Rihannsu
by Starsinger
In case you're wondering, this is the term that Romulans refer to themselves in many non-cannon books. For those of you who know TOS, Charvanek is the commander of the Romulan Bird-of-Prey in "The Enterprise Incident". For the rest of you, it's not terribly necessary to know that for this story. This is for T'Xiao and Doggielilly, a two fer as you would say. Spock and McCoy find themselves stuck on a Romulan Bird-of-Prey, special guests (and I do mean guests, they haven't done anything to piss the Romulan Empire off, yet) of its commander who is quite beautiful, in a green-blooded sort of way. One of them catches her eye. Don't own them.
"Ya know," McCoy said with a shaky laugh. "Jim would be laughing at us right now if he could see us."
Spock lifted an eyebrow, "What Jim would or would not do now, is irrelevant, Doctor." What had happened to land them as guests on a Romulan Bird-of-Prey? Well, as far as McCoy was concerned, it was a funny story. He and Spock were heading back from shore leave on Omega Eridani Prime when the freighter was attacked by pirates. The tricky part of going on shore leave near either neutral zone are pirates, unless you're on a starship, and they don't attack those, unless they have a death wish.
Anyway, they were on a freighter, and were attacked. The captain put out a distress call and a nearby ship responded. No one was prepared for the massive Romulan warship to appear out of nowhere, literally. It just materialized and started shooting the pirates out of space. Some turned and fled but the fiery green light followed them into oblivion. Spock and McCoy were in civilian clothes, but still their Starfleet IDs would have been in the ship's computer. They watched curiously as Romulans came on board the freighter to ensure that it would be able to get on its way. Romulans may be militaristic, but impeding trade was never considered a good thing.
Then the Captain started babbling about having two Starfleet officers returning from shore leave and needing to get them back to base before long. That got the attention of the Romulans. Spock and McCoy didn't know what was happening until the Romulan Commander, Charvanek, stood in front of the passengers and told them that those officers would be allowed on their ship and taken to meet theirs, all they had to do was step forward.
Both officers looked at each other, confused. They had good reason to be wary of Romulans, but the Commander was beautiful, even if Spock wasn't interested. They shrugged, knowing the freighter wasn't going anywhere for a while, and stepped forward. Charvanek walked to them, studying them. She studied Spock most closely, "I've never met a Vulcan before, you are Vulcan, correct?" Spock nodded his head. She looked at McCoy and did something he'd never seen Vulcan do, she smiled. "Welcome aboard the Honor Blade, gentlemen. We are heading for New Vulcan, an envoy of the Emperor, my cousin by the way. I've been told we're expected, so we won't be cloaked outside the Neutral Zone. Honor Blade, five to beam up."
The Honor Blade stayed around long enough to ensure the freighter was being towed back to the nearest planet. Then she took off to rendezvous with a Federation ship, happily enough it was the Enterprise. Sub-commander Tal, Charvanek's second in command, escorted them to their room. The room was sparse and bare with two bunks to hold them. He bowed and left as the two sat on the bunks.
"Well, at least they're taking us to the Enterprise," McCoy said cheerfully, Spock sank into a trance.
This will be a multi-part story. It'll take about two weeks to rendezvous with the Enterprise, and these two cooped up with each other will stretch Charvanek's hospitality VERY thin. Hope you enjoy, please Read and Review.
