Captain's starlog January 23 2153. We have broken off from the assault fleet to study a hypergiant star. It is possible we have company.

As he saw the triangular wedge cruising past the giant fireball, Commander Archer nodded to the communications officer. "Hail them."

Hoshi, as busy as always, tapped a few buttons and studied her monitor, but it was no uise. "The interference is pretty heavy, sir."

"Then try audio. This is First Officer Archer of the Imperial Starship Enterprise. I assume you've detected us."

"Captain Drennik," replied an unknown yet strangely familiar voice. "Where have you travelled from?"

"The Sol system. And you?"

"We come from a system called Vissia, more than twenty five light years from here. We saw you arrive yesterday. I assume you're here to study the hypergiant."

"The Empire has never seen one up close. "

"It is quite a sight. Have you measured its rate of nucleosynthesis?"

Suddenly, the turbolift door swished open and out came Captain Maximilian Forrest with his personal guard. "I'll take over. I'm sorry, Captain Drennik, for my first officer's impetuousness. I'm Captain Forrest."

"No apologies necessary, Captain. I was just asking if your ship has measured the hypergiant's nucleosynthesis."

"The Empire currently does not have the technology to do that."

"If you don't mind eliminating the development stage, I'd be more than happy to help you modify your sensors."

Forrest rubbed his hands and smiled at Hoshi, the captain's woman. New technology! "Thank you. What can we offer you in return."

"You could invite us to visit your ship. Meeting new species is one of our primary goals."

"It's one of ours as well," Archer said from his usual seat at the helm. "We'd be honoured to have you join us for dinner."

"We'll be there within the hour. I look forward to it."

Hoshi cut off the transmission. From the other side of the bridge, a Terran with a severely deformed head snorted and said, "It'll be nice to have a First Contact where no one's thinking about charging weapons."

Archer looked at Forrest and then said to Hoshi, "Tell Chef we're going to have some visitors.

It's been a long road, getting from there to here.

It's been a long time, but empire's finally near.

And we will see our dream come alive at last. We will touch the sky.

And they're not gonna hold us down no more, no they're not gonna change our mind.

Cause we've got faith of Terra.

We're going where conquest will take us.

We've got faith to believe. We can do anything.

We've got strength of the soul. And no one's gonna bend or break us.

We can take any star.

We've got faith.

We've got faith, faith of the heart.

Captain's starlog supplemental. I have agreed that Commander Archer will accompany Drennik in the Vissian stratopod. After all, I'll be rid of him for a few days at least.

In the mess hall, the scarred engineer with a droopy eyelid known as Charles Tucker held the attention of two of the Vissians. He had ice cream for them. "This is called vanilla and this is chocolate. Give it a try."

The women, Traistana and Veylo, smiled and dipped their spoons into the edge.

"Oh no, wait. You've got to eat the cherry first. This."

"Why?" Traistana asked.

"Because we say so."

"A Terran tradition?" Veylo said with a smirk.

"Exactly."

At that point, a smaller Terran with a larger nose and dressed in grey rather than blue approached the table. Tucker rolled his good eye as the man said, "Aren't you going to introduce me?"

"This is Malcolm Reed, our MACO commander. This is Traistana, a xenobiologist, and Veylo is a tactical officer."

"Very pleased to meet you," Reed said with a slight smirk in Tucker's direction.

"Why don't you sit down? The Captain did ask us to mingle."

"Indeed," Reed said with some venom as he eyed up Veylo. "I was just speaking with their Chief Engineer and his wife. Maybe you should say hello."

Snarling, Tucker shoved his sundae at Reed, almost covering the MACO with it, and left. "See you later."

Reed merely smirked and began his 'cultural examination' of Veylo.

Seeing 3 more Vissians, one of whom Tucker recognised, Tucker joined them without asking. "I'm told you're the Chief Engineer."

"Commander Tucker," said the male without hesitation. "Major Reed pointed you out. Please, sit down."

"Yeah."

"This is my wife, Calla."

The female said, "I'm glad you invited us here."

"Are you enjoying your food?"

"Oh, very much."

Leaning forwards, the apparently nameless engineer said, "I hope you get the chance to sample our food. It's more fragrant than yours."

This was it. It was time to acquire new technology for the Empire. "I look forward to it. I'd also like to get a peek at your engine room."

"By all means."

Tucker nodded and turned to face the one person who hadn't spoken. "Trip Tucker. Welcome aboard."

"Hello."

"It has no name," Calla explained. "It's our cogenitor."

"Cogenitor?"

"We're hoping to have a baby."

"Our warp core emits omicron radiation," the engineer said. "I'd recommend you speak with your doctor about an inoculation, though looking at you I'm not sure what he can do. Delta radiation?"

"If I have a baby myself, which I nearly did once believe it or not, he'll glow in the dark."

"FOOL!"

Tucker turned around, as did Reed. One of the Andorian crewmembers had just walked into a Vissian and his host, Sergeant Mayweather. The MACO gave the blue-skin a solid punch to the stomach. "Corporal Cutler, over here!"

Cutler, a small Terran MACO, rushed over and pinned the Andorian down. As she got him restrained and ready to take away for flogging, she said to the Vissian, "Our apologies for the conduct of our conscripts."

"No problem," said the alien. "So, Travis, what were you saying?"

Sitting the Vissian down at a vacant table, Mayweather said, "You were asking why we go out and conquer."

"Ah, yes, it was disturbing that you invaded and occupied so many more advanced planets in such a short time."

Ordering a Vulcan conscript to bring some drinks over, the MACO replied, "It is, though in fairness the Vulcans were trying to invade us, only to be stopped by the inventor of warp drive on our world. As for the others, we just found some groups who wanted power, gave them help, and so prop them up."

"But why?"

"The people of those worlds have spend years arguing over planets, everything. We just seek to bring order to chaos."

The dark zoo of sickbay was the domain of Pholx, a Denobulan research scientist who kept a number of creatures aboard as supplements for conventional medicine... and as delicacies. Rumours flew about what he did to captured Antarans. On this occasion though, all he did was give Tucker a blast with a hypospray. "This should do it."

"Hope it'll work better than for delta rays. So, you've heard of these cogenitors."

"Not all species are limited to two sexes. In fact, I have it on good authority that the Rigellians have four, or was it five? "

"So you're saying that this man or woman or whatever, is a third sex?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying."

Tucker's mind raced. "And she, it, is part of the impregnation process."

"Precisely," the Denobulan said with a massive smile.

Thinking of his time with T'Pol, Tucker said, "I'm pretty familiar with how it works with two sexes, but..."

"Multi-gendered techniques aren't always the same, but in this case I imagine the cogenitor provides an enzyme which facilitates conception. "

"What do you mean by provides?"

"You know, the female does what she has to, the male does what he has to, and the cogenitor adds some more. If you're interested, I can have one dissected later, perhaps without anaesthetic."

"Ah, right, doc. I'll just hope this treatment works better than everything else you've given me."

In the depths of the Vissian ship, a pulsing column gave life to the ship. Tucker and the Vissian engineer examined a variety of consoles. "The antimatter stream is compressed before the deuterium's injected into the core," he explained.

"So you don't need magnetic confinement."

"Let me bring up the schematics."

Tucker tried to process the information, and succeeded for the most part, but he had to say, "Where we come from, Earth, there are only two genders."

"That's true of most worlds."

"I don't mean to pry but, does every family have a cogenitor?"

The answer began with a laugh. "That wouldn't be very efficient. They are only needed when a couple's trying to have a child."

Now Tucker raised his good eyebrow. Something was wrong. "And when they're not?"

Going to another console, the engineer said, "The cogenitor is assigned to another couple. They make up about three percent of our population, which seems to be a perfect ratio. Nature has a way of finding the right balance."

"Is the one I met the only one on your ship?"

"The only one. Once Calla and I are finished with it, I doubt it'll be needed before we return home. Would you like to take a closer look at the plasma converters?"

Walking towards a row of glowing rods, Tucker said, "I would. Thanks. So, does it live with you and your wife?"

"We keep it in our quarters, yes."

"What does it do when you're not...?"

The engineer, bathed in the glow, said, "It eats, sleeps. There's not much else for it to do."

"What about school?"

"They only serve one purpose. Sending them to school would make no sense. Why are you so curious about them?"

Keeping his emotions in check, Tucker said, "Terrans are very curious."

"You might find this difficult to believe, but this polymer is composed of over two hundred naturally occurring elements."

"That's impossible."

"I read in your database that you've discovered only ninety two. I understand how this might seem unnerving."

"A lot of things around here do, but I'm trying to keep an open mind."

On top of the warp core that had poisoned him over time, Tucker looked down when his favourite conscript called up to him.

"Commander," T'Pol said.

"Archer left yet?"

"He'll be gone for three days."

Climbing down from the deadly reactor and giving the Vulcan a radiation meter, Tucker took a PADD from T'Pol.

"Captain Forrest asked that you download these films and transfer them to the Vissians' database."

"Did you meet their Engineer?"

"Briefly."

"He and his wife are trying to have a baby."

"How interesting."

"There was someone else with them. They called her a cogenitor. You know what that is?"

"A third gender. Why do you call it her?"

"Well, she looks more like a her than a him. They treat her like a pet, kept in her room, not taught to read or write, no name. Porthos has a name."

T'Pol bristled. Although she, as a Syrannite, had high status amongst the conscript crewmembers, she was still banned from various areas of the ship and had to toe the line even to Terrans she outranked. "It's not our place to judge the customs of other cultures until they're within the Empire."

Tucker realised he was condemning the Vissians enslaving a gender when the Terrans had enslaved whole races, including Vulcans. "We're not talking about taking your shoes off when you walk into someone's house. This cogenitor's treated like one of Phlox's leeches. You pull it out of its tank when you need it, then you throw it back in."

"Tri-gender reproduction is not uncommon."

"That's not what I'm talking about. This is a question of human rights."

T'Pol, despite her emotional control, had to stop herself laughing in Tucker's face. "They're not human. Captain Forrest hopes to develop a productive relationship with this species. It might be best you kept your opinions to yourself."

Back in sickbay, Phlox continued treating the flogged Andorian while saying to Tucker, "It's good advice. Mating habits are often quite personal. Some species aren't comfortable discussing them."

"I'm not interested in discussing their habits. I'm concerned with the way they treat this cogenitor."

"They're most likely one and the same."

"Yeah, well, that doesn't make it right."

Pointing at the remains of a dissected Paragaan without arms or a head, Phlox replied, "It's not a question of right or wrong."

"You scanned them when they came on board," Tucker said. He stepped out of the Andorian's way at he limped out. "Don't you always do that?"

"They weren't carrying any pathogens that would be dangerous to our crew."

"Is there anything you can tell me about the mental capacity of this cogenitor? Is it any different than the males and females?"

"I'm afraid I didn't take any neural scans."

"Is that something I could do?"

"Why would you want to?"

"Just curious."

"I suppose you could."