well.”

The overhead lights suddenly failed, plunging the entire control complex into utter darkness during the few heartbeats it took for the battery-powered backups to kick in.

“Life support is down,” Ragaav reported. “Along with communications.”

A terrible sense of dread began to settle deep inside both of Prev’s stomachs. “Agram, get us out of here— now!”

“No propulsion, either, Captain,” Agram said.

Dread ossified into a fatalistic certainty. The Miracht had flown right into a trap. Clearly the Romulans had hidden one of their vessels nearby, perhaps using the flux created by the planet’s magnetic field as a means of concealment, and from there they had attacked.

“The Romulans have struck us with their new weapon,” Prev said. “The one that can seize control of other vessels.”

“We must resist!” Ragaav shouted as he rushed to the spot where Prev stood.

“It’s too late for that, Ragaav,” Prev said, shaking his great shaggy head. “But it’s not too late to launch the log buoy. Just in case.”

Ragaav looked scandalized. “You’re planning to destroy the ship?”

“We can’t let the Romulans capture it, now, can we?” Prev said, angered because he didn’t like the idea of dying any better than Ragaav did. “Whatever their other capabilities, they don’t have anything quite like our Phinda-class frigates.”

“We can’t initiate the self-destruct system, either, Captain,” Agram reported, sounding relieved. “That system has failed, along with all the others. Backup sensors are still working, though.” He paused, then let out a short but fearful squeal. “A bird-of-prey is approaching. Must have been using the planet to conceal itself from us.”

Prev cursed. “What about the log-buoy launcher?” he wanted to know. After Agram shook his head, the captain turned back to Ragaav and said, “Launch the buoy manually. While we still have a little time left.”

Ragaav approached Prev very closely, and the captain could see the glint of mutiny in his small, dark eyes. Without breaking eye contact, he reached for Ragaav’s sidearm and seized it before the lieutenant could succumb to the temptation to draw it on him.

Prev couldn’t afford to let anybody stop him from doing what had to be done.

Backing toward the lift, he said, “Ragaav, you have the bridge.” Before exiting the bridge, he pulled out his own sidearm and tossed Ragaav’s weapon to a very surprised-looking Ensign Agram. “And make sure that buoy gets launched, Ensign.”

As he stepped over the motionless bodies of his engineering crew, Prev kept telling himself that everybody aboard the Miracht would have frozen to death because of the life-support system failure anyway. He wished they’d had the sense to see that, but they had instead opted to defend their engine room from what had to be done. To the death, as it turned out.

Despite the pain in his heart and the heaviness in his soul, Prev felt confident that Phinda, the ancient god after whom both Tellar’s second moon and the new Tellarite frigate class had been named, would see fit to forgive him for what he had done.

And what he was about to do.

The mobile communicator in his pocket squealed, and he pulled it out with his free hand.

“Prev here. Go ahead.”

“The log buoy is away, Captain,” Agram said. “And the Romulans are going to start boarding us at any moment.”

“Let them come,” Prev growled.

“That’s not all, Captain. Ragaav is on his way down to the engine room now. He’s bringing cutting tools and weapons.”

Prev felt a brief surge of disappointment to learn that Agram hadn’t used Ragaav’s weapon to stop him from attempting a mutiny. On the other hand, this way no Tellarite hands aboard the Miracht save his own needed to be spattered with innocent blood before events reached their inevitable conclusion.

“Good work, Agram,” the captain said. “Prev out.”

He tossed the little comm unit to the deck. And after pausing to offer the old deity Phinda a brief prayer, he knelt beside the reactor core’s open access hatch and pointed the barrel of his sidearm directly into the matter-antimatter annihilation chamber. With as much gentleness as his blunt fingers could muster, he began to squeeze the trigger.

During the half-heartbeat that preceded the searing flash of brilliance that followed, he awaited Phinda’s tender embrace.

Dateline: Near Kappa Fornacis (Deneva)

TRANSCRIPT FROM THE OCTOBER 16, 2155, NEWSTIME JOURNAL SPECIAL COMMENTARY FOLLOWS:

This is Gannet Brooks, with all the news that’s under the sun and beyond, reporting from the United Earth Space Probe Agency Medical Ship Christiaan Barnard.

There’s no easy way to report what I have to report tonight, so I’ll just say it: Deneva has fallen to the Romulan Star Empire, a development that eyewitnesses on the ground have confirmed. In addition, at least two Coalition vessels—Starfleet’s recently constructed Daedalus-class Starship Yeager and the Tellarite Defense Frigate Miracht—have failed to check in after attempting to render aid to the human settlers on Deneva.

One of the most disconcerting facts surrounding the fall of Deneva is that the planet was protected by a Vulcan-built sensor grid capable of providing at least a limited degree of warning in the event of any Romulan incursion. The core worlds of Coalition space, including Earth and the Alpha Centauri settlements, rely on similar Vulcan sensor grids as the lynchpins of their own systemwide defense programs. Could these planets have vulnerabilities similar to Deneva’s? And, more importantly, what can be done about it? An official spokesperson has confirmed that this matter has already risen to the top of Starfleet’s priorities.

But the Romulans’ apparent destruction of the Miracht—one of the most advanced military starships in the star navy of Tellar, a civilization whose starfaring experience significantly exceeds that of Earth and Alpha Centauri—does not bode well for Earth’s space forces in their efforts to find a quick solution to this problem. After all, Tellar’s starfaring technologies are more advanced than those of Earth’s NX- or Daedalus-class starships, rivaling those of Andoria and even Vulcan. Could the nearly simultaneous loss of both the Miracht and the Yeager, immediately following the as yet unexplained catastrophic failure of Deneva’s early-warning grid, be seen as clear evidence that the Romulans have developed potent new weaponry? Senior Starfleet officials have harbored such suspicions for months, citing prior incidents involving ships from Vulcan and the Klingon Empire, and even Earth’s own Starship Enterprise.

But as dire as the future might appear now that the Romulans have added Deneva, like Calder II and Tarod IX before it, to its expanding list of subjugated worlds, this reporter can see more reason for encouragement than despair. And that is because for all that we don’t know about these mysterious Romulans, and for all the fear that a lack of knowledge can engender, the simple truth is that the enemy’s knowledge of humanity is equally deficient. The Romulans just don’t understand how often humans have risen to occasions such as these in the past.

And that will be their undoing.

TWENTY-THREE

Saturday, October 18, 2155

Enterprise, Oregon, Earth

THE TIDINGS OF WAR from the frontier droned on in the corner where Selma Guitierrez sat lotus-style on the floor, doing her yoga stretches in front of the living-room screen.

Nelson Kemper tried to ignore the broadcast, concentrating instead on the laughing, brown-eyed, brown-haired toddler who sat on his knee, balancing herself precariously as he leaned back on the sofa as her pudgy fingers maintained a firm grip on both of his thumbs. Although little Elena had already been walking for more than six months, she had yet to outgrow the need for “daddy rides,” much to Kemper’s delight.

On most days, such small but sublime joys served only to vindicate the decision that he and Selma had made almost two years earlier, shortly after their discovery of the unplanned pregnancy that had ultimately given them Elena, who had since become the light of their lives. They had decided then to swap their military careers for a semirural existence in a town that shared its name—Enterprise—with that of the Starfleet vessel where they had last been posted as MACO troopers.

Today was not one of those days.

After the third time Selma had replayed the recording of Gannet Brook’s report about the assault on Deneva—neither of them had been in the mood to listen to any more of Keisha Naquase’s well-meaning but ill-advised pacifism—Kemper knew that something was very different today. Although he found that playing with Elena brought him no less joy than it ever did, he also noticed that it was becoming harder than ever before to keep trying to ignore what was going Out There, in the hostile immensity of deep interstellar space.

Just as it was becoming increasingly difficult to tamp down his burning need to do something about it.

After swinging Elena playfully onto his shoulder, Kemper got his feet beneath him and walked toward his wife.

“How many more times are you going to watch that?” he said, nodding toward the image of Gannet Brooks, whose every pore seemed to radiate a mixture of both concern and encouragement.

Selma stretched once more, then rose to her feet. She pointed a small remote control unit at the screen, and Brooks’s likeness abruptly vanished.

“Sorry, Nelson,” she said, brushing several strands of her dark, lustrous hair away from her eyes. “I didn’t realize it was bothering you.”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t. At least, not as much as that Naquase woman bothers me. If Starfleet could figure out how to use her denial to turn a turbine, Earth’s ships would all be able to hit warp eight, easy.”

Selma snickered as she began doing some standing stretches. “Bless her heart. Gotta love anybody whose best military advice amounts to ‘Run away, find a hole to hide in, and pull it in after yourself.’”

Kemper felt Elena fidgeting on his shoulders, so he gave her a few quick bounces to settle her down. “Well, I suppose we haven’t got to the part where we pull the hole in after us. At least not yet.”

Selma froze in mid-motion and studied him, a grave look on her olive-toned face. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying, Nelson?”

He nodded slowly. “Earth is under direct threat from these Romulans, Selma. In spite of that, we seem to be taking Naquase’s advice, even though we’re both trained warriors who know better.”

There. He’d finally laid his cards on the table, or at least most of them.

“I thought we settled this after the thing with the freighter out in the Gamma Hydra sector,” she said with a weary sigh. “We might both be trained warriors, Nelson, but we’re also both new parents.”

He paused to shrug, then continued bouncing Elena, who responded by releasing a happy cry. “The Romulans don’t seem to think much of anything’s been settled,” he said. “They’ve taken Deneva, Selma. I had cousins living there.”

Her expression darkened, her cheeks flushing with what he recognized as anger, though it was restrained as tightly as the superheated plasma in a warp nacelle.

“I lost a couple of old classmates on Tarod IX,” she said. “What’s your point?”

“I’m not trying to compare my grief to anybody else’s,” he said, raising a placating hand.

She appeared more or less satisfied by that, and seemed to stand down. “And I want to get out there and stop the Romulans just as much as you do. But we have Elena to think about.”

I am thinking about Elena, he thought as he prepared to toss his final card onto the table.

“So we both want to take the fight to those bastards,” he said. “I just can’t put it aside any longer, Selma. Not since Deneva. I have to go back out there.”

Now that the words were out at last, like so many slow-motion meteors painting the sky with lingering traceries of fire, he braced himself for her reaction. This time it was going to turn out differently. Unlike all the previous occasions when they’d had precisely the same argument—right after the attacks on Alpha Centauri, Calder II, Tarod IX, and the Kobayashi Maru—he had his talking points lined up, prepared and polished like rows of dress boots. This time he was ready to argue that the best way to safeguard Elena’s future would be to do everything possible to turn back the Romulan tide.

Then Selma put him almost entirely off balance by failing to object. Instead she merely gazed silently into his eyes for a seeming eternity.

Very quietly, she said, “All right, Nelson.”

“Come again?” he asked, unable to keep the confusion and suspicion out of his voice. This was exactly the sort of rhetorical jujitsu that always seemed to give her the crucial edge in any argument.

“I said, ‘All right.’ I can see that your mind is made up.”

He blinked in incredulity. “You’re going to let me go? Just like that? You’ll stay behind and look after Elena?”

She put a hand flat against his chest. “Not so fast, Sergeant. I want to go just as badly as you do, remember?”

“But we can’t both go,” he said, his confusion only deepening. “Like you said, we have Elena to think about. We’ve been imposing on the Marvicks way too much for child care as it is.”

Nodding, she said, “Right. And who said anything about both of us going? You just said that one of us has to go and fight, and I said ‘All right’ to that.”

It finally came to him what she was suggesting. “I outrank you, Corporal Guitierrez.”

Elena grew restless again, prompting Selma to reach up and take her down from his shoulders. “Not while we’re both retired and wearing civvies, Sergeant Kemper,” she said.

Because his hands were now freed by Elena’s sudden departure from his shoulders, Nelson Kemper shoved them both into the pockets of his khaki trousers, as was his wont when he was waxing thoughtful.

“Now we just have to find a fair way to decide which one of us stays home, and which one of us rides out to slay the dragon,” Selma said. Elena threw her arms around her mother’s neck, almost as though she understood the uncertainty that lay ahead.

Kemper absently rubbed his thumb over the slightly serrated edge of the silver disk he kept in the depths of his left pocket. He had begun carrying the ancient dollar coin as a sort of good luck talisman on the day Elena was born.

“Call heads or tails,” he said as he took out the coin.

Then he sent it spinning into the air with a practiced flick of his thumb.

TWENTY-FOUR

Thursday, November 6, 2155
Enterprise, near the Kappa Fornacis system

DESPERATE FOR SOME SURCEASE from the turmoil in her belly, Ensign Elrene Leydon sat in the crew mess, her eyes glued to the wide observation windows. Beyond the layers of transparent aluminum the stars had taken on a bluish tinge, the ship’s relentless superluminal motion stretching them into elongated strands of sapphire brilliance.

“Try not to let the motion sickness get to you,” said the starship’s chief communications officer. “I felt the same way right before my first bridge shift started.”

Leydon tried to contain her surprise, but failed utterly. “How could you tell I was feeling motion sickness?”

Ensign Hoshi Sato flashed a grin that contained no trace of mockery. “For one thing, you’re the greenest-looking non-Vulcan I’ve ever seen. Second, you just came aboard with the new crew rotation we took on during the Archon rendezvous, and I know that the Academy’s high warp simulations don’t really do justice to warp-five flight. And lastly, you’re squeezing that coffee cup hard enough to turn a carbon composite into diamond.”

Suddenly hyperconscious of her fidgeting hands, Leydon set the cup down on the table between them. Folding her hands in her lap, she decided to devote her concentration to satisfying the curiosity Sato had piqued.

“Are you telling me that you felt like you were about to puke a few minutes before you did your first bridge duty?”

Sato nodded as she pushed her now-empty breakfast plate to one side. “Uh-huh. Incidentally, I discovered back then that staring out the windows while the ship is at warp only makes it worse.”

Leydon thought that sounded counterintuitive, raised as she’d been on tales of the ancient ocean fleets of the United States at the height of its global power and prestige. In those days, green sailors could anchor both their sea legs and bellies by staring out at the vast blue horizon—at least according to the lore handed down from her greatgrandfather, who had served aboard CVN-65, the U.S. Navy’s first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, better known as the U.S.S. Enterprise.

Leydon turned her chair slightly, hoping to prevent the stars from continuing to draw her attention. Leaning conspiratorially toward Sato, she lowered her voice and said, “But why should you have ever gotten that nervous? I mean, you were handpicked by Captain Archer himself.”

Despite some the mean-spirited Kobayashi Maru scuttlebutt concerning Archer that she had heard among some of her recently graduated Starfleet Academy peers—and, astonishingly, even among some veteran members of Enterprise’s crew—Leydon’s image of the captain remained untarnished. Whatever hard decision circumstance might have forced on him out at Gamma Hydra, Jonathan Beckett Archer remained a hero in her eyes. Without Archer, the Xindi sneak attack that had killed her mother would have been followed by carnage on a scale that the captain’s craven detractors probably couldn’t even imagine.

“You’re right,” Sato said. “Captain Archer did handpick me to be a part of his senior officer corps, right before Enterprise left spacedock for that first voyage to Qo’noS. But being handpicked isn’t all that comforting when you’re about to strike out into the unknown.” She paused to take a swallow from her own coffee cup, then added soberly, “And I think that you are living proof of that.”

Once again Leydon felt stunned, just as surely as if the com officer had drawn and fired a phase pistol. “What are you talking about?”

“Just this,” Sato said, her grin amping up again. “What makes you think that you were any less handpicked than I was? You don’t really think that either Captain Archer or Commander T’Pol would choose just anybody to be Mayweather’s permanent replacement behind the helm, do you?”

Sato’s revelation nearly knocked Leydon out of her chair. Travis Mayweather’s contributions to the resolution of the Xindi affair were already well known; he was already on his way to becoming a larger-than-life heroic figure in the annals of midshipman folklore, and his recent sudden departure from Archer’s crew to take the helm of the newly launched Starship Discovery NX-04 was therefore both a perplexing surprise and a source of endless barstool speculation.

And on top of all of that had come the knowledge that Commander T’Pol—whose entire race was not renowned for either tact or tolerance of human foibles—had had a direct hand in her selection. Despite Sato’s obviously encouraging intentions, Leydon’s guts felt no less queasy than they had before. And her first-ever shift on the bridge, her shaking hands guiding the stick and rudder of the very ship that had faced down the Xindi and was even now rushing home to defend Earth from perhaps an even worse threat, was due to start in less than ten minutes.

Elrene Leydon slumped backward slightly as she struggled to find her breath. “Maybe I should go back to staring at the stars.”

Four hours into her shift at the helm, Leydon had managed to keep her stomach battened down and her hands steady. Both of those things had proved far easier to do after the ship had come out of warp on the farthest fringes of Deneva’s solar system. If Captain Archer had noticed anything amiss in her performance, he had refrained from mentioning it.

Archer’s voice came from behind her, startling her slightly. “Any sign of Romulans?”

Before Leydon could offer a clumsy response about the subspace navigational sensors showing clear, she heard the senior officers stationed aft of her begin to make their own crisp verbal reports.

“I am picking up nothing other than the expected icy and chondritic system-periphery bodies, Captain,” Commander T’Pol said. “The long-range sensor scans of the inner system detect no large-scale spaceflight activities near Deneva, nor evidence of patrols farther out.”

“Tactical is clear so far,” said Lieutenant Malcolm Reed. “But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t Romulan ships lurking about the system, watching us from behind the cover of some comet or asteroid.”

“True enough,” the captain said. “They can’t have put all their resources into consolidating what they’ve taken on the surface of Deneva. But I want to find out exactly what happened here before we resume our original heading toward home. We need to learn everything we can about the current strength of the Romulan force that’s taken the planet. Not to mention how the hell they managed to get through the warp-detection grid in the first place.”

“There is very little we can learn with any certainty about Deneva’s surface at such an extreme distance,” T’Pol said in tones colored by neither frustration nor disappointment. “Even with the long-range sensors adjusted to their maximum resolution.”

“Commander T’Pol is right, Captain,” Reed said, prompting Leydon to turn to see the look of concern etched on the Englishman’s craggy face. “And the longer we stay even this close to Deneva, the greater the chance that the Romulans will pounce on Enterprise with that starship-hijacking weapon of theirs.”

Archer looked unhappy, but seemed to take his tactical officer’s words under advisement. Turning toward his exec, he said only, “T’Pol?”

The frostily elegant Vulcan woman nodded, and remained seated behind her science station’s scanner. “I must agree with Mister Reed. We should not linger here any longer than necessary without other armed vessels to assist us in fending off an unexpected Romulan attack.”

A sharp staccato beeping commenced at that moment, and it took Leydon a full second to realize that it was coming from her navigation board. A heartbeat later she had found both the source of the alarm and, thankfully, her ability to speak.

“Captain, our subspace navigation beam is detecting a small metallic object, dead ahead,” she said, feeling as though she’d been caught with her pants down, and on her first day on the job, no less. Concentrate on the task at hand, she told herself. Then hands trained on a dozen flight simulators moved automatically. And almost before she realized she had done it, she had manually entered the slight course correction necessary to avert the possibility of a catastrophic multiwarp-speed collision.

“Analysis!” Archer said. Leydon turned long enough to see that he was sitting ramrod straight in the seat at the bridge’s center, and appeared to have taken no notice of her greenhorn’s lapse.

“It is a small duranium-encased object,” T’Pol said as she looked intently into the scanner display on her console. “Approximately half a cubic meter in size, massing at approximately twenty-seven kilograms. It no longer poses any collision danger.”

Leydon grinned to herself.

“Could it be some sort of mine?” Archer said.

“Tactical sensors read negative for explosives, fissiles, or antimatter,” Reed said. “I read electronic circuitry of some kind inside the casing. It might be a log buoy from one of the ships that was lost here last month. But I’d still recommend handling it carefully.”

“Noted,” Archer said. “Let’s beam it aboard and have a look.”

“The device already appears to have sustained some damage,” T’Pol said. “The transporter could cause further damage to whatever electronics are inside it.”

“Or maybe trigger a disguised weapon,” Reed said.

Leydon watched Archer stroke his chin thoughtfully as he stared at the starfield displayed on the forward viewer—without appearing the least bit seasick as a consequence.

Archer turned toward Leydon and addressed her directly. “I have another baptism of fire for you, Ensign.”

“Sir?” Leydon said, swallowing hard.

“Activate the grapple-retrieval system, Mister Leydon. If jostling this thing makes it go ‘kaboom,’ then we’ll probably know about it before you drag the thing aboard.”

She nodded mutely, then transferred as much attention and energy as she could muster to the console before her.

And tried like hell to ignore the ever-so-slight tremor in her hands.

“Well, it’s definitely Tellarite,” Malcolm Reed said. He listened to his voice as it echoed across Launch Bay 1, which he had evacuated as a precaution just before Ensign Leydon had finished grappling the charred and pitted metal object aboard.

Very carefully, Hoshi Sato reached across the worktable on which the device sat and drew a small data module from inside its open duranium cover. Fortunately, the component hadn’t sustained enough damage to prevent its successful connection to a small adaptor unit that relayed its contents to a nearby viewscreen.

After watching the blunt Tellarite script scroll past for a few moments, Sato said, “It’s the log buoy from the Miracht.”

“What happened to them?” Reed wanted to know, his anxiety levels rising very quickly; after all, the Miracht was supposed to be one of the most advanced, powerful vessels in Tellar’s fleet. Regardless, he held out the hope of learning something useful from the buoy—something that might help Earth fend off the Romulan threat.

“The captain seems to have been in a serious hurry to get this buoy launched, so whatever happened must have hit them pretty fast. It’s possible that all this exterior damage was caused after launch by whatever attacked the Miracht, but that’s all just speculation on my part.”

Reed’s spirits fell. “So we still don’t have any hard information. Just guesses.”

Sato’s eyes widened. “Not entirely. I’m seeing a pattern here. Right at the end of the flight recording, each of the Miracht’s vital systems spontaneously shut down, one by one.”

“As though somebody was turning each of them off, by remote control,” Reed said.

Sato nodded. “The Romulan hijacking weapon.”

“I’d bet on it,” Reed said. “I’ll tell the captain.”

Although he hated what he was thinking right now, Reed hoped for the sake of his whole species that the Miracht’s commander had had sufficient time to destroy his vessel before the Romulans managed to seize the prize of the Tellarite navy.

And that Enterprise reached her homeworld before the Romulans forced the very same horrible choice upon Captain Archer.

• • •

Once Enterprise was under way, Jonathan Archer left T’Pol in charge of the bridge and withdrew to his ready room.

He sat behind his desk and wasted no time composing and sending a quick dispatch to Admiral Gardner at Starfleet Command. Without a pause, he then opened up one of the special secure Coalition diplomatic comm channels. A few seconds later, a hirsute female humanoid with porcine features regarded him with undisguised suspicion from across the gulf of parsecs that separated them.

The Tellarite diplomatic attaché greeted Archer with a put-upon snort, then issued the formal greeting of, “What?”

“I need to speak with Ambassador Gral immediately,” Archer said. “About the Miracht.”

TWENTY-FIVE

Day Eleven, Month of Khuti

D’caernu’mneani system, Ahiuan sector

Imperial Romulan Annexed Space

ACCORDING TO THE NAV COMPUTER back aboard the Bird-of-Prey Dhivael, D’caernu’mneani—“great eye of red” in ancient High Rihannsu—was the name of the bloated red giant star toward which Commander T’Voras and his attack wing now moved at the agonizingly torpid pace of less than half of luminal speed.

Unfortunately, the dawdling crawl of T’Voras’s two ten-vessel squadrons was something he had no power to influence, any more than he could avoid the necessity of leaving his command, the Dhivael, on a long orbital trajectory just beyond the remote debris zone that marked the far boundaries of the red giant star’s planetary system. To bring the large mother ship any closer to her midsystem target world would be to risk immediate detection by the enemy outpost on Draed’ulhei, which enjoyed the protection of an automated early-warning grid whose subspace-transmitted alarms would be triggered instantaneously by the entry of any unauthorized warp-driven vessel.

A sublight Nei’hrr-class attack raptor, however, had no such limitations. Therefore the small assault craft that T’Voras now piloted, leading nineteen of his bird-of-prey’s finest flyers to coast ever deeper into the massive red giant star’s deep gravity well, had the best chance of catching the enemy unawares on the surface of Draed’ulhei, the innermost of the system’s two neighboring habitable worlds.

Provided, T’Voras reminded himself, that we succeed in entering the planet’s atmosphere at the proper coordinates, and at the appropriate angle.

And that Centurion T’Vak, whom T’Voras had left in charge of the Dhivael, took no action that might inadvertently reveal the large, T’Liss-class bird-of-prey’s presence at the edge of this system.

The planet, the middle child of a fertile family of thirteen worlds, hung in T’Voras’s forward port like a glowing aquamarine gem and grew steadily before his eyes. Even after the squadrons reduced their velocity for entry approach, the raptors would hit the atmosphere at multiple hundreds of mat’drih per eisae, and would have to endure hull temperatures of several thousand onkians as their deceleration continued. Under such unforgiving circumstances, there would be no second chances.

T’Voras keyed open the squadron’s scrambled EM-band frequency, a wavelength and transmission mode chosen for the purpose of avoiding detection by either ground-based subspace transceivers or those that comprised Caernu’mneani’s systemwide detection grid.

“Ehrie Hwi to Ehrie Squadron and Khoey Squadron,” the commander said into his throat mic. “Cut speed and assume atmospheric entry formation. Synchronize your planetary approach data.”

He listened as nineteen terse acknowledgments came in, in numerical order, from both the Green and Orange squadrons, from Ehrie Kre to Ehrie Dha and Khoey Hwi to Khoey Dha, confirming that both raptor groupings had arranged themselves into a single random formation that closely mimicked the long tumbling ellipse of a swarm of small meteors making its terminal approach to the planet. By the time the enemy forces on the ground realized that something other than an inconsequential spray of interplanetary rocks was headed their way, it would be too late for them to mount any significant defense.

As the blue-green crescent of the planet grew too huge to be contained by his forward windows, T’Voras breathed a quiet prayer of supplication to the D’ravsai—the Great Brothers—and all the other ancient deities of Romulus. And though he felt reasonably certain that none of them had any interest either in him or his men, he placed their fates squarely in the gods’ hands.

Saturday, November 8, 2155
Berengaria VII

In the experience of Lieutenant Richard Stiles, the best time for dragon-watching was during the half hour or so before sunset brought the curtain down on the purple twilight that dominated the daytime hours. Earlier in the day, the majestic creatures tended to be inactive, sleeping off the red giant Berengaria’s heat—oppressive despite the generally thick cloud cover—as they stored up their energies for their nocturnal hunts in and around the nearby Vale of Mists and the surrounding foothills.

After sunset, of course, it was safest to observe the graceful, leatherwinged flyers from the safety of the observation deck on the roof of the still-under-construction multistory starbase complex. Specimens of Draco berengarius were far less likely to approach the base closely enough to endanger anybody than they were to seek more traditional native prey in the tracts of thick jungle that predominated from the perimeter of the starbase all the way to the Vale.

One of the great gray dragons—which Stiles’s own research had proved was not a dragon, nor even a reptile—glided close to the horizon at the moment, its spread-winged silhouette splayed momentarily across the bloated red sunset. Buoyed aloft thanks to the relatively small planet’s Mars-like gravity and the system of internal gas bladders that filled and surrounded the creature’s deceptively tough tubular skeleton, the dragon rose on a thermal updraft before swooping away.

A few kilometers in the distance, and directly in the creature’s path, stood the cluster of weathered-looking stone observation towers, laboratory spaces, and flat dwellings that had housed Berengaria’s Vulcan population for the past half century. In the jungle beyond the Vulcan compound, the rapidly encroaching darkness emphasized a telltale orange flare of another early-rising night flyer; this one had already begun igniting the hydrogen sulfide-bearing compounds contained in its forward air bladders, probably to roast a surprised prey animal in its tracks.

A movement in Stiles’s peripheral vision drew his attention back toward the nearly completed sunset that still girdled much of the purpling horizon. Another shadow was quickly crossing Berengaria’s distended disk, followed by another, then another, and another. Outside of their seasonal migrations, he had never seen such a large grouping of dragons assembled in formation. Several of the flying shapes even seemed to be breathing fire into the jungle beneath them.

A moment later, the flock of newcomers swooped across the Vulcan compound, their exhalations immolating the towers below them.

Oh, no, Stiles thought as he watched the first dragon he had spotted ignite, caught in a crossfire and instantly incinerated beneath and between two of the newly incoming winged shapes.

Shapes that had been constructed by the intentions of sentients rather than the random ministrations of nature. Unimaginably fast winged shapes that now appeared in a sudden profusion beyond counting, shapes that looked about twice as large as the genuine dragon that had just been blown out of the sky so callously. Swooping, menacing shapes whose bellies bore the aggressive red plumage that Stiles had read about in reports filed by those few who had seen them and lived to log the experience afterward.

How the hell did they get past the grid? he thought.

Hoping to get a quick warning out to Captain Hutchinson at Starbase 1 and Chief Scientist T’Kumbra at the Vulcan facility, Stiles pulled his communicator out of his uniform jacket. He flipped open the grid just in time to see it vanish in a hailstorm of fire and broken plasteel.

Nei’hrr-class Attack Raptor Ehrie Hwi

Less than a quarter of the way through the slow return voyage to the Bird-of-Prey Dhivael, the passive sensor alarm on T’Voras’s console was activated, the lights flashing a baleful green. He wasted no time turning on the secure intership EM channel.

“Ehrie Hwi to both squadrons,” T’Voras said into his throat mic. “Confirm presence of an incoming Starfleet vessel.”

“Khoey Hwi to Ehrie Hwi,” came the acknowledgment. “Starfleet vessel confirmed. It is entering orbit around the target.”

“Very well, T’Vak,” T’Voras said. “Maintain velocity and heading. Since we have already neutralized the target, we need not risk attracting their attention.”

“But this is not just any Starfleet vessel, Commander,” the other squadron leader said with an audible edge of impatience. “It reads as the same configuration as Enterprise.”

Although the mission had been accomplished flawlessly, Commander T’Voras did not wish to give any of his more ambitious junior officers—especially Centurion T’Vak—an excuse to try to oust him from his command in order to pursue glory and prestige for himself.

“This is Ehrie Hwi,” T’Voras said. “Bring both squadrons about, and assume attack formation mnha’lli.”

Starship Discovery NX-04

Travis Mayweather had spent his entire life in space. But in all that time he had never seen such wholesale devastation, apart from the Xindi sneak attack on Earth. The images from both the high-resolution sensors and the sensor drones Discovery had launched from orbit had offered the same revelation: Berengaria VII had been brutally and thoroughly scrubbed of all human and Vulcan life, and it had all happened within the past day or so.

“Whatever hit them came quickly,” said Captain Curtis.

“That must be why all we received was an automated distress signal,” Mayweather said, staring at the image of the blue-green world’s equator. The deep black scar in the greenery, punctuated by the still-settling ejecta plume in its center, was plainly visible on the main bridge viewer even at Discovery’s present high orbit of nearly one thousand kilometers.

“The Vulcans have been doing research on Berengaria VII for fifty years before we started building our starbase out here,” Curtis said.

“Those equatorial jungles are a gold mine, pharmacologically speaking,” Lieutenant Carpenter said from the science console. “Who knows how many disease cures have come out of all that plantkingdom biodiversity?”

“And to think the Vulcans didn’t want a Starfleet presence at first,” said Curtis. He sounded almost bitter as he added, “They gave us permission to build our starbase near them only because Starfleet agreed to protect them.”

“As I recall, the local Vulcans were pretty grudging about it,” Carpenter said. “Most of them were scientists and pacifists.”

“A fat lot of good it seemed to do them,” Curtis said. “Whatever took down the Vulcans wiped out our starbase as though it wasn’t even there.”

Maybe it serves them right for turning their back on Earth, Mayweather thought, though he instantly regretted the sentiment.

“Captain, I think we already know what hit them,” Carpenter said.

Mayweather nodded in agreement. “An asteroid strike wouldn’t have left a hard radiation signature like the one we’re reading down there.”

“All right,” the captain said. He sounded weary, as though he was only belatedly acknowledging a fact he would have preferred to see disproved. “The Romulans appear to have gotten through the defense grid somehow, just like they did on Deneva. Any sign of the hostiles?”

“Not so far, Captain,” Carpenter said. “Wait a minute.” Her eyes suddenly grew wide. “I’m reading a swarm of bogeys, headed toward the planet from outsystem. Moving at high impulse.”

“Romulans?”

Lieutenant Commander Brent shook his high-domed head and scowled at his tactical console. “I’m reading them as small ships, Captain, but not like anything I’ve seen the Romulans use before. If they are Romulan, they’ve got to be one-person fighter craft.”

“Tactical Alert,” Curtis said. “Polarize the hull plating.”

On the main screen before Mayweather, a swarm of birdlike shapes, replete with ventral markings that resembled feathers and claws, resolved themselves into view in Berengaria’s pitiless blood-red glare.

Not birds, Mayweather thought as the apparitions continued their relentless approach. Hawks.

Or Raptors.

“Picking up a new bogey,” Brent said. “Smaller than these ships. Metal.”

“Range and heading?” said the captain.

The main viewer abruptly flashed a blinding white, which was followed by darkness, screams, and a horrible tumbling sensation.

Wiping the blood away from his brow yet again, Mayweather watched in silence through the escape pod’s port as Discovery’s battered hulk receded into the distance.

Molecular fires blazed all across the hull of the brand-new NX-class starship, and had already nearly consumed the forward sections that had been closest to the nuke with which the Romulans had surprised them.

“I can’t believe we let them destroy her before the paint finished drying,” Brent said, seated on the narrow bench beside him. “Never thought I’d see the inside of one of these lifeboats except in a drill.”

“It’s better than hanging around for a warp core breach,” Mayweather said, though he couldn’t help but agree with the tactical officer. When he’d served aboard Enterprise, most hostiles had used directed energy weapons of various sorts rather than old-style nukes. Such weapons could be lethal when detonated within a certain radius of a starship’s hull, despite the latest in hull-polarization systems. In this case, the nuclear blast had blinded and crippled the ship just long enough to enable the pack of Romulan fighter craft to inflict mortal damage.

“Don’t worry, Travis,” Carpenter said from Mayweather’s other side. “The captain made sure the distress call and the log buoy got out, in spite of all the damage.”

Mayweather noted that Carpenter had pointedly avoided mentioning that Captain Curtis had died getting those final tasks accomplished.

Discovery blew herself into countless fragments amid an expanding cloud of superheated plasma and metal vapor that showered the entire vicinity with small pieces of tumbling debris. The only parts of the late NX-class starship that seemed to be at all intact were the red parallelogram-shaped shrouds that had covered the lifeboats prior to their hurried launch from the primary hull’s dorsal section.

As he watched a couple of dozen of the bright yellow, wedge-shaped lifeboats make their way toward the blue-green planet below, he wondered if anybody would hear Discovery’s final mayday calls in time to help any of her crew.

And if the Romulans would let any of them make it all the way down to the surface.

Attack Raptor Ehrie Hwi

”Preparing for atmospheric pursuit of survivors,” T’Vak said.

“No,” T’Voras said into his throat mic, throttling down his engines. He had learned much from the overeagerness he had displayed during his encounter with the Terran freighter he had destroyed during the test missions of the arrenhe’hwiua telecapture system. Besides, he already had more than enough explaining to do as it was, having misjudged the capabilities of this new Terran ship’s armor sufficiently to have destroyed it rather than capturing it for study in the Romulan Star Empire’s shipyards.

“Turn the squadrons about and fall back to the Dhivael, T’Voras told his subordinate. “Let this scattered Terran crew survive to spread fear among their kind.”

TWENTY-SIX

Monday, November 17, 2155

Enterprise, near Threllvia IV

“THE DISTRESS CALL IS COMING from the Andorian Imperial Guard Destroyer Ka’Thelan Krotus, Captain,” said Ensign Hoshi Sato as she listened to the voices chattering in her earpiece. “She’s taken heavy damage from three Romulan birds-of-prey. And she reports complete failure in every one of her critical systems, including the backups.”

That last news sent a chill up Archer’s spine. Just like what happened to the Kobayashi Maru, the Miracht, and probably the Yeager, too, he thought, recalling the remote-control hijacking Enterprise had only narrowly avoided as well.

“Don’t tell me,” Malcolm said, leaning forward across the tactical console. “We’re closer than any of their own ships are.”

“Threllvia is one of Andoria’s most remote colonies, Lieutenant,” T’Pol said, looking up from the hooded scanner at her science station.

Reed straightened and nodded toward the exec. “And Andoria’s forces have been spread pretty thin these days, ever since...” He busied himself at his console displays rather than completing the sentence he had left hanging in the air, as conspicuous as a sign written in meter-high letters of fire.

Ever since Vulcan decided to hide in the basement until the Romulan storm blows over.

Archer turned his chair forward so that he faced Ensign Leydon, who was manning the helm. “How quickly can we reach the Krotus?”

“About twenty minutes at warp five, Captain,” she said.

“Do it,” Archer said as he rose and approached Hoshi’s comm console. “Tell the Andorians we’re on the way.”

Hoshi’s face fell abruptly. “I was already trying to do that. But now I can’t raise the Krotus. They’re no longer transmitting.”

Damn it, Archer thought. This may have just changed from a rescue mission to a recovery operation.

Eighteen minutes later, T’Pol’s sensor readings transformed the captain’s dismaying speculations into cold, hard fact.

“I’m reading an expanding debris cloud with strong duranium and polyferranide signatures,” T’Pol said. “It is definitely the remains of the Ka’Thelan Krotus. And the cloud’s sensor profile is consistent with a sudden catastrophic failure of the ship’s antimatter containment system.”

“Looks like this Romulan remote-control thing needs some serious fine-tuning,” a stunned-looking Ensign Leydon said. “They tried for a hijacking but vaporized their target instead.”

“The Romulans are nothing if not careful, Ensign,” Archer said. “I’d say it’s likelier that the Andorians did this themselves.”

Leydon looked even more nonplussed than before. “They’d really commit mass suicide?”

“If that was the only way to keep one of their best-armed warships out of Romulan hands,” Archer said with a grim nod. Turning toward Malcolm and T’Pol, both of whom were already busy running their respective scanners, he added, “Let me know the minute you find any survivors.”

“No sign of survivors yet, Captain,” Reed said. “But I am picking up three Romulan vessels, at extreme range and retreating at about warp four, on a heading for Romulan space. Judging from the unusually high delta-particle counts I read in their warp trails, all three vessels sustained considerable damage during their encounter with the Krotus.”

“We could catch up to them before they return to their own territory,” T’Pol said.

Archer was sorely tempted to order Ensign Leydon to do exactly that.

But only for a moment. Earth still needed Enterprise’s protection, and Archer knew he wouldn’t be able to provide it if the Romulans were to snare his ship with their remote-hijack weapon.

“Continue scanning for survivors,” he said at length. “And find the log buoy. Once we’re done with recovery operations here, we’ll resume our heading for Earth, at maximum warp.”

Within two minutes of having received Lieutenant Reed’s warning of incoming patients, Phlox was already well on his way to transforming his sickbay into a military field hospital.

The three escape pods that Lieutenant O’Neill evacuated with the ship’s transporter yielded a total of fourteen living Andorians. Once the doctor had finished administering triage and first aid—with the able assistance of two Starfleet medical technicians and a MACO corpsman—Phlox decided that twelve of his new patients had a better-than-reasonable chance of recovery, despite the severity of their injuries. And although the remaining two were still critical even after being stabilized and sedated, they were not beyond all hope.

As the doctor carefully ran an osteoregenerator over the broken sternum of a bloodied and unconscious Andorian shen, he thought, I could get used to this level of efficiency. But as Phlox moved from patient to patient, he continued to cling to the likely forlorn hope that he would never get accustomed to the carnage.

Archer knew that there was always a chance of finding another escape pod, even after the recovery of the first three some six hours earlier. Malcolm had just found the Ka’Thelan Krotus’s log buoy. But Archer also knew it was a captain’s unpleasant duty to decide when the chance of rescuing any more survivors had become too remote to continue looking. Earth still needed Enterprise, and the two other Andorian vessels that were now minutes away from arriving could handle whatever rescue and recovery operations remained to be done.

“Prepare to go to warp, Ensign,” he said to Leydon. “Engage once Doctor Phlox finishes handing the Krotus’s survivors off to the Andorians.”

“Aye, sir.”

A boatswain’s whistle drew his attention to the arm of his command chair. “Archer here,” he said after opening the channel.

“Lieutenant Reed, sir,” the Englishman said. “I’ve been down in the armory reading out the data from the Krotus’s flight recorder.”

Archer frowned slightly. “I thought you and T’Pol had already confirmed the cause of the Krotus disaster.”

“We did, Captain. And what I’ve found since then doesn’t change that. At least, not exactly.”

His frown deepening slightly in spite of himself, Archer said, “Well, what exactly did you find?”

“It seemed to me that the Krotus succumbed to the Romulan hijack weapon a little too quickly. Same with the Miracht, come to think of it.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean, Malcolm.”

“I mean that the Krotus should have put up more of a fight than she did, even given all the damage those retreating Romulan ships had taken. So I asked Ensign Sato to convert all the time indexes from both the Andorian and Tellarite log buoys to Solar standard time. Cross-comparing those indexes with our own logs confirmed that all the system failures on both the Krotus and the Miracht happened nearly twice as fast as those that Enterprise experienced while the Kobayashi Maru was getting scuttled. It looks as though the Romulans have made their weapon almost twice as effective as it was only a few months ago.”

“Either that,” Archer said, “or else Andorian and Tellarite vessels are twice as vulnerable to this thing as our ships are.”

Regardless, the captain knew one thing: certain people needed to know about this immediately.

Heading toward his ready room, Archer said, “Ensign Sato, please get me Ambassador Thoris of Andoria.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

Dateline: Threllvia system

TRANSCRIPT FROM THE NOVEMBER 18, 2155, NEWSTIME JOURNAL SPECIAL COMMENTARY FOLLOWS:

This is Gannet Brooks, with all the news that’s under the sun and beyond, reporting from the Andorian Imperial Freight Service Vessel Shesh.

Imperial Guard forces from the remote Andorian colony world of Threllvia are reporting heavy ship-to-ship fighting, both in orbit about the planet and in the atmosphere. And the consensus among both military personnel and the civilian starfarers who have been pressed into emergency service—such as the crew of the freighter Shesh—is uniformly grim.

The Romulans now hold Threllvia IV, which they assaulted today in a brazen sneak attack that no one in the system saw coming. Like the Earth colony at Deneva and the Vulcan and human settlements on Berengaria VII, the Andorian Threllvia system had been outfitted with a Vulcan warp-field detection grid designed to give the colonists at least a few crucial minutes to prepare for a Romulan attack.

Like Deneva and Berengaria, Threllvia IV never got those minutes. And still nobody can say why.

But despite the savage and unexpected nature of the Romulan assault, Andoria’s military and civilian fleets have risen nobly to the occasion, continuing to ferry hundreds—perhaps even thousands—of civilian refugees, many of them wounded, out of the system. They continue their efforts in defiance of the mounting danger, even as the situation on the ground looks progressively more hopeless.

Regardless of the ultimate outcome of this fierce clash over a distant Andorian outpost, the Imperial Guard and their civilian counterparts have already distinguished themselves for centuries to come. This reporter hopes that their fighting spirit will inspire her own world to bear whatever burden needs to be borne to stop the Romulan scourge in its tracks, to break its will, and finally to send it back where it came from.

From the Battle of Threllvia, this is Gannet Brooks.

Thirteenthmoon, Fesoan Lor’veln Year 463

Tuesday, November 18, 2155

Northern Wastes, Andoria

A chill wind blew across the soul of Hravishran th’Zoarhi, though it bore no connection to the blanket of ice and snow that covered the subterranean Aenar city.

“At least three of my former subordinates from the Kumari were serving aboard the Krotus when she was lost,” Shran said to Jhamel after word of the latest Romulan outrages had come to him, fresh from Threllvia.

“Thon. Keval. Tholos. All slain by the cowardly Romulans,” he continued, withdrawing to his quarter of the bed. “Who no doubt struck from a safe distance.”

“I am so very sorry,” said Jhamel, Shran’s favorite shelthreth-mate. With Vishri and Shenar out at the moment conducting Aenar Council business with Aenar leader Lissan, Shran and Jhamel had the entirety of their spacious, thermally insulated house—and the huge shelthreth bed that dominated the main sleeping chamber—all to themselves.

Her blind gray eyes brimming with moisture, Jhamel used her inherent Aenar-Andorian talents to speak directly inside his mind, a space he had grown used to sharing with her only very slowly and haltingly.

Didn’t that human journalist who reported from Threllvia mention survivors of the Krotus?

Shran had to admit that he had lately become an enthusiastic viewer of the reportage and commentary of the pinkskin news correspondent Gannet Brooks, whenever he could find the time. For one so young, Brooks seemed to understand the immutability of the circumstances that necessitated war far more keenly than many in her profession, and he included a few Andorians in that comparison. Brooks’s viewpoint seldom left him irritated and enraged the way the fear-spawned naïveté of isolationists like Keisha Naquase nearly always did.

I know that a handful of Krotus personnel were rescued, Shran thought to Jhamel, mentally “annunciating” his internalized words carefully to offset his own lack of Aenar telepathic ability. Trust me, neither Thon nor Keval nor Tholos would have willingly accepted anything less than a fight to the death.

“You can hope, Shran,” Jhamel said aloud. She rearranged the pillows and sat up on the bed, a motion that accentuated the curve of her already slightly distended belly. The first child of their shelthreth, a living symbol of hope, was due in about seven months.

That hope warmed the chill that had settled over his soul since he’d heard about the Krotus. But a volcanic anger burned beneath, stoking the violent interior fires that he had struggled to control every day since he’d first come to live among the pacifistic Aenar.

Shran knew that the fire would win in the end, and he felt in a brief, fluttering touch of minds that Jhamel knew it as well.

“Jhamel, I have to go back to the Imperial Guard,” he said. I have to do something.

She withdrew to another corner of the bed. A look of resignation crossed behind her sightless eyes, and her already snow-white skin seemed to turn half a shade paler.

“All right, my Thy’lek” she said aloud, pronouncing the Aenar form of his first name as she cradled herself in her own pallid arms. “I will help you break the news to Shenar and Vishri.”

Laikan, capital city of Andoria

“Yes, yes, this channel is indeed secure,” Ambassador Gora bim Gral of Tellar growled from the monitor that sat atop the desk of Andorian Foreign Minister Anlenthoris ch’Vhendreni. The Tellarite’s blunt, brown-bristled features made for a stark contrast to the delicate rime of ice and snow that had accumulated overnight on the office window beyond the Andorian’s desk.

“Thank you, Gral,” Foreign Minister Thoris said. “I can afford to take no chances.”

“I see. But I trust that you do intend to come to the point sometime today, don’t you, Thoris?”

“My point is simple,” Thoris said, willing his antennae to a strenuous stillness in order to avoid showing his annoyance. “The analyses of the Imperial Guard’s forensics experts seem to be entirely in agreement with those of Tellar’s military.”

“‘Agreement’?” the Tellarite diplomat interrupted with a snorting guffaw. “That is not a word one normally hears alongside the words ‘Andorian’ and ‘Tellarite.’”

Despite his best efforts, Thoris’s antennae flattened backward slightly over his mane of snow-white hair. “Believe me, Gral, my surprise is as profound as yours.”

“And what, precisely, have our respective worlds’ greatest brains agreed upon?”

“Based on detailed examinations of the log buoys that Captain Archer’s crew recovered following the loss of the Miracht and the Ka’Thelan Krotus—as well as the general pattern of recent Andorian and Tellarite ship disappearances—my government has concluded that the military and civilian fleets of both Andoria and Tellar are particularly susceptible to a potent new Romulan weapon with a proven capability of seizing space vessels by remote control.”

The Tellarite nodded, his small and deep-set obsidian eyes taking on a haunted cast, like a man who has caught a glimpse of the apocalypse.

“Perhaps our respective governments should have heeded Soval’s warnings all those many moonturns ago.”

“You may be correct,” Thoris said, returning the nod of his longtime nemesis. He knew that Gral had supported his government’s decision to disregard Soval’s quiet, back-channel request that they emulate Vulcan’s seeming cowardice, just as Thoris had done.

But now a persuasive spine of logic actually seemed to support Vulcan Administrator T’Pau’s apparent lunacy, though Vulcan’s decision to sit out the Romulan conflict still flew in the face of the Coalition’s mutual defense provisions. Regardless of Vulcan’s diplomatic debacles, however, Andoria and Tellar still bore an obligation to the Terrans.

“This information might prove useful to the humans’ ongoing defense efforts,” Thoris said.

“Unfortunately, my government has already classified this information.”

“As has mine. And matters will remain this way—at least pending the resolution of renewed internal debate about whether or not to pull our fleet back from the Romulan front in order to concentrate solely on Andoria’s own defense.”

After a protracted and uncharacteristically thoughtful silence, Gral said, “Now I see why you were so insistent that we speak of this only on a secure channel. It seems that at least one of us must commit a serious breach of protocol.”

“According to my intelligence sources, the United Earth government and Alpha Centauri are conducting specialized defense research on Centauri III, at the Cochrane Institute.”

“Highly secret research, I’ll warrant.”

“Let’s just say that certain individuals there are accustomed to handling... sensitive information.”

“Even when it necessarily cannot be transmitted via official channels.”

“Exactly.”

“You must understand that I cannot support this, Thoris.”

“I see,” Thoris said, disappointed though not at all shocked. After all, Tellarites were far more renowned for hiding in the mud than they were for their bravery.

“Officially, I would have to denounce what you are proposing.” As he spoke, Gral looked down, perhaps in shame, or perhaps to tend to some other urgent business that had suddenly come across his desk.

A gentle amber light suddenly began a rhythmic flashing on the left side of Thoris’s work station, indicating a large amount of incoming data—data apparently originating from Gral’s location via the same secure channel that was carrying their present conversation.

“I would have to denounce it in the strongest possible terms,” Gral continued, giving no overt indication that he was sending a data attachment. “If I even knew about it, that is. Which I do not, of course.”

As Gral droned on, Thoris examined the incoming data stream, which appeared to contain huge quantities of analytical data.

This is Tellar’s official data about the new Romulan weapon, he realized in a pleasurable flash of surprise. Gral couldn’t have gathered all of this for me so quickly—unless he had already collected it with the intent to share it with the humans, just as I have proposed.

“I hope I have made my position absolutely plain and clear of all mud,” Gral said.

Thoris could feel his antennae trying to rise in a manner that signified delight and satisfaction, but he restrained them with an effort of pure will.

“You have made your meaning as transparent as an Aenar icecarving, Mister Ambassador.”

Gral signed off with a characteristically curt snort and a grunt, leaving Thoris to contemplate how badly he had misjudged Tellarite courage. Gral’s gesture brought to mind the pinkskins’ ancient political philosopher Benjamin Franklin, who had once said, “We must hang together, gentlemen. Else, we shall most assuredly hang separately.”

Resolve stiffening his spine, Thoris began setting up a second secure channel.

But rather than Tellar, he directed this one toward the Cochrane Institute on Centauri III.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Tuesday, November 18, 2155
San Francisco, Earth

DESPITE THE THICKNESS of the walls and windows at Starfleet Headquarters, Sam Gardner could hear the voices of the crowd out on Hitchcock Street and Harrison Boulevard quite clearly throughout the afternoon military briefing. Those voices had been proliferating steadily all morning, and the multitude outside seemed still to be swelling even now.

“I’m glad my office isn’t as close to the street as yours, Sam,” Greg Black said as he peered out from behind the blinds.

With an acerbic half-smile, George Casey, the general in command of United Earth’s MACO forces, said, “And I’m glad I’ve got a hovercar warmed up and ready on the roof.”

Gardner shook his head wearily, rose from behind his desk, and took a tall, curve-necked bottle out of the bureau, along with a trio of small glasses. He immediately began filling all three with the fluorescent green Ganymedan whiskey he’d picked up during his last visit to Jupiter Station.

“They’re frightened,” Black said, waving off the drink. “They want something done about all these Romulan advances.”

“And they’re starting to get damned shrill about it,” Casey said as he picked up both glasses, downing the first in a single gulp.

Black nodded. “Calder. Tarod. Deneva. Berengaria. Threllvia. Only a damned fool wouldn’t be scared.”

“And there’s more to be scared of here than just the Romulans,” Gardner said after downing half the contents of his own glass.

“What do you mean?” Casey said, raising a steel-hued eyebrow.

Gardner nodded toward the window, and the crowd that lurked behind the blinds. “A public relations firestorm. A steady diet of this could convince Earth’s civilian leadership to push Starfleet and the MACOs into taking action prematurely.”

“Prime Minister Samuels is a pretty level-headed guy,” Casey said.

Gardner emptied his glass and set it down on his desk with a sharp clack. ”Samuels is a politician. An extremely capable one, but even he isn’t immune to a steady drumbeat like the one out on the street.”

Black nodded. “Or the one from the news media. The top war correspondents have sent half the planet into hiding and convinced the other half that all we need to defeat the Romulans is grit and clean living.”

“Gannet Brooks,” Gardner said. He refilled his glass, then gestured with the bottle toward the window. “I’d bet my admiral’s pips that most of the people out there watch her reports from the Romulan front every day.”

“At least Brooks is on the correct side of the issue,” Casey said. “She knows that appeasement only gets you dead. Or worse. I think she’s telling Earth the story it needs to hear right now. Not like that other one, the yellow rose of journalism.”

Keisha Naquase, Gardner thought. It seemed to him that Naquase’s message of fatalistic passivity wasn’t doing Earth any favors either.

Apparently the topic of pain-in-the-ass journalists had begun giving Black an old-fashioned bellyache; before Casey could raise Black’s discarded Ganymedan whiskey to his lips, the admiral took it, muttering something about needing a drink after all.

“Brooks’s heart might be in the right place,” Black said after he’d downed the drink. “But her expectations about Starfleet’s capabilities and timetables strikes me as unrealistic. And if enough people buy into those expectations—particularly among the civilian leadership— they can become a damned menace.”

Casey clearly wasn’t impressed. Standing ramrod straight, he said, “We’re MACOs. We can do anything.”

Gardner chuckled as he refilled all three glasses. “Semper Invictus,” he said. Always Invincible, the Latin motto of the Military Assault Command Organization.

“Boo-ya,” Casey said, then downed his second whiskey.

“You sharks might be invincible superheroes, George,” Gardner said, raising a glass. “But we squids have to take on the politics of war, on top of the war itself.”

“And Starfleet just might find itself in the position of having to try to... influence some of our opinion makers,” Black said. As an apparent afterthought, he added, “Within the framework of the UE Constitution and the Coalition Compact, of course.”

Casey scowled silently.

Sam Gardner found himself agreeing with his fellow admiral, though he hoped it was merely a reaction to the potent Ganymedan whiskey.

TWENTY-NINE

Wednesday, November 26, 2155

Columbia, Altair system

ERIKA HERNANDEZ LEANED TOWARD her command chair’s intercom pickup and opened a channel to engineering. “How much longer do your people need to get this job finished, Karl?”

The German-accented reply of Chief Engineer Karl Graylock came without hesitation. “It’s been going sehr schnell, Captain. Much more quickly than I thought it would.”

Standing to the immediate right of Hernandez’s chair, Commander Veronica Fletcher said, “We probably have that cadre of government engineers we picked up on Altair VI to thank for that.” Leaning toward the chair mic, she added, “No offense to you and yours, Karl.”

“None taken, Herr Executive Officer,” Graylock said. Hernandez didn’t even have to glance at her XO to know her back teeth were grinding; she hated being addressed as “Herr” even more than she disliked Starfleet’s traditional one-sex-fits-all use of the naval honorific “Mister.”

“I can’t say I’m surprised that Altair VI would make this mission a huge priority,” Hernandez said. “They have an even bigger stake in reinforcing their system’s warp-field detection grid than we do.”

“There’s about sixteen thousand very nervous civilians on Altair VI right now, more than half of them clustered in one place,” Fletcher said. “And there’ll be about as many crossed fingers down there until the new, improved defense grid proves itself.”

But Hernandez knew that Starfleet was not detached from Altair’s problems; it shared them to an increasingly uncomfortable extent. Starfleet had an urgent need to stem the recent rash of Romulan penetrations of the early-warning systems the Vulcans had provided to Coalition worlds and their colonies—penetrations that had already wrought horrendous results with the losses of the Daedalus-class Yeager and the NX-class Discovery.

Heck of a job, Vulcan, Hernandez thought, wondering for perhaps the thousandth time how the Romulans had been so consistently successful over the past several weeks in piercing the grid—and whether the measures taken today by Columbia’s crew and Altair VI’s finest engineering minds would succeed in patching whatever vulnerabilities the Romulans might have been able to exploit.

“I expect the final installation and testing operations very soon to be ganz vollständig,” Graylock said. “Totally complete before lunchtime tomorrow.”

That was indeed better than she’d hoped, by more than a full day. Still, a lot could happen in only a day.

“Will the system still be up and running in the meantime?” Fletcher asked, as though she’d read Hernandez’s mind.

“Ja, Commander. Like a Risan jackrabbit.”

Hernandez was impressed by Karl’s acumen, as usual, though her curiosity wasn’t yet entirely satisfied. “But don’t you have to have the system at least partially shut down to change out and test components?”

“We’ve identified the minimum number of subspace-linked nodes necessary to maintain complete network coverage of the system periphery,” Graylock said in tones fairly bursting with pride. “We determined that number by figuring out exactly which nodes were completely key to the system, and therefore had to be the first ones hardened against jamming and other types of outside attack.”

“So the network never falls below the minimum number of nodes,” Hernandez observed.

“Absolut richtig, Captain. Correct. And the Altairians have even tied their preexisting civilian communications satellite network into the system to provide additional backup coverage and processing power. But...” The confidence that had lofted the engineer’s words mere moments earlier seemed to fail him.

“What’s wrong, Karl?”

After a brief pause, he said, “Well, Captain, the Romulans have gotten past some early-warning systems that are even finer-grained than this one over the past few weeks. Heaven help me if I can figure out how they’ve been doing it.”

And heaven help us all if it turns out you can’t.

“You’ve done great work so far, Karl. Just keep on doing what you’ve been doing. Hernandez out.”

An alarm suddenly began to blare. Hernandez got to her feet.

“Report!”

“It’s the warp-field detection grid,” Lieutenant Kiona Thayer said as she worked the tactical console.

“Incoming hostiles?”

Thayer scowled at the data displays before her. “No, Captain,” she said, her speech tinged with a melodious Quebecois accent. “It’s the network itself. The key nodes along the periphery appear to be failing, one by one, in a kind of cascade effect.”

Hernandez returned to her chair and called back to the engine room.

“Karl, are you getting this?”

“We’re already on it down here, Captain. Twelve key subspace-transmitting nodes have gone gebrochen so far.”

“The warp-field sensors still show negative for Romulan incursions,” said Lieutenant Commander Kalil bin Farraj bin Saleh el-Rashad from the main science station. “At least that much is encouraging.”

But Hernandez found the Syrian science officer’s report anything but encouraging. After all, the last few Coalition-allied worlds the Romulans had annexed had enjoyed perfectly functional warp detection systems—at least apparently. The Romulans had surprised them anyway, as though their victims had left a key for them under the front doormat.

“Our instruments are telling us stuff that I don’t feel comfortable accepting on faith,” Hernandez said. Turning toward the helm, she said, “Lieutenant Akagi, plot a course parallel with the pattern of node failures. Take us out to edge of the system, maximum warp. Lieutenant Thayer, place the ship on Tactical Alert status and polarize the hull plating. Sidra, send a coded secure-channel advisory to the Heinlein and the Kon-Tiki. The local coast guard needs to know that Columbia is following a hot lead on the Romulans.”

As the Tactical Alert klaxon sounded, Fletcher stepped between the captain and the helm, which Akagi manipulated with the skill of a concert pianist. “Captain, if the Romulans have somehow managed to game Altair’s defenses, they might be deliberately trying to draw Columbia as far away from Altair VI as possible in order to launch a ground strike in our absence.”

“I know, Veronica,” Hernandez said. “But if they’ve been feeding fake ‘all clear’ data into the network to cover a stealth approach from outside the system, I want to catch ’em before they get any closer to Altair VI than they already are.”

Evidently satisfied, Fletcher backed away from the helm. “Course laid in and ready, Captain,” said the young helmswoman.

“Engage, Reiko,” Hernandez said.

The stars on the main viewer turned to streaks of light near the edges, and brightened into sapphire hues near the center as Columbia leaped into warp, compressing the light waves between the starship and infinity’s verge.

“We’re making sensor contact with... something,” said el-Rashad. He turned from the main science console toward the bridge’s center, surprise and concern etched across his olive features. “Spacecraft of some sort, near one of the detection grid’s failed primary nodes.”

“Sixteen vessels by my count,” Thayer said. “And we’re closing on them fast. Their speed is difficult to estimate while we’re at warp.”

“Configuration?” Hernandez said, peering forward into a warp-distorted starfield that so far revealed precious little about the peril toward which Columbia now raced.

“Definitely Romulan,” said el-Rashad.

Sometimes I really hate being right, Hernandez thought. Aloud, she said, “Reiko, bring us out of warp close enough to give ’em a good scare. I want to see right up their noses.”

“Captain, there are at least sixteen Romulan ships out there,” Fletcher said, her voice brittle with alarm.

“To which we can do one hell of a lot of damage if we hit them hard and fast,” Hernandez said, buttressing her words with a hint of admonition. “Stand ready, Reiko.”

With a tense nod, Akagi pulled back on the throttle-lever and the velocity-streaked stars on the main bridge viewer immediately settled down to their usual shapes.

Framed squarely in the viewer’s center, a flock of predatory birds approached rapidly from the heart of that darkness, opening and closing their formation as needed to avoid the large bodies of ancient ice and rock that tumbled about here on the ragged edges of Altair’s gravitational influence. Now clearly visible in the harsh glare of the system’s distant but nevertheless quite bright A-type star—Altair’s luminosity exceeded that of Earth’s star, Sol, by about an order of magnitude— the raptors moved as one, winglike engine nacelles extended like auguries of menace as they rolled effortlessly in a coordinated display of maneuverability.

All the while each vessel called attention to the aggressive, blood-red plumage that adorned its nearly flat underbelly.

“Have they noticed us yet?” Hernandez asked.

“I don’t think so, Captain,” Thayer said. “We may be close enough to one of the system’s larger Kuiper bodies right now to confuse their sensors.”

Which are probably in passive mode right now anyway, to preserve the element of surprise, Hernandez thought.

“Try and keep it that way, Reiko,” she said. “And, Kiona, please cut off that damned alarm.”

“Aye, Captain,” the young pilot said as she refined Columbia’s trajectory. Simultaneously, Lieutenant Thayer entered the command that rendered the battle klaxon mercifully silent.

Watching the lethal parade on the viewscreen with as much fascination as fear, Hernandez said, “The hostiles’ profiles look almost identical to the Romulan bird-of-prey images in our intel briefings.” Although she and her crew had tangled with the Romulans before, the enemy had yet to engage Columbia directly, without recourse to proxies like the Vulcan vessels they had hijacked near Alpha Centauri back in July.

Well, that’s all about to change, you motherless escoria.

“The ship profiles might look familiar,” el-Rashad said. “But my scans show these vessels to be far smaller than any Romulan ships anybody has ever encountered previously. I’d guess these to be one- or two-man ship-to-ship fighter craft.”

“I wonder if this is how they’ve been beating the warp-field detection grid,” Fletcher said. “By sending in swarms of vessels too small to set off the alarms.”

“Maybe, Commander,” el-Rashad said with a shrug. “But I find it hard to believe that a Vulcan-designed warp-field sensor would be that easy to fool.”

“We can sort all that out later,” Hernandez said impatiently. “They haven’t seen us yet, so let’s take advantage of that. Thayer, ready the forward phase cannons, and lock and load all torpedo tubes.”

“Aye, Captain,” Thayer said as she threw herself into the task.

Hernandez bared her teeth in a long pent-up display of aggression that left her feeling surprised at herself. “Let’s give these sneaky bastards a taste of their own medicine.”

The battle was fierce and at moments nearly blinding, but it was also agreeably brief. As Hernandez had hoped, Columbia’s sudden out-of-nowhere appearance had rattled the Romulan squadron just enough to allow Columbia’s relentless phase-cannon fire and torpedo launches to destroy about half of the Romulan force while it was still reeling and trying to regroup following the NX-class vessel’s surprise entrance into their midst. Two of the vessels had collided, all but vaporizing each other in their scramble to get clear of the far larger and less agile Columbia.

Five more of the small Romulan fighter craft went down over the next several minutes in exchanges of fire that cost Columbia two of her forward torpedo launchers and a phase-cannon array. The two remaining Romulan fighters had chosen the better part of valor by fleeing Columbia’s immediate vicinity.

But instead of taking the outbound trajectory one might expect of a fleeing vessel, the two small birds-of-prey had placed themselves on steep subluminal descent courses into Altair’s powerful gravity well, with each craft taking its own individual but decidedly “downhill” trajectory.

“They’re on separate headings for Altair VI, Captain,” el-Rashad reported. “Full impulse.”

“Pursue, Reiko,” Hernandez said. “Go in and out of warp as needed to pass ’em and come about. I think our stomachs can take it.”

“I’ll try to be gentle, Captain,” the helmswoman said with a sideways grin. A few heartbeats later, Hernandez felt her innards shuddering in protest as Columbia shot forward, straddling the superluminal line as she gained relentlessly on her quarry.

“The Romulans must be counting on eluding the warp-field detectors all the way down,” Fletcher said.

Hernandez nodded toward her exec, whom she thought looked a little green because of Columbia’s small but noticeable velocity oscillations. “And they’re gambling that we can’t fly precisely enough at warp inside the system to avoid overshooting them before they reach the planet.”

“Bad call on their part,” Fletcher said, her jawline taut with resolve and more than a little apparent anger at the Romulans’ brazenness.

“Subspace scans show both the Heinlein and the Kon-Tiki scrambling up from Altair VI to intercept the incoming bogeys,” Thayer said, her expression a study in intensity. Her eyes never broke contact with the tactical console’s dynamic displays.

“Heinlein reports engaging one of the bogeys,” Valerian reported from the comm station, her right hand holding her earpiece in place as she listened to developments that could only be followed in real time via the subspace bands, given the light-minute or so that still separated Columbia from the unfolding battle.

On the main viewer, the artificially polarized white light of Altair turned blue, while the background stars elongated into glowing cerulean spears. When Akagi dropped Columbia out of warp moments later, restoring the universe to its normal palette of shapes and colors, the blue-green orb of Altair VI looked close enough to reach out and touch.

And as Columbia quickly decelerated into a tight, three-hundred-klick orbit above the planet’s surface, a rapidly expanding conflagration suddenly hove into view from just beyond the terminator.

Something had detonated, leaving a gigantic, silent orange fireball in orbit. As if in answer to Hernandez’s subvocalized prayers, the bulbous shapes of the Heinlein and the Kon-Tiki, both of them Starfleet Daedalus-class vessels, emerged from the fiery debris field, heading in different directions.

“The fireball is what’s left of one of the Romulan attackers,” elRashad confirmed, his hands moving in a blur across his scanner controls. “I’m not reading enough mass to account for them both.”

Hernandez’s brow furrowed. “So where’s the other one?”

The Kon-Tiki’s ungainly rolling turn toward the planet’s atmosphere, coupled with Columbia’s continued forward motion, drew Hernandez’s gaze deeper into Altair VI’s expanding dayside and answered her question before any of her crew could.

In the distance, just above the ninety-degree-canted horizon, a telltale streak of fire gave away the presence of the last Romulan fighter craft, which was now on an almost meteor-fast entry trajectory. Racing toward the intruder from above was another pair of spacecraft, a local welcoming committee, judging from the familiar configurations.

“Kon-Tiki confirms that one Romulan vessel is still coming in,” said Valerian. “Despite having taken at least one direct hit.”

“Let’s hope that one hit crippled the Romulan at least. Is she making a controlled descent?” Fletcher asked.

“I can’t tell from these readings,” el-Rashad said. “But it probably doesn’t matter either way. The hostile craft is on a direct heading for the Altair VI outpost, and the only things possibly standing in her way are a couple of local DY-500-class ships making steep descent maneuvers from orbit. Based on the numbers I’m seeing, a ground collision looks just about certain.”

“We can’t let that happen,” Hernandez said, quickly doing the tactical math in her head. Since those DY-500s were most likely armed with nothing stronger than navigational lasers, there was no point in expecting them to intervene successfully. “Go after the bogey, Reiko.”

“Aye, Captain.”

As Lieutenant Akagi busied herself at the conn, Fletcher leaned in close and spoke almost directly into the captain’s ear. “Erika, Columbia wasn’t designed to enter planetary atmosphere any more than those DY-500s or Daedalus ships were.”

“I know, Veronica,” Hernandez answered just as quietly. She gestured toward the forward viewer, upon which a green-brown landscape, highlighted by the red-orange of a hull superheaded by reentry friction, hurtled ever nearer. “But the outpost down there wasn’t designed to withstand a hot ballistic encounter with a spaceship. And since Columbia is the most fleet-footed vessel here, it’s up to us to step into the breach no matter what the owner’s manual says.”

“Understood,” Fletcher said with a sober nod that she leavened with a wry grin. “But you may have just voided the warranty on this beast. I intend to hide someplace safe when Karl Graylock reads you the riot act about this afterward.”

Hernandez returned her XO’s grin. If there is an afterward, I’ll gladly accept whatever punishment our chief engineer deems appropriate.

Aloud, she said, “Lieutenant Akagi, estimated time to intercept?”

“About thirty-two seconds, Captain,” the pilot said. “That only leaves another five seconds or so to take out the bogey before it slams into the outpost.”

Which means that the outpost is probably finished no matter what, unless we blow that Romulan out of the sky right now, Hernandez thought. She was well aware that a metallic debris cloud moving at terminal velocity could devastate an even larger area of the planet’s surface than could an unchecked collision—unless the detonation that created it took place sufficiently high in Altair VI’s fortunately substantial mesosphere.

“Kalil, what’s my safety margin?” she asked the science officer.

“Another ten seconds,” came el-Rashad’s crisp response. “Perhaps fifteen, if the local atmospheric variables are kind.”

Rising from her chair, Hernandez said, “Lieutenant Thayer, target phase cannons. Ensign Valerian, warn those DY-500s not to get too close. I don’t want anybody getting caught in the blowback.”

“Weapons lock is balky, Captain,” Thayer said. “Atmospheric distortions.”

Hernandez nodded in her weapons officer’s direction. “Understood. Aim manually. We’re running out of time here.”

“Aye, Captain,” Thayer said, beads of sweat coalescing on her forehead. “No pressure.”

“Both DY-500 craft have acknowledged our wave-off request, Captain,” said Valerian. “They’re steering clear.”

“Target is still descending in terminal trajectory, nearing minimum safe detonation altitude,” el-Rashad said. “And I’m reading a live nuclear warhead arming aboard the bogey!”

“Confirmed,” Valerian said.

“So this isn’t just an inert meteor falling on the outpost’s head,” Fletcher said.

Hernandez breathed a curse. “Of course not. That would be easy.” It made sense that the Romulan ships would carry nukes; they had probably used them to initiate the cascade of node failures in Altair’s warp-field detection grid that had caught Columbia’s attention in the first place.

The ship rumbled and shuddered beneath the captain’s boots, interrupting her reverie.

“Try and keep her level, will you, Akagi?” Thayer said. “You’re screwing up my manual target lock.”

“Sorry,” Akagi said, her face creased with concentration as her fingers moved in a blur across the flight control console.

“Target has passed minimum safe detonation altitude,” el-Rashad said.

“Lieutenant Thayer,” Hernandez said, injecting calm into her voice with pure force of will. “Are you ready to fire or not? We’re not gonna have any time for do-overs.”

“My manual target lock keeps drifting,” the weapons officer said. “Damn!”

The jumble of green-brown ground and dark ocean below was beginning to look uncomfortably close. Hernandez could actually see one of the Darro-Miller outpost’s larger seaside domes, right on the approaching daylit horizon.

“Hull temperature approaching critical,” el-Rashad said. “If we don’t detonate this thing right now, nothing we do later will make any difference.”

“Thayer?” Hernandez said, hoping the messiness of the real world would provide more favorable circumstances than el-Rashad’s pure math would suggest. She was well aware that the chaotic behavior of Altair VI’s thicker lower atmospheric layers could interfere with electronic targeting systems. But she also knew that this very same chaos could also help to neutralize any debris field created even at this low altitude.

“Outer hull temp has just passed twenty-five hundred degrees Celsius,” el-Rashad reported. “Approaching spec thermal limits.”

“Target locked,” Thayer said as Altair’s thick atmosphere rumbled and shook the ship again.

“Fire!” Hernandez said.

On the main viewscreen, the salvo from the forward phase cannons was nearly lost in the incendiary glow coming from the overheated hull. Through that tunnel of fire, all that Hernandez could see was the glowing point of light of the descending bogey and the shadows cast by the settlement structures and the nearby fields of ancient Altairian ruins, both of which still appeared to lie several hundred klicks distant.

A seeming eternity later, the bogey erupted in a gout of fire, which immediately blossomed into an orange sphere of thermonuclear destruction that encompassed the entire viewscreen.

“Akagi, take us clear!” Hernandez cried, getting back into her captain’s chair and hanging onto its arms for dear life as Columbia’s bridge tilted while the inertial compensators struggled to catch up to the pilot’s lightning maneuver. Everyone else on the bridge likewise anchored themselves to chairs and railings as best they could until the ship had leveled out.

Hernandez turned toward the main science station. “Outpost status, Mister el-Rashad?” she asked.

The science officer wore a grim expression of concentration as he consulted his scanner and console displays.

“No signal traffic from the surface,” Valerian said.

Hernandez slammed her fist on the arm of her chair.

“That might not mean anything, Captain,” Fletcher said gently. “The nuke aboard that bogey detonated at one-hundred and thirty-two klicks above the planet’s surface. But the blast cloud is still spreading upward and outward. It could ionize the atmosphere quite a bit before it finally dissipates. And that doesn’t even take the detonation’s electromagnetic pulse into account.”

Hernandez stood and approached el-Rashad’s science station. “Kalil, can you scan through the ionization effects?”

“Working on it, Captain,” said el-Rashad. After another seeming eternity, the science officer looked up from his scanner and smiled. “All of the Altair VI outpost’s structures appear to be intact. The prevailing winds are carrying the fallout and other remnants of the blast away from the outpost.”

Hernandez returned to her chair and sagged into it as Lieutenant Akagi shepherded Columbia back up into a safe standard orbit, whereupon Valerian announced that the outpost’s chief administrator was hailing Columbia, in order to discuss her ad hoc plan to throw a victory celebration before Columbia’s eventual departure. Meanwhile, Fletcher and el-Rashad delivered their reports on all the damage the ship had sustained, which turned out to be minimal except for some minor thermal damage to the ventral hull plating and the impulseengine power relays.

So the folks down there want to throw us a victory party, Hernandez thought. Even though what she had just endured felt far more like a catastrophic near miss—a disaster avoided as much by luck as by skill—than the work of a conquering hero. The colonists’ relief was understandable, but the fact remained that the Romulans had nearly caught everybody by surprise, including Columbia.

If they did it once, they can do it again.

Just as Hernandez directed her exec to politely decline the hospitality of the colony’s leadership, Lieutenant Graylock’s hard-edged Teutonic voice came over the bridge comm system.

“Engineering to bridge.”

“Hernandez here.” She allowed a small smile to escape onto her lips. “What’s new down in the engine room, Karl?”

“Captain, I’d like to meet with you at your earliest opportunity to discuss the proper care and feeding of this ehemals schön schiff—this once beautiful ship.”

Preferably in a meeting room that’s been thoroughly soundproofed, Hernandez thought.

“Let me make a deal with you, Lieutenant,” she said aloud. “I’ll agree to take an entire remedial engineering course from you—once you and Lieutenant Commander el-Rashad figure out exactly how the Romulans managed to penetrate the Altair system far enough to do as much damage as they did.”

THIRTY

Place de la Concorde
Paris, France, Earth

ON DAYS LIKE TODAY, Prime Minister Nathan Samuels found himself wishing that he had never entered politics. A lowly clerical job inside some nice, quiet bank looked very appealing right now.

As the impromptu meeting unfolded before and around the massive hardwood desk that dominated the prime minister’s main-office-cum-reception space, Starfleet’s Sam Gardner took the floor momentarily while assorted high-ranking Starfleet and MACO officers, along with key officeholders in the United Earth government’s parliamentary and executive branches, listened attentively.

“We might as well have built a fortress out of rice paper and cotton candy,” the admiral said as he leaned forward on one of the office’s antique straight-backed chairs. Through the window behind him, Samuels could see the towering stone spire of the Obelisk of Luxor casting its long, late-afternoon shadow alongside the Seine River in Paris’s eighth arrondissement. “We have to face an unpleasant reality: the Vulcan early warning systems just don’t work worth a damn.”

“I’m not sure that’s entirely true,” said Minister Lydia Littlejohn, one of the up-and-coming members of United Earth’s preeminent legislative body, who had taken a seat on the low couch that abutted the office’s south wall. “Altair VI evidently received enough advance warning to prevent the Romulans from actually reaching the settlements there. The Darro-Miller dome came through the crisis without so much as a scratch.”

“If you’ll permit me to make a blunt observation, Madame Minister,” said MACO General Hayes as he slowly paced along the west wall of the spacious office, “Altair VI escaped Romulan conquest only by the skin of its ass.”

Appearing considerably more relaxed than either the general looked or Samuels felt, Interior Minister Haroun el-Rashid crossed an ankle over a knee on the same low sofa upon which Minister Littlejohn sat, alongside a worried looking Admiral Black. “But you can’t argue with results,” el-Rashid said. “Whatever the folks at Altair VI were doing seemed to work for them. Maybe we ought to study that and replicate it.”

“Whatever early warning Altair received was no thanks to the Vulcans’ warpfield detectors,” said Captain Eric Stillwell, who stood beside the couch, his arms folded.

Thomas Vanderbilt, the prime minister’s defense secretary, chimed in from his chair to the immediate right of Samuels’s desk. “I’m afraid I have to agree. If one of Starfleet’s NX-class starships hadn’t been close at hand, Altair VI would have been another rout.”

“It sounds as though my defense advisers are all in agreement that Altair owes its survival to little more than dumb luck,” Samuels said, shaking his head. He was beginning to feel a lancing pain behind his eyes. “Wonderful.”

“Maybe sometimes it’s better to be lucky than to be good,” Minister el-Rashid said with a shrug.

Admiral Black shook his head. “I’ll always take whatever luck I can get, Minister. Like the luck that has protected Earth ships from getting hit hard by that Romulan hijack-weapon over the past few months. But luck is no substitute for solid long-term strategy and flexible, adaptable tactics.”

“I have to agree with that assessment, Admiral,” said Secretary Vanderbilt.

“As do I,” Samuels said. The Andorians and the Tellarites had indeed taken the brunt of the Romulans’ remote-control attacks lately, although the reasons for that remained inexplicable, stumping humanity’s finest tactical minds. “I’m gratified to see that no one here needs to be warned how dangerous it can be to develop an overreliance on luck.”

“Unfortunately, Mister Prime Minister, luck has been our most reliable tool all too often lately,” General Casey said. “If we had more ships available to enable us to distribute our forces across Coalition space, this conflict would suddenly be less about luck and more about skill.”

“We’re working as hard and as fast as we can to achieve tactical parity with the Romulans,” Black said. “But these things don’t happen overnight.”

“Then we still have a fundamental problem,” said Casey. “We need as many fast ships as Starfleet can build—otherwise our troops won’t be able to reach the war’s hot spots in time to do anyone any good. Semper invictus becomes a joke when Starfleet’s motto seems to be Nunquam adventus.”

Samuels tried to let the general’s bitter, counterproductive joke sail right past him. Nunquam adventus meant “Never arrived.”

Black’s eyes were hard as daggers as he replied to the blunt-spoken MACO leader. “Our NX-class shipbuilding efforts are already running round the clock at multiple sites,” he said.

“One of which the Romulans have already destroyed at enormous cost to us,” Gardner said, poker-faced. “We’re still scrambling to recover from that.”

Casey glared back at both the admirals. “So what Starfleet is really saying is that we’re stuck with having to rely on luck. And that’s to bolster a defensive strategy that’s a loser in the long run anyway. We have to keep rolling the dice, hoping that one of our far-too-rare NX-class ships will happen to be near enough to a Romulan target to get there in time to mount a defense. I trust you are aware that you lost Discovery three weeks ago.”

Setting aside his ire at Casey’s hostile tone, Gardner raised his eyes to the ceiling, a look of mock supplication on his face as he muttered, “Illegitimi non carborundum.”

Samuels suppressed a snicker as he watched Casey fume in silence at the admiral. Evidently the general possessed enough command of nonmilitary neolatinisms to recognize the decidedly post-Roman adage, “Don’t let the bastards grind you down.”

Minister Littlejohn stood and raised her hands, as though trying to ensure that the Starfleet and MACO brass remained in their respective corners and refrained from trying to land any physical blows.

“Okay,” she said. “We know that the NX-class starship is the most advanced design Starfleet currently has.”

“And we have the goddamned Vulcans to thank for that fact, too,” said Admiral Black.

Ignoring the interruption, Littlejohn continued. “But we also know that building the NX is a long and expensive process.” She paused significantly. “Maybe too long and expensive.”

“What are you driving at, Madam Minister?” Black asked.

“Mainly this: I’ve been told that at least three Daedalus-class vessels can be built in the time it takes to put a single NX-class starship into service,” Littlejohn said. “And that’s also a better schedule than we can expect for the newer Intrepid-type design.”

“That’s true,” Black said with a nod. “But we need to build fast ships, even if it takes us a bit longer. Without warp-five capable ships, the troops might as well have to walk to the battlefields.”

“We need quantity, though,” Minister el-Rashid said. “Maybe at least as much as we need quality. Otherwise we’re still placing way too much faith in luck—betting on the chance that our least-numerous but best-equipped ships will just happen to be close to wherever they need to be as this war continues to deepen and broaden.”

Captain Stillwell looked decidedly unhappy, which Samuels found unsurprising. Not only had the captain long been a vocal advocate for the production of high-warp propulsions systems like the Henry Archer warp-five engines that now powered the NX fleet, he was also currently in charge of Starfleet’s cutting-edge warp-seven drive research project, being conducted in conjunction with the Cochrane Institute on Alpha Centauri III.

“As long as we’re still talking about luck,” Stillwell said, “then perhaps we ought to discuss going full-bore into the business of manufacturing our own luck—the way Columbia did.”

“Exactly what are you getting at, Captain?” Samuels asked, hoping that Stillwell wasn’t about to exacerbate his incipient headache.

“Let’s concentrate on quality and quantity both,” the captain said. “We could convert all of our current Daedalus-class production capacity—and that’s a considerable amount of capacity—into NX-class production.”

No such luck on the headache, Samuels thought.

“That’s insane!” Black said. “We’d be betting all of our limited war resources on a still-unproved set of technologies.”

“Unproved?” Stillwell said, his voice rising in both pitch and volume. “Archer’s Enterprise and Hernandez’s Columbia have more than proved the capabilities of the NX design.”

“Which remains Starfleet’s only starship configuration that has shown a consistent vulnerability to Romulan remote-hijack attacks, Captain,” Black said, accentuating his own higher rank.

But Stillwell wasn’t letting go. “Consistent? Admiral, a dataset of two incidents does not make for good empirical research. We’d be upgrading our technology. If we formally consolidate our Daedalus efforts with the NX program, along with all the progress my team has been making lately on the warp-seven project—”

“Your still highly speculative warp-seven project,” Black said, interrupting.

“Admiral, I—”

“All right, let’s save some of this aggression for the Romulans,” Samuels said, shutting down the rapidly overheating discussion. But unlike the present debate, the pressure inside his skull was continuing to build steadily, like the insistent whistle of a teakettle at full boil.

He knew that whistle wouldn’t quiet down before he’d reached a decision—a decision that only he was empowered to make.

Settling back in his chair, Samuels addressed the entire room. “A great man once said, ‘When you come to a fork in the road, take it.’ And after much consultation with all of you, I propose that we do exactly that.”

He paused, looking from face to face to face during the ensuing silence. Blank stares. Completely, utterly lost, all of them, except perhaps for Vanderbilt.

Good. There were times when an uncommon familiarity with the obsolete sport of baseball could be a useful thing rather than a mere oddity.

“We will indeed pool our shipbuilding resources,” he said at length. “Though possibly not in the way any of you might have expected. We’ll address our need for large numbers of ships by amping up the production of Daedalus spaceframes.”

“Respectfully, Mister Prime Minister, that will not address our need for large-scale high-warp capability,” Black said.

“It will if we use all the resources of Starfleet and UESPA to integrate our NX-class propulsion expertise with our much more efficient Daedalus production capabilities,” Samuels said. “And if we also give the NX and Daedalus teams full and complete access to the interim results of the warp-seven research program, who knows what we might accomplish?”

One by one, Samuels made wordless eye contact with Black, Gardner, Stillwell, and Casey. Each of them seemed to mull over his idea with commingled skepticism and pleased surprise, as though only their internecine rivalries had prevented each man from forging precisely the same chain of reasoning on his own. Stillwell, who had always taken a highly proprietary interest in the warp-seven research program, appeared more skeptical of Samuels’ plan than anyone else in the room, though he held his tongue.

Gardner was the one who finally broke the silence. “Mister Prime Minister, I have to admit that your plan makes a lot of sense, at least conceptually. But I’ve spent almost half my career helping to shepherd the NX design through every stage of its development. It’s the most advanced production spacecraft Earth has ever developed.”

“I know it is,” Samuels said, hoping the sympathy he felt was coming through in his manner. “And I’ve always tried to give your efforts as much support as possible. But the world is changing, Sam. And we have to change along with it.”

Gardner offered a deferential nod. “And I appreciate that, sir. But I’d hate to think we’re taking a step backward just for expediency’s sake.”

“I prefer to think of it as a step toward the smallest number of moving parts,” Samuels said, standing to signal that the meeting had come to an end. “After all, ‘less advanced’ can also translate to ‘not as much can go wrong.’”

After his colleagues and advisers had filed out of his office, the prime minister decided that such questions were best left to be settled by the historians.

And with any luck at all, he thought, humans will be the ones who’ll write those histories, and not the Romulans.

THIRTY-ONE

Enterprise, en route to Earth

HOSHI SATO WONDERED just how long Ensign Elrene Leydon’s hand had been waving just centimeters from her face.

“Oh, good. You’re still in there somewhere,” said the helmsman as she withdrew to her own side of the small table in the mess. “I was afraid for a second I might have to get Doctor Phlox over here to revive you.”

Sato tore her gaze from the patch sewn onto Leydon’s left sleeve; the patch, which matched the one on her own sleeve, was emblazoned with the motto that Captain Archer had selected from a list of contenders submitted a few weeks earlier by personnel from every department, thanks to an ancient tradition that had been revived aboard Columbia.

Ire audaciter quo nemo ante iit.

Although she agreed wholeheartedly with the motto’s sentiment, it wouldn’t have been her own first choice; she still preferred her own submission, the pithier Scientia, scriptatum in astra: “Knowledge, written in the stars.”

Making a slow half turn in her seat, Sato glanced to her right, where Phlox was seated at one of the other tables, which he shared with Commander T’Pol; the Vulcan’s meal was both abstemious and vegetarian, while the Denobulan physician’s was conspicuously neither. But despite their vast differences in both taste and temperament, the sight of the pair dining together wasn’t an uncommon one; they were, after all, the only two nonhumans who served aboard Enterprise.

Sato once again belatedly became aware that her friend had started speaking again. “Okay, I’m reasonably sure you’re not having a stroke or a seizure, Hoshi,” Leydon was saying in an apparent effort to brighten Sato’s all-too-obviously gloomy frame of mind. “But I’m still trying to make sense out of something you said a minute ago.”

“What?” Hoshi said, kicking herself for her bad habit of thinking out loud. It seemed to come with the territory, however, when most of one’s energies were devoted to chopping, grinding, and analyzing words and their underlying ideas.

“That comment you made about the Edsel,” Leydon said around a swallow of iced tea. “I’m still not sure what you were talking about.”

Sato tried to put a brave face on what she had been fretting about for the past couple of hours. “You never heard of the Edsel? I’m surprised at you, with all those stories you have about that ancestor of yours who ran the flight deck of the old wet-navy Enterprise.”

Leydon coughed as the iced tea nearly came back through her nose. “He was only deck crew.”

“Sorry,” Sato said, smiling. “Telling tall tales about your family is your job.”

“Thank you,” Leydon said, coughing into her hand. Setting aside the iced tea, she continued. “My great-grandfather might have only been a skittle on old CVN-65, but he did own a Ford Edsel. Left it to my grandfather, who was still driving the thing until an ECON bomb attack wrecked it during Dubya-Dubya-Three.”

Sato nodded. “So maybe you’re not aware that the Edsel was considered one of the great automotive marketing blunders of its era.”

“I get that. I mean, the Edsel was ugly. Even people back in the mid-twentieth century must have thought so, since nobody wanted to buy ’em. That’s one of the things that made Edsels valuable to collectors decades later. What I don’t get was why you muttered, ‘We’re flying back to Earth in an Edsel’ under your breath a minute ago.”

Sato made an understated please-use-your-inside-voice gesture, spreading both hands just above the tabletop. This close to Enterprise’s keen-eared exec wasn’t the ideal venue for the passing along of scuttlebutt. With her back to T’Pol and Phlox, Sato leaned closer to Leydon and whispered, “I just heard that the NX design is going to be phased out, and soon.”

Leydon looked as though she’d been slapped. “Where’d you hear that?”

“As communications officer on Starfleet’s highest profile NX-class ship, I have a few... inside sources. You’re not going to get more than that out of me without using torture.” Sato wasn’t about to betray the confidence of Sidra Valerian, her counterpart aboard Columbia, or those of several others she knew inside Starfleet Headquarters.

The helmswoman crossed her arms, her gaze squinting through a haze of doubt; Sato didn’t find that surprising, considering how hard her friend had worked to get posted to Enterprise.

“And just what do your ‘inside sources’ say Starfleet intends to replace the NX design with while the Romulans are circling us like sharks?” Leydon said. “A hot-rodded Daedalus?”

Sato was glad her friend wasn’t sipping her drink again just now. “That’s right. One that’s supposed to be capable of making warp five, or can at least sustain a warp four-and-a-half cruising speed. It’s supposed to cut the shipyard manufacturing time by a factor of at least three. But you didn’t hear any of this stuff from me, okay?”

Leydon settled back into her chair and slammed down the rest of her iced tea. A moment later she looked forlornly into the empty glass as though wishing it had held something a good deal stronger.

“I didn’t hear anything,” she finally said at length, speaking quietly. “And I won’t believe it until Newstime picks up the story. And maybe not even then.”

Hoshi could imagine the debate that would consume the attention of the interstellar news media once this rumor was confirmed. Keisha Naquase would worry that Earth’s once exploration-oriented Starfleet was about to get itself onto a permanent war footing. Gannet Brooks would see the move as a temporary step backward, made necessary by the unfortunate but often inevitable circumstances of war.

Of course, the stately NX-class design wouldn’t disappear overnight. If the rumors were true, they merely meant that Starfleet and UESPA were shifting their expectations going forward; Earth would no longer be relying upon Enterprise and her sister ships as humanity’s primary wartime workhorses.

Starfleet probably expects the NX-class to disappear on its own, Sato thought glumly as she imagined the many battles that were certain to come. Losses would mount on both sides. The Romulans might well take out the few remaining NX specimens still flying, including Enterprise and the small handful of her sisters still being assembled in spacedock even now.

Sato looked down at the motto on her own sleeve patch. The lofty sounding phrase, cribbed from a seminal speech by Zefram Cochrane decades ago and translated into Latin to give it additional heft, seemed to mock her.

Ire audaciter quo nemo ante iit.

To boldly go where no man has gone before.

We humans are warriors now, not explorers, she thought with a sense of all but infinite loss. Starfleet just hasn’t got around to making all the formal announcements yet.

That wasn’t what she’d expected when Jonathan Archer had talked her into signing on to his initial mission to Qo’noS four years ago. And it still wasn’t what she’d expected this year, after the captain had barely managed to talk her out of leaving alongside Travis Mayweather.

All Hoshi could do for the moment was to cling to the desperate hope that the human species—starting with the crew of Enterprise— would one day find the road back once all the shooting finally stopped.

THIRTY-TWO

Thursday, November 27, 2155
U.S.S. Yorktown NCC-108
Proxima Shipyard, Proxima Centauri

HIS LIMBS TAUT with an almost electrical feeling of anticipation, Travis Mayweather sat behind the newly refurbished helm console, awaiting the order he knew Captain Shosetsu had to deliver any moment now.

A seeming eternity later, that moment arrived. “Clear all moorings, Mister Mayweather. Take her out.”

“Aye, Captain,” said the helmsman. A grin spread across his face, reflecting his commingled delight and relief as his hands moved swiftly over the still-slightly-unfamiliar console before him. But the fact that the arrangement of a Daedalus-class vessel’s standard helm controls differed somewhat from those found on the bridge of an NX-class ship was of no concern to him; he was still far too excited about his new posting for that.

Yorktown was getting under way at long last, now that her repairs were finally complete, and was leaving spacedock for the first time since Mayweather had joined Ketai Shosetsu’s newly reconstituted crew—a crew whose numbers had been cruelly reduced, his new shipmates had informed him immediately after his arrival, during Yorktown’s recent Romulan encounter near the planet Valakis.

“We’re clear, Captain,” Mayweather said a few moments later.

He heard the captain’s enthusiastic tenor voice coming from over his shoulder. “Very good, Ensign. Nice and smooth.”

“Thank you, sir,” said the helmsman with no small amount of pride. Having literally grown up in deep space, Mayweather had become used to achieving almost a Zen-like serenity that made a starship almost an extension of his arms and legs and eyes. “Standard patrol course entered, as ordered.”

“Execute course at warp two once we’ve cleared safe navigational boundaries,” said Commander Tyler Mendez, Yorktown’s executive officer. “One-quarter impulse until then.”

Mayweather acknowledged the XO’s orders as the bridge’s wide forward viewer displayed an aft view of the intricate latticework of metal trusses and beams that made up the largest shipbuilding and repair yard in the Centauri system. The sprawling orbiting shipyard was framed against the cool blue haze of Proxima Centauri’s glacial second planet and the dim ruddy glow of Proxima itself, the red dwarf that circled the gravitational fringes of the far friendlier inner stars Alpha Centauri A and B. Although the vast open-architecture facility steadily dwindled in size on the screen, signs of furious activity—tiny environmental-suited figures nudged massive yet weightless components into position amid the brilliant orange flashes from the beamjacks’ arc-welders while small workpods flittered about from worksite to worksite—remained manifestly in evidence. Ships of human manufacture, fully half of which were Daedalus-class vessels like Yorktown, filled each of the complex’s sixteen unpressurized but solar-flare-shielded repair bays—except for the two micrograv hangars that were conspicuously dark. One of these was the one in which Yorktown had just completed her repairs. The other had for nearly a year served as the cradle and incubator for one of Starfleet’s newest warp-five-capable ships of the line.

Atlantis NX-05 hung motionless in the shipyard’s skeletal embrace, neglected and dark except for work lights that illuminated the ship’s frame, revealing the many gaps in the vessel’s still-incomplete hull plating. It occurred to Mayweather then that for most of the ships here this place was a hospital, while for others it was a nursery, thanks to the war’s ever-growing demand for new ships.

But for Atlantis it looks like a tomb, he thought, feeling wistful about Enterprise, perhaps for the very first time since he had decided he could no longer serve under Jonathan Archer.

“She’s a fine ship,” Mendez said, suddenly at the helmsman’s elbow. Mayweather had gotten so lost in his ruminations that he hadn’t heard the XO’s approach. “I hope they finish with her soon and get her launched.”

“You must have read my mind, sir,” Mayweather said.

He didn’t add that he’d always thought that the Daedalus design suffered greatly when compared to the swift and speedy compound-curved lines—not to mention raw speed—of the NX-class. Or that Yorktown and her sister vessels looked about as elegant as three soup cans lashed to a soccer ball.

The Daedalus design was quicker to build than the sleeker NX ships. If the rumors he’d been hearing were true—and the sight of Atlantis lifeless in her cradle was pretty good confirmation—Starfleet was hoping to give the newest Daedalus vessels warp capabilities similar to those of the NX, while gradually retrofitting the existing fleet. Such were the war’s demands on the collective shipbuilding capacity of the Coalition’s human-inhabited worlds—a capacity that the governments of both Earth and Alpha Centauri had agreed was best decentralized as much as possible, thereby short-circuiting any Romulan plot to cripple humanity’s wartime industrial base via a single Pearl Harbor–style attack.

“There’s another one just like her being assembled in orbit over Utopia Planitia,” Mendez said quietly as cold, apparently dead Atlantis and the rest of the receding shipyard drifted out of view beyond the limb of the retreating planet. “The last one, the way I hear it.”

“Endeavour,” Mayweather said with a nod, though he hoped Mendez was wrong about Endeavour being the last of her line. “NX-06.”

“I hear you’re something of an expert on the NX-class,” Captain Shosetsu said. “Commander Mendez tells me you served aboard one.”

“Two, actually. The second one was Discovery.”

Silence fell across the bridge, and Mayweather made no effort to break it. He wasn’t sure whether to curse himself for having invoked the ghosts of the slain and stoking all-too-raw fears, or to curse his captain for not having bothered to read his personnel report.

When he took Yorktown to warp a few minutes later, Mayweather still couldn’t force the image of poor, neglected Atlantis from his mind. Nor could he avoid thinking of Endeavour, incomplete and abandoned, orbiting Mars in endless darkness, as cold and lonely as Deimos.

He could only hope that their replacements would avoid the fate that had befallen the waxen wings the Daedalus class’s mythological namesake had created.

THIRTY-THREE

Monday, December 1, 2155
San Francisco, Earth

NASH MCEVOY’S TWO ESCORTS from Starfleet Security led him past the cordoned-off crowd of noisy protestors outside the building, then outfitted him with a chipped ID lanyard before conducting him through the plushly carpeted halls deep in the interior of Starfleet Headquarters.

During the subsequent quiet procession into the building’s labyrinthine core, McEvoy rejoiced that it was he, and not Gannet Brooks, who had received yesterday afternoon’s cryptic summons from Starfleet’s Admiral Gregory Logan Black. He was all but certain that the war-toughened Ms. Brooks would simply have told the admiral to go climb his thumb while wrapping herself tightly in the self-righteous sanctity of journalistic freedom.

McEvoy, however, liked to think that he was more a creature of the real world than were many of the journalists in his employ—particularly some of the younger ones. But that didn’t mean he liked being called on the carpet, even by someone he’d known for as long as he’d known Greg Black.

Once he was seated in the padded chair before Admiral Black’s desk, McEvoy wasted no time getting down to cases with the blue-uniformed, brown-haired man with the close-cropped salt-and-pepper beard who sat behind it.

“Meaning no disrespect, Admiral,” he began, a sardonic smile fixed on his face, “but what the hell gives you the right to drag a member of the press corps in here like he’s been called into the principal’s office?”

Black displayed a wounded expression. “How does sending you an invitation at home last night and dispatching a driver to your office this morning constitute ‘dragging’ you anywhere?”

McEvoy’s glasses slid forward on the bridge of his nose. He pushed them back into place. “Suppose I’d said no?”

“Well, I’m glad we didn’t have to find out,” Black said as he sat down behind his desk for a moment. After rummaging through a bottom drawer for a moment, he emerged with a silver flask and a pair of glass tumblers. “Scotch, Mac?”

“It’s just like when we were back in college,” McEvoy said, glancing down at his wrist chronometer. Hell of a way to start a Monday, war or no war. “My God, it’s not even lunchtime yet.”

Black shrugged, grinning. “So what? Want one?”

The war must have been going badly indeed if some of the admirals were already drinking this early in the day. He hoped this was merely a “Monday” thing.

“Sure,” McEvoy said, doing his best to maintain an outwardly dour demeanor. He wasn’t about to let a little liquor and conviviality with an old friend spoil his bad mood.

Once the tumblers were generously filled and distributed, McEvoy said, “Tell me what you want, Greg. This is gonna take way too long if you were expecting to soften me up first by getting me drunk.”

The admiral took a long, slow swallow from his glass, then set it down on a desktop that was otherwise empty but for the presence of a small computer terminal.

“All right, Mac. I want you to... tamp down your war coverage a bit, from both Brooks and Naquase.”

McEvoy swallowed half the contents of his glass and let the caustic amber liquid burn on its way down.

“You’ve got to be joking, Greg.”

Black shook his head, his eyes blazing with something that didn’t appear to have originated from a bottle. “I’m as serious as a heart attack. Now, I’m going to trust you to keep what I’m going to say next off the record.”

McEvoy didn’t feel exactly sanguine about that, though he could see the value in making the gesture. “All right. At least, I’ll agree to warn you before I go back on the record.”

Black nodded. “Fair enough. I trust you saw that crowd out there.”

“What crowd?” McEvoy deadpanned. He was quite sure the crowd was visible from low Earth orbit.

“Very funny. Starfleet Command feels that Newstime’s correspondents have been offering up far too much unconstructive criticism of the government’s handling of the Romulan situation.”

“That’s debatable. Who’s to say what’s constructive?” McEvoy said, scowling.

“Crowds of frightened people get even more people scared. Fear snowballs, and that’s never good.”

“Brooks and Naquase are polar opposites, both politically and in terms of the war,” McEvoy observed. “If they’re both hitting Starfleet in the same sore place, maybe that means the problem lies with Starfleet.”

Black waved a hand dismissively. “I’m not going to spend the whole day debating that. Politics aside, we think their reporting has been a huge factor in motivating the people outside to break out their torches and pitchforks. What those people out there don’t know could fill the Valles Marineris twice. Regardless of that, they’re convinced that everybody from the Coalition Council and the United Earth Parliament down to Starfleet and MACO isn’t handling this crisis correctly.”

Maybe they’re right, McEvoy thought, though he clung to the hope that that wasn’t so.

“Come on, Greg. The people have a right to get as much information as possible. We need an informed citizenry to remain free. That’s all we’re doing, trying to fill that need.”

“Journalism school talking points,” Black scoffed. “People are scared, Mac. And it’s largely because of your organization’s reporting.”

McEvoy took another swallow. “People are scared because these are scary goddamned times, Greg. But if you start trying to muzzle the press, it’s gonna get a hell of a lot scarier.”

Black leaned forward, his eyes blazing. “What’s scarier still is letting side issues like demonstrations—maybe even full-fledged riots—get Starfleet’s civilian decision-makers so distracted that they start making bad decisions regarding how best to take on the Romulans.”

“You start taking away the people’s freedoms,” McEvoy said, emptying his glass, “and you’re doing the Romulans’ work for them.”

“You have a responsibility for the safety of your planet,” Black said, his tone sharpening. “A responsibility toward your species, just as Starfleet does.”

“Don’t lecture me about my responsibilities, Greg,” McEvoy said, rapidly running out of patience. “We both have the same responsibilities to the United Earth Constitution. You’ve even sworn an oath to uphold it.”

“You’re damned right I have. And my oath won’t mean a whole hell of a lot once Romulan flags are fluttering over Starfleet Headquarters and the Place de la Concorde. If those feather-bellied alien bastards even use flags.”

“My responsibility starts and stops with keeping the public informed,” McEvoy said, his chest swelling with a fury that he would have expected more from Gannet Brooks than from himself. But then, Greg Black had always had a talent for pushing his buttons.

“Really?” Black said, folding his arms. “That’s the extent of your responsibility?”

McEvoy slammed his empty glass down on the desktop, perhaps a little harder than he’d intended. Somehow, it didn’t break. “Yes! As long as Newstime doesn’t lie, or let anything classified slip out.”

“Well, that’s the rub, isn’t it, Mac? I’m glad that you at least acknowledge that as part of your sphere of responsibility.”

“I’d like to go back on the record now, if you don’t mind,” McEvoy said, trying to reel in his indignation.

Black held up a hand, temporizing. “Let me ask you one question first: Where was that sense of responsibility when Newstime started shouting from the rooftops about the Vulcan warp-field detection grid?”

That brought McEvoy up short. He stood up, his knees slightly wobblier than he had expected after just one drink.

“Thanks for the breakfast, Greg,” he said. “I think I can find my own way out.”

And he did, with the help of what appeared to be the same two Starfleet security officers who had brought him here.

Although it was past lunchtime by the time he had settled back into his own quiet Mission District office and closed the door behind him, McEvoy found that he still wasn’t hungry.

And he also found, sloshing in his own desk’s bottom drawer, an all but forgotten vessel that looked substantially similar to Admiral Gregory Black’s silver flask.

THIRTY-FOUR

Thursday, December 4, 2155
Enterprise

CHIEF ENGINEER MIKE BURCH FELT the aberrant but all-too-familiar vibration through the engine room deck an instant before Ensign Camacho spoke.

“Lieutenant Burch, the warp core is making that... noise again.”

Of course it is, Burch thought, rubbing his eyes. It had been yet another grueling night, for himself and most of his engineering staff, and the ship’s night was still barely half over. We’re damned lucky this thing hasn’t already shaken itself apart.

Not that the long, tense hours were remarkable—at least, not anymore. When the engines had to run hot for this many months on end, the entire propulsion system had to be monitored closely, hour to hour and minute to minute. There was no alternative. Captain Archer wanted Enterprise’s return to Earth expedited and the only warp engine downtime was a brief stopover at Vulcan.

Like anyone posted to an engineering position aboard a Starfleet vessel, Burch was well aware that the warp-five engine that provided power and propulsion to NX-class starships was the brainchild of Doctor Henry Archer, the late father of Enterprise’s commanding officer. But the rough treatment to which Jonathan Archer had lately subjected that engine was making Burch wonder whether the captain needed some discreet professional help with some unresolved daddy issues.

I should have transferred when Commander Kelby did, Burch thought. He was a better engineer than I am, and he didn’t think he’d be able to fill Commander Tucker’s boots.

Ever since Kelby’s transfer, on the heels of the Terra Prime terrorist crisis back in January and Commander Tucker’s subsequent death, Burch had played a fill-in role, running engineering by default. At first, Captain Archer and Commander T’Pol had made it clear that they considered him the ship’s “interim chief engineer,” which was just fine with him. But as the days had become weeks, which then had stretched into months—an elastic span during which Enterprise had voyaged to points far too distant to accommodate even the most basic and necessary of crew rotations—Burch had found that his position had gradually evolved into a state of uneasy permanence.

“Let me have another look at those flow regulators, Ensign,” Burch said as he ducked below the work platform for the massive, pulsating engine core, alert for any obvious signs of imminent trouble. He moved between Ensign Camacho and Lieutenant Hess, the former scowling at the plasma flow regulation board while the latter kept a weather eye on the antimatter containment field monitor.

The deck vibrated again beneath Burch’s boots as he ran his handheld scanner carefully over a key conduit, then paused to compare the results to those being generated by the engine room’s internal monitoring system.

A discrepancy emerged almost immediately, this one much larger than anything he’d ever seen before. Something was badly out of calibration. Better double-check it, Burch thought, maintaining a calm exterior mainly because he knew better than to mistake a single reading for a trend. He began to run the scan again, in parallel with the flow regulator’s self-diagnostic program he had activated on the console, and silently hoped to the superluminal gods that he’d merely misinterpreted some basic mathematical function.

His stomach plunged into freefall when he saw that he hadn’t.

“Shut her down,” Burch said, swallowing hard.

“Sir?” Camacho said, saucer-eyed.

“Do it! Take us out of warp, now. I have to contact the captain.”

Jonathan Archer was roused from a deep slumber by something he’d grown almost completely unaccustomed to over the past several months.

Silence.

Curled up at the foot of Archer’s bed, Porthos raised his head and made a noise halfway between a whimper and a growl.

“I hear it, too,” Archer said as he swung his bare feet onto the deck in his quarters, whereupon he felt it as well.

We’ve dropped out of warp.

Cinching his robe around himself, Archer brought his cabin lights up to one-quarter intensity and strode to his desk.

The intercom whistled just before his hand reached the button.

“Engineering to Captain Archer,” said a voice he recognized immediately as that of Mike Burch.

“Just the man I was going to call,” Archer said. “Whatever you’re doing down there just woke up my dog.”

“Sir?”

“We’ve just dropped out of warp, Lieutenant. Why?”

“The warp engines have been running almost nonstop ever since we left the Gamma Hydra sector, Captain.”

Archer scowled. They’d been through all this before, on a number of occasions. “I understand, Mike. But it can’t be helped if we’re going to get back to Earth before the Romulans start building summer homes there. Now why aren’t we moving?”

Burch paused for a moment before replying, as though adjusting his composure. “We just came a lot closer to a core breach than I ever want to see again, sir.”

Archer sighed and slumped into his desk chair. “Report.”

“The magnatomic flux constrictors are shot, along with the intercoolers, and those failures allowed the warp coils to get partially flash-fried by the plasma stream before I got us out of warp. Warp five or even warp four are totally out of the question now—at least until I can get a week or more of dry-dock time to do a thorough rebuild of the entire propulsion system.”

Damn.

It was Archer’s turn to pause in order to calm down. He was glad the conversation was audio only. “Do we still have any warp capability, Lieutenant?”

“Almost half the plasma conduit system will have to be bypassed just to keep any warp capability at all, sir. Give us twelve hours, and we’ll have the warp drive juryrigged back into service. But warp three will be our absolute limit until after we can lay over somewhere for repairs.”

Archer slowly counted to ten before answering.

“Thank you, Lieutenant. I know you’ll do everything you can. Archer out.”

Command was a lonely place to be even when everything aboard ship was five-by-five. But now, sitting alone in the semidarkness of his cabin, Archer felt the distance that separated him from his crew grow exponentially, multiplied by the unimaginable volume of emptiness that still separated Enterprise from home. Ever since the setback the Romulans had dealt to Starfleet at Berengaria VII—effectively scuttling, at least temporarily, a plan to establish a parsecs-spanning network of starbases—space itself seemed to have gotten a whole lot bigger and darker.

Let’s just hope we don’t run into any more Romulans before we get our sheets back into the wind, he thought.

And as he opened another channel, it occurred to him that in all the vastness of space that still lay within his lamed vessel’s reach, he had no idea where the nearest friendly port might be found.

“We are quite fortunate,” T’Pol said.

Archer knew he hadn’t slept well last night, so he was going out of his way to be cheerful so as not to aggravate what appeared to be a fairly glum state of morale on the bridge. T’Pol’s last sentence, however, strained his efforts to remain pleasant just a little bit past any reasonable person’s endurance capacity.

“My ship is still crippled, Commander,” he said in measured tones. “Mister Burch says that won’t change for at least another four hours, and once it does the best we can hope for is warp three. Somehow, that all points to a decidedly less than ‘fortunate’ outcome.”

T’Pol approached from her port science console and came to a stop beside his command chair. “Nevertheless, Captain, we are indeed fortunate, at least according to Vulcan maps of this vicinity of space. The planet known on Vulcan charts as Haurok leh-keh lies only four days from our present position at warp three. We should find everything we need to regain full operational status there.”

She handed a padd to Archer, and he examined it in silence. It contained a brief list of materials that Burch and his staff would need, the rarest of which were the refined dilithium Enterprise needed for power generation and the verterium cortenide plating necessary for Burch’s proposed rebuilding of everything from the plasma conduits to the warp coils.

“Verterium cortenide,” Archer said. “And dilithium, all in one place. Huh.”

T’Pol seemed almost pleased with herself. “As I said, Captain, we are fortunate. Even if the planet cannot supply processed verterium cortenide, we can synthesize the material from raw orestocks of polysilicate verterium and monocrystal cortenum, both of which are present in abundance on Haurok leh-keh.”

“It sounds almost too good to be true.” Archer rose from his chair and approached the starboard tactical station, where Lieutenant Reed was studying a chart of local space. “Malcolm, do our charts have any information on this planet?”

The Englishman nodded. “UESPA has charted the system, but never visited or explored it. It’s known as Cygnet on our charts. It’s a bright B-type star with seventeen planets. Based on communications interceptions, the fourteenth planet appears to support a high-order civilization. But that’s essentially all we know about the place, Captain.”

“So it’s likelier than not that they’ll know we’re coming before we arrive,” Archer said.

Reed nodded. “I wouldn’t assume we could sneak up on them and simply take whatever we need.”

“One of the things we need is access to an advanced repair facility, Malcolm,” Archer said, returning to his chair. “We’ll need all the goodwill we can muster if we’re going to expect Cygnet XIV to furnish that. Ensign Leydon, start laying in a course for the planet. Engage at maximum safe speed as soon as Lieutenant Burch says it’s safe to do so.”

“Aye, sir,” said the helmsman as she started making the necessary calculations on her board.

Turning his chair toward the comm station, Archer said, “Hoshi, we’re going to need your linguistic expertise.”

“I’ve already begun a multifrequency search of the subspace bands,” Ensign Sato said, an expression of intense concentration creasing her porcelain features as she listened via her earpiece to voices audible to no one else. “I’m hoping to find some comm traffic originating in the Cygnet system while I’m studying the linguistic data Commander T’Pol just sent me from the Vulcan database.”

Archer smiled, feeling an infusion of real enthusiasm for the first time in weeks. Enterprise was on a mission of exploration again—a genuine first contact situation, at least for the starship’s human contingent.

But that enthusiasm was tempered by the harsh knowledge that this mission could easily end in utter disaster for his injured ship should anyone make a serious mistake.

Monday, December 8, 2155

For perhaps the first time during the long months that had passed since Captain Archer persuaded her not to transfer from Enterprise, Ensign Hoshi Sato felt that her skills were essential.

It wasn’t that the Cygneti language had been all that difficult to figure out, at least in terms of its broadest phonetic, grammatical, and syntactical characteristics. The basic work had taken less than a day. It was the cultural assumptions that underpinned that language—what was a language but a species’ cultural operating system, an ultimate expression of its most fixed assumptions regarding both itself and the outside universe?—that had posed the most formidable challenge to her skills. And it was a challenge that easily could have consumed an entire career.

Four days into her analysis of the few snippets of Cygneti comm traffic Enterprise’s EM and subspace receivers had intercepted so far, most of it apparently low-security, entertainment-oriented material, she still wrestled with the curious lopsidedness of the language’s gender characteristics, not to mention the frustration of the previous morning’s apparently mutually baffling attempt to exchange intelligible hails with personnel at a Cygneti ship-repair facility.

She continued to hope that she hadn’t missed anything fundamental about the Cygneti language even as Enterprise settled into a high orbit above the aquamarine world, whose surface as displayed on the bridge viewscreen looked surprisingly ice-free despite its extreme distance from its star. According to Commander T’Pol, who was providing real-time sensor analysis, Cygnet XIV’s relatively temperate climate was the result of a combination of internal geothermal heat and the tidal interactions of the planet’s two large moons.

The only question Sato was truly interested in at the moment, however, was whether or not the captain would succeed in talking with the Cygneti. As a large orbiting hangarlike facility rolled into view across the planet’s terminator, Captain Archer rose from his chair and turned toward her station.

“Hail them, please, Hoshi. Let’s hope whoever answers this time doesn’t find our troubles quite so amusing.”

“Aye, Captain,” Sato said, recalling the highlight of the previous audio exchange: a gurgling sneeze that had sounded very much like a startled spit-take followed by giggles and guffaws. Setting aside her last nagging doubts about the accuracy of her newly revised translation matrix, she opened the standard hailing frequency, including video, should the Cygneti decide to use it.

“This is Captain Jonathan Archer of the Starship Enterprise, from Earth,” said the captain. “As we indicated earlier, we are in need of repairs in order to continue our homeward voyage. I wish to discuss trading—”

The hangarlike facility abruptly vanished from the viewer, replaced by the face of a frowning woman of perhaps early middle age. “You’re the captain?” she said, the universal translator matrix rendering her Cygneti words in incredulity-tinged English. “You must be joking.”

“Jonathan Archer. Commanding officer of the Starship Enterprise, from Earth.”

“A man. The captain. Of a great big starship.” Her frown disintegrated under the onslaught of her own peals of laughter. “That is just adorable.”

Archer was beginning to look irritated. “I assure you, ma’am, this is no laughing matter.”

The woman on the screen appeared to get hold of herself. “You’re quite right, ‘Captain.’ My apologies.” Another snicker escaped her lips, but she seemed to be trying to maintain an otherwise almost businesslike demeanor. “But before we discuss your repair issues any further, would you mind turning around once or twice? I’d like to get a look at you from behind—”

Responding to Archer’s chopping hand signal, Hoshi touched a control, causing the woman’s image to disappear. The ship repair facility, gleaming in the blue-white glow of distant Cygnet, took its place.

“Hoshi, are the wires still crossed on your translation matrix?” he said, annoyed. “She seems to find my request awfully entertaining.”

Hoshi was at a loss. “As far as I can tell, the matrix is providing accurate two-way translations. Of course, there could always be cultural factors I haven’t dealt with adequately.”

“Perhaps the fact of the matriarchal nature of Haurok leh-keh’s humanoid civilization has not been adequately addressed,” T’Pol said.

“The Vulcan files on this civilization mentioned that fact,” Sato said. “I’m sure I accounted for it.” In fact, she was certain that the Cygneti matriarchy, which had evidently endured for many centuries, had much to do with this language’s gender bias.

“This might be an aberration on the part of the Cygneti,” Malcolm Reed said. “I mean, Vulcan is a matriarchy, too. But they aren’t sexist pigs about it.”

An inspiration struck Sato then, and she exchanged a look with Archer that told her instantly that he was thinking along the same lines.

“I think the Cygneti’s cultural expectations are a little bit different from ours,” he said as he approached her comm station, removing three of the pips from his uniform’s right epaulet as he walked.

“When in Rome...” Sato said as the captain dropped the pips into her hand. She relinquished her seat as she began attaching the small metal rectangles to her own uniform tunic.

“Captain?” T’Pol said.

Seated in the comm station’s chair, Archer turned toward his exec. “Any objections to my giving the hardest-working communications officer in Starfleet a temporary field promotion to captain?”

T’Pol raised an eyebrow, her manner frostier than usual. “None at all, sir.” Lieutenants Reed and O’Neill murmured their assent as well, while trying to suppress their mirth.

“Good,” Archer said, and reopened the channel. The Cygneti woman reappeared on the screen.

“This is Captain Hoshi Sato, in command of the Starship Enterprise,” Sato said, putting as much authority as she could muster behind her words.

The woman on the screen not only seemed to relax immediately, she seemed to take the conversation far more seriously now than she had before. Within a few minutes of gentle haggling, Sato—with some assistance from T’Pol, who seemed uncharacteristically miffed—had engineered a mutually acceptable arrangement whereby Enterprise would gain access to Cygnet XIV’s most advanced ship-repair facilities for upwards of ten local rotations in exchange for some exotic chemicals that could be synthesized in the ship’s warp core.

And although no one laughed during the proceedings, Sato did come close to losing her composure when T’Pol got even with the captain by coolly ordering him and Lieutenant Reed off the bridge—while in full view of the Cygneti woman—to fetch some Vulcan spice tea for “Captain” Sato, Lieutenant O’Neill, and herself.

Now I’m really glad he talked me out of putting in for that transfer, Sato thought.

She did wonder, however, if D.O. might have gone a bit too far in delivering a good-natured swat to Archer’s backside as he turned to enter the turbolift.

THIRTY-FIVE

Sunday, December 14, 2155
Cochrane Institute
New Samarkand, Alpha Centauri III

AS A GENERAL RULE, Tobin Dax hated to complain. Complainers tended to draw a lot of unwelcome attention to themselves, and usually ended up directing blame at others inappropriately, rather than taking it to heart as a personal learning experience and an encouragement to do better the next time.

But when the most urgent hurry-up research project of his scientific career got interrupted—and on the orders of the very people who always seemed so unwilling to compromise on the deadlines they’d already imposed on that selfsame hurry-up research project, no less—Tobin saw no viable alternative to griping out loud to whoever might listen.

A brisk walk beneath the twin midday orbs of Alpha Centauri A and B took him swiftly across the university’s carefully tended grounds and into the cool shelter of Henry Archer Hall’s main superluminal propulsion research lab complex. A few moments after making it through the sprawling facility’s three layers of biometric security scanners, he caught sight of his two colleagues, both of whom seemed to be quietly reading data from padds in the warp-seven team’s customary work area.

Tobin started giving vent to his fulminations without preamble. “Exactly how are we supposed to finish creating a warp-seven drive prototype when Captain Stillwell drops some other project that’s on fire right into our laps?”

S’chn T’gai Skon, the mathematician on temporary loan to Starfleet from the Vulcan Science Academy, looked up from his padd and raised an eyebrow quizzically. “On fire?”

Dax grimaced. Sometimes he wondered if the universe hadn’t created Vulcans for the sole purpose of deemphasizing his own socialization deficiencies. “I’m talking about this... side project that Starfleet has suddenly gotten so excited about. I mean, I hope Stillwell intends to cut us some slack on our sched—”

“Dax, don’t you ever start a conversation with small talk?” Doctor Pell Underhill said, tossing his own padd onto a nearby desk with a chuckle. “With conversationalists like you around, Tobin, we almost don’t need Vulcans. No offense meant, Skon.”

“None taken, Doctor,” the Vulcan mathematician said in apparent agreement with the Centauri-native human’s sentiment.

Damn. I did it again, didn’t I? Dax thought. Nervous and anxious, he started chewing the cuticle of his right thumb, but stopped himself as soon as he noticed he was once again doing something that others would see as socially awkward. He constantly had to remind himself not to let his interactions with others get carried away on the wings of his obsessions, as hard as that was during times of stress; as his Symbiosis Commission counselor had pointed out on multiple occasions, it was always better to start a conversation with a flashy card trick instead of a detailed analysis of Andrew Wiles’s proof of Pierre de Fermat’s final theorem.

Sports, he thought. Sports is always a good topic. Aloud he said, “How about that documentary on the London Kings’ last season?”

Both Skon and Pell stared back at him blankly. And neither of them appeared to be in the mood for a card trick. Tough room.

“All right, Tobin,” Underhill said finally, shaking his gray head with a sigh. “I guess that’s enough small talk for now. Can I assume that you’ve already read the packet Captain Jefferies sent us?”

“The terminal in my apartment is not secure,” Dax said, shaking his head. “So I haven’t seen any of the technical specs yet. All I know so far is that Stillwell and Jefferies want us to drop everything for the moment. What I don’t know yet is why, or what they’re expecting us to do instead.” With the Romulans having already gotten to within striking distance of Alpha Centauri, perhaps rendering Earth, or even Trill itself, vulnerable to invasion, Dax was hard-pressed to imagine anything more urgent at the moment than the crash warp-seven-drive program to which he had already devoted most of the past year of his life.

Skon steepled his fingers contemplatively. “Develop a countermeasure to a weapon that the Romulans have already deployed against Coalition vessels on a number of occasions.”

“A weapon that has the apparent capability of seizing control of Coalition ships remotely,” the human physicist added in a tone far graver than any Dax had ever heard him use before.

Dax rarely paid much attention to the news other than its broad outlines, such was his obsession with the technical minutiae of his job. He recognized immediately that the weapon his colleagues were describing must have been the cause of the attack on a local commercial convoy about half a year ago—an attack that only the timely intervention of the Starship Columbia and several Vulcan military vessels had averted.

Dax was finally beginning to understand the urgency of the matter— just as he recognized the likelihood that he would be of little use to Starfleet’s countermeasure efforts. “My specialties are propulsion related,” he said, dejected. “I’m good with phase coil inverters and any other engine component from warp cores on down to subimpulse thrusters. I’m not sure what Jefferies and Stillwell expect me to contribute.”

“Captain Jefferies has just completed a detailed analysis of data submitted from the field,” Underhill continued, sidestepping Dax’s objection. “It came from a number of sources, including the tactical officer aboard Enterprise, a Lieutenant Reed.”

“Enterprise,” Dax said, nodding. He recalled that some of the unsung transporter-beam collimation enhancements upon which he and Skon had collaborated several years ago had been integrated into Doctor Erickson’s basic design, eventually ending up in general use aboard Enterprise and her sister starships.

Skon stepped gracefully into the human physicist’s pause. “Shortly after the attacks that destroyed the freighter Kobayashi Maru, Lieutenant Reed noticed something that has since been corroborated by field data supplied by both the Tellarites and the Andorians following Romulan attacks that destroyed some of their most advanced vessels. The use of the Romulan remote-control weapon causes certain subtle but detectable changes in a ship’s computer hardware, as well as in various related systems.”

“Including propulsion,” Underhill said. “That fact ought to give us a leg up on shoring up our vulnerabilities.”

“Sounds like we need to develop a whole new starship control technology,” Dax said.

Underhill picked his padd up again, thumbed a control, and handed the device to Dax. “Captain Jefferies already seems to have some solid ideas in that area for us to build on. He’s even included some of the work that’s already being done to patch the warp-field detection fence at Altair. Maybe one of these ideas will pay off and let us get back to the warp-seven project.”

Dax stared at the padd’s small screen, which displayed a detailed technical drawing of a roughly circular starship bridge. The geometry differed none too subtly from any other Earth technology that either he or his predecessor Lela had ever seen before, and that included the specs to Starfleet’s NX-class starships.

What he saw did not encourage him. His overall impression was that Starfleet was contemplating taking a huge step backward, both in terms of technological sophistication and the ineffable mathematicalaesthetic qualities that Dax could only describe as “elegance.” There were too many ugly planes and angles in evidence.

“This new technology promises to prevent any outside system from engaging in unauthorized communication with a starship’s command-and-control architecture,” Skon said, in lecturing mode. “Only personnel with access to particular predetermined authorization code sequences could gain and maintain that measure of control. The simulations Jefferies and Stillwell have run have convinced them that the concept is sound. It will be our task to work out the operational details in order to allow Starfleet to deploy this countermeasure as quickly and successfully as possible.”

Dax listened to the Vulcan as he continued studying the display. He tried not to make a face, but knew he hadn’t succeeded.

“Do you have a critique already, Doctor Dax?” Skon said.

With a shrug, Dax finally said, “Ugh.” He wondered if he’d ever learn to appreciate these designs.

“I think ‘retro’ may be the word you’re groping for, Tobin, at least in terms of its superficial design aesthetics,” Underhill said, grinning. “But please, don’t let me put words in your mouth. I’m sure I’m as eager as Doctor Skon is to hear your appraisal.”

Dax wasn’t quite sure where to start. Digital displays and smooth vernier interfaces gave way to clunky analog readouts and huge, square buttons and switches that wouldn’t have looked out of place aboard one of the ancient military submarines that once patrolled Trill’s purple oceans. Even the control interfaces on the century-old survey ship that Skon’s father had commanded when Vulcan had made First Contact with Earth must have looked generations more advanced than this design.

And it was all being done, if Skon’s comments and Jefferies’ cryptic marginal notes could be taken at face value, in the name of hardening a starship’s entire command-and-control hardware-firmware-software architecture against external intrusion and takeover.

The only way this could be any uglier is if they decide to paint it bright orange, he thought with a barely suppressed shudder. And the only way to find out if this thing can really work is to subject it to an actual trial by fire.

“I think,” Dax said as he handed the padd back to Underhill, “that we’ve all got a lot of hard work ahead of us.”

TODAY

2156

THIRTY-SIX

Dateline: Achernar II Achernar Prime Alpha Eridani II

TRANSCRIPT FROM THE JANUARY 21, 2156, NEWSTIME JOURNAL SPECIAL COMMENTARY FOLLOWS:

This is Gannet Brooks, with all the news that’s under the sun and beyond, reporting from Heliopolis, Achernar II’s largest human settlement, a place named for the ancient Egyptian city of the sun because of the dominating presence in its skies of massive, lopsided Achernar.

If you spend most of your time in Earth’s northern hemisphere, then you may never have laid eyes on Achernar before. Achernar, also known as Alpha Eridani, is visible from Earth only from south of the equator. It’s the brightest (hence the “Alpha” designation) and southernmost star in the constellation Eridanus (the River) as seen from Earth.

Achernar (whose name is derived from the Arabic phrase Al Ahir al Nahr, which means “The End of the River”) doesn’t become a completely real place until after one has experienced it. It isn’t until you get in-system that you can begin to get a handle on what it means to stand on a planet orbiting a young B-type star about seven times as massive and three thousand times as luminous as Sol.

A hat and plenty of solarderm is a must. And keep on hand a source of outsystem transportation. Because today Heliopolis is firmly in the grip of what I can only describe as a panic. Too many people are seeking too few available berths aboard Heliopolis’s rapidly dwindling stock of departing vessels, even as the arrival of transport vessels continues to decline precipitously.

Starfleet and the Earth Cargo Service have each pitched in, despite the war having already stretched the resources of both. The apparent inadequacy of humanity’s best hopes on the interstellar frontier has only exacerbated the breakdown of law and order that has confounded local peace officers for the past several weeks. This is a city gripped by a mounting tide of chaos, neglect, violence, and street crime that only seems to intensify as the Romulan threat looms ever larger.

Will these Romulans chase humanity home with its collective tail between its legs? That’s still not clear. After all, things change quickly here. As recently as two Earth months ago, Heliopolis was relatively tranquil despite the Achernar system’s location, which only during recent years was revealed as occupying a remote part of the Romulan Star Empire’s sphere of influence. Achernar II’s human inhabitants had prospered here for decades, working alongside a number of nonhuman species from many far-flung worlds.

Like the numerous other sentient races that have carved out toeholds on this world, the humans have embraced self-sustaining agriculture, while making their fortunes in the extraction and offworld sale of the planet’s abundant mineral resources. The efforts of Achernar’s human colonists have benefited Earth and her allies as much as themselves. However, some of the nonhuman farming and mining operations here have almost certainly redounded to the benefit of the Romulans, via the provincial traders and middlemen—Orions, perhaps, or Adigeons—who are rumored to have direct dealings with the Romulan Star Empire’s mystery-shrouded homeworld.

The relative importance of Achernar II to the Romulans’ war effort remains open to debate. Achernar may be too remote a Romulan province to make a significant wartime contribution. Most of the people I have interviewed here seemed to believe this, though I suspect for many that belief is merely a comforting myth, a means of whistling past the graveyard.

Sergeant Dwayne Keller is fairly typical of Heliopolis’s law-enforcement community. He is philosophical about the rumor that the Romulans are secretly building warships near Achernar. Sergeant Keller’s attitude is understandable; he and his colleagues have more immediate problems, such as the possible collapse of a grossly overworked transportation system, in addition to their normal responsibilities of upholding the law.

Even ordinary crimes can take on an extraordinary aspect during extreme times. When I asked about the type of crimes that were on the rise, Sergeant Keller paused.

“A series of brutal slayings,” he explained. Murders that had begun a couple of weeks earlier. The killer, after slashing the victims, left behind notes taunting the police, challenging them to find him. The only thing his victims have in common is that they all were women. A dangerous psychotic remains at large, adding to the rising tide of fear gripping the city.

“For all I know,” Keller told me, “the bastard might already have escaped the planet in all the confusion that’s been going on.”

He seemed embarrassed that he had given voice to the thought. Perhaps he felt it petty and self-serving to wish a killer as horrendous as this one on another law officer’s jurisdiction, or on those fleeing for their lives.

Like everyone here who has decided to stay, Keller remains phlegmatically hopeful about the future. “Things will calm down around here eventually,” he told me. “Unless the Romulans really do blow Heliopolis to Kingdom Come.”

I actually found it encouraging to hear this sentiment coming from someone who’s seen humanity at its worst.

“If the killer is still here, we’ll get him,” Keller promised me, or perhaps himself. “After all, he can’t keep this up forever, can he?”

And neither can the Romulans.

This reporter believes that, like Sergeant Keller, we need only believe in ourselves, stand firm, and embrace the darkness, because daylight will come.

THIRTY-SEVEN

Tuesday, February 10, 2156
Enterprise, en route to Earth via Vulcan

ARCHER FELT THE DECELERATION through the soles of his boots even as Ensign Leydon’s voice came across the ready-room intercom, brisk and businesslike.

“We’ve just entered the 40 Eridani A system, Captain. I’m keeping station within the bounds of the system’s Kuiper belt. Ensign Camacho reports Shuttlepod One prepped and ready to go.”

“Thank you, Ensign. Continue on an in-system course and enter a high, transporter-range orbit around Vulcan.” Both Archer and T’Pol had agreed that it was best not to tie up any of Enterprise’s auxiliary craft, which Enterprise might need at a moment’s notice in the event of a surprise Romulan attack.

Leydon took her new orders in stride. “Aye, sir. Altering course.”

“Be ready to resume course for Earth after we reach Vulcan,” Archer added. “And go to maximum warp once we’ve cleared the system. Archer out.”

Sixteen and a half light-years from home, he thought, rising from the chair behind his cluttered desk. After a long homeward journey, he was anxious to get busy with the ongoing defense of Earth and its settlements all across the Sol system.

But first, he had to see his executive officer off on her voyage home.

The door chime sounded before he’d gotten halfway to the ready room’s sealed entrance.

“Come.”

The hatch slid open, admitting T’Pol. Once the aperture had closed behind her, assuring their privacy, she said, “You’re putting me off the ship.”

T’Pol’s bald assertion took Archer aback, the lack of affect behind it rendering it somehow more intense than if she had shouted the words in anger.

After pausing for a handful of heartbeats to recover his equanimity, he said, “T’Pol, I didn’t redline Enterprise’s engines for nearly seven months—and let the Cygneti treat me like a twentieth-century cocktail waitress so I could keep redlining the engines—just to make you walk the plank.”

“Nevertheless. You have ordered me home.”

He offered a smile that he hoped she’d find reassuring. “Try to think of it as a working vacation, T’Pol.”

“With the dangers the ship will be facing, it is clear that you need me at your side.”

“You agreed right after Tarod IX that you were the one member of this crew with the best chance of persuading T’Pau to get off the sidelines of this war.”

T’Pol stepped closer. “You could have simply made it an order.”

“I think we both know this has to be voluntary,” he said at length.

“But T’Pau may refuse to see me. You’ll note I have yet to secure a firm appointment on her official meeting calendar.”

Archer shrugged. “Your meetings with T’Pau may have to be entirely unofficial, then.”

T’Pol looked doubtful. “Administrator T’Pau, like most Vulcans, is not known for conducting business in an ‘unofficial’ manner.”

Archer couldn’t help but chuckle slightly at that. “Administrator T’Pau ran the very revolution that put her government in power. You may be surprised at how flexible somebody with a skill set like that can be when push comes to shove.”

“The chance of that appears slim to me.”

“ ‘Slim’ is a hell of a lot better chance than ‘none,’” Archer said.

“True,” she said, nodding. “But should I fail to secure a meeting with T’Pau—or if I succeed in meeting with her but fail to persuade her—I will be on Vulcan, and therefore in no position to assist you directly with Vulcan’s obligation to defend the Coalition.

“However, if I remain at your side, I can aid in the defense of both Enterprise and Earth. I needn’t remind you that the Romulans have shed significantly larger quantities of human blood than they had at the time I made my initial promise to seek out and persuade T’Pau.”

He put up a hand. “You don’t need to remind me. Neither Enterprise nor Earth is likely to survive for very long should the Romulans get the upper hand in this fight. Right now, getting Vulcan into the war looks to be our best hope. And you are hands-down the best candidate for the job.”

The first officer stood in contemplative silence for a long time after he finished. She clasped her hands behind her back and began to pace very slowly across the small office, apparently lost in thought. Finally she came to a stop directly in front of Archer and looked him straight in the eye.

“Logical,” she said. “I will direct Lieutenant O’Neill to transport me to Vulcan once we reach orbit.”

Had she not been a Vulcan, the captain would have succumbed to the temptation to give her a bear hug. Somehow, he restrained himself, contenting himself with a moment of wistful regret: Too bad she wouldn’t change her mind about letting me throw a little going-away party in her honor.

But considering the dismal state of morale aboard this ship ever since the Gamma Hydra mission, maybe that was for the best.

Going-away parties sometimes bore far too close a resemblance to wakes.

THIRTY-EIGHT

Late in the month of Tasmeen, YS 8764
Tuesday, February 10, 2156
Vulcan’s Forge, Vulcan

T’POL WAS STILL SILENTLY upbraiding herself even as Enterprise’s primitive transporter finished the uncomfortably slow task of restoring her body’s solidity, retrieving it particle by particle from the device’s tightly collimated matter stream.

Now she stood in an open, rust-colored plain, with only the hood of her robe to protect her from the searing rays of red Nevasa. She inhaled deeply of the warm, dry, appropriately attenuated air, which wasn’t bestirred at the moment by even the slightest breeze. Under the vault of a ruddy, early-afternoon sky the towers of SkiKahr rose like sentinels guarding the western horizon. She knew that she might have eliminated an hour or more of hiking time had she selected a beam-down location closer to the city’s government district. That choice, however, might have attracted undue attention to her mode of transportation—as well as to the fact that by making this stopover at Vulcan, Captain Archer was “bending” Admiral Gardner’s order that Enterprise return to the Sol system without delay.

T’Pol pulled a communicator from one of the pockets of her civilian traveler’s robe and flipped the small device’s antenna grid open.

“T’Pol to Enterprise. I have arrived safely.”

“Acknowledged,” came Archer’s subdued reply. “Good hunting, Commander. Everyone here hopes we’ll see you again soon. Enterprise out.”

I am home, she thought, tucking away the communicator. As she began walking toward Vulcan’s capital, she wished that her homecoming could have occurred under more tranquil circumstances. The residue of the emotional turmoil stirred by leaving Enterprise, however temporarily, made it difficult to derive any satisfaction from her arrival.

Continuing to punish herself for her weakness, however, was a far more easily achievable goal.

Before she had debarked from the Earth starship, she had demonstrated weakness, first by trying to convince Jonathan Archer to release her from her promise to return to Vulcan. And she had followed that up with an act of emotional profligacy, when she had caught herself staring longingly down at the world of her birth as it slowly turned beneath Enterprise, taking in the entire daylit hemisphere from a lofty vantage point only a few hundred kilometers from T’Rukh, the world with which Vulcan shared its orbit about bright Nevasa.

Her gaze had been held by Vulcan’s variegated surface. She allowed herself to be drawn irresistibly by the pristine white of the northern polar cap and the mists that shrouded the peaks of Mount Tar’Hana and Mount Seleya, the sapphire blue of Lake Yuron and the Voroth Sea, all of which were set against the contrasting flame-and-rust-colored backdrop of lowland, coastal Raal, the sun-baked highlands of the Plain of Blood, and the sweltering expanse of volcano-ringed Vulcan’s Forge. Just beyond the nightward terminator, the lights of the cities of Gol, Kir, and Vulcana Regar beckoned in dignified silence.

After she had torn her gaze away from the vista on the main viewscreen and entered the turbolift, T’Pol had still found herself wondering: Did the captain really expect her to succeed? Or was he actually attempting to keep her out of harm’s way as the Romulan conflict escalated?

Striding purposefully toward ShiKahr, T’Pol considered that the mission ahead of her needed to be undertaken, for a number of eminently logical reasons. First, the warp-field detection grid had so far failed to live up to Vulcan’s promises. Second, T’Pol had harbored quiet doubts about the longevity of T’Pau’s Syrrannite government from its inception, particularly if its aggressively reformist agenda were to precipitate a political backlash that could empower a new reactionary demagogue. For lives to be spared, time was of the essence.

Government district, Shikahr, Vulcan

If T’Pol had to place a label on the vague trace of emotion that had filtered to the surface of the older man’s stony visage, it would have read “mild annoyance.”

For any Vulcan—especially one who occupied the high-profile position of Administrator T’Pau’s first deputy and senior surrogate—this was the equivalent of a human’s shouted curses. Minister Kuvak’s demeanor might have signaled that he was not generally well disposed toward unscheduled visits to his office so late in his workday. Or it might have meant that he was not generally well disposed toward her, an intuition supported by the ruthless efficiency his office functionaries had applied to terminating her initial call, which she had made from a public comm unit on ShiKahr’s quiet outskirts.

“As I already told you, Administrator T’Pau is off-planet today,” the minister said with exaggerated patience as he walked around the austere desk that dominated his surprisingly small inner office.

T’Pol nodded. “So you said earlier. But you did not indicate then, however, when you expected her to return.”

Kuvak walked to his office door and gazed out into the wide outer foyer, where several clerical workers busied themselves at their computer terminals.

“How did you get past my staff?” Kuvak said, fixing his narrowing gaze back upon T’Pol.

She briefly considered asking him if he’d expected to find his staff unconscious and restrained, then thought better of it. Instead, she said, “My V’Shar security credentials.”

“Thank you for apprising me of that,” Kuvak said in clipped tones. “I will see to it that that particular lapse is remedied. After my security contingent escorts you out of this building.”

“That is, of course, your decision,” T’Pol said, determined not to allow Kuvak to provoke her, as she had evidently already provoked him. “At least until Administrator T’Pau returns to Vulcan. Must I invoke the kash-to’es-khau to learn the approximate date you expect that to occur? Or must you arrest me instead, thereby complicating your schedule with court proceedings and diplomatic protests from Earth, Starfleet Command, and Captain Jonathan Archer?”

Kuvak remained silent, but his eyes blazed with the ancient flames. T’Pol knew him well enough to understand that he did not enjoy being manipulated by a troublesome former intelligence agent quoting V’Shar security directives. But she also knew there was nothing to be gained by being overly gentle with him.

“Administrator T’Pau will return to Vulcan in approximately twentyeight point six four Vulcan standard days,” he said at length. “I will remain in charge until that time.”

The lengthy duration of T’Pau’s absence surprised her, though she harbored no illusions that the interval would suffice to allow Kuvak to craft any substantive change in Vulcan’s policy regarding the Romulans. And the fact that Kuvak had barely even deigned to speak with T’Pol initially made any such initiative from him unlikely in the extreme.

And where was T’Pau? Given the speed capabilities of Vulcan starships, the amount of time she was spending offworld could have put her in any number of places. T’Pol realized she could infer this to be good news, a sign that she was working in person and behind the scenes against the Romulan threat, perhaps partnering quietly with Coalition worlds or other nonaligned planets. But this was entirely conjecture. Kuvak was clearly not about to volunteer any specific information regarding the administrator’s whereabouts or itinerary, and T’Pol knew it would be less than prudent to press him on the matter; neither the V’Shar kash-to’es-khau directive nor the numerous other laws governing executive privilege and government transparency strictly required him to be forthcoming with details.

Tipping her head forward in a gesture of respect, T’Pol said, “I am content to wait until then, Minister. And I hope to cause you as little trouble as possible in the meantime.”

The glare Kuvak cast at her as she turned to leave gave her the satisfaction of knowing that he was expecting precisely the opposite outcome.

Mighty T’Rukh gazed down from an indigo-and-black sky that it half covered, a gigantic eye maintaining its unending vigil over the sleeping city. The night was already several hours old by the time T’Pol had finally finished her meal at one of the local restaurants. Resolved to delay no longer, she had taken a hovercar to the quiet residential neighborhood near ShiKahr’s northernmost boundary.

T’Pol entered the darkened house quietly, unwilling to do anything that might disturb the tomblike silence. Her last visit had been more than a year ago, when her mother had died in her arms following a raid by the reactionary V’Las government on a nearby Syrrannite hideout. T’Les had been one of the casualties of the transition from the corruption of the V’Las regime to the current reformist Syrrannite government led by T’Pau.

The realization came to T’Pol that T’Les’s dark and silent dwelling now belonged to her. I have little to do but wait until T’Pau returns, she thought as she felt along one of the entryway walls for the illumination controls. Perhaps I should take some time to tend to this place.

She was surprised to note that the lights came on immediately once she had found the control padd and entered the appropriate command. Vacant houses were usually disconnected from the central power generation and distribution infrastructure as a matter of course, if only to reduce the possibility of accidental fires. She made a mental note to check out the household utility circuitry herself as soon as possible.

The illumination did little to encourage her; instead, it only accentuated the yawning emptiness of the house. That emptiness mirrored the bereft sensation in her gut, the sense of utter isolation that she usually refused to acknowledge. But she was separated from the solace of her work now, cut off from the comfort of her deepening friendship with Jonathan Archer.

Just as she was cut off from Trip.

Again she cursed herself for her weakness. I am a Vulcan. I must master this.

A knock at the front door broke the silence. Reflexes and training took over, and the phase pistol she carried beneath her robe sprang into her hands.

“Enter,” she said.

The front door opened, and a familiar figure strode into the brightly lit entry foyer.

“I thought I might find you here,” he said, an eyebrow raised.

T’Pol lowered her weapon, frowning. “Denak?”

T’Pol’s old V’Shar colleague gestured with his maimed right hand toward her weapon. “I am gratified that you recognized me, T’Pol.”

Tucking the weapon away, she said, “Come in. Please accept my hospitality.”

The gray-haired Vulcan man followed T’Pol into the wide central living area and took a seat on a low sofa there, facing the antique chair that T’Pol had taken.

“How did you know I was on Vulcan?” T’Pol asked.

Denak scowled. “I see you have lived among humans long enough to have acquired their sense of humor. You couldn’t have forgotten that I have maintained my connections to the V’Shar, if only peripherally. However, your visit to Minister Kuvak’s office this afternoon stirred up enough talk to get my attention even without recourse to my intelligence sources.”

T’Pol silently cursed herself. Had she alienated a potential ally unnecessarily, jeopardizing her mission in the process?

“I was merely trying to establish a rapport as efficiently as possible.”

Denak leaned forward. “I assume the urgency with which you are pursuing this rapport involves an attempt to change Vulcan’s policy with regard to the Rihannsu.”

The Romulans.

“Unless you are in a position to aid me, I should not discuss this matter with you any further.”

He nodded. “Logical. But do you mind if I continue to speculate?”

“Not at all.”

“Then I shall further assume that the rapport you seek to establish will have to be with Administrator T’Pau rather than Minister Kuvak.”

“There is no practical alternative,” T’Pol said. “However, although Kuvak is nominally in charge of the government during T’Pau’s absence, his authority to affect policy in a meaningful way would seem to be constrained both by time and his own intentions.”

“So you have essentially a zero chance of making any progress toward your goal,” he said. “At least for the next twenty-eight days.”

“Unless you can assist me in some manner, yes.”

His brow furrowed. “I have been assisting you for more than a year now.”

“I have not forgotten the role you played in the mission I conducted in Romulan space last year.”

“I was not referring to that,” Denak said, using his good left hand to make an expansive gesture. “I am speaking of this house.”

T’Pol blinked, lost. “I do not understand.”

His frown deepened. “I am disappointed in your powers of observation, T’Pol. Or perhaps it is your eyesight. Did you fail to notice the distinct lack of dust on every level surface in this dwelling?”

She was ashamed to admit it, but she had indeed failed to notice any such thing. My emotional preoccupations again, she thought, upbraiding herself.

“The household utilities,” she said, putting the pieces together. “That was your doing as well.”

He nodded. “I have seen to the maintenance of this place, including the landscaping, since shortly after T’Les died. I recommend that you inspect the plomeek patch in the morning light. You may even find new fruitings on the g’teth berry bushes.”

Once again, T’Pol felt her emotions threatening to overwhelm her. Empowered only by her training, she held them at bay, if only barely.

“Thank you.”

The frown that had crumpled her old friend’s scarred forehead gradually smoothed and softened as he appeared to consider his next words carefully. Then, his gaze fixed upon hers intently, he said, “Now I must ask you for help.”

“I will assist in any way I can,” she said.

“It is about my wife, Ych’a. She is missing.”

T’Pol chided herself. Two of her oldest friends, colleagues from her days as an intel operative, had married and she had never suspected.

“Your wife?” she said, somehow managing not to stammer. “I did not know you were presently married. Let alone to Ych’a.”

His frown returned momentarily. “You worked in intelligence long enough to understand the logic of concealing certain personal information, even from close friends.”

“Of course,” she said with a nod. “Just as I am sure you understand that intelligence agents sometimes must burrow very deeply into their cover identities—often under circumstances that preclude their communicating their status to family members.”

Images of Trip, in the Romulan guise he had worn when she had last seen him, sprang painfully to mind.

“Something more than that may have transpired in this instance,” Denak said.

“Why do you think so?” she said, mirroring his frown. “Isn’t it also possible that she is dead?” After all, being discovered and killed while in the field was an ever-present hazard of the intelligence profession.

Denak was unfazed by her blunt observation, but T’Pol had expected nothing less. Instead, he surprised her by adopting an uncharacteristically confessional tone. “Ych’a and I have shared a... telepathic bond for many years. Establishing psi-links between spouses is a Syrrannite practice that is still not considered entirely acceptable.”

It occurred to her that this lack of social acceptance had given Denak and Ych’a a reason to keep their marriage concealed. T’Pol still had misgivings about the practice of mind-melding.

“I will not judge you,” T’Pol said. “Or Ych’a.” How could she, when she shared a similar bond with Trip? The implications of that bond now seemed far more profound than ever before. The connection that she and Trip had shared—that they continued to share—was no mere casual dalliance. It was all but identical to the link that united two of her oldest friends in the bonds of Syrrannite marriage.

And that makes Charles Tucker my mate, she thought. In a much truer sense than Koss ever was.

Denak’s eyes seemed to brim with both gratitude and pleading. “It was my link to Ych’a that gave me confidence that she would assist you in your foray into Rihannsu space last year—just as it tells me now that she isn’t dead. And that she has been concealing something important from me, in spite of our link, and continues to do so even now.”

T’Pol sat back in her chair, trying to process everything Denak was revealing. It was hard to fully embrace it. “Your assertions seem to contain a great deal of supposition. Do you have any empirical proof?”

“Only the evidence of my years of experience with our telepathic bond. For instance, I have always been able to feel the link attenuate with distance, though it has never broken. I sense a similar attenuation now, greater than ever before, as though Ych’a is now physically farther away from Vulcan than she has ever been...” He trailed off into a troubled silence, staring into the middle distance of the westfacing wall.

T’Pol wanted nothing more than to assuage her old friend’s distress. “What do wish me to do?”

Turning to face her again, Denak said, “I want you to help me find Ych’a. Even if that means venturing offworld, or perhaps even into Rihannsu space.”

“You are being overly emotional, Denak,” she said. “And illogical.”

The determination in his eyes told her that he couldn’t care less about that. “Perhaps. But you know as well as I do that logic alone is seldom the sole determining factor in such decisions. Help me, T’Pol.”

Loyalty and friendship warred with practicality and logic. She had a vitally important task to perform on Vulcan, one that could alter the outcome of the war. But she also couldn’t pursue it effectively for another twenty-eight days—and he knew it.

On the other hand, his conclusions were based almost entirely upon subjective information. It was likely that he couldn’t even determine in which direction to head when he began his search.

But how is Denak’s request any less logical the one I made of him last year? she thought, slowly allowing loyalty and friendship to gain sufficient leverage for a narrow victory.

When I needed his help, and Ych’a’s, to rescue Trip, both of them were there for me.

“I will assist you in any way I can,” she said.

THIRTY-NINE

Day Ten, Month of K’ri’lior
Wednesday, February 11, 2156
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

FIRST CONSUL T’LEIKHA WATCHED in silence as Praetor D’deridex rose slowly from the opulent chair atop the dais in the Hall of State’s cathedral-like audience chamber. Transcending the enfeeblement of his aged lungs, the Romulan Star Empire’s supreme leader spoke with surprising volume and vehemence.

“My boot,” the old man roared, “should already be upon their throats by now, Admiral!” A heartbeat later the praetor’s imperious bluster disintegrated into a violent coughing fit, prompting the pair of servants that flanked him to help ease him back into his seat.

Thank Erebus his ire is not directed at me this time, T’Leikha thought as she cast a discreet eye upon the uniformed military officer who stood beside her before the praetor’s dais. The years she had spent navigating the capricious world of Romulan senatorial politics had long ago taught T’Leikha when to keep her own counsel and when to speak plainly. Seeing the anger that seemed so evident behind Admiral Valdore’s blank expression and bowed head, she wondered if he understood that as well as she did. She certainly thought he should; after all, Valdore’s present position as the supreme commander of all the fleets of the Romulan Star Empire—the apex of a military career that would have ended in indefinite imprisonment had she not intervened recently to salvage it—had followed Valdore’s own tenure as a senator, which had ended prematurely because of his immoderate political positions regarding the bedrock necessity of perpetual Romulan territorial expansion.

Judging from the belittling tenor of the praetor’s disparagements of Valdore’s conduct of the war against the hevam Earthers and their allies, D’deridex—who had been a senior senator when Senator Valdore had delivered a particularly fateful speech questioning the need for unending conquest—remembered those times just as clearly as T’Leikha did.

“You could have attacked and occupied the core systems of this so-called Coalition of Planets khaidoa ago,” the praetor said, addressing Valdore as though T’Leikha weren’t even in the room. The old man’s dark eyes shone with rage commingled with the progressive ravages of the Tuvan syndrome he apparently still believed that his court physician had successfully concealed from the Senate. “Instead you bring me news of skirmishes near the Sei’chi Sei system, or word of occupations of entirely peripheral hevam outpost worlds like Isneih Kre, or D’caernu’mneani Lli, or Denevaei!”

To Valdore’s credit, he replied with apparent equanimity and deference. “Praetor, a multisystem operation on such a scale as this requires extremely careful logistical planning and preparation to achieve success.”

“Yes, yes, I understand that!” The praetor waved a hand dismissively, and the faint tremor in his bony forearm did not escape T’Leikha’s notice. “But instead of a glorious series of conquests in the very heart of hevam space, you have contented yourself so far with mere skirmishes. Explain yourself!”

“Respectfully, Praetor, there is a vast difference between taking a world and holding it,” Valdore said.

“I am well aware of that, Admiral,” D’deridex said. “Nevertheless, your operations seem to be requiring an inordinate amount of preparation time.”

The praetor seemed to master his frustration, at least somewhat. T’Leikha could sense that despite his decades-old political differences with Valdore, D’deridex felt a tremendous amount of respect—or was it envy?—for Valdore’s uniform and all that it represented; she knew that the old man was particularly sensitive about military credentials, being one of the few senators in Romulan history to ascend to the Praetorate without first having distinguished himself in battle.

“I can certainly understand how it might appear that way, Praetor,” Valdore said. “But the fleet and all of its matériel, including all the supporting ground bases and personnel, must be in position before the fleet can be fully ready to take and hold the core worlds of Coalition space, such as Thhaei, Sei’chi Sei, or the homeworlds of the hevam, the Andorsu, and the Tellarsu.”

Whatever misgivings Valdore might have had—or might even still harbor—regarding the Romulan Star Empire’s expansionist ethos, T’Leikha had no doubt that his careful, methodical approach to both strategy and tactics would succeed, ultimately visiting a crushing conquest upon each planet that the admiral had just mentioned: Vulcan, Alpha Centauri III, Earth, Andoria, and Tellar. The threat to Romulan territorial integrity those expansionist Coalition worlds represented would one day be neutralized.

But only if Valdore’s plans were permitted to proceed in due course, as the admiral was still trying to explain.

“Praetor, ever since the war effort began in earnest, we have been carefully preparing our beachheads at places like Isneih Kre and Bereng’hhaei Lli and Denevaei—building and protecting our supply lines while systematically probing the enemy’s defenses even as we have continued to move the tip of the spear closer to the enemy’s soft, exposed vitals.

“But the fleet cannot afford to attempt to launch our endgame before all the pieces are in their proper places, so to speak. Such a move would lead not to glory and conquest, but might very well instead herald ignominy and defeat. I do not wish to risk allowing that to happen during your tenure as praetor.”

Well played, Admiral, T’Leikha thought as she suppressed a smile. Valdore’s gambit brought to mind one of the oldest maxims of the Senate: “The honor of the praetor is the honor of the Empire.”

The praetor started to reply, but succumbed instead to another lengthy fit of coughing. Once he had recovered his breath and most of his voice, he leaned slightly forward on his chair and said, “Whatever time remains in my tenure as praetor may not grant me the luxury of patiently awaiting outcomes, Admiral. You must do better.”

Valdore stood in silence, regarding the hagridden man on the throne for a lengthy interval before responding. “I understand, Praetor.”

T’Leikha noted that he had carefully avoided promising to do the impossible.

“Do you, Admiral?” replied the praetor, the blaze behind his aged eyes intensifying. “Throughout this audience, you have spoken as though Romulus is not beset by deadly adversaries on all sides.”

Valdore’s calm façade cracked slightly, allowing T’Leikha a fleeting glimpse of the confusion that roiled beneath. “Praetor?”

“Our foes are not all neatly arrayed between the Romulan Star Empire and its coreward Avrrhinul Outmarches,” the old man said. “A deadly enemy still threatens us on our rimward side—Haakona. Therefore you will launch your meticulously planned full assault against the Coalition coreworlds now, Admiral. Immediately, whether you believe our forces are ready or not. You will begin with the Andorsu. Once that invasion and occupation is under way, you can begin paying proper attention to the Haakonan threat.”

Valdore blinked several times before responding. “Proper attention, Praetor?”

D’deridex sighed heavily, then adopted a demeanor of exaggerated patience usually reserved for small children. “Yes, Admiral. Proper attention. And by that I mean no less than a full-scale invasion and occupation, just as with the Andorsu, and the rest of their Coalition allies.”

T’Leikha had heard rumors that D’deridex had been discussing with his intimates the urgent need to take decisive and preemptive action against Haakona, although he had yet to bring the matter before the Senate. This mixed bag of rumor, conjecture, and puzzling praetorian behavior only lent credence to T’Leikha’s tentative conclusion that D’deridex’s Tuvan syndrome had been accelerating lately, compromising his rationality while heightening his concerns about his mortality and his legacy.

Valdore, however, apparently had either never heard the Haakona rumors or had taken them less seriously than had T’Leikha. In fact, she had never seen Valdore look quite so dumbfounded as he did at this moment; he had seemed far less surprised more than a full fvheisen ago when she had had him dragged out of one of the Hall of State’s deepest dungeons to tell him not only that he was to be summarily freed, but also that he was to be put back in full command of the Romulan Star Empire’s fleets.

“I shall... revise our battle plans at once, Praetor.”

D’deridex nodded, then clapped his hands twice, his eyes aglow with the fires of madness. “Good. Off you go, then.”

Valdore wasn’t surprised when First Consul T’Leikha cornered him in the vestibule just across the broad, stone-lined corridor from the praetor’s audience chamber.

“Tell me what you think, honestly,” she said, once she had finished sweeping the small conference room for listening devices.

Although she had taken a seat, Valdore remained rigidly at attention. His nation’s supreme leader, after all, had just ordered him to commit the imperial military to an entirely new invasion and occupation, a war on a second front.

“The praetor is insane, First Consul,” he said simply.

T’Leikha nodded gravely. “I am inclined to agree. So I must ask you something, Admiral, in strictest confidence.”

He nodded.

“Do you intend to follow the orders of an insane praetor?” she said.

Valdore allowed an enigmatic smile to cross his lips. He knew he had to take the utmost care in answering such a loaded question. At length, he said, “The praetor is also... prone to forgetfulness. He has issued unorthodox orders before, and subsequently forgotten them.”

“Has he ever before ordered the military to do anything quite this unorthodox?” T’Leikha countered, her gaze like sharpened nhaih- stone spear points.

“No, First Consul,” he said quietly.

“What is the situation at Haakona, really?” the first consul wanted to know.

“It is a quiet backwater, as it has been for more than a generation.”

She nodded. “Ever since the fleet pulled out of the system.”

Valdore nodded. He had only been in the military for a short time, following his abortive Senate stint, when D’deridex’s father had, as part of his perceived mandate as praetor, begun the initial occupation of Haakona. That disastrous military misadventure had cost countless Romulan lives, and had finally ended after nineteen bloody years of ceaseless insurgent attacks upon the occupation forces.

Some of the dead had been his closest friends.

“Why do you suppose the praetor has suddenly placed such importance on Haakona?”

Valdore spread his hands helplessly. “When a man nears the end of his life, he begins considering his legacy with more intensity than ever before. And D’deridex’s legacy has always been bound up with that of his father.”

“Perhaps he fears that a Coalition race—probably the Andorsu— will outflank us at Haakona to gain control of the dilithium supply there,” T’Leikha said. “The Empire still indirectly imports significant amounts of dilithium from Haakona, and the destruction of Coridan has made dilithium a much dearer commodity in Coalition space than it once was.”

Valdore tried to avoid wincing at the mention of Coridan. Although the carnage there had been terrible, the immolation of Coridan Prime’s subterranean dilithium stocks had turned out to be far less complete than he had hoped it would be. He had asked himself more than once since the Coridan attack whether the results he had achieved on that world had been worth the level of indiscriminate death that he had dealt to the Coridans.

Dismissing his self-recriminations, Valdore shook his head and said, “I find that doubtful, First Consul. Outflanking us at Haakona would require a ruinous deployment of high-warp ships that are needed far more urgently elsewhere, for defense against our fleet. Besides, of all the members of the Coalition, the Thhaesu are best positioned to take Haakona’s dilithium, but they do not yet appear to have seen the logic in making any large-scale grabs for the mineral, Coridan Prime notwithstanding.”

Committing so much of the Empire’s vast yet not unlimited military resources to reoccupying Haakona struck Valdore as utterly wasteful on two levels, irrespective of the planet’s dilithium wealth. First, there was the far more urgent war in which the Romulan fleet was already embroiled, fighting back against an aggressively expansionist Coalition. Second, the presently—and with luck, only temporarily—stalled avaihh lli vastam warp-seven-stardrive project that Chief Technologist Nijil had inherited from the late Doctor Ehrehin still held the promise of rendering dilithium effectively obsolete. At any moment, Nijil might achieve another breakthrough that could make dilithium as outmoded and anachronistic as the giant in’hhui’lasendt, the millennia-extinct Apnex Sea leviathans whose glandular secretions had served the First Rihannsu as a cheap source of power. And third, even were Haakona’s dilithium suddenly denied to the Empire, more than enough of the mineral was available from multiple sources, such as provincial Atlai’fehill, the system the hevam called Achernar.

Acknowledging his opinion with a nod, T’Leikha said, “Well, regardless of the praetor’s reasoning and motivations, it would seem to me that D’deridex’s order for the conquest of Haakona might be the very worst medicine the Empire could take at this point in her history.”

Although he agreed wholeheartedly with her appraisal, Valdore was still as bound by honor and law to uphold the praetor’s will as he was to protect the welfare of his fleet, his officers, and the Empire at large. Opening up a second front at Haakona, particularly at a time when preparations for the Coalition war were to be substantially accelerated at this critical juncture, was very likely the single worst idea he had ever heard, second only to the notion of surrendering outright to Earth. Therefore, he maintained a guarded expression as he carefully crafted a response.

“What the praetor has ordered is contrary to my military instincts,” he said at length.

“Which is another way of saying that your praetor has given you an impossible order.”

For all his reservations about the wisdom of the praetor’s plan, Valdore did not like what he was hearing. “With respect, First Consul, I would remind you that you owe D’deridex every allegiance, as do I.”

“Only for so long as he remains praetor,” T’Leikha said, her dark eyes taking on a cunning, calculating cast, like that of a patient hunter. “His symptoms appear to be worsening rapidly. In fact, his declining health may remove him from the praetorate very soon.”

Although Valdore had on more than one occasion considered accelerating D’deridex’s departure from the praetorate—he had contemplated the practicalities and ramifications of assassinating T’Leikha as well—he wasn’t comfortable discussing such matters aloud, even in veiled fashion.

“As I have said, the praetor is prone to forget his most... untoward orders shortly after giving them,” Valdore said. “There is no reason to suppose his newest directives are any different in that respect.”

“No reason,” T’Leikha said. “Except for the continuing decline in the praetor’s health.”

Valdore allowed himself to display a slightly bewildered expression. “I do not understand, First Consul.”

“You say he is forgetful,” she said, her voice taking on the more sonorous, lyrical quality she usually reserved for Senate debates. “When a man’s mortality begins to beckon in earnest, it can focus his attention like nothing else. The cold exhalations of death on the back of his neck may well give the praetor a sense of purpose that stands to make him far less forgetful than you might expect. Therefore he may actually hold you to a disastrous course of action this time.”

“Perhaps,” Valdore said, still trying to resist being drawn into any verbal trap that might give the praetor cause to relieve him of duty. “But as you say, First Consul, D’deridex is unwell and getting worse. A natural death may well remove him from the praetorate quite soon.”

T’Leikha rose and moved purposefully toward the door. Before exiting into the corridor, she said, “Perhaps. But are you willing to gamble that a natural death will intervene soon enough to save both your fleet and the Empire?”

Alone in the small conference chamber, Valdore considered one of the proverbs he had learned during his time in the Senate: “The honor of the praetor is the honor of the Empire.”

If that wise old saw was true with regard to honor, then it seemed to Valdore that it ought to be equally applicable to shame.

The admiral already carried the responsibility for one heinous and shameful act: the superfluous destruction of Coridan. He knew he would carry that shame with him for the rest of his days.

What was one more act of murder? Especially an arguably necessary one—even if that meant slaying a sitting praetor in order to preserve countless other lives that would otherwise be cast into the jaws of death in the pursuit of a useless and foolish cause.

As he contemplated his slate of options—a list that grew steadily shorter with each passing day that Praetor D’deridex continued to draw breath—Admiral Valdore came to realize that it wasn’t the act of murder that made him feel so unsettled.

He closed his eyes, and immediately noticed that the dimly glowing red surface of the burning sea of Coridan was rhythmically rising and falling before his mind’s eye. I have already become an instrument of murder, he thought, unable to banish the image for which he was responsible. Must I become an instrument of treason as well?

FORTY

Monday, March 8, 2156
Enterprise, near the Sol system

TWENTY-SEVEN DAYS TO GET HERE from Vulcan, Archer thought, grateful to note that his unofficial stopover at his exec’s homeworld hadn’t put a crimp in the ship’s itinerary. Pedal to the metal across sixteen light-years and change, and without letting the engines blow us into a half-parseclong streamer of superheated plasma.

He made a mental note to put Chief Engineer Burch in for a commendation once Enterprise reached Earth.

Ensign Leydon turned toward him from the helm. “We’ll reach the periphery of the Sol system’s sensor grid in two minutes at this speed, Captain.”

Archer nodded. “Acknowledged. Drop out of warp in ninety seconds. We don’t want to set off any alarms. I want everything to go by the numbers.”

Like the rest of Earth’s small NX-class fleet— Columbia and the recently completed, just-launched Atlantis—Enterprise was tasked with trying to determine just how the Romulans managed to fool the Vulcan warp-field detection grids. The most expeditious way to do that was to attempt to pierce the grids using Starfleet ships, flying them into each system at random, unannounced approach angles, while employing every imaginable stealth protocol, in the hopes of exposing whatever vulnerabilities the Romulans had learned to exploit.

Both Columbia and Atlantis had already tried this method, under the utmost secrecy, in several Coalition systems and their outsystem colonies over the past several weeks. So far, the defense grids at Tau Ceti, Procyon, 61 Cygni, Alpha Centauri, and even Sol herself had passed with flying colors.

Archer didn’t find that very encouraging.

In fact, he agreed completely with Starfleet Command’s official opinion that these test results constituted very bad news indeed. He sincerely hoped, as Enterprise prepared to undertake her first concerted attempt to “break” the defense grid, that today’s test would yield the opposite result. You have to find the leak before you can patch the space suit, he thought.

He turned his command chair toward the comm station where Ensign Sato sat, apparently listening to the local subspace bands with rapt attention. “Any sign that Starfleet has detected our presence yet, Hoshi?”

“None, Captain,” said the comm officer with a shake of her head. “I’m picking up nothing but normal traffic throughout the Kuiper belt outposts, and all is calm everywhere else, from Jupiter Station all the way down to the solar monitoring outposts on Mercury.”

“Good. Keep listening, but maintain communications silence.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“Dropping out of warp now, Captain,” Leydon reported as she entered a course correction into the helm console.

“Very good, Ensign. Keep station here. Silent running.” He punched a button on the arm of his chair. “Archer to Shuttlepod One.”

A familiar British-accented voice responded crisply from deep in the belly of E deck. “Shuttlepod One here, Captain. I’ve completed the prelaunch checklist. The boat is ready for launch whenever you give the word.”

With a grin, Archer rose from his chair. “I’ll give you the word in about two minutes, Malcolm—in person.”

“I’ll keep the left chair warm for you, sir.”

Archer turned to face the bridge’s aft section, where Donna O’Neill was maintaining a vigilant watch over Reed’s tactical console.

“You have the bridge, D.O.,” he said as he strode toward the turbolift.

Shuttlepod One

”This is the last time we’ll be able to speak before we know how this test will turn out, sirs,” O’Neill said. Seated beside Reed in the small, instrument-crammed cockpit, Archer smiled at O’Neill’s thoroughness; she seemed to be giving both men a gentle reminder of the importance of maintaining strict radio and subspace silence once the shuttlepod was under way.

“Understood,” Reed said from the copilot’s chair, where he was busy double-checking a status reading.

“If you manage to pull this off, Lieutenant Reed,” O’Neill said, “Starfleet is liable to name a new standard tactical plan after you in some Academy textbook.”

Reed wasted no time responding in kind to O’Neill’s wry tone. “Thank you, Lieutenant. And if things don’t work as expected, I’ll try to make sure you receive full credit as well.”

“Shuttlepod One out,” Archer said. Success has a thousand parents, he thought as he closed the channel to the bridge and disconnected the shuttlepod’s hardwired comlink. But failure is an orphan.

“We’re in low-power mode, rigged for silent running, and ready to launch.” Reed said from the chair beside him. “Is the word given, Captain?”

“Let’s get you into the history books, Malcolm,” Archer said.

The captain released the holding clamps, whose opposing motion pushed the shuttlepod clear of Enterprise. Next he fired the dorsal thrusters for a few seconds to put a little distance between the shuttlepod and the starship. Then Archer briefly activated one of the portside thrusters, sending the little vessel into a slow, leisurely roll. The maneuver provided a slowly revolving glimpse of Enterprise as she dwindled away rapidly into invisibility, owing to the combination of distance, relative motion, and the dimness of the light here on the fringes of the Kuiper belt.

So far, so good, Archer thought.

After nulling out the shuttlepod’s roll with an equivalent and opposite firing of a starboard thruster, Archer took manual control of the small craft’s course and heading. He placed Sol almost directly in the center of the forward windows and opened up the throttle to one-quarter of the shuttlepod’s maximum sublight velocity; Archer felt the force of acceleration push him into his chair for an instant, until the inertial damping system kicked in and restored the local gravimetric conditions to a static one g.

Since a shuttlepod had no warp capabilities, its maximum sublight velocity was, in fact, the upper limit of its speed capability. And that fact lay at the heart of today’s test of the warp-field detection grid, as conceived by Malcolm Reed and Donna O’Neill. Without a warp drive, a ship could take hours or even days to cross the gulf that separated the farthest extremities of the detection grid from the planets it protected, down deep in the solar gravity well, relatively speaking. In theory, that interval should have allowed any starfaring race enough time to mount a substantial defense.

But only if interloper vessels generated the warp fields necessary to set off a systemwide alarm.

Reed’s discovery several weeks ago of a passive means of finding— and thus of mapping—a detection grid’s individual sensor nodes had been the first step; one couldn’t very well avoid setting off the warp-field alarm without knowing where its “eyes” and “ears” were located. The tactical officer’s supposition that the Romulans may have developed a similar technique—a hypothesis supported by the data Columbia had gathered during last November’s narrowly averted Altair attack—was the second step.

Today’s test was to be the third and most significant step in the process, because it held the potential of shoring up the defense-grid “holes” that had allowed the Romulans to pierce the warp-field detection grids in numerous systems, with lethal results.

“I hear Starfleet has really been beefing up the sensitivity of the grid over the past month or so,” Reed said, breaking the silence that had descended over the dimly illuminated cockpit. “I hope whatever changes they’ve made won’t spoil the test. If it does, we’ll be back exactly where we started.”

“Then we’ll just have to regroup and try again,” Archer said. “At least until we finally figure out how the hell the Romulans have been beating the warp detectors.” The captain knew that his tactical officer was preoccupied not with personal glory, but rather with preventing the Romulans from doing to Earth what they’d already done at Deneva, Berengaria, and Altair. “Don’t worry, Malcolm. We’re going to beat them at their own game.”

As he spoke, Archer never took his eyes off Sol, the distant bottom of the system’s deep gravity well. At this distance it looked more like an unusually bright background star than what it really was: a vast fusion furnace that ultimately powered every energetic process on Earth and all her planetary siblings—the central star around which the rest of the solar system quite literally revolved.

“So do you think this test will turn out like all the others?” Reed asked at length. “Do you think they’ll detect us before we get all the way to Earth?”

“Doesn’t seem likely,” Archer said. “The shuttlepod isn’t generating a warp field.”

“But Starfleet’s engineering people have done a lot of fine-tuning to the grid’s overall EM sensitivity over the past few weeks.”

Apparently that hasn’t made much difference in any of the static tests Starfleet has run this past month, Archer thought. Aloud, he said, “When we’re in silent running mode, the shuttlepod blends in pretty thoroughly with the interstellar background noise. That should make us nearly as invisible in the EM bands as our lack of a warp field makes us in subspace.”

Archer thought the odds of anyone making visual contact with the tiny shuttlepod before it got within striking distance of Earth were pretty remote. Even at subwarp speed the little craft was moving at a not-inconsiderable fraction of c, which would make a chance sighting highly unlikely. Besides, the shuttlepod’s precise location and angle of approach to its inner solar system targets had been deliberately withheld from Starfleet for the purposes of today’s war game. And added to that was the sheer scale of the space that the shuttlepod was now crossing. Although Archer had visited many unimaginably distant alien worlds, he was still staggered when he considered the vastness of even the much smaller volume of space contained with his own home system.

“Space is big, Malcolm. Even local interplanetary space. That fact alone will go a long way toward hiding us.” Just as it hid whole Romulan fleets at Deneva and Berengaria, Archer thought. And at Altair, until it was almost too late.

Apparently satisfied by Archer’s reassurances, Reed lapsed once more into a nervous but companionable silence. The resumption of the quiet allowed Archer to focus his thoughts inward as the distance gauges on his pilot’s console began monitoring and reporting each milestone the shuttlepod reached: the equivalents of the relative distances from Sol of the orbits of Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, the asteroid belt, and Mars, with the shuttlepod maintaining an off-the-ecliptic trajectory that kept the vessel well away from any planet, minor planet, or asteroid.

The whole passage took nearly twenty-two hours, so Archer and Reed took turns. The captain was relieved at how uneventfully the time passed, though the back of his brain—not to mention the little hairs on the back of his neck—were increasingly charged with tension as Earth grew steadily nearer until the blue world of his birth looked close enough to touch right through the forward windows.

“We did it!” Reed said, grinning from ear to ear.

“Congratulations, Malcolm,” Archer said, not wanting to risk jinxing this success by saying anything cocky while they were still in the home stretch.

A red alarm indicator suddenly began flashing on his console, telling him that it might already be too late to avoid the wages of cockiness. The gods must have been listening.

“Incoming,” Archer said, still studying at his console. “Four vessels. Tactical alert.”

Malcolm nodded. “Powering up weapons system. Armed and ready.”

A moment later, two of the bogeys appeared in the shuttlepod’s forward window, approaching swiftly from behind the western limb of the planet. Though still distant, Archer could see that both possessed the spherical forward sections that clearly identified them as Daedalus-class vessels. The third and fourth bogeys rose together perhaps three seconds later, rising out of the darkness that lay beyond the eastern limb. One of them quickly resolved itself into the sleek, flat profile of an Intrepid-class starship.

The fourth ship bore the unmistakable profile of the NX-class.

Columbia.

With a grin, Archer touched the fire control panel to his right, enabling the launch switch.

“Essex, Archon, Intrepid, and Columbia are all ordering us to stand down,” Reed said, his attention held by the copilot station’s comm indicators. “They’re all powering up their phase cannons. Getting ready for a crossfire.”

So Uttan, Bryce, Carlos, and Erika had made it to the party after all, after having been caught with their pants down; had they detected the shuttlepod even a few minutes earlier, they would have had time to surround him significantly farther away from Earth. Shuttlepod One had obviously surprised them, sent them scrambling.

“Too late,” Archer murmured. Quietly savoring a moment of triumph over his peers, he gave the “launch” button a firm tap. The shuttlepod rumbled as the inert payload in its belly exited at multimach speed, on a straight-line, perpendicular course for Earth.

The captain watched the descending payload sprout a rooster tail of yellow-orange plasma as it began to burn up harmlessly in the atmosphere. Columbia and Intrepid chased after it, phase cannons blazing.

Then the pulse cannons of Archon and Essex struck the shuttlepod in tandem, ringing her hull like a bell.

San Francisco, Earth

The debriefing that followed at Starfleet Headquarters went pretty much as Archer had expected. After unanimously (if reluctantly) awarding the war game’s kill to Enterprise, Admirals Black and Gardner expressed both gratitude and chagrin at having had such a gaping vulnerability in Earth’s defenses pointed out to them. Though he never mentioned it, Archer sympathized with the admirals. They must have felt at least as foolish as he did never to have imagined before that the raptorlike Romulan ships had no warp capability; the success of Reed’s penetration of the security grid confirmed this hypothesis as the only plausible explanation for the Romulan sneak attacks.

But now that Starfleet Command clearly understood both the extent and the likely cause of its vulnerability—one that had apparently afflicted all Coalition worlds and their colonies from the outset—one critical question remained unanswered: Could Starfleet find a way to neutralize this vulnerability before the Romulans made effective use of it here in the Coalition’s very heart?

Captain Archer could not avoid worrying that a Romulan mother ship might be lurking deep in the weeds of this system’s Kuiper belt even now, just beyond the ability of the grid to detect. At any moment Earth could be facing a large, virtually undetectable armada of small but lethal sublight fighter craft. Archer could only hope that the number of vessels would make them vulnerable to early detection. But space was big; it could hide a multitude of ships, perhaps until it was too late.

On his way to an informal dinner with his peers at the Lotus Blossom restaurant, Archer’s mind continually revisited his concerns. With his tactical officer at his side, the captain passed through the restaurant’s familiar glass doors about thirty minutes late. The establishment’s diminutive and impeccably dressed Asian maître d’, Tommy, delivered his customary enthusiastic greeting and conducted the two newcomers to the large private dining space at the rear. Four of Archer’s fellow Starfleet captains were already seated around a large table, where they were sharing a platter of steaming Chinese dumplings, two pitchers of beer, and a large decanter of wine.

“Congratulations, Jonathan,” Erika Hernandez said, rising from her chair and shaking Archer’s hand firmly before helping her colleagues to make room at the table for both Enterprise officers.

“Thanks, but the credit really ought to go to my tactical officer,” Archer said, gesturing toward Malcolm Reed, who now stood a couple of paces behind him, as though intimidated by the rare concentration of captain’s pips clustered around the table.

Erika grinned as she greeted Malcolm, and then introduced the other three captains to him. Captain Uttan Narsu of the Archon offered his own smiling congratulations on a job well done, as did Captain Bryce Shumar of the Essex. Captain Carlos Ramirez of the Intrepid wore a wry half-smile, as though laughing at some private joke.

“Jonathan, do you have any idea how close I came to scattering that faux-tonic torpedo of yours before it made it into the lower atmosphere?” Ramirez said.

Archer couldn’t resist returning Ramirez’s smirk-like expression, albeit with increased wattage, as he took the seat between Ramirez and Hernandez. “As my grandmother used to say, Carlos, ‘Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.’ Anyway, wasn’t your weapons officer the trigger-happy maniac who left that big scratch on the starboard side of my shuttlepod?”

Ramirez affected a look of wide-eyed innocence as he began to fill a beer mug for Archer. “The phase cannons were set at one-percent intensity, standard war-game protocol. So that scratch ought to buff right out.”

“Please, Lieutenant,” Captain Narsu said to Reed, gesturing toward the last empty chair. “Join us.”

Although Malcolm still appeared reluctant to mingle with so many senior command officers, he took the proffered seat and joined in the conviviality of conversation, appetizers, drinks, and the communal Chinese meal that followed. The discussion seemed to have started winding down almost before Archer realized it—partially a result, he decided, of a decidedly non-Einsteinian alcohol-fueled time-dilation effect—though a glance at his wrist chronometer told him that more than three hours had passed since he and Malcolm had arrived.

I really have become isolated from most human contact lately, haven’t I? he thought, in a poignant emotional leitmotif that reprised itself each time one of his peers—Uttan first, followed by Ramirez, and finally Shumar—stood up to say a collegial farewell.

Now Erika and Malcolm were Archer’s only company. Spread across the tabletop that separated them was a veritable Gettysburg of empty mugs, bottles, and pitchers.

Reed rose. “If you don’t mind, Captain—Captains—I really ought to be heading out now.”

Belatedly, Archer realized what his ever-magnanimous tactical officer was trying to do.

“Relax, Malcolm,” Archer said. “Don’t feel you need to rush off.”

“But I do, sir. It’s getting quite late, and there’s a, ah, scratched shuttlepod that desperately needs some buffing out.”

And with that, Archer found himself sitting alone in the private dining area with Erika.

“So,” she said.

“So,” he echoed, chuckling. “Here we are at long last.”

She took a sip of tea that couldn’t have been more than lukewarm by now. “Just the way we planned it last June.”

Of course, he might have planned on a different restaurant, since this was the same restaurant where his other old flame, a waitress named Rebecca, still worked. Had Erika known that when she had first suggested this place? Or was it simply one of her favorite haunts by simple coincidence?

The image of the two most significant loves of his adult life meeting here for drinks and conversation—mostly about him—immediately gave the captain pause.

“How long will you be staying on Earth?” he asked.

Erika scowled slightly. “Not nearly long enough. For a lot of things.”

He nodded. “When do you have to ship out?” he said quietly.

“Columbia breaks orbit at oh seven hundred tomorrow.” She glanced at her wrist. “Today, I mean.”

“Back to patrolling the civilian shipping lanes?” he said.

“And protecting supply lines, and escorting mining convoys, and fighting pirates whenever the Romulans aren’t keeping us too busy. Starfleet still has too few ships on the frontier to give Columbia much downtime. In fact, my crew will have to rush through a long list of repairs and skip a few scheduled upgrades if we’re going to reach the Onias sector in time to do any good there.”

“Next time we’re both in the same town, then,” Archer said, trying to keep the regret out of his voice.

“Next time we’re both in the same sector.” She leaned toward him and gave him a single chaste kiss on the cheek by way of farewell before she stood up. “Let’s hope this damned war is over by then. Where are you taking Enterprise next?”

He rose too, and was grateful that the world remained steady and level beneath his boots. Archer’s eyes were briefly drawn to the ship patch on Erika’s upper left arm, with its Latin motto, “Audentes fortuna juvat.” Drawn from Virgil’s Aeneid, it translated to “Fortune favors the bold.” As he recalled the one and only truly surprising portion of his post-war-game debriefing, he hoped the sentiment expressed on that patch would apply to Enterprise.

“Enterprise will be taking the point when we take Starbase One back from the Romulans.”

FORTY-ONE

Middle of the month of Z’at, YS 8765
Tuesday, March 9, 2156
Outer ShiKahr, Vulcan

T’POL STOOD in the immaculate garden that her old friend had tended so diligently since her mother’s death. Her inner eyelids closing against the sunlight, she drew the still, hot air deeply into her lungs, pausing to appreciate the blend of plomeek and g’teth blossoms it carried. She decided there was no point in putting off saying what she needed to say any longer.

“Denak, we have already made fifteen diligent attempts to locate Ych’a,” T’Pol said. “Nine of those attempts involved interstellar voyages. And yet we have not found any reliable information as to her present whereabouts.”

Nodding, the gray-haired former spymaster said, “This is so. Just as it is so that we have yet to obtain any conclusive evidence of Ych’a’s death. The link tells me my wife is still alive. We should continue the search.”

T’Pol recalled how strongly her psionic link with Charles Tucker had motivated her to do everything in her power to rescue him from the dangers he was facing in Romulan space last year. She had allowed nothing to dissuade her from her commitment to pursuing Trip, not only through parsecs of interstellar space, but also across the political boundaries that separated Coalition space from Romulan territory.

“Perhaps,” she said at length as she moved toward the open entryway that led from the garden into the central living area of the house. “However, I have another mission as well, one to which I must devote my full attention now that Administrator T’Pau’s return to Vulcan is imminent.”

Denak followed her inside the house, his hands clasped meditatively before him. “I see. Perhaps if you had been as attentive to my search for Ych’a as you have been to your constant attempts to locate T’Pau—”

T’Pol interrupted him, though she took care not to sound nettled by his accusation. “Your criticism is unfair, in addition to being overly emotional. Ych’a was—is—my friend as well as your mate. And I am a trained Vulcan intelligence operative. Therefore there is no logic in assuming that I am incapable of performing multiple tasks simultaneously.”

“You argue my point convincingly,” Denak said, still stubborn even though his tone had softened somewhat. “That you are more than able to continue to assist me in finding Ych’a while you also act on your Starfleet orders.”

T’Pol reminded herself that one of the reasons Denak had been so effective in leading and motivating the operatives serving under him was his facility with rhetorical traps. “You are as aware as I am, Denak, that even the most capable person must focus and prioritize her tasks,” she said. “I am confident that Ych’a would agree with me, were she here.”

“You certainly have displayed no lack of focus on your Starfleet mission,” Denak said. “I must grant you that. And that focus has manifested itself for more than a tevun-krus now as obsessive clandestine scrutiny of T’Pau’s government.”

She raised an eyebrow, unsure where Denak’s rhetorical lirpa would strike next. “My thoroughness is only logical, considering that my purpose is to persuade T’Pau to fight the Romulans alongside Vulcan’s Coalition allies. A difficult task, made far more so by my inability to find her.”

“Fair enough, T’Pol. But what has your scrutiny—the surveillance and data-tapping tasks with which I assisted you without hesitation— yielded so far? I see only conflicting and inconclusive evidence of a ‘conspiracy’ that probably owes its entire alleged existence to two completely nonsinister factors: first, administrative incompetence on some minor bureaucrat’s part, and second, excessive imagination on yours.”

T’Pol pushed her rising anger down with a conscious, though not yet strenuous, effort. She reminded herself that this was far from the first time that she and Denak had disagreed on matters of intelligence analysis.

“I can see only one valid interpretation of the intelligence we have acquired so far: the Vulcan government has been secretly using civilian merchant vessels to export weapons covertly through third parties, perhaps using business interests on Adigeon Prime as proxies. We already know that the Adigeons are willing to act as intermediaries for both criminal enterprises and hostile powers—including the Romulans.”

Denak shook his head. “I find it difficult to accept that one of my oldest friends—and the daughter of a committed, pacifistic Syrrannite like T’Les—would seriously entertain the notion that Administrator T’Pau would secretly arm the Romulans. Or anyone else, for that matter.”

T’Pol considered pointing out that neutrality was often an untenable position in a universe that was all too frequently binary in nature. It seemed to her that T’Pau’s decision to leave Earth and the rest of the Coalition to their own devices against the Romulans was only a short distance away on the very same continuum with actively assisting the Romulans in their war effort. It was all a matter of degree.

Instead, she decided to hew as close to the heart of the matter as she could. “I level no accusations at Administrator T’Pau. Her senior deputy, however, may be another matter entirely.”

Denak lofted an eyebrow. “Minister Kuvak? How so?”

“I... do not trust him, Denak.”

An expression that T’Pol could describe only as mild satisfaction settled upon Denak’s lined countenance. “Interesting. Living aboard Enterprise must have greatly honed your capacity for what the humans call ‘intuition.’ Who is being overly emotional now?”

“You were a field agent far longer than I was, Denak. You worked among races that valued logic far less than we do. Therefore you should understand better than anyone that certainty sometimes trumps measurable evidence. Or even logic. Your mind-link with Ych’a serves as a case in point.”

“I will grant you that,” Denak said. “However, I must point out that self-delusion is an ever-present pitfall, even for one as rigorously committed to logic as a Kolinahr master. Since our search for the actual weapons in question—not merely serial numbers cross-referenced with sealed shipping canisters—has been no more successful than your efforts to contact Administrator T’Pau, I could just as easily conclude that your ‘discovery’ may amount to nothing more suspicious than misfiled or corrupted computer records.”

“These data patterns are extremely unlikely to have resulted from mere coincidence,” T’Pol said. “Or simple incompetence.”

“Perhaps,” Denak said, spreading his hands in an almost priestly who-can-truly-comprehend-the-infinite? gesture. “Or it may be that you have indeed found evidence of a real conspiracy—but one that indicates that either T’Pau or Kuvak are secretly supplying Earth and the other allies with military aid. T’Pau’s resistance to bringing Vulcan overtly into the war could be merely a logical exercise in protective coloration—a political stance designed purely for domestic consumption. Meanwhile, Vulcan could join the fight against the Romulans under a cloak of... discretion.”

Not for the first time, T’Pol marveled at her old friend’s rhetorical gift for intertwining flawless logic with appalling cynicism. It was probably fortunate indeed that he had not opted to go into politics after the V’Shar had placed him on “inactive” status.

“I hope you’re right, Denak,” she said. “But I fear that the Romulans are the intended recipients of these weapons. I discovered another shipping manifest this morning, for a ship slated to carry several sealed cargo containers that match up with a weapons cross-check I confirmed just last night. They don’t indicate a final destination for the weapons, but they do show a heading for a rendezvous—deep inside Romulan territory.”

An almost-smile creased Denak’s lips, which surprised her. “ ‘Hope,’ T’Pol? ‘Fear’? I must ask you again: Which one of us is being overly emotional?”

“I have helped you search for Ych’a to the best of my ability, Denak. I need your help in resolving this covert weapons question. Just as I still need your help in persuading T’Pau to see reason regarding the Romulan War.”

“And that is to say nothing of your continued need for help in merely locating Administrator T’Pau,” Denak said.

And only then does the difficult part begin, T’Pol thought as a tense silence stretched between the two old friends. Convincing a zealous follower of the ways of Surak that peace requires a good deal more than a mere refusal to fight.

Denak was the first to disturb the quiet. “And what of Ych’a, T’Pol?”

“I never said I intended to cease trying to locate Ych’a,” she said. “I will pay Kuvak a visit shortly regarding T’Pau’s whereabouts and... other matters. I have begun to suspect that whatever I learn from him will also lead me to Ych’a.”

Denak scowled. “It is not logical to assume that the objects of more than one search will be found together merely because none of them have been found yet.”

“I agree,” T’Pol said. “It is not logical.”

“But it is intuitive.”

Government district, ShiKahr, Vulcan

Nevasa lay bloated on the horizon beneath vigilant T’Rukh, heralding evening’s imminent approach as Kuvak returned to his private office from what had been his final official meeting of the day.

He was slightly startled, though not at all surprised, to find T’Pol awaiting him in his personal meditation area after he had entered and closed the chamber’s heavy door after him. After all, today was the day he had told her she could expect Administrator T’Pau to return from the business that had occupied her for better than a tevun-krus now.

He was surprised, however, at what she had to say to him. “I am aware of the arms shipments, Kuvak. Does Administrator T’Pau know about them?”

Doing his best to cleanse his mien of all discernable emotion, Kuvak said, “You must not draw conclusions from whatever fragmentary information you may have stumbled upon, Commander T’Pol.”

“If I resist drawing conclusions,” T’Pol said, tempered Raalan steel in her voice, “it will not be because your reaction to my accusation has inspired my confidence.”

He answered only with silence. She took a single menacing step toward him.

Kuvak considered making a run for the security-alert button on his desk, but decided he’d never reach it before she intercepted him. Besides, even if he had his security personnel arrest her, she would be called upon to give testimony. That which he wished to withhold from the general public would come out too soon, unless he was prepared to bring the most permanent of sanctions against her.

But even though he had worked at the side of the corrupt V’Las during the previous administration, he was prepared to go only so far in the name of guarding the current administrator’s confidences.

Shunting aside a very real and mounting sense of fear, Kuvak raised a hand and said, “You may have misapprehended the situation, Commander.”

“Are you sending arms to the Romulans?” she asked. Though the question dismayed him, it also provided some reassurance; it made it clear that her knowledge was incomplete at best.

“I cannot give you any details about such matters, Commander.”

“Cannot?” Her eyes blazed with restrained fury. “Or will not?” When he did not answer, she added, “Are you aware that I am adept at the Syrrannite technique of the mind-meld?”

Kuvak had no idea whether or not this was true. However, he had no desire to put her assertion to the test. “Extracting information from me with a forced meld would be extremely unwise, Commander. Administrator T’Pau would not be pleased by such a violation, and I believe you still require her goodwill.”

To Kuvak’s relief, his words seemed to bring T’Pol to a halt. But her determination did not appear to have diminished at all. When she spoke, her tone told him in no uncertain terms that she would remain dangerous to him, no matter how hard he tried to stall.

“Administrator T’Pau will not be pleased by your continued evasions, once she learns of them. And she will learn of them. Where is she, Kuvak?”

Keenly aware that she had backed him into a corner, he made a decision. “I still cannot tell you anything. I am not authorized to offer you any explanations for whatever you think you have discovered.

“However, I can show you something...”

FORTY-TWO

Wednesday, March 10, 2156
Challenger NX-03
The outskirts of the Procyon system (Andoria)

DUNSEL STILL BEAMED WITH PRIDE even after he’d finished conducting the tour.

“You’ve got a very impressive ship, Roy,” Captain Ketai Shosetsu said, nodding appreciatively to his fellow captain from across the table in Dunsel’s private mess, where a yeoman had just finished laying out a pair of steak dinners and beer glasses.

“Starfleet’s latest and greatest, crewed by its best and brightest,” Dunsel said around a mouthful of food. “She’s got all the newest classified retrofits, straight from the Cochrane Institute and the Proxima Shipyard. I just wish we had a hundred more like her—especially with the coyote getting into the henhouse as often as it does.”

Shosetsu raised his glass. “To Lieutenant Malcolm Reed of Enterprise,” he toasted. “If we had a few more like him analyzing Romulan tactics out on the front lines, then this war might be over by Christmas.”

After taking a long swallow from his glass, Shosetsu noticed not only that Dunsel had gone quiet, but also that he was pointedly avoiding contact with his own glass.

“What’s wrong, Roy?”

“I’m not sure Reed did Earth any favors,” Dunsel said, looking troubled.

“Well, he was the first one to work out the new Romulan carrier-and-fighter tactic.”

Dunsel shook his head. “I hope that’s not literally true, Ketai. That he was first, I mean.”

Shosetsu scowled slightly, pausing in his eating and drinking even as Dunsel resumed. “What are you saying, Roy?”

Dunsel paused to eat another chunk of steak, then finally bowed to necessity and washed it down with some of his beer. “Just that the Romulans didn’t really start using this new tactic in earnest until after Reed pointed it out.”

“Even if that were true, it would only underscore the importance of getting our countermeasures into place all across Coalition space as quickly as possible,” Shosetsu said, growing increasingly uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was taking. Dunsel had taken a dim view of Jonathan Archer ever since the Kobayashi Maru incident, and he had never been shy about expressing his thoughts on the matter in public. Now, apparently, some of his ill feeling toward Archer had spilled onto the captain’s senior staff.

But to Dunsel’s credit, he was nodding as though conceding Shosetsu’s point.

“Countermeasures,” Dunsel said. “Even the ones that turn out to be useless. Like everything we’ve tried against that Romulan remote-control hijack weapon so far, other than flat-out running away.”

“Unfortunately, sometimes the only way to test a new countermeasure is to actually try it out in battle,” Shosetsu said. He paused to drain his glass. “Even the ones that turn out to be useless.”

Realizing he was no longer hungry, Shosetsu pushed his plate forward slightly, leaving the meal half eaten. There are worse things than uselessness, he thought. Like paranoia and fatalism.

The keening of an electronic boatswain’s whistle interrupted the uncomfortable silence that ensued. Dunsel walked to the companel mounted on a nearby bulkhead and punched the “receive” button.

“Bridge to Captain Dunsel,” said a crisp, efficient female voice.

“Dunsel here, Hendricks. Go ahead.”

“Procyon’s systemwide warp-detection alarm has begun to develop an anomalous cascading pattern of node failures, all concentrated in a small volume of space near the system’s edge.”

Dunsel frowned, evidently impatient. “What do you make of it?”

“Captain, it looks a lot like the node-failure pattern that occurred in the Altair system just before the Romulan incursion there.”

“Tactical Alert,” Dunsel said, speaking with a decisiveness that went a long way toward exorcising the bad feelings that had plagued Shosetsu throughout the meal. “Get me General Shran, asap. I’m on my way to the bridge.”

Shosetsu rose from the table and followed Dunsel to the hatchway. Useless or not, he thought, here we come.

Firstmoon, Fesoan Lor’veln Year 464
Wednesday, March 10, 2156
I.G.S. Weytahn, the outskirts of the Procyon system (Andoria)

Shran hated it when Jhamel had bad premonitions, mainly because they had a terrible and inconvenient habit of coming true. The moment after he closed the subspace channel that connected him with the transceiver in the dwelling that he and his three shelthreth mates shared beneath Andoria’s northern ice fields, this morning proved to be no exception.

As Shran strode briskly from his austere cabin to the bridge of his new command, the I.G.S. Weytahn, Subcommander Nras filled Shran in on the details of what had happened. Several adjacent sensor nodes on the outer periphery of the system’s warp-field detection grid had just gone down, and the pattern of new failures was spreading rapidly inward toward Andoria and her sister planets. Fortunately, the epicenter of the trouble was occurring on the same side of the system that the Weytahn was presently patrolling.

Something very bad could be coming, and very quickly. And as the head of the newly formed Andorian Imperial Guard unit charged with the monitoring and defense of the cursedly unreliable defense grid that the cowardly Vulcans had so graciously “loaned” to the Andorian government, it was chief among General Shran’s new duties to repel whatever hostile force was on its way.

“I will not permit this enemy to strike at our vitals by blinding our defense network,” Shran said, trying to encourage his restive crew as he took his seat at the center of the small but well-armed warship’s bustling command deck. “Add at least ten Yravas-class fighter craft to the support squadron, and take us out to the gap in the grid,” he told Thras, the helmsman. “I want to take a good look at whatever vermin are trying to burrow under our fences before we destroy them.”

Of course this was no mere nuisance infestation of grelths; no one present could have had any doubt that the pests in question today were Romulans.

“We are being hailed by both of the visiting Starfleet ships, General,” said sh’Rreev, the young shen who was running the Weytahn’s comm network, once the squadron had gotten under way. “They are requesting an informational update and offering their assistance.”

“We should not be too quick to share the glory of this kill with the pinkskins,” said Nras, who was standing at Shran’s immediate right and speaking in an aggressive whisper. “Especially when the Romulans appear to be using a tactic our human ‘allies’ may well have invented for them.”

Despite his best efforts to moderate his reaction to his executive officer’s words, Shran’s antennae betrayed him, standing almost straight up before flattening backward against the curve of his white-haired scalp. There had been a time not all that long ago when he might have agreed wholeheartedly with Nras’s greed for battle prestige, if not with his paranoia. But his new life among the pacifistic Aenar had taught him much about the wages of unchecked violence, the value and necessity of considering consequences, and, above all, the central importance of facing responsibility. And it would be irresponsible in the extreme to refuse the open hand of a friend threatened by a common enemy—especially an enemy who had already tried to pierce Andoria’s defenses on more than one occasion and had been repelled by mere luck and happenstance as much as by strength and military acumen. Increasing one’s reliance on friends might well decrease one’s reliance on luck.

“They are our allies, Nras,” Shran said, carefully modulating his voice to reinforce the message already being sent by the position and electrostatic charge of his antennae—a warning to his overeager subordinate that he was treading dangerously. “Remember, the pinkskin who discovered the Romulans’ method of using sublight craft to pierce our defenses is Malcolm Reed, who serves under Archer aboard Enterprise. I consider Archer and his crew friends. And Reed is no more a Romulan collaborator than Archer is.”

“As you say, General,” Nras said, though it was clear from the roused state of his own quickly shifting antennae that he still needed some convincing.

Shran paused momentarily to reflect upon how the attacks at the pinkskin colonies at Deneva and Altair, to say nothing of the Andorian world of Threllvia IV, had been preceded by almost identical warp-field detection failures. He also considered how much more forthright the pinkskins had been about sharing the best of their expertise, their personnel, and even their ships with Andoria than had any other Coalition member, including even the Tellarites. The humans had even sent the Andorian Imperial Guard and the other Coalition militaries the rough specs for several prospective countermeasures against the much-feared Romulan “remote-hijack weapon,” in the evident hope that the allies would soon begin collectively refining the initial designs by testing them in actual combat.

Despite their aloof airs of superiority and the relative technological advancement they enjoyed in comparison to the pinkskins, the Vulcans still had much to learn from them about how to treat allies.

Shran pointedly turned his back upon Nras, whose fuming silence filled the air like a static charge. “Put the Earth-ship captains on the screen,” he said to sh’Rreev at the comm station. “They will fly at our side today, if that is their wish.”

U.S.S. Yorktown NCC-108

Nearly twenty minutes had passed since General Shran had officially invited the two Starfleet vessels to join his squadron on its emergency excursion to the outer edge of the system’s lonely and deep-frozen Kuiper belt.

Seated behind the Yorktown’s still-battle-singed helm console, Travis Mayweather watched the bridge’s forward viewscreen anxiously, knowing full well what he was about to see even before the squadron reached visual range of whatever it was that had already crippled such a wide swath of the local warp-field detection grid. Because the system’s white F-type primary star, Procyon, was somewhat brighter than Sol, the Yorktown’s computer needed to perform very little enhancement to the image that appeared moments later: a group of perhaps a dozen small, sleek fighter craft, each one’s belly displaying the bright red plumage and viciously sharpened claws of a predatory bird.

“Fourteen vessels total,” said Lieutenant Albertson at tactical. “None of them giving off warp-field emissions, and therefore all moving at far closer to space-normal speed than to c.”

“I am detecting one warp field, though,” Ensign Giannini said from the main science station. “But its point source is substantially farther out from Procyon than the current position of the incoming craft.”

Glancing over his shoulder, Mayweather saw Commander Tyler Mendez—Captain Ketai Shosetsu’s XO and the Yorktown’s second in command—turn to face the man who sat brooding in the big chair at the bridge’s center.

“Let me guess,” Mendez said. “That warp field is emanating from just beyond the sensitivity limit of the system’s warp-detection grid.”

“Confirmed,” Giannini and Albertson said in a near-perfect unison, both of them apparently rapt by the figures and images on their respective console displays.

“This would seem to completely confirm Lieutenant Reed’s theory about Romulan tactics,” Captain Shosetsu said.

“I agree,” Mendez said, nodding. “They park a warp-driven mother ship just outside the detection limit, then tiptoe right past the sleeping watchdogs with their subluminal ships.”

“But they’ve tweaked their tactics a little bit this time,” Mayweather said, then stopped himself when he realized he’d crashed right into a discussion between the Yorktown’s two most senior officers.

“Go ahead, Mister Mayweather,” Shosetsu said genially. “I want to hear your perspective.”

“Now it looks like they’ve given their sublight craft the additional task of disabling chunks of the detection grid on their way in,” Mayweather said.

“That could explain the hard radiation traces I’m picking up along the fighter ship’s trajectory,” Giannini said. “They’ve been using nukes on enough of the system’s detection nodes to create a substantial zone of blindness.”

“The Romulans must have somehow gotten wind that Starfleet has figured out how they’ve pulled off so many sneak attacks right through the detection grids,” the captain said. “And they’ve begun to adjust their tactics accordingly.”

“But there’s only so many nukes that sublight ships that small can carry,” said Albertson at tactical. “It doesn’t make a lot of sense to squander your whole arsenal before you even reach your target.”

Albertson’s objection made sense to Mayweather as well—until he paused for a moment to think it through. “It won’t matter if the little ships empty their quivers before they get all the way to Andoria—not if their real mission is to cover the tracks of their warp-driven mother ship just before she swoops in. A bigger, better-armed warp-driven ship could do a hell of a lot more damage.”

Mendez nodded, looking impressed. “Very good, Ensign. Damned clever, these Romulans.”

Shosetsu scowled. “They may have out-clevered themselves this time. If they really are trying to set up a ‘zone of blindness’ to let their mother ship approach Andoria undetected, then they should have synchronized their attacks on the detection nodes a bit better. Let’s make sure their learning curve costs ’em this time. Ensign Fleming, raise General Shran on a scrambled channel, and make sure Challenger is in the loop.”

The young woman at the comm console swiftly entered a series of commands. A moment later the azure features of the Andorian general scowled across the bridge from the central viewscreen.

Mayweather hadn’t seen Shran since shortly before Commander Tucker’s death early last year. Back then Shran had been struggling to adjust to a new civilian life that had been forced upon him, at least in part, by the destruction of his Imperial Guard warship, the Kumari. Although Mayweather had not known him well, he recognized Shran’s contributions to the Coalition cause, and was glad to see that he had finally gotten back into the good graces of the Andorian military.

“General Shran, I trust your sensors have detected the warp field just outside the perimeter of the detection grid,” said Captain Shosetsu.

The general nodded grimly. “We’ve just picked it up, Captain. We have yet to establish visual contact, but we’re reading the warp-field emissions as a single vessel, probably a large bird-of-prey.”

“Your sensors can see a bit farther than ours, General,” Commander Mendez said. “Can you tell if they’ve detected us?”

“The Romulans have not reacted to our presence yet. The nearest warp-detection nodes may be shielding us somewhat from sensor beams being aimed into the system from outside. I will take the Weytahn to warp briefly, drop back to sublight within weapons range, and then engage the hostile ship. I want the Yorktown and Challenger to head back in-system with part of my fleet to begin taking out the inbound fighter craft. The Romulans may have already spent most of their armaments partially blinding the defense grid, but I do not want to risk allowing even one of those fighter ships to reach Andoria with so much as a single warhead.”

Apprehension gnawed at Mayweather’s guts. Though he knew it wasn’t his place to question a general’s tactical plan, he couldn’t remain silent either.

“I’m not so sure that’s such a good plan, General.”

“Belay that, Ensign!” snapped Mendez.

Shran’s eyes narrowed and both of his antennae thrust forward aggressively. His deep blue pupils seemed to bore straight through to the back of Mayweather’s head, as though daring him to look away. Though he stayed silent as ordered, Mayweather nevertheless held at least some of his ground by not breaking eye contact.

“What do you mean, Pink—” Shran stopped himself, as though he had only now realized that not every human possessed pigmentation that could be even remotely described as “pink.” The notion gave Mayweather an almost irresistible urge to chuckle.

“I know you,” Shran said, his eyes widening in recognition. “You served as Archer’s helmsman, aboard Enterprise.”

After turning to take in the curt nods of both the captain and the exec, Mayweather resumed facing the screen. “Ensign Travis Mayweather, General. I’ve been... reassigned recently.”

A predator’s grin crossed Shran’s face. “It would seem that Archer’s loss is our gain, Ensign. When you pursue those Romulan fighter craft, their pilots will be hard pressed to evade you.”

Sensing that Shran’s recognition might have gained him a little additional leeway in terms of bridge decorum, Mayweather said, “With respect, General, the Yorktown should take the point against the Romulan mother ship.”

“Stand down right now, Ensign,” Mendez said, his voice pitched for Mayweather’s ears alone. “Or I’ll relieve you of duty.”

Once again silent, Mayweather turned in time to see Captain Shosetsu raise a hand. “Wait a minute, Commander. He has a point.” He rose from his chair and addressed Shran directly. “General, we have to assume that the Romulan carrier vessel out there is equipped with the remote-control hijacking weapon.”

Shran nodded. “Which is why we must strike with our best-armed ships, hard and fast, before they have the opportunity to deploy it.”

“Starfleet has upgraded Yorktown’s armaments, defenses, and propulsion systems quite a bit over the past few months, General,” said Shosetsu.

“Not nearly enough, I fear, Captain. The Imperial Guard reports that your technology is still somewhat... backward when compared to ours, generally speaking.”

“I’ll grant you that our food reconstitutors still can’t do justice to Andorian ales and citrus drinks,” Shosetsu said around a wry smile. “But ‘backward’ isn’t always a bad thing, General. Even your own engineers can’t dismiss the Cochrane Institute team’s findings about Earth technology in comparison to what the Romulans have.”

Shran’s antennae probed forward, suggesting either suspicion or curiosity, or perhaps a mixture of both. “Findings, Captain?”

“The ones that suggest that the more ‘backward’ a ship is, the less vulnerable it should be to having the Romulans seize it by remote control. That’s why I believe Mister Mayweather’s suggestion has some merit, General. The Yorktown should go after the mother ship.”

“We have made every command-and-control-system retrofit that the Cochrane team has recommended so far,” Shran said. “With these initial countermeasures in place, we should be no more vulnerable than you are.”

“Perhaps. But I’m sure you’re no more eager than I am to wager the safety of either your ship or your homeworld on untested research, however brilliant it might look on paper.”

“That’s a good point, Captain,” Shran said, nodding.

“I recommend that the Weytahn and her support ships stay clear of the carrier vessel and concentrate on the sublight fighters instead. Protect your homeworld. Yorktown and Challenger will engage the mother ship together.”

It occurred to Mayweather that while Shran might not be comfortable staking everything on the Cochrane Institute’s high-tech brain trust, Captain Shosetsu seemed to carry no such compunctions. He seemed perfectly willing to make a life-or-death gamble that the Cochrane team’s analysis of Earth’s relative vulnerability to an insidious Romulan weapon was correct. But however risky that assumption might turn out to be, it still seemed the way the smart money should bet—provided Challenger didn’t turn out to be the Achilles’ heel of today’s Andorian-human flotilla.

“Very well, Captain,” Shran said at length, though his expression remained stiff and guarded. “But the Weytahn will return to assist you just as soon as I make certain that the sublight threat to Andoria has been neutralized. Shran out.”

As an infinite gulf of star-bejeweled blackness replaced the general’s face, Shosetsu said, “Let’s hope we can take that mother down before Shran gets back here. The last thing we need is a fight with the Romulans and a hijacked Imperial Guard warship.”

“Amen to that,” Mendez said.

“We’re just close enough for visual contact now,” Giannini said.

“On-screen,” said Shosetsu, retaking his chair. “Maximum magnification.”

The starfield shimmered and reoriented as dim foreground objects—the lumps of frozen volatiles and dirt common to many Kuiper belts—grew from the apparent size of dust motes to boulders.

A menacing, hawklike shape now hung near the viewer’s center.

“Ensign Krawczak,” Shosetsu said. “Raise Challenger. Let’s go get ’em.”

Bird-of-Prey Dhivael

Commander T’Voras shifted uncomfortably in the high, thronelike chair that dominated his vessel’s bustling control center. “The squadron should have finished its work by now,” he said, simultaneously addressing everyone and no one.

I should have flown with them as I did back at D’caernu’mneani. Sometimes a commander had to guide a delicate operation with his own hands in order to ensure its success, which in this case could only come once a clear flight path, unobstructed by the presence of any functional warp-field detection apparatus, lay between the Dhivael and the homeworld of the steki’ehrhe blueskins, the Andorsu.

“The squadron has just reported engagement with enemy forces, deep inside the system,” Decurion Morek reported from the com station.

“Identify enemy ships,” T’Voras snapped.

“Assorted Andorsu vessels, ranging from large warships down to medium-sized patrol craft. Precise number indeterminate. The hostiles appear to be trying to jam the squadron’s comm traffic, and are using portions of the system’s defense grid to obscure our sensors. From the fragments of comm traffic that are getting through, it appears that the ship-to-ship battle is not going well. I am sorry, Commander.”

T’Voras muttered a curse. The system’s defenders had made their appearance somewhat earlier than he had anticipated. It appeared highly unlikely that any of the Dhivael’s complement of Nei’hrr-class attack raptors would reach Andoria now, given the current circumstances; though the raptors had the advantage of maneuverability in subwarp combat, they were still no match for Andoria’s military spacefleet, either in armaments or in sheer speed. The raptors’ principal advantage was their capacity for stealth, but that advantage had just become a red-feathered hlai’hwy that had escaped from its cage, taken wing, and flown far, far away.

Of course, had Admiral Valdore granted him all the raptors he had requisitioned for this mission—a number sufficient to have cleared the way more quickly for the Dhivael’s undetected warp-speed approach of Andoria—then the tide of battle would be flowing in an entirely different direction at this very moment. He might already be raining destruction down upon Andoria’s cities.

But now was not the time for either regrets or recriminations.

“Are the hostiles within range of our arrenhe’hwiua telecapture system?” T’Voras asked. Since none of the subwarp raptors could generate sufficient power to operate such an energy-intensive weapon, the telecapture unit had to be the sole province of the Dhivael on this mission.

“No, Commander,” Morek said. “We would have to make a closer approach.”

And just how close an approach, T’Voras knew, would depend greatly upon what measures the Andorsu may have taken to “harden” their systems against the arrenhe’hwiua device.

“A stealthy approach would seem to be out of the question,” T’Voras said as he came to a decision. “Helm, put us on a direct heading for Andoria. Maximum warp.”

“Yes, Commander,” Decurion Rarek said from the flight control board, into which she was began to enter a swift series of commands.

“Since they discovered our attack raptors so quickly, Commander, we should assume that they have detected the Dhivael as well,” Centurion T’Vak said, standing ramrod straight beside the T’Voras’s chair. “Withdrawal would be our most prudent course of action.”

T’Voras glared hard at the centurion. Prudence, he thought with disdain. The Romulan Star Empire was not built by men who valued prudence over victory.

He noticed then that Rarek seemed frozen over her flight controls as she regarded the Dhivael’s two most senior officers uncertainly. Ignoring T’Vak, T’Voras addressed Rarek directly.

“You will carry out my order, Decurion.”

Rarek nodded as her hand moved toward the “execute” switch. “Yes, Commander.”

“Commander T’Voras!” T’Vak cried. A flashing green alarm on the nvaimn-side scanners had evidently just attracted his attention.

“What is it now, Centurion?” T’Voras said, his patience rapidly thinning.

“Two more large ships have just dropped out of warp, Commander. They’re both already within weapons range of the Dhivael, and they seem to be trying to bracket us between them.”

Interesting. “More Andorsu?”

“No, sir. They’re Earth ships. Starfleet Daedalus-and NX-class.”

T’Voras grinned. For reasons that remained obscure, the Romulan Star Empire had succeeded in acquiring precious few Starfleet ships so far. Admiral Valdore would be grateful indeed if the Dhivael managed to increase that small number by even one—particularly if that one belonged to the NX-class, Starfleet’s most advanced ship of the line.

“Should I hold our position here, Commander?” Rarek asked, again looking uncertain. Her hand still hovered above the “execute” switch.

“Take us to Andoria, best speed,” he said, his grin broadening. “And get the arrenhe’hwiua ready to deploy against multiple targets.”

He was counting on his prey to chase him.

I.G.S. Weytahn

“The Romulan carrier ship is headed into the system,” Lieutenant ch’Narv reported from the tactical station. “It is headed toward Andoria at high warp.”

“Pursue!” Shran barked. “Redeploy the Yravas-class fighters to engage the incoming enemy, and scramble as many more from Andoria as you can get.” It had grieved him to learn that six small fighters were the only elements of his flotilla that had survived the initial engagement. But life had taught him long ago to adapt to changing circumstances, using whatever tools came to hand. If ice borers killed your alicorne, you used their heat to cook up a batch of alicorne steaks.

“The Romulans are jamming our ground communications,” said Lieutenant sh’Rreev from the comm station.

Shran muttered a curse as he tried to rein in his rapidly mounting dread. Surely one lone Romulan vessel, even one as apparently well-armored as this one, couldn’t stand for long against a concerted attack by six agile fighter craft, not to mention the combined firepower of the Weytahn and two of Starfleet’s ships of the line. Especially when the remnants of its complement of sublight auxiliary craft were presently too far away to render assistance.

The Weytahn lurched slightly as the inertial damping system momentarily lagged in compensating for the ship’s sudden burst of acceleration. Ignoring this slight discomfort, Shran studied the central viewscreen, which Nras had split into a simultaneous real-time subspace-band-enhanced display of the imagery coming from the ship’s electronic “eyes.” The aft camera was focused on the rapidly dwindling Romulan mother ship, which was receding quickly ahead of the Andorian Yravas-class fighter craft that were closing from behind even more rapidly; the forward camera showed the disk-shaped and globular forward sections, respectively, of Challenger and Yorktown, the Earth ships that were bringing up the rear. Of the two Starfleet vessels, only the warp-five-capable Challenger seemed to have a realistic chance of catching up to the Romulan carrier vessel before its speed took her all the way to Andoria.

“Can we intercept them in time?” Shran quietly asked Subcommander Nras, who was standing beside him, rapt by the dramatic tableau on the viewer.

“They won’t get any closer than two orbital units before the Weytahn can engage them directly,” Nras said.

Shran was delighted to hear that, though he would have preferred a somewhat thicker safety margin than twice the mean distance between Andoria and her primary star.

“The fighters should be on top of them before that,” ch’Narv said.

“They’ll be space dust before they get anywhere near Andoria,” Nras said. “Unless...”

Shran scowled as he watched the small Andorian fighter craft begin breaking formation.

“Unless what?” Shran wanted to know, though he feared the answer to his question was already unfolding, quite literally, right before his eyes: two of the six remaining little Andorian fighter ships suddenly broke off from their roughly hexagonal attack formation and reversed course, followed a few heartbeats later by another, and another, and another.

“Unless that happens,” said Nras as he nodded toward the screen, his antennae going limp.

All six Andorian Yravas-class fighters in Shran’s squadron had come about completely, each taking on a direct heading for the Weytahn. Though their new formation was less organized than the one they had just broken, the air of menace they presented was palpable nevertheless. Shran’s antennae raised themselves like a pair of sharpened Ushaan-Tor blades being prepared for ritual combat.

All six of the fighter ships’ forward weapons tubes began to glow a perilous blue-white.

“Evasive maneuvers!” Shran cried as the two nearest craft released their first salvos...

U.S.S. Yorktown

“The Andorian fighter ships have broken off from the Romulan carrier vessel,” Lieutenant Albertson said from the tactical console, his pale features presenting a study in both puzzlement and horror. “And they’ve just opened fire on the Weytahn!”

“Damn!” said Captain Shosetsu, who looked as stunned as Commander Mendez, who stood mutely beside him.

Travis Mayweather felt every bit as much horror as everyone else on the bridge, if not nearly as much surprise. What had just happened seemed to him not only perfectly obvious, but also entirely predictable.

“The Romulans have hijacked them,” he said. So much for quickie off-the-shelf countermeasures. Looks like it’s back to the drawing board for the Cochrane team.

Mendez seemed to be thinking along similar lines. “We build a three-meter wall, and the Romulans make a three-and-a-half-meter ladder to climb over it.”

“How soon will we engage them?” Shosetsu asked.

“Maybe not soon enough, even at maximum warp,” Mayweather said, his eyes riveted to the main viewer. “But Challenger will reach the Weytahn almost five full minutes before we do. Maybe they can keep the Romulans occupied until we arrive.”

“Get us there as fast as you can, Mister Mayweather,” Shosetsu said before relaying essentially the same order to engineering.

Mayweather put the spurs to his throttle controls; he tried to ignore the almost painful whine of the overtaxed propulsion system, instead focusing his attention toward the main bridge viewer.

Thanks to the images collected by the long-range subspace scanners, the screen now displayed orange petals of fire blossoming across the Weytahn’s hull—and the sleek shape of Challenger as she dropped out of warp apparently only a few hundred meters away from the beleaguered Andorian warship. Challenger’s phase cannons blazed to life at the same instant, immediately crippling one of the Andorian fighters even as two others began concentrating their fire on their newest target, leaving the remainder to maintain their single-minded focus on the Weytahn. Yellow-orange impacts flared against the NX-class starship’s polarized hull plating, which already looked scorched in places.

“Just hang in there for a few more minutes, Dunsel,” Shosetsu muttered, his voice nearly drowned out by the whine of the warp engines.

Challenger

The ship rumbled with the relentless impact of the hijacked Andorian guns, briefly prompting Captain Roy Dunsel to wonder if his teeth were coming loose.

“The Romulan carrier is accelerating downsystem,” said Ensign Hendricks. “She could make it all the way to Andoria if these fighters delay us here any further.”

“I’ve managed to cripple two of them so far, Captain,” said Lieutenant Rubin at tactical. With a doubtful shake of his prematurely gray head, he added, “But it takes a lot more luck and effort to shoot a gun out of a bad guy’s hand than it does to squeeze off a lethal gut-shot.”

“They’re allies,” Dunsel said. “We can’t just destroy allied ships, Lieutenant.”

Lieutenant Commander Estelle Granger, Challenger’s first officer, approached Dunsel’s chair and spoke in a tone deliberately pitched to be all but inaudible to anyone but the captain. “Even if that turns out to be the only way to save an entire planet?”

For the first time in his career, Dunsel felt completely stymied, utterly helpless, and absolutely useless.

And if there was any one thing he truly hated more than anything else, it was to feel useless.

I.G.S. Weytahn

“Must I remind you that there are still pilots aboard those last four fighters?” Nras said, his tone bristling with anger, his antennae jabbing forward antagonistically. A console smoldered behind him, its flames having just been smothered by the fire-suppression system, leaving the command deck redolent of ozone and fear.

“No,” Shran said with affected calm, though he was well aware that one of the Yravas pilots out there was Nras’s only son, Skav. “And I trust I need not remind you that all of Andoria will be in peril if we allow those craft to destroy us or cripple us—or even delay us any further. Forgive me, my old friend. I am only doing what I must.”

He turned away from Nras, trusting his exec to maintain proper command-deck decorum in spite of the terrible sacrifice that circumstance had thrust upon him.

Turning toward ch’Narv at tactical, Shran said, “Destroy them all.”

Can Jhamel forgive me as well? he thought. He wondered if he could ever again face his peace-loving Aenar shelthreth mates or the child Jhamel would soon bear them all.

He cursed the soulless Romulans who had engineered this situation.

Challenger

Dunsel stared in disbelief as the last of the explosions faded from the viewer. All four of the remaining Andorian fighter craft were gone, destroyed by General Shran’s own weaponry.

The combat-generated debris field suddenly vanished, replaced by the haunted, glowering visage of Shran himself.

“Captain, I have just been advised that our warp drive has sustained damage,” the general said, his eyes deep blue pools of pain. “We cannot pursue the hostile vessel effectively at impulse speeds. Can you intercept it before she reaches Andoria?”

Dunsel nodded, excusing himself just long enough to order Ensign Kaye at the helm to do precisely that. Turning back toward the screen, he said. “Can the Imperial Guard supply some support ships?”

Shran shook his head. “We are the support ships, it would seem, Captain. The Romulans are still blocking our subspace traffic to Andoria, so I cannot summon reinforcements using the usual protocols. My comm officer is trying to relay a message through what remains of the local warp-field detection nodes, but by the time it reaches Imperial Guard Command...” Though he didn’t finish his sentence, the general’s message could not have been any clearer.

We’re on our own, Dunsel thought.

Bird-of-Prey Dhivael

“Approaching the Andorsu homeworld, General,” ch’Narv reported. “Adjusting altitude to a standard strafing orbit.”

T’Voras savored the image of the blue-white ball of ice that turned serenely on the viewer before him, growing ever larger as the Dhivael optimized her orbit, balancing the minimum acceptable weapons impact with the maximum tolerable exospheric/atmospheric drag. He wished he could afford to take the time to properly admire his target, though there would be many opportunities to enjoy the system’s many scenic wonders after the Romulan banner had been unfurled here and a proper Imperial presence established.

Although Andoria was remote from its sun, the yellow-white star that illuminated the planet was very nearly as brilliant as Eisn, the home star of Romulus and Remus. Blue-white, largely glacial Andoria was actually the satellite of the system’s eighth planet, a massive and turbulent gas giant embroidered by an intricate array of gossamer rings. Regardless, Andoria’s size, mass, atmosphere, and surface gravity—and the fact that it was circled by a pair of moons of its own— made it a planet in every way that counted, at least as far as T’Voras was concerned.

“Locate the two target cities,” T’Voras said, putting aside his ruminations until he had concluded the business at hand. “Establish weapons locks.”

Looking up from his tactical scanner, ch’Narv said, “Incoming ship, General. It’s Ch’lenjer, the NX-class hevam vessel.”

An inspiration suddenly struck T’Voras. Why not share the glory of the coming kill—with the hevam Earthers?

“Lock the arrenhe’hwiua device on Ch’lenjer’s systems, ch’Narv.”

Challenger

Never before had Roy Dunsel felt such an intense sense of purpose.

“Lock phase cannons onto the Romulan ship,” he said as he studied the hawklike vessel that hung against the incongruously peaceful blue-white backdrop of Andoria’s northern hemisphere. “Full spread of photonic torpedoes.

“Fire.”

Rubin pressed the firing stud.

Nothing.

Static flooded the main viewer, which went dark an instant later. Meanwhile, the bridge lights flickered, dimmed, and shut off entirely. Red emergency lights, battery-powered backups, began casting their eerie, shadow-strewn glow a second or two afterward.

“What the hell?”

“Weapons systems are nonresponsive,” Hendricks said. “Life support has just failed as well.”

“Propulsion and navigation are gone, too,” Kaye said from behind the helm.

The bridge shook and rumbled at that moment, though not as severely as it might have under a salvo of enemy weapons fire.

“The Romulan ship has grabbed us somehow,” Rubin said in answer to Dunsel’s unspoken question. “It reads a lot like a Vulcan tractor beam. They’re pulling us fairly close to them.”

Of course, Dunsel thought. They want to take Challenger intact. “Ensign Hendricks,” he said. “Tell the MACOs to prepare to repel boarders. And get down to the armory and start passing out phase pistols and communicators to all Starfleet personnel.” Since the comm system currently was in no better shape than the rest of the ship’s hardware, Hendricks headed straight for one of the bridge stairwells to see to Dunsel’s orders in person.

The tactical console suddenly began glowing intensely. “Our primary weapons system has come back up, Captain,” Rubin said. “Our photonic torpedo launchers are locking onto targets on the surface, just like the Romulan ship seems to be doing. But I still have no control over anything.” His fingers stabbed at the buttons and touch pads, to no apparent effect.

God, no! Dunsel thought, studying the tactical panel over Rubin’s shoulder. Aloud, he said, “Cut the power.”

“The system won’t let me, sir. It’s locked me out!” Rubin banged a fist against the console, apparently causing more damage to himself than to anything else.

“Clever bastards,” Commander Granger said from the tactical officer’s other side. “Why should they attack Andoria solo, when they can force an ally to do it with them in tandem?”

Though dismayed, Dunsel wasn’t completely surprised by this development. He’d been briefed about the Romulan hijack-weapon, though he had always frankly doubted how such a thing could be possible. How could any highly invasive, communications-based weapon, no matter how sophisticated, simultaneously seize every system aboard one of Earth’s most advanced starships? Even now, it just didn’t seem possible. Eager to put that idea to the test, he pressed one of the glowing buttons on the right arm of his command chair and examined the backup digital display that came up in response.

With a grin born of gallows humor, he noted that at least one system seemed to remain beyond the Romulans’ reach, at least for the moment. This system had been installed only weeks earlier, during Challenger’s most recent repair layover at the Proxima Centauri yards. So far as he knew, Challenger was the only ship in the fleet to have received this particular systems upgrade; not even Columbia or Enterprise was so equipped.

Dunsel’s fear that the Romulans might figure out what he was doing in time to put a stop to it neatly canceled out his apprehension about what lay ahead. Buoyed by a renewed sense of purpose, Roy Dunsel pressed another button, then quickly began keying in a sequence of commands.

U.S.S. Yorktown

Still maintaining his vigil at the helm, Mayweather listened to the reports coming in from around the bridge with increasing frustration.

The nearly four minutes that still separated Yorktown from her sister ship and her attacker might as well have been an eternity.

“Challenger is flying in a tandem orbit with the Romulan carrier,” Albertson was saying. “Defenders are scrambling up from the surface, as well as from inner-planet bases and other points in the system, but that Romulan ship could devastate a huge swath of the planet’s surface in the meantime.”

“Why haven’t they done it already?” Mendez said. “Their weapons read hot.”

“Apparently,” Shosetsu said, “because the Romulans have been too busy seizing control of Challenger to do much of anything else yet.”

Like the Romulan ship, Challenger’s weapons tubes were reading hot, even at this distance.

They’re going to use Challenger as a weapon against Andoria, Mayweather thought, horrified. Captain Dunsel won’t be able to do anything except sit on his bridge and watch as his own ship does the Romulans’ dirty work for them. Mayweather wondered how it would feel to be in charge and yet be so helpless, so useless, against such an insidious enemy. Even his own frustrating inability to stop the Romulans had to be almost trivial in comparison.

Could that have been the way Captain Archer felt, he asked himself, when he was trying to decide whether or not to rescue the Kobayashi Maru?

Challenger

The bridge was silent as a tomb and very nearly as dark. Though his sweat-slickened hands shook more than a little, Dunsel typed in the penultimate code-sequence slowly and deliberately.

This procedure would be a lot easier if it could be done with voice commands. Maybe someone would take to heart his own suggestion to that effect, made in his hastily recorded final log entry, before Starfleet released version 2.0 of the software. If, of course, the log buoy had the good fortune to be blown clear of the ship intact instead of being destroyed outright in the coming conflagration.

Of course, it would be best if the first vessel to test out this new system also turned out to be the last, though Dunsel knew this was hardly likely.

The final command prompt came up on the tiny screen on the arm of the captain’s command chair. In response to Granger’s grim concurring nod, Dunsel typed in the final command string.

ZERO ZERO ZERO DESTRUCT ZERO.

He pressed “ENABLE.” The thirty-second countdown immediately commenced, marked in silence by the glowing figures that paraded solemnly across the command chair arm’s tiny electronic display.

The clock counted down to five, the point at which an abort was no longer possible.

Dunsel waited in the silent semidarkness with his crew, hoping that his last act would redeem the mood of utter helplessness and futility that had suffused his final log entry....

Bird-of-Prey Dhivael

“All weapons locked on both the industrial city of Laibok and the political capital at Laikan,” ch’Narv reported. “Both the Dhivael and the Ch’lenjer are ready to fire in concert.”

“Outstanding work, Lieutenant,” T’Voras said, his eyes riveted to the image of the planet that would soon bear his name forever. The captured hevam ship could not be seen at the moment; the tractors had brought her quite close to the Dhivael in order to enable the warship’s engineers to make the most detailed possible interior scans before the boarding teams were assembled and dispatched.

But there would be plenty of time to do all of that later in safety, once the hevam crew had been dispensed with. In the meantime, the Earth vessel had to remain close enough to inhibit any enemy effort to destroy her proprietary technology, yet far enough away to prevent the hevam ship’s guns—now firmly under Romulan control—from striking the Dhivael accidentally.

“Open fire with all tubes, ch’Narv.”

The tactical officer scowled at his console, which had just begun flashing with urgent, blood-green alarms. “Commander, I’m getting some strange energy readings from—”

Before the gunner could complete his sentence, the entire universe was suddenly suffused with a rush of heat and fire whose speed far outpaced either screams or nerve impulses.

An equally abrupt darkness followed at almost the same instant.

U.S.S. Yorktown

By the time Mayweather settled the ship into a standard orbit about Andoria, the debris and residual fire from the explosion had spread itself into a weirdly beautiful ring. At least half a dozen Andorian military vessels, ranging from small patrol ships all the way to large ships of war comparable to General Shran’s temporarily disabled Weytahn, had just turned up—too little, too late, to Mayweather’s mind—apparently to investigate the newly formed ring’s shimmering curvature.

Heedless of any observers, the still-spreading band of detritus was already well on its way to girdling Andoria completely, transforming that icy moon into a miniature of the multiringed gas giant it orbited, if only temporarily. Mayweather wondered idly if gravitational interactions with Andoria’s own two natural satellites—one of which had just loomed into view over Andoria’s western limb—would make the ring a permanent feature. Or had the hoop of orbiting shrapnel formed inside Andoria’s Roche limit, so close to the Andorian homeworld that local tidal forces would effectively doom it to an atmospheric death spiral in a matter of days or weeks?

“Any sign of Challenger?” Shosetsu said over Mayweather’s shoulder. “Or the Romulan ship?”

Mayweather turned to the side and saw Giannini shake her head ruefully at the science station. “Just debris, duranium fragments, and traces of polyalloy and plasteel. Gamma and delta ray counts are consistent with large-scale uncontrolled mutual annihilations of matter and antimatter.”

A double warp-core breach, Mayweather thought as he watched the tumbling, drifting debris on the viewer.

“It’s a miracle that the explosion didn’t rip away half the planet’s atmosphere, even this far from the surface,” Mendez said, awe and relief commingled in his expression.

“If Andoria’s magnetic field was only a little bit weaker, then that’s probably just what would have happened,” said Giannini. “They’re likely to have ion storms for weeks.”

Mayweather looked past the debris ring, focusing his attention instead on icy Andoria itself. Only now did he notice that the hazy atmosphere carried a subtle glow that had nothing to do with reflected sunlight; auroras of pink and aquamarine stretched from the polar regions almost to the equator, following Andoria’s magnetic field lines the way a Kaferian rosevine climbed an airponic trellis.

He could only hope that the Andorians would remember what Dunsel had done here once the auroras settled down and the ring dissipated.

“He blew his own ship to kingdom come,” Shosetsu said, as though he’d been reading Mayweather’s thoughts. “Who knows how many millions of Andorian lives he saved?”

“And not just today,” said Mendez. “Those Romulan bastards would have got their hands on an NX-class starship if Dunsel hadn’t pulled the pin on that new autodestruct system.”

Mayweather swallowed hard. He knew that the Yorktown now carried an identical autodestruct package, thanks to her most recent repair-and-upgrade layover at Proxima. And thanks to Captain Roy Dunsel, the autodestruct system had just received its first effective test in the field.

Would I have had the strength, Mayweather wondered, to make the same choice that Dunsel did?

Firstmoon, Fesoan Lor’veln Year 464
Wednesday, March 10, 2156
I.G.S. Weytahn

Nearly half a dayturn had passed since the Weytahn’s engineers finished getting the ship back under way, allowing her to resume her patrol of the home system’s remote defense infrastructure. Late in the ship’s night, Shran left the command deck in the capable hands of Subcommander Nras, whose need for the succor of duty Shran recognized as having become particularly acute since the death of his son, Skav. But even though Shran had retreated to the solitary darkness of his small, utilitarian cabin, the solace of sleep eluded him.

Instead, he welcomed the chorus of the slain for yet another visit. “Hello, my friends.”

Anitheras th’Lenthar separated himself from the silent, shadow-shrouded figures who crowded the corner—the ghosts of Keval, Tholos, Thon, Skav, Gareb, Talas, and all the rest—and approached the bed where Shran lay, wide awake. Speaking without speaking, his words sounding directly in Shran’s mind, the visitor said, “Jhamel, Vishri, and Shenar are concerned about you, Shran.”

Shran chuckled humorlessly as his elbow accidentally knocked a half-empty bottle of Fesoan grainwine from his bedside table to the floor. Ignoring the mess he knew was spreading across the floor, he replied aloud.

“How could you possibly know that, Theras? Or aren’t you still dead?”

Theras seemed to have a far stiffer spine now than he had had in life. “Of course I’m dead. That’s why you were able to take my place in the shelthreth, alongside my three lifemates. I know your feelings for Jhamel had always come first, but I still thought you were committed to the marriage group.”

“I am committed to the shelthreth,” Shran growled, though he was bitterly aware that he had never done right by either Shenar or Vishri. Having been nothing but supportive of his halting but sincere attempts to embrace Aenar-Andorian pacifism, both Shenar and Vishri were unlikely to admit they agreed with Shran’s harsh self-assessment. Regardless, he believed that in their hearts they knew it to be true.

“Then prove it, Shran. Take some leave time and come home, if only to reassure Jhamel.”

Shran shook his head. “I can’t do that. Not now.”

“She needs to speak with you, Shran. She needs to know you are all right.”

“Perhaps being dead has kept you somewhat out of touch with current events, Theras. But Andoria has an enemy to fend off at the moment. We are at war. I cannot come home now.”

“Not even to celebrate a victory over the Romulans?”

Shran sniffed. Victory indeed. The Romulans had caught the Imperial Guard unawares, as though they were so many drunken tunnelers sprawled in the path of a school of ice borers. They had nearly succeeded in launching calamitous attacks on Andorian cities, and still possessed voluminous resources capable of bringing still more havoc to Andoria, at any time and from any direction. And Andoria’s first practical test of the pinkskins’ remote-hijacking countermeasures had been a failure of colossal proportions.

“I do not feel much like celebrating anything, Theras,” Shran said at length.

“Ah,” Theras said. “Forgive me, General. I smelled liquor, and apparently drew an entirely wrong conclusion.” The dead Aenar took another step toward the bed. The external starlight illuminated his gray eyes; they appeared to be directed at the infinite starscape that lay outside Shran’s window, even though they looked just as sightless as they had when Theras had been alive.

“I understand that you have duties to perform, and I can respect that,” Theras said. “But do those duties require you to raise your mental barriers against your own bondmates? Why won’t you at least allow Jhamel to speak inside your mind?”

“I do not want the ugliness of this war to touch her. Or Vishri. Or Shenar. Or our unborn child.”

Theras shook his head in the starlight. “You need not protect them from reality.”

“Of course I have to protect them from reality, Theras. They all practice pacifism, Just as you did.”

“Pacifism, yes, a goal to which you, too, have aspired, Shran. But pacifism does not make its practitioners children. Pacifism is not paralysis. It did not prevent me from taking action when the occasion required it.”

That action, Shran knew, had cost Theras his life, though it had saved many others. It had also given Shran a new lease on life, as Theras’s replacement in Jhamel’s bondgroup. And for the first time in his life it had motivated Shran to make a serious attempt to put the ways of war behind him forever.

But that was a luxury he could no longer afford. “War has a certain... corrosive effect, Theras. On everything it touches.”

“Of course it does, Shran. Jhamel knows that very well already. Don’t you think she experienced that corrosiveness in full measure when the Romulans killed her brother Gareb?”

Shran squinted into the most shadowy corner of the room, where the rest of the dead stood by restlessly. In a cluster among these he saw the pilots whose deaths he had caused yesterday, including Skav, Subcommander Nras’s dead son, as they leaned with silent insouciance against the hullward wall. Unlike the blind gray eyes of the Aenar, Skav’s starlight-reflected gaze was refulgent with accusation, as were the eyes of his peers.

Shran would not let himself flinch from it.

“Jhamel does not understand,” he said. Jhamel could never truly grasp this nettle. Not unless she been forced to put Gareb down herself, the way Shran had had to kill Skav as the means to the end of saving countless others.

And he was adamant that Jhamel never learn what that truly felt like, even vicariously. She needed no further tutelage in the ugly art of war.

“When will you try to make her understand?” said Theras. “When will you finally come home?”

Shran closed his eyes, trying to banish the unquiet dead, the corpses that never stayed buried. And he considered all the carnage that almost certainly lay ahead, thanks to the inadequacies of the Vulcan “protection” Andoria had accepted, and the Vulcan “diplomacy” that even now plied the high and the mighty in the political capital of Laikan with recommendations of appeasement and retreat.

“I may never be able to come home again,” Shran said. Then he reached toward the floor in the hope that a little Fesoan grainwine might remain inside the upended bottle.

FORTY-THREE

Middle of the month of Z’at, YS 8765
Wednesday, March 10, 2156
Vulcan’s Forge, Vulcan

“BEHOLD,” MINISTER KUVAK SAID as he gestured broadly at the breathtaking desert vista that sprawled from the mountain’s foot to the eastern horizon. A pair of sha’vokh birds, desert carrion eaters whose wingspans exceeded the height of a tall adult Vulcan, wheeled lazily in the vermilion sky. Vulcan’s Forge was resplendent in reds and ochers beneath the rays of the newly risen Nevasa and the half-shadowed bulk of ever-watchful T’Rukh.

Surak’s Peak, the source of T’Pol’s present impressive vantage point, was among the highest elevations on Vulcan. Located near the summit of Mount Seleya, on ground that Surak had walked nearly two millennia ago during the Vulcan people’s painful transition from the chaos of barbarism to the discipline of logic, the peak was one of the most historic and revered places on the entire planet. It was used as a site for study and meditation, its ancient, rock-steady strength an anchoring force for the adepts who used the self-regulation of Kolinahr training to seize their passions and cast them out onto the desert’s cleansing sands.

This morning, however, T’Pol and Kuvak appeared to have the peak to themselves.

T’Pol looked to the east across the ocean of desolation that was Vulcan’s Forge. The venerable stone structures that comprised the aboveground portion of the T’Karath Sanctuary rose in the foreground, nearly thirty kilometers distant. Much farther off lay the skyline of ShiKahr, the desert heat already rippling and distorting the ancient city’s only faintly visible image despite the rarefied atmosphere. Apart from the many occasions when she had flown over this hemisphere of Vulcan in suborbital and orbital spacecraft, the last time T’Pol could recall having seen ShiKahr appear so remote had been some six decades ago. On the day before undertaking her kahs-wan—desert survival ritual—she had stood in almost this very spot, surrounded by her parents and the family pet, a large, slow-moving sehlat. Not long after she and her family had returned home to ShiKahr, her father had died from a sudden illness.

It occurred to T’Pol that her youthful memories of her father were far less clear than were her recollections of the kahs-wan.

Pushing aside her unbidden memories as unworthy of this sacred place, T’Pol turned away from the vista to face the gray-haired bureaucrat who had brought her here.

“With respect, Minister Kuvak, what is the relevance of this place to the questions I have asked you?”

“As I have said, T’Pol,” Kuvak said, cinching his simple, unadorned travel robe tightly about his lean frame. “I have already given you all the answers I am authorized to give.”

T’Pol found that unsatisfying. So far, Kuvak’s answers had amounted to little more than the vague assurance that he had never sent any arms or technology to the Romulans.

Realizing she had little choice other than to engage in what Tucker would describe as “playing along,” she said, “You indicated a desire to show me something.”

He nodded. “Indeed I did.”

She watched him carefully, alert for any sign that he might be about to pull a weapon from his robe. Although her own robe appeared deceptively baggy, she felt confident it would not impede her ability to disarm the minister should he attempt anything violent.

But instead of pulling out a tricheq blade or a phase pistol, he merely raised his arms so that his sleeves billowed in the thin breeze. The large sleeves bunched up as he made another expansive gesture at the desert, as though intending to encompass the entire dry expanse of Vulcan’s Forge.

“Daughter of T’Les, what do you see when you look out across the desert?”

T’Pol frowned, not at all certain what he expected her to see. She studied his stony features carefully, though they gave nothing away.

“I see,” she said at length, “the land where Surak conceived the principle of IDIC.”

Kuvak appeared somehow disappointed in her answer, if not outwardly displeased. “Interesting. I see the land where Surak died from radiation poisoning. Look again.” He pointed back out across the sea of sand. “Do you not see the scars?”

Understanding dawned as T’Pol looked out across the russet sands again, more closely this time. A curved, broken ridge, no doubt the eroded remnant of a nuclear-spawned crater, suddenly resolved itself in her vision, as though someone had just drawn a city-sized, slightly foreshortened circle across the desert’s face.

“I believe I see one of them,” she said. Why, in all the times she had visited the desert, which had been many, had she never observed this before?

Kuvak seemed to sense her surprise. “Here you see what you can see from nowhere else. Only from this peak can one truly see the lingering blemish left by the war that claimed the life of Surak. The conflict between those who would follow his teachings and those who decided to march beneath the raptor’s wing. Those old scars could reopen more easily than one might think. Unless we remain on guard to prevent it.”

There was no question that it was an arresting sight. But it had little apparent relationship to the troubling questions to which Kuvak had yet to furnish any satisfactory answers: What was the Vulcan government covertly shipping into territory controlled by the Romulan Star Empire?

And, perhaps more important, why?

T’Pol’s sensitive hearing picked up a sharp noise almost directly behind her; it was the sound of gravel crunching beneath someone’s feet, at the range of only a few meters. In a rush she realized that she and Kuvak did not have Surak’s Peak to themselves after all.

Turning, T’Pol watched the approach of one slight, short figure, dressed in threadbare black monk’s robes of a cut even simpler than her own. Approaching from T’Klass’s Pillar, a nearby spire of ancient red rock, the interloper had either just surmounted the peak’s flat lookout area from the opposite side, or else had just materialized via transporter opposite the Pillar. The deep shadows inside the robe’s raised hood concealed its wearer’s identity as thoroughly as the shapeless robe muddled any resolution to the question of the newcomer’s gender. The figure walked straight toward T’Pol and Kuvak, apparently unconcerned with stealth.

“You may return to ShiKahr, Kuvak,” said a familiar voice from within the darkened hood. “We will... I will answer the commander’s questions as best I can.”

T’Pau, T’Pol thought, her eyebrows springing aloft in spite of herself.

Kuvak cast a doubtful glance at his superior, but obediently melted away into the shadows of the rocky spire after T’Pau’s gaze sharpened into something that came close to a warning glare.

“Administrator,” T’Pol said after the two women were finally alone on the windswept mountain. “Are you aware of the secret activities Minister Kuvak has conducted during your absence?”

T’Pau began walking toward the edge of the precipice beyond which lay the Forge and the distant Vulcan capital, forcing T’Pol to fall into step beside her. Although the Vulcan leader’s eyes were on the horizon, she appeared to have heard T’Pol’s every word.

“We are aware of a great many secret activities on Vulcan, among other places,” T’Pau said at length. “While you were conducting your searches, how did you find your mother’s garden?”

“Thriving,” T’Pol said, confused and taken aback by the irrelevancy of the question, at least for the moment it took her to realize that the slight woman walking beside her was really saying a great deal more than the face value of her words.

“You’ve known all along that I was here on Vulcan, seeking you out,” T’Pol said.

T’Pau nodded soberly. “And not only on Vulcan. You and your colleague Denak have made a number of offworld excursions, during which you apparently never stopped searching for us... for me.”

Despite her puzzling use of the plural pronoun, T’Pau’s equanimity seemed all but impregnable, even by Vulcan standards. Presented with such a smooth and unclimbable emotional wall, T’Pol was finding it increasingly difficult to maintain her own calm, centered state. That serenity became doubly difficult to maintain as she realized that she finally had an opportunity to pursue her original mission on behalf of Captain Archer and the Coalition.

At long last she had a chance, however slim, to try to persuade Vulcan’s foremost decision-maker to enter the fight against the Romulans.

“There are urgent matters I must discuss with you,” she said with as much tranquility as she could muster, which at the moment felt like precious little; decades-old memories of her late mother, T’Les, chiding her for the uneven quality of her emotional control, rose unbidden to the forefront of her mind until she forcibly banished them.

“And equally urgent questions,” T’Pau said. “Or so Kuvak has informed us.”

T’Pol nodded. “Yes.”

“You confronted him yesterday about our secret shipments into Rihannsu territory.”

“He left me little choice, Administrator. It would appear that answering my questions forthrightly was beyond the scope of his authority. I presume that is why he brought me to you.”

“You are correct,” T’Pau said with a nod.

“And am I also correct in being concerned that Vulcan may be supplying armaments to a deadly enemy of the Coalition?” Now seemed the perfect time to come to the true nub of the matter. “That would be consistent with Vulcan’s decision to abandon the humans during their time of greatest need, would it not?”

T’Pau stopped walking abruptly and lowered her gaze from the horizon. She fixed her dark eyes squarely upon T’Pol’s as she appeared to weigh and measure with the greatest of care whatever response she was contemplating.

T’Pol allowed herself some small degree of satisfaction at the glimmer of anger she thought she saw behind the young woman’s stern gaze.

“It would appear that our decision to enter the Kolinahr cloister here at Mount Seleya was indeed the correct one,” T’Pau said after a lengthy pause.

She never left the planet, T’Pol thought. She lied to keep her true location concealed. Or Kuvak lied, or maybe they both did.

But why?

“I am a Syrrannite, T’Pol,” T’Pau said, stepping into the lacuna opened up by T’Pol’s momentary speechlessness. Her eyes were aflame. “Syrrannites are followers of Surak’s tenets of peace. Our government was founded upon Syrrannite principles, which is why our first official action after the fall of the V’Las regime was to reverse every existing initiative to make war on our neighbors, the Andorians. We will not make war, nor will we abet war.”

Although T’Pol appreciated the administrator’s vehemence, she knew she could not afford to accept it uncritically. “Perhaps Minister Kuvak has violated those Syrrannite principles on his own authority. He may have sent war matériel to the Romulans without your consent or knowledge.”

The storm clouds of anger T’Pol had thought she’d seen behind the other woman’s eyes now were nowhere to be seen, replaced by something that might best be described as vague amusement, had she been human. “Kuvak has neither the desire nor the ability to do anything without our knowledge.”

T’Pol still wasn’t quite convinced. “But his ties to the last administration—”

“Those have served us well in ensuring continuity and institutional memory, and have helped greatly in our ongoing efforts at department-by-department reform. Had Kuvak been capable of the sort of base betrayal you suggest, V’Las would never have let him rise as high in the governmental hierarchy as he did.”

T’Pol felt the scowl on her face intensify. “And yet a number of secret deliveries of weaponry and related technology have left Vulcan for Romulan space. That is at odds with what you have told me.”

“So it would appear. But frequently things are not what they appear to be.” Seeming satisfied with the answer she had given, the administrator resumed walking with all the calm of Surak himself conducting a peripatetic desert colloquium for T’Klass and the other early Adepts of Gol.

T’Pol stood and watched the other woman walk away for a moment. She found T’Pau’s belief in both herself and Kuvak impressive, and had never felt more certain of the solidity of the administrator’s Syrrannite convictions. But she also believed in the objective evidence she had collected.

Illicit shipments had left Vulcan, bound for some point beyond the Romulan border region. That much was incontrovertible, regardless of appearances.

Trotting to catch up with T’Pau, T’Pol said, “I suppose your government could have been sending arms to some distant adversary of the Romulans, rather than to the Romulans themselves. Doing that would give you a way to avoid actually abandoning our human allies to whatever fate the Romulans have in store for them.” It would also account for the shroud of secrecy, since supplying offensive weapons—even to an ally—would be a violation of Surak’s very essence. Helping to set up warp-detection grids was one thing; providing actual ordnance was quite another.

“We... I have faith in the human species,” T’Pau said. “And it’s surprising that your belief in their capabilities isn’t even greater. After all, you have worked among them extensively.”

T’Pol could feel her anger on the rise again. “It’s not merely a matter of faith, Administrator.”

“Isn’t it? The Terrans have proven equal to every adversity they have faced so far. Humanity is more than capable of continuing to win its own battles, whatever temporary reversals of fortune might beset them at the moment.”

“There is no guarantee of that, especially now that the Romulans almost certainly know that their once-secret sublight attack strategy has been exposed,” T’Pol said. “They will adjust their tactics, and humanity may not be able to cope once they do. This adversity may prove to be the last one the Terrans and the Centauri face. And if that turns out to be the case, their blood will be on our hands as well as on those of the Romulans.”

T’Pau stopped again, apparently considering T’Pol’s words carefully. “The universe issues no guarantees.”

“That’s true enough, Administrator,” T’Pol said. Noting that the administrator’s equanimity now seemed not to be what it once was, T’Pol seized the opportunity to renew her attack. “But humanity’s battles are also Vulcan’s battles. That is not simply my opinion; it is written into the mutual protection provisions of the Coalition Compact, to which Vulcan is a lawful signatory.”

T’Pol fell silent, though she continued watching the other woman, whose wall of calm seemed to grow more compromised from moment to moment. Considering the crushing weight of responsibility that she carried—not only for the fate of her own race, but also for that of every Terran in two solar systems and beyond—it was no wonder that she had secretly cloistered herself in this place of seclusion and devotion to the principles of pure logic and total peace.

But whatever was motivating T’Pau on a personal level seemed to bear very little resemblance to pure logic, and appeared anything but peaceful. The administrator’s best efforts to conceal that motivation kept it well hidden, though not perfectly contained; it was possible to gain glimpses of it, in momentary flashes. What T’Pol glimpsed now was something most unseemly for a Vulcan, particularly for a committed Syrrannite.

It was fear, though precisely what it was that T’Pau feared was not immediately apparent.

T’Pol thought she glimpsed something else as well, but that, too, withdrew behind the other woman’s stern visage as her iron wall of control reasserted itself.

T’Pau turned away again so that she faced the baking expanse of desert below the sacred mountain. She might have been pondering the eroded nuclear crater that Kuvak had pointed out earlier. Was a repetition of that what T’Pau feared?

“Your colleague Denak once told us that you are rare among Vulcans,” T’Pau said.

“Us,” T’Pol thought. Not “me.” The administrator’s peculiar usage of plural first-person pronouns was becoming distracting.

“Rare in what way?” T’Pol asked.

“In that you are aware of the blood we share with our Rihannsu cousins.” T’Pau said.

T’Pol couldn’t stop herself from blinking in surprise. “I have visited a Romulan world,” she said. “So I know of the... relationship between our people and the Romulans.”

T’Pau nodded again. “Then perhaps you can appreciate the logic behind the decision we have made regarding the humans. And why we must resist the urge to turn away from that decision, no matter how vociferously either you or Foreign Minister Soval might argue to the contrary.”

T’Pol could see the logic inherent in concealing the genetic and cultural kinship between the Vulcan and Romulan peoples. But that logic assumed that T’Pau’s intent was to preserve the Coalition of Planets rather than to fracture it; the administrator’s decision to keep Vulcan out of the war would seem to put the lie to her own logic.

“Perhaps,” T’Pol said, skeptical. “Though I doubt the same could be said of Jonathan Archer.”

A recollection of Archer’s visit to the Forge—during which Surak himself chose him as a temporary vessel for his katra—sprang to mind. The errant memory, coupled with the strange tics that had crept into the administrator’s speech, sent a chill down T’Pol’s spine.

She realized all at once that while she was speaking with T’Pau, she was not speaking only with T’Pau.

FORTY-FOUR

Thursday, March 11, 2156
San Francisco, Earth

“EGG DROP SOUP,“ SAID THE DOCTOR after downing yet another gulp from his bowl. “The only thing that compares from here to Denobula is your own Greek soupa avgolemono. We have nothing even remotely like either dish on Denobula.”

Seated across one of the Lotus Blossom restaurant’s small tables from his chief medical officer, Jonathan Archer fidgeted in his chair. “You know, Phlox, Chef can whip up egg drop soup for you any time you like back on the ship. Or even soupa avgolemono.”

Phlox shrugged, then tossed down another mouthful with a loud, enthusiastic slurp. Then he paused to dab at the corners of his mouth with a linen napkin. The dainty gesture made for a stark contrast to the consumption component of his table manners.

“Undoubtedly,” he said. Then, in a conspiratorial whisper, he added, “But why be stuck aboard Enterprise on the eve of battle when your entire world beckons?” The whisper seemed calculated for comic effect, since Tommy, the Lotus Blossom’s always solicitous maître d’, had seated them in one of the otherwise empty private-party dining rooms in order to assure their privacy.

My entire world, Archer thought grimly as he contemplated the wreckage of his General Tso’s chicken and Mongolian beef. Of all the eateries in all the Chinatowns in all the world, Phlox has to choose this one. It has to be a conspiracy.

Archer nodded as he assayed a small, guarded smile. “‘Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we may all die at Berengaria.’” He supposed it might be prudent to compose prayers to the Coalition’s various deities—maybe including even the pointy-eared ones—in the hope that the Romulans wouldn’t launch a major offensive elsewhere when so much of Starfleet’s attention was focused on Berengaria.

Phlox looked surprised. “I wouldn’t have described our situation in such fatalistic terms, Captain. I have complete confidence in your ability to lead us through whatever might be in store for us.”

That makes one of us, Archer thought as he tried to draw strength from the doctor’s attempt to encourage him. Unfortunately, his recollections of the last desperate pleas of the master of the Kobayashi Maru kept getting in the way.

“Regardless,” Phlox continued, “a life-affirming social activity is far preferable to leaving you to brood alone in your quarters.”

“I never brood alone, Phlox. I would have had Porthos with me.”

“Who would almost certainly be contemplating suicide by now. No, Captain, medical ethics demanded that I intervene on the canine’s behalf. And as I said, the best prescription for you right now—not to mention for poor Porthos—is a life-affirming activity. And what better time is there than the night before the commencement of a major military operation to undertake a life-affirming activity?”

Archer’s lips curled into a wry smile. “Are you referring to the egg drop soup, or the fact that Rebecca was working here tonight?”

Phlox’s smile grew disconcertingly broad and wide, a reminder of his nonhuman facial musculature. This cultivated humanlike mannerism must once have been a Denobulan threat display, a physiological relic from some bygone epoch. “Take your pick,” he said.

“I suppose it was good to get the chance to tell her good-bye,” Archer said. “Even if I can’t tell her why this time.” Starfleet’s upcoming mass assault on Berengaria VII—whose twin goals were the elimination of an uncomfortably close Romulan beachhead and the reestablishment of Starbase 1—was still a highly classified matter. Still, he wished he could have been more forthright with Rebecca about the very real chance that he might never see her again—even as he hoped he hadn’t led her to think he wanted to reignite their past relationship....

“I prefer to think in terms of ‘until we meet again’ rather than ‘goodbye,’” Phlox said as he set aside his empty bowl.

A familiar voice spoke up behind Archer. “Captain. Your communications officer indicated I might find you here.”

Archer turned to see the tall, dour figure of Soval, Vulcan’s foreign minister, standing on the private room’s threshold.

“Minister Soval,” Archer said, rising to his feet, as did Phlox. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Vulcans are not sanguine about pleasure, Captain,” the Vulcan said with characteristic stoicism. “Nonetheless, I wish that pleasure had been the reason for my visit.”

Archer pondered that for a moment, even as he wondered why Soval hadn’t simply had Hoshi or one of her relief comm officers contact him. Then it hit him: Soval had extremely sensitive news to report, something he didn’t want to risk broadcasting, even over a secure Starfleet channel.

“You have news from Vulcan,” he said. “About Commander T’Pol. And Administrator T’Pau.” Although it was hard to tell with Vulcans, it already seemed that whatever tidings Soval was bringing wouldn’t be happy ones.

Soval raised an eyebrow. “Most perspicacious, Captain.” He paused. “Is this room secure?”

“I swept the place for listening devices myself,” Archer said. As much as he trusted Tommy and Rebecca and the other members of the Lotus Blossom’s staff that he knew well, he also knew there was no percentage in taking unnecessary chances.

Nodding, Soval said, “Very well. I have been advised that Commander T’Pol has just concluded a face-to-face meeting with Administrator T’Pau—a meeting that the commander apparently requested at your behest.”

It’s about damned time, Archer thought, frowning. He couldn’t believe that T’Pol had been goldbricking ever since Enterprise dropped her off at Vulcan; T’Pau had obviously been dodging her. But why? Where the hell has T’Pau been keeping herself?

“I regret to inform you,” Soval continued, “that Administrator T’Pau has just reiterated to me her earlier decision to keep Vulcan out of the war.”

Vulcans. This was so goddamned typical of them. Archer’s eyes narrowed as all the resentment he had built up toward Vulcan over the years—a span of decades during which the Vulcan government had systematically tried to hold back Earth’s interstellar ventures, such as his father’s warp-five engine—threatened to return in one great torrential rush.

“So that’s it,” Archer said. “No dialogue. No negotiation. Just another flat refusal.”

Although Soval looked no happier about delivering the news than Archer did to receive it, he continued, guided by duty. “Vulcan will provide no more assistance to Earth and the rest of the Coalition than it has already provided. If I may speak off the record for a moment, Captain...”

“Go right ahead, Minister,” Archer said tightly. He suddenly realized that both his hands had bunched into fists.

“I... regret this decision,” Soval said. “However, it is not within my power to change it.” He took a single backward step toward the room’s narrow entrance. “Live long and prosper, Captain.”

If any of us get to do either of those things, Archer thought, disgusted, it’ll be no thanks to your fearless leader.

Apparently sensing the depth and intensity of Archer’s anger, Phlox stepped between them, allowing Soval to make a dignified exit rather than beat a hasty retreat.

“Maybe we should go for a walk, Captain,” the doctor said.

The cool night air quickly helped Archer center himself as he and Phlox wended their way along Kearny Street, one of the broader avenues in what was otherwise the rabbit warren of ancient roads comprising San Francisco’s venerated Chinatown district. Despite the lights from a thousand shops and restaurants, the stars overhead were bright and clear on this moonless evening, unusually so in the midst of so much scattered urban lighting.

Phlox had apparently noticed the same thing, since he had stopped, his gaze riveted to something in the sky over the East Bay, in the direction of what Archer immediately recognized as the constellation Boötes.

With no vehicular traffic crossing that particular patch of sky at the moment, it became immediately obvious what Phlox’s keen eyes had lit upon: a double star located some ninety-seven light-years from Earth: Iota Boötis, also known as 21 Boötis, HR 5350, Asellus Secundus, and several other more or less arcane designations, including Denobula Triaxa.

Whatever astronomers and stellar cartographers had chosen to call it over the centuries, it was the place that Phlox called home—a home that lay on the opposite side of the sky from those sectors that were now under Romulan attack.

“Thinking about jumping ship, too?” Archer said, only half serious about the question.

The pained look he saw when the doctor’s deep blue eyes met his made the captain regret the jab instantly. “It has crossed my mind from time to time over the past few months. Even though I’m quite sure there’s not a drop of either Chinese egg drop soup or Greek soupa avgolemono anywhere in the Denobula Triaxa system.”

“You never told me that,” Archer said, placing his hands in his jacket pockets even though the chill in his bones had little to do with the weather.

“That’s funny,” the doctor said with a chuckle. “I thought I had said as much when I finally confessed to having encouraged Commander T’Pol’s attempt to rescue Commander Tucker from Romulan space last year.”

“That’s water over the dam, Phlox,” Archer said softly. “What goes for T’Pol and Malcolm goes for you, too. I can’t afford to lose any of you. Not now. So tell me... is something wrong back home?”

“Wrong? No, nothing to speak of, though I must confess to feeling rather wistful lately about home, and my three wives. To say nothing of all the battlefield surgery that surely lies ahead.”

Archer finally thought he was beginning to understand Phlox’s misgivings. “You’re still thinking about Tarod IX.”

“Denobulans are no more attracted to war than are the Vulcans,” Phlox said. “We don’t like being enablers of war, and I am no exception.”

“You haven’t been... ‘enabling’ war, Phlox. The Romulans attacked, and you’ve been trying to stanch the bleeding.”

“And yet it goes on and on and on. There are times when I wonder if I can do the same.” The unearthly blue eyes shone with unshed tears. “I can’t help but wonder how many of those I saved at Tarod IX will lose their lives later on in this conflict. How many have done so already?”

“That’s not your responsibility, Phlox. You’re a doctor. The Romulans have made the wrong moral choice here. Not you.”

Phlox nodded. “I keep telling myself that. And that by becoming a battlefield medic I have not endorsed or enabled war: I have merely made the best of a bad situation. I believe you humans call that ‘choosing the lesser of two evils.’”

“That’s exactly what we call it,” Archer said, nodding. But although he was glad that Phlox had decided to put a philosophical face on the horrors of war, he felt anything but encouraged himself.

“So you’re saying that you agree that there are times when one evil or another is unavoidable,” Phlox said, interrupting Archer’s reverie.

“That’s what they teach us at the Academy.”

“So by staying on as Enterprise’s CMO—by trying to save the lives the Romulans would take—I have chosen the lesser of those unavoidable evils.”

Archer frowned. “I understand the concept, Phlox. What’s your point?”

“All right,” Phlox said, holding up a placating hand. “The Kobayashi Maru.”

Archer stiffened. What, is he about to reveal he’s telepathic on top of everything else?

“What about the Maru?”

“It’s omnipresent, Captain. It’s behind your fear that I might leave Enterprise the way Ensign Mayweather did—or any of the others who have made no secret of the fact that the incident was their reason for leaving, or at least the trigger for the decision.”

Archer could tell that his funk was only deepening; if Phlox had intended to bolster his morale with this little homily, he was achieving exactly the opposite effect.

“Where is this going, Doctor?”

“Back to the choice between two evils, Captain,” Phlox said, speaking with surprising vehemence, apparently cowed not at all by the steely edge in Archer’s voice. “You made that choice, just as I have. You chose to preserve your ship and everything you had learned about the Romulans in order to save more lives than could have been saved if Enterprise had shared the Kobayashi Maru’s fate—or worse, had been captured.”

Archer opened his mouth to respond, but found he had nothing to say. He knew that Phlox was right. At least, his head knew it. His heart, however, was another matter entirely.

“It’s never easy to make a decision like that, Phlox. I’d rather chew one of my own arms off than have to repeat what I did that day.”

Phlox offered an encouraging smile. “If those decisions were easy to make, then ship’s captains would be a fairly inexpensive commodity.”

And we’re certainly anything but that, Archer thought as he considered just how expensive even a single wrong decision could turn out to be in the long run.

Aloud, he said, “I’m lucky you’ve agreed to stay on, Phlox. Even after you’ve seen how hard it is to do this sort of simple moral math in my head.”

“Jonathan, ‘simple’ is not the same as ‘easy,’” Phlox said, his good-natured smile succumbing to a gravity he displayed only rarely. “I would seriously consider leaving only if and when those ‘simple’ moral equations become too easy for you to solve.”

FORTY-FIVE

Day Thirty-Nine, Month of K’ri’lior
Thursday, March 11, 2156
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

CHIEF TECHNOLOGIST NIJIL DREADED having to visit Admiral Valdore’s office when he was experiencing one of his “moods,” which had occurred with increasing frequency of late. But since the admiral’s orders had left him no discretion to do otherwise, he reported to Valdore’s office with all required haste.

Delay, after all, would only make Valdore’s mood uglier, if such a thing was possible. At least he had some good news to counterbalance the bad, assuming that the early reports he had just gleaned were reliable.

The grim-faced decurion conducted Nijil to the front of Valdore’s massive sherawood desk, then beat a hasty retreat to the exit. The office was in uncharacteristic disarray, with papers scattered about, a desktop computer lying broken on its side and staring out toward Nijil like a single blinded eye. The collection of blades and particle weapons that usually hung in such an orderly fashion on the rear wall was incomplete and askew, with some items strewn across the floor as though the admiral had been hurling objects about in a spittle-flying rage.

Most significantly, Valdore’s gleaming dathe’anofv-sen, his Honor Blade, lay across his desk, free from both its wall-mounted display rack and its scabbard, as though the admiral had foreseen an urgent need for its keen edge in the very near future.

Swallowing hard, Nijil tried to maintain a façade of coolness. “I trust you have seen the after-action reports from the Andorsu operation, Admiral.”

Valdore nodded, then spoke in surprisingly calm and measured tones. “I have read them all several times over. I have also made a close study of the recordings of the long-range sensor data, sketchy though they are.

“I find little reason for encouragement in any of it.”

“We needed more ships for the Andorsu operation,” Nijil said, struggling to remain composed. “Three or four Amosarr carrier vessels would have been much closer to optimal, along with at least double the complement of Nei’hrr-class sublight raptors on each.”

Valdore glowered in silence for an uncomfortably lengthy interval before responding. “Unfortunately, Doctor, that wasn’t an option, given the fleet’s... other military priorities,” he said, his words fairly dripping with bitterness as he wrapped his fingers around the pommel of his blade.

Ah, Nijil thought. The praetor’s recent renewed preoccupation with Haakona, his father’s folly. What a waste.

Valdore continued, polishing his Honor Blade with a cloth as he spoke. “There are times when we are not permitted to have the fleet that we might find ‘optimal.’ During those times, we must make do with the resources available, and seize victory regardless of any dearth of resources.” He lifted his gaze from the gleaming blade he held, and used it to pin Nijil where he stood. “Do we understand each other, Chief Technologist?”

“I believe we do, Admiral,” Nijil said, hoping he was reading his cues correctly, and that Valdore was about to dismiss him, rather than succumb to an apparent urge to leap across the desk and use his blade for emphasis.

Valdore shook his head, scowling. “No. No, I’m not at all certain that you really do. The Andorsu had detected our attack early enough to repel it, if only barely. That cost the lives of one of my most accomplished field commanders and his entire crew.”

Nijil supposed this specific point was the source of much of the admiral’s anger and frustration. Commander T’Voras, the hero of D’caernu’mneani, was a dynamic young officer whom Valdore himself had groomed as one of his possible replacements; now he was dead, incinerated along with all hands aboard the Bird-of-Prey Dhivael.

“And the real tragedy,’” Valdore continued, “is that the Andorsu operation could have succeeded, just as it was.”

It occurred to Nijil that the failure at Andorsu had occurred for tactical reasons as much as technological ones. The former was the admiral’s province, however, and that fact made it less than prudent for Nijil to stray too far from the latter.

“Had fortune favored us, Admiral, perhaps,” Nijil said noncommittally. “But the resources—”

“Were adequate, if sparse,” Valdore said, interrupting. “Having more ships on hand would not necessarily have prevented the Andorsu from detecting the attack as early as they did.”

While Nijil did not wish to provoke Valdore by arguing further with him, he hoped to improve his mood by trying to focus on whatever bright side the Andorsu debacle might present. Still, he noted with some relief that the admiral had released his death grip on his Honor Blade.

“According to the long-range observation vessels,” Nijil said cautiously, “one of the assault craft nearly made it all the way down to the Andorsu homeworld.”

Valdore shook his head. “And nevertheless missed the opportunity to obliterate the two most important Andorsu cities, if only by the width of one of their antennae. Unfortunately, such margins can determine entire outcomes in warfare, Nijil. There is no ‘almost victorious.’”

“Of course not, Admiral. But we stand to learn a great deal from the telemetry collected during the operation.”

“I certainly hope so, for your sake. For instance, have you learned yet how the Earth ships have managed to harden their systems against our arrenhe’hwiua telecapture device?”

“The hevam do not yet appear to be capable of resisting telecapture completely,” Nijil said, feeling defensive. “They are not invulnerable.”

“Not yet. But they now appear significantly less vulnerable than the ships of the other Coalition races. The telemetry data do not lie, Nijil. The Earthers have obviously devised at least a partial countermeasure.”

“We will redouble our efforts to overcome it, Admiral,” Nijil said.

With a curt nod of acknowledgment, the admiral stood, grasped the pommel of his sword and raised it before him. He approached Nijil and leveled the blade at his throat.

“See that you do,” Valdore said. “It would be inconvenient to have to seek a new chief technologist during times such as these. I really don’t want to have to find yet another new leader for the avaihh lli vastam project now that the prototype is so close to completion at the Atlai’fehill Stelai complex.”

His façade of calm now all but demolished as he contemplated losing control of his beloved warp-seven stardrive project, Nijil barely resisted a deeply reflexive impulse to flee, an action he knew would be a fatal error.

Instead, he held his ground and decided that this was the perfect time to do something completely unexpected: become the bearer of good tidings for a change.

“I have received some early reports of victory from our invasion force at C’pory, Admiral,” he said.

Valdore pressed the blade against the neck of the chief technologist, who shuddered as he felt a drop of blood beginning to exit from the tiny nick that the keen edge had made.

“I just received those reports, too,” the admiral said. “I have to wonder why the hevam forces are so thin at C’pory, but in light of the Andorsu disaster I will take any victory I can get.”

Lowering his blade, Valdore added, “You should consider C’pory the reason I’m in such a forgiving mood at the moment.”

FORTY-SIX

Dateline: Near the Beta Hydri system
The Borka system, home of the planet Capory

TRANSCRIPT FROM THE MARCH 11, 2156, NEWSTIME JOURNAL SPECIAL COMMENTARY FOLLOWS:

This is Gannet Brooks, with all the news that’s under the sun and beyond, reporting from close proximity to hell, on audio only today because of local difficulties with subspace bandwidth.

What should be a placid sky now probably looks like something that would have given Hieronymus Bosch nightmares, thanks to the detonations of Romulan munitions that are visible all the way to the outermost of this system’s several asteroid belts. Capory is a sparsely settled outpost world, noteworthy for little other than a native biosphere that consists largely of mold.

And for the fact that the Romulans have just seized it, giving them another beachhead even closer to Earth than the ones they have already established in the Calder and Berengaria systems. The faceless killers have commenced heavy aerial bombardments in an apparent effort to rid the planet of much of the apparently inconvenient life it harbors.

Including some two thousand human beings who never got an opportunity to evacuate, given Starfleet’s minimal presence here.

Now, thanks in large part to Starfleet’s no-show, the Romulan Star Empire has a staging post for war—one located only two-dozen light-years from the cradle of humanity.

This reporter has only a single question for Starfleet’s brass hats: Why do you appear to have fallen asleep at the switch?

Enterprise

Seated at her bridge station, Hoshi Sato shut off the Newstime feed to her earpiece in disgust. She turned her chair toward the forward viewer, which displayed the hypnotic Brownian motion of the superluminal starscape that lay on the current heading of Enterprise and the rest of the assault force bound for Berengaria.

She wondered, and not for the first time, whether Gannet Brooks’s reports, biased though they were in favor of Earth standing strong against the Romulans, was doing more harm than good.

FORTY-SEVEN

Saturday, March 13, 2156
Vulcan Cargo Ship Kiri-kin-tha, near Achernar

“ARE YOU SURE he’s really ready to go on an assignment like this?” Tucker asked as he studied the slumbering features of the Romulan soldier, who lay on his bunk in the freighter’s small cabin.

Sitting at the side of the bunk, Ych’a appeared to ignore Trip’s question as she moved her long fingers in delicate, spidery patterns against the sleeping man’s temples as the therapeutic mind-meld progressed toward its conclusion. Centurion Terix, like Trip, now sported the smooth forehead of a Vulcan or a human, thanks to a simple plastic surgical procedure. The only difference between the respective surgeries experienced by Trip and Terix was that the former’s had restored the natural appearance of his brow, while the latter’s had been undertaken to disguise an inborn Romulan trait. Now all three of them—a human, a Vulcan, and a Romulan—were Vulcan nationals bound for Achernar II, at least so far as their outward appearances, their official identity documents, and Terix’s telepathically altered memories were concerned.

Ych’a took a deep breath, in tandem with Terix, before withdrawing her hands from Terix’s face, which slackened further as his post-mind-meld slumber deepened, the therapeutic blocks in his memory presumably growing stronger.

Or so Trip hoped.

Looking up at Trip, Ych’a finally answered his question. “Tevik of Vulcan is as ready for the coming mission as either of us are.”

Tevik, Trip thought with no small amount of regret. Because of the months of tampering Ych’a had performed inside the mind of Romulan Centurion Terix, the man now thought of himself as Tevik of Vulcan, a V’Shar agent who had dedicated his life to gathering intelligence on the Romulan Star Empire. As far as Tevik knew, Centurion Terix was merely another of the many aliases he had used during a long and distinguished espionage career. If Tevik’s own memories seemed to belie that convenient fabrication from time to time, well, that was only to be expected given the V’Shar’s routine use of telepathically implanted false memories on some its deepest-cover operatives.

Necessary though this sort of thing might have been given the danger posed by the Romulans, Trip couldn’t help but feel guilty for having abetted Ych’a’s ongoing subversion of the integrity of another man’s identity.

Apparently sensing Trip’s discomfiture and finding it distasteful, Ych’a stepped to the hatch that connected Terix’s cabin with the rest of the freighter and opened it. As she exited, she motioned for Trip to follow her out into the corridor.

They walked in silence along a passage that seemed wide, at least in comparison with what Trip had grown used to aboard Enterprise. When none of the Vulcan freighter’s crew was nearby, she said, “Tevik is as prepared as it is possible for me to make him, Sodok.”

It still took Trip a moment to grasp that she was addressing him when she used his Vulcan cover name. If the concept of Sodok, a Vulcan dealer in kevas and trillium, hadn’t yet become second nature to Charles Tucker, then why should anyone assume that a similar fake identity would work any better when involuntarily imposed on a battle-hardened Romulan soldier like Terix?

“He’s as ready as he’s ever gonna be?” Trip said quietly, only barely restraining the nervous imperative he felt to raise his voice until it echoed throughout the ship. “Is that what you’re telling me? That we have to do this thing now whether we’re ready or not, just because time has finally run out?”

Ych’a stopped walking and faced him, fixing him with her piercing dark eyes. “Mister Sodok, your emotional control borders on the execrable at times.”

“Sorry,” Trip said, trying to get back into character. “My apologies. I’ve been a bit... spacesick on this voyage.” Yeah, that’s the ticket, he thought, hoping nobody was listening to them who shouldn’t have been.

“Understandable,” she said. “But the time for such misgivings is long past. Captain T’Vran will deliver us to Achernar II in two standard hours. We will find ample resources there to carry out the task that awaits us.”

She didn’t need to outline those “tasks” aloud, both for security reasons and because Trip was thoroughly familiar with the current mission’s objective, having spent the last several interminable months preparing and training for it. During that time, Ych’a had been methodically building up the psychic bulwark of “Tevik’s” personality and memories.

Using the Kiri-kin-tha’s commercial itinerary for both cover and the bulk of their transportation, their mission was to slip into a clandestine shipyard located near the Achernar system and destroy the warp-seven prototype vessel the Romulans were in the process of preparing for its initial test flights.

To that end, the V’Shar had obtained fairly detailed plans of the shipbuilding facility’s layout, which Trip had committed to memory as though they were elementary warp plasma-flow diagrams. He had taken enormous pains to get every detail right, at least so far as they could trust their intel, which looked reliable inasmuch as it seemed to agree with the knowledge that Terix—or Tevik—had shared with them over the past few months. If their mission was to fail because of someone’s mistake, Trip was determined that it wouldn’t happen on account of his mistake.

Which was why Trip thought, even now, that having a fellow spycum-saboteur working alongside him—a man who might suddenly forget his carefully crafted identity and “go Romulan” at an inopportune moment—was such a terrible potential liability.

Trip suddenly noticed that Ych’a was still speaking, a look of something that closely resembled consternation creasing her usually composed features. “Mister Sodok, do I have your attention? It is far too late for you to decide that you cannot follow through on this assignment. There is entirely too much at stake.”

Despite his misgivings, he knew she was right. The time for doubt was long past.

“Don’t worry, Ych’a,” he said.

“Vulcans do not worry.”

“Sure they don’t. Anyway, this thing is going to work because I’m gonna make sure it works.” That meant, among other things, maintaining an engineer’s readiness to improvise at all times.

And keeping an extremely close eye on one Tevik of Vulcan.

FORTY-EIGHT

San Francisco, Earth

NASH MCEVOY FUMED as the two interchangeable Starfleet security officers escorted him deep into the interior of the office complex, all the way to the man who had precipitated this unscheduled visit.

Only this time, the admiral had not summoned him.

McEvoy tried to draw strength from the agitated murmuring that lingered in his ears, thanks to the angry crowd—a commonplace these days—that had gathered beyond the security perimeter of Starfleet Headquarters. Although the thickness of the walls precluded his actually hearing anything from outside, he imagined he could still hear the chants, the imprecations, the pleas.

People were becoming desperate for Starfleet to get off its collective brass and finally do something about the Romulans, and McEvoy could hardly blame them.

As his uniformed chaperones conducted him into the plushly carpeted office of Admiral Gregory Logan Black, the editor thought, If this jackbooted fascist expects me to tug my forelock and beg his forbearance, then he’s got another goddamned thing coming.

But Black, his back to the door as McEvoy entered, looked anything but imposing as he turned around and dismissed the security people.

“Drink?” he said, offering McEvoy one of the two glasses he carried.

“I’m not thirsty.”

Black shrugged, and then set both glasses down on his desktop. “Have a seat,” he said, gesturing toward the hard-backed chair before the desk as he took the taller, more lavishly upholstered seat behind it.

McEvoy folded his arms across his chest. “I prefer to stand.”

Another shrug. “Suit yourself, Mac. Now what can I do for you?”

“You know damned well why I’m here, Admiral.”

“Of course I do, Mister McEvoy.” Black’s earlier pretense of being a gregarious host, much less an old college friend, abruptly vanished. “And I’d think you might approach me with a bit more politeness, given that I didn’t owe you a return call, much less an unscheduled face-to-face meeting.”

“This isn’t about my manners, Admiral,” McEvoy said. “You know damned well you owe me an explanation.” You owe everybody on the whole damned planet an explanation, he thought, now beginning to regret having agreed to treat this meeting as off the record as a precondition for even having it.

Black nodded and leaned back in his chair, his earlier fit of pique appearing to extinguish itself in the drink into which he had begun staring. McEvoy began to wonder if the explanation he had demanded was actually forthcoming.

But after a pregnant pause, Black said, “There’s a crucial distinction between freedom and license, Mister McEvoy.”

“And you obviously believe that Newstime can’t tell the difference,” McEvoy said. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have suddenly pulled all of my people’s credentials.”

“I didn’t ‘pull’ them,” Black said. “The reporters holding those credentials are being given detailed security and background checks. It’s an unfortunate wartime necessity. If everything goes smoothly, it should all be cleared up in a few weeks.”

“This is outrageous! Freedom of the press is fundamental to both the United Earth Constitution and the Coalition Compact!”

“But not the freedom to shout ‘fire’ in a crowded theater. Besides, I didn’t suspend all of your reporters’ credentials. Caen passed muster right away.”

“Caen only writes about food, wine, and celebrity gossip, Admiral. But I suppose those things are a lot less troublesome for you than topics like the Romulan raid on Beta Hydri IV.”

“Every battle in this war is a potential hornet’s nest on the home front. Gannet Brooks has been stirring up too many of those, going back to the Romulan-Andorian skirmish at Threllvia and even earlier than that. In my judgment, she’s posing a threat to domestic security.”

McEvoy found what he was hearing infuriating, though not at all surprising. “Whatever danger you might see coming from Gannet’s editorializing, I can assure you that public ignorance will do a hell of a lot more harm in the long run.”

A smile spread across the admiral’s face. “And I assure you, that’s the last thing Starfleet wants to bring about. As I said, if everything goes smoothly, all this business with the reporter credentials and the security reviews should be cleared up in a few weeks.”

“And exactly how does Starfleet define ‘smoothly’?” McEvoy asked, not impressed in the least by the smile, which vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

“Put a leash on your dog, Brooks,” Black said. “That would go a long way to smoothing out just about everything for Newstime.”

The implied threat, of course, was that a decision to do anything else would ensure that life would be anything but smooth for Newstime.

“Do you really expect Gannet Brooks to come running obediently home if I were to recall her?” McEvoy said. “I don’t think she’d cooperate if I tried to put her on the sports beat, or gave her the gardening section.”

Black shrugged again. “Starfleet has both the ability and the authority to greatly curtail the dissemination of her subspace broadcasts. I don’t think she’d enjoy essentially talking to herself out there on the ragged edge of the war. Wouldn’t she find it in her... professional self-interest to try to take a more cooperative tack?”

“Cooperative. Are you asking Newstime to become a propaganda service for Starfleet?”

“Of course not,” Black said, actually looking offended. “But seeing as the survival of her own species is at stake, does she really need to portray our war effort as so... ineffectual?”

McEvoy considered commenting that the objective truth of Starfleet’s efficacy was largely up to Starfleet, but decided against it. Though he felt no less violated now than he had before, he had to admit that he could see the admiral’s last point—just as he could see he wasn’t going to budge Starfleet on this, the purity of his journalistic ethics notwithstanding.

“All right. I’ll ask her to be a little more... moderate in her criticism,” McEvoy said at length. “Would that make things go more smoothly on the background checks?”

Black grinned, then rose from behind his desk. “It certainly couldn’t hurt.”

McEvoy nodded, though he couldn’t bring himself to offer a “thank you.” When the admiral extended his hand, he turned without waiting to be dismissed and found his own way to the door.

I can try to put Gannet Brooks on a leash for you, Admiral, he thought. But I can’t guarantee she won’t leave an unwelcome surprise or two on your lawn.

FORTY-NINE

Yorktown, Zeta 2 Reticuli

I GUESS I REALLY have become a “bad-luck charm” since my Enterprise days, Travis Mayweather thought as he surveyed the correspondences on his padd.

The bulbous primary hull of the Yorktown gleamed like a crescent moon outside the wide observation windows that ringed the repair and shore-leave facility’s public gallery. The place was all but deserted at this hour of the local night, which made it an excellent place of refuge whenever Mayweather wasn’t busy doing his part in the Yorktown’s post-battle repair efforts.

His solitude here was far more complete than what his shipboard quarters would have afforded him; he never seemed to have that limited space all to himself, even for a few precious hours. As Mayweather sat alone in his booth looking over his transfer applications in the Yorktown’s shadow, he wondered if his latest batch of shipmates hadn’t simply given him a wide berth here after making a collective decision—consciously or not—that he was a latter-day Jonah, a magnet for trouble. As absurd as it sounded, he’d heard enough scuttlebutt over the past few days to convince him that a substantial percentage of the Yorktown’s crew was spooked enough by the war to take this whole “bad-luck charm” business seriously.

And why? Just because I drove Jonathan Archer’s getaway car the night he abandoned the Kobayashi Maru to the slaughter. And because my hand was on the rudder when Discovery went down at Berengaria.

Rereading the stack of “thanks, but no, thanks,” replies from the XOs of the last several ships to which he had submitted transfer-application queries, he couldn’t help but wonder how far and wide this “bad-luck charm” juju had already spread. The entire Dædalus fleet seemed to have drawn the same conclusion about him, figuratively rolling up their gangways at his approach.

Just when he was beginning to believe that a veritable legion of XOs was arrayed against him, he scrolled down to a just-arrived reply to his query about a helm position aboard the recently-launched Atlantis NX-05. Admittedly, it had been one of his long shots, since NX postings were becoming rarer by the day, almost literally.

Mayweather had been accepted, apparently in the hopes that his prior experience aboard Enterprise would help expedite her newest sister ship’s current round of repairs in spacedock. He blinked in disbelief, but the text before him remained confidently in place. He grinned, delighted as much by the chance to rehabilitate his unfairly smeared reputation as he was by another opportunity to fly one of the fleet’s best and fastest vessels. His only regret was having to break the news of his decision to Captain Shosetsu, who had always treated him with decency and fairness. Shosetsu might actually have a serious problem with Mayweather’s decision to leave. But if he did, Mayweather was confident that Commander Mendez would get his CO on board with it in fairly short order.

The Yorktown’s exec had never seemed reticent about disposing of “bad-luck charms,” particularly when they were asking to be sent elsewhere.

FIFTY

Sunday, March 14, 2156
Heliopolis, Achernar II

THANKS TO EARTH’S NEWS MEDIA, Tucker had already seen images of the slow, chaotic exodus from the planet’s main human-inhabited city. But it wasn’t until he actually saw it from space that he realized that it was visible from space.

“The people down there must be terrified,” he said in a not-quite-Vulcan turn of phrase as he swiveled in his copilot’s chair toward Ych’a, who was running the conn panel while simultaneously checking and rechecking the functions on at least two other consoles. Posing as Sodok the trader, Trip had assisted her in checking out the small Tellarite shuttle’s vital systems during the hour or so prior to their purchasing it yesterday at the central Heliopolis spaceport.

“Those people chose to build a city deep inside territory controlled by a deadly and deeply paranoid society,” Tevik said from the portside communications console he was quietly monitoring. “It seems... illogical that the humans here have grown concerned about the possible consequences of their folly only now.”

Tevik’s tone sounded cold-blooded, even for a Vulcan, and his reference to logic seemed particularly alien, at least coming from him. Trip knew his uncomfortable awareness was because Tevik of Vulcan was actually Terix of the Romulan Star Empire. Trip still half-expected the man to call the planet below Atlai’fehill Kre, rather than Achernar II. And as that azure world continued its steady retreat from the shuttle’s belly, he found himself idly wishing to head in the same direction as Achernar II’s departing human citizenry.

But the constellations visible through the forward windows consisted largely of stars that lay ever deeper inside territory controlled— and presumably jealously patrolled—by the Romulans. Inside of an hour, one of those stars became much brighter, growing swiftly from a distant pinpoint lost among a myriad of others to a small disk, a foreground object that continued to increase sharply in size as the little shuttle approached. Trip and Terix darkened the shuttle, damping down its power in order to make it as undetectable as possible to whoever might be watching them approach.

A sensor alarm on Trip’s console began to issue a chorus of frantic bleeps and rhythmic flashes of light.

“What was that?” Ych’a asked.

Trip shrugged. “Not sure yet. Sensors picked up a flash of hull metal for a moment, then it vanished.”

“Curious,” Tevik said.

Ych’a did not seem impressed. “Not really. It could be an artifact of solar radiation interacting with local dust particles.”

“A sensor ghost,” Tevik said.

“Precisely,” Ych’a said, nodding.

“Maybe,” Trip said. “Or there might be another ship out here trying to keep a low profile, just the way we are.”

Much to Trip’s relief, no more sensor ghosts—or half-hidden ships— appeared for the duration of their approach.

“You weren’t kidding when you said the Romulans put the shipyard close to Achernar,” Trip said as he helped Ych’a bring the shuttle into as close a parking orbit as they dared and began making passive scans. The vast open spaces Trip detected inside the spherical, three-kilometer-wide duranium structure did indeed appear to be ideal for hangaring spacecraft, especially those that needed to be concealed. “But it seems strange to leave it out here without a lot of obvious protection.”

“Such protection might tend to call undue attention to the facility,” Tevik said. “The Romulans do not like to call attention to that which they prefer to keep hidden.”

Nodding, Ych’a added, “The brightness and hard radiation from this system’s primary star does a great deal to obscure its presence— unless, of course, one has spent months obtaining intelligence indicating the precise place to look.”

“Of course,” Trip said. “So... are we just gonna beam right inside, or what?”

No more than five minutes later, and much to Trip’s amazement, he, Terix, and Ych’a had not only done just that, but were standing in a small, pressurized observation chamber that provided a spectacular bird’s-eye view of the two mighty starships that floated near the center of the main hangar, surrounded by several small, inactive work-drone shuttlecraft. Although the two main craft floated in weightless freefall with the rest of the facility, they were also connected to it—and to its presently invisible central power generation system—by a complex bird’s nest of delicate scaffolding, conduits, and umbilical lines.

“Welcome to the Atlai’fehill Stelai complex,” Tevik said, his unaccented pronunciation of the Romulan place name sending a cold shiver through Trip’s nervous system. “That’s the Romulan name for this place.”

Trip returned his attention to the two vessels before and below them, both of which were illuminated only dimly in what Ych’a soon confirmed was night on the Romulans’ watch. They could have run duty shifts around the clock in perpetually simulated daylight, but the Romulans must have deemed it healthier for long-term deep-space crews to maintain a normal diurnal rhythm. Still, it seemed odd that there wasn’t at least a skeleton crew working.

The farthest away but most prominent of the two ships was a Vulcan military vessel whose dominant feature was its hoop-shaped outboard warp drive, through which the long, narrow, tapering crew compartment passed like a spear. Sh’Raan-class, Trip thought, impressed despite all the times he had compared the signature Vulcan design to a flying lampshade. The thing dwarfed even Enterprise. And she’s capable of warp six-point-five, at least. The Romulans must have grabbed her last year at Alpha Centauri, before the Vulcans pulled out of the fight.

It occurred to Trip that the loss of that one ship might well have represented much of the reason for Vulcan’s withdrawal; risk-averse by nature, the Vulcans would not have wanted to allow the Romulans any further opportunities to co-opt their technology.

Looks like that genie might already be out of the bottle, though, Trip thought as his gaze drifted down the Vulcan ship’s nacelle-hoop and down to the second, though nearer, vessel. A kind of bastard offspring of the larger Sh’Raan-type ship it floated beside, it bore the sleek lines and backswept, delta-wing nacelle configuration that he’d seen several times already in the V’Shar intel files—not to mention in the electronic notes and hand-rendered drawings made by the slain Romulan scientific eminence, Doctor Ehrehin i’Ramnau tr’Avrak.

There could be no mistaking it for anything other than what it obviously was—the Romulan Star Empire’s prototype warp-seven starship.

Which left Trip with one very immediate worry—a reprise of his concern about the lack of a night crew. “Why doesn’t anyone seem to be keeping watch over this place?”

“Never assume the Romulans are being lax in their security procedures, Sodok,” Tevik said as he hefted the massive toolbox that Trip knew held a good deal more than spanners and scanners.

“Romulan security is exactly what concerns me right now, Tevik,” Trip said, trying with only indifferent success to keep his voice level.

“My sources tell me that the Romulans have recently developed priorities other than security redundancies,” Ych’a said. “Nevertheless, I would recommend caution.”

Sound advice, Trip thought as he pulled out his scanner and began searching out a means of accessing some of the larger umbilicals that connected both ships to the rest of the facility.

FIFTY-ONE

Bird-of-Prey Terrh’Dhael
Haakona

THE FLEET HAS far more urgent duties to attend to than adventures such as this, Commander T’Met er-Iuruth t’Hveinn thought, her eyes fixed upon the gold-and-amber disk that was slowly expanding on the command deck’s central viewer. This is a waste of time and resources that would best be deployed elsewhere.

But Commander T’Met did her best to conceal her persistent, gnawing misgivings about the fight that lay ahead, and relayed the initiate order to her command-deck crew scant moments after having received it over the vastam comm bands. She knew that the order, as well as the complex attack plan it was intended to start, had come directly from Admiral Valdore, so she had scant cause to question either its reason for being or its prospects for success.

Except for the fact that T’Met also knew, thanks to her fortuitous consanguinity with Senator Karzan, a key member of the Continuing Committee of the Romulan Senate, that the only reason Valdore had formulated and instigated the Haakona campaign was because of the obstinate insistence of an increasingly irrational Praetor D’deridex.

“We will be within standard orbital distance of Haakona Prime in three siuren, Commander,” Centurion R’Tal reported crisply from his science station, his silver helmet blending in with the dull chromium finish of his hooded scanning/monitoring device.

Subcommander D’ridthau, who had been standing beside T’Met’s chair, turned to face the young science officer. “Have the Haakonans detected our presence yet?”

“I see no evidence of that,” R’Tal said.

“No hails or challenges yet, either from space or from the planet’s surface,” reported Uhlan Tomal, who was manning the communications post.

“I don’t like this,” D’ridthau said, turning his sharp gaze upon T’Met.

“Meaning that you do not enjoy achieving your victories too easily?” said Centurion Belak before T’Met could respond. “Or that you are still calling the wisdom of this campaign into question?”

A tense silence fell across the command deck. It was all but unheard-of for a mere centurion to address a subcommander in such a disrespectful fashion, let alone to interrupt a conversation between a subcommander and a commander. But as the Terrh’Dhael’s security-chief-cum-political-officer, Belak had extraordinary wide latitude when it came to matters of deportment and protocol. Every time the man tempted her to shoot him through the nearest airlock, T’Met had to pause and remind herself that he reported directly to the Praetorate, which effectively made him the Terrh’Dhael’s ranking officer in every way that counted.

Not for the first time, T’Met contemplated how the Praetorate might react to a report that Belak had suffered a sudden tragic “accident.” The deep scowl on D’ridthau’s face, as well as his clenched fists, revealed that he had to be thinking much the same thing.

“We are all soldiers of the Empire, Belak,” T’Met said in forcedly mild tones. “We all understand that.” Belak appeared mollified, at least somewhat.

But D’ridthau was not so easily disarmed. His hard gaze now locked upon that of the much smaller political officer, he said, “It may be a fatal mistake not to question the coming battle.” He gestured toward the planet on the viewer, which had expanded so that it now filled more than half the screen. “We know too little about these Haakonans to be assured of success today.”

“What more do you need to know than what you know already?” Belak countered coolly. “Long-range probes have revealed the locations of their highest-concentration population centers. Terrh’Dhael will vaporize the largest of those,” he said, pausing to glance down at his wrist chronometer, “beginning in about five siuren, and the rest of the attack force that trails us will appear immediately thereafter to extract maximum advantage of the resulting confusion as we blow the rest of their population centers to Vorta Vor.”

“The plan seems sound enough,” D’ridthau said, “provided we have not badly underestimated the Haakonans.”

Belak looked annoyed. “Why would you presume that?”

“Other than a healthy tactical conservatism?” D’ridthau gestured again at the approaching planet, one of whose dual primary stars was emerging from behind Haakona’s western limb. “Consider the nature of the twin Haakonan suns. Both are extremely variable in their output, oscillating by nearly an order of magnitude between their dim and bright phases. Yellow to blue and back again in the span of only a few ch’Rihanturns, and with little real predictability. This always caused grave difficulties for the occupation forces we once deployed here. Yet the Haakonans now seem to take it entirely in stride. It’s as if they have developed technology that can absorb their suns’ excesses.”

Belak shrugged, unimpressed. “Then this technology will number among the many spoils of this war.”

“All right,” T’Met said, raising a hand in an appeal for quiet. “Let us lay this matter aside for consideration later.” Assuming, she thought, that there is a later.

She was uncomfortably aware that the exchange she’d just witnessed begged a deeply unsettling question: If the Haakonans could absorb the outbursts of a variable binary star with little difficulty, then how much of a threat would even an armada from the Romulan Star Empire pose?

“Any change in Haakona’s status?” T’Met asked, striding away from the two glaring combatants and toward the forward ops station, her hands clasped contemplatively behind her.

“None, Commander,” Decurion Denorex said a moment before Centurion R’Tal and Uhlan Tomal confirmed his observation.

T’Met nodded. “Lock all weapons tubes on primary target city.”

“Weapons lock confirmed.”

After pausing to take a deep breath, T’Met said, “Open fire.”

An instant later, the command deck was engulfed in a blinding, incendiary whiteness. Perhaps because this was the last thing T’Met saw or felt before awareness fled her, her last thoughts were of Vorta Vor.

FIFTY-TWO

Enterprise, Neptune orbit

JONATHAN ARCHER STOOD at the center of his bridge, the apparent eye of calm in the midst of a highly disciplined storm. Surrounded by the bustle of his crew, he watched the main viewer with no small amount of awe. The screen displayed a magnified view of what lay immediately astern.

It would be an image for the history books and the news reports, once operational security was no longer a concern: an armada of no less than one dozen Daedalus-class starships, some newly constructed, some very recently refitted, their hulls glinting dully in the light of dim, distant Sol. Had this large assemblage of armed and armored Starfleet vessels gathered any nearer to Earth than it had, the civilian comnets would already be abuzz with news of the bold assault that Earth was about to undertake. Though Archer understood the necessity to a free society of a free press, he also appreciated the truth of the early-twentieth-century adage that loose lips may sink ships.

He was not about to allow any of these ships to sink, not if he had anything to say about it. Starfleet Command had entrusted all of them to his overall command in what he acknowledged—not without some trepidation—was the largest single naval action the United Earth government had ever undertaken using only its own resources. Of course, the plan hadn’t been conceived with the assumption that Earth would be standing entirely on her own; Starfleet Command had hoped initially that the Andorians and the Tellarites would shoulder at least a portion of the burden. Archer still presumed that they would have, if their own respective vulnerabilities to Romulan sneak attacks had not drawn their attention inward of late.

But now was not the time to mull over might-have-beens. He had a fleet to command, and a job to do.

“Fleet status report, Hoshi,” Archer said.

Ensign Hoshi Sato turned her chair away from her communications console on the bridge’s port side and faced Archer. “All vessels report ready, Commodore.”

Archer winced slightly at the archaic-sounding naval title. He had tried to get accustomed to hearing it ever since Starfleet had cut his current mission orders, and during the whole period Enterprise had been in spacedock receiving its most recent round of repairs and upgrades during the four days prior to today’s deployment. He didn’t like it any better now than he had the first time Admiral Gardner had lobbed it at him.

“Enterprise stands ready with the fleet, Commodore,” Lieutenant Reed reported, standing at crisp attention behind the tactical station to starboard.

“Helm ready as well, Commodore,” Ensign Leydon said, her hands moving at a blur as she ran and reran last-minute systems checks.

“The fleet awaits your orders, Commodore,” said Lieutenant O’Neill from the science station at Archer’s immediate left, ably filling her current role as acting XO.

Archer was suddenly hyperaware that every eye on the bridge was now simultaneously upon him. In an absurd flash of free-associational recollection, his mind’s eye dredged up an image from a more-than-century-old video he had seen during one of the crew movie nights a few years back. The film was set in medieval Scotland, and depicted the bloody fight of the Scottish people for independence against their English oppressors. On the eve of the climactic battle against Edward Longshanks, the Scottish hero William Wallace had ridden his horse along the front of his army’s lines while delivering a stirring speech about fighting, and quite possibly dying, in the cause of freedom under the banner of the legendary Robert Bruce.

He suppressed a grin as he imagined Malcolm contemptuously waving his bare buttocks at the Romulans, a tactic Wallace’s kilt-clad warriors had used to infuriate the English. Banishing the absurd image from his mind, he directed Hoshi to open the interfleet comm channel.

“This is... Commodore Archer,” he said, addressing the entire attack force. “Today we will all take a bold step into history on behalf of Starfleet, Earth, and the entire human species. Until now, we have only waded on the cosmic beach, ankle-deep in the ocean. Today we’re heading into deeper waters.

“The Romulans might have succeeded in taking Berengaria away from us,” he said. “But with all of you at my back, I have every confidence that they’ll soon discover they can’t hold on to it. So consider the word given. Let’s get out there, hit ’em hard, and hit ’em fast. Commodore Archer out.”

Feeling a palpable sense of relief now that he’d formally thrown down the gauntlet, he met the anxious gaze of Ensign Leydon at the helm.

“Take us out, Mister Leydon,” he said. “Best fleet speed for Berengaria.”

FIFTY-THREE

Day Forty-Two, Month of K’ri’lior
Sunday, March 14, 2156
Government Quarter, Dartha, Romulus

“LESS THAN HALF of my attack fleet even made it back from Haakonan space,” Valdore growled, taking care to be quiet despite the almost complete emptiness of the concourse. “I cannot accept losses on such a scale if they serve no larger purpose.”

“Are you questioning the wisdom of your infallible praetor, Admiral?” said the woman who was strolling beside him alongside the wide rectangular reflecting pool that fronted an assemblage of ancient stone administrative buildings. Like Valdore, she wore a simple, unadorned cloak; First Consul T’Leikha clearly had no more desire to attract undue attention to herself, or their conversation, than he did. “Or am I hearing nothing more than soldierly gripes?”

“All you’ll ever hear from me is the truth, First Consul,” Valdore said, his soul laden with the weight of worlds. “The Haakonans have become considerably more formidable during the decades since our original occupation ended there. We could not stand against them. At least not while we are already occupied fighting the Coalition worlds.”

“It should come as no surprise that Haakona would have developed new weapons in order to deter a second occupation,” T’Leikha said.

He nodded. “Of course not. But there are limits even to what the Empire’s intelligence service can anticipate.”

“Have you fully assessed the Haakonans’ new capabilities yet?”

Valdore shook his head glumly, and waited to speak until after an elderly gentleman finished walking past. “The chief technologist’s office is still coming to grips with it. Nijil’s preliminary reports indicate that the Haakonans may have weaponized a capacity they already possessed—their ability to absorb and redirect much of the excess energy released by the two variable Haakonan stars during their violently active phases. But we are still far from certain about anything, since none of this technology was in use during the previous occupation.”

“Praetor D’deridex is aware of that much already. Whatever this Haakonan innovation turns out to be, he is now determined to possess it.”

Valdore swallowed a curse. “Wonderful. Now he can believe he has a good reason to persist in a bad course of action.”

She favored him with a wry smile. “He is his father’s son.”

“Is the praetor aware that our abortive attack on Haakona has cost us access to all Haakonan sources of the akhoii that powers our ships?”

“He is confident that you will get Haakona’s dilithium exports flowing again,” she said with a nod. “After you regroup your forces to begin the second occupation, of course.”

Valdore stopped beside the reflecting pool, admiring its mirrorlike surface, envying its tranquility.

This is intolerable, he thought. He will bring my fleet to ruin. And the Empire with it.

He turned to face her. “D’deridex cannot be allowed to do this.”

“It is true that another would be far preferable in D’deridex’s place, given the perils that now beset the Empire,” she said with a shrug. “Senator Karzan, for instance. But D’deridex is the praetor, Admiral. At least until a natural death contravenes that fact.”

Valdore knew there could be no turning back from what he was about to say. “First Consul, the life and health of the Empire no longer permit me the luxury of waiting patiently upon the whims of death.”

FIFTY-FOUR

Aeihk’aeleir Shipyard

“THIS COULD HAVE BEEN a hell of a lot simpler,” Trip muttered, grunting as he continued to squeeze forward through the dark and narrow access passage. “We could have just beamed from the shuttle straight into that prototype ship, destroyed its engine room, and then beamed away before the Romulans even knew what hit them.”

“Without doubt that would have been simpler,” said the man who went by the name of Tevik; he was bringing up the rear directly behind Trip, quietly rolling the wide toolbox forward through the cramped passage. “But our intelligence about this facility’s interior did not allow for such fine-tuned planning. Nor did it include either the precise positions of the ships moored here or a detailed layout of the prototype vessel’s interior. Besides, our current plan enables us to disable or destroy the entire facility, rather than just one ship.”

Assuming, Trip thought, that we miraculously keep avoiding encounters with the skeleton crew that seems to be running this place.

“I have reached the end of the crawlway,” Ych’a said from up ahead. For a Vulcan, her tone sounded downright irritated. “I would appreciate a minimum of chatter when I open the access hatch.”

“Sorry,” Trip said, holding his breath and clutching his phase pistol as Ych’a gingerly opened the small hatch and wriggled out into the dim illumination that now leaked into the tunnel. He pushed forward, following after her as the clattering sounds of a struggle resounded from just outside the barely passable exit.

Trip half climbed and half fell out of the aperture, spilling awkwardly onto a deck composed of a hard metal gridwork. As he rolled to his feet, his eyes were already adjusting to the dim light of the chamber, which was a good deal brighter than the illumination levels he’d grown used to during the passage through the access tunnel.

Ych’a stood in the wide corridor beside him, smoothing a wrinkle from her cloak. A pair of Romulan soldiers lay at her feet, their necks bent at unnatural angles, expressions of surprise and dismay etched onto their features. Trip looked away from the corpses, momentarily sickened, before helping Tevik drag them into the recesses of another access hatch.

Once the dirty work was done, Trip turned to see Ych’a consulting a map on the small padd she carried. “We read the schematics correctly,” she said as she gestured toward the right end of the corridor. “The facility’s main reactor core should be only twenty-two meters in that direction.”

Precisely twenty-two meters, one decidedly permeable hatchway, and three more guards later, the trio stood in the shadows of a four-meter-tall cylinder whose tightly controlled energies reminded Trip of the warp core aboard Enterprise.

“I believe I can identify the best places to set the thermal charges for maximum effect,” Tevik said. Trip nodded, then opened up the toolbox and began arming each of the lightweight, palm-sized charges one by one.

“How long until detonation?” Trip asked Ych’a as they worked.

“Detonation will occur precisely twelve siuren after the final charge is deployed.”

A little over ten minutes, Trip thought after doing a quick mental calculation.

Tevik and Ych’a finished placing the last of the charges. They had gone about their work so tidily, fastidiously hiding the charges among the farrago of control panels and cables and conduits that already festooned the place, that Trip couldn’t see any of the charges after they had been deployed.

Trip’s heart raced in a manner that would almost certainly have embarrassed any genuine Vulcan. This is the part where a whole pigpile of guards suddenly shows up and arrests us, then shuts down the bombs just before escorting us out the nearest airlock.

Instead, he watched in silence as an infuriatingly calm Ych’a activated the comlink on her wrist to transmit the prearranged we’re-all-done-now-so-beam-us-the-hell-out-of-here notice to the shuttle’s computer, which dutifully signaled its readiness to establish a signal lock.

Then he waited for the familiar ant-crawling, tingling sensation of a transporter beam.

And waited.

And waited a little longer still.

The small hairs on Trip’s neck rose to attention when Ych’a and Tevik exchanged matching raised-eyebrow glances.

“Aw, shit,” Trip said under his breath. “It freakin’ figures, don’t it?”

FIFTY-FIVE

Ir-Dartha, Romulus

PILOTING HIS PERSONAL FLITTER, Valdore raced alone to his family home in the capital’s suburbs moments after the centurion had brought him the unsettling news.

Someone had attacked the manor, breaching its security. And Valdore had been unable to make contact either with Darule, his wife, or with either of his teenage children. He could only hope that his daughter, Vela, and his son, Vool, had been safely in their classes at the Institute when the incident had occurred.

Now, as he surveyed the ransacked great room and each of the systematically upended bedchambers, even that narrow hope had begun to flee him. On some deep, gut level, he knew that his family was gone, utterly and completely. The only question that remained was why, though he had a strong suspicion that he already knew at least part of the answer.

A voice spoke almost directly behind him. “Admiral.”

Valdore spun toward the sound, his disruptor at the ready almost before either mind or body realized it. He saw T’Luadh, his primary asset within the Tal Shiar spy bureau, standing alone near the great room’s entry vestibule, her hands spread benignly before her.

“Never sneak up on me,” he said, holstering the weapon.

“I’m surprised to see you leave your back undefended, Admiral,” she said. She relaxed her posture and walked more fully into the room so that she, too, could take in what must have happened here. “Where are your personal guards?”

“I came alone,” he said.

“Of course,” she said with a nod of understanding. “It’s difficult to know whom to trust at times such as these.”

“Indeed. And I don’t, as a rule, trust the Tal Shiar.”

She appeared wounded. “Present company excluded, I hope.”

He narrowed his eyes as what little patience for double-talk he possessed rapidly sublimated away. “I suppose that remains to be seen, T’Luadh. Did you have anything to do with this?”

“No,” she said with no hesitation. “But I can’t rule out Tal Shiar involvement.”

“Lovely,” he said sourly.

“The bureau weaves a web that is both vast and tangled, Admiral,” she said as she pulled a small scanning device from the sash of her trousers and began moving it through the air in a slow, sweeping motion.

He frowned. “What are you looking for?”

“Something I believe should be quite easy to find,” she said. “That is, if my assumption proves to be true.”

“Your assumption?” he said, his frown deepening.

“That this deed was done to send you a message,” she said as her scanner began beeping insistently. Kneeling beside a moraine of clutter on the carpet, she extracted a data chip and plugged it into a slot on the device in her hand.

The deed was done before Valdore could protest—for all he knew, she might have just inadvertently detonated a hidden microexplosive device—and a heartbeat later an image of a withered old man seated on an ornate throne shimmered into view on T’Luadh’s device.

“Admiral Valdore, you may now consider yourself officially on notice of my displeasure,” Praetor D’deridex said, staring straight through to the back wall with transparent, prerecorded eyes. “Your handling of the Haakonan campaign has been marked by both a lack of punctuality and a dearth of competence. And your abortive attack on the Andorsu hasn’t exactly covered you in glory, either.”

“You may have my resignation any time you like, you motherless wort,” Valdore growled, though he knew the image’s ears were no more capable of listening to reason than were those of the genuine praetor. “Find somebody else to waste the Empire’s blood and treasure.”

“Until now, I have been remiss in providing you with adequate motivation, particularly regarding Haakona,” the praetor’s image continued superciliously. “To make up for this unforgivable negligence on my part, I have had your family brought to me.” He held up a placating hand, spreading his withered fingers. “Rest assured that they are alive and well, and are enjoying every benevolent protection of the Praetorate.”

Relief flooded Valdore’s body, followed immediately by a sharp rush of anger; the long months he’d languished in the dungeons beneath the Hall of State had given him a keener appreciation than most for the Praetorate’s “benevolent protection.” Despite his roiling emotions, he continued to listen attentively to the madman.

“They will continue to enjoy my largesse for the duration of the Haakonan campaign, Admiral,” the praetor said. “And they will be released to you—but only if the next engagement of Haakona goes significantly better than the first one did. I hope we understand each other clearly now. And that you can forgive my earlier negligence in tending satisfactorily to these troublesome matters of motivation.

“Jolan’tru, Admiral,” D’deridex said just before dipping his head as though taking a nap right on the throne. Then he vanished.

“Well,” T’Luadh said. “That’s certainly not something one sees every day, is it?”

Valdore ignored her. A protracted silence settled over the room. Whatever misgivings might have lingered in Valdore’s mind regarding the plot he and First Consul T’Leikha were in the midst of so carefully hatching—engineering the replacement of D’deridex as praetor with the far more reasonable and tractable Senator Karzan—had just been swept away.

“Will you save the Empire, or your family?” T’Luadh asked.

Valdore now knew with the certainty of gravity that he had to move against D’deridex—and that doing so would require him to take a good deal of care, both in planning and in acting.

What he didn’t know was whether either he or the Empire still had enough time to plan or act with care.

“T’Luadh,” he said. “I’m going to need your help.”

FIFTY-SIX

Aeihk’aeleir Shipyard

“ALL RIGHT,“ TRIP SAID, gesturing broadly at the complex confluence of control panels and power conduits into which the thermal charges had just been deployed. “Let’s shut these down until we can fix whatever’s gone wrong with the shuttle’s transporter.”

“No,” Ych’a said in that aggravating, too-calm tone. “The countdown cannot be rescinded once begun.”

“It’s a safety mechanism,” Tevik said.

“Safety?” Trip said.

“To ensure that nothing disrupts the attainment of the mission goal,” Tevik said. “Regardless of what might happen to any of us.”

“You ought to pay closer attention to the briefing materials, Mister Sodok,” Ych’a said, using the vaguely chiding “remedial lecturer” voice that he had come to dislike so intensely during their long months of association. He was now fairly certain that she was the one who must have gifted T’Pol with that particular annoying tic.

“Beautiful,” Trip said as he gathered his jangled thoughts. “All right, since I didn’t sign on to a suicide mission, I have to assume we can still get out of here before the clock runs out. The reactor core must be interfering with the shuttle’s transporter lock. Let’s put some distance between us and the reactor, and then beam out—say, from the place where we first materialized. We know the transporter was working there.”

“Logical,” said Ych’a.

Moving as one, the three began retracing their steps as swiftly as possible back through the labyrinth of concealed accessways. Exiting was proving much faster than entering, since they were unencumbered by their toolkit once they’d found an inconspicuous place to hide it.

Just under five minutes into the countdown, Trip stood between his two colleagues in the same observation chamber into which the shuttle’s transporter had placed them. Ych’a activated the transmitter on her wrist and waited several seconds. Then her brow crumpled.

“Please don’t tell me,” Trip said.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “Very well. I won’t. Nor will I mention the fact that I cannot determine whether the shuttle is even receiving my signal.”

Trip scowled and reached for her wrist. “Let me see that thing, Ych’a. Maybe it got damaged in one of the access crawlways.”

Ych’a quickly relinquished the transmitter rather than submit to being touched; Trip could see immediately that the device was still in good working order.

“Operational or not, the transmitter hardly seems to matter now,” Tevik said. “If the shuttle cannot receive its signals, then we would appear to have run out of viable escape options.”

Handing the wrist unit back to Ych’a, Trip looked up at the observation windows again. The two hulking ships in the hangar beckoned to him.

“Maybe,” Trip said. “But then, maybe not....”

FIFTY-SEVEN

Enterprise

A LOUD BRONX CHEER erupted over Hoshi Sato’s shoulder, drowning out the words of the earnest-looking woman on the communications console’s viewscreen.

“Shhh!” Sato said as she turned her chair away from the console, frowning slightly at Elrene Leydon, who appeared to be loitering about before the start of her duty shift. “Let’s save the commentary for after she’s finished speaking her piece.”

The young pilot suppressed a grin. “Sorry, Hoshi. Keisha Naquase isn’t exactly on my short list of favorite newscasters.”

“No kidding.”

“I didn’t realize you were a fan.”

“Who said I was a fan?” Sato said. “I just like to hear every side of an argument.”

“Naquase is definitely on my short list,” said Donna O’Neill, who was seated in Captain Archer’s chair during his absence.

“That surprises me, Lieutenant,” said Leydon. “I never figured you for a pacifist.”

“I’m not. The title of my short list is ‘Journalists I Would Keel-Haul If I Ruled the World.’”

Focusing past the chatter, Sato turned back toward her console and tried to pick up the thread of Ms. Naquase’s latest Newstime editorial comment.

“... one thing that has always been true, at least until very recently. The ideal behind humanity’s every advance outward into space has always been the promotion of the cause of peace, at least nominally.”

“The meek might inherit the Earth,” O’Neill muttered. “But only very small plots, about one meter by two meters by two meters.”

“... when man first landed on the Moon, we left behind a placard that read ‘We came in peace for all mankind.’ And this was in spite of the fact that humanity’s only planet was still divided into hundreds of adversarial nation-states, the largest and richest of which had thousands of nuclear weapons ready to wipe out one another in what amounted to a dispute over economic systems, if you can believe that.

“But humanity still strove for peace, regardless. So what’s happened to that striving of late? Have we allowed the Romulans to kill that spirit, that fundamental desire for and belief in peace? If so, then our mysterious adversaries may have taken from us something far more valuable than mere military victory.

“Good night. And good luck.” The image on the screen vanished, replaced by a neutral Starfleet logo.

“Right now,” D.O. said, “I’d settle for the military victory.”

“Preach it, Sister O’Neill,” Leydon said as she took her position behind the helm console.

A great sadness welled up within Hoshi Sato’s soul. She wished with all her heart that the universe really could work the way Naquase seemed to think it did. Perhaps someday it would. But mankind’s first order of business now had to be survival, all other lofty considerations aside.

Because the fight for Berengaria, along with who only knew what else, still lay ahead.

FIFTY-EIGHT

Aeihk’aeleir Shipyard

THE CORPSES HAD BEEN dumped unceremoniously in an alcove near an untended hatchway that led directly into the main hangar.

Both of the dead men were uniformed Romulan soldiers. From the severity of the burns to their chests and abdomens, Trip judged they’d been slain by point-blank disruptor fire. And the fact that the nearby hatchway was both unguarded and open was apparently related to the fact that the dead men had been the ones in charge of guarding it.

Trip was also bothered by the fact that he had never seen either of the men before. “None of us did this,” he said, glancing up at Tevik and Ych’a as he knelt beside the bodies.

Tevik knelt beside Trip and began cold-bloodedly rifling through the soldiers’ scorched and bloodied uniform tunics, until he located a small data chip.

“Identification,” he said, holding up the chip momentarily before rising and tucking it into his pocket. “This could prove invaluable.”

Ych’a glanced at her wrist chronometer, looking as close to nervous as Vulcans ever did. “Mister Sodok, I must point out that we do not have sufficient time to conduct a murder investigation.”

“Good point,” he said as he got to his feet. He then fell into step behind Ych’a and Tevik as they moved at a quick, crouching trot through the long, low-ceilinged run of umbilical scaffolding that ended at the outer hull of the Sh’Raan-class Vulcan ship.

Constrained by time, the three had agreed very quickly that the Vulcan vessel represented their best hope of getting out of here alive. Since Ych’a was most familiar with its systems, she would have a better chance of getting the ship clear of the hangar before the reactor blew. Using the Sh’Raan for their escape would also remove a valuable piece of captured Vulcan technology from Romulan hands, and the detonation of the Aeihk’aeleir Shipyard’s reactor core would take out the prototype, thus satisfying their mission objective.

Trip had lost track of precisely how much time remained before the thermal charges they’d planted in the reactor room went boom and sent this place to its reward. But as they reached the Sh’Raan ship’s outer hatch, he could feel in his bones that there couldn’t be more than a couple of minutes left, tops.

“If I understand this facility’s work schedule, the ship should be empty except for a few technicians,” Tevik said as he used the slain Romulan soldier’s ID chip to open the nearest access hatch that led into the Vulcan starship’s interior.

Moments later, Trip and Tevik were following Ych’a down the curving length of an empty, dimly illuminated corridor. “The nearest turboshaft with direct bridge access is this way,” she said.

In short order, the trio entered a turbolift car whose doors obediently enclosed them. Trip felt the slight heaviness in his boots that signaled the lift’s upward surge in response to Ych’a’s terse voice command.

Then the lift came to an abrupt, lurching stop. Ych’a and Tevik traded significant glances that made them both appear very nearly alarmed.

“Nuts,” Trip said.

At least when the big boom comes, he thought, I’ll be able to get away with acting a little bit surprised.

FIFTY-NINE

San Francisco, Earth

ALONE IN HIS OFFICE, long after everyone else had gone home for the evening, Nash McEvoy sat and watched the one Newstime feed he knew had come directly from the front lines of his organization’s reporting.

It was the only story that genuinely worried him, as much for its content as its possible consequences, which could be quite dire for Newstime. Unlike Keisha Naquase’s semipoetical—some would say naïve—elegies to peace, Gannet Brooks’s ever more frequent fire-and-brimstone entreaties to humanity’s basic survival instincts were garnering serious attention across at least a half-dozen sectors of known space.

With Starfleet Command’s attention being the most serious of all.

“This is Gannet Brooks,” said the intense young woman, “with all the news that’s under the sun and beyond, reporting from somewhere outside the Draken system.

Now would come the test. Now he would see if Gannet had taken to heart his request, sent earlier today via subspace radio to her aboard the Tellarite freighter that currently carried her on her travels. McEvoy had asked that she go just a little bit easier on those luckless souls whom fate, UESPA, and the United Earth government had lumbered with the awful charge of conducting the war.

She had not been enthusiastic about his request.

McEvoy held his breath, contemplating the hollow look in Brooks’s eyes as he waited for her to speak. Waited to see if Starfleet had misjudged her.

If he had misjudged her.

“Where the hell is Starfleet?” Brooks said after a seeming eternity had passed.

“Shit,” McEvoy hissed, allowing his breathing to resume as he continued to listen and hope.

“Draken IV is located in the Taugan sector. It lies somewhat closer to the Kaleb sector boundary than Calder does, but it’s still close enough to Earth to pose a credible strategic threat should it fall under Romulan control the way Calder II did.

“For the past decade, the Draken system’s fourth planet has been home to dozens of human scientists, researchers, and engineers. During that time, the outpost they built there and expanded steadily has prospered, despite the perils of Draken IV’s harsh climate and the occasional pirate raid.

“But all that has just changed, suddenly and completely, amid fire and screams and whistling projectiles launched from orbit. The Romulans came in the dead of night, and took Draken IV as she slept. So far there appear to have been no survivors. The dreams and futures of seventy-three men, women, and children appear to have been snuffed out in a callous bombardment, with a single rag-tag merchant vessel serving as the sole living witness to the slaughter. Starfleet has yet to tender an official comment.

“Of course, whatever Starfleet might have to say about the Draken IV massacre is neither here nor there. Words of sympathy or outrage won’t bring back the people who died, after all. What really counts is action— stopping the Romulans cold the next time they attempt such a cowardly sneak attack. But can we really rely on Starfleet to take that kind of action? Their record so far, and their persistent silence, does not inspire confidence with this reporter.

“This is Gannet Brooks, for Newstime.”

She vanished from the screen, leaving a lingering afterimage of her hollow, deadened gaze. Finally that, too, faded, leaving McEvoy alone with his dour thoughts and gnawing fears.

Perhaps Gannet Brooks was absolutely right to continue playing the maverick, despite his pleas for moderation. She was out in field, after all, free of the blinkered perspective of an Earthbound office. He had to concede that she just might understand what was going on a whole hell of a lot better than he did.

But there was that damned haunted look in her eyes. What horrors must she have witnessed out there? She may have seen terrors that he could scarcely even imagine.

Maybe Admiral Black is right, he thought. Maybe she really isn’t looking at things objectively anymore.

Maybe she no longer can.

Something occurred to him then that surprised him greatly: Even though he had always taken Gannet’s toughness for granted, he found that he was suddenly worried about her.

He decided then and there to recall her to Earth. If that made him appear to be knuckling under to Starfleet pressure, then that was fine with him. It was true enough that he didn’t want to tempt Admiral Black to follow through on his threat to tie up Newstime indefinitely in planetary security red tape. But it was equally true that he no longer cared about appearances. He had to bring Gannet home.

Wait a minute, he thought. This is Gannet Brooks you’re talking about here.

He knew that reeling her all the way back to the home office might turn out to be a lot easier said than done. She was more than likely to dig in her heels. He would have to exert some leverage if he wanted to short-circuit that.

McEvoy touched a button on his desktop computer, activating the unit’s audio note-recorder.

“Note to self,” he said. “Remember to revoke Gannet Brooks’s credit chit... tomorrow.”

SIXTY

Aeihk’aeleir Shipyard

TRIP FELT A FAMILIAR VIBRATION coming through the floor of the Vulcan vessel’s turbolift.

“The lift is moving again,” Tevik said. Ych’a nodded but added nothing.

Trip’s nervous system made a nuanced but emphatic counterobservation. “It’s not the lift,” he said. “The ship is moving.” His years serving as Enterprise’s chief engineer had made him intimately familiar with the sensation of forward motion coming slightly ahead of a ship’s inertial damping system; apparently Vulcan inertia-canceling technology possessed a similar lag.

A few moments after the slightly disconcerting feeling of sudden acceleration had passed, the turbolift came to an even more noticeable stop. The hatchway bifurcated, a hissing pneumatic mechanism propelling it open almost instantaneously.

Another pair of armed Romulan soldiers stood just across the threshold of the Vulcan ship’s busy bridge, their disruptor pistols raised and ready as black-garbed crew members busied themselves with various technical tasks all across the bridge. Although Tevik appeared ready to leap upon the nearest of the armed guards, it was obviously a lost cause.

“Move,” said the closest of the soldiers, and Trip allowed himself to be led out of the lift toward the bridge’s bustling center. He was relieved to note that neither Tevik nor Ych’a seemed to be of a mind to try anything stupidly heroic—at least not yet. And he suddenly noticed a certain familiarity about the decidedly nonregulation clothing worn by the bulk of the bridge crew. It occurred to him that their black, paramilitary clothing bore a more than passing resemblance to that of the Ejhoi Ormiin assassins who had killed Doctor Ehrehin last year.

The soldiers brought the trio to a halt at the command deck’s center, just behind the equivalent of the captain’s chair on a Starfleet vessel. The troops withdrew to a discreet yet easily crossable distance, leaving Trip and his colleagues to stare at the back of the salt-and-pepper-haired male who occupied the center seat, his attention evidently focused tightly upon the image being displayed on the broad forward viewscreen.

It was easy to see why. The viewer was presenting a departure view of the Aeihk’aeleir Shipyard, its roughly spherical shape dwindling quickly into the darkness of the outer Achernar system. In the foreground, another vague shape was just as steadily increasing in apparent size. Despite its lack of running lights, Trip could see enough of its outline in the dim ambient light to ascertain that it was another ship.

It wasn’t until the shipyard’s reactor detonated silently, temporarily transforming the giant facility into an artificial sun, that Trip could discern the approaching vessel’s sleek lines amidships and its delta-shaped aft section. Trip’s jaw fell open. His heart could scarcely have beat faster if it had just crossed a black hole’s event horizon. Though the shipyard had been destroyed, the mission had failed spectacularly.

The Romulan warp-seven prototype, the late Doctor Ehrehin’s dream and Earth’s nightmare, was intact and flying, apparently after a last-minute rescue from destruction by whatever skeleton crew had been aboard her.

The man seated in the command chair chose that moment to swivel around to face his “guests.” As he recognized the man in the chair, Trip felt his jaw fall open further still; he managed to close it only with an act of pure will.

“Sopek,” he said when he had at last recovered his voice. “Or Ch’uivh. Or whatever it is you’re calling yourself these days.”

“Traitor,” Ych’a accused the man in a matter-of-fact tone.

The man in the chair seemed content to allow Trip and his colleagues to wonder about him; he turned toward the black-garbed woman who had just approached him, and took the padd she had extended in his direction.

“It’s a new status report from the crew aboard the avaihh lli vastam prototype,” the woman said.

“Very good,” said Sopek/Ch’uivh, his eyes moving quickly across the padd’s display as his thumb quickly scrolled the information.

“What’s your angle this time?” Trip asked the man in charge after he’d handed back the padd and dismissed the woman. Although Sopek had the smooth forehead characteristic of a Vulcan, his true origins and affiliations remained obscure to Trip. “Still working for the Ejhoi Ormiin dissidents? Or have you secretly been on Admiral Valdore’s payroll all along?” Trip knew that the likeliest possibility was that he was really playing both ends against the middle, operating purely for his own benefit.

Something like a smirk pulled at Sopek’s lips for a moment before he answered. “If you must know, Commander Tucker, I have lately been working very closely with one of your closest colleagues.” He gestured with his open hand toward Ych’a.

Trip wondered when his capacity to feel surprise would atrophy.

“Please do not blame Ych’a, Commander,” Sopek continued. “She did not make the essential arrangements: V’Shar headquarters on Vulcan handled those.”

“Arrangements that you have betrayed,” Ych’a said, her frosty gaze focused solely upon Sopek.

“Nonsense,” he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “I never agreed to lay my own agenda entirely aside in favor of that of the V’Shar.”

“And which agenda might that be?” Trip said. “It can be pretty damned difficult to keep track with you.”

Sopek regarded him curiously. “Have I ever been anything other than straightforward in my commitment to the revolutionary goals of the Ejhoi Ormiin?”

“As near as I could tell,” Trip said, “the word ‘straightforward’ has never been part of your vocabulary.”

The man in the chair shook his head slowly in an exaggerated show of patience. “I have always regarded the expansionist ethic of the Romulan Praetorate, as well as the vast military might it has at its disposal, as a threat to galactic peace. Just as the V’Shar does.” His dark gaze locked with Trip’s. “Just as you do.”

But Trip wasn’t ready to buy it, and doubted he ever would. “Sure. That must be why you murdered my partner in cold blood. To protect galactic peace.” In Trip’s mind, “cold blood” was a barely adequate description of what this man had done to Tinh Hoc Phuong, his late partner and mentor in Section 31 field operations. Tucker doubted the image of Sopek burning Phuong to a crisp with a disruptor pistol would ever dim in his memory.

“Mister Phuong,” Sopek said. “Or Terha of Talvath, as he called himself when he infiltrated us. He was an unfortunate casualty of our covert war for survival. My regret over his death has probably disposed me to treat you more gently than I might have under other circumstances.”

“Gee, thanks,” Trip said.

“You must admit that I have ample reason to be aggrieved. You did, after all, cause the destruction of my ship out in the Gamma Hydra sector.”

Trip grinned.

Sopek spread his hands in a gesture of magnanimity. “I do not bear grudges, Commander—even though the destruction of my vessel caused interminable delays in the operation you just watched us conclude.”

“An operation whose scheduling you coordinated with ours for some reason,” Tevik said. Trip realized that a secret Ejhoi Ormiin operation was the best explanation for the dead Romulan soldiers they had encountered during their attempt to exit the shipyard—soldiers who had obviously been killed by someone else.

Sopek nodded. “I supplied much of the intelligence that Ych’a used to carry out your plan to destroy the Aeihk’aeleir facility. My intention was to use that mission to conceal my own.”

Trip thought he was finally beginning to grasp Sopek’s plan. “You snatched the warp-seven ship for your Ejhoi Ormiin buddies, and also grabbed a state-of-the-art Vulcan military vessel while you were at it. And you used the detonation we rigged to cover your tracks and make it look like both ships got destroyed along with the shipyard.”

“Very good, Commander Tucker,” Sopek said. “My only regret was failing to coordinate my efforts precisely enough to leave you and your colleagues believing that scenario as well.”

But Trip was having trouble buying that as well. “That’s bullshit, Sopek.”

Sopek appeared taken aback. “Excuse me?”

“If you’d really intended us to go on believing anything,” Trip said, jabbing a finger at the other man’s chest, “then I doubt you would have destroyed the shuttle we left parked outside the shipyard. That is why we couldn’t get the shuttle’s computer to beam us out, isn’t it? Because you destroyed it?”

“Is this true, Sopek?” Ych’a said. Tevik continued to stare at the man.

Sopek/Ch’uivh went silent, his jaw setting in a hard line. He made a wordless gesture that summoned the two armed guards back into close proximity.

Sure, Trip thought, coming to a grim understanding of what had to be coming next. We know way too much now. There’s no way we’re getting off this tub alive.

“Please escort these... gentlemen off my ship,” said Sopek/Ch’uivh. A moment later Trip was walking toward the turbolift, alongside Tevik.

Only belatedly did he realize that Ych’a had remained on the bridge, standing beside the vessel’s slippery commander.

As the soldiers herded Trip and Tevik into the turbolift—which was no doubt bound for the nearest airlock—Trip realized that Sopek hadn’t just double-crossed him, Ych’a, and Tevik.

Sopek and Ych’a appeared to have just double-crossed everybody.

SIXTY-ONE

The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

“I’M AFRAID there is no easy way to tell you this, Admiral,” Chief Technologist Nijil said, fidgeting as he stood before Valdore’s sherawood desk. His eyes kept shifting to Valdore’s Honor Blade, which was back in its usual position of pride on the office’s rear wall.

“Why don’t you simply come out and say it, Doctor?” Valdore said. He reflected that much about his life was anything but easy at the moment. How difficult could it really be to assimilate one additional morsel of misery?

Nijil nodded. “The Atlai’fehill Stelai shipbuilding complex is gone.”

“Gone?”

“Destroyed. In an apparent Coalition sneak attack.”

A pit of apprehension opened up deep within Valdore’s guts. “And the avaihh lli vastam prototype?”

“Destroyed along with it,” Nijil said, his face rapidly turning a livid green. “A year or more of work has been scattered to the winds. I am sorry, Admiral. I do not understand how this could have happened.”

Valdore struggled to keep his roiling emotions in check. The horrible fact was that he understood precisely how such a thing could have happened.

He had let it happen, because he had permitted Praetor D’deridex to compel him to allocate his forces imprudently.

“Relax, Nijil,” he said in the gentlest tones he could manage under the circumstances. “Security is not within the purview of the Empire’s scientists. It is the responsibility of the military. It is my responsibility.”

Nijil looked like a condemned prisoner whose executioner had fortuitously dropped dead moments before the sentence was to be carried out. “Thank you, Admiral.”

“See if anything can be salvaged from the wreckage, and keep me informed of your findings. You are dismissed.”

Nijil wasted no time exiting Valdore’s office, leaving the admiral alone to contemplate what he needed to do next. He feared he already knew what D’deridex would do, once he learned what had happened at the Atlai’fehill Stelai facility.

Darule, Vela, and Vool were all as good as dead unless he made his move now.

With disciplined, measured movements, Valdore activated the private, scrambled comm channel on his desktop. A moment later, First Consul T’Leikha’s emotionless face appeared on the viewer.

“We can delay no longer,” he said.

Day Forty-Three, Month of K’ri’lior
Monday, March 15, 2156
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

Though the skimmer accident was an enormously unlikely occurrence, Doctor Nijil had pronounced it well within the bounds of possibility. According to the official record, there had been a rash of defects in several recent lots of antigrav motivator parts. Since such carelessness could not be tolerated, Valdore wasted no time ordering the first round of ad hoc military investigations and summary executions.

After the deed had been done, Valdore felt stunned to the very depths of his soul. The admiral had been uncertain of his ability to do this thing. To be sure, he felt a strong sense of relief at the departure from the world of a madman who had done untold damage to the Empire and its military, and doubtless would have done far worse had he gone on living.

Nevertheless, he also felt devastated in a manner that went far beyond even his reaction to learning that a billion or more civilians had succumbed to his attack on Coridan Prime. Despite the favorable outcome, both for himself and for the entire Empire, he found the knowledge that he was actually capable of such an act of naked treason almost too much to bear. Although such base betrayal was contrary to his every military instinct, he now understood that it was preferable by far to the possibility of losing his family to the whims of a mad praetor. There were limits, apparently, even to military discipline and obedience, and he hoped never again to encounter those limits.

Even as he grappled with his conscience, Valdore knew that First Consul T’Leikha had called an emergency meeting of the Continuing Committee of the Romulan Senate. D’deridex’s sudden passing from the Praetorate had left behind a dangerous power vacuum, creating the possibility of a perilous shift within the civilian government that could have made a bad situation even worse. Valdore and T’Leikha had agreed going in that such a scenario was intolerable, particularly at a time when the Empire was fighting wars on two fronts.

Valdore was relieved to learn that the succession deliberations had concluded a scant four dierha after they had begun, showcasing a degree of administrative efficiency that must have owed much to T’Leikha’s no-nonsense, iron-gauntleted guidance.

Valdore made it a point to be among the first to enter the cavernous audience chamber to congratulate the former proconsul Karzan on his ascension from the Continuing Committee’s topmost echelons to his present august position as the Romulan Star Empire’s newest praetor. The admiral was therefore gratified, though not entirely surprised, when Praetor Karzan had not dismissed him along with the host of assorted courtiers, supplicants, and other high-level well-wishers following the conclusion of his lengthy official installation ceremony.

“I need to be briefed in detail about the wars, Admiral,” Karzan said. “D’deridex’s follies now belong to me—at least until I can bring the worst of them to an honorable conclusion.”

It pleased Valdore immensely to hear that, though it didn’t surprise him in the least. During his time in the Romulan Senate, Karzan had always advocated a far more focused military policy than D’deridex had favored. He had even recently taken the risk of advancing a plan to redeploy all Haakonan-front military resources to the conflict with the expansionist Coalition; most in both the civilian government and in the military—including Valdore himself—believed the Coalition represented a far more genuine threat to the Empire than did Haakona.

“My operational commanders are already assembling the necessary briefing materials, Praetor,” Valdore said, bowing his head deferentially. “We will be ready within the dierha.”

“Excellent, Admiral. The imperial military must be advised of the change in the praetorate in a way that does not harm morale.”

“I will see to it, Praetor.”

“Very good, Admiral. Within one ch’Rihanturn of your briefing, you will receive revised orders regarding the disposition of fleet resources. I promise you that. Now I release you to your duties until you are ready to conduct that briefing.”

“Thank you, Praetor. But may I make a request first?”

The new praetor raised an eyebrow inquisitively. Although Karzan was Valdore’s junior by at least several decades, his prematurely gray hair gave him air of authority beyond his years.

“You have earned the privilege of asking this praetor anything, Admiral,” he said, making Valdore wonder just how much he knew about the actual circumstances surrounding his ascension to the Praetorate—and how long it would take T’Leikha to begin eliminating anyone besides herself who possessed any knowledge of her true role in those apparently fortuitous events.

“Thank you, Praetor,” Valdore repeated. “My request deals with certain people who were... detained by your predecessor.”

“Your family,” Karzan said with a nod. “I understand. You may consider them released.”

“Thank you, Praetor,” he said yet again, relief flooding him as he contemplated the safe return of Darule and the children; despite the sudden upwelling of emotion, he maintained a rigidly military bearing, and managed to keep his thoughts in order. “And if I may trouble you further, there is another prisoner on whose behalf I would seek your intervention as well.”

Karzan appeared intrigued. “Another family member?”

“Merely a friend. But he is someone to whom I owe a great debt.”

As well as one who might prove to be an insurance policy of sorts, Valdore thought, should my relationship with the first consul begin to become... difficult.

SIXTY-TWO

Day Forty-Four, Month of K’ri’lior
Tuesday, March 16, 2156
Bird-of-Prey Terrh’Dhael, deep in Romulan space, near the Haakonan front

AFTER THE DEVASTATING REPRISALS they had suffered during the Haakonan assault, it had taken an entire Romulan dayturn for Commander T’Met’s crew to restore the ship to a marginally operational condition. It took still another complete eisae for the Terrh’Dhael to limp far enough away from Haakona proper to begin undertaking more permanent repairs.

T’Met was surprised to have awakened after the Haakonan counterattack had driven her, along with her crew, into abrupt unconsciousness. More than a few, like her hapless XO, Subcommander D’ridthau, hadn’t been quite so fortunate, despite the tireless ministrations of Doctor T’Tpalok.

“Sit-rep,” T’Met demanded, addressing Decurion Genorex at ops. In her peripheral vision, she saw the bridge hatchway slide open to admit Centurion Belak. Unfortunately, the Tal Shiar political officer had been part of the ship’s complement that had survived.

“Repairs remain under way on all major systems,” came Genorex’s crisp report. “Stardrive is functioning, but unreliable except at low warp. Only half the weapons tubes are back on line.”

That was better than nothing, but still far from sufficient for a renewed engagement with the Haakonans. “How long until our propulsion and tactical capabilities are fully restored?”

“It is difficult to estimate that precisely, Commander. It will likely take at least three eisae, and that is provided the engineers discover no unforeseen problems.”

T’Met sighed in frustration. “All right, Decurion. Carry on. And inform me as soon as the repairs are completed.” Addressing the entire command deck, she said, “It appears we won’t be going anywhere for at least three eisae. In the meantime—”

“Wrong,” Centurion Belak said, interrupting.

Silence engulfed the busy command deck as T’Met fixed the political officer with a narrow gaze. “Remember your place, Centurion. You do not give orders on my vessel.”

Belak strolled directly to the center of the command deck, not looking chastened in the least. “As a general rule, that is true, Commander. But not when I observe you violating the duly issued orders of Admiral Valdore and Praetor D’deridex.”

“What in the name of Erebus are you talking about, Belak?”

“The Bird-of-Prey Terrh’Dhael was to lead the Haakona invasion force, Commander. The Haakonans have scattered that force.”

T’Met folded her arms across her chest. “I’m glad to see you’ve been paying attention so far.”

The centurion did not react to her snide tone. “Your original orders stand, Commander. Now that this ship is operational again, you are obliged to regroup the invasion force and return to Haakona with it.”

“The Haakonans swatted us like an oallea bug, and we were in optimal condition when it happened,” T’Met said. “We would stand no chance against them whatsoever in the shape we’re in now.”

“Your orders give no dispensation for excuses, Commander,” Belak said, sorely tempting T’Met to strike him. Uhlan Makar, glaring at Belak from behind the helm, seemed to be thinking similar thoughts.

Belak’s provocative demeanor had to be calculated, of course. He wanted to goad her into taking some precipitous and foolish action against him, thereby giving him a tidy excuse to seize command immediately, as was permitted by regulations and enabled by the crew’s prudent fear of the Tal Shiar.

Belak smiled. “You will reassemble the attack fleet, and make best speed to Haakona. I will expect to see the target world before us in one siure. You have that long to come into compliance with your orders.”

And with that, he stalked off the command deck, leaving T’Met fuming and her command staff studiously avoiding eye contact with her.

Except for Uhlan Tomal at the communications console. “We’ve just received a priority communiqué from Romulus,” he said.

Wonderful, she thought. More good news, no doubt.

“Send it to my quarters, Tomal,” she said, and exited the command deck.

The dispatch she saw on the terminal in her small cabin was indeed a surprise, but not the kind for which she had girded herself. Owing to a highly improbable cascade of political circumstances back home, she was no longer consanguineous with an influential member of the Continuing Committee of the Romulan Senate.

However, she did share an ancestor with the newest praetor, a man with a new vision for the Romulan military. The most promising augury of that new vision was new orders to the Haakona-deployed forces, orders cut by Admiral Valdore himself.

T’Met activated the intercom unit on her desk. “Commander T’Met to helm.”

“Uhlan Makar here, Commander.”

“We’ve just received new orders, Uhlan. Plot a course for the Coalition front.”

The helmsman’s reply was tinged with relief. “Immediately, Commander.”

T’Met leaned back in her chair. Now, the fleet would be run in a rational fashion.

Still, she knew it was unwise to rejoice prematurely. The normally placid and standoffish Haakonans, after all, might not forget the ill-starred Romulan assault. They could decide to mount punitive attacks of their own, a development that could greatly complicate or even abort Valdore’s new effort. Even if everything went smoothly, a mass redeployment away from Haakona and toward Earth and her allies could take several turns of Remus to complete. During those interminable khaidoa, a great deal could happen, both inside and outside the Empire.

Over such a protracted span of time, the continued presence of Centurion Belak would become insufferable. But it came to her then that while she could do little to affect the future of Romulan-Haakonan relations, Centurion Belak’s destiny aboard the Terrh’Dhael now lay entirely within her power. D’deridex, Belak’s principal patron outside the Tal Shiar hierarchy, was dead.

Activating the intercom again, she said, “Centurion Belak, this is Commander T’Met. Please meet me in my quarters at your earliest convenience. I wish to discuss your desire to approach Haakona again.”

She rose from behind her small, tidy desk, drew her Honor Blade, and awaited the arrival of her guest.

The commander wondered which would be the first to drift across the billions of mat’drih that now separated the Terrh’Dhael from Haakona: Belak’s head, or the rest of his body.

SIXTY-THREE

Middle of the month of Z’at, YS 8765
Tuesday, March 16, 2156
Vulcan’s Forge, Vulcan

“YOU ARGUE PERSUASIVELY,“ Administrator T’Pau said, raising T’Pol’s hopes yet again in spite of herself.

Unsurprisingly, T’Pau dashed those hopes once more, just as she had done several times already during the six days since their desert colloquy had begun. “We remain, however, unpersuaded.”

Their dialogue had become an endurance contest as they descended from Mount Seleya to the desert canyon that marked its boundary. But it was a contest that the petite administrator seemed to be in no danger of losing. T’Pol was impressed by the smaller woman’s strength and stamina as she walked beside her along the Forge’s broiling sands, scarcely sweating despite the heaviness of her robes and Nevasa’s merciless brightness overhead. T’Pau showed little sign of the fatigue she must have felt, other than a slight puffiness around her dark eyes, which remained as sharp as ever.

Only twice before had T’Pol herself gone this long with neither food nor drink, on or off the Forge. The first time was the ten-day kahs-wan survival ritual she had undertaken in this very desert at the tender age of seven. The second occasion had come two decades later, during the basic Vulcan military training exercises she had endured on the volcanic slopes of Mount Tar’Hana.

During the past six days, T’Pol had used all the Vulcan discipline at her disposal—a fund that she knew had been depleted by the lingering aftereffects of her former trellium-D addiction, as well as by the vestigial synaptic scars left behind by Pa’nar Syndrome—to pursue a single purpose: convincing T’Pau that she was wrong to keep Vulcan out of the fight against Romulan aggression.

But for all that effort, T’Pol had made no measurable progress, although she counted the fact that T’Pau had consented to continue the dialogue as a moral victory of sorts. It was as though the administrator had something to prove, to herself if not to T’Pol or the rest of Vulcan and the Coalition, and that apparent need had kept her talking right through a prolonged interval of what should have consisted of meditation and contemplation, in addition to the fasting and deprivation that both women were enduring.

The dialogue would have to come to an end sooner or later. Even Vulcan endurance had its limits, and T’Pol knew that every day T’Pau spent here in the desert was another day during which Minister Kuvak’s hands would wield the Vulcan government’s levers of power and influence—including those that quietly moved illicit arms shipments from Vulcan to destinations located on the wrong side of the Romulan border. But since pursuing that topic had proved useless so far—T’Pau simply wouldn’t hear it—T’Pol decided instead to pursue a different tack.

“Vulcan’s relations with the rest of the Coalition have been strained greatly by your decision,” she said, continuing to match T’Pau’s vigorous walking pace.

“That is true,” the administrator said. “It is regrettable.”

Weary though she was, T’Pol still wasn’t prepared to give up. “The damage still might not be irreparable, Administrator. However, that could change quickly should certain information become generally known within the Coalition.”

“Explain,” T’Pau said as she overcame a slight hesitation in her step. That hesitation might have marked a shred of self-doubt, or it might have merely been the consequence of a rock in the sand.

“Have you considered how much damage it would cause to Vulcan-Coalition relations should our allies discover our... unique relationship to the Romulans?”

T’Pau came to an abrupt halt and turned to face T’Pol, who planted her feet firmly as she awaited the administrator’s response.

“T’Pol, the prospect of that eventuality never ceases to haunt those few of us who are aware of it.”

T’Pol nodded. “Then you must also have considered the natural corollary of that eventuality: the assumption many would make that we have been acting in collusion with the Romulans in their aggression against the allies.”

“Believing that would require a formidable leap of illogic,” T’Pau said with a slight shake of her head.

“Perhaps not. In fact, it would not be an altogether implausible chain of reasoning, given that our collective inaction has arguably already cost many thousands of Coalition lives so far.”

“Nevertheless, it would be a most unfair conclusion.”

“Fair or not, such a reaction would be both understandable and widespread,” T’Pol said, standing her ground. “Especially given the emotional proclivities of such species as humans, Tellarites, and, particularly, Andorians. Do you not agree?”

An almost pensive expression crossed T’Pau’s pinched, sun-seared features. She seemed to be giving T’Pol’s latest argument serious consideration, or at least to be letting her guard down enough to allow herself to exhibit some doubt about her chosen course.

The moment reminded T’Pol of a passage she had read in a copy of the King James Bible that Doctor Phlox had once lent her, when she had been making a concerted effort to understand human myths. A passage in the Book of Luke had recounted a forty-day ordeal of fasting in the desert endured by one Jesus of Nazareth, who was almost a sort of Surak figure for many humans. On the eve of Jesus’ gruesome, state-sponsored murder—a perplexing episode from humanity’s Iron Age that might have appalled even her own pre-Surakian ancestors for its sheer brutality—an antagonist named Satan had tried several times to tempt Jesus, at one point offering him all the world’s wealth and power if he would only agree to apply his divine powers to decidedly nonecclesiastical purposes.

Which one of the two of us, I wonder, is playing the role of Satan? T’Pol thought as she allowed T’Pau to think on her words in silence.

“It is imperative,” the administrator said at length, “that our allies do not discover our relationship to the Romulans. Perhaps the Romulans’ own obsession with keeping their society closed and leaving behind no prisoners will be enough to ensure that this does not occur.”

“It will occur, Administrator. The only question is when it will occur.”

“We shall see,” T’Pau said, then resumed walking.

“Your reluctance to see our Romulan connection revealed is logical, Administrator,” T’Pol said as she moved alongside her again. “But if you fail to plan for its inevitable revelation—if you continue to sit out the fight without offering a satisfactory explanation for Vulcan’s idleness—then you may damage the Coalition beyond all hope of repair.”

“That is the burden we must carry, T’Pol.”

“And that burden may be heavier than you realize. There is a fundamental ethical concern at play here, Administrator. Even without the Coalition Compact, Vulcan bears at least some responsibility for the actions of the Romulans.”

“The Romulans make their own choices,” T’Pau said. “Just as their ancestors did, centuries ago. Vulcan is not responsible for that.”

“Can you be certain of that? Are the Romulans not what we once were? Are they not us?”

Nodding solemnly as she trudged onward, T’Pau said, “That is precisely why we dare not get any more deeply involved in this fight than we are already.”

SIXTY-FOUR

Day Two, Month of et’Khior
Thursday, March 18, 2156
Uaenn Ei’krih Outpost, near Haakonan space

WORKING IN ORANGE FATIGUES right alongside the eighteen enlisted personnel in his company, Uhlan Takris personally oversaw the preparations to evacuate the partially hollowed-out planetoid. Most of the base’s equipment and supplies had been inventoried and packed on antigrav pallets within three dierha of Commander Pehrek’s initial posting of Admiral Valdore’s surprising new orders.

Takris, the clerk in charge of maintaining the outpost’s electronic supply manifests, might have been disappointed to have a posting downgraded as Command had just done with the Uaenn Ei’krih facility; the stroke of an admiral’s stylus had just redesignated Uaenn Ei’krih as a semiautomated listening post. In lieu of its banks of hastily disassembled particle weapons, the base would soon train multitudes of sensitive electronic ears upon Haakona, once the final technical swapouts had been completed and the new staff of intel specialists—a far smaller number of personnel than made up the base’s present all-military complement—had arrived and settled in.

Takris was anything but disappointed at the prospect of leaving this barren, lonely place behind; Uaenn Ei’krih was essentially just a ten-mat’drih-diameter ball of rock and iron, tumbling eternally through the cold silence just beyond the bow-shock of the central Haakonan binary star system.

But mostly he was delighted at the prospect of going home and seeing V’Kelis again, at least until his next deployment orders came through.

Takris had briefly questioned the wisdom of packing up everything in the facility, weapons included; but those fears had been assuaged by Subcommander Ghavenehk’s assurances that such measures were necessary to discourage any Haakonan scavenging of the base’s weapons technology in the unlikely event of a sudden enemy attack. Ghavenehk considered it prudent to have all the weaponry already packed and secured for transport before the cargo and personnel ships arrived, even though the move would leave the planetoid essentially defenseless for a few brief dierha.

Since neither Subcommander Ghavenehk nor Commander Pehrek was worried, Takris decided not to worry either—until he felt the ground rumble beneath his feet, and the sick-making lightness in his belly that could only mean that the artificial gravity had failed. But even then Takris worried only that one of the enlisted men might have broken down and packed up the base’s tech gear a little too thoroughly, inadvertently gutting part of the life-support system in the process.

It wasn’t until one of the men activated a monitor screen—one keyed to the last sensor system capable of displaying an infrared view of the space just beyond Uaenn Ei’krih’s rocky confines—that Takris began to grasp what was happening. Limned in the false green hues of the external dark-vision sensor system was the elegant, deceptively fragile-looking shape of an approaching Haakonan warship, its forward weapons tubes refulgent with menace.

Only now, as Takris loped through the intermittent and oscillating gravity toward the emergency subspace transmitter controls, did he understand that he hadn’t worried nearly enough....

SIXTY-FIVE

Day Four, Month of et’Khior
Saturday, March 20, 2156
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

THE CENTURION ENTERED VALDORE’S OFFICE, carrying a padd whose ominous deep green hue marked its contents as highly classified. From the uneasy expression on the young woman’s face, Valdore assumed that the tidings he was about to receive would make him no happier than had the initial reports of the Uaenn Ei’krih Outpost’s destruction two ch’Rihanturns ago.

“Admiral, the first detailed forensic report has just come back from the responders to the Uaenn Ei’krih attack,” she reported as she leaned across Valdore’s desk to hand him the padd.

At least the responders were able to gain access to the base’s remains, Valdore thought as he quickly scroll-skimmed over the text and tables the padd displayed, grateful for any stroke of good luck he could find in this unfavorable turn of fortune. We were fortunate that the Haakonans chose not to establish their own base at Uaenn Ei’krih. They seem mainly interested in eradicating our forward bases in Haakonan territory, and they appear content to withdraw homeward once they accomplish that.

At least that was how the Haakonans had operated so far. The future, however, was never certain, a fact that the padd in his hand now all but screamed at him.

“Has this been verified?” he asked.

The centurion nodded. “I presume you refer to the Vulcan energy signatures the forensic analysts discovered, Admiral.”

He threw her a hard glare.

“It has been verified, sir, multiple times,” she said, chastened. “The precise meaning of the findings is still being determined, however.”

“Thank you, Centurion. Dismissed.” With another nod, she made her exit.

Alone in his office, Valdore resumed studying the padd, more slowly this time. Whatever debates the intel specialists might be conducting at this moment, the meaning of this latest report from the front of D’deridex’s Haakonan war could not have been clearer: Vulcan was covertly supplying Haakona with weapons, and perhaps other technology as well.

Irrespective of the broader, more critical war with the Coalition, this revelation made it a military imperative to establish a new listening post at least as close to Haakona as the defunct Uaenn Ei’krih facility had been. Valore couldn’t afford to allow Haakona to attack from the rear just when his forces were about to become fully engaged with the higher-priority task of bringing Earth and her allies to heel.

Tossing the padd onto the desktop, Valdore keyed open one particular secure channel on his personal comm unit. The dark viewscreen before him suddenly brightened and displayed a cunning, familiar female face.

She did not appear surprised to be hearing from him. Given the nature of her work, that fact, in turn, did not surprise him either.

“T’Luadh,” he said. “I require your assistance.”

A predatory smile spread slowly across her face. “The Tal Shiar lives to serve, Admiral. I assume you are speaking of the intelligence that your people gathered during their sweep of the rubble of the Uaenn Ei’krih Outpost.”

Unwilling to volunteer any information that her reputedly omniscient spy bureau hadn’t already managed to gather on its own elsewhere, he said, “You tell me.”

“All right, Admiral,” she said, apparently not offended by his caution. “Haakona has come into possession of certain Vulcan technologies. You want me to get to the bottom of it.”

He was impressed, though again unsurprised. “Correct. I trust you understand the danger to the Empire that such a Vulcan-Haakonan connection would pose if it were allowed to continue.”

“I do indeed, Admiral. Therefore I shall apply my resources to the problem with the tenacity of a wild hnoiyika.”

Now that Valdore better understood the origin of her smile, he returned it; her grin did indeed make her resemble a ravenous hnoiyika about to sever the jugular of some terrified rodent.

“But I must caution you, Admiral,” T’Luadh continued. “Even the fiercest hnoiyika must be patient. Vulcans are quite clever adversaries. Tracking down and cutting off the specific supply line in question will take a great deal of careful intel gathering on the ground, and could take a considerable amount of time and effort.”

Valdore knew he was not renowned for his patience. But he was also a military man of a highly practical bent; he knew when it was time to bow to necessity’s nonnegotiable demands.

“In this instance, T’Luadh, results are far more important than raw speed,” he said. “But even if success can come only slowly, I trust I need not remind you that failure is not one of our available options.”

She nodded and vanished from the screen, leaving Valdore alone with his thoughts.

And vainly struggling to confine his worries to those matters he was capable of influencing directly.

Sihaer nnea Rrhiol ch’Chulla, Romulus

”Major, I have an assignment for you,” said the woman on the screen.

Talok tried to conceal how pleased he was by the prospect of the imminent alleviation of his between-missions boredom; such ennui was an occupational hazard that he didn’t like to broadcast, especially to his Tal Shiar superiors.

“I’m listening, Colonel T’Luadh.”

“It’s an extremely important assignment.”

Sure it is, he thought wryly as he nodded toward the screen. But they’re all critically important, aren’t they?

“This mission should be quite interesting to you, personally, Major,” she continued. “It begins on Vulcan.”

In spite of himself, Talok’s right eyebrow rose in a steep slope, wordlessly ratifying her presumptions. He hadn’t been to Vulcan since he’d almost succeeded in subverting that planet’s government, alongside the ousted Administrator V’Las, in preparation for an Andorsu war and a Romulan conquest, both of which, sadly, had been aborted two years ago.

“Tell me more, Colonel.”

SIXTY-SIX

Friday, April 2, 2156
Enterprise, near the Berengaria system

JONATHAN ARCHER STEPPED OUT of the turbolift and began a slow, counterclockwise stroll around the bridge’s comfortingly familiar circumference. He nodded to each individual crew member working at the various duty stations as he passed them.

By the time he’d completed about three-quarters of the circuit, a hard realization struck him: With the exception of Malcolm Reed at the tactical console and Hoshi Sato at the comm station, none of the bridge personnel currently on duty had been aboard Enterprise for longer than a few months. Elrene Leydon had occupied Travis Mayweather’s old position as the alpha-shift helmsman for the past four months, and almost everybody else present had come aboard far more recently than that. The absence of T’Pol and Trip now seemed embarrassingly conspicuous.

Archer quietly kicked himself for his momentary lapse into moping self-indulgence. He told himself that having a rock-steady, veteran hand working at tactical was far more important than the luxury of being surrounded by familiar faces.

“Any further contact with the enemy?” Archer asked as he came to a stop near Lieutenant Reed.

“Not since we took out that patrol four hours ago, Captain,” Malcolm said with an audible air of incredulity. “I honestly would have expected a lot more Romulan resistance this close to Berengaria. We’re less than an hour from crossing Berengaria’s magnetopause and entering the system, but the Romulans are still quiet. It’s almost as though they’re... distracted, or preoccupied.”

Archer didn’t believe that for a moment. “That’d be very convenient for us, wouldn’t it? It’s more likely that the patrol warned them that we’re coming.”

“The better to give us a very warm welcome,” Malcolm said with a nod. “Once they think they’ve lulled us into a false sense of security, that is.”

Archer was aware, of course, that Reed wasn’t all that easily lulled. The lieutenant’s tactical assessment buoyed Archer’s growing sense of confidence in the coming battle’s likely outcome. And having his back covered by the largest starfaring attack force Earth had ever assembled didn’t hurt either.

“Fleet readiness?” Archer asked.

“Fully locked and loaded for bear,” Malcolm said, obviously proud of all the hard work he’d done coordinating tactical preparations across the entire fleet over the past several days. The battle group consisted almost entirely of Daedalus-class vessels whose offensive and defensive capabilities had benefited greatly from Malcolm’s expertise, in addition to the rush hardware upgrades those vessels had already received.

“All MACO units report ready across the fleet, including landing equipment and ground matériel,” Malcolm continued. “And best of all, since Intrepid joined us, we now have a total complement of fourteen starships.”

Archer grinned. Starfleet had originally ordered Intrepid deployed elsewhere, but Captain Carlos Ramirez had started twisting arms at Starfleet Command to get those orders revised. The way Carlos told the tale, Admiral Gardner finally knuckled under to his request to join the Berengaria battle group shortly after being made aware that the flotilla as originally constituted was comprised of thirteen vessels; a small but influential plurality of spacegoing humans still seemed to take that numeric superstition far too seriously, going back nearly two centuries to the Apollo era.

Despite Archer’s escalating sense of confidence, he still felt a healthy distrust for any quiet that came immediately before an anticipated storm.

Berengaria VII

Archer arranged the flotilla into a one-hundred-klick-long linear formation in order to obscure the final, subluminal phase of the attack group’s approach to Berengaria’s mist-shrouded seventh planet. He appreciated the ironic justice of using one of the Romulans’ own tactics against them, having bet on the likelihood that they would be making as much use as they could of Berengaria’s preexisting warp-field detection grid.

He dared to believe that his combined stealth tactics had actually worked by the time the hindmost vessels in the formation reported their insertion into an extended orbit about the planet.

That, of course, was when a group of eight birds-of-prey came swooping up out of the cloud canopy, their weapons ports blazing in almost simultaneous fusillades of angry red disruptor fire.

“Evasive, Ensign Leydon,” Archer barked. “Malcolm, polarize the hull plating. Target the lead ship and bring every tube to bear. Hoshi, tell the fleet to execute Tactical Plan Alpha.”

As the bridge crew busied itself carrying out Archer’s orders, the battle seemed to unfold in dreamlike slow motion on the bridge’s central viewscreen. Hot blue phase cannon blasts and salvoes of photonic torpedoes lanced across the ever-dwindling distance between Enterprise and the nearest of the fiercely plumaged Romulan warships, while the Valley Forge and the Zefram Cochrane worked in tandem to engage another raptorlike hostile vessel. The Olympus dropped into the fray a moment later, her spherical primary hull and cylindrical secondary hull already showing severe damage from Romulan weapons fire. Her attitude control apparently haywire, the Olympus drew impossibly close to one of the Romulan craft. A moment later she disappeared in an expanding fireball, along with the Romulan, leaving Archer to wonder whether Olympus had actually been entirely out of control, or if a deliberate ramming maneuver had become her captain’s final viable option.

“Keep hitting ’em!” Archer shouted to his own crew, addressing the fleet as well. “And get those dropships launched!”

Once the sixty-odd small troop transports were away from the ships that carried them, the battle for Starbase 1—or whatever might remain of it following the long months of Romulan occupation—would finally be joined in earnest.

Even though the captain knew he wouldn’t be getting off the bridge any time soon, Archer was determined to take that battle all the way to the ground.

Even before the explosive bolts ejected the dropship from the Dykstra’s belly, Private Colin Idaho had known to expect his stomach to try to claw its way out of his body. But what he hadn’t expected was for his guts to attempt to escape through the top of his head before settling for his face. He vomited explosively moments after the dropship took up a fast, planetward trajectory that more than lived up to the little troop transport’s name.

“Why couldn’t these friggin’ dropships come equipped with those really efficient inertial dampers that Starfleet uses?” Idaho said while still in the throes of his agonies.

“You’re a shark, not a squid, trooper. You’ll live,” the corporal told him after he’d finished yakking, at least for the moment. But Idaho wasn’t ready yet to accept that he’d decisively quelled the rebellion of his internal organs; he’d consider that battle won only after his land legs returned, which wouldn’t happen until after the little transport ship was finished making its bucking, rattling, flame-trailed descent.

With nothing better to do at the moment, he recalled having asked Sergeant Mankiewicz just yesterday why the troops couldn’t have used one of the starships’ new cargo transporters to get to the planet’s surface, rather than the dropships. After the lengthy, complex, and decibel-enhanced answer he’d received—Mankiewicz had loudly emphasized both the unsuitability of the transporter equipment for mass human beamings and the tactical assumption that the Romulans could disrupt a transporter beam in such a way as to ensure that whatever it transmitted would arrive as so many kilos of ground chuck—Idaho now knew better than to question the natural MACO order of things.

The recollection made him rejoice that he’d never worked up the nerve to ask the sergeant about the many “here there be dragons” stories he’d heard about Berengaria VII.

But the drop was over soon enough. An immeasurable interval after the harrowing orbital descent had begun, the little dropship was finally on the ground. Idaho saw that the egress hatches were opening, letting in wide shafts of red Berengaria’s cloud-filtered light as the debarkation ramps extended. He also saw what appeared to be the telltale scorings of particle-beam weapons on the external metal gangways as they unfolded; he shuddered, nearly vomiting again as he realized how close he and his fellow MACOs must have come to being vaporized by the gauntlet of orbital Romulan guns they’d just run, and at nauseating ballistic speeds, no less.

He blinked against the intermittent flashes of brilliance he saw coming from beyond the nearest open hatchway as his fellow MACOs shouted in excitement and anger and fear while preparing to plant their boots on the alien ground they’d been ordered to take back from the faceless Romulans.

A strong arm grasped his, helping him get his feet beneath him. “Up and at ’em, trooper,” the corporal said. “You don’t want to let everybody else have all the fun, do you?”

“Thanks, Corporal Guitierrez,” Idaho said, his training finally kicking in and overriding his motion sickness—or at least most of it.

More flashes from outside assaulted his eyes as he checked the charge indicator on the stock of his pulse rifle. Then he tried to move toward one of the landing ramps to follow the other MACOs into battle.

But his boots seemed to be bolted to the deck.

“Come on, trooper,” Guitierrez said, the almost maternal compassion he’d heard in her tone earlier hardening to cast rodinium toughness. It was obvious that she was done coddling him.

Once he’d managed to get himself moving again, she said, “You’re lucky my husband lost the coin-flip, Private.”

“Coin flip?”

She nodded. “To settle which of us was going back into the MACOs to fight the Romulans, and which of us got to stay home to change the diapers.”

Idaho’s stomach lurched at the thought of soiled diapers. Bring on the Romulans instead. “How’s that lucky for me?” he said.

“If the toss had gone the other way, I can guarandamntee you wouldn’t be getting such gentle treatment from him.”

Although he had no memory of how it had happened, he was now outside the dropship, keeping pace as his squad sprinted through a scorched, stump-laden field toward a distant row of burned and blasted structures and even more remote, haze-shrouded towers. Columns of MACOs advancing from the other dropships toward the same destination were visible from both sides through the scattered remnants of an incompletely defoliated jungle that bore scant resemblance to the images of the vibrant, Cretaceous-era Berengarian jungle that Sergeant Mankiewicz had shown the company at the mission briefings. A fog-shrouded valley lay in the distance beyond the ruins toward which all the MACO units headed.

“Starbase 1,” Corporal Guitierrez said, maintaining a brisk pace as she walked slightly ahead of Idaho. “And the Vulcan science outpost. Or at least whatever bits and pieces are still there since last November.” She tossed him a look over her shoulder. “Stay sharp, kid.”

The squad walked on for what felt like hours as fear and residual motion sickness dilated Idaho’s sense of the passage of time. Berengaria sailed across the cloud-decked sky, oblating and spreading across the horizon as evening approached. The tumbledown structures in the distance appeared no closer than they had been a seeming eternity ago.

Idaho saw, or imagined that he saw, a group of small, dark figures approaching from the direction of the ruins.

On a cue from Lieutenant Stiles, Sergeant Mankiewicz raised a fist to signal the group to stop, and Idaho instinctively complied. Another hand signal ordered the troopers to take cover. Idaho did that as well, though he could see he had been among the last to complete the task. He willed his hands to stop shaking, but to little avail.

I’m gonna get everybody here killed, he thought as the dark, distant figures continued their relentless approach. It wasn’t his imagination playing tricks; whatever was coming was real. Following the lead of Sergeant Mankiewicz and Corporal Guitierrez, Idaho readied his weapon from behind one of the outsize charred tree stumps.

“Remember, kid,” Guitierrez said as she hovered beside him. “Stay cool. Do your job.”

He nodded dumbly. Idaho’s thoughts flew to his mother, who had fled to Earth once Alpha Centauri had started to look too vulnerable to a Romulan attack.

Mom’s never gonna see me again, he thought. I’m gonna die here.

The ranks of approaching figures had grown close enough by now to be positively identified as essentially humanoid, though their bright silver helmets obscured any other fine details. For all he knew, they were reptile men under that headgear, or bipedal starfish.

Romulans, he thought, his spine shuddering with dread.

Responding to Mankiewicz’s hand signals, the MACOs began to power up.

Another hand signal. Then MACO pulse rifles volleyed and thundered, just like in that damned Tennyson poem. More flashes of light assaulted Idaho’s eyes, and Sergeant Mankiewicz vanished from right in front of him.

“Get down, kid!” Guitierrez yelled, tackling him.

Weapons fired kaleidoscopically all around him, seemingly from every direction simultaneously. Fear grabbed his belly and squeezed, and he was almost certain he had vomited yet again in response. Something struck him, and he felt burning, followed by numbness and the stench of burned hair and ozone. I’m going into shock, or worse, he thought as he realized that he was lying on his back.

Idaho further realized that he couldn’t move, other than blinking and turning his head slightly.

He saw MACO bodies sprawled nearby, perhaps alive, perhaps not. He saw parts of bodies, and closed his eyes in an effort not to see any more.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw the approaching Romulans, closing with obvious determination. Only a handful were coming, however, presumably because the MACOs had cut down many of them. But they had managed to survive in sufficient numbers to finish off what remained of Idaho’s unit.

One of the hawk-eyed, silver-helmeted bastards drew a blade as he approached, apparently intent on killing Idaho with it.

Should have listened to Mom, he thought, closing his eyes again. Should have paid closer attention to that damned poem.

He opened his eyes and felt both relief and horror when he saw that the two nearest bedraggled Romulans had moved past him to get to Lieutenant Stiles, who appeared to be either unconscious or already dead. One of the enemy soldiers used his sharp blade to finish Stiles off. A shadow passed overhead, but Idaho still felt too stunned to turn his head toward its source. Idaho assumed it was cloud cover. Or perhaps the impending fall of night, which might as well last forever as far as he was concerned.

God. I’m gonna die. I’mgonnadieI’mgonnadieI’mgonnadie.

The Romulan with the knife turned toward him and approached, his blade still dripping with Stiles’s blood.

“V’rhaen-ao’au thea,” the Romulan said. Idaho needed no translation to recognize the ugly universal sentiment of I’m going to kill you now.

The shadow passed again overhead, like a portent of doom, and was followed by a faint whiff of sulfur. The Romulan crouched beside Idaho, smiling a cruel rictus as he raised his blade, poised to strike.

A heavy boot suddenly crashed into the Romulan’s side, sending him and the blade sprawling in opposite directions. Straining to get himself up onto his elbows, Idaho saw that Guitierrez had not only survived the firefight, but had also brought the enemy soldier down with one deft martial arts maneuver. Before the Romulan could react, she smashed him across the face with the stock of her damaged phase rifle, and then brought the heavy weapon down hard against his throat, apparently crushing the alien’s windpipe.

But three other Romulans were already converging on the corporal from different directions, their energy weapons held temporarily in abeyance to avoid the chance of catching one another in a crossfire.

With a huge effort, Idaho turned his head this way and that, but only managed to determine that no weapons lay within his reach. He still couldn’t move worth a damn, regardless. He and Guitierrez were both finished.

The shadow returned. But this time it was attached to something swift, muscular, and equipped with wickedly sharp claws.

More shadows, and the deep-green, scale-covered shapes that cast them, crossed the battlefield. The Romulans screamed and struggled, but their cries quickly grew faint with distance as their attackers bore them away on their leathery, scalloped wings. Had the arrival of the MACOs given them a long-awaited opportunity to take a little revenge?

Idaho forced his numbed body into motion, dragging himself to where Guitierrez lay. He was relieved to find that she was still alive and conscious.

“I thought the bastards had killed you,” he said.

“Uh-uh,” she said, her breathing labored. “That would just have made Sergeant Kemper mad. You wouldn’t like him when he’s mad.”

“Your husband? The coin toss?”

She nodded. “You hurt?”

He shrugged, and winced as his body responded with a sharp pain in his torso. He tried to force himself to be grateful, at least, that he wasn’t coughing up blood. “I think I’ll live, Corporal,” he said. “What about you?”

“Fine. What the hell just happened?”

He studiously avoided shrugging again. “I guess all I can say about that,” he said, catching his breath, “is ‘Here there be dragons.’”

Enterprise

The reports had been coming back fast and furious for the past fifteen minutes. There had been heavy losses, both in orbit and on the ground. Though Archer could hardly believe it, the Battle of Berengaria was already over. Earth’s single most decisive victory in the war thus far—Earth’s only solid victory, decisive or otherwise, some would argue—had taken slightly less than twelve hours to achieve.

It was hard to accept. He kept expecting the Romulan fleet to reappear. Instead, the Romulans had beaten a hasty retreat from the Berengaria system, taking care to leave behind next to nothing in the way of intact Romulan technology. According to the MACOs on the ground, they had even taken pains to either vaporize or collect all of their dead before their small surviving complement of ships had gone to warp. There were no prisoners to interrogate, nor even a corpse for Phlox to examine. Archer was relieved, given what would almost certainly happen to Earth-Vulcan relations once the Romulan-Vulcan relationship became known.

The victory had been decisive, but it had not come cheaply. In addition to MACO losses on the ground that numbered in the hundreds— about half of the troops that had landed—a similar percentage of the Starfleet attack group had suffered fatal damage as well.

“I have logged seven of the Daedalus-class ships as lost with all hands,” Reed said glumly as he delivered his after-action report to Archer in his ready room.

Sitting silently behind his desk, Archer looked over the list of ship names—names drawn from history and mythology that had earned yet another mark of distinction today: Olympus, Valley Forge, Cochrane, Dykstra, Probert, Ptolemy, Stephen Decatur.

“The Essex and the Roosevelt took the smallest amount of damage, Captain,” Malcolm said. “They could pursue the Romulans as they retreat.”

Archer shook his head. “No. They’d probably never catch up, unless the Romulans wanted them to. We’ll keep Essex and F.D.R. here with Enterprise for a while, along with Archon, Carolina, Lovell, and Intrepid. We all need some post-battle repairs, so we’ll get those under way here while Captains Ramirez, Narsu, Shumar, and I sift through whatever the Romulans left of Starbase 1—and whatever the Romulans built here since they arrived last November.”

“What about the Vulcan outpost, Captain? Do we claim salvage rights?”

Archer scowled. “Starfleet has decided to leave the Vulcan outpost to the Vulcans.”

Reed nodded. “Has Starfleet Command issued us new orders, sir?”

“Liberate Deneva. Once our flotilla is ready to rendezvous with the reinforcements that Starfleet is sending.”

“Understood, Captain,” Reed said with a small, wry smile. “Ready or not, Deneva, here we come.”

SIXTY-SEVEN

Early in the month of D’ruh, YS 8765
Saturday, April 3, 2156
ShiKahr Spaceport, Vulcan

THE CUSTOMS INSPECTOR’S FACE was a mask of impassivity, just as Colonel Talok expected, considering which world he was presently visiting.

“Welcome back to Vulcan, Minister Tavak,” the inspector said. “Your travel documents appear to be in order.” The inspector handed back the datachip after giving it a perfunctory examination. “Live long and prosper.”

“Peace and long life,” said Talok, whose normally prominent forehead ridge had been smoothed to a placidly Vulcan appearance to match his newly assumed name and mannerisms.

Carrying only a small valise, as was the real Minister Tavak’s wont whenever he traveled offworld, Talok made his way through the vast open spaces of the spaceport’s public gallery. He headed to the transit square, where a public antigrav vehicle would carry him into the government district in the capital city’s heart.

As long as he was not subjected to a comprehensive DNA analysis or a deep tissue scan, no Vulcan would ever discover that Talok had assassinated Minister Tavak and taken his place. Talok understood that suspicions would almost certainly be roused eventually. Questions would be asked. Sooner or later, somebody was bound to take a scan of him, or obtain a tissue sample. If he was both competent and fortunate, however, he would discover the source of Haakona’s Vulcan technology connection and melt away into the shadows—per his decades of Tal Shiar field experience—long before any of that could happen.

Mount Seleya, Vulcan

T’Pol wondered if she was losing command of her faculties as a consequence of the twenty-four consecutive days of deprivation she had experienced. She could draw some solace from the fact that the worst of the physical punishments of the last few weeks was behind her. Although the ascent from the blazing sands of the Forge to the chill, wind-carved peaks of Mount Seleya had been arduous, at least it was finished, and hadn’t been followed immediately by an equally harrowing descent through the forbidding darkness of the Osana caverns. She and Administrator T’Pau had even paused at Mount Seleya to take their first meal in weeks. And now, as T’Pol sat quietly on the stone floor between an equally silent Administrator T’Pau and Minister Kuvak—the latter’s presence being somewhat reassuring inasmuch as it meant that he couldn’t actively undermine T’Pau’s government at the moment—T’Pol found at least a fleeting interval of peace.

The other people present were the handful of adepts charged with the maintenance of Mount Seleya’s ancient, open-air cathedral. Today the adepts were conducting the solemn rites associated with the induction of a new Kolinahr master, who was kneeling respectfully before them. The ancient ritual progressed in stately fashion as T’Rukh stood sentinel duty overhead and Nevasa drew ever closer to the distant horizon, lengthening the shadows cast by the circle of dour, robed figures. The net diminution of the sky’s brightness made the fires that crackled in the central ceremonial brazier appear ever brighter by contrast. The only sounds were a few ritually intoned phrases of Old High Vulcan, the sporadic jangling clashes of the hexagonal racks of kus-vakh bells carried by two of the adepts, and the faint background keening of the wind.

Evening arrived as the ceremony reached its slow and dignified conclusion. In the rarefied air of Mount Seleya’s upper reaches, high above the heat of the Forge, the cold of night came immediately, making T’Pol shiver despite the thickness of her robes.

The three visitors rose to their feet as the adepts and their newest inductee formed a procession that departed the broad stone circle, a space that had been worn smooth over the centuries. After the wind had swallowed up the retreating sound of the adepts’ bells, T’Pau turned toward T’Pol and said, “We hope that this—the full embracing of the teachings of Surak—will become the birthright of every Vulcan, from now through every generation yet to come. Peace, through the exercise of logic, via the discipline of the Kolinahr. Do you understand now that we cannot contemplate war when that possibility is finally within our grasp?”

Ignoring T’Pau’s question, T’Pol instead addressed the administrator’s deputy. “Minister Kuvak, are you in agreement?”

Administrator T’Pau’s deputy cast an uneasy eye in his superior’s direction before answering. “In this matter, Administrator T’Pau speaks for all of Vulcan.”

“Indeed,” T’Pol said, as the bulwark of hope that had enabled her to endure the past two dozen days crumbled. “Then I must report to my commanding officer that my mission has ended in failure.” She paused; what she planned to say next would be difficult, but it had to be said. And her candor could hardly make matters any worse.

“And I must also report,” T’Pol added, “that Vulcan is being led to ruin by an evident megalomaniac.”

“Kroykah!” Kuvak shouted, his self-control momentarily in shambles.

T’Pau held up a hand for silence, and her deputy dutifully subsided, though he cast a heated glare at T’Pol. T’Pau merely stood in silence as she considered her accuser’s words with apparent serenity.

At length, the administrator said, “Do you harbor... objections to the teachings of Surak, T’Pol?”

That was a question T’Pol hadn’t expected. In fact, she hadn’t expected a question at all; she had assumed that both officials would immediately have her banished from the mountain, if not from Vulcan, for her effrontery.

“No, Administrator,” T’Pol said. “Like all Vulcans, I revere Surak. I deeply respect his accomplishments.”

T’Pau nodded sagely, looking disconcertingly wise for one so very young. “We understand. Yet you will allow your reverence and respect to take you only so far and no farther. You will not permit yourself to pass a certain point of inconvenience, particularly in regard to matters of war.”

“War is never a matter of convenience, Administrator,” T’Pol said, nettled. “But it can be necessary.”

Kuvak ceased glaring at T’Pol and lowered his eyes to the stone floor, perhaps meditating on T’Pau’s words. Did that signify that he agreed with her, T’Pol, about the occasional necessity of war?

She put that matter aside for the moment; her eyes were drawn to those of T’Pau, whose gaze had grown eerily fervid and bright, canceling out some of the darkness that was encroaching upon the guttering brazier’s failing light.

“No, daughter,” T’Pau said, shaking her head. “There are always... alternatives to war. Still, we do not wish to leave you with the impression that we are mad.”

Unable to restrain her irritation at the administrator’s continued predilection for self-absorbed pronouncements, T’Pol said, “Then will you explain precisely whom you speak of when you say ‘we’?”

T’Pau lapsed into a meditative silence for a few moments, then appeared to reach an important decision. “Very well, daughter. The person standing before you does indeed speak for another in addition to T’Pau.”

Noting that the administrator was now speaking of herself in the third person, T’Pol hoped that T’Pau’s grasp on sanity hadn’t grown as tenuous as it appeared.

“Do you claim to speak for all of Vulcan?” T’Pol said.

“No, to do so would be illogical. We speak for T’Pau, but we also speak for another: Surak.”

“Are you... keeping Surak’s katra now?” T’Pol asked. “As Jonathan Archer once did?”

“The Kolinahr adepts have designated one of their own as a long-term vessel for Surak’s katra. But we are together now, and have been for a time, since shortly after our arrival—after my arrival—at Mount Seleya several weeks ago. The experience has been a transformational one. And it is something that all of Vulcan can share, via the meld.”

Syrrannism from Voroth to ShiKahr, T’Pol thought, not quite sure yet how she should regard such a sweeping prospect of change, which could well prove to be both inevitable and permanent. It could spread out exponentially through a network of telepathic contact. All of Vulcan, governed by the purest application of Surak’s ideals, and it could all occur in a single generation’s time.

The night deepened and grew more frigid. T’Pol stood alone beside the dying brazier, pondering, long after T’Pau had retired to an adjacent chamber to meditate, long after Kuvak had excused himself to return to ShiKahr.

She contemplated the broad transformation that was almost certain to come to Vulcan.

T’Pol found a stick of incense that one of the adepts had apparently dropped on the stone floor, and tossed it onto the brazier’s stillsmoldering embers; the incense ignited, and its bitter aroma helped her to focus her racing thoughts.

As she inhaled deeply of the incense, she began to wonder whether there was more to T’Pau’s decision to stay out of the war than simple Surakian pacifism. After all, her meld with Surak had occurred after Jonathan Archer had briefly carried the Vulcan philosopher’s katra in his brain. Therefore T’Pau may have been granted a rare understanding of humans and their capabilities.

But Archer had shared his own mind with Surak, and yet had remained pragmatic in matters of war and peace. T’Pol’s mind-link with Charles Tucker must have given her an understanding of humanity’s capabilities—at least equal to that T’Pau—yet T’Pol had no illusions about humanity’s chances of survival. It was going to take more than resolve to defeat the Romulans. Earth still desperately needed Vulcan’s help.

Something else had begun to bother her about T’Pau’s vision as well: She wondered just how the administrator expected to persuade all of Vulcan to adopt the mind-meld. While the Syrrannites regarded the practice as a sacrament, most Vulcans saw the act as either an unacceptable compromise of personal boundaries or as an outright obscenity. The notion that the mass of Vulcan’s population might be expected to undertake it—even to touch the most universally revered mind in all of Vulcan history—could rouse a social backlash capable of reversing all the progress that T’Pau’s new Syrrannite government had made so far.

T’Pau is attempting to tame truly dangerous forces, she thought. Those forces could bring about an overnight leap forward in Vulcan’s progress along Surak’s path of peace and logic. Or they could dredge up old apprehensions that could drive this society right back to the fear and aggression that motivated V’Las. And that place, T’Pol felt certain, lay only a few short steps away from the raptor’s wing. She shivered, but for reasons that had nothing to do with the chill of Seleya’s thin air.

The shrill beep of the personal comm device interrupted her grim reflections.

“T’Pol here. Go ahead.”

“I have news, T’Pol,” said a voice that she recognized immediately as Denak’s. “Ych’a has just returned to Vulcan after completing a clandestine assignment.”

“That is gratifying to hear,” T’Pol said, relieved to learn of the congenial resolution to which Denak’s unenviable predicament had come.

“There is more,” Denak continued, sounding almost ebullient by Vulcan standards. “Ych’a brought someone back with her—someone I am certain you will wish to see immediately.”

SIXTY-EIGHT

The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

CHIEF TECHNOLOGIST NIJIL ONLY GLANCED at the image on the screen atop the desk in the First Consul’s office. But that momentary glimpse had been more than sufficient to tell him everything he needed to know. Nijil had known from the outset that T’Leikha wasn’t content to conduct a mere ransacking, as the late Praetor D’deridex had recently done in an attempt to intimidate Valdore. Had that been her plan, T’Leikha wouldn’t have prevailed upon him to create and plant the explosive compound that had reduced the mansion, along with most of the estate’s outbuildings and much of its surrounding landscaping, to a smoldering crater.

“You do fine work, Doctor,” First Consul T’Leikha said as she gazed with obvious satisfaction at the real-time aerial images the tiny drone was still transmitting.

“Thank you, First Consul,” Nijil said, forcing a smile.

But even though he had been working secretly against Admiral Valdore’s interests, Nijil found it difficult to share the first consul’s enthusiasm. He had been quietly funneling assistance to the Ejhoi Ormiin dissidents for years—presumably without the knowledge of either Valdore or T’Leikha—but he would not have chosen this moment to make an overt move against the admiral.

“I’m not at all certain this was a wise course of action,” he said as he slowly paced across the broad, plushly carpeted chamber.

T’Leikha sighed in an almost theatrical display of forbearance. “Don’t worry, Doctor. I will see to it that Admiral D’soria retains you as his chief technologist once he assumes Valdore’s duties.”

“That’s not what worries me, First Consul.”

“I find that curious, Doctor,” she said, frowning. “I would think protecting your career would be uppermost in your mind at the moment, given the penchant that new administrations have for making a clean sweep of their predecessors’ functionaries so they can replace them with their own toadies and sycophants. Unless you have something else to protect—something you value more highly than your prized position in Valdore’s military hierarchy. But I find it difficult to imagine what that might be, since you are not known to be a family man.”

“What if Valdore turns out to be right?” Nijil asked, hoping to use a larger truth to distract her from what he wished to keep concealed. “What if the Coalition really does pose as grave a threat to the Empire as Valdore believed?” After all, the Ejhoi Ormiin’s aspirations to seize power on Romulus would be trouble enough without an aggressive external foe to fight off as well.

T’Leikha looked askance at him. “Of course Valdore was right. Coalition habitations have been expanding at an alarming rate for tens of fvheisen—particularly those of the hevam.”

“Granted,” Nijil said, though privately he maintained the same doubts he always had. “And yet you just killed a military leader who seemed to appreciate that fact better than most.”

“No,” she said, aiming such a hard scowl at him that he nearly flinched. “We quietly removed a dangerous obstacle from our paths. Other military leaders can rise to the Coalition threat more than adequately, particularly now that D’deridex’s madness has ended. Leaders such as Admiral D’soria.”

“D’soria has far less practical experience than Valdore did.”

She shrugged. “That can be said of most anyone. But D’soria also lacks Valdore’s capacity for vindictiveness. I am well aware that Valdore always held me responsible for his recent imprisonment.”

“Yet you were instrumental in setting him free.”

“In order to make use of Valdore’s talents. I have no further need of them now.”

Nijil thought he understood. Freeing Valdore had never been about his ability to win the war against the Coalition and the hevam—at least not entirely. But by freeing Valdore, T’Leikha had acquired a means of removing D’deridex from the praetorate, and with that purpose accomplished there was now no longer a reason for T’Leikha to delay replacing Valdore with someone less ambitious, and therefore less dangerous.

Admiral D’soria bore no grudges against the first consul of which Nijil was aware, and he was certain to be far easier to manage— and far less likely to make an eventual bid for Senate power—than Valdore, a former senator, would have been. Nijil wouldn’t have believed that Valdore had been plotting to rebuild his old power base in the Senate—at least not before the new praetor had freed the disgraced Senator Vrax from indefinite confinement in the Hall of State’s dungeons.

Vrax’s family now stood to regain much of the standing it had lost under D’deridex’s rule, a development that could be extremely disruptive of the delicate balance of senatorial power that T’Leikha had crafted so carefully. Vrax would place much of the blame for his imprisonment on T’Leikha, who had almost literally stepped over Vrax in order to free Valdore.

Nijil could only hope that Vrax and T’Leikha would quietly destroy each other with mutual assassination schemes, canceling each other out like a particle/antiparticle pair, preferably without causing excessive collateral damage.

As he considered what might happen in the meantime, a new thought chilled Nijil to his core: If T’Leikha could find Valdore dispensable, then when might she make a similar determination concerning the newly deceased admiral’s chief technologist?

“I trust that my services will remain useful for the foreseeable future,” he said cautiously. “Both to you and to Admiral D’soria.”

She smiled indulgently, in obvious response to his transparent unease. “Relax, Doctor. You still have a high-warp stardrive project to rebuild. Valdore has paid the price for the catastrophic failure of the avaihh lli vastam project at Atlai’fehill Stelai.”

Nijil nodded, resisting only barely the urge to smile. The apparent debacle at Atlai’fehill Stelai was indeed a setback for the Romulan military. Fortunately for him and his Ejhoi Ormiin allies, no one in the Empire’s power structure understood as yet how truly monumental that setback was.

“So you need only concern yourself with restarting the warp-seven initiative,” T’Leikha continued. “As well as periodically furnishing vital assistance with certain... special endeavors. Like the one our joint efforts brought to fruition today. As well as others that we will speak of in person at your earliest convenience.”

The scientist wasn’t sure whether he ought to feel reassured or worried. On the one hand, she had reminded him that they both would be equally culpable in today’s assassination, should it ever come to light. On the other hand, she had also acknowledged not only her inability to eliminate her political enemies cleanly on her own, but also her continued need for his expert help in covering her tracks. Nijil had always found such matters easy enough to deal with. No one would suspect that the destruction of Valdore’s estate had resulted from anything other than a tragic, if unlikely, malfunction of the public utility grid that served Ir-Dartha. The chiefs of the military, the Continuing Committee of the Romulan Senate, and even Praetor Karzan himself would soon believe Valdore’s death to be merely another unfortunate happenstance. It was a common belief, among the moneyed and ruling elites of Romulus, that such calamities tended to occur in clusters.

But now Nijil had to put all of that to one side. He had to at least keep up the appearance of rebuilding the warp-seven stardrive program. Very shortly he would have a new supreme admiral to manage. And it was all because of one key fact to which he had not yet become accustomed, or allowed himself to accept:

Admiral Valdore was dead.

SIXTY-NINE

Outer ShiKahr, Vulcan

ALTHOUGH T’POL HAD EXPECTED the lights to be on inside her late mother’s home, she kept her phase pistol at the ready as she opened the front door and entered.

“Welcome home, T’Pol,” said Denak, who stood in the entry vestibule, showing no apparent concern over her display of caution.

She lowered her weapon as the door closed silently behind her. “Your request to use T’Les’s home as a safe house was logical.”

“Nevertheless,” he said as he turned and led the way through the narrow entryway toward the dwelling’s broad central living space, “you have my gratitude.”

“Ych’a is here with you?” T’Pol asked as they walked toward the living area.

“Yes. She has just returned from the Atlai’fehill system.”

Achernar, deep inside Romulan space, T’Pol thought. The star the Terrans call Alpha Eridani.

They came to a stop in the main living area, which Denak had left brightly illuminated to accommodate his guests, all three of whom— Ych’a and two Vulcan men who appeared considerably younger than Denak—were seated in one or another of the room’s few low chairs.

The guests rose to their feet, and after T’Pol and Ych’a exchanged perfunctory greetings, Denak gestured toward the two other men and said, “T’Pol, this is Tevik of Raal Province, and Sodok, a dealer in kevas and trillium.”

Tevik raised his right hand in the traditional split-fingered Vulcan salute, pairing the hand gesture with the time-honored greeting, “Live long and prosper.”

The man beside her, Sodok, presented a stark contrast, inarticulately clearing his throat while wringing his hands awkwardly as though he didn’t know what to do with them. As she made the expected response to Tevik’s greeting, T’Pol blinked repeatedly in an effort to conceal her intense surprise. Despite the minor surgical alterations their faces had undergone since she had last seen either of them, T’Pol knew she was acquainted with both men, one via combat, and the other through far more intimate channels of communication.

After her previous encounter with “Tevik”—it had occurred in a Romulan dissident stronghold on Taugus III, where she had stunned him unconscious with her phase pistol, thereby preempting a disruptor blast aimed squarely at Tucker—she had learned that Terix was a Romulan centurion. Although “Tevik” lacked Terix’s distinctive Romulan brow ridge, T’Pol recognized him.

And although “Sodok” looked Vulcan, T’Pol knew his real identity as well: Commander Charles Anthony Tucker III, a man with whom she shared a unique bond.

T’Pol held herself rigid and maintained her silence, restraining herself from reacting in an outwardly noticeable way. Although she found it enormously gratifying to discover that Trip was alive and apparently unharmed, she was not privy to how much the others present knew either about Trip’s real identity or his ongoing espionage work. She had no wish to compromise him, or worse, to place his life in any greater jeopardy than it might be already.

And while she found it sorely tempting to blurt out a warning to everyone present concerning “Tevik,” T’Pol refrained, since that action, too, carried with it the possibility of compromising Trip.

Belatedly, T’Pol noticed that Ych’a was speaking to her, though she had no recollection of what the other woman had said.

“Pardon me?” T’Pol said, feeling foolish.

The corners of Ych’a’s usually stern mouth curled slightly, making her appear almost amused. “I said that for one who has spent so much time lately among the adepts of Mount Seleya, your emotions are surprisingly close to the surface.”

“Indeed,” Denak said with a slow and somber nod. “I was about to make much the same comment. Did you notice that as well, Sodok?”

“Yes.” Trip mumbled, looking at T’Pol in an utterly dumbfounded fashion.

“Do not be concerned,” Ych’a said, her gaze locked upon T’Pol’s. “We are all working toward the same goal.”

T’Pol sat down heavily on one of her mother’s chairs. “Please explain.”

SEVENTY

The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

NIJIL HAD TURNED to leave the office once First Consul T’Leikha released him to return to his duties. But before he reached the door, her comm unit emitted a piercing electronic tone—a tone that Nijil knew heralded a high-priority incoming communication.

He paused momentarily on the threshold and glanced back at her, prepared to move on instantly should she so much as scowl at him. But the look of dismayed surprise on T’Leikha’s face made his feet throw down roots. All of her color had abruptly drained away.

“It’s from Valdore,” she said, incredulous.

Nijil stepped back into her office and sealed the door behind him. “The admiral is alive?” he whispered in disbelief, though he found the notion curiously easy to accept; after all, in all the images of the post-detonation wreckage he had seen, he had never so much as glimpsed a body.

The world suddenly began to spin wildly about him. Valdore doesn’t know about my involvement, he told himself. He’s not omniscient. He couldn’t possibly know.

But he also wasn’t supposed to have been able to survive.

The Krocton Segment, Dartha, Romulus

“T’Luadh, I believe the First Consul may actually have soiled herself when my face appeared on her terminal,” Valdore said to the woman who sat across the dining room table from him, slurping her bowl of aafvun’in’hhui mollusk soup with noisy gusto. “I’m still more than a little surprised that she found the courage to strike at me so brazenly.”

“This wasn’t about courage, Admiral,” the spy said, setting down her bowl. “If it were, T’Leikha simply would have challenged you to a duel.”

Valdore pushed his own half-eaten plate of viinerine to the side— he had developed a taste for simple military fare decades ago, and had never lost the habit—and slowly swirled his glass of kali-fal. He savored the blue liquor’s pungent aroma as much as he did the continued rock-steadiness of his nerves.

“True enough,” he said. For most of his adult life, in fact, Valdore had been keenly aware of the complex, indirect machinations of which members of the Romulan Senate were capable. This knowledge was the primary reason he had over the years established a number of safe houses such as this one, in Dartha and elsewhere, some of which he felt certain that not even the Tal Shiar knew about. He’d spent enough time in the Senate prior to his initial fall from grace—and before his subsequent military career—to gain a thorough understanding of the lethal deviousness of the Empire’s political schemers.

Which was why he had sent Darule, Vela, and Vool away to one of his most remote safe houses just yesterday, shortly after Tal Shiar operative T’Luadh had initially apprised him of the First Consul’s plot—a scheme that his own Commander Khazara had not only corroborated, using discreetly intercepted comm traffic, but which he had also successfully backtraced through Chief Technologist Nijil’s office. Thanks either to skill or blind luck, a number of communications between Nijil and known associates of the antigovernment Ejhoi Ormiin dissident faction had turned up. It appeared that Nijil had used his dissident connections to engineer last year’s assassination of Doctor Ehrehin, the original developer of the still uncompleted avaihh lli vastam stardrive project.

Using the dissidents to arrange Ehrehin’s murder may simply have been Nijil’s most expeditious means of poaching the most prestigious undertaking of Ehrehin’s long career. Or it might have been indicative of a deeper, far more dangerous ideological bent. It left Valdore wondering whether Nijil’s slow progress on the high warp project came from the difficulties of the physics or from a desire to confound the Empire’s efforts. Whatever Nijil’s agenda might ultimately prove to be, Valdore was certain of at least two things: first, Khazara was now in line for a promotion; and second, Valdore had something quite different in mind for both Nijil and T’Leikha.

“How is your family adjusting to their present... low profile?” T’Leikha said as she helped herself to another osol twist from the platter. Judging from her lean proportions, he doubted she ate such trifles very often. Valdore himself had never developed a taste for the damned things—they were far too sour—but his servants often left heaps of them out for his visitors, perhaps guided by the knowledge that the confections wouldn’t tempt him to overindulge.

“Darule says that Gal Gath’thong is lovely this time of year,” he said. “Vela and Vool haven’t seen the firefalls since they were in secondary school.”

T’Luadh answered with a knowing nod. “Gal Gath’thong. Good choice.”

Of course, Valdore had sequestered his family nowhere near Gal Gath’thong. As trusted an adviser and ally as T’Luadh had become, he never allowed himself to forget that she was attached to the Tal Shiar, which commanded her primary loyalty. And he was not about to reveal his family’s present whereabouts to the Tal Shiar. Let them unearth the truth themselves, if they really considered it worth discovering. For all he knew, T’Luadh already knew that his family was actually elsewhere in the Krocton Segment’s southeast district this very moment, and she was simply humoring him.

“Are you pleased with the progress your Haakonan-front forces are making in redeploying to Coalition space?” she said, adroitly changing the subject between bites of her osol twist. “Commander Khazara’s report on the subject indicated that the redeployment was proceeding more quickly than even some of the most optimistic logistical projections.”

Valdore wondered how T’Luadh, or her Tal Shiar puppet masters, had gotten hold of Khazara’s report, which was intended for his own eyes alone. Her personal interest in the fleet’s redeployment was probably perfunctory at best; he knew that she was really delivering a subtle reminder that he’d be hard pressed to keep anything truly secret from her.

“I think the fleet still needs some serious shoring up at our Coalition lines,” he said, deliberately sticking to safe generalities.

“Yes. The loss of D’caernu’mneani Lli was an alarming development. But our new praetor trusts it will not be repeated elsewhere.”

“Thanks to the redeployment, I will not only avoid repeating it, I will undo it.”

She raised her glass of kali-fal in a salute. “The praetor will be delighted when I report that to him. I drink to your making good on that promise, and to the Empire.”

Valdore raised his own glass in response, but remained silent. So not only must you remind me that you can read my mail with impunity, he thought, but you also must reiterate that the Tal Shiar has at least as much access to Karzan’s ear as I do.

T’Luadh drained her glass and set it down on the table. “What will you do next, Admiral?” she said. “Regarding First Consul T’Leikha and your chief technologist, I mean.”

Valdore allowed a death’s head grin to split his craggy, weather beaten face. “I am content to leave Nijil working in his present position—for now. He may become complacent, grow careless again, and expose whole nests of Ejhoi Ormiin vermin as a consequence.”

T’Luadh grinned. “Well played, Admiral. You’re beginning to think like a veteran Tal Shiar field operative. And what of the first consul?”

“I shall bide my time with her as well.”

“Wise, Admiral. Now that Senator Vrax is out of prison, I would think you’d have to get in line behind him to get revenge against T’Leikha.”

“Perhaps,” Valdore said. “Vrax is considerably more patient than I am, T’Luadh.”

“Does that mean you do plan to retaliate against the first consul before Vrax does?”

He shrugged. “Retaliate for what? The destruction of my residence has been officially recognized as purely accidental, has it not? Therefore I needn’t be in a rush to seek revenge.”

She nodded, finally seeming to take his meaning: Once a suitable time interval had passed, similar “accidents” could be relied upon to befall both T’Leikha and Nijil, no doubt at the times and in the places they were least likely to expect them.

Provided, of course, that Valdore did not wait so long as to allow T’Leikha to strike preemptively against him.

SEVENTY-ONE

Northern ShiKahr, Vulcan

IN ONE OF THE HOUSE’S spare bedrooms, Tucker stood regarding T’Pol in silence, utterly at a loss for words as she stared back at him with equal intensity. Neither of them spoke, and although they weren’t in physical contact, he could feel her presence intensely, the durable telepathic bond they shared no longer attenuated by parsecs of distance. The bond nevertheless still apparently functioned as a kind of open carrier wave, the conductor of a telepathic reverberation that reminded him of the echo that occurred when one spoke to someone in person and through an open comm channel simultaneously.

At the moment, however, the link served as a conduit for the loudest silence Trip had ever heard, a roaring ocean of emotional white noise.

This was the first time he’d been alone with her—hell, it was one of the very few times they’d even both been in the same sector—since that memorable day on Taugus III, more than eight months ago. Now, as then, he wanted nothing more than to take her into his arms and disperse all the built-up tension he could feel roiling within them both—and maybe break some of the furniture in the process.

Down, boy, he told himself in some private corner of his innermost thoughts. He felt like a randy teenager, knowing that T’Pol’s mother had lived in this house not all that long ago. Besides, we still have company out there in the living room. True enough, Ych’a had all but banished them both from the main living area in order to rid herself of anything that might break her concentration or distract her from her present task. The time had come for one of Centurion Terix’s “therapeutic mind-melds,” the latest in a series of telepathic treatments necessary to maintain the fiction that the Romulan Centurion Terix was actually the Vulcan V’Shar operative Tevik.

T’Pol’s eyes were aflame in the room’s dim light, confirming that she, too, had to struggle against the same impulses he was experiencing.

“I need...” she said.

“Yes?” Stepping toward her, he realized he was bracing himself, his muscles tensing. He hadn’t forgotten the wicked shoulder bruise she’d given him on Taugus III, when in her passion she’d slammed him into one of the seats on the small Romulan scoutship he’d been using at the time.

She shook her head, as though rousing herself from the thrall of some magical spell. “I need... to sweep this room for listening devices.”

“Oh. Yeah. Of course, right.” Putting aside his commingled disappointment and relief, Trip realized that her idea was a sound one; even before he’d started working alongside a telepathically tamed Romulan, he’d come to appreciate the survival value in keeping his guard up as much as possible. And T’Pol had already mentioned that this house had been in the care of the master spy Denak ever since T’Les’s passing almost two years earlier.

Once T’Pol appeared satisfied that no one was eavesdropping on them, Trip said, “Ych’a told you what I’ve been up to lately, more or less. But you haven’t said what brought you back to the old hometown.”

“Captain Archer sent me,” she said with no hesitation. “My mission was to persuade Administrator T’Pau to bring Vulcan into the war.”

“Was,” Trip said. “I take it that T’Pau didn’t listen to you.”

“No,” T’Pol said, looking almost sad as she sat at the foot of the low, futonlike bed. Her eyes, however, were still aflame, though Trip did his best to pretend not to notice.

“Did she have a better excuse than the one she and Soval gave to the Coalition Council?” Trip wanted to know.

T’Pol stared off into the middle distance, apparently gathering her thoughts. “Administrator T’Pau has... a great deal on her mind at the moment,” she finally said, effectively explaining nothing.

Though he remained standing—he didn’t trust himself at the moment to touch her, or even to sit beside her—Trip wanted to do whatever he could to bolster her spirits.

“Maybe she just needs more time to think the problem all the way through,” he said. “Maybe if we both went to see her togeth—”

“I do not wish to disrupt your mission,” she said, interrupting. “Your objectives may suffer if you involve yourself in this. Besides, it is an endeavor that is likely to prove futile.”

“T’Pol, once I finish debriefing with the V’Shar about the Achernar mission, I expect to be done with all of this covert cloak-and-dagger crap, forever and ever, amen. I have no other objectives at the moment.” He paused, pointing at the sides of his face with both index fingers. “Other than hanging up these ears and heading home, that is.”

“Will you return to Starfleet?”

He nodded. “They’re not gonna be able to keep me away, at least as long as the freakin’ Romulans keep trying to finish what the Xindi started. But I’ve had a bellyful of pretending to be dead for some spook bureau, whether it’s attached to Earth or Vulcan. Besides, I want my life back.”

“And what do you plan to do with that life?”

“I haven’t quite figured that part out yet,” he said with a shrug. “Maybe I’ll go back aboard Enterprise and take charge of the old gal’s engine room.” With a playful grin, he added, “Wanna come along?”

She looked up at him. Something changed very subtly along the invisible cable that connected them, like a modulation in either amplitude or frequency, or a sudden increase in the distance between the line’s two end points. Or perhaps it was something else entirely, something that defied any engineering-metaphorical description. He searched her eyes and found it; alongside the passion he knew they were both still struggling to keep at bay, he saw misery and regret, emotional floodwaters that threatened to inundate the levies of her Vulcan reserve.

I’m losing her, he thought. Again. Or was it the other way around?

“My mission has ended in failure,” she said, lowering her gaze. “I do not know whether I can face Captain Archer ever again. Not after failing him twice in as many years.”

It took Trip a moment to realize that the previous failure to which she was alluding was the unauthorized rescue mission she had mounted last year. Though her plan had certainly been an ill-advised one, nobody could deny that she had prevented Terix from frying him with a disruptor pistol, with some help from Malcolm Reed. The ends might not justify the means, but results still had to count for something.

He sat down next to her, reaching out for her hands, which had begun wringing each other in her lap in a curiously un-Vulcan way. “Hey. T’Pol. The captain didn’t expect you to fall on your sword for coming after me. And he’s not gonna expect you to do it now.”

She looked at him. Her dark eyes had not only remained aflame, that flame had brightened to a roaring blaze.

Oh, hell, he thought as he took her in his arms and let the conflagration consume them both.

T’Pol could no longer deny the demands of the bond that linked her so inextricably to this emotional, illogical, noble Terran. And she no longer wanted even to try.

They disrobed quickly, urgently, their bodies moving together with abandon, and she experienced it all with the vivid clarity of a lucid dream. Their connection, of course, went far beyond the physical level. It was far more profound than mere transactions of limbic and endocrine systems, hormones and nerve endings. The mind-link that still joined them was no longer stretched thin and taut across interstellar distances. They were together—mentally and spiritually as well as physically—joining and becoming one with a furious intensity that even their memorable Taugus III encounter last year had lacked.

Although Trip had seemed resistant at first, demonstrating the inborn reticence natural to a member of an almost entirely nontelepathic species, her gentle insistence gradually persuaded him to lower his mental barriers as he had the physical ones. T’Pol knew that she lacked schooling in many of the intricacies of the Syrrannite discipline of the mind-meld—when she’d had to meld with Hoshi Sato two years earlier, she had required the guidance of Jonathan Archer, whose brief psionic encounter with Surak had made the captain more adept at the practice than his Vulcan first officer. But her desire to be with Trip, to reduce the space between them to a value of zero or less, to reach or surpass whatever Planck-scale distance might limit the proximity of their two living spirits, guided her.

She knew that he could see, hear, feel, touch, and taste virtually everything in her mind. She felt his internal barriers teeter and fall one by one as he allowed her the very same access to his own awareness, his experiences, his memories, his innermost thoughts and fears and hopes.

In a hailstorm of fast-moving and fragmentary imagery, she saw Trip’s family. His parents, Charles Junior and Elaine. His brother Albert, Bert’s husband Miguel, and their son Owen. His late sister Lizzie, slain by the Xindi. Baby Elizabeth, and the wrenching pain of losing her as well. T’Pol herself, a convergence of fascination and exasperation. Other friends and crewmates, living and dead. Doctor Ehrehin i’Ramnau tr’Avrak and Tinh Hoc Phuong, both of whom became hapless casualties of Romulan treachery. Terix, foe and friend, enemy and ally, a source of anxiety and danger even now.

And Sopek—or was it Ch’uivh?—capturing Trip, Ych’a, and Terix aboard a Vulcan vessel that she knew, courtesy of Trip’s running memories, was moored at the Romulan shipbuilding complex deep in the Achernar system. Standing ghostlike on Sopek’s bridge, T’Pol saw the livid ball of fire and wreckage that had erupted from the exploding the Romulan shipyard.

And then she was standing beside Trip on solid ground, on a Minshara-class world whose sere sky was dominated by a bloated, strangely flattened blue-white star—Achernar, from the look of it, which meant that the planet had to be Achernar II—with no apparent passage of time having followed the successful sabotage mission.

More imagery and sound tumbled past, around, and through her, commingling with sensory inputs of every imaginable kind. It all came in an increasingly frenetic rush as their mutual sharing deepened and the pace of their physical lovemaking grew more urgent, finally building toward a blinding release that forced them both, instinctively, to narrow the bandwidth of their connection and slowly withdraw from each other.

Afterward T’Pol gradually returned to her body, which she noted was slick with perspiration, hers and his both. Trip lay alongside her, in a similarly winded condition.

“Wow,” she heard him whisper as he struggled to catch his breath. “Now I know what a supernova feels like up close and personal.”

Trip’s offhand remark made T’Pol wonder what sort of future might lie ahead for them as a couple. Indeed, a supernova might indeed be an apt analogy for their unlikely relationship: preternaturally bright and hot, yet ultimately destructive and short-lived.

Where could they go from here? And how long could they stay there?

She decided it didn’t matter. We’ve crossed the Rubicon, let the bridge be burned behind me, come what may, she thought, borrowing the half-remembered phrase from a long-dead leader of an extinct empire from Trip’s homeworld. Or perhaps she had mentally “overheard” Trip thinking the very same thing during the meld.

Setting aside her personal concerns, T’Pol decided to tend to an even more urgent issue to which the mind-meld had alerted her. Raising herself up onto one elbow, she looked him straight in the eye.

“Trip, why didn’t you say anything earlier about your encounter with Sopek at Achernar?”

He turned and looked at her strangely. Then a look of discomfited realization crossed his face. “I don’t know. I guess it must have slipped my mind somehow. Funny.”

T’Pol knew from their meld what he meant, but she also knew that he knew something wasn’t right.

“You thought only of us.” she said. “But you do remember your encounter with Sopek now?”

“Sure. I’ve been at the business end of that guy’s disruptor too many times to forget about him for very long. This time he took all three of us prisoner, me, Ych’a, and Terix.”

As before, she sensed no willful evasion on Trip’s part. “And do you recall precisely how you freed yourselves, and reached Achernar II afterward?”

He appeared to consider her question for a moment. Then his eyes grew large with evident alarm, ratcheting up her suspicion to a nearly palpable certainty.

Something was indeed very, very wrong.

Once again, Tevik closed his eyes. Long, delicate fingers touched his face, probed his temples. And moments thereafter he floated in a cool, dark void, a familiar place that both comforted and smothered him. He tried to relax, as Ych’a advised. Tevik sought peace.

No. Not Tevik. Not the spy. The soldier.

I am Terix. Centurion of Admiral Valdore’s Fifth Legion, in the service of our glorious Praetor D’deridex. Centurion Terix!

Then he began remembering things. Or rather, things were being forced into his memory. Tevik’s first bowl of plomeek soup, and his pet sehlat. Tevik’s kahs-wan ordeal. His abortive first term at the Vulcan Science Academy. Tevik’s perilous ascent of the L-langon Mountains during his Vulcan basic military training—

—and as he neared the summit, a gleaming dathe’anofv-sen, a traditional Romulan Honor Blade, appeared in his hand. He thrust it into the mountainside, to no effect. He clung to the blade, even after he lost his footing and fell off the slope. He tumbled back into the embrace of the void, at which he slashed ineffectually with his blade.

Perhaps he could not slay the corrupting influence of the void with a sword. But he could shout his name into it.

I am Centurion Terix!

The sound of a brief, pained shout instantly snapped Trip out of the afterglow and into a state of total alertness.

“Did you hear that, or did I dream it?” he said as he rolled out of bed and began searching the floor for his hastily discarded trousers and traveling robe.

“I heard it as well,” T’Pol said. She rose from the tangle of bedsheets and quickly recovered her own clothing.

Moments later, Trip stood disheveled but decent beside a much tidier-looking T’Pol in the house’s broad central living area. Terix— Trip still had trouble thinking of him as Tevik of Vulcan—sat on the low sofa, flanked by Ych’a and Denak, each of whom had applied both hands to one of Terix’s temples, their digits splayed like crab legs on either side of the centurion’s head. The trio seemed to be frozen in place, Denak and Ych’a transformed into matching bookends of focus and concentration. They sandwiched Terix, whose expression was locked in an attitude of distress, if not outright agony.

“A double-team mind-meld,” Trip said. “That’s not something you see every day.”

“What is wrong with Tevik?” T’Pol asked, addressing Denak, Ych’a, or both. Neither Vulcan responded.

But a few moments later, motion began to return to Denak as he slowly disengaged from Terix/Tevik, leaving the Romulan and Ych’a frozen in a meld that had clearly gone terribly awry.

“I do not know for certain,” Denak said after T’Pol had repeated her question. “A complication... has arisen.”

And water is wet, too, Trip thought. Aloud, he said, “What kind of complication?”

Denak seemed at last to rouse himself fully into ordinary consciousness. Turning to face Trip, he said, “As Ych’a explained it to me, Tevik requires therapeutic mind-melds periodically. She was in the midst of administering one, as is her habit when they work together in the field.”

“I was not aware that Ych’a had become a credentialed mind-meld therapist,” T’Pol said, a not-very-subtle tone of judgment underlying her words.

Denak raised an eyebrow, apparently displeased by T’Pol’s implication. “As long-practicing Syrrannites, both Ych’a and myself are qualified.”

“Granted,” T’Pol said. “But why did both of you participate in this particular meld?”

“Ych’a initiated the procedure, per Tevik’s treatment schedule. Tevik’s condition apparently worsened in the midst of the meld, however. She required my assistance.”

“What exactly is... Tevik supposed to be suffering from?” Trip asked. Though he was well aware of the real reasons behind the ongoing mind-meld treatment regime, he wondered how much of the plain truth Ych’a had opted to share with her husband.

“Ych’a explained that he suffers from the chronic aftereffects of an old bout of Pa’nar Syndrome. He contracted it decades ago during a botched V’Shar mind-meld intended to introduce false memories in support of an undercover identity.”

Good cover story, Trip thought, though he wondered how she expected to continue to keep the truth concealed from a husband who appeared to be just as skilled a telepath as she was—and who had apparently just emerged from a meld with both Ych’a and Terix.

And more importantly, why did she think she needed to conceal such a thing from Denak? He was, after all, not only her husband, but also a veteran V’Shar operative who was ostensibly on the same side she was.

“May I ask which identity?” T’Pol asked.

Denak apparently saw no reason to try to conceal anything from his old colleague. “That of Centurion Terix, of course.”

So Ych’a’s been feeding Denak the same line of cowpucky we’ve been serving up to Terix, Trip thought. Terix thinks his real life as a Romulan is a lie, and now so does Denak. Though he bore no love for the Romulans in general—or for Centurion Terix in particular—Trip felt soiled by the role he had played, and continued to play. Why couldn’t Ych’a have told Denak the truth? He couldn’t help but speculate about how many other lies and half-truths she might have sold Denak, not to mention T’Pol, concerning her V’Shar assignments over the years.

And I also have to wonder what sort of crap she’s been feeding me to get my help when all I’ve wanted to do for the past year is just go home and put all this spy stuff behind me.

But the only way to answer those questions was to confront Ych’a directly. Addressing Denak, Trip said, “When do you expect her to come out of this?”

Now it was Denak’s turn to look distressed, at least for a Vulcan. “She should have broken from the meld when I did. Something has gone wrong.”

T’Pol wasn’t entirely certain what she should do. But she knew she had to do something.

Seeing no alternative, she began to place the fingers of both hands on the qui’lari—the natural bioelectrical focal points for Vulcan touchtelepathy—located at Ych’a’s temples.

“My mind to your mind,” she said. “My thoughts—”

“Exactly what do you think you’re doing?” Trip said, interrupting as he stepped in close to her. He seemed to be considering grabbing her by the wrists, restraining her. She discouraged him with a cold, hard glare.

“Ych’a is in need of assistance,” she said. “Her vital signs are declining, as are Tevik’s.”

“Indeed,” Denak said. “But I was not aware that you possessed sufficient training in the Syrrannite disciplines to render aid.”

T’Pol did not withdraw her hands, but merely spread her fingers in an effort to access Ych’a’s mind. “She is my friend. I cannot stand by and do nothing.”

“This meld has become dangerous,” Denak said. “I cannot allow you to attempt to interpose yourself alone.”

“Then help me,” T’Pol said.

“Why don’t we just call a medic?” Trip said.

T’Pol glared again at Trip, who seemed to grasp her meaning immediately; despite the close genetic relationship between Vulcans and Romulans—a linkage of which most Vulcans were unaware—any medical scan of Terix would be all but certain to raise some very ticklish questions.

“Do what you have to do, T’Pol,” Trip said, backing away slightly. “Both of you.”

“It is true that I do not possess your training, Denak,” T’Pol said. She tried to focus all of her attention on joining in on the already initiated meld, but it felt as though some barrier stood in her way. “Therefore I require your help.”

“Very well,” Denak said, apparently unfazed by his recent ejection from the very same meld. He placed one hand on Ych’a’s forehead, and the other on Terix’s.

“My mind to your mind,” T’Pol intoned. “My thoughts to your thoughts.”

Behind her, she heard Trip mutter, “My God, it’s a telepathic orgy.” She ignored him, concentrating.

And the barrier that had stood between her and the meld abruptly vanished, dropping her headlong into infinity.

The images had come faster and in even more of a free-form, disassociated jumble than they had during her mating with Trip. The chaotic, hypersensory experience was a veritable high-pressure fire hose of thought and emotion, far more intense and vibrant than she had anticipated. Whether this was because so many individuals had attempted to link together simultaneously, or because one of the participants was a highly emotional Romulan, or because of her own shortcomings in the psionic disciplines—or perhaps a mixture of all of those reasons—the experience had left her by turns confused, exhilarated, and enervated.

Although T’Pol’s mind had all but shut itself down in what was doubtless an instinctual act of neurological self-preservation, consciousness slowly began to return to her, like a hla’meth leaf adrift on the relentless currents of the Voroth Sea.

She heard a voice that sounded impossibly distant. “She’s coming around.”

T’Pol opened her eyes. Trip’s face hovered before her. She was back in her mother’s home—her home—and it was morning, not long after dawn.

She tried to speak, but could barely muster a whisper. “Trip.”

Trip was kneeling beside the low sofa on which she lay, holding her hand gently. He leaned close to her ear and whispered, “That’s Sodok, sweetie. Remember?”

She sat upright suddenly, as if jolted by a strong high-voltage current; she had momentarily forgotten that neither Denak nor Terix were supposed to be privy to Trip’s real name, nor even the fact that he wasn’t Vulcan.

“Relax,” Trip said. “Don’t strain yourself.”

She settled back on the sofa and saw that Ych’a and Denak, as well as the man called Tevik, now stood around her, each of them regarding her with apparent concern.

“You were very nearly lost to us during that mind-meld,” Denak said.

“I will recover,” she said. Casting her gaze toward Ych’a and Tevik/Terix, she said, “And I am gratified to see that neither of you seem to have suffered any ill effects either.”

“What do you recall from the meld?” Ych’a asked.

T’Pol shook her head. “Nothing. Nothing at all. I believe I may even have failed to achieve a meld. I was never trained in the Syrrannite fashion.”

Ych’a nodded, though T’Pol’s lie did not appear to have entirely satisfied her curiosity. “We should leave you to rest,” she said, then moved toward the door. Denak and Tevik followed suit.

Apparently eager to speak to her alone, Trip remained beside the sofa. “I’ll stay with her,” he said. “In case she needs any help.”

Pausing on the room’s threshold, the others nodded, then took their leave.

Once he was alone with T’Pol, Trip said, “All right. What really happened?”

Signaling for quiet, T’Pol rose unsteadily to her feet, shooing away his attempt to help her stand. Trip waited with unconcealed concern while she found her scanner and made another sweep for listening devices. As before, none turned up.

“You lied to her,” Trip said. “I thought Vulcans didn’t do that.”

“I thought that your association with a clandestine Vulcan intelligence agency might have disabused you of that notion by now.”

“All right. So you Vulcans are just bad at lying. And you’re such a bad liar that you telegraphed the fact that you learned something important during your mental ménage-a-four—something that nearly did you in.”

She nodded. “Some of what I saw is still fragmentary in my mind. I am still processing much of what I encountered. But I believe I can already state a number of things conclusively.”

“Such as?”

“You and Tevik. Or Terix. The two of you have something fundamental in common.”

“Besides the ears?”

She smiled, uncharastically. “Both of you have the same gap in your memory concerning your Achernar mission. Specifically, with regard to what happened in between the time Sopek captured you and when you found yourselves safely delivered back to Achernar II.”

“Ych’a was there, too. Do you suppose she remembers anything we don’t?”

“Unfortunately,” T’Pol said, “I wasn’t able to tell for certain during the meld; Ych’a has an extremely disciplined mind.” Nevertheless, she was beginning to suspect that the answer to Trip’s question was “yes.”

“I seriously doubt that Sopek would have let us go without a fight,” Trip said. “And he’s never been bashful about killing people in cold blood. Ych’a must have found a way to turn the tables on Sopek and rescue us.”

“Or else she simply persuaded him that you would all be more valuable to him alive than dead,” T’Pol said.

“Are you saying you think Sopek and Ych’a are in cahoots?” After she raised a questioning eyebrow, he added, “Do you think they’re working together?”

T’Pol bit back a tart response. “Ych’a is one of my oldest friends, Trip. I am making no such accusation. I merely find it strange that neither you nor Terix are presently able to access your memories of a recent shared experience.”

Trip stroked his chin thoughtfully, a peculiar mannerism for one who looked so Vulcan. “The therapeutic mind-melds are all about memory suppression. Ych’a has had to do them for months to keep Terix’s Romulan identity pushed down—to keep him convinced that he’s really one of the good guys, and that Terix’s memories are just stray odds and ends left over from one of Tevik’s old V’Shar cover identities.”

T’Pol nodded, though the notion appalled her. Romulan or not, Terix was still a sentient being with a basic right to the integrity of his identity. Violating that right was anathema to her. Still, she was pragmatic enough to understand that Terix could be an invaluable Romulan intelligence source going forward—he had already proved indispensable to Ych’a and Trip in their Achernar operation—and allowing his Romulan identity to come to the fore while he was on Vulcan would be irresponsible. But what of his future? The logic of practicality argued against his repatriation to Romulus, and the logic of ethics forbade simply killing him once his usefulness was at an end.

She wondered how Surak might have squared this particular ethical circle—and acknowledged with no small amount of relief that the matter was well above her pay grade; responsibility for such questions lay in Administrator T’Pau’s lap, not in T’Pol’s.

“Memory suppression,” T’Pol repeated, trying to remain on topic. “From what I’ve observed, Terix’s Romulan memories have not been easy to keep subjugated. His real identity continues trying to reassert itself, even now. Ych’a expended considerable effort to force the Terix persona to yield to the synthetic identity of Tevik. That appears to be why she nearly failed to extricate herself from the meld.”

“You mean our meek, mild-mannered Tevik might suddenly ‘go Romulan’ on us?”

“The danger may not be imminent at the moment. But without a continued regime of frequent melds to keep his memory blocks firmly in place, I would judge that outcome to be an eventual certainty.”

Trip rose and began pacing beside the sofa. “Crap. I really hate being right all the time. I knew this whole memory suppression thing was a good, old-fashioned bad idea right from the start.”

“Perhaps it is,” T’Pol said. “But I can certainly understand why Ych’a perceived the need to suppress much of Terix’s memory, given the use to which she, or the V’Shar, has decided to put him. But I must question the need to suppress your memories, however.”

“How do we know that’s what really happened?” Trip said, coming to a stop. “I mean, I expect Ych’a not to be entirely candid, or even to tell lies; she’s a spy, after all. But the thought that she might have tampered with my memories...” He trailed off, perhaps having difficulty digesting the idea that he may have suffered such a deep, fundamental violation without even knowing about it.

“Ych’a has tampered with Terix’s memories,” T’Pol pointed out. “Do you honestly believe it impossible that she might have decided it had become necessary to do the same to you? She certainly has the ability.”

“Maybe. But judging from my own, um, limited direct experience with this stuff, a mind-meld seems sort of like a huge fun-house mirror for the mind, or a kind of dreamscape. You can never be entirely sure what you’re looking at. Maybe you just misinterpreted something you saw.”

“Perhaps. However, that would not explain the gap in your memory.”

“No. But it might account for your thinking you saw something inside Terix’s head right after you caught a glimpse of what you think was the exact same thing in mine. I can remember everything important that happened on that mission, including the finish—the explosion that wiped out the Romulan warp-seven prototype starship and the stolen Vulcan ship.”

T’Pol nodded. Via Trip’s memories, she had witnessed the same sequence of events, though she hadn’t actually seen the explosion consume the vessels that Trip had described; both ships were supposed to have been moored inside the enclosed shipyard when its reactor core went critical and tore the entire facility apart, and thus wouldn’t have been visible to outside eyes at the time.

“As far as you know,” T’Pol pointed out.

It had struck her that Trip and Terix could indeed have shared an experience that Ych’a might wish to see suppressed—the knowledge that they only appeared to have accomplished their mission objective. But what end would such a betrayal on Ych’a’s part serve? Still, T’Pol had been dealing with a government that appeared rife with both foolish idealism and corruption, and perhaps other failings that she had yet to bring to light. She had to concede that anything was possible. Including the prospect that there was no one, other than Trip, whom she could afford to trust implicitly, even among the ranks of her oldest friends.

“Of course it’s as far as I know, T’Pol,” Trip said, looking perplexed. “What are you trying to say? That you don’t trust me to remember what I saw?”

“I was merely beginning to wonder,” she said, “whether Ych’a and Sopek know the same things that you and I do—but also know them somewhat... differently.”

SEVENTY-TWO

Sunday, April 4, 2156
Columbia, near Tellar

“THE LEAD SHIP in the convoy confirms receipt of the pergium consignment, Captain,” Ensign Valerian reported from the comm station.

It’s about damned time, Erika Hernandez thought. As vital as pergium could be to the life-support systems employed by the civilian and military outposts Earth had established in some of the galaxy’s unfriendlier reaches, the dilithium, uridium, gallicite, and other warrelated matériel this convoy carried might prove even more crucial, at least in the short term.

Besides, she’d been getting damned antsy from all the waiting around she’d been doing of late.

“Very good, Sidra,” she said, nodding to the comm officer before turning toward the helm. “Reiko, lay in a course for the Onias sector. Keep pace with the convoy’s lead ship.” Addressing the whole bridge, she added, “And keep your eyes peeled for Romulans.”

“Aye, Captain,” Lieutenant Reiko Akagi said, working the helm with a surgeon’s precision.

“Onias or bust,” said Commander Veronica Fletcher, who stood beside Hernandez’s chair as she watched the convoy’s lead ship on the main viewer.

“I’ll try to go easy on the ‘bust’ part,” Lieutenant Thayer said from tactical. “But some of that could be up to the Romulans.”

The possibility of running into a Romulan sneak attack was a very real one, particularly after the convoy reached its destination. Once there, Columbia would be expected to escort a second group of ships, a mining convoy, out of the Onias sector and back toward the Coalition’s core worlds. At the farthest extremity of her route, Columbia would be at the crossroads of both the Romulan and Klingon Empires, not to mention about as far from Earth as Hernandez had ever ventured.

To say that Columbia and her charges would be vulnerable at that point struck Hernandez as an understatement; it was at such times that she drew genuine comfort from the presence aboard Columbia of Major Foyle and the three-dozen-strong company of MACO troopers under his command.

Columbia surged forward, her latest convoy escort mission under way at long last. But Hernandez remained restless. The convoy’s progress would be slow, and she ached to get back into the fight against the Romulans. Unfortunately, Starfleet had decided that the safety of the convoy’s cargo was worth sidelining one of its best-armed vessels, at least for a while. Antsy though she was, the captain had to concede that Admiral Gardner’s tactical reasoning was sound.

As the fleet sped toward Onias, she thought of Jonathan Archer, who was even now gathering a reconstituted assault force around Enterprise. She was determined that Columbia would be part of that force before it moved on to its next big planned engagement. Hernandez hoped that the inevitable all-out war wouldn’t reach full throttle before Columbia was able to join it.

Maybe I missed Berengaria on account of babysitting duty, Jon, she thought. But you’d better not even think about trying to liberate Deneva without me.

SEVENTY-THREE

Sunday, April 4, 2156
Alaraph Central Spaceport, Zavijava V
Beta Virginis Colony

THE DUFFEL THAT CONTAINED her clothing and imaging equipment slung over her shoulder, Gannet Brooks watched the frantic press of humanity from one of the gallery’s upper levels. The bright yellow light of the star, after which both the colony and its spaceport were named, streamed in behind the frantic prospective travelers, suffusing them with an appropriately unearthly glow.

Brooks judged that comparatively few of these people had come merely to bid farewell to friends and loved ones; just about everyone she saw was laden down with baggage of some sort. These people meant to get off the planet, and quickly. She wondered what percentage of the multitude that crowded the departure gates had booked passage in advance, as opposed to the proportion that had decided to flee at the spur of the moment.

She reached into her pocket to extract the printed plastic flimsy that would get her aboard the transport scheduled for departure at 1430, local time. Nash McEvoy had just narrowed her options down to exactly one: boarding the transport when the time arrived to do so and returning to the Sol system. Her desire to remain here, to continue covering the war’s unfolding drama, had apparently counted for next to nothing.

In retrospect, she supposed this day was inevitable. Nash had been gently cajoling her for the past three weeks, first asking her to tone down her critiques of Starfleet’s conduct of the war, then suggesting that he might have to reassign her if she wouldn’t agree to be a little more “even-handed.”

She’d brushed him off. He’d persisted. They had repeated the pattern as necessary. Then she had appeared to relent, promising to think about it before ultimately going her own way. (She was amazed that this should have surprised him, even a little bit. What did he expect? Hadn’t he been paying attention all these years?)

She had begun to avoid taking his real-time subspace calls, stretching out the intervals between her receipt of his many messages— mostly of the “C’mon, Gannet, Starfleet is really riding my ass about you!” variety—and her ever more belated return calls.

He’d finally lowered the boom on her, making good on a threat that she’d always assumed to be an idle one born more of frustration than of practicality. She had never really believed he’d do it.

Despite the praise she’d recently heaped on Starfleet for the triumph at Berengaria VII, Nash had temporarily rescinded her Newstime credit chit—a fact that she had discovered while trying to use the chit to pay a restaurant tab. The maneuver had forced her to call him in real-time, right then and there, in order to sort things out with the annoyed restaurateur.

Now Nash wants me to do some nice, safe puff pieces about the Martian terraforming project, she thought, both discouraged and disgusted by the prospect. Even though the Romulans are coming.

The public address system finally announced that her transport was about to begin boarding. She allowed her ticket to dangle from between her index and middle fingers over the upper gallery’s railing. It would be so easy to just let go.

Snatching the ticket with her other hand, she shoved it into her pocket, and hated herself for her powerlessness. She straightened her duffel and wended her way through the crowd in the direction of her departure gate. As she walked, she tried to find something positive to focus on about the dreary homeward voyage that lay ahead.

A full ten minutes later, as she presented her ticket to the young woman at the departures desk, she thought she’d finally come up with something.

Credit chit or no credit chit, Brooks thought, there probably won’t be any shortage of trouble spots for me to point a lens at between here and Mars.

SEVENTY-FOUR

Day Thirteen, Month of T’ke’Tas
Wednesday, May 19, 2156
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

VALDORE BRACED HIMSELF the moment he saw the centurion cross the threshold of his office. It was obvious, both from his graver-than-usual countenance and from the bone-whiteness of his complexion, that he was burdened with bad tidings.

“Go ahead, Centurion,” Valdore said, rising from behind his massive desk. He did not wish to be trapped behind it.

“Artaleirh has been attacked, Admiral,” the centurion said. “Early reports indicate that the Trilakis settlement has been razed. Admiral Dagarth’s vessel, the Nel Trenco, responded, but is now out of contact and presumed lost. The agricultural world of Virinat is on high alert, but remains unmolested at the moment.”

Valdore almost wished he had remained seated. This was a stunning blow. He had recently promoted Dagarth, rewarding both her brilliant performance in last year’s test deployments of the arrenhe’hwiua telecapture device and her key contributions to the most recent modifications Nijil had made to that weapon. Dagarth’s efforts had greatly increased the telecapture system’s resistance to the recent Coalition countermeasures and solved certain production problems, enabling a substantial increase in the speed of the weapon’s manufacturing process. This had greatly increased the device’s availability to the Empire’s ships of the line, including many that were already bound for Coalition space.

But even more alarming was the matter of the location of the hostiles’ latest target: the Artaleirh system lay deep inside Romulan territory, nowhere near any of the fleet’s recent engagements, as did Virinat. And, possibly worst of all, the Trilakis settlement was intimately linked to a new military shipbuilding facility that Valdore had hoped to make fully operational in the very near future.

“How did the hevam manage to penetrate so deeply into our territory?” he said, processing his shock by thinking aloud.

“It was not the Earthers, Admiral,” the centurion said. “The attackers came from the Empire’s other flank—from Haakona.”

Valdore returned to his desk and settled heavily into his chair.

“Llhusra,” he cursed. At least some of the ships and matériel he had just redeployed away from the Haakonan front would have to be turned around and redirected toward Artaleirh and the surrounding sectors. This wouldn’t be easy, since the fleet had reliable intelligence indicating that a combined hevam-Andorsu-Tellarsu fleet was massing even now near K’Feria, with the obvious intention of restoring that system to Coalition control. Romulus’s resources in that sector needed to be enhanced, not diluted.

Though necessary, this exercise in rearranging the playing pieces on the galactic latrunculo board would surely create a costly distraction from Valdore’s less urgent objectives in the hevam war. True, he could ill afford such disruptions, especially after the humiliating setback the fleet had suffered at D’caernu’mneani Lli, the planet the expansionist Terran hevam called Berengaria VII. But, faced with the Haakonan lightning that D’deridex had brought down upon the Empire, he knew he couldn’t avoid them.

It came to Valdore only now that he was as culpable for this development as the late D’deridex had been. He had spent too much time wrestling with his conscience prior to deciding to help replace a mad warmonger of a praetor with a saner, more manageable successor. He had hesitated, and no amount of tactical cleverness on his part could ever expunge that transgression.

For his hesitation had allowed Praetor D’deridex’s legacy of madness to continue bedeviling the Empire from beyond the grave.

SEVENTY-FIVE

Late in the month of re’T’Khutai, YS 8765
Saturday, May 22, 2156
Northern ShiKahr, Vulcan

THE WARM DAWN BREEZE CARRIED with it the faint tang of g’teth blooms and fast-growing gespar seedlings. T’Pol stood in the garden in the ruddy glow of newly-risen Nevasa, watching the approaching hovercar as it completed its slow, almost silent descent. She approached the vehicle after it settled gently onto the stone patio. The driver, a young male Vulcan with a deep olive complexion, wasted no time extricating himself from the idling craft’s cockpit blister; he offered to take the small travel bag that was slung over T’Pol’s left shoulder, but she politely declined.

Like most Vulcans, T’Pol had never been interested in the accumulation of things. In fact, she might have been even less inclined than most, having lived the necessarily itinerant life of a V’Shar field operative for so many years, followed by a stint in the Vulcan Defense Force and, most recently, Starfleet. As a consequence of her nomadic career path, she traveled light, never burdening others with the management of her sparse inventory of personal effects.

“A moment, please,” she said to the driver, who replied with a polite nod before returning to the cockpit to wait on her readiness. Crossing the garden, she approached Trip, who stood in the stone archway that connected the garden courtyard to her mother’s house—her house, she reminded herself yet again.

Something was obviously wrong, a fact she felt without having to see the deep frown that creased Trip’s ordinarily smooth Vulcan brow. He had been using the cover identity of Sodok the trader for some time now, but she didn’t think he made a convincing Vulcan. Once they left Vulcan and returned to Enterprise—they had both made plans to return prior to the starship’s next large, planned military engagement against the Romulans—it would be entirely irrelevant.

Trip had managed to get one aspect of his Vulcan persona exactly right. He, too, was not encumbered excessively by material possessions. In fact, he appeared not to have packed anything.

“I can’t go with you,” he said.

She found her surprise all but impossible to conceal. “I do not understand, Trip. Ever since you came to Vulcan, you have spoken of little other than your desire to return to your... previous life.”

“I know.” His frowned deepened, prompting her to shift her position so that the driver would have difficulty seeing anything untoward if he happened to look in Trip’s direction.

She dropped her bag onto the stone pathway and folded her hands behind her back. “What is wrong, Trip?”

“It’s Terix. Tevik. Whatever the hell I’m supposed to call him.”

“I don’t understand. Tevik has proved himself an invaluable resource to the V’Shar these past several weeks.”

“So Ych’a keeps telling me,” Trip said with a nod. “Denak, too. But I still have my doubts.”

For the past three weeks, T’Pol and Trip had her home to themselves while her investigation into Minister Kuvak’s apparent arms-smuggling conspiracy continued—with assistance from Trip, Denak, Ych’a, and a tightly supervised Tevik. Ych’a had even agreed to keep investigating after T’Pol and Trip departed Vulcan.

“Have you seen any evidence that Tevik may, as you say, ‘Go Romulan on us’?”

He shook his head. “Nothing specific, no. He’s been behaving himself, and Ych’a’s been keeping him on a short leash. But I still don’t feel comfortable leaving a land mine like Terix lying around. Romulans are sneaky sonsabitches.”

T’Pol thought she was beginning to understand. “You feel responsible for him.”

“Shouldn’t I? I’m the reason he’s here.”

“That’s not entirely true, Trip. You told me that you and Ych’a were working together when you found him in one of Sopek’s escape pods.”

Trip’s sloped eyebrows converged over the bridge of his nose in exasperation. “Well, we couldn’t very well have left him there to die, could we?”

“No. But you do not bear responsibility for him merely because you rescued him.”

“He followed me home, Mom. I have to keep him.”

“Another obscure Earth idiom?”

Trip sighed. “I stood by and let Ych’a reach into that poor bastard’s brain and rewire it. After that, I didn’t even try to stop her from bringing him here. Now he’s on Vulcan, a Romulan soldier who only thinks he’s one of the good guys, and who might pop his cork at any time once he realizes the truth about his identity and what’s really been done to him. Sure, he’s been a help to the V’Shar. But that fact just gives them a perfectly respectable, logical reason to keep right on mining him for intel.”

She could feel his conflict. “Can you think of a more logical use for him, given the present circumstances?”

“Brainwashing is brainwashing,” he said. “Terix is dangerous, T’Pol. Leaving him behind on Vulcan while I go off to stage a career comeback feels wrong.”

T’Pol could not disagree with his assessment. She could, however, find fault with his priorities. “Trip, we have a much larger scenario to consider. The Romulans are on the move throughout Coalition space.”

“I know.” He stepped closer, lowering his voice. “They might even be receiving Vulcan weapons, right under Administrator T’Pau’s nose. Your own investigation has already revealed that much.”

“My investigation has yet to rule out that possibility, yes. But our work here is done. We have a larger war to fight, on Enterprise. There is nothing to be gained by remaining here.”

“Do you really think it’s wise to leave Ych’a running your government corruption investigation and watching Terix the time bomb?”

“Ych’a has been indispensable to both endeavors,” T’Pol said. “And she has kept Terix not only contained, but also utterly unaware of his true identity.”

“Except on that first night on Vulcan. I don’t think Ych’a ever came clean to us about how close Terix came to busting out of his cage then.”

Over the weeks that had passed since that fateful evening, T’Pol had come to regret having raised Trip’s suspicions. Because Ych’a had given T’Pol no subsequent reason to suspect her of treachery—Ych’a had, in fact, gone out of her way to assist T’Pol in her investigation of Minister Kuvak’s illicit activities—T’Pol’s own suspicions had faded away. And Ych’a had revealed, via mind-meld, that her own memories of the Achernar mission contained the same gaps as Trip’s and Tevik’s. If there was treachery to be found here, it had been perpetrated not by Ych’a, but upon Ych’a, Trip, and Tevik together by one Sopek of Vulcan, aka Ch’uivh of the Romulan Star Empire.

“Captain Archer needs us,” she said.

“I know,” he said, looking pained. “But I still can’t go, T’Pol. What he really needs is you—the best XO he’s ever had.”

“Don’t...” T’Pol knew his mind was made up, immovable. “You must take care to maintain your Sodok identity, Trip,” she said, bowing to the inevitable. “You are an alien here. And you must remember to take your sulfatriptan drugs regularly.”

He grinned. “To keep my blood a nice, healthy green. Of course. I’ll even take the added precaution of not letting myself get cut, stabbed, folded, spindled, or mutilated, and I’ll stay out of the rain.”

“ShiKahr experiences little rainfall,” T’Pol said, struggling to maintain her composure. “But it can be a challenging place for an... outworlder.” His meandering and irrelevancy-strewn words both confused and amused her.

“Don’t worry about me, T’Pol. This isn’t permanent. Once I’m satisfied that Terix isn’t going to leave a rooster-tail of destruction behind him, I’ll come back from the dead.”

“To Enterprise?”

“If the captain’ll have me, yes.”

She nodded, satisfied. Her eyes stung. She heard T’Les’s voice echoing in the distance, chiding her for her lack of emotional control. She ignored it.

Trip gestured over his shoulder toward the house. “Mind if I crash on your sofa while I’m in town?”

Once she understood what he was asking, she nodded. “Mi casa es su casa.”

Trip looked surprised. “Wow. I figured you for having taken French, not Spanish.”

Tears threatened to rise, as did laughter. She tamped down hard on both.

He stepped toward her and took both her hands between his. “I’ll even stay on top of the maintenance around here.”

She swallowed, barely trusting herself to speak. “Thank you.”

“Least I can do,” he said. She saw that tears stood in his eyes as well. “I can’t let poor Denak do all the weed-pulling himself, you know. He’s not getting any younger.”

She wanted to embrace him.

Time passed, but T’Pol couldn’t say just how much.

“Your driver’s gonna start honking,” Trip said.

“Vulcan drivers do not ‘honk,’ Trip.”

He shrugged. “I should have figured. Not logical.”

Oh, yes, she thought wryly. You will blend right in on Vulcan, Charles Anthony Tucker III.

“Be careful,” she said.

He smiled gently. “If there’s one thing I learned from living among the Romulans, it’s how to get along while trusting nobody.”

He brought her hands up to his lips and kissed them gently. “Almost nobody,” he amended, and then released her.

Deciding she no longer cared about what the driver might see, T’Pol hooked her hand around the back of Trip’s neck, pulled him to her, and kissed him.

Then she grabbed her travel bag, turned silently on her heel, and walked very quickly back to the waiting hovercar. She could hear the echo of his last thought and knew he could hear hers. They were one and the same: I love you.

SEVENTY-SIX

Sunday, June 20, 2156
Endeavour, Altair VI

THE ADRENALINE RUSH that had sustained Lieutenant Commander Stephen B. Reynard, XO of the Starship Endeavour, throughout the battle suddenly collapsed, dropping him heavily into the big empty chair at the center of a bridge that was now in need of extensive repairs.

According to the chronometer on the arm of the captain’s chair, barely visible in the dim red emergency lighting, the entire gun-to-gun “conversation” with the Romulan invasion fleet—the second such armada that the sneaky bastards had sent to Altair VI—had taken just short of ten minutes to complete.

But those ten minutes had numbered among the longest of Reynard’s young life.

Despite the relative brevity of the engagement—or perhaps because of it—his recollections of the fight were still largely a jumble. In retrospect his own participation now seemed like the narrowest conceivable triumph of training over the good sense that inspired some people to tuck tail and run. But whatever errors he might have made in the heat of battle, he’d at least managed to remain focused on the fight, thanks in large part to Captain Shea’s calmly delivered orders.

The commander felt justifiable pride in that; that feeling gave him something positive to focus his mind on rather than the wholesale death that had been inflicted upon Endeavour and across the rest of the Coalition fleet. There would be plenty of time to deal with that later.

What Reynard recalled about the battle was that he had stayed at his post throughout the merciless exchanges of phase cannon fire and Romulan disruptor bursts. Through the ceaseless hail of torpedo strikes and the less frequent, if more terrifying, eruptions of spherical nuclear fireballs—one of which had detonated close enough to Endeavour to completely melt her portside defensive hull-plating system— Reynard had done his duty. Endeavour was crippled but still there.

He closed his eyes, shutting out the corpses that still littered the deck, and the forest of scorched consoles, dangling conduits, and burned bulkheads that surrounded him. He imagined Endeavour in her pristine state on the day he’d piloted her out of spacedock right after Captain Winchester, Endeavor’s first CO, had given him the traditional “take her out” order.

Your paint was barely dry, he thought, imagining he was communing with Endeavour herself. And look we’ve done to you already: eighteen days of service and you’re already an old lady before your time.

Opening his eyes again, Reynard resumed studying the large forward viewscreen, one of the few bridge components that still functioned, more or less. Some six hundred kilometers above Altair VI’s partially cloud-obscured surface, at least a dozen battle-ravaged ships were visible describing leisurely ellipses about the planet. Some of the vessels were still in one piece, like the Cooper and the Maryland, while others, like the Montgomery and the Tripoli, had been divided into several. Other starships were moving in to render aid to their crippled brethren. That was a real relief to see, since Endeavour herself wasn’t going anywhere for a while, at least not under her own power.

Reynard turned his chair slightly to the right and watched as Lieutenant Esther Stiles, her blue uniform jumpsuit scorched badly, her forehead bruised and bleeding, limped from an emergency stairwell to the bridge’s center. Obviously exhausted, and very likely in shock, the youthful weapons officer came to a stop beside the command chair and steadied herself on a length of twisted railing nearby.

“Looks like we get to chalk another one up for our side,” Stiles said, her eyes huge and haunted. Although Reynard had never gotten the time to get acquainted with her, he did know that this war had already cost Stiles a number of family members.

“I think we won,” she said, and Reynard nodded numbly in response.

Stiles’s remark reminded Reynard of something Captain Shea had said to him shortly after Commander Goldser had died during a Romulan sneak attack—just before Shea had field-promoted Reynard to the XO position he had occupied for the past one hundred or so hours. “Nobody really wins a war,” the captain had said. “You might prevail. Or they might prevail. But nobody really wins.”

His gaze once again riveting itself upon the main viewer, Reynard nodded noncommittally to Stiles, whom he realized with a start was the only person on the bridge, other than himself, who remained alive. “At least it looks like we... prevailed.”

More than half of the wrecked or damaged Coalition ships that now slowly tumbled around Altair VI were of either Andorian or Tellarite configuration. Endeavour had joined the largest nonhuman Coalition force yet assembled in the war.

Each and every vessel in the Romulan flotilla was a total loss. The ships either spent on desperate suicide runs or via deliberate self-destruction—the latter apparently being a last-ditch means of preventing boarding and capture.

“We have to start doing a hell of a lot more than prevailing,” Stiles said, her voice quavering badly. “I think we might finally be turning the corner. Maybe we’ll finally start doing more then just stopping ’em from grabbing more systems. Maybe we’ll start pushing ’em back and rooting ’em out of the places they’ve already taken.” It seemed to Reynard that she was talking entirely too fast, on the ragged edge of hysteria. “Hell, we already pried Berengaria out of their claws. Why stop there? We have a war to win!”

“Stand down, Lieutenant,” Reynard said gently. “We’ve got to tend to the crew. Situation report.” With the comm system down both internally and externally, the bridge had to depend on runners for information on Endeavour’s various departments.

Stiles nodded, getting at least partial control of herself with a visible effort. “Major systems are crippled all over the ship, including propulsion, but life support is functioning and the warp core is stable. When the Romulans tried to seize control of our systems remotely, the new countermeasure protocols prevented it, but at the cost of a cascade of memory-core failures. The Andorians and the Tellarites took a way worse beating than we did.”

Reynard nodded. That’s what we get for having to beta test the Centauri brain trust’s new countermeasure protocols on the fly. He hoped the new remote-hijack-resistance protocols would prove more effective for the other attack groups.

The Romulans had gained outright control of several Andorian warships, in addition to at least one of the Tellarite vessels, forcing the destruction of the ships and crews. Fortunately, sheer numbers had prevented the Romulan hijacking trick from turning the tide in their favor. But if they had brought more ships, today’s outcome might have been very different. Had the battle for Altair VI gone on significantly longer than it had...

“Crew status?” Reynard said.

“Sickbay’s overflowing.”

Reynard knew that the captain was among the injured who had required emergency medical treatment; he’d been carried off the bridge less than halfway through the battle. The last message Reynard had received from sickbay indicated that the captain had finally regained consciousness.

“Any new orders from Captain Shea?” Reynard asked. It was going to be a relief to return this chair to its rightful occupant.

A look of shock shattered Stiles’s businesslike calm. “Oh my God. Nobody got the message to you.”

“Message? What message?”

“Captain Shea died a few minutes ago,” Stiles said quietly. “You’re in command now. The crew is waiting for your orders, Captain.”

As the weight of the world settled unceremoniously upon Stephen B. Reynard’s narrow shoulders, it occurred to him that the crew was likely to expect a damned sight better from him than merely ‘prevailing’ in the many battles that must surely lie ahead.

Sausalito, Earth

Ambassador Gora bim Gral of Tellar hated to admit it, but he was beginning to grow rather fond of the tangy blue citrus drink that Andorian Foreign Minister Thoris’s people kept leaving on the refreshment tray during the informal war councils he and Thoris shared at the Andorian diplomatic compound.

“Has your government come to a final decision about the war?” Gral asked. Tipping his hirsute head back, he drained his glass of the last of the sapphire-hued liquid as he waited for his blue-skinned counterpart to formulate one of the highly crafted, less-than-direct answers for which he was so justifiably famous.

Very much to Gral’s surprise, Thoris did not hesitate. “Andoria has indeed reached a decision, Mister Ambassador. However, I have been instructed not to reveal it prior to the Coalition Council session.”

Gral set his empty glass on the table with a sigh. “Come now, Thoris. You’re hurting my delicate feelings. This is me you’re talking to.”

Thoris’s antennae flattened against his white-maned scalp, revealing his displeasure at being cajoled. “I have my instructions, Gral, just as you do.”

“Thank you for recognizing that, Mister Foreign Minister,” Gral said. “Of course, my instructions include learning Andoria’s position sooner rather than later.”

“I regret having to put you at odds with your superiors, Mister Ambassador. However, they should know better by now than to try to coax information from me prematurely.” Although Thoris’s facial expression remained stoic, his antennae resembled a pair of serpents preparing to strike.

Gral spread his great, hairy hands in a gesture of peace. “Fair enough. Please allow me to speculate, then.”

Thoris nodded. “I am certain I am powerless to prevent it.”

“The war against the Romulans has been very costly to Andoria lately, both in lives and in treasure,” said the Tellarite. “Even the recent Coalition victories have been hugely expensive. This must necessarily be a significant component in your government’s decision-making process.”

“Just as it surely must be in your world’s internal deliberations,” Thoris said.

Although Gral tried to keep his countenance as free as possible of revelatory emotion—what the humans referred to as “tells”—he could not deny that a certain dour zeitgeist had come to dominate much of Tellarite officialdom lately regarding war-related matters. The downbeat mood had even permeated the news media of the generally upbeat humans. Keisha Naquase’s Earthbound coverage of most Earth-Romulan engagements this year, including even the victories at Berengaria and Altair VI, had taken on an increasingly gloomy “we should have stayed out of this” tone. And while Gannet Brooks’s most recent reporting and commentaries continued in the same “this war has to be won” vein they always had, even her broadcasts seemed curiously subdued. If humans started losing faith in Starfleet’s ability to win, then what was the rest of the Coalition supposed to think?

“Tellar has lost many ships and crews as well,” Thoris continued. “Does your government favor continuing to fight alongside Earth?”

Gral showed Thoris his teeth. “I asked you first, Mister Foreign Minister.”

His antennae momentarily motionless, Thoris regarded his Tellarite counterpart with a cool, inscrutable expression.

“Yes,” Thoris said. “Yes, you did, didn’t you?”

SEVENTY-SEVEN

Enterprise, near Deneva

T’POL HAD THOUGHT THAT the worst suffering she would ever witness lay two decades behind her, dead and buried alongside the bones of the failed Vulcan colony on Trilan. True, the wounded and terrorized humans she had encountered on the civilian refugee transport had not resorted to cannibalism as the Fri’slen had, but their despair at having been displaced by a foe that no one had ever even seen was every bit as profound.

At least when the Fri’slen struck and dined on the flesh of sentients, their victims’ suffering came to an eventual end.

Now, as she preceded Lieutenant Reed in climbing up through the dorsal airlock of the shuttlepod that Captain Archer had sent to ferry her from the refugee transport, she experienced a strange mixture of the most un-Vulcan of emotions: guilt at having abandoned the refugees on their long Earthward voyage, and gratitude at having returned at long last to the place she regarded as... home.

Captain Archer stood alongside Ensign Hoshi Sato on the metalgrid catwalk that covered much of the upper level of the launch bay, looking down at the shuttlepod’s open top. Both wore grins that caused the Vulcan instinctively to rein in her emotions.

T’Pol stepped onto the catwalk, set her small travel bag down beside her, and smoothed a wrinkle from her dark brown Vulcan robe. Standing smartly at attention, she said, “Permission to come aboard, Captain.”

Archer’s grin broadened. “Permission granted, Commander. I would have brought somebody down here to pipe you aboard with a bosun’s whistle, but I know how you feel about those things.”

“Thank you, sir,” she said, not sure whether to be grateful for his consideration, or to attempt to appreciate his attempt at droll humor. Her gratitude at not having to endure the whistle was quite real, however; because of her sensitive Vulcan hearing, she found the traditional naval instrument’s upper-partial overtones to be highly unpleasant, particularly at close quarters and in the reverberating acoustics of the launch bays.

Malcolm Reed emerged from the shuttlepod next, stepping onto the catwalk beside her as the captain moved toward a nearby companel.

“Archer to bridge.”

“Leydon here, Captain. Go ahead.”

“Shuttlepod One is docked, Ensign. Make best speed back to the Deneva-bound fleet, and return us to our point position at the head of it.”

“Aye, sir.”

Signing off, Archer strode purposefully toward the nearest turbolift. T’Pol slung her bag over her shoulder and fell into step beside him, leaving Reed and Sato to follow.

“It appears that I have chosen a propitious moment to return to Enterprise, Captain,” she said.

“You might say that, Commander,” Archer said with a nod as the group exited the launch bay and moved quickly toward E deck’s core. “You’ve been missed around here, that’s for damned sure. I’m relieved that we won’t have to liberate Deneva without you. And D.O. told me she’ll be extremely relieved to go back to being just the gamma-shift watch officer.”

It was only as they approached the central turboshaft, where the overhead light fixtures were closer to the deck than those in the launch bay, that she noticed how haggard the captain looked. He seemed to have aged a decade during her months-long absence. She experienced a pang of regret for having agreed to leave for such an extended period, especially with so little to show for it.

“I look forward to resuming my post, Captain,” she said as Archer allowed Reed and Sato to enter the open turbolift ahead of him. Archer got in next, but stopped on the threshold and turned to face T’Pol.

“I think you can find the time to visit your quarters first,” he said. “Drop off your luggage, get reacquainted with the ship—” He paused as he stepped all the way inside the lift, then pointed at her robe with a slight smirk. “And maybe think about putting on a regulation uniform, Commander.”

The turbolift doors hissed shut, leaving her standing alone in the corridor. It was true that the stresses of the past year had etched themselves indelibly upon the captain’s face. But in a fundamental and strangely reassuring way, he hadn’t changed at all.

Although Archer had expected T’Pol to waste no more time getting to the bridge than it took for her to don a uniform, his prodigal exec made it to her station even more quickly than he’d expected. Since the fleet was still hours away from the Kappa Fornacis system and Deneva, now seemed to be the ideal time to begin debriefing T’Pol about her mission on Vulcan. He asked her to join him in his ready room.

Archer was disappointed to learn that Administrator T’Pau still hadn’t budged. He wasn’t surprised, however, given everything T’Pol was telling him about T’Pau’s commitment to pure Syrrannite principles and her recent intimate contact with the living katra of Surak.

But T’Pol’s revelation that she had unearthed an apparent conspiracy within the Vulcan government—a plot to smuggle Vulcan arms technology into Romulan-controlled territory, no less—not only surprised him, it all but floored him.

“And you say you’ve found evidence implicating Minister Kuvak in this thing?” he asked, incredulous.

Standing in front of his desk, she reached across it to hand him a data module. “All the data and analysis are here.”

“What about T’Pau?” he said, staring at the module as though it were some poisonous insect that had lit on his hand. “Is she involved with this thing somehow?”

T’Pol shook her head. “If she is, she is probably the victim of a deception. I do not believe she would willingly work against the cause of peace.”

Of course not, he thought, chiding himself for questioning T’Pau’s integrity. That integrity, that steadfast devotion to a principle, lay at the crux of her stubborn refusal to bring Vulcan into this war. The captain still hadn’t given up hoping to persuade her that choosing to fight was not the same as selling out her beliefs; he felt certain that the argument was far from finished.

“Well, at least she’s consistent,” he said, tucking the module into one of the cubbies on his desk. “That’s better than being corrupt, as appears to be the case with Kuvak—not to mention whomever he’s conspiring with.”

“My V’Shar contacts on Vulcan are continuing to try to determine who those co-conspirators may be,” she said. “With some help from Commander Tucker.”

Archer leaned forward in his chair, grabbing his desk for balance. “Trip? You’ve seen him? How is he?”

“He is well. He is working on Vulcan. And he wishes to return to Enterprise.”

“That works for me. Why the hell didn’t he come back here with you now?”

“He nearly did. But the commander decided that he needed to resolve certain... complexities to his satisfaction first.”

Over the past year Archer had given a great deal of thought to the many complexities Trip would face once he finally did return from the dead. As far as his family knew, Trip was dead, a fact that had provided Section 31 with an operative who could leave no trail because he did not officially exist. Archer didn’t much like the way they used Starfleet officers, the charter be damned.

“‘Complexities’?” Archer asked.

“For the most part, those complexities involve a Romulan military officer who is presently operating on Vulcan,” she said.

“A Romulan. Operating on Vulcan.” Just when I thought she’d run out of ways to surprise me, he thought.

“This Romulan has been conditioned, however, to believe that he is a Vulcan operative in the employ of the V’Shar.”

“Let me guess,” Archer said, holding up a hand. “This fake Vulcan agent could lapse into full Romulan mode at any moment.”

With a nod, she said, “The commander has elected to remain on Vulcan for an indeterminate period in an effort to prevent exactly that.”

Archer sighed. He was beginning to wonder if he would ever recover the best chief engineer he’d ever had, and his friend.

The shrill whistle of the intercom cut off his next question. Pushing a button on his desk, he said, “Archer here. Go ahead.”

“Lieutenant Reed, Captain,” Malcolm said unnecessarily. “The long-range sensors have just made contact with a ship.”

“Type of vessel?”

“It’s still on the edge of sensor resolution, sir. All we can tell so far is that it’s coming in at high warp—and it’s on an intercept course.”

The rest of the debriefing would have to wait. “Tactical Alert,” he said as he rose from his chair. “I’m on my way.”

Though the ship that appeared on the long-range sensors was not the one that Archer had hoped to see, he was nevertheless grateful for its arrival. The captain still held out the hope that Columbia would put in a miraculous eleventh-hour appearance as part of his attack group, but he was glad to have the I.G.S. Weytahn throw in with the Deneva fleet.

“Have you heard the news from Altair VI, General?” he said to the man whose hard, azure visage stared at him intently from the view-screen.

“I have, pinkskin,” said Shran. “The Coalition has achieved a proud victory over the Romulans today.”

“Which wouldn’t have been possible without the support of the Imperial Guard,” Archer said. “Starfleet is in your debt for persuading your government to help us hold the line against the Romulans.”

“You may be overestimating my influence, Captain. Especially once my government takes the cost in lives and starships into account.” He smiled. “But I have never minded having you in my debt.”

Archer found he didn’t have it in him to return that smile. “Whatever it takes to drive the bastards back where they came from, General. Whatever it takes.”

“Indeed. I see you’ve assembled quite an assault fleet. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen so many of your Daedalus-class ships gathered together before.”

“You’d be surprised what we pinkskins can accomplish when we really put our minds to it.”

“Endlessly surprised. Your fleet includes only one of Starfleet’s most advanced vessels.”

“Unfortunately, the NX fleet is stretched pretty thin these days,” Archer said glumly.

Columbia had been due to join the fleet six days ago, once her convoy duty in the Onias sector was finished. But no trace of the starship had turned up. The last time Archer had heard from Erika Hernandez had been exactly a month ago. His queries to Starfleet Command into Columbia’s status and whereabouts had revealed only that the mining convoy she’d been guarding had been destroyed, reduced to an expanding debris cloud several astronomical units in diameter. But analyses of the detailed sensor scans had revealed absolutely no trace of Columbia.

“We’ll just have to make do with what we have, General,” Archer said.

“I shall count on your leading us to victory,” Shran said. “We will split a bottle of Fesoan grainwine on Deneva, Archer, to toast our victory. Shran out.”

“No pressure,” Archer said quietly to the warp-distorted starfield that replaced the general’s image.

Ensign Leydon took Enterprise out of warp ten minutes before crossing the outer edge of the Kappa Fornacis system’s warp-field detection grid.

Six and a half minutes later, nine large, horseshoe crab–shaped Romulan vessels screamed in at the Deneva-bound fleet while it was at the system’s periphery. Enterprise rocked and trembled as disruptor fire raked the polarized hull plating, melting sections of it, parts of which ablated away into space. Reed wasted no time returning fire, freeing Archer to coordinate the Daedalus fleet even as the Weytahn roared into the midst of the Romulan crossfire, every tube blazing.

“The communications countermeasure is active, Captain,” Hoshi reported, her consoles and readouts all aglow with flashing alarm indicators. “We’ve intercepted a subspace transmission. It’s a communication between ships in the Romulan fleet.”

“Does this transmission carry anything else besides the message?” Archer said. The latest work of the Cochrane Institute’s countermeasure team was built around the idea that the Romulan remote-hijack weapon worked by slipping malicious software code into its victims’ vital systems through their communications grids.

“According to the new protocols, yes,” Hoshi said. “Some sort of malware is embedded in the Romulan message. But it’s been completely contained in the new protected memory buffers.

T’Pol examined Hoshi’s readouts over her shoulder. “Copy the code onto external media for analysis, Ensign,” she said. “Then purge the buffers.”

“Aye, Commander,” Hoshi said as she got to work.

“A Trojan horse,” Archer said. The Romulans have been turning our own ships into their weapons against us with a damned Trojan horse.

Had Columbia run afoul of this same maneuver out in the far reaches of the Onias sector, the way Enterprise very nearly had out at Gamma Hydra? But if Columbia really had met with such a fate, then why had no trace of her turned up along with the remains of the convoy?

Praying that the Romulans hadn’t captured Columbia, Archer tried to put the matter out of his mind and savor today’s victory. But he knew it wouldn’t do to let that apparent triumph make him overconfident. After all, the fleet still had to fight its way down Kappa Fornacis’s gravity well close enough to set the MACO landing craft down on Deneva. And a hell of a lot could happen in the meantime.

The ship-to-ship clash had concluded quickly and decisively—and in the Coalition fleet’s favor. The Romulan troops on the ground had ultimately succumbed to the MACO landing force’s superior numbers, and they had to have been demoralized by the amount of orbital force that was bearing down on them.

Captain Archer studied the image of the blue world that turned slowly on his ready-room terminal, its skies and ground including the scorched earth of the once-idyllic Summer Islands, now free of any detectable Romulan presence. He could only describe the half-day running battle that had just concluded as a rout. The Romulans had fought tenaciously to hold on to Deneva, perhaps driven by desperation once they realized that their starship-hijacking protocols had been nullified. Regardless, the Deneva colony was once again under Coalition control and protection.

At least the Romulans have lost another beachhead smack inside Coalition space.

His door chime sounded. “Come,” Archer said.

The hatchway opened, admitting T’Pol. Once the aperture had sealed behind her, she said, “I have compiled a detailed after-action report, including the initial reports of the MACO officers on the ground.” She walked to his desk, and he accepted the datapadd she handed him.

Archer tossed it onto the desk, procrastinating. Although he had yet to compute the cost of today’s victory, he knew the figure would be high. A total of thirty-three Coalition vessels had undertaken the liberation of Deneva, with the Starfleet contingent comprising eleven ships, including Enterprise. Of that total, Starfleet’s losses had amounted to a total of three Daedalus-class vessels—Adirondack, Kearsarge, and Shepard—all three destroyed with all hands. The MACO forces had sustained fatalities in the hundreds, with dozens more gravely wounded.

But the Andorian and Tellarite ships had taken the worst beating, with half of their combined forces either crippled or destroyed. Shran and much of his crew had survived, though the Weytahn wouldn’t be going anywhere under her own power for at least a week. Archer wasn’t certain whether his debt to the general had just diminished or increased.

And what the MACOs had discovered about the fate of the thousands of human settlers who’d found themselves trapped on Deneva after the initial Romulan invasion last October was too terrible to contemplate. It seemed that while the Romulans did indeed place some value in the taking of captives, they also believed in keeping them no longer than it took to torture them either into useful submission or to death.

“I’ll read all the details in the morning,” Archer said at length. The last thing he needed right now was a microscopic recap of the pageant of woe that had enabled today’s victory. “But there’s one detail I’d like now: Did the Romulans pick up after themselves at Deneva as thoroughly as they did at Berengaria and Altair?”

The Vulcan nodded. “Apparently. They left behind no significant Romulan technology, nor bodies. And no Denevan colonists were left alive.”

“I see,” he said, sickened, although he already knew about the Denevan massacre. “Thank you, Commander, you’re dismissed.”

Archer closed his eyes, nearly succumbing to his weariness, wondereding how many more “victories” Starfleet could afford. Without the enormous payment in blood made by Andoria and Tellar, the math of today’s battle would have worked out far less favorably.

Opening his eyes, he saw that T’Pol was still standing near the ready room entrance.

“Is there anything else in your report you’d like to call to my attention, Commander?” he said.

T’Pol looked uncharacteristically anxious. “No, sir. Yes. One thing.”

“Some new consequence of the battle that we’re going to have to deal with sooner rather than later?”

She paused thoughtfully before answering. “In a way, yes. But it has nothing to do with my analysis of the after-action reports.”

“What is it, then?” he asked, frowning.

“As your executive officer, it is part of my job to stay current on issues of crew morale.”

Archer had to wonder if anyone on Vulcan was content just to put in the required eight daily hours of work and then go home afterward. “You just got back from Vulcan after spending months there, T’Pol. Then you went straight into a combat situation. I don’t expect you to be on top of every last crew evaluation just yet.”

“And I’m not, I assure you. However, I did take the liberty of glancing at the crew files while we were still approaching Kappa Fornacis. And I noticed something of which you may not be aware. A pattern.”

Great, he thought. Another festering crew morale problem that I’ve been too preoccupied to even notice. All at once he was both glad and sorry to have T’Pol back.

“What sort of pattern did you notice?” Would he have to brace himself for another mass exodus of discontented junior officers?

“Simply that no Enterprise personnel have applied for transfers since you led the successful invasion of Berengaria. Good evening, Captain.”

She made her exit, leaving him to wonder if the ghosts of the Kobayashi Maru had been laid to rest.

SEVENTY-EIGHT

Early in the month of ta’Krat, YS 8765
Sunday, June 20, 2156
ShiKahr, Vulcan

TUCKER WATCHED from a discreet distance as the orange fireball lit up the night, sending flame, smoke, and shadows across the low skyline of ShiKahr’s spartan industrial district.

This was a really bad idea, he thought. And it gave him ample justification for never allowing Terix—Tevik—to go it alone, even on what should have been a simple information-gathering mission. Trip was now more determined than ever not to let the Romulan out of his sight, regardless of how “tame” Ych’a believed him to be.

“I thought we were only going to do a reconnaissance of the warehouse tonight,” Trip said, wondering precisely when and how the wily Romulan had managed to plant the explosives in the illicit arms shipment they had just discovered.

Ironically, this evening’s recon-turned-sabotage operation was their first unofficial action together as partners in the licensed, entirely legitimate Vulcan import-export business known as Ych’a, Sodok, and Tevik—or, as Trip preferred to think of it, Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe. The business entity was intended to provide all the necessary legal protective coloring for the corruption investigation that T’Pol had begun, and that Ych’a was now continuing with the assistance of both Trip and Tevik.

“There could be no surer way to keep an arms consignment from reaching its destination, Sodok,” Tevik said as the initial explosion began to die down. The sirens of the emergency responders had begun to wail in the distance.

Trip turned toward Tevik and affected the most Vulcan expression in his repertoire before he spoke. “We’re fortunate that the consignment contained nothing volatile enough to cause more extensive damage. Your explosive charges alone destroyed more than enough of the warehouse, including many things besides weapons contraband.”

“It couldn’t be helped,” Tevik said. “It was difficult enough making sure no one would be around tonight to be caught in the blast.”

“No one but the emergency responders,” said Trip. How many members of the local fire brigade had this maniac’s impatience endangered? The pair ducked out of sight into the alley’s shadows as the approaching sirens intensified further.

“Instead of destroying it,” Trip pressed, “we should have allowed the cargo to reach the ship that was to carry it. We could have tried again to follow it to its destination.”

“How many times have we done that already, only to fail?” Tevik said, matching Trip’s quick pace as they continued to recede from the scene of the crime, staying in the shadows as they walked. “They have been finding our tracer transmitters somehow, or at least blocking them, no matter what we do. It is long past time that we did something to curtail the traffic.”

“It’s a given now that they’ll have to change warehouses.”

“We have built an extensive intelligence network, Sodok. Such maneuvering will not confound us for long.”

“Ych’a wouldn’t have approved what you’ve done,” Trip said. “You know that as well as I do. I assume you didn’t consult with her first.”

“There is an old Terran proverb, Sodok,” Tevik said, beginning to sound exasperated. “ ‘Sometimes it is better to ask for forgiveness than for permission.’”

But Trip wasn’t buying it. “I know another old Terran proverb, Tevik: ‘Never pick a plomeek before it’s ripe.’ Tonight you took a step that none of us are ready to follow up on.”

Instead of answering, Tevik came to an abrupt halt. In T’Rukh’s pale glow, Trip could see that the other man had closed his eyes, and that a pained expression creased his normally calm, faux-Vulcan features.

Uh-oh, Trip thought, suddenly visualizing a huge crumbling wall. “Tevik? Are you all right?”

Trip let his right hand wander a little closer to the phase pistol he had tucked inside his robe. With his left hand, he pulled out his personal comm device and sent a priority signal to Ych’a.

SEVENTY-NINE

Atlantis NX-05, near Tau Ceti IV

LIKE THE CITY from the ancient legends from his parents’ homeworld, Atlantis seemed about to succumb to a lethal deluge. The bridge was in flames, scorched conduits sagged overhead, and the structural beams that held the deck together groaned ominously.

And the crew of the fifth starship in Earth’s small NX-class fleet was powerless to do anything to halt the Romulans, whose landing craft were even now disgorging their shock troops less than two hundred kilometers below Atlantis’s disruptor-scarred belly.

Lieutenant Travis Mayweather remained behind the helm, where he struggled to halt the starship’s bucking, rattling approach to the green world that had already grown disconcertingly large in the main view-screen before him. Behind him, Captain Weiss barked a steady stream of orders aimed at preventing a fiery atmospheric entry. All around the battered bridge, the other members of the command crew ran, hopped, or limped to carry those instructions out.

“Main propulsion is still not responding, Captain,” Mayweather said, shouting to be heard over the wail of the emergency klaxons. “Warp and impulse power are both dead, and I can’t get enough out of the maneuvering thrusters to make much difference in our descent.”

“Understood. Keep trying anyway.”

While the captain harangued Chief Engineer Mirsky for more power, Mayweather dutifully continued carrying out his captain’s orders as best he could, though he didn’t try to kid himself that he was accomplishing anything other than staying focused on something besides the cosmic unfairness of the universe.

I finally find a ship where I feel at home, and look what happens, Mayweather thought. This is the first crew since I left Enterprise that didn’t treat me like some kind of albatross. He felt confident that nobody here regarded his “Kobayashi curse”—a phrase he’d heard colleagues on other vessels whisper when they thought he couldn’t hear them—as the cause of Atlantis’s woes.

Even though it looks like this will be the second time an NX-class starship goes down with me at the helm.

Finally Mayweather had received a promotion to lieutenant, only to discover that it had arrived just before an urgent summons from the Reaper. And death seemed very near indeed now, despite the merciful stroke of luck that had led the Romulans to ignore Atlantis, at least for the moment.

The Romulan fleet that had engaged the combined Starfleet-Andorian-Tellarite Tau Ceti task force had turned out to be much larger than the enemy battle groups at Berengaria, Altair, and Deneva. And while the latest countermeasures had neutralized the Romulans’ remote-hijack weapon, their plentiful complement of birds-of-prey and the smaller, nuclear-armed fighter craft had proved overwhelming to the Coalition battle group. In fact, the Romulans seemed to have overcompensated so much that the entire Andorian and Tellarite complements had already withdrawn to the system’s periphery. Starfleet was battered and bloodied. And the Romulans now had a beachhead less than twelve light-years from Earth.

Mayweather turned from his console to face Captain Weiss. “I’m still fighting too much atmospheric drag, Captain,” he said. “And engineering can’t give me enough thrust to cancel it out.”

“Get to the escape pods,” Weiss said, effectively pronouncing Atlantis’s epitaph. “We’re going to abandon ship and autodestruct.” Lieutenant Brenner, the comm officer, dutifully relayed the captain’s order throughout the ship.

Locking the helm console per standard emergency evacuation procedures, Mayweather rose and took a final parting glance at the central viewer. The lights of the planet’s largest city, punctuated by the fires and explosions the Romulans had provided, illuminated the night that lay beyond the terminator.

He recalled that the besieged city, Amber, had been the home port of the S.S. Kobayashi Maru.

EIGHTY

Day Forty-Three, Month of T’ke’Tas
Sunday, June 20, 2156
The Hall of State, Dartha, Romulus

KHAZARA’S MINIATURE, GHOSTLIKE HOLOIMAGE materialized about a hand’s width above the massive desk, giving Valdore the momentary impression that the heavy sherawood beneath the figure had suddenly developed antigravity properties.

“You have proved my objections to be groundless, Admiral,” the newly minted vice admiral said. “Your decision to divert most of the D’Neva and Hlai’vna attack groups to K’Feria has proved to be a wise one.”

Though he knew others had seen it as a risky gamble—a gamble that had cost the Empire dearly in both lives and resources—Valdore continued to believe that he had merely made a pragmatic trade: the worlds that the hevam knew as Deneva and Altair VI in exchange for K’Feria, better known to the enemy as Kaferia, or Tau Ceti IV.

That planet was a beachhead superior to any other the fleet had yet seized, for it was closer to Earth than even Thhaei, ancestral Vulcan. And as such it was worth at least twice the price of any of the other planets that Romulan forces had seized and occupied elsewhere in Coalition space.

Valdore allowed his lips to curl into an ironic half-smile as he regarded his newest junior flag officer. “Your promotion is safe, Khazara. You needn’t continue to kiss my aehf any more than duty absolutely requires.”

Khazara chuckled. “My apologies, Admiral. But I haven’t finished kissing your aehf yet. Please allow me to finish, so that I can move on to kicking it.”

“Continue, please,” Valdore said, folding his large hands across his desktop. Khazara had always been plainspoken to a fault, even as a lowly centurion; it was a quality that Valdore prized—at least up to a certain hard-to-define point that most of his subordinates seemed loath to approach too closely.

“I must also confess that the consequences of redeploying from the Haakonan border region have been significantly less dire than I had predicted. With K’Feria in our hands and the Haakonan supply lines apparently interrupted, fortune has chosen to favor the Romulan Star Empire in both our current theaters of war.”

“You’re too kind, Vice Admiral,” said Valdore, sensing that his subordinate had concluded the lhiet-polishing phase of his communication. “But...” He trailed off, encouraging Khazara to continue, and to venture into less complimentary territory.

“But we cannot count on such happy circumstances continuing forever, Admiral,” Khazara said. “The Haakonans are extremely clever people, as well as extraordinarily patient. We haven’t isolated them permanently from their offworld supplies of war matériel. They still have ample potential to cause us grave trouble—unless we deal with them the way you dealt with the Coridans.”

Valdore sat back in his chair, stunned but trying hard not to show it. As blunt as he had come to expect Khazara to be, he hadn’t expected him to invoke the ghosts of Coridan Prime, a world Valdore had essentially destroyed, merely to constrict the enemy’s dilithium supplies.

It wasn’t that Valdore was shy about causing destruction; such things were part and parcel of war. He had no problem trading the lives of some for the lives of many, particularly when the losses were among military personnel who understood the hazards of the job and the cold iron of the chain of command. He even recognized the need to execute the relatively small, mostly civilian populations of the hevam outposts his forces took, in the interests of Romulan state security.

But the indiscriminate destruction of enemy worlds, the wholesale slaying of hundreds of millions of noncombatant inhabitants, was another thing entirely.

“ ‘It is far better to conquer than to exterminate,’” Valdore said, quoting the great Commander Amarcan, whose Axioms was still required reading at the Romulan Military Academy.

Khazara responded at once with his own Amarcan quote. “‘It is no dishonor to admit exhaustion of the heart.’”

“Do you believe I have become... exhausted?” Valdore said, scowling. Khazara had just become entirely too candid.

“No, Admiral. But I know about the enormous energies the Haakonans have learned to tame since our occupation of their homeworld ended—and I have seen but a fraction of the Haakona intelligence reports that you have. You know better than I do that we cannot rely upon continued good fortune when it comes to such a powerful and patient adversary.”

And vengeful, Valdore thought, recalling the recent Haakonan reprisals at Uaenn Ei’krih and Artaleirh. You mustn’t forget vengeful.

Momentarily putting aside his personal revulsion at the thought of creating another Coridan Prime, Valdore said, “I am not in the habit of leaning upon luck, whether it be in my dealings with the hevam or with the Haakonans.

“Therefore I shall consider your suggestion, Khazara, very carefully indeed. Valdore out.”

EIGHTY-ONE

Early in the month of ta’Krat, YS 8765
Monday, June 21, 2156
Government district, ShiKahr, Vulcan

HIS HANDS FOLDED TOGETHER before him, lost in the long, bulky sleeves of his diplomatic robe, Foreign Minister Soval addressed the small woman who sat behind the heavy desk and the gray-haired, gravemannered man who stood facing him beside her. Being posted on Earth, Soval did not visit this austere yet august chamber very often.

“Thank you,” Soval said, speaking in his most deferential tones, “for agreeing to meet with me, Administrator T’Pau. Minister Kuvak.”

Dressed in robes similar to Soval’s, T’Pau rose from behind the desk and began to pace her office’s stone floor. “Not at all, Minister,” she said. She came to a stop a short distance from Soval. “My apologies for having allowed myself to become so... preoccupied of late.”

“No apologies are necessary, Administrator, I assure you,” Soval said.

“Please state the reason for your visit, Minister,” Kuvak said, his tone unemotional yet somehow peremptory as well. “The administrator is extremely busy.”

“Of course,” Soval said, nodding to acknowledge Kuvak. There would be no logic in making this meeting last any longer than was strictly necessary. “I have come at the behest of Captain Jonathan Archer and Commander T’Pol.”

“I see,” T’Pau said, making it clear that she had his full attention.

“I find myself in agreement with their assessment that Vulcan should apply its military power to the cause of Earth’s war effort against the Romulans.”

“You have mentioned this to me before, Soval, a number of times. Have I not explained my logic adequately?”

“Respectfully, Administrator, your logic may bear reexamination in light of the catastrophic fall of Kaferia yesterday.”

“Mind your place, Mister Foreign Minister,” Kuvak warned smoothly.

“I speak only as a servant of Vulcan,” Soval said to Kuvak, maintaining his poised deference without yielding any ground. Addressing T’Pau, he said, “I entreat you to reconsider your decision to maintain Vulcan’s neutrality vis-à-vis the Romulans. The mutual defense clause of the Coalition Compact—”

“Is always subject to renegotiation and amendment,” Kuvak said, interrupting.

T’Pau raised a hand toward Kuvak, who subsided into silence.

Soval took this as a signal to press on. “The Coalition Compact is no longer the only matter at issue. Now that the Romulans control the Tau Ceti system, they are in a strong position to conquer Earth itself. Can Vulcan really afford to risk the possibility of the Romulan Star Empire creating a stronghold a mere sixteen light-years away?”

Kuvak interposed himself again. “A better question,” he said, “might be this one: Can Vulcan actively make war and still remain Vulcan?”

Soval had wrestled with that very question. “I do not know,” he conceded.

T’Pau was staring off into the middle distance as she seemed to contemplate the latest wrinkle in an old argument.

“ ‘Where fear walks, anger is its companion,’” she said at length. Kuvak nodded and made noises of agreement.

Soval recognized the ancient, hallowed words of Surak immediately—and just as quickly understood the irony of the stance that both T’Pau and Kuvak had taken. But although pointing that irony out was surely logical, he did not know if doing so would be prudent.

A small, still voice in the back of his mind whispered to him, quoting another one of the great Vulcan philosopher’s many aphorisms: “What is, is.”

His decision made, Soval said, “Respectfully, it is the two of you who walk in fear,” he said. “It is the fear that Vulcan will forever lose its best self in the maelstrom of war. And I must further ask you to consider the fear that will soon sweep across Earth once news of the fall of Kaferia becomes known—the blind panic that could spread among billions of emotional humans who lack the discipline of Vulcan logic.”

Kuvak began to deliver what doubtless would have been a sharp retort, but T’Pau once again restrained him with a gesture before returning her full attention to Soval.

“You have given us much to consider, Mister Foreign Minister,” she said. “Please leave us now. We must seek... guidance.”

Soval nodded, then turned and exited the chamber. There was little to do now other than to await word from the administrator’s office, and begin making arrangements to return to his post on Earth.

Several weeks ago he had told Jonathan Archer that Administrator T’Pau’s absolutist stance on matters of war and peace was outside his power to change.

Now Soval permitted himself to grasp at a slender reed of hope that he had been wrong.

Outer ShiKahr, Vulcan

The crackles and hisses on the audio channel were a distraction, but they were also an unavoidable artifact of the security-scrambling process.

“I have a new task for you,” said the muffled, distant-sounding voice. “It is terrible, but it is also necessary.”

Necessary, the assassin thought dispassionately. More dirty work that the high and the mighty lack the courage to perform themselves. And over which they will no doubt experience considerable guilt, even though they will not wield the blade themselves.

Guilt was something that the assassin considered illogical in the extreme.

“I am listening,” he said, and awaited the instructions for his latest assignment.

EIGHTY-TWO

Mount Seleya, Vulcan

BREATHING DEEPLY of the rarefied air as he stood at the base of the great stone steps, the assassin took care to keep his voluminous, drab pilgrim’s robe gathered loosely about his body; it wouldn’t do for a chance encounter with a passing Kolinahr adept to reveal the presence of the tools of his grim trade in this ancient place.

Of course, he would have preferred at least a full day’s notice before beginning this job—that would have afforded him the option of preparing the terrain under the cover of darkness—but his employer had been very specific: the deed had to be done immediately, and orders were orders.

Surveying the ground in anticipation of his target’s arrival turned out to be a matter that was both simple and quickly handled; his actions were concealed by his robe, as well as by his apparent act of kneeling in meditational devotion on the broadest of the great stone steps. The scant handful of other robed, devout Vulcans he saw in the vicinity appeared to have taken no notice of him.

Not wishing to attract their attention, he completed his ascent of the steps and paid the expected obeisance before he descended into the shadows of a cave entrance at the great mountain’s base. The rocky concavity lay several mat’drih distant from the tactical center point of today’s operation.

The wait until evening was a lengthy one, but he was a professional, long accustomed to the giddying oscillations between rushing and abiding. Sitting cross-legged on the cave’s secluded threshold, he went into a meditational state. He used his subspace connection to the planetary satellite network to maintain constant real-time observation of the section of rocky ground he had prepared on the well-worn side of Mount Seleya.

The ruddy light from bloated, sinking sun spread across the section of the horizon that was visible from the cave’s verge before disappearing entirely, replaced by blackness, a few stars, and T’Rukh’s comforting glow.

The assassin continued to wait, watching the screen on his remote device as he pondered some of the more perplexing aspects of his current assignment. Prime of these was the motivation behind it. Vulcans—even those of the ousted Administrator V’Las’s ilk—claimed to revere their culture’s ancient traditions. Even if one did not believe, no one would set out to destroy a katra—the spirit of a deceased Vulcan— particularly the one carried by the assassin’s present target.

No one except, evidently, his employer.

The assassin had plied his trade long enough, of course, to understand that Vulcans were not monolithic in their views. The assassin knew that his actions today could bring down the fledgling Syrrannite government. The assassin did not regard himself as political, but he could tell when the political winds were about to start blowing in his direction.

A low beep signaled that the remote sensors he had planted under Seleya’s steps had acquired the target. A glance at the display confirmed that a small group of monks was approaching, heading down the mountain after the completion of one of their rites.

Clearing his mind, the assassin waited, holding the remote monitoring device gingerly as he continued to study its small display. A tactical overlay, created by the telemetry from the biometric sensor devices he had planted along with the explosives, confirmed that his specific target was in the center of the moving formation, his fellow adepts grouped around him.

The assassin continued to wait and watch as the leading edge of the procession stepped across ground zero. Heartbeats later the entire ring of monks had surrounded the tactical hot spot. He pressed DETONATE and was gratified by a brief flash, which was followed immediately by coarse static as the conflagration he had unleashed indiscriminately consumed both hardware and flesh.

Enterprise, near Deneva

The voice spoke to him from what seemed a very long way away.

“Captain, are you all right?”

T’Pol. He realized that T’Pol was speaking to him, leaning over his command chair in the center of the bridge. His blurred vision began to clear, and he saw lines of concern etched across her Vulcan features.

“I’m fine,” Archer said, pulling himself up into an upright position in his command chair. “I think.”

He belatedly realized that Hoshi and Malcolm had crowded around his chair as well, their worry plain on their faces. Ensign Leydon had turned away from the helm, apparently ready to spring toward him, as though he might topple forward at any moment.

“What happened, Captain?” Reed said. “Should I call Doctor Phlox?”

“I’m not sure what happened, Malcolm.” Just somebody walking on my grave.

I hope.

EIGHTY-THREE

Monday, June 21, 2156
Sol 5 of Martian Month of Capricorn
Popé Pueblo (“Canyontown”), Mars

WITH SEVERAL UNEVEN STACKS of battered metal cargo crates visible behind her, Gannet Brooks was speaking from the ancient flatscreen monitor over the bar. But nobody was listening. This had as much to do with the sound being turned all the way down as it did with the fact that every person in the room, with the lone exception of the Coalition of Planets Martian Representative Qaletaqu, was seated facing in the opposite direction, toward the makeshift speaker’s lectern in the tavern.

Qaletaqu stood at the lectern and regarded the dour gathering in silence. Never before had he seen such quiet prevail at a tribal leadership meeting. Ahota’s Public House, Canyontown’s only watering hole, was utterly still, its usual rough, back-slapping camaraderie replaced by a tension that could have crushed one of Shaman Cheveyo’s ceremonial medicine drums.

The usuals had come tonight to partake of Canyontown’s unique form of direct democracy. Ahota, the establishment’s proprietor, was keeping his radical political musings to himself tonight. The tavern-keeper had shoved his manifesto into a jacket pocket, from which a bulky, battered padd protruded. Both Cheveyo, shaman of the local habak, and Powaqa the undertaker seemed uncharacteristically disinclined at the moment to crack crude jokes about the indispensability of their respective professions. Even the usually incorrigible Kolichiyaw, chief executive of the grandiosely named Dytallix-Barsoom Resource Extraction Corporation, was behaving himself.

There was no joy here. Only worry, fear, and an inchoate anger at the growing likelihood that Canyontown’s twenty thousand–strong Hopi/Pueblo population might be displaced by an invader—the very same fate their ancestors had suffered.

I’ll be damned if I’m going to let that happen to us again, Qaletaqu thought, even as he relinquished the floor to his father.

“Kaferia has fallen,” white-haired Katowa intoned. “A merciless and lethal enemy besets us now, my people. An enemy that has exterminated whole human populations whose settlements were in their way. Now this enemy has set up camp a mere spear’s throw away from us.”

Qaletaqu thought his father was being hyperbolic, as was his wont. Twelve light-years, the rough distance that separated the Tau Ceti system from Sol, was a hell of a lot farther away than a “spear’s throw.” Tau Ceti did lay about one-third closer to Sol than Vulcan did, however, which he had to admit was a sobering fact to consider.

Still, Qaletaqu saw it as no reason to cut and run.

“What happened at Tau Ceti only vindicates what all of you have heard me say here many times before,” Katowa continued, spreading his hands before him. “It is only a matter of time before these Romulans come here. And do not make the mistake of believing that they will overlook us. Earth will be their prime target, to be sure, but they must trample over us in order to get there.”

Qaletaqu found his father’s poor understanding of planetary positions and orbital mechanics frustrating; there was no reason to assume that a Romulan invader would necessarily approach Earth on a trajectory that would first take it past Mars, or even across Mars’s orbit. But trying to explain that to Katowa would be an exercise in futility.

“The tribe must relocate to a place of safety,” Katowa said. “We must find a new home, far from the Romulan threat.”

Although Qaletaqu knew how deeply everyone here respected his father as a wise tribal elder, no one appeared happy to hear his words, even in light of the fall of Kaferia.

“Of course,” Qaletaqu said, no longer able to contain himself, “such a home would also be far from the star that warms the bones of our ancestors.”

Katowa seemed unperturbed by the interruption. “And if the Romulans should make it all the way to the inner solar system, as is believed likely by so many heads that are wiser than mine?”

The notion ignited an intense, slow-smoldering anger deep in Qaletaqu’s belly. “Let the damned Romulans come. We can stay, and we can fight, the way our ancestors rose up against the Spaniards nearly five centuries ago. If we have survived this planet’s constant attempts to kill us, then we can survive anything.”

That provoked some laughter, and sparked further debate. They argued, and argued, and argued some more, until everyone in the room seemed to have tired of hearing about the subject. And although the vote the gathering took afterward went decidedly in Qaletaqu’s favor, he had to wonder in the private depths of his heart what might have happened had the vote gone the other way.

And whether any gulf of cosmic distance could be wide enough to protect the tribe from a people as implacably aggressive as these mysterious Romulans.

Grangeburg, Alabama, Earth

“Holy crap!” Charles Anthony Tucker II said a few seconds after he’d picked up the hardcopy newspaper from the living-room printer.

Now I remember why we stopped watching the news, he thought as he digested the headline and the gist of the copy beneath it.

“What is it?” Elaine Tucker said, cinching her robe about herself as she emerged from the bathroom, her wet hair bound up in a large terry-cloth towel. “What’s wrong?”

“Do you remember a couple of weeks ago, when Bert and Miguel were telling us about that Tau Ceti IV vacation they were arranging for later on this summer?”

“Sure. Why?”

“They may need to come up with an alternate plan.” Then he held up the paper, whose terse headline was printed at billboard size:

ROMULANS TAKE KAFERIA

San Francisco, Earth

After concluding his brief announcement of the changes he was mandating in Earth’s military posture, United Earth Prime Minister Nathan Samuels stood in silence at the podium. He looked out across the spacious assembly room where representatives of Earth’s Coalition partners, Starfleet, and the Military Assault Command Organization had gathered, and had listened attentively.

Admirals Gardner and Black and MACO General Casey were all present along with their small army of functionaries. The UE’s Interior Minister Haroun al-Rashid, Ambassador Jie Cong Li of Centauri III, and Draylax’s observer Grethe Zhor were all seated nearby, along with a handful of their respective staffers.

It was only the Coalition’s nonhuman members who appeared to be underrepresented. Despite the presence of a number of their junior functionaries, the Vulcan contingent was conspicuously incomplete. Ambassadors Solkar and L’Nel had assumed Minister Soval’s duties. Even Thoris, Andoria’s foreign minister, and Ambassador Gral of Tellar were absent, their respective staff members filling in for them.

It seemed strange indeed for Andoria and Tellar to maintain a low profile during an emergency session of the Coalition Security Council. Especially in view of the significant changes Samuels’s executive order would bring to the military landscape: In response to the fall of the Tau Ceti system, the bulk of Starfleet and MACO resources were henceforth to be concentrated overwhelmingly upon the defense of the Sol system.

As the room began to fill with a low buzz of muttered crosstalk, Samuels opened the floor to questions. General Hayes appeared satisfied with the prime minister’s executive order, although neither Admirals Black nor Gardner looked pleased. But since both admirals were disinclined to question their civilian leadership’s orders in front of the allies, Samuels passed them over and recognized the raised hand of Grethe Zhor of Draylax.

“Thank you for taking my question, Mister Prime Minister,” the Draylaxian woman said, her gray diplomat’s attire doing little to conceal the fact that the females of her species had three breasts. “It seems to me that Earth’s new tactical stance might work against the prospect of turning the tide against the Romulans.”

Samuels had anticipated this objection. Forcing a smile, he said, “Starfleet is building an unprecedented number of new starships. It isn’t as though we’ll be withdrawing our presence from deep space, Madam Observer.”

“But you will nevertheless devote the vast majority of your resources to the creation of a ‘Fortress Earth,’ will you not?”

“We have to harden our soft targets.”

She shrugged. “You still must concede the possibility that your decision might serve to undermine your world’s interstellar military reach, and therefore its offensive capabilities.”

“I respectfully disagree,” Samuels said, eager to move on. “Next question?”

A loud crash reverberated from the rear of the chamber. Before he could call security, a pair of familiar figures approached quickly from the back entrance, one tall and almost regal in bearing, the other lumpen and porcine.

Thoris and Gral, Samuels thought. Well, better tardy than absent.

Rather than sitting with their respective delegations, the Andorian and the Tellarite strode toward the central dais, coming to a stop together directly before the podium Samuels occupied. Anticipating that their staffers had sent them word of the contents of his executive order, Samuels allowed them both to take the floor, anticipating immediate objections similar to the point raised by Grethe Zhor, only delivered with a good deal more passion.

Instead, the two alien diplomats merely regarded one another in uneasy silence for a moment before turning their surprisingly mild-mannered attention back upon Samuels.

The prime minister scowled. “Well?”

Thoris hemmed, then said, “There is no easy way to say what we must say.”

“Why not just come right out with it, then?” Samuels said. “Or if you prefer, we can speak in private later—”

“No!” Gral rumbled, interrupting. He turned and looked at the assemblage of dignitaries for a moment before returning his gaze to Samuels. “Everyone here will learn of this soon enough. So on behalf of the government of Tellar, I will speak now.”

“All right,” Samuels said as a sinkhole of foreboding opened in his guts.

His tone adopting the formal cadences of rehearsed diplomatic boilerplate, Ambassador Gral of Tellar said, “Owing to prohibitive losses incurred in defending Earth against Romulan aggression, Tellar must formally withdraw its fleets from the active defense of both Earth and Alpha Centauri—effective immediately.”

“And Andoria,” said Andorian Foreign Minister Thoris, “has just reached a substantially similar decision.”

Samuels watched, stunned into silence along with everyone else present, as the senior diplomats of two founding Coalition worlds turned on their heels and exited the auditorium chamber.

EIGHTY-FOUR

Northern ShiKahr, Vulcan

NOT LEAVING VULCAN with T’Pol was a mistake, Trip thought as he stood in the entryway and regarded the two hulking Vulcan men who had come calling. Just who the hell are these gorillas anyway?

“May I help you?” he said aloud as he pulled his bathrobe more tightly about his body, which was still wet from the shower. The hard stares of his two visitors screamed “cop.” But if he judged them by their size alone, he’d have them pegged as barroom bouncers—if this planet had any market for that particular skill set.

Tucker assumed that this unannounced visit had something to do with the explosion at Mount Seleya. So far the government seemed to be keeping the details tightly under wraps, and when he had tried to contact Ych’a about it, he had succeeded only in reaching her messaging system. However, he was also unable to reach Denak, and that made him fear that something truly ominous might be going on.

“Are you Sodok the trader?” the man on the right said.

“That’s what it says on my identification documents,” Trip said, unable to resist needling these guys despite the obvious danger inherent in doing so. But he’d never succumbed easily to bullying by authority figures, if that’s what these two sides of beef really were.

“Get them,” said the man on the left.

Trip used a corner of his towel to force a few stubborn drops of water out of his ear. “Get what?”

“Your identification documents,” said the first guy. “So we can verify your identity on the way to our destination.”

Crap.

“Are we going somewhere?” Trip asked.

“You’re coming with us,” the second side of beef said unhelpfully.

Trip took a moment to study the huge figure on the left, then the one on the right. He decided not to test the efficacy of the sulfatriptan drug—the chemical compound that maintained the artificial green coloration of his normally red human blood—by challenging these gentlemen any further.

“May I get dressed first?” he said.

Government district, ShiKahr, Vulcan

To Trip’s surprise, the hovercar whisked him from the periphery of ShiKahr toward one of the city’s central districts. He had envisioned the two huge thugs who now shared the front compartment driving him straight out to the driest, most godforsaken stretch of Vulcan’s Forge, where they would execute him, Las Vegas mob–style, before leaving him in a shallow grave, or as food for some passing le-matya or sehlat or some other Vulcan nightmare with huge, pointy teeth.

He wondered if anyone on Vulcan would bother to inform his Section 31 handlers, Agent Harris and Captain Stillwell, of his fate. He’d had scant contact with either of them over the past several months, just enough to ascertain that his present sojourn on Vulcan suited their purposes, at least for the time being. He drew some grim amusement from the thought that they might have been left to wonder what had become of him, two control freaks being driven to distraction by circumstances that they couldn’t manipulate.

The hovercar didn’t slow down appreciably until it had penetrated deep into the ring of ancient stone towers that comprised central ShiKahr’s government district. Trip was mildly surprised when it came to a stop atop a building he recognized—the one in which Administrator T’Pau maintained her offices. But as his escorts conducted him out of the hovercar and down into the building, something felt... off about the place. The building seemed entirely too quiet, even for a Vulcan institution. Hell, the entire city had seemed emptier than it should have been by now, a good two hours into the workday.

Tucker put all of that aside, concentrating instead on the question of why he’d been brought here. Kuvak must have figured out what Terix and I have been up to over the past couple of months, he thought as his minders guided him into a suite of majestic yet spartan stone-floored offices.

Moments later, Trip was nonplussed to find himself in the presence not of Minister Kuvak, but of Administrator T’Pau herself, as well a Vulcan male whom he recognized immediately.

“Soval,” he whispered before he realized that the foreign minister had never been formally “read in” to Trip’s whole “secret identity” business. From Soval’s standpoint, Commander Charles Tucker had died last year aboard Enterprise, and Sodok was just one of the billions of his fellow Vulcans.

Let’s just hope he doesn’t take too close a look at Sodok’s face, Trip thought, knowing that Soval had seen that face before, on a dead man.

Fortunately, Soval appeared to have taken no notice either of Trip or the gargantuan bookends who had brought him into T’Pau’s office. The foreign minister’s attention was focused completely on the administrator, who had turned away from them. She was gazing out the broad window at ShiKahr’s exotic skyline of variegated stone towers.

“I regret that I cannot do more, Administrator,” Soval said.

“Your presence here is appreciated, Soval,” T’Pau said. “However, I should delay your return to Earth no longer. I have all the assistance I need already.”

With a nod, Soval made his exit, walking past Trip without paying him any heed.

“Leave us,” T’Pau said, her face still turned toward the window. Apparently sensing instinctively that she was addressing them, Trip’s chaperones departed.

All at once, he was alone with Vulcan’s supreme leader. “Um, what can I do for you, Administrator?”

T’Pau turned toward him.

Tears were streaming down her cheeks. The living face of all of Vulcan was weeping.

“Administrator?” What the hell is going on here?

“Commander T’Pol has assured me that you are a trustworthy man, Mister Sodok,” she said as new tears rolled out of her eyes and down both cheeks. She had utterly cast aside the haughty pride that he had come to expect from Vulcans, heedless of what that might have cost her.

She’s calling me by my fake name, he thought. How trustworthy am I supposed to feel, when I’m fooling her with this secret identity stuff?

“What has happened, Administrator?” he asked.

“I’m surprised you haven’t heard already,” she said. “I imagined that Commander T’Pol’s... associates would have told you by now.”

She means Denak and Ych’a.

“I haven’t been able to reach them this morning,” he said.

She nodded knowingly. “I see. Being Syrrannites like myself, they are both no doubt deep in meditation. Even Kuvak has sequestered himself.”

Although whatever crisis had just erupted remained an utter mystery to Trip, this didn’t seem like an occasion for meditation. Mourning would have been more accurately descriptive of what he had seen so far, but for the fact that this was Vulcan.

“What’s happened?” he repeated. And if Ych’a and Denak are off somewhere in a meditational funk, then who the hell is keeping an eye on Terix?

“I need your help,” T’Pau said, still explaining nothing. “All of Vulcan needs your help.”

He could hardly refuse a plea from the head of Vulcan’s government while he remained a guest on her world. But it wasn’t Trip’s preference. All he wanted, still, was to go home.

Tucker looked at T’Pau and realized that his prospects of going home had just vanished.

EIGHTY-FIVE

Enterprise, near Deneva

ARCHER LEANED AGAINST his command chair, feeling numb. The news of Andoria and Tellar’s intended withdrawal from the war effort had just arrived, via both the civilian media and a Starfleet dispatch.

“They can’t just pull out like this,” Ensign Leydon said from the helm console. “Can they?”

“The Coalition Compact says they can’t,” Reed said. “But Vulcan has already set a precedent.” When T’Pol fixed him with a sour stare, he amended his small gaffe by adding, “Present company excepted, of course.”

“So what happens now?” Hoshi Sato wanted to know.

“Admiral Gardner has promised to explain all the logistics and other details about the pullout,” Archer said. He didn’t want to further wound the morale of an already frightened crew, but he knew he couldn’t afford to sugarcoat reality for them either. “I’m afraid it already adds up to just one thing: We’re going to have to face the Romulans alone.”

With the Coalition essentially coming apart at the seams, the human species—essentially Earth, Alpha Centauri III, and a handful of remote, mostly dependent colony worlds that would likely prove to be liabilities rather than assets—was now on its own against an aggressive, conquest-driven empire.

Unless somebody else joins us, or intervenes on our behalf, Archer thought. He wondered idly whether the Klingons might be persuaded to help, given their ongoing enmity with the Romulans. Teaming up with the Klingons has got to be one of the worst ideas in the entire sad, sorry history of bad ideas.

Hoshi’s console began beeping insistently.

“Who is it?” Archer said, moving to the comm station.

“The signal is coming from Vulcan, Captain,” Hoshi said. After she paused to study the console display, her eyes widened and became fixed on Archer. “It’s Foreign Minister Soval.”

“Do you suppose Vulcan might have had a change of heart about throwing us to the wolves?” Reed said.

T’Pol said nothing.

“From your mouth to the Great Bird’s ears, Malcolm,” Archer said. “Pipe it to my ready room, Hoshi. T’Pol, you’re with me.”

Soval didn’t need to say a word. The veteran diplomat usually excelled at hiding his emotions, but his despair was apparent.

“I have met with Administrator T’Pau on multiple occasions, Captain,” Soval’s image said from the terminal on Archer’s ready room desk. “I attempted again to persuade her to join in your fight against the Romulans before both the fall of Kaferia yesterday and today’s announcement from Andoria and Tellar. And I repeated my efforts yet again after those events. She still will not listen.”

Archer wasn’t surprised, though he was disappointed.

“You have my sincere thanks for continuing to try, Mister Foreign Minister,” he said, shifting in his chair and straightening his posture. “But I’m confused about one thing: The last time I contacted you, you seemed to think you had a reasonable chance of changing her mind.”

“So I did, Captain.” Despite his disciplined emotional control, the lines of despair on Soval’s face seemed to both deepen and lengthen. “But that time has passed. There is no longer any chance that Vulcan will enter the war. I expect those who wish to maintain Vulcan’s isolation to be impossible to persuade now.”

“Why?” Archer said.

“Because someone has perpetrated an unspeakable act of violence on Mount Seleya, Captain. An explosion. As a consequence, all of Vulcan will now oppose our entering the war, not merely the most committed Syrrannite pacifists or the most reactionary isolationists. Vulcan may even close its borders to outworlders.”

“What has happened?” T’Pol asked. Though her emotions seemed very carefully modulated, something about her manner made Archer keenly uncomfortable; her proximity felt like the eerie drop in barometric pressure that often preceded a tornado.

“Surak,” Soval said, pausing as though he had to catch his breath. “The living katra of Surak has just been lost to us forever.” With that he signed off and vanished from the screen, as though he no longer trusted himself to speak coherently.

The thing that Archer found most surprising about this revelation was that it hadn’t surprised him. It had shocked him, but it hadn’t surprised him. He realized only now that he had sensed the violence of Surak’s passing a short time ago, on the bridge, no doubt because of some residual effect of having once held Surak’s katra.

T’Pol stood in the middle of the ready room, her eyes closed while her tightly clenched fists put the lie to any pretense of serenity.

She has to go home, he thought, stunned by yet another new realization. Her world has just suffered an unimaginable cultural tragedy. She can’t stay aboard Enterprise, no matter how much I might need her now.

Though uncertainty about just about everything plagued him, he knew one thing with absolute certainty: Never before had he felt as alone as he did right now.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

With his latest outing in the Star Trek: Enterprise line, this author would again like to recognize the contributions of the legions who enriched the contents of these pages: Andy Mangels, who collaborated with me on the preceding three Enterprise volumes, as well as on numerous other tomes, both Trek and non-Trek, before that; über-editor Margaret Clark, whose boundless patience, creativity, and enthusiasm kept me on track throughout the many iterations of this book’s plot and the lengthy process of transforming it into (I hope) a coherent manuscript; John Van Citters of CBS’s licensing department, for his keen eye and perspicacious observations; my fellow Pocket Books Star Trek fiction writers, most notably Christopher L. Bennett, Keith R.A. DeCandido, Diane Duane, John M. Ford, David R. George III, Joe Haldeman, Jeffrey Lang, David Mack, S. D. Perry, Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens, Susan Shwartz & Josepha Sherman, and Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore, all of whose work became sources of Easter eggs and/or inspiration; Memory Alpha, Memory Beta, and the entire Star Trek internet community, those tireless wiki-compilers whose multitudinous and serried ranks defy enumeration here; the kind and indulgent folks at the New Deal Café (née the Daily Market and Café), where much of this novel was written; Eric A. Stillwell, whose name became attached to a fictional Starfleet captain in the Enterprise series finale, a tradition that continues in this volume; Mike Burch of Expert Auto Repair, whose skillful maintenance of Andy Mangels’s car earned him a billet as Enterprise’s current chief engineer; Doug Drexler and Michael Okuda’s Ships of the Line hardcover, which inspired certain events aboard Columbia, foreshadowed here and realized in detail in David Mack’s astonishing Destiny trilogy; special-effects wizard John Dykstra and designer Andrew Probert, whose names adorned two of my pre-Federation Starfleet ships; S. John Ross, Steven S. Long, and Adam Dickinson, whose The Andorians: Among the Clans fixed the identity of the despot Krotus (“Whom Gods Destroy”) as Andorian; John A. Theise (author of FASA’s two-volume RPG sourcebook, The Romulan War) for Praetor Karzan; Geoffrey Mandel, for his Star Trek—Star Charts, which kept me from getting lost in the galactic hinterlands many times; Michael and Denise Okuda, whose Star Trek Encyclopedia remains indispensable; Shane Johnson, whose The Worlds of the Federation inspired the dragons of Berengaria VII; the copy editor who perished during this large tome’s grueling production process; Rick Berman and Brannon Braga, who brought Star Trek: Enterprise to the small screen; Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens and Manny Coto, scenarists whose televised work created the continuity from which this novel and its two predecessors arose; Gregory Itzin, for his portrayal of both Captain Sopek (“Shadows of P’Jem”) and Admiral Black (“In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II”); the entire regular cast of Star Trek: Enterprise, especially Scott Bakula (for leaping into not one, but two, of science fiction’s most compelling and conflicted heroic roles), and Connor Trinneer and Jolene Blalock, whose portrayal of Charles Tucker and T’Pol created a classic portrait of truly star-crossed lovers; Gene Roddenberry (1920–1991), for having created the entire universe in which I get to spend so much time playing; and most importantly, my wife, Jenny, and our sons, James and William, for both long-suffering patience and inspiration.