Into the Distance: Determined to Try

by jtm1848

My take on "Sleeping Dogs."

It was ship's night aboard the Enterprise, well past the hour when most crew members turned in; a handful were on duty, manning the overnight shift, but few crew were needed to hold the starship in standard cruise. For many, it was a relaxing time, a chance to catch up on old endeavors and loose ends.

Thus, after several weeks, Commander "Trip" Tucker finally tracked down T'Pol, their Vulcan first officer and science officer extraordinaire. She was in the mess hall, sitting at a table and reading from a data padd; the reduced night lighting gave a soft glow to the room that highlighted her natural beauty.

"Feel like some company?" Trip asked as he approached the table. Unbidden, he pulled out a chair, swung it around, and sat down. "We haven't talked much since Vulcan. How are you holding up?"

T'Pol didn't look up from her reading. "I've been fine," she answered politely. Their recent ad hoc mission on the Vulcan homeworld had been particularly brutal for her; while the mission itself was not abnormally dangerous, it had forced her to challenge virtually every belief she held about her people. It was not easy fighting with a lifetime of imposed preconceptions, but the experience had left little doubt that she must.

"I've been seeing you by yourself a lot," Trip added, pushing forward in an effort to open her up. He wasn't going to accept a polite brush-off.

"I've been reading the Kir'Shara," T'Pol answered unwillingly, still not looking up at her human crewmate. The Kir'Shara—the hidden teachings of Vulcan's greatest sage—had only recently come to light, and in the process had toppled the long-standing orthodoxy of Vulcan philosophy. To call it cataclysmic would not do it justice; the government had fallen, the temples had fallen, and a new cadre of 'heretical' leaders had surged to the forefront.

"How is it?" Trip asked, ignoring the cold shoulder. He lowered his head slightly, trying to drop his own eyes down into T'Pol's gaze.

She sighed internally, wondering what it would take to make him leave. "Interesting," she said in monotone.

"Interesting?" Trip leaned in, pressing for more.

"Extremely interesting," T'Pol replied.

Slightly frustrated, Trip latched his hands behind his head and leaned back. "Listen, T'Pol," he began, "I know what you're going through. Losing a family member, it's the toughest thing there is." Trip had been through it himself, when his sister perished in the initial Xindi attack; his unfruitful efforts to deny the pain had made things…interesting.

T'Pol finally set the padd down and looked at Trip. "I see no point in discussing it," she answered curtly. Even if there was a point, she chose to not see it. "It's in the past."

"Your mother just died, T'Pol," Trip said softly as he rocked forward. "I was there, remember? I know you didn't get along with her—but she's still your mother."

"Talking won't change her death," T'Pol replied, almost by rote. The passionless monotones of Vulcan logic practically did the speaking for her, allowing her to withdraw behind the cover.

"But it might change the way you feel about it," Trip opined. "You're carrying a helluva lot of baggage about this, T'Pol. You can't deny it; I know you too well."

"I don't feel anything about it," T'Pol retorted. "To do so would be illogical."

Trip smiled slightly; he had scored his first hit, made it through the first crack. "You can tell yourself that—"

"It's the truth," T'Pol shot back.

Trip ran a hand through his hair. "You know, when Lizzie died, you were the one who really came through for me, T'Pol," he said gently. "There were times when I wanted to just close up and retreat inside myself—"

"Trip." T'Pol's tone became sharp. "I appreciate what you're trying to do, but it's not necessary."

Trip only smiled. "Well, if you ever do want to talk, let me know."

…

With a clank, Malcolm Reed affixed the target projector to the armory bulkhead and stepped back.

"You have a ten second firing window," he noted, not quite commanding the young lieutenant who stood beside him. "Ready on your mark."

Hoshi Sato nodded as she double-checked the settings of her phase pistol, then raised it upwards. "Ready."

Malcolm pushed a button on his handheld data padd. "Go."

First one, then two, then three targets spit out across the room, and Hoshi tracked them with her pistol, firing as each one appeared and then disappeared; some her shots struck home, disrupting the false targets, but many more encountered the armory walls.

Ten seconds elapsed, and the target projector shut down. "Time," Malcolm announced, shaking his head.

"Any better?" Hoshi asked, almost apologetically.

"Your hit to miss ratio is still below fifty percent," Malcolm noted, reading the results from his padd. "If those had been live rounds, you'd have blown out two or three bulkheads."

Hoshi dropped her shoulders in frustration. "I never used to have this much trouble."

"You have to remember to relax," Malcolm replied. "Just point straight at the target, and keep your shoulders relaxed. Don't try to compensate for any particle drift. The phase pistol is a very—" he raised one arm sharply, mimicking the raising of a pistol into firing position. "User-friendly—" he pulled his index finger, as if squeezing a trigger. "Weapon."

With a sudden start, Malcolm cleared his throat, as if hacking up phlegm.

"Are you all right, Commander?" Hoshi asked in concern.

"Yeah, fine." Malcolm cleared his throat again. "You'll get the hang of it again," he added, changing the subject. Prior to their nearly year-long mission in the Delphic Expanse, Hoshi had checked out cleanly with the new phase pistols; but since their return, she had been somewhat shaky, precipitating this training session. "Let's try for twenty seconds this time."

As Malcolm raised the padd, ready to start the target program again, the two officers heard the familiar shroom of the starship dropping from warp speed into normal space. Instinctively, both looked overhead, as if to see the bridge.

"I thought we were staying at warp for the next few days," Hoshi commented.

Malcolm took two steps towards the bulkhead and hit the wall panel, cueing up the navigational readouts. "We're approaching a gas giant," he noted. "Class nine."

"So much for target practice," Hoshi replied with relief. At any time—but especially now—exploring a new planet held far more allure than target practice.

Malcolm nodded. He, too, was intrigued by the massive planet. "We'll pick up tomorrow," he announced. "In the meantime, let's get to the bridge."

…

It was stunning.

Space, Archer mused to himself, taking a second to sit back in his command chair as he took in the image on the viewscreen. It never fails to amaze you.

It was a gas giant; a supergiant at that, far larger and far closer than he had ever been. Decorated with its hydrogen-enriched clouds, the planet—the sixth in the system of Nu2 Canis Majoris, and tentatively dubbed Prophyrion after the mythical king of the Thracian Giants—was nearly close enough to touch, despite still being thousands of kilometers away.

It started with the gas cloud, a glowing aura that spread across the stellar system. At its core lay a burning ball of compacted gases, glowing a gentle white as it highlighted the surrounding mist; on each side, a dusty disk reached out, spanning the interior of the cloud in white-lit beauty as the newborn star at its center continued to accrete the virgin materials that would fuel its furnace for countless millennia. Surrounding it, stretching outward as it reached towards the darkness, was the halo of light; bright whites and faint yellows combined with sun-kissed oranges, highlighted by faint hues of reds and pinks and dotted in nearly a dozen places by the dots of growing planets, still in the early springtime of their lives.

One of the dots—the sixth—dwarfed the Enterprise's viewscreen with its beauty. Despite being a pinprick in the system, Prophyrion was several times larger than the largest planet of Earth's own solar system. Girdled with vast, circling banks of never-ending clouds, the planet nearly glowed as it basked in the light of the infant sun nearby. Vast disks of maroon encircled each polar region, transmuting into shades of burnt oranges and tangerines that seemed to layer atop of one another. Here and there, faint bands of bright amber could be seen; and a brilliant halo of white circumscribed Prophyrion as if an angelic halo.

"The probe has entered the outer atmosphere," T'Pol noted dispassionately, and Archer resisted the urge to upbraid her for failing to show a sense of wonder. Vulcans, after all, had their own ways, and he was not to be a judge of them.

"Switch to the probe view," he ordered instead, and the scene flipped suddenly to show the planet from the interior of the highest clouds. From inside, the planet was—fuzzy. "Can we clear up the signal?" he asked, trying not to voice any frustration.

"I am attempting to do so," T'Pol answered.

"There's a lot of EM interference," Travis Mayweather noted from the navigation console. "The magnetic fields often create unpredictable waveforms. They sound beautiful, but I'd never want to pilot a ship in there. They'll bounce you around like a toy before crushing you down to dense pieces."

Realizing that he had raised a solitary eyebrow, Archer forced it back down. "Sound?" He glanced sideways to Hoshi Sato, who was sliding into her usual post at the communications station. "Can you play some for us, Hoshi?"

"I think I can, sir," Hoshi replied with a slight smile, and moments later, a wavering sound—almost a cross of a hum and a whistle—started playing across the Enterprise's bridge.

"Siren calls," Travis added, his face splitting into a broad grin as he sat back to listen. "At least, that's what we called them when I was a kid. My dad would put them through the speakers whenever we flew by a gas giant."

"Other than listening to EM interference, I'm not sure what we expect to accomplish here," T'Pol intervened curtly. "We have seen gas giants before. This one is not sufficiently unique to warrant further study."

Archer tilted his head backwards to address the Vulcan science officer. "Even you, T'Pol, can appreciate some beautiful music," he replied, quashing a small note of ire. Vulcans, he thought ruefully. Never bring one to a party.

"Even I," T'Pol responded, still curt, "can appreciate the danger to us that such a planet represents. As it is, we are far too close for safety."

"Nah, we're fine." Archer grinned at the diminutive woman. "Travis won't let anything bad happen."

"Of course not, Captain." Travis added his own grin. "Once when I was seventeen, I was in a transport pod that was—" his voice faded out as the lieutenant leaned forward, concentrating on the viewscreen. "Permission, sir?"

"Of course, Lieutenant," Archer answered. He was uncertain just what he was granting permission for, but he trusted the young man.

In response, Travis tapped several controls on his panel, and the view shifted quickly, scanning to the left of the screen; once there, it stopped, and magnified suddenly.

"What are we looking at, Travis?" Archer asked, trying to coax an explanation from Travis.

"One moment, sir." Travis hit his controls again, and the screen cleared up slightly. "See right there?" he added, pointing forward. "There's a patch of gray coloring that doesn't belong. Commander T'Pol, can you run a scan for power signatures?"

"Yes, Lieutenant." Though hard to tell, her own curiosity was peaked. "I am detecting an anomalous power signature, Captain."

"What?" Archer's head swiveled about; what had started as a stop for pure curiosity was taking on another tone. "What kind of power signature?"

'Captain," T'Pol added abruptly, "I'm reading several biosigns."

Can anyone survive in there?

"Take us in closer," Archer ordered. "Try to clear up the view."

Moments later, a half-wrecked ship emerged before them.

…

Malcolm Reed sneezed. Again.

"We can travel faster than the speed of light," he muttered, his voice off-kilter and stuffed. "You'd think we could find a cure for the common cold."

Doctor Phlox tsked from across sickbay. "You should be grateful," he commented, gifting the commander with a broad Denobulan smile as he punched the controls of sickbay's pharmaceutical replicator. "A human cold is mild," he continued as he worked. "I once had a patient with Kamaraazite flu. He sneezed so violently he nearly regurgitated his pineal gland." A soft whoosh sounded as the replicator pumped an antiviral cocktail into the attached hypospray.

Malcolm shook his head. "I don't know how I could actually catch a cold," he said, sounding bewildered. "Not on a hermetically-sealed starship!"

"Oh, you may have picked up the virus from a piece of equipment," Phlox countered. He held the hypospray up to the light, visually checking to ensure that it was filled. "It could have been lurking inside a sealed container."

"I did open a case of stem bolts recently," Malcolm admitted. He paused speaking as his face wrinkled up, but the moment passed without eruption.

"You see?" Phlox replied. "Whoever packed that case was probably nursing a cold."

"But that was packed in Spacedock!" Malcolm protested. He felt miserable, and his stuffed head could scarcely keep up with the doctor. "Five months ago!"

"You underestimate the tenacity of a virus, Commander," Phlox answered. Finally satisfied with his work, he came up beside Malcolm. "It can lay dormant for months, adapt to whatever enrivonment it finds itself in." He pressed the hypospray to Malcolm's neck and squeezed the trigger. "This should help with the symptoms. But the only cure I know of involves bed rest."

Malcolm's shoulders drooped. "No, that'll have to wait," he answered. "The captain wants me on the team investigating that shipwreck."

"Well, you won't be contagious inside an environmental suit," Phlox pronounced, and he smiled again in anticipation of the coming line. "Just try not to sneeze in your helmet."

…

Archer was lost in contemplation, dreaming, oddly enough, of dragon's fire and dwarves, when the door chime sounded once, then twice. "Come in," he pronounced, straightening up in his chair as he spoke. A quick glance at his desk revealed scattered data pads and the remnants of a half-eaten lunch, but little to show that he had spent the previous half hour with his mind floating freely.

The door to the captain's ready room hissed open, and Hoshi poked her head through. "Captain?" She looked around, as if expecting someone to be standing just inside the hatchway. "Is this a good time, sir?"

"Of course, Hoshi," Archer replied with a broad smile. Gesturing loosely with one hand, he invited the lieutenant into the small chamber. "What can I do for you?"

The door hissed shut as Hoshi stepped in. "It's the shipwreck, sir," she offered, smiling with an almost-apologetic bashfulness. "There's no match for it in the database."

Uncertain of Hoshi's point, Archer leaned back slightly. "All the more reason to board it, Lieutenant," he pronounced, keeping his tone light. "It could be an entirely new alien race."

"Yes, sir," Hoshi replied. Her own tone wavered. "We have no idea what type of life forms we'll find on that alien vessel," she continued, her voice firming up as she went. "Are you sure the away team won't need a translator?"

Archer frowned slightly. Was Hoshi trying to talk him out of sending an away team? Or was she—surprisingly—hinting that she should accompany the away team? "They'll have their UTs," he replied, looking to counter Hoshi's apparent objection. "And we'll keep an open comm link at all times."

"There's a lot of interference in the atmosphere." Though clearly ill at ease, Hoshi forged forward. "The comm link may not work. And what if the control panels and hatches are labeled in a language that the universal translators don't understand? They'll need someone who can decipher the writing."

The right corner of Archer's mouth rose in a wry smile. "Are you trying to tell me something, Hoshi?" he asked lightly, guessing that he had figured out the purpose of the lieutenant's visit.

Hoshi gulped. "Yes, sir," she began, and licked her lips once before continuing. "I realize that I've been…hesitant to return to space."

Archer simply nodded, noting the understatement to himself; in the wake of their mission to the Expanse, Hoshi had wrapped herself up in the familiar and comforting world of academia. Each time since, when he had managed to convince Hoshi to board the Enterprise for a temporary mission, it had required a personal plea and much wrangling; and the young lieutenant's uneasiness was transparent. Perhaps, he realized, I've rushed her back too soon.

"But…" Hoshi paused, reflecting on her upcoming attestation. "I want you to know, sir, that you can count on me," she went on, almost apologetically. "I mean, I chose to come. I'm not going to let anything hold me back from my duty."

Archer gifted her with a smile, but leaned forward in seriousness. "Are you sure, Lieutenant?" he asked, looking up at Hoshi. "You don't have to go with the away team."

"I want to, sir," Hoshi stated firmly. She squared her shoulders in reiteration. "I'm prepared to go."

"Very well," Archer replied. "You'd better get to the launch bay before they leave without you."

"Yes, sir," Hoshi answered, and the corners of her mouth crept upward. "Thank you, sir."

But as she turned and left the room, Archer's eyes followed, lingering on the hatchway as it hissed shut, uncertain if he was making the best decision.

…

Hoshi tapped the control button once, just to verify that it worked; twice, for good measure; and thrice, just in case.

T'Pol nearly frowned as she watched the young lieutenant. "I thought you were familiar with the environmental suit," the Vulcan deadpanned, feeling slightly unnerved by Hoshi's careful checking of the suit's systems.

Hoshi glanced backward at the science officer. "I am," she replied, somewhat abashedly. "I'm just brushing up on the backup systems," she added belatedly. "I wouldn't want the emergency oxygen to fail during a hull breach."

Malcolm sniffled sharply. "Trust me, Lieutenant," he muttered through a stuffy nose. "If there's a hull breach, the pressure will crush you to something—" he held out a fist before Hoshi's face. "About this big."

T'Pol was less cavalier. "If you're feeling uncomfortable, Lieutenant—" she began, before Hoshi cut her off.

"I'm fine, Commander," Hoshi answered, somewhat tartly. She smiled in quiet apology. "It's…just been a while, that's all. I have to get used to the suits again." And space, she acknowledged silently. "Anyway, I'm fine." With that, she turned away, refocusing on checking the systems of her environmental suit.

Hoshi could feel T'Pol's eyes burning a hole in her back.

…

Hoshi swore that the shuttlepod was bouncing out of control.

As the craft fell, angled downwards toward the alien ship located in a soft spot between two eddies deep below, it careened from side to side, slammed back and forth by the powerful winds of the planet's dense atmosphere. Like a little toy at the mercy of a tempest, it rose and fell, doing its best impersonation of a shuttle of the damned.

"Smooth flight," Malcolm remarked from the pilot's seat. Hoshi's eyes shot arrows at him. "The alien craft is one hundred kilometers below us, still descending."

"Gravity is pulling it deeper into the atmosphere," T'Pol commented; her voice, like Malcolm's, betrayed none of the worry that Hoshi felt. T'Pol tapped her controls to pull up a reading. "At their current altitude the pressure is fifteen thousand gsc."

Hoshi refrained from comment as the conversation passed between her two co-officers.

"That's—" Malcolm's voice became gargled as the shuttlepod shot sideways, buffeted by a fierce current of gas. The shuttle steadied somewhat as he goosed the engines, pulling it out of the current's path. "That's well within our hull tolerance."

"For now," T'Pol added. Her voice expressed a degree of concern. "But at the rate that vessel is descending, we'll have an hour at most."

"We'll be—" Malcolm's voice cut out again as the shuttlepod dropped sharply. "We'll be on our way back well before we're in any danger," he added, politely ignoring the muffled Denobulan curse that came from Hoshi's general direction. Leaning forward, he squinted into the distance, trying to discern some visual sign of the alien craft. "After all," he tacked on nonchalantly, "I for one have no interest in imploding a valuable shuttlepod."

Hoshi couldn't hold her tongue any longer. "Or three valuable officers?" she retorted.

Malcolm let loose with a smile. "Or that," he acknowledged.

Again, the pod shook violently, but smoothed out after spinning in a near-circle.

"We crossed an eddy of liquid helium," T'Pol reported, reading from her controls. "We're clear."

"Wait a sec." Hoshi squinted her eyes, trying to make sense of the visual cues coming from the planet's thick, gaseous atmosphere. "There's a dark spot ahead!"

"It's the alien vessel," Malcolm confirmed. "One hundred meters."

Hoshi pointed forward. "Is that a hatch on the side?" she asked, still uncertain. Dense waves of gas made any sort of visual confirmation delicate at the best.

"I see it," Malcolm replied.

"Fifty meters," T'Pol added. Her controls chirped once. "Forty meters."

"Slowing down," Malcolm answered. Realizing just how difficult the docking maneuver would be, Hoshi stayed silent; for the moment, she was just along for the ride. Some ride, she retorted to herself.

"Twenty meters," T'Pol confirmed. A warning siren seemed to explode in the tense shuttlepod, and T'Pol moved quickly to shut it off. "Just the proximity alarm," T'Pol commented, giving the rattled Hoshi a kind look. "Ten meters."

"Engaging docking interface!" Malcolm called out. The shuttlepod rocked once again, but the heavy sound of docking clamps affixing to the alien vessel brought them to a quick halt. "See, Lieutenant?" Malcolm grinned. "Nothing to worry about."

…

Hoshi struggled to find the right word to describe the interior of the alien ship.

It was dark, that much was certain; the primary power was clearly out, and the emergency lighting was weak, providing barely a glow to the inner airlock. Little was visible, beyond that which was illuminated by the lights of her environmental suit. Dark corners and recessed crevasses dominated the room.

Medieval? Hoshi thought, wondering if that was the best fit. It was accurate, at least; somehow, the interior of the alien vessel gave her the feeling of an ancient castle, or stony warrens, or…perhaps an evil lair. She shivered once, her imagination running ahead of her.

T'Pol's voice brought Hoshi back to the immediate. "Nitrogen-oxygen atmosphere," the science officer commented, reading from her scanner. T'Pol looked up at Malcolm. "Carbon dioxide levels are high, but not toxic. It's breathable."

Hoshi, too, looked at the tactical chief. "You first," she added.

Malcolm nodded. "All right," he confirmed, and with a slight hint of trepidation, he unlatched the clasp on the front of his helmet. "Not too bad," he commented, taking a short breath.

He promptly sneezed.

Moving at approximately the same time, Hoshi and T'Pol unlatched their helmets as well.

The potent stench of unwashed bodies, rotten meat, and machine lubricant assaulted Hoshi like a blow to the face, and as she reeled backwards from the onslaught, she saw that even the serene Vulcan was unable to control her reaction to the aroma; both women gagged silently, and T'Pol made a violent wretching move.

"What is it?" Malcolm asked, alarmed.

"You can't smell that?" Hoshi asked in astonishment, still gagging on the odor. She coughed twice, trying to clear her throat of the stench.

Malcolm shook his head. "No," he replied. "Not with this damn cold."

"Count your—blessings," Hoshi answered, coughing in the middle. She shook her head, as if the movement would chase the smell away. She glanced back at T'Pol, whose eyes were open wide. "Are you alright, Commander?"

"I will be," T'Pol confirmed.

"Anyone recognize anything?" Malcolm asked, pulling the team back to its duty. Looking around the airlock, he advanced forward, pushing into the corridor beyond. "Hoshi? Any writing that you recognize?"

And like that, Hoshi's blood ran cold as all thoughts of the stench disappeared. "Yes," she whispered, then: "Yes. Over there, Lieutenant." She pointed to a bulkhead on their left, about waist-high. Four jagged etchings were marked prominently on the wall.

Malcolm followed, but shook his head. "What are they, Lieutenant?" he asked, back firmly to business.

Hoshi shivered once. "Klingon," she answered.

In response, Malcolm drew his phase pistol. "I thought you knew Klingon ships," he commented hoarsely, looking at T'Pol.

"The Klingons have many classes of ships," T'Pol replied evenly. She, too, had drawn her phase pistol and was pointing it forward. "I'm not familiar with all of them."

Despite herself, Hoshi was thankful that her two fellow officers were taking the point positions. "So I suppose you don't know how many Klingons are on board?" she asked, somewhat hesitantly.

"No, I do not," T'Pol answered after a moment; her attention was already split between surveying the corridor and reading her scanner. "But I'm only detecting three lifesigns. Very weak."

…

It was hard to be stealthy when wearing a clunky environmental suit.

The corridor to the Klingon bridge was short, for which Hoshi was grateful; the cramped confines, clad in shades of battle-gray and shadowed black, was claustrophobic for the young linguistics officer.

The bridge, of course, was little better.

The bright lights of various control panels bathed the bridge in hues of reds and yellows by which Hoshi could see; and every wall, every corner, of the small compartment had a panel of some sort, one or another, maximizing use of the limited space aboard. Even the center of the bridge was taken up, with a bank of controls sitting just ahead of the captain's chair.

Of more concern were the three Klingon bodies, slumped over in ugly repose.

"They're still alive," T'Pol, seemingly unaffected by the oppressive sense of doom, reported. She was standing next to the captain, who was sitting half-in and half-out of his chair. "We should leave."

"The atmosphere's going to crush this ship like an eggshell pretty soon," Malcolm warned. His face looked a pale white in the heavy air. "If they don't wake up, they're going to die."

"We should try to help them," Hoshi commented, doing her best to match the steely resolve of her comrades. "We can't just leave them here to die."

"On the contrary," T'Pol replied, still scanning the bodies. "That's exactly what we can do."

Malcolm shot a sharp look at the Vulcan. "How can you say that?" he exclaimed.

T'Pol returned the look. "They don't want our help."

"What do you mean?" Hoshi joined back in the conversation. "How do you know that?"

"They're Klingons," T'Pol answered, as if that simple statement explained everything. Moments later, she continued. "To die at their post assures them a path to the afterlife, but if we rescue them, they'll be dishonored."

"Well," Malcolm muttered, "I for one don't intend to just fly off and let these people die, honorable deaths or not! We have a chance to save them."

"Your compassion is admirable but misguided," T'Pol answered. "If they wake and find us aboard their ship, they'll kill us."

Feeling an icy ray shoot down her spine, Hoshi couldn't help but shudder. "We need to check in with the captain," she replied, somewhat unwillingly; T'Pol was, after all, in command of the boarding party.

"Yes, of course." T'Pol flipped her communicator open. "T'Pol to the Enterprise. Come in, Enterprise."

…

A crackle and a hiss later, Archer heard the Vulcan's voice come over the speakers of the Enterprise bridge. "This is the Enterprise," he replied, his voice projecting loudly. "Can you hear me, T'Pol?"

Another loud hiss sounded over the speakers, followed by the interrupted sound of T'Pol's voice.

"Can you clear that up, Ensign?" Archer asked, glancing over at Anzel Stali, who was manning the communications console in Hoshi's absence.

"Yes, sir," Stali answered, and a moment later: "I have Commander T'Pol, sir."

"T'Pol!" Archer nearly shouted. "Can you hear me now?"

"Yes, Captain." T'Pol's voice cracked slightly, but was audible. She quickly brought Archer up to speed.

"So how many are there?" Archer asked at last, having gotten a grasp on the situation.

"Three on the bridge," T'Pol replied. "But I'm detecting at least three more biosigns on board."

"And you can't tell what happened to them?"

…

On board the Klingon ship, it was the captain's voice that was garbled; and, even with the sensitive hearing of a Vulcan and an ace communications officer, Archer had to repeat his question.

"And you can't tell what happened to them?"

"I'm detecting residual amounts of a carbon dioxide-based neurotoxin in the Klingon captain," T'Pol replied loudly. "But it seems to be dissipating."

…

"Stand by," Archer replied. He looked over to "Trip" Tucker, who was unusually on the bridge, staffing the little-used engineering console. "How long is the shuttlepod's hull going to hold up?"

Trip shrugged slightly. "At their present rate of descent? Half an hour, give or take."

Archer nodded. "T'Pol."

"Yes, Captain," she replied.

"You've got twenty minutes to see if you can do anything for that crew, then I want you out of there," Archer ordered.

…

"Understood?" Archer's voice was barely audible across the comm channel.

"I don't believe there is anything we can do in twenty minutes," T'Pol responded. "I suggest we leave now."

"You have a margin of safety, Commander," Archer replied. "Try to do something." With that, static consumed the channel.

"Damn interference," Malcolm grumbled.

"We may have dropped out of comm range," T'Pol countered.

"Either way, we still have twenty minutes," Hoshi added, not certain if she was grateful for the opportunity to remain on board. "We have time to do something."

T'Pol shook her head. "It doesn't make sense to place ourselves at risk when the crew would rather die," she said. "We should leave. Now," she emphasized.

"There must be something we can do," Malcolm exclaimed. "Maybe they have a distress beacon we can activate."

"This is not a matter of discussion." T'Pol's voice crept up slightly. "You are attempting to force your own ethics onto an alien species. Little good ever comes of that. Klingons would rather die, and we must respect that."

The sound of a bulkhead closing rattled from without the confined compartment.

Both hands moving simultaneously, Malcolm signaled for T'Pol and Hoshi to be quiet while he drew his phase pistol. Pointing it down the entry corridor, he started back into the heart of the Klingon ship, the clang of his boots on the metal deckplating the only sound.

Equally alarmed, T'Pol and Hoshi followed a step behind as Malcolm rounded a corner.

Despite being on guard, Hoshi was taken by surprise when a body fell from overhead, crashing down onto Malcolm's head. His phase pistol fired wildly as the two hit the floor, and immediately, the action was on.

Beneath the weight of the Klingon—a woman, Hoshi noted—Malcolm braced his legs and uncoiled upward, tossing his assailant backward and into the wall. Recovering quickly, the Klingon spun Malcolm about and hit him twice, first in the abdomen, then across the chin; and with a mighty show of strength, she tossed the Starfleet officer to the floor. Punching the controls to a hatchway, she slipped through, even as it shut behind her; and the violent beams of two phase pistols narrowly missed their target, hitting the closed hatchway instead.

A rumbling sound came from beyond.

"What's that?" Hoshi called out, alarmed.

T'Pol revealed no emotion. "It's our shuttlepod taking off."

…

Jonathan Archer fidgeted in his chair. It wasn't easy, at times like this, to be the captain of a starship; his crew, off exploring the unknown and potentially in danger, while he sat behind on the bridge, waiting, hoping, for any sign of communication from them…it tested his patience and tried his nerves to sit and wait, when every bone in his body ached for action.

"Try it now," Ensign Stali offered. Still seated at the communications console, Anzel Stali was fiddling with every available control to clear up the static on the comm line.

Archer punched the comm control on the arm of his command chair. "Archer to T'Pol," he called out loudly, hoping to hear something back in response. When no voice answered, he opted to continue. "What's your status?"

Only the constant hissing replied.

Archer sighed. "Try it again, Ensign," he ordered, at a loss for any better option; for better or worse, the mission was completely in the hands of his first officer and the boarding party. She was quite capable, of course, and he had full trust in T'Pol…but it's hard to sit still, he recognized.

"Captain!" Travis Mayweather's voice erupted from the helm, pulling Archer away from his brief reverie. "The shuttlepod, sir!"

Archer's gaze pivoted forward to the viewscreen, and his heart leapt slightly in joy; the shuttlepod was rocketing forward from the dense gaseous atmosphere of the planet below, leaving behind the danger beneath. Malcolm, no doubt, was at the controls, and…something's not right, he realized a moment later, unable to quite place a finger on it.

Travis, however, caught the anomaly. "Sir, they're headed into open space," he commented. "Not back to the Enterprise."

Archer's brow furrowed in puzzlement. "Try hailing them," he ordered.

"I have them," Stali replied a moment later, then: "Sir, something's wrong here."

Archer turned to look at the young comm officer. "Pipe it in."

Stali nodded, and a moment later, the signal filled the bridge. "Duj-to! Chak wa kah Deesh paklah! Kah Deesh paklah!" The voice sounded roughly feminine, but was decidedly not Commander T'Pol. Or Lieutenant Sato.

"It's Klingon, sir," Stali said, answering the unspoken question; and Archer felt his blood run cold. What's happened down there? A Klingon commandeering the shuttlepod? The captain realized immediately that his boarding party was in deep danger.

"Tie in the UT," he ordered, hoping to make some sense of the barked Klingon language. Perhaps it would reveal something, anything, about the fate of T'Pol, Malcolm, and Hoshi.

"Aye, sir," Stali answered.

"Chak wa kah Deesh paklah!" The Klingon voice repeated. "kah Deesh paklah! 'kiv Duj in range." The last two words came through clearly. "Respond. We've been attacked by an unknown ship designation Enterprise NX-01. Any warships in range, respond."

Shit. Archer's head swung back to the viewscreen, as orders formed in his head. "Set a pursuit course, Travis. Ensign Rahimi, bring the grappler online."

…

The grappler launcher lowered itself from the belly of the Enterprise. Orienting itself, the device fired at the fleeing shuttlepod.

…

"We've got it," Neda Rahimi confirmed a moment later. The intense strength of the device was enough to overcome the momentum of the shuttlepod, and was quickly reeling the small craft in to the Enterprise.

Archer nodded. "Good work, Ensign," he stated. "Send a security team to launch bay one. The bridge is yours, Travis," he added as he left his seat. This, he would take care of himself.

…

Phase pistols, pointed forward, entered the launch bay first, followed momentarily by a pair of security guards, then Ensign Rahimi, and finally, unwillingly bringing up the rear, Captain Archer himself. Stepping slowly, carefully, the foursome fanned out, making their way around Shuttlepod One.

The side door of the shuttlepod was already open.

Ever so carefully, the first security guard stepped in front of the open hatch.

Fury erupted from within as the Klingon woman exploded outward, catching the guard squarely in the chest as she knocked him backward. Without hesitation, she grappled the stunned guard, and threw him into the second guard, sending both men to the ground.

From the front corner of the shuttlepod, Archer levelled his pistol and fired. Undaunted, the Klingon woman straightened up, revealing a pilfered phase pistol in her own hand. Raising it, she prepared to fire.

Just then, a second phased beam hit the Klingon, this one coming from the opposite side; Rahimi had made her way around the pod, and caught by the flanking maneuver, hit by twin phased energy beams, the alien woman finally gave way. She fell, stunned, to the deck plating.

Archer released the trigger. "Is everyone all right?" he asked, looking at the sheepish guards now picking themselves up from the floor.

"Yes, sir," one answered, and the other just nodded.

It was enough for the captain; having had a taste of action, he was ready to commit the Enterprise to a dangerous course of action.

Finding a comm panel by the doorway, he hit it, opening a channel. "Archer to the bridge," he called out.

"Mayweather here," Travis answered.

"Have you still got a fix on the shipwreck?" Archer asked.

"Yes, sir."

"Transfer the coordinates to the launch bay," Archer ordered. "I'm going back for the boarding party," he added, grimly.

"Sir." Travis' hesitation stopped the captain. "The alien ship has sunk another two thousand meters. It's below the shuttlepod's safety limits."

Archer found himself smiling in response. "Then polarize the hull plating," he ordered. "We're taking the Enterprise down."

…

Hoshi was sweating inside her environmental suit.

"There's got to be some way off this ship," Malcolm said as he wandered about the small command compartment, absently looking at the Klingon-coded controls decorating the various computer panels. The jagged symbols meant nothing to him, other than screaming danger.

There was a pause as T'Pol, too, looked about the bridge.

"What about the escape pods?" Hoshi asked finally, as the heavy silence became too much to bear in the dank, stale atmosphere of the descending Klingon ship. She had little hope for the answer.

"I don't know about the structural integrity of Klingon escape pods," Malcolm remarked, his hand poised over a nondescript button; it glowed red beneath his palm, adding to the eerie lighting of the darkened room. "My guess is that we're better off here."

"It is irrelevant," T'Pol countered a moment later. "Klingon ships don't have escape pods."

I knew it, Hoshi remarked to herself. "What about their comm system?" she asked, searching desperately for options. "If we can figure it out, we may be able to contact the Enterprise."

This time, T'Pol shook her head before answering. "I doubt their comm system will penetrate the EM field any better than our own," she responded, tossing cold water on the flicker of an idea.

"But we need to try something!" Hoshi exclaimed. "We can't just sit here and—and wait to be crushed!" Just that moment, an undercurrent of stink passed by Hoshi, and she scrunched up her face.

"Perhaps," T'Pol started, paused, then continued: "Perhaps, if we can access their helm controls, we might be able to put this vessel into a stable orbit."

"That sounds good!" Hoshi remarked, glad that T'Pol was getting off her pessimism-laced current. "Um, how do we do that?"

"I don't know," Malcolm countered, re-entering the conversation; he stood just off from the other two officers, trying to make sense of a panel that looked just like a dozen others. "I haven't had much experience in piloting Klingon ships."

"I believe we have no other choice," T'Pol commented flatly. "Lieutenant, start translating these consoles." The Vulcan gestured at a panel chosen at random. "Look for anything marked propulsion, or helm, or navigation."

"Or engines," Malcolm muttered.

Hoshi swallowed heavily. "I'll try," she answered. "But reading Klingon is a lot different than speaking it." And I can barely speak it, she continued silently. How am I supposed to read it?

Malcolm snorted loudly. "We could always try waking one of them to help us."

Hoshi shot a glare at him. "That's okay, Commander, I can take a shot at it," she retorted. I can do this, she told herself. Looking at the first screen, she carefully read the jagged characters, then mentally translated them into sounds. "Kolat chack tabak. That's 'plasma'…plasma containment, maybe?" Her voice ran up at the end.

"Are you certain?" T'Pol asked.

"Containment." Hoshi repeated the word to make certain. "Yes, I am. Plasma containment…this looks like…I think this is an engineering station."

"Try another panel," T'Pol prompted, encouraging Hoshi to continue with due haste. Overhead, all three officers could hear the ship's hull bend and crack under the intense pressure outside. By now, they were deep inside the gas giant's atmosphere…far deeper than their sanctuary was designed to travel.

Hoshi moved on to the next panel. "Pu'DaH dak cha." She spoke slowly, feeling out the awkward vocals as she went. "That translates as 'torpedo.' 'Photon torpedo' makes sense."

"Photon torpedoes?" Malcolm nearly pushed Hoshi aside as he joined her at the panel. "What else?"

Hoshi ran through a couple more words in her head before coming to a conclusion. "This is all weapons systems," she answered. She gestured broadly at the panel. "Torpedoes, tactical sensors, disruptor arrays."

"Good work, Lieutenant," T'Pol commented, then pointed to the next panel. "What about this one?"

Hoshi squinted her eyes, as if that would help make sense of the truly alien language. "I recognize 'pressure'," she said, pointing at a row of Klingon characters. "Ka'tahl. That can mean wall…maybe barrier," she added, uncertain of herself. It was, after all, primarily guesswork.

"What about 'hull'?" T'Pol asked.

Hoshi felt a small sense of excitement within. "Yes! Hull! This means 'hull pressure'."

"That's not good," Malcolm commented as he pulled himself away from the weapons panel. He pointed to an indicator light. "If that's hull pressure, then this must mean that it's falling. It looks like…we've got a few hours at most. The hull integrity's failing."

"Then we'd better hurry," T'Pol commented. She pointed at yet another panel, subtly pulling the linguistics officer along with her. "What about this one?"

"Quee nagah," Hoshi read, her mouth moving to parrot the symbols above a dead yellow button. "That's 'drive'… 'impulse drive', maybe. And this…" she pointed at a small screen. "This says something about 'vector.'"

"This could be the helm station," T'Pol stated.

"I think you're right," Hoshi replied, her focus still on the Klingon lettering. "Yes, this all appears to be navigation and propulsion. This is the one we want."

"Can you program a heading?" T'Pol asked, moving aside to allow Hoshi more room to work. Hoshi slid in absently, her focus clearly on the controls.

"Maybe," Hoshi replied quietly. "There's a scrolling note across the screen…give me a second, I'm trying to read it."

T'Pol and Malcolm stayed silent.

"J'khat bah." Hoshi sounded like a bad sneeze. "It's a warning indicator…the pressure is failing in the…manifold! That's 'fusion manifold'!" Her eyes lit up momentarily, until she realized what she was saying. "That doesn't sound good."

Malcolm groaned. "To quote our own Mister Tucker…it means that we're dead in the water. We're not going anywhere."

Hoshi let out a deep sigh. "So what do we do next?" she asked tiredly. The stress was starting to wear her down. "There's got to be another answer!"

As if bidden, T'Pol's communicator chose that moment to crackle to life. "Archer to boarding party." The captain's voice came through, albeit not completely clear; some static continued on the channel. "Come in."

T'Pol flipped upon the handheld unit. "We read you, Captain," she responded.

…

Jonathan Archer nearly jumped from his chair in excitement; it had been too long, far too long, since he had last heard the voice of his Vulcan first officer. Surrounded by the hull-crushing atmosphere of the gas giant, he had been uncertain if the boarding party was even still alive.

"How are you holding up?" he asked, worried about the team. Alive, yes, but in what kind of shape?

"We're doing okay, sir," a voice responded through the crackling static; it took Archer a second to piece the voice together as belonging to Hoshi. "It's nice to hear your voice."

"It's nice to hear your voice too, Hoshi," Archer called out, doing his best to project his own over the omnipresent crackle. "What's your status?"

"We're—dead in the water," a voice responded. Archer recognized it a moment later as belonging to T'Pol. The human idiom was an odd sentiment for her to voice. "The engines are offline."

"Don't worry about it, T'Pol," Archer answered loudly. "We're coming down to get you." He lowered his voice somewhat as he redirected it at the navigations console. "Travis, how much farther?"

Travis shook his head. "Ten thousand meters, sir, but I'm having a hard time getting a fix on him," the youthful lieutenant answered. His fingers tapped his controls rapidly. "Too much interference."

Archer let loose a sigh. "Is our probe still working?" he asked, searching for ideas. If the probe was still functioning, they could use it to triangulate…

"Barely, sir," Travis answered. "I can read a 'beep' from it, but there's no telemetry coming through. And…I just lost it, Captain," Travis' dejection was audible. "I think it imploded."

Archer resisted the urge to slap his forehead. Great timing.

A beeping siren went off, forcing Travis to move rapidly to shut it off. "Sir, external pressure's at maximum," he reported, as he punched the relevant command control. "We need to ascend, sir."

Archer sat back in his seat. Is this really it? "Are you sure we can't go any farther, Travis?" he asked, hoping for a tolerance built into the gauges.

"Captain," Travis replied, "we've already passed the safety point a thousand meters ago. We go any farther, and we'll take ourselves out."

Shit. There was little else for Jonathan Archer to do, but he still hesitated, hoping that some answer would reveal itself.

It didn't.

"T'Pol," Archer called out finally. "I'm afraid we've got a little hitch in our rescue plan." He cringed at his own understatement. "We'll be back for you as soon as we can…Travis, take us back up."

…

Jonathan Archer and Trip Tucker entered sickbay to the sound of a belligerent Klingon woman.

It is odd, Archer supposed, that it was so easy to identify their guest as a woman; in some alien species, sexual identity was fraught with unease and potential peril, trying to make an educated guess where there were few cognizable clues to indicate the universal difference between "male" and "female." It was true, too, that most alien species encountered the same difficulty when looking upon humans, particularly for the first time.

But she—and it was definitely a she—was fighting against the biobed restraints, grunting and groaning as she fought; there was considerable strength behind the flexing muscles, surpassed only by the palpable sense of anger coming from the Klingon woman.

"Cowards!" she bellowed, raising her head upward from the pillow. She could clearly see the two newcomers entering through the main hatchway. "Let me die on my feet!"

Doctor Phlox, unperturbed by the commotion, motioned for Archer and Tucker to join him in the small sickbay office; and the three officers gathered quietly, doing their best to ignore the outrage coming from their guest.

"Captain," Phlox acknowledged, then: "Commander. This has been going on since she arrived, I'm afraid." He nodded back to the main room, indicating the irate Klingon. "All I've been able to get from her is a name: Bu'kaH."

Archer blew a deep, strong breath between his lips. "What's her condition?" he asked.

Phlox pointed to a medical readout on the main computer screen. "T'Pol was right," the Denobulan physician stated. "There's a neurotoxin in her bloodstream. If left untreated, it could kill her within a day or two."

Archer furrowed his brow and stared at the screen, as if he could decipher the obscure medical readouts. "Can you do anything?" he asked finally, having waited for an unusually-loud bout of bellowing to subside.

"I'm working on it," Phlox answered. "I believe that I can conjure up an antidote. Give me three or four more hours, Captain, and we ought to be able to cure her."

A deep-seated roar came through the open doorway, causing Trip Tucker to look askance at Phlox. "T'Pol said the Klingons were unconscious," he commented. "Why is this one so lively?"

Phlox shrugged. "She's showing the effects of hypothermia," he answered. "My guess is that she took refuge in a low-temperature environment aboard her ship. The cold would have delayed the onset of the toxin. Given another couple hours, and she'd be as unconscious as the rest."

"All right, Doctor," Archer murmured. "Thanks for the update." Straightening his spine, he turned to Commander Tucker. "Are you ready to speak to our guest?" he asked.

Tucker's face split into a wry grin. "You know, I read that if they sense a leader's weak, they'll try to kill him and take command."

Archer, too, smiled. "Some days, you're welcome to it, Commander," he answered. "Let's do this." Together, the two officers stepped back into the main compartment.

"I demand to speak to your captain," Bu'kaH snarled, as the two officers returned to her line of sight.

Archer stepped up to the biobed, positioning himself to look down at the Klingon captive. "I'm the captain," he said sharply. "What do you want?"

Bu'kaH looked up at him through narrow eyes. "I've never seen your kind," she spit out. "But today you have made an enemy of the Klingon Empire."

Archer refused to flinch. "From what I've noticed," he retorted, "that's not hard to do." He leaned in a little further. "You stranded three of my people down there."

The Klingon woman throughst her head upward, straining to reach the alien captain. "You raided my vessel!" she shouted out, baring her fangs. "And infected my crew. For this, you will die."

Archer kept himself just out of reach. "We didn't infect anyone," he stated firmly in response. "We boarded your ship to try and help."

"Liar!" Bu'kaH retorted loudly, still pulling at the restraints. She wrestled her body back and forth, seeking any slack in the belts. "You boarded my ship to pillage it!"

"Look, I don't know what happened to your crew," Archer replied. He straightened his back as he spoke, putting more distance between himself and the alien woman. "But we had nothing to do with it. We found your ship as it is, stranded in the gas giant, with the crew unconscious."

Bu'kaH growled deeply.

"Listen," Archer continued irritably. "Your vessel is sinking deeper into the atmosphere. Unless we do something, it'll be destroyed."

Bu'kaH glared at the captain. "Better that than let it fall into your hands," she spat out. "I will not surrender my ship to anyone."

"I've already got three very capable people on your ship," Archer retorted, feeling the heat in the room rise. "Let them help! If you tell them how to get the engines running, you can save your ship and your crew."

"And do what?" Bu'kaH grinned angrily. "Fly it back to your world? So you can steal our military secrets? Better to let it be crushed by that forsaken world!"

"No," Archer stressed heavily. He let out a deep sigh. "I just want my people back. I don't want your ship."

"When our birds of prey arrive," Bu'kaH answered, "your ship will be destroyed!"

"Let's go, Trip," Archer commented quietly. He could tell that the conversation was going nowhere.

The two officers turned to leave sickbay, and Archer raised one eyebrow. "Remind me to stop helping people."

…

Archer's next stop was the situation "room" at the rear of the bridge, where he and Trip found Lieutenant Mayweather skimming over the schematics of the alien vessel on the primary table-top computer display.

"I found these schematics in the Vulcan database," Travis commented, after properly greeting the two superior officers. "The sensor readings didn't give me much to match up, but I believe I have the right ship. It's a Raptor-class scout vessel."

Archer nodded as he looked at the display. It was a small vessel, maybe half the size of the Enterprise, but the design specifics indicated that it was a tough little beast. "How long will it last down there?" he asked, flipping through to find the hull specifications.

"Its hull is at least twice as thick as ours," Travis commented. He politely shouldered the captain aside and pointed to a sidescreen, where the requisite data was already posted. "And it's reinforced with some kind of coherent molecular alloy. It can go several thousand more meters before the pressure will crush it."

"Yeah," Trip agreed, glancing quickly through the data that Travis had prepped. "But it can't hold up under that pressure forever."

"No, sir," Travis acknowledged. "Its rate of descent seems to be variable, but I give it about three more hours."

Archer could feel the weight of the missing boarding party heavily on his shoulders. "I'm open to suggestions, gentlemen," he offered, hoping that Trip or Travis would have an idea.

Travis came through. "What if we use duratanium braces to reinforce a shuttlepod?" he asked. It was a trick they had used in the Delphic Expanse to preserve the Enterprise itself.

"It wouldn't be pretty," Trip added. He paused for a moment as he ran the analysis in his head. "But it might hold up long enough for us to get our people out."

"Our only other option is for Commanders T'Pol and Reed to fix a broken-down Klingon ship and fly it out themselves," Travis confirmed. "I think this is a better shot, sir."

Archer nodded again. "Especially since I don't think we're going to get any help from our guest in sickbay," he commented, reliving that particular confrontation for a moment. He shuddered slightly at the thought and made his decision. "Get started on those braces, Trip."

"Aye, sir," Trip replied.

"And Travis?" Archer continued. "Keep an eye out for any Klingon ships coming this way. We don't want any company."

"Aye, sir," Travis answered. "No company, sir."

…

The Klingon ship was growing hot.

It was, Hoshi supposed, due to bad or malfunctioning environmental controls. The natural tendency of a starship, after all, was to generate mass amounts of heat—every system on board, for better or worse, generated warmth. Usually, it simply bled out into the absolute coldness of space.

But buried inside the atmosphere of the gas giant, the heat appeared to be trapped within the hull of the ship.

All three members of the boarding party had, by this point, stripped down to the blue long-johns that were a regulation part of the environmental suit. But it was only of moderate relief; all three sported sweat stains that were growing by the minute. Even T'Pol, who had once sworn that Vulcans don't sweat.

"The one time we need our Chief Engineer," Malcolm muttered, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow, "is the one time we leave him behind."

T'Pol glared at Reed. It was she, after all, who had assembled the boarding party.

"Come look at this!" Hoshi called out suddenly. She was standing by the captain's chair, eyeing a small computer screen just off to the left side. "I think I found something!"

As bidden, Malcolm and T'Pol turned about; in the cramped confines of the Klingon bridge, a single step to one side was sufficient to bring both officers alongside Hoshi. "What is it, Lieutenant?" T'Pol asked.

"I have a recording of some kind," Hoshi answered. She pressed a command button, and the image of the Klingon captain appeared on the screen. "OonoS Thrott!" he said, spitting out the harsh Klingon consonants. "Nej joS mIch ka Xanant 'ach pagh Q'Tahl class planet." Midway through, the universal translator was finally able to kick in, providing Earth sounds for the three Starfleet officers. "We destroyed their ship, but we've sustained damage in our port fusion injector."

"There it is again," Malcolm murmured. "The port fusion injector."

"We've descended into the outer atmosphere of a Q'tahL class planet," the Klingon captain continued. "We are making repairs here. There may be other Xarantine ships in the area."

T'Pol started slightly; the reference to the Xarantine was evidently of significance to her.

"My crew is falling ill," the Klingon captain went on, his voice growing softer and gravelly. "I have been unable to determine why. If only we had died when the Xarantine attack, our honor would be secure; but to fall victim to some disease, to be crushed into nothing in the depths of this miserable planet—" Abruptly, the recording cut out.

"Of course," T'Pol said quietly.

"Commander?" Hoshi prodded.

T'Pol glanced back at the linguistics officer. "Xarantine biochemistry contains some neurochemical anomalies," she explained. "If they were to somehow get inside the Klingons' bloodstreams, it could account for the poisoning we've seen."

"That explains that," Malcolm commented. "But it sounds like we need to find the port fusion injector."

"Wait," Hoshi replied. "I think I saw that somewhere." As if an expert on the Klingon systems, she punched in several commands, summoning a map of the starship. "Here, one deck below us. It's in the reactor pit."

"Reactor pit?" Malcolm answered. "Could that be main engineering?"

"I believe it is," Hoshi commented. "Let's go."

…

I was wrong, Hoshi thought wryly as the trio of officers stepped through the hatchway leading to the reactor pit. THIS is hot.

The sheer weight of the combined heat and nose-curdling aroma was getting brutal inside the small Klingon ship, and Hoshi found herself debating her decision to come along onto this barge of the damned. She had thought, at the time, that her "space legs" were back, and she was ready to face whatever they might find; only now, to be confronted by something as simple as atmospheric conditions…not to mention a not-so-small dose of claustrophobia, brought on by the cramped confines and thickening air…

"This one?" Malcolm asked, pointing at a random computer screen. He is the lucky one, Hoshi reflected, whether or not he realizes it. Reed's stuffed nose was no doubt protecting him from the vile smell of the Klingon ship.

Hoshi glanced over Malcolm's shoulder. "No, that one says something about…'plasma induction', I think," she decided. Just then, a draft of bile-inducing air caught her sideways, and Hoshi held down her shudder as she looked around the room; it wasn't large, less than half the size of its counterpart on board the Enterprise. "Try that one," she said, mostly at random, as she pointed at a stand-alone unit sitting in the middle of the room. A Klingon male was slumped over the unit.

"You're the boss," Malcolm replied with the ghost of a smile. Together, he and T'Pol hoisted the Klingon and hauled him away, leaving him slumped over another computer unit. "What does this one say?"

Hoshi smiled. "'Port fusion injector.' We're here."

…

The whine of laser torches and old-fashioned welders filled the small shuttlepod as Jonathan Archer and Trip Tucker worked. They were moving quickly, as fast as they safely could; while they wanted to avoid an accident of their own, both officers were very cognizant of the clock ticking down on their rescue effort.

Finally, Archer sat back and raised his protective face mask. "I've been thinking," he said, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow. "I think I might have made a tactical error in dealing with the Klingon woman."

Trip, at a momentary stopping point, glanced up from his work. "How so?" the engineer asked.

"I asked for her help," Archer stated. He ran a hand through his hair, leaving strands standing upright. "She might've seen that as a sign of weakness."

Trip sat back up. "You been boning up on your Klingon psychology?"

Archer sighed lightly. "Maybe I should be. Every time we run into them, they want to destroy us. I'd love to figure out why." The Klingon attitude clashed heavily with the captain's own sentiments.

"Well," Trip shrugged, "maybe the best thing is just to steer clear of them."

"That might not be so easy." Archer chuckled lightly as he spoke. "Not when we're mapping their border. We're going to run into them again, sure as hell."

"Plus, we could use the woman's help right about now," Trip acknowledged.

"If we could re-establish a comm signal with T'Pol and the others," Archer continued, "she could probably talk them through the repairs." He eased back in his make-shift seat and looked meaningfully at Tucker. "But she got, what, a thousand generations of instincts at work? Something's telling her not to trust me."

"Well, Cap'n." Trip grinned crookedly. "Maybe it's time you started thinking like a Klingon."

…

It's no longer funny, Hoshi thought, unsure that it ever had been. The heat was getting too intense to bear.

Malcolm stood up too quickly from a crouched position, and staggering slightly, he placed his hand on a pipe for balance. "Argh!" he hollered, yanking it away.

"Are you okay?" Hoshi asked in alarm.

It took Malcolm a moment to respond as he slowly flexed his hand. "Yes, it appears so," he answered at last. "I'm just getting a little light-headed. It must be the heat."

T'Pol didn't need a medical scanner to render a verdict. "You're dehydrated," the Vulcan stated blandly. "You need some water."

Hoshi rapidly ran through her memory before settling on one particular recalled image. "I saw a galley on the schematics," she answered. "Deck four, blue sector." That was near the belly of the Klingon ship. "I'll see what I can find."

As Hoshi turned to leave, T'Pol chimed in. "You shouldn't go alone."

Hoshi nodded in recognition, and the two officers departed in unison.

…

Hoshi gasped and covered her mouth as they entered the Klingon galley.

The already-strong stench of the Klingon ship was being augmented by the smell of now-stale foods and rotting meat, some of it hanging as not-so-fresh carcasses from the ceiling. Everywhere she turned, in fact, another butchered animal seemed to be draped down from overhead, as if the galley chef had been interrupted mid-task by the neurotoxin that had struck down the Klingon crew.

An intricately-carved table ran down the center length of the room. Well laden with…food, it was a gastronomic exercise in self-abuse to the young lieutenant. She stopped at the head of the table, picking up the first bowl she saw; multitudes of limp, worm-like forms lay within, each one white with a faintly-purple ridge along one side.

"It's called gagh," T'Pol commented, seeing Hoshi examine the bowl. "It's a Klingon delicacy, but only when they're alive."

Hoshi set the bowl down sharply. "They look like worms," she replied, nauseated at the thought of eating them alive.

"They are worms," T'Pol answered.

Hoshi shot a quick glare at the commander as she made her way down the table, doing her best to not look away from the alien cuisine. Finding a stewing pot, she stirred the ladle once and pulled it up.

It came with an animal skull.

"Ugh!" Hoshi dropped the ladle. It was nearing too much for her senses to bear.

A snarl sounded from behind a door, followed quickly by other animalistic noises.

T'Pol issued a curt nod to Hoshi, and the two officers drew their phase pistols as they advanced towards the closed door. T'Pol, on the right side, punched the controls, and both officers took a step back as the doors clanked open.

Inside were three pig-like creatures, decked out in spines, struggling at the ends of sturdy leashes. They were snarling fiercely, leaving little doubt that they could be dangerous animals.

T'Pol shut the door quickly before any of the creatures could break free. "Targs," she said evenly, identifying the Klingon pigs. "Klingons prefer their food freshly slaughtered—are you all right?" T'Pol changed pitch in mid-sentence.

Hoshi had sat down, hunched over with her hands cradled in her lap. A panicked look clearly crossed her face, and she was trembling slightly. "I promised myself I wouldn't do this," she said, feeling as though she had reached the end of her rope. The targs had been too much for her; the heat, the stench, the dirt, the confinement, the Klingon "delicacies"…all of it came rushing at her in a blur.

"You're in a dangerous situation in an alien environment," T'Pol commented, searching her Vulcan repertoire for a supportive tone. "Your anxiety is understandable."

"Don't you mean, for a human?" Hoshi glared upward at the would-be Vulcan counselor.

"You can't deny your nature," T'Pol acknowledged, a little unhelpfully.

Hoshi shook her head. "This may sound strange," she said, "but I envy you sometimes. I know, envy is just another pesky human emotion." She smiled wryly. "But there are times I wish I could just ignore my feelings. Bury them the way Vulcans do."

"It's—a little more complicated than that," T'Pol answered. Her own recent history was testament to that; it had taken an encounter with T'Pau to restore T'Pol to some semblance of Vulcan steadiness. "Take my hand," T'Pol stated, finding an idea.

"Excuse me?" Hoshi asked, not quite following.

T'Pol kneeled down in front of the younger officer. "Take my hand," she repeated, reaching out for Hoshi. She took Sato's hand and flipped it palm-up. "Now close your eyes."

Hoshi, uncertain, did so.

T'Pol placed three fingers on Hoshi's palm and started stroking the pressure points. "Think of yourself on a turbulent ocean," T'Pol commanded. She paused to give Hoshi a chance to visualize it. "Now recognize that you have the power to control the waves."

Hoshi tried to pull her hand back, but T'Pol wouldn't let go. "Whatever is it that you're trying to do, it's not working." Hoshi's voice wavered as she spoke.

T'Pol shifted her fingers to another pressure point. "Focus," she said, her voice becoming softer. "The waves are subsiding. The water is growing still. You're in control."

Finally, Hoshi breathed deeply. Straightening up, she rolled her head around, feeling the tense muscles begin to ease. "That was amazing," she said, truly astonished by the results. "How did you do that?"

"When we return to the ship," T'Pol replied, "I'll teach you how to do it on your own."

"Thanks," Hoshi answered gratefully.

Just then, the ship jolted. The two officers looked at each other in alarm. Was their time up?

…

Malcolm gratefully accepted the skin of water as T'Pol and Hoshi returned to the reactor pit. The water was warm, and tasted faintly of the animal skin which encompassed it, but he had drank far worse. "Thank you," he said, taking care to not gulp down the precious liquid too quickly.

"Commander Reed, report," T'Pol stated. She was back in full-business mode.

Malcolm nodded once. "The hull pressure is approaching critical," he reported. "At least, as far as I can tell. I'm still not certain that I'm reading the gauge correctly." He glanced around at the bulkheads surrounding them. "But given the noise, we have to be close."

As if bidden, the Klingon ship groaned again, as if buckling under the intense pressure of the gas giant's atmosphere. "This ship's about to be crushed," Malcolm added, a little unnecessarily.

T'Pol took in the report with equanimity. "What about the fusion injector?" she asked. "Have you had any luck with repairing it?"

Malcolm, still weak, shrugged lightly. "I can't even find the damn thing," he admitted. "And I'm a weapons officer, not an engineer. If we can find it, I'll…have no idea what I'm even looking at."

"That makes sense," Hoshi replied slowly, entering the conversation. "You're a weapons officer, Commander. What if we use the weapons system?"

Both T'Pol and Malcolm turned to look at her with matching quizzical looks.

"They have photon torpedoes on board, right?" Hoshi ran a hand along her neck, rubbing the sore muscles as she went. "What if we set them to detonate in the atmosphere, and we can ride the shock wave?"

"That might work," Malcolm replied slowly as he pondered the notion. "It'll take some precise calibrations. The hull can't take much more stress, but too little, and we won't move."

"Can you do it?" T'Pol asked decisively.

"If there's one thing on board this ship I ought to be able to figure out," Malcolm murmured, "it's the torpedoes. I say we give it a shot."

…

There were entire weeks at a time when little of note happened on board the Enterprise. They were slow, almost boring days, stuck in the routine of duty and paperwork for the captain; even at warp five, the distance between stars could be great, and the odds of running into an alien vessel in deep space were nearly infinitesimal.

And then there are days that are great flurries of activity, Archer noted as he looked up from his reading. Firmly ensconced in his ready room, he had expected an hour or so of undisturbed solitude with which to conduct some research.

He was given fifteen minutes.

"Cap'n?" Trip Tucker stuck his head through the doorway as the hatchway opened, glancing around to make sure that Jonathan Archer was, indeed, inside the closet-sized room. "Do you have a moment, sir?"

"Of course, Trip," Archer mumbled somewhat absently as he continued his reading. Without looking up, he went on. "I'm listening, Trip. Go ahead."

"I, ah, I'd like to run one more structural diagnostic before you launch," Trip answered. He shifted his head, trying to catch the captain's line of sight.

Archer looked up suddenly. "Qapla'!" he sneezed out.

Trip's mouth opened halfway as his face split with befuddlement. "Beg your pardon?"

"It means 'success,'" Archer replied with a bemused smile. "Doesn't sound like it, does it? But it's a traditional Klingon saying. We say 'good luck,' they say 'success!'"

"I see." Trip's face indicated anything but. "I don't get it, Cap'n."

"I took your advice, Trip," Archer answered. "About thinking like a Klingon. I'm doing a little research on them. Turns out that the Vulcan database has about nine hundred pages on the Klingons."

Trip snorted slightly. "Learn anything useful?"

"Plenty." Archer gave his chief engineer a pointed look, indicating just how much material he was wading through. "They're driven by a warrior mentality," he stated, recapping the first, last, and every other thing that he had read.

Trip furrowed his brow. "So what?" he replied quizzically. "How does that help with our guest?"

"Well," Archer answered, "they tend to view anyone they meet as a potential enemy, whereas I like to view strangers as potential friends."

"That does help," Trip replied, feeling like he was starting to get a grasp on the point. "She's viewing us as an enemy, and we've captured her. We probably have designs on her ship as well."

"Get this," Archer went on. "They also have a strong sense of martyrdom. Hence…Heh Cho' mruak tah." He winced. "I just killed that."

"What does that mean?" Trip asked.

"Death before dishonor," Archer answered.

"I see." Trip spoke as he picked up the thought. "So, by allowing herself to be captured, she dishonored herself?"

"Something like that," Archer finished. "And us asking for her help is just confusing the hell out of her."

"Uh huh." Trip grinned. "That explains why our guest is so irritable."

"It also gives me an idea," Archer said slowly. "Trip, can you finish up that diagnostic? I'll be in sickbay."

…

Sickbay had quieted somewhat since Archer's last visit. Evidently, Archer noted, the doctor's ministrations had not been completely ineffective.

Archer did, however, stay back a step as Phlox pressed a hypospray against Bu'kaH's neck, bringing her back from a point of semi-somnolence. "Please relax," Phlox advised his patient, using a firmer-than-usual bedside tone. He ran a medical scanner across the Klingon as she came to full consciousness. "If you strain against the straps you might hurt yourself."

Bu'kaH tried to bolt upright, but was held back by the restraints. "What is that?" she hissed, seeing the hypospray in Phlox's right hand. "Is that what you used against my crew?"

Phlox stepped away without answering, leaving that task up to the captain. "Doctor Phlox has developed an antidote to the neurotoxin in your system," he stated, in a tone that he hoped would broker little argument.

"Hah!" Bu'kaH snorted loudly. "What are you talking about? Did you poison me, only to cure me? Is that your trick for gaining my trust?"

"I don't need to gain your trust," Archer retorted. "It's enough that you do as I say! Now tell me this: have you had a drink lately?"

The irrelevant question took the force out of the Klingon woman, replacing it with confusion. "What?"

"The neurotoxin that's affected you and your crew," Archer barked out. He leaned over her, looking straight down into the woman's face. "It bonds to alcohol. Now, answer my question: did you have a drink lately?"

Phlox chose that moment to speak up. "Particularly Xarantine ale," he suggested, prodding the Klingon captive.

"Yes," Bu'kaH replied unwillingly. She was growing sullen.

"Yes?" Archer pressed harshly.

"There was a raid," Bu'kaH admitted, but she went no further.

Archer took a deep breath and continued. "I can understand that you don't want to talk about it," he said, nearly shouting in belligerence. "Especially if the Xarantines beat up on you and your crew."

Struggling against her restraints, Bu'kaH came alive again. "Fool!" she hissed. "You think the Xarantines are any match for the Klingon Empire?"

"Then tell me about it!" Archer pressed.

"We attacked their outpost and took what we wanted!" Bu'kaH snarled. She continued to twist her body, fighting with the straps, as if wanting to get her hands on this insolent, alien captain.

"And did that include Xarantine ale?" Archer stayed firm, refusing to move away from the writhing, angry Klingon woman.

She bared her teeth. "It was the best thing they had." She lunged again at the straps.

Archer didn't flinch. "Did the whole crew drink it?"

"Of course!" She twisted about, making little progress. "The triumph belonged to all."

Archer leaned in further, dangerously within her spitting range. "And yet you think that we poisoned you? It was the ale that infected you, not us! Think about it!" He could only imagine what the alien woman thought about his bellowing breath in her face. "When did your crew start getting sick? It was right after the raid, wasn't it? After you celebrated victory?"

Bu'kaH's only response was to lay down silently.

Archer took that to mean that he was scoring points, and he continued. "We can make enough of the cure for your entire crew, if it's not too late. We're offering you a chance to save your crew from dishonorable deaths, Bu'kaH." He smiled, showing his own perfectly-rounded teeth. "You can give them a chance to fight and die properly. Isn't that worth taking a chance on?"

…

Hoshi wanted nothing more than a hot shower.

Even she was starting to feel light-headed inside the Klingon deathtrap (as she was now referring to it). The heat was taxing her limits as the trio of officers clustered back onto the bridge and reassembled around the weapons panel, where Hoshi made her best time in decoding the Klingon script.

And Malcolm was, after all, suffering the worst of them as he tried to follow Hoshi's instructions; but he had to interrupt, query her, and ask Hoshi to repeat herself as he sought to keep up. He was barely upright, supporting himself on the back of the gunner's chair, and he had a dazed look in his eyes.

Even T'Pol appeared to be fading; but the Vulcan would never admit to it.

Finally, when Malcolm failed to respond to Hoshi's prompts, she looked at the first officer for direction. T'Pol, concerned as well by Malcolm's unsteady condition, nodded for Hoshi to take his role.

"All right, here goes nothing," Hoshi murmured to herself as she pressed the firing button. "Torpedo away. One thousand meters. Two thousand. Three thousand."

The Klingon ship barely shook as the torpedo detonated.

"No effect!" Hoshi called out. It didn't take a reference to the computer readouts to tell that their decaying position hadn't changed; the simple lack of turbulence told her that the shock wave was insufficient.

Nonetheless, T'Pol checked the readouts. "We're still sinking," the Vulcan stated. "The shock wave dissipated before it reached us."

Malcolm groaned. "We'll need to detonate one closer next time," he mumbled.

"I would advise against that," T'Pol countered. "The hull is under too much stress as it is. Detonating a torpedo closer to us may prove to be too much."

Malcolm lifted a hand to run it through his hair and nearly fell forward. "Well, then, what do you suggest?" he asked, raggedly catching his balance.

Hoshi shook her head. "We need to generate a large enough shockwave to push us into a higher orbit," she replied. "To do that, the blast has to be big and it has to be close."

"What are you thinking, Lieutenant?" T'Pol asked.

Hoshi pursed her lips and blew out a deep breath. "What if we load two?"

…

Archer fancied himself to be a good pilot; he had, after all, earned his wings as a warp-drive test pilot.

The gas giant didn't care.

The shuttlepod bounced and careened as it made its way deeper into the thick, soupy atmosphere of the planet, fighting its best against various updrafts, currents, and near-liquid eddies that threatened to send the small craft into gaseous oblivion. Archer, behind the controls, was doing what he could to mitigate the effects of the wild ride; but the shuttlepod was like a drop in a tempest, berated from every angle, simply trying to survive the chaotic mess.

"Sensor resolution's dropping off," Commander Tucker said from the jump seat.

Bu'kaH, seated behind the two officers, snorted loudly. "This was your plan?" she demanded, clearly displeased. "To grope about in the darkness and hope to find my ship?" Even the fierce Klingon woman was grasping tightly to the nearest available handhold.

Archer shrugged as he leaned forward, trying to peer visually into the muck. "It worked last time," he remarked flippantly.

The shuttlepod jolted again, but something about it felt different. "That was weapons fire!" Trip shouted out, doing his best to decipher the partial sensor readings. "I think it was a torpedo!"

Archer kept his eyes forward as he spoke. "Could it have come from the Klingon ship?"

"I don't see why not," Trip answered with a grin. "I think I have a bearing, Cap'n!"

"Feed it to me!" Archer ordered.

"Aye, sir…two-nine-seven-mark-two-six-one. Distance…two kilometers, give or take two kilometers."

"You mean we could be flying right into them?" Archer asked, even as he punched in the new heading. The shuttlepod did its best to respond, angling downward on the new trajectory.

Trip couldn't help but smile. "Keep your eyes open, Cap'n!"

…

Malcolm was fading fast.

"Did it work?" he mumbled, swaying in place at his make-shift station. One palm slipped, and he fell forward, only to be caught by the quick-moving T'Pol.

Hoshi shook her head. "We've moved up," she reported, "but only two hundred meters. We need several thousand more than that." And how are we going to do that? she wondered. This was their best idea, after all, and it was coming up far short.

A big bang resounded through the outer corridor.

"Shit!" Hoshi hollered, her fingers flying over the Klingon controls. She had to pause, take a deep breath, and slow down her work.

"What is it?" T'Pol asked, showing alarm.

"A whole compartment just collapsed," Hoshi answered, deciphering the readout. "Deck three, green sector."

"This whole damn ship's coming apart," Malcolm grumbled. He was still swaying, but with T'Pol's help, he was staying upright. "How many torpedoes do we have left?"

"If I'm reading this right, we have six," Hoshi answered.

"Load two more," Malcolm stated.

Hoshi shook her head instead. "It won't be enough," she countered, starting to sound resigned. She sighed deeply.

"Load the weapons!" Malcolm repeated. He was clinging on to consciousness by the last neural connection, but he was still clinging on.

"It won't do us any good!" Hoshi exclaimed. "We already tried it, and it didn't work. It's not working, Commander."

"She's right," T'Pol said, rendering her verdict. "We'll never reach a safe altitude by climbing a couple hundred meters at a time."

"The longer we stand around, the more ground we lose!" Malcolm was growing agitated.

"So why not fire them all?"

T'Pol and Malcolm both turned to stare at Hoshi, mouthing a simultaneous "What?"

"Fire them all at once," Hoshi repeated. She smiled as the idea grew on her. "What if we detonated all six torpedoes together?"

"We may gain altitude," T'Pol answered, but she sounded defeated. "I doubt that we'd make it in one piece."

Hoshi thought again of the hot shower. "I don't know about you," she replied, "but I'm willing to take the chance."

Malcolm's mouth curved slightly upward in a weary approximation of a smile. "Who am I to argue with you, Lieutenant?"

T'Pol raised a single eyebrow. "We can detonate at eight hundred meters. The ship will take a beating, but it may survive."

Hoshi steeled herself. "I was thinking more like five hundred kilometers," she countered. "Look, I didn't come all this way just to get crushed in the atmosphere of some anonymous gas giant!"

T'Pol nodded slowly. "Neither did I, Lieutenant. Load ports one through six."

Hoshi punched in the relevant commands. "Ports loaded, and…firing." The battered hull shuddered slightly as the torpedoes departed.

…

Archer clenched tightly as the shuttlepod shot sideways.

"What was that?" Bu'kaH growled from the back.

"Another explosion, sir!" Trip confirmed a moment later. "I'm guessing multiple torpedoes, no more than…five, six hundred meters away."

And Archer broke into a grin as the soupy mixture before them cleared to reveal a Klingon scout ship.

…

Hoshi realized that she had been holding her breath, and slowly released it. They were still intact, she realized a moment later. We're still intact!

"Altitude, Lieutenant?" T'Pol asked.

Hoshi checked the readout. "We've only gained five hundred meters, sir," she replied, dejectedly. It had been their best shot. What they needed now…was a miracle. And she was feeling woozy.

…

"T'Pol, this is Captain Archer. Repeat, T'Pol, come in." Jonathan Archer paused as the comm channel filled with static, waiting for word from his first officer. They were nearing the docking port on the side of the Klingon vessel, but there had been no indication of life from within.

"This is Commander T'Pol." The words were barely audible through the static, but to Archer, they were as clear as a bright summer day.

"T'Pol! Good to hear from you!" he called out excitedly. The shuttlepod was easing into position for docking. "What were you shooting at?" he asked, completely puzzled.

"We used the shock waves to gain some altitude, but it is only temporary," T'Pol answered. "We've started to sink again. We need to repair the ship to get out of here."

"I brought someone who should be able to do just that," Archer answered. He was grinning broadly. "We're docking now."

…

T'Pol alone met the second boarding party inside the docking chamber.

"Where are Malcolm and Hoshi?" Archer asked instantly, noting the absence of two of his officers. "Are they all right?"

"Commander Reed and Lieutenant Sato are not feeling well," T'Pol answered. She looked like she had been dragged through hell herself. "They are on the bridge…holding each other up."

Archer gestured to Trip, who took off into the bowels of the Klingon ship. "I believe you've met officer Bu'kaH," he added, pointing his head to the Klingon woman emerging from the docking port.

"We're acquainted," T'Pol answered dryly. "The Klingon crew made most of the necessary repairs before they were overcome, but the port fusion injector is still damaged," she reported.

Bu'kaH nodded curtly. "I will tend to my ship."

…

Most days, Travis liked the captain's chair.

Okay, he admitted wryly, a slight smile coming over his face. Even today.

"Lieutenant." Ensign Rahimi's voice cut across the bridge. "Sir, two ships are approaching at high warp. I think they're Klingon."

Travis settled back in the chair. "Time to weapons range?" he asked, running tactical simulations through his mind.

"Sixteen minutes," Rahimi answered promptly, having the answer ready.

"Bring us about, helm," Travis ordered. "We'll be ready for them."

"Sir!" This one came from Ensign Stali, manning the communications console. "We're being hailed. It's the captain, sir."

"Acknowledged," Travis answered. His face couldn't help but split into a grin. "Put it on screen, Ensign."

"Aye, sir," Stali acknowledged. A moment later, the viewscreen changed from an image of the hellacious planet below to the static-filled image of the Klingon bridge. Bu'kaH sat in the Klingon captain's chair, but Archer was standing front and center.

"This is the Klingon Raptor Somraw, hailing the Enterprise," Archer called out, and the hail, thought rendered with interference, was audible. "Request permission to disembark five passengers."

"Permission granted, sir," Travis answered. He held down the instinct to make a loud whoop. "Welcome home, sir."

…

Sixteen minutes, relatively speaking, is not much time.

Travis and Phlox met the twin boarding parties in the shuttlebay, with Phlox ordering his three charges directly to sickbay, and Travis briefed Archer on the way to the bridge. The Klingon ships were, after all, bearing down quickly on the Enterprise, and it was time for them to leave.

There was one matter left to attend to.

"Lieutenant, Captain," Stali stated as the two officers entered the bridge (in that order). "It's the Raptor, sirs. They're hailing us."

Archer nodded at the young communications officer. "Put them on screen," he ordered, as he made his way to his chair. The viewscreen flickered again, this time to be filled with the visage of the Klingon commander; his craggy ridges dwarfed the human captain and the Enterprise bridge. "What can I do for you?" Archer called out, hoping against hope that it was a thank-you call.

"Prepare to surrender your vessel," the Klingon captain intoned harshly. He leaned forward slightly, blocking out any view of the command center behind him. "You will be boarded and your vessel seized in the name of the Klingon Empire!"

Archer resisted the urge to plant his face in his palm as he took his chair. I should've seen this coming, he realized. "Maybe Officer Bu'kaH neglected to tell you," Archer barked out, "but we just saved you and your crew!"

"Bu'kaH has been relieved of duty," the Klingon growled. "For collaborating with the enemy. Now prepare to surrender your ship!"

"Not a chance!" Archer shot back. "We've done nothing to harm you. I don't recognize your claim of being an enemy!"

"You boarded our ship," the Klingon retorted angrily. Spittle seemed to fill his goatee. "You accessed our weapons!"

"It was either that or stand by and watch you get crushed!" Archer stood up from his chair and advanced on the viewscreen. "We helped you, damnit!"

The Klingon captain laughed once. "We need no help from the likes of you…alien." He turned to a point off-screen. "Disruptors!"

"They're charging weapons!" Rahimi called out.

Archer was nearing the end of his patience, and decided to let it show. "You wouldn't last ten seconds in a battle with us!" he bellowed out angrily. "You've got multiple hull breaches, your shields are down, and from what I'm told, you're fresh out of torpedoes!" He took a deep breath before continuing. "If I were you, I'd take what little honor I had left and go home."

The Klingon laughed loudly. "You speak of Klingon honor, alien. What, did you read about it in a book? Do you think you know what it means to be a Klingon?"

Archer took another step forward. "All I know, friend, is this: fire one shot at us and I'll blast you right back to where we found you!"

The Klingon captain snarled once and the transmission ended, returning an exterior view of the Somraw to the Enterprise's viewscreen. Archer couldn't help but cringe as he waited for the declaration of weapons fire.

It didn't come.

"Sir, they're moving off!" Travis exclaimed a moment later.

Archer let out a fervent sigh. "Get us out of here," he ordered, "before their other friends show up."

…

It wasn't a hot shower, but Hoshi wasn't complaining.

Together, she, T'Pol, and Malcolm Reed were sitting in the ship's decon chamber, each stripped down to their skivvies. Her eyes closed, her head rolled back, Hoshi allowed the gentle bath of UV light to wash down her tired and dirty body, and she could feel the tension in her muscles begin to lessen.

The comm unit chose that moment to start beeping, but no one—not even T'Pol—moved to answer it.

It kept beeping, and Malcolm was the first to give in. "Is someone going to answer that?" he said, somewhat irritably. It was clear that he was not volunteering for the job.

T'Pol gave a slight, vaguely human sigh as she stood up and crossed the small chamber. "T'Pol here," she called out as she pressed the communications control.

"This is Doctor Phlox," the physician said genially as the channel opened. "You'll be happy to know that you're free of any microbes or parasites." And given the dirt on the Klingon vessel, they had doubtlessly contracted a few. "Your captivity in decon is over."

Malcolm and Hoshi traded a look; neither officer appeared willing to leave. Not just yet. "Are you sure, Doctor?" Malcolm called out. "Who knows what was living on that ship?"

Hoshi gifted a smile at the tactical officer. "Yes, Doctor," she added. "What if we picked up something that your scans didn't detect?"

"My scans are quite thorough," Phlox replied. He sounded slightly perturbed at the suggestion. "I've run every possible test. It's time for you three to come out."

Malcolm and Hoshi shot a simultaneous look at T'Pol; and to her credit, T'Pol picked up the hint. "Maybe you should run them again, Doctor," she stated. "I believe I'm…developing a slight headache." And Vulcans don't lie, after all…

"Of course, if you insist. I'll give you another round. Bon voyage!" With that, Phlox cut the comm channel.

Malcolm rolled his head back on his neck. "That should buy us at least another half hour." He groaned with pleased satisfaction.

Hoshi arched her back and could feel tense muscles cracking loose. "Oh, I could stay in here all day," she murmured.

"I went to a spa once in Mexico," Malcolm commented. "The most relaxing place I've ever been, but it doesn't compare to this. Oh, it certainly feels nice to be clean again."

T'Pol sniffed once. "Yes."

"Do you smell that?" Hoshi asked, looking over at the Vulcan.

"I don't smell anything," T'Pol stated.

"Exactly." Hoshi smiled. "Nothing at all."