by Diane Carey
Trip Tucker had the distinct displeasure of working side by side with the Vulcan female at the sensor data station in main engineering. Still, it gave him a chance to see what she knew, just how much of a token she was in practice. That Vulcans had a strong science base in their education and also their natural predilections couldn’t be denied. Hiding a spy as a science officer became the convenient and most obvious trick. There was too much about this woman that was just plain obvious.
Working made Tucker feel better. No matter what they did, he hadn’t been able to find any systems failure or falloff. The intruders had flickered the power flow just enough to do what they wanted to do—steal the Klingon—then let everything come back without damage. No damage at all.
Why would they go to all the trouble of figuring out the technology, the security system, sneaking aboard, hiding themselves, shutting down the power, finding a prisoner, stealing him, and sneaking back off the ship, and go to the extra bother of not hurting or breaking anything? You’d have to work at that.
“How about this?” he pointed at the newest flush of data on the sensors.
“It’s just background noise,” the Vulcan’s monotone voice stated. “Your sensors aren’t capable of isolating plasma decay.”
“How can you be so damned sure what our sensors can do?”
“Vulcan children play with toys that are more sophisticated.”
Tucker stopped what he was doing and took a moment to reflect on this, which was just a plain fake-out. She knew better, and worse—she knew he knew better. Either she was playing, or enjoying another insult.
“Y’know,” he began, fed up, “some people say you Vulcans do nothing but patronize us, but if they were here now … if they could see how far you’re bending over backward to help me … they’d eat their words.”
Her dark eyes barely registered that he had said anything at all. “Your captain’s mission was to return the Klingon to his people. He no longer has the Klingon.”
“I realize he’s only a simple Earthling,” Tucker responded acridly, “but did it ever occur to you that he might know what he’s doing?”
She was silent. Of course, he’d put her in a bad position. Even impolite Vulcans knew better than to openly criticize a commanding officer’s decision before that decision had played out. At least not too much.
Tucker laid off the snide tone and tried something else. “It’s no secret Starfleet hasn’t been around too long … God knows you remind us of it every chance you get, but does that mean the man who’s been put in charge of this mission doesn’t deserve our support?” He waited a moment to see if his words got a rise out of her. “Then again,” he added resentfully, “loyalty’s an emotion, isn’t it?”
She looked at him, and he could tell a response was forming—what would she say? Under that stony facade and the gloss of having a “mission” of her own, what did she really think of Jonathan Archer? He knew, of course, what she’d been told, probably all her life, about humans and Starfleet and Earth culture, because she parroted it mightily. Still, anybody or any race who didn’t embrace something new—new people and relationships—would eventually just sit down and finish dying.
Before she could say anything, though, Captain Archer stalked in, obviously annoyed and impatient.
Who could blame him?
“Any luck?” he demanded.
Tucker glanced at the Vulcan. “Not really.”
T’Pol had a longer version. “My analysis of the spatial disturbance Mr. Reed saw indicates a stealth vessel with a tricyclic plasma drive.”
“If we can figure out the decay rate of their plasma,” Tucker said, “we’ll be able to find their warp trail.”
“Unfortunately your sensors weren’t designed to measure plasma decay.”
Both men looked at her with varying degrees of resentment. She didn’t mean the “unfortunately” part.
Tucker didn’t make any comment. But the new communications officer walked in behind Archer and stopped short, looked around engineering at the massive pulsing warp core and the overwhelming complexity of consoles and scanners. Apprehension showed in her eyes.
She sidled toward them on the farthest side of the deck. “Are you sure it’s safe to stand so close to that?” Her tone was half-joking, but only half.
“What’ve you got?” Archer asked sharply.
“I’ve managed to translate most of what Klaang said. But none of it makes any sense.” She handed him a padd.
The captain took it and read the screen. “Nothing about the Suliban?”
“Nope.”
Archer now turned to T’Pol and skewered her with a glare. “That name ring a bell to you?”
“They’re a somewhat primitive species from Sector 3641. But they’ve never posed a threat.”
“Well, they have now.”
Tucker snickered at her. Yet another “primitive” species for the Vulcans to chide? Did she think of the Suliban the way she thought about humans? If so, were they more capable of subterfuge than she gave them credit for?
“Did he say anything about Earth?” Archer asked Hoshi.
She shrugged. “The word’s not even in their database.”
Archer eyed the padd again. Tucker watched him, and wished he could help.
“It’s all there,” Hoshi said weakly. “There were only four words I couldn’t translate … probably just proper nouns.” She wanted to help, too, but Archer’s problem wasn’t improving.
The captain strode away a few steps, contemplating what he saw on the screen.“Jelik … Sarin … Rigel … Tholia … Anything sound familiar?”
T’Pol hesitated, uneasy. Seemed her goals were at cross-purposes. Or worse, maybe they weren’t.
“T’Pol?” Archer sternly pressed.
She paused again, glanced at Tucker, who was careful to give her one of those get-cracking looks.
“Rigel,” she finally began, “is a planetary system approximately fifteen light-years from our present position.”
Tucker watched and held his breath. Of course, Earth had known about the blue giant Rigel for generations, and other stars like Altair and Arcturus, but this was the first he’d heard of settled planets there.
“Why the hesitation?” Archer challenged.
Tucker almost blurted ah-hah!—but he held back. Archer looked as if he might be ready to pull this gal’s eyebrows off if she didn’t give, and quick.
Realizing she was about to knock the stick off his shoulder again, she decided to shell out.
“According to the navigational logs salvaged from Klaang’s ship, Rigel Ten was the last place he stopped before crashing on your planet.”
Though Archer’s face flushed with new anger, he plainly wasn’t surprised. “Why do I get the feeling you weren’t going to share that little piece of information?”
“I wasn’t authorized to reveal the details of our findings.”
There it was—the problem in a nutshell. “Our” and “your”—“we” and “they.” She was here, but she wasn’t yet on the team.
Tension mounted. Archer shared a pointed glance at both Tucker and Hoshi. Tucker held his own expression in careful check, not knowing which side of this teeter-totter would be the best one to be on. Should he fan Archer’s anger and therefore his strength of will, or should he mollify the situation and hunker down for more efficiency?
Better not choose right now. The captain would signal soon enough which direction he wanted to go.
Controlling himself valiantly, Archer was scarier now than if he’d been yelling. He glowered at her like a cat.
“The next time I learn you’re withholding something,” he warned, “you’re going to spend the rest of this voyage confined to some very cramped quarters. Understood?”
T’Pol’s expression was hard to read, but she didn’t have any snotty remarks. In fact she said nothing at all.
Archer hit the wall com. “Archer to helm.”
“Aye, sir,” Mayweather responded f
rom the bridge.
“Go into the Vulcan starcharts and find a system called Rigel. Then set a course for the tenth planet.”
“Aye, Captain, right away.”
Turning to T’Pol, Archer strictly said, “You’re going to be working with us from now on.”
She paled a little, but owned up to her reasons. “I’m sorry you feel slighted. But I agree with Ambassador Soval’s restraint in giving Earth too much information. Perhaps the last thing we need is another volatile race in space with warp power. You may easily go out and get yourselves killed. It may be a mistake to have helped you so much, to give you so much before you are ready.”
“So much?” Archer barked. “You’d better use the next portion of your long lifetime to go back over the records and see just how much we’ve done on our own, in spite of your cultural cowardice.”
“Cowardice?” Her eyes widened.
Over to the side, Tucker smirked and pressed his lips flat with delight.
Archer closed the step between him and her. “I’ve been thinking about Vulcans all my life. You’ve been in space a long time, and suddenly the game is complex. Vulcans are logical, but it won’t be enough. You’ve been advanced for a thousand years, and suddenly you’re being overrun by us rabbits. The clock is ticking. All sorts of species are moving out into the galaxy. Maybe you don’t need another volatile race out there, but guess what—they’re everywhere. The galaxy will be driven by passion, not prudence. You haven’t been holding back because you think we’re so primitive—if you thought that, you wouldn’t be bothering with humanity at all. Being logical allows you to say, ‘That is a new idea; therefore it hasn’t been proven; therefore I don’t have to pay any attention to it.’ ”
“Shall we give you the knowledge to rush out into the galaxy and cause chaos?” she gulped. “Humans claim some right to know that which has been earned by others—”
“We never said that. You offered. On the galactic scale, thirty years this way or that is nothing. When you see somebody is ready to walk, why hold back? There’s more going on with you people.”
He narrowed his eyes and unplugged the floodgate he’d been saving for Soval all these years.
“You’re not the cutting edge anymore, are you?” he badgered. “In a thousand years, why has Vulcan progress been so slow? And here comes Earth, making wild advances in less than two hundred years. You’re dragging behind, and now you need us more than we need you. Why else would you want to come and teach the apes how to sew? I think all this is happening because you’re plain scared of being out there alone anymore.”
Stunned, T’Pol parted her lips again. Nothing came out this time. She never blinked, as if staring at a flashing billboard declaring his words to the known galaxy. He was saying the Vulcans were doomed. Nobody had the guts to say that to their faces.
Archer backed off now, but pointed at her with a determined finger. “You get on that warp trail. And you’d better find something or be able to explain why not in very clear terms. Dismissed.”
T’Pol blinked almost as if he’d slapped her. She turned on her heel and exited without a word, taking a cloud of confusion along on her shoulders.
Hoshi squirmed a little and said, “I’ll … I’ll keep learning Klingon.”
“Good idea.”
He handed her the padd.
When Archer and Tucker were alone in the steadily pulsing warp chamber, the captain finally allowed himself a moment of quiet contemplation. He flexed his shoulders, took a deep breath, and let his arms sag. He really wanted to talk to his father.
Instead, there was Trip Tucker, offering him a sympathetic and curious gaze.
“Maybe now we know why we had so many quirks and misdirections with the last three days before launch,” Archer contemplated. He turned to lean on the console that had provided such little information.
“You think they infiltrated before we left Earth?” Tucker said.
Archer shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s a possibility. Getting off the ship is far less problematic than getting on, but where they went presents us with a goading mystery. I don’t like goading mysteries.”
“Yes, you do,” Tucker drawled. “They had a ship following us, and they went over there.”
“If we can find the trail, we’ll follow them. If not, I’ll go to Qo’noS anyway and start there. Klaang’s mother might know something.”
Tucker shook his head in worried respect for the sheer gall of that plan. “Why would these Sulibans want to blow our chances to make nice with the Klingons?”
“Might not be it at all. For all we know they might have a personal grudge against Klaang.”
“Or … maybe they want to ruin our chances to make nice with the Klingons, John.”
Archer smiled cannily to reassure him. “I’m not missing that one, Trip, believe me.”
Tucker shifted on his feet. “You were pretty hard on Lady Jane. You never had your own pet Vulcan to kick around before, did you?”
“No, and I mean to be harder on her. She’s about to discover what the term ‘short leash’ means.”
Appreciatively Tucker nodded and bobbed his brows. “Probably smart, now we know for sure she’s been hiding information from us on purpose.”
“She’d better knock it off, too.” Abruptly, Archer turned grim. “She’s my science officer now, not Soval’s patsy. She’ll learn that lesson over the next week if I have to tattoo it on her tongue.”
“Good thing it was you chewing her out instead of me. I’d have punched her in the nose.”
“She’d hit me back,” Archer said. “And she’d probably break my jaw.”
Tucker grinned, though rather drably. “She, uh … she came on the ship about the same time as all our little troubles started …” He broached the subject, then let it hang there. He didn’t seem to have quite the conviction for a direct accusation.
Archer accepted what the engineer was saying. The idea wasn’t new to him. He’d be silly to ignore it. “We’ll wait and see. Vulcans are reserved. They don’t converse. She’s just learning about us. As Vulcans go, she’s very young. I get the feeling she’s as much in the middle as we are. She could be just echoing what she’s been taught all her life, and doing what she was told to do. Just a feeling, though.” Archer offered him another smile, a little different from the one before. “Anyway, I won’t ignore your concerns. In the meantime, you organize a landing party. Make T’Pol part of it.”
“Do I have to?”
“It’ll show her which team she’s on. And Hoshi and Reed. And Mayweather’s spent his whole life in space dealing with merchants and travelers. Let’s use what we have and get this done.”
CHAPTER 9
HUMANS WERE GETTING HELP FROM THEIR VERSION OF “future” people—the Vulcans—who had advanced technology to give. Was it so unwise for Silik’s people also to have assistance?
Yet he was troubled and made to feel small by the future beings. Like strangers on the shore, they gave gifts without reasons, asked for trust without substance. Why? If only to play for affection, everyone gave gifts for reasons. Certainly these people had no need of Suliban affection.
Silik stood before the Klingon, Klaang, who was constrained in a medical chair, sitting upright, monitored by the two Suliban physicians. Tubes and devices of bizarre natures were hooked into the Klingon’s body. He was bathed in the blue glow of the temperature light, and lolled with the groggy results of having been thoroughly drugged.
“Where is it?” Silik persisted in the Klingon’s native language. He had asked the question three times before.
“I don’t know.” Klaang responded for the fourth time.
“We’re not going to harm you. Tell me where it is!”
“I don’t know.”
Frustrated, Silik looked at the physicians. “Are you certain he’s telling the truth?”
“Absolutely certain,” one of them answered, and he seemed to believe it.
Silik bent forward toward Kla
ang. “Did you leave it on your ship? Did you hide it somewhere? Is it on Enterprise?”
Klaang’s enormous head rolled to one side. “I don’t know what you’re looking for.”
As he realized this line of questioning had solidified and would offer no progress, Silik thought about different approaches that might shake the Klingon’s mind.
After contemplating for a moment, he attempted, “What were you doing on Rigel Ten?”
“I was sent to meet someone.”
“Who?”
“A Suliban … female … named Sarin.”
At last—the first bit of useful information.
“And what did Sarin give you?”
“Nothing.”
But Silik now had a tidbit upon which the day might turn. From a single name, he had an idea of where to begin.
He turned away from the Klingon and to the physicians charged, “Keep him alive while I’m gone!”
Enterprise
Shuttle deck
“Once we’ve tied down, we’ll be descending into the trade complex. It’s got thirty-six levels.”
Archer paused and looked at T’Pol, indicating that she should take over. The crew should become accustomed to hers as the voice of the science officer.
“Your translators have been programmed for Rigelian. However, you’ll encounter numerous other species. Many of them are known to be impatient with newcomers. None of them have seen a human before. You have a tendency to be gregarious. I suggest you restrain that tendency.”