§ 4 §
They had smiled at each other profusely, and Archer had found himself wondering if Naatians found the Humans' smiles, with their two rows of teeth, threatening. He certainly found the Naatians' smiles odd in an unsettling way: these people indeed had no teeth, and their... well, gums – the word sounded perfectly fitting for the gummy flesh that replaced the apparatus more traditionally found in people's mouths – were bulging and shiny, as if swollen. If one concentrated solely on their smiles, it was like looking at overgrown teething babies.
There were four of them, all very similar in aspect. Shiny brown scales in place of hair, one-piece suits adhering to their fit bodies, a bit in the style of Subcommander T'Pol's outfits. Curves and bulges were in all the right places, as well as in some of the wrong ones, at least by human standards. Indeed, if one went by what their garments let see of their anatomy it was impossible to tell what gender these four aliens were.
While they sipped on an aperitif, and while Hoshi, with the help of some creative use of sign language, was doing her best to introduce their guests to Enterprise and their mission, Archer took Phlox, who had joined them, aside, and ventured to ask his opinion: the doctor gleefully launched into a lengthy and detailed medical explanation of why he supposed Naatians were both genders at the same time, making Archer repeatedly curse his curiosity. He was already not very hungry, given the hour, and Phlox's descriptions were definitely not the best of appetizers.
The most extraordinary feature of Naatians, however, was their faces: not particularly finely chiselled, they were incredibly mobile, having the remarkable characteristic of being able to change shape and complexion. It all had to do with the necessity to communicate through signs and expressions, presumably; but seeing someone before you turn from anaemic-white to purple or green, while his features moved from squarish to oval, to trapezoid, and back again, was striking to say the least. Archer had tried not to stare but the sight, if slightly disquieting, was truly magnetizing.
The tour of the ship had gone fairly well. The Naatians had clapped their eight-fingered hands on many occasions, which Hoshi had surmised being a sign of admiration; stomped their feet to convey, in all likelihood, hilarity; jerked pear-shaped heads sideways as a way to ask more detailed explanations; and become almost all the colours of the rainbow: bright orange in the launchbays; various shades of blue in Engineering; radioactive green in sickbay. Not that they – Hoshi included – had any idea what that meant.
They had passed in front of the Armoury, but of course that was off-limits. Archer had seen a couple of them look at its door as their faces turned V-shaped. The fact had not gone unnoticed with the ever-vigilant Müller, who had tensed up and virtually shooed them away, disguising the action as a gesture intended to steer them in the right direction. Archer had glared at the security man, belatedly remembering that the Naatians were probably experts in reading one's facial expressions. Of one accord their complexions had gone grey, for reasons Archer didn't yet understand.
So now they took their places around the table in the Captain's mess: Archer, T'Pol, Hoshi, Phlox, and the four Naatians. Müller was unhappily stationed outside – just outside – ready, as he had reminded Archer in an ominous low voice, to jump in, in case of need.
Naatian the Tall – as Archer had baptised him (uhm, her?) because of his, well its towering height – was the most loquacious of the four, so to speak. Presently it was in the middle of a lengthy communication: arms flinging, fingers snapping, shoulders dancing the cha-cha, face moulding into the most absurd shapes. Archer was having a hard time keeping a straight face. The man... woman... – whatever – was offering a great show and only the proximity of his composed Vulcan Second in Command kept him from chuckling openly.
Hoshi cleared her throat. "He is saying, Sir, that Enterprise is a rather large vessel – at least I think that's what he said." Her eyebrows creased in slight uncertainty.
"Uh, yes," Archer replied, shifting his gaze from Naatian the Tall to Naatian the Curious. "She is the largest of our fleet. And the fastest. We are quite proud of her."
Hoshi, who, quite predictably, had started to enjoy the challenge, stopped in the middle of what looked more like a tribal dance than a simultaneous translation and turned to Archer with a puzzled look in her almond-shaped eyes. "Proud, Sir? How am I going to render that?"
"Ah, I wouldn't know Hoshi," Archer replied raising his eyebrows. "How about puffing up your cheeks and getting some weird colour on them?"
The comment made Hoshi burst into a giggle, which she quickly restrained, while Phlox's mouth curved into one of its improbable grins. T'Pol's expression, by contrast, was the subtle but still recognisable Vulcan version of irritation. Archer immediately regretted the gibe, feeling a little embarrassed. But – goodness – this felt more like the circus than a first contact.
Just then Manetti came in. "If we may, Sir, we are ready to serve the hors d'oeuvre."
"By all means, Crewman."
Naatian the Suspicious regarded the small flans with narrowed eyes. His face turned the colour of mud and pulled into a slightly trapezoid shape. Naatian the Curious picked its plate up and brought it to its nostrils, smelling the food noisily. Archer decided they needed a little gentle push, so he smiled his umpteenth smile, got his fork and opened the dances.
Malcolm was first aware of his nose itching as they skirted some, well, reedy grass which grew on the east shore of a big expanse of water. They were already in sight of their destination and he had taken the direct path to it, which passed between a field of those white-flowered shrubs and the lake. He had eyed the fluffy blossoms with slight dread, but the other route, in addition to being longer, would have meant going around the water through the dense grove of trees which grew on the other side of it, and after T'Pol's report on the local fauna and her recommendation that he be careful he had deemed it less risky to take his chances with the flowered shrubs. Now he was regretting it deeply. Damned, bloody, sodding allergies, he silently cursed, losing his fight against the first sneeze.
"Etchoo!"
"Bless ya."
"Th..." Malcolm closed his eyes and held his breath, willing to shut the door on the next impending sneeze and send it back to wherever it was coming from. "Thank you," he managed at length. He shrugged. "Allergies," he muttered as an explanation. Stopping, he went through his pockets and their usual supply of handkerchiefs in search of a dry one. He was more likely to find a gold-fish or two.
"I just needed that, a lovely allergic reaction, to fully enjoy myself on this paradise of a planet," he complained with a sarcastic huff. "Now all I can ask for is to run into some of that local fauna, the kind we ought to take precautionary measures against, and – voila – the fun will be complete."
Settling for a hankie that was just damp, as opposed to soaking wet, he blew his nose. Now his eyes were watering too, but – what the hell – join the club: so was the rest of his body.
Trip, who had maintained his strangely meditative mood, let out a dreamy sigh. "You can be a real pain in the ya-know-what, Loo-tenant. My, ya fussy! Might be a bit hot'n humid, I'll grant ya that, but just look around: not a cloud in the sky, beautiful lake, gorgeous cotton-like flowers..."
His Southern drawl had the slurred quality that Malcolm associated with a drink too many, and he began to seriously wonder if the canteen had actually contained only plain water or... Nah! He shook his head to clear it of the absurd idea. He too had drunk from it. And he felt just fine. Well, not quite, but that was another story.
"A pain in the you-know-what?" Malcolm countered. "Let me tell you, Trip: without th..." He pinched his itchy nose. "...Without this fussy pain in the... Etchoo!...you-know-what, your precious platinum would remain where it is." A few drops of something – sweat, saliva, he couldn't tell – flew off, propelled the explosive p's of his irritated British accent. They hit Trip in the face, making Malcolm feel mortified, but the engineer just wiped them off unperturbed.
"Yeah, well, can't but agree with ya," he said, shrugging; then he yawned. "Tell ya what: you go get it, Loo-tenant. I feel totally lazy."
"You wh-at?"
But Trip just stretched, dropped to the ground and laid back on his elbows, crossing his legs. "This place reminds me of…"
The hors d'oeuvre had not been a hit. Definitely not a hit, Archer could tell as much. There is something universal in the facial expressions denoting dislike. The thick asparagus soup, fortunately, had seemed more to their taste, and the Naatians had sucked it up noisily, shaping their mouths like the nozzles of as many vacuum cleaners. Even T'Pol had not been able to repress an impulse of distaste: she had frozen briefly, which, to the trained eye, was the equivalent of a smirk of disgust. Luckily, their guests had been too busy to notice it.
Now, as they waited for the next course, conversation, or rather, communication, lulled – at least inter-species communication. The Naatians were communicating plenty among themselves, and Hoshi was at a loss translating for her Captain and fellow officers.
"I'm sorry, Sir," she apologised tensely. Archer could hear a hint of anger beside the frustration in her voice. "They gesticulate too fast, I'm still learning... And I suspect they are using abbreviations, like a sort of dialect."
"How nice of them," Archer muttered through gritted teeth, careful to keep his mouth shaped into what was turning out to be a perennial smile. He'd probably have to undergo surgery to be able to straighten his face again, after this first contact was over.
T'Pol put down her spoon. "They may want to keep some of their comments to themselves, Captain," she said softly, with her usual poise. Her eyebrows shot up briefly. "Different cultures have different codes of politeness."
"No kidding," Archer murmured back levelly. "If I had slurped my soup like that my mother would have killed me."
"An illogically harsh punishment," T'Pol commented.
Archer's brow creased. "A figure of speech. Don't Vulcans have any?" he asked, hurrying to add, "Never mind."
Breaking a bite off his bread stick in frustration, he chewed on it with passion. He'd had enough of letting these aliens speak among themselves and ignore them. He picked up the carafe. "Tea?" he asked loudly with a glance at Hoshi that meant no need to translate this.
Naatian the Haughty turned to him – and the colour of a rotting persimmon – just as Manetti entered balancing a serving plate loaded with omelettes. The crewman lowered it to serve them out, but as soon as the Naatians set eyes on the food they jumped to their feet of one accord, the Haughty knocking Manetti off balance. A couple of omelettes went sliding off the plate, ending with a spat on the white tablecloth. The aliens took a step back.
What happened next was going to haunt Archer's dreams for a long time. As he too rose, unsure of what to do, the four Naatians shaped their hands into guns, like children playing war. Then, just like children playing war, they fired.
He wouldn't need surgery after all: Archer's smile was gone in an instant as he watched T'Pol, Phlox and Manetti fall one after the other unconscious to the ground.
"Summertiiiime, and the livin' is eeeeasy..."
Malcolm blinked. This wasn't happening. It couldn't be happening. It must be his allergies, giving him hallucinations. He obviously wasn't on a planet in thirty-some degrees' heat and ninety percent humidity, and that wasn't really Trip stretched out on the ground, singing at the top of his lungs. And just that tiny bit off key, one might add, to make the experience subtly excruciating.
"...Fish are jumpin', and the cotton is high..."
"Bloody hell."
Malcolm's head was throbbing painfully and he was beginning to feel positively rotten.
"Trip, quit joking, I'm not feeling all that well," he moaned, pressing both hands to his temples. They felt a bit hot, but then again, they weren't exactly in the Arctic.
"Oh, your Mama's rich and your Pa is good lookin'..."
Malcolm closed his eyes. "Neither," he muttered in despair, reaching blindly for another hankie. "And anyway I could swear it was the other way round."
He opened his eyes again in time to see Trip's turn up and sideways in thought. The Engineer shrugged.
"Oh, your Daddy's rich, and your ma is good lookin'…"
"Not particularly."
Crouching, Malcolm shook his friend's shoulder weakly. "Stop it, please," he begged. "This is no time for… for this, whatever it is."
Trip held out a shaky hand towards Malcolm's watery eyes. "So hush, little baby, don't you cryyyyy..."
TBC