Seleya
Private Freighter Vessel

His plan foiled, Malcolm decided there was no point letting the Starfleet officer stew any longer. He was Starfleet, after all. Sooner or later he'd figure out some way to cause trouble, if he was left alone in there too long. If Tolaris got out of hand with T'Pol it wasn't as if he could fight him off anyway. The best he'd be able to do is shoot him. But he couldn't help but feeling anxious. It was his job to cover her back. He'd just have to stay handy in case she needed someone to shoot the crazy Vulcan. That much he could do.

Gladly, truth be told.

He cycled the airlock door again, opening it. And, thankfully, the Commander hadn't take the opportunity in the meantime to formulate some plan of attack. He was still sitting in the corner where he'd left him.

"What's your name?" Malcolm asked.

"Tucker." The man said, tapping his chest. "It's right here on my...aw, where the hell's my name tag?"

Malcolm was tempted to raise an eyebrow at that, but he caught himself in time. The captain was really starting to rub off on him.

"That's a good question." Malcolm said. "But let's start with 'they' instead. Who's 'they'?"

"Orions." Tucker said. "I know they put me in stasis anyway. I don't how I got from there to here."

"And why would Orions throw you into a stasis chamber?"

Tucker sighed tiredly, running his fingers through his hair.

"Okay, look." He said. "Let me just save us both some time. Starfleet thinks I went AWOL and took some technical data with me to sell on the black market. And it's Starfleet. They're not real patient with deserters. So…I was in hard spot. I was just trying to get a ride somewhere I could hide out, until I could think what to do."

Tucker frowned. "Then the damned green-skin I was dealing with figured out I was on the run from Starfleet. So somebody clocked me over the head and threw me in stasis, then I wake up on that ship. And that's it. That's the whole story."

Malcolm nodded. "Not quite. Why does Starfleet think you're AWOL with some kind of restricted tech?"

Tucker started to speak…then stopped.

"Long story. Doesn't matter." He said instead. "I don't have anything and I didn't even really go AWOL."

"Okay." Malcolm said. "I've got time for a long story. If you don't, that's fine. I can just come back later…"

"Wait." Tucker said, as Malcolm started to turn away. "Do I have to be in here? I'm not armed. Where am I gonna go?"

"Commander Tucker, Starfleet, Chief Engineer of the Gladius." Malcolm said. "The last thing I'm going to do is let you loose on this ship. Get comfortable."

Malcolm closed the door.

Well, Trip thought. They're not as stupid as I was hoping.

Which meant the last thing they were going to do was let him live. They couldn't take the chance that he'd bring Starfleet down on their heads.

It was time to get out of there.


"T'Pol." Tolaris said, grinning down at her. He probably intended the open expression as an insult.

He was breathing heavily at least, after having tossed her about the room as he had. But any hope she had of throwing him off would have to wait until her vision came into focus and the dizziness eased.

She reflected again that black market cybernetics weren't all they were said to be. And there wasn't much good said about them.

Tolaris nudged the phase pistol up under her jaw…just enough to ache.

"I think it's time I terminated my employment with you. Captain." He breathed.

"Tolaris." She rasped. "This is an unwise…"

"Shut up!" He snarled. "The only reason you're alive is the safe code. I'm taking everything in the ship's safe and then I'm taking the ship. Consider it severance pay."

He jabbed the pistol upward again, causing her to grunt involuntarily at the pain.

"I'm going to kill you, T'Pol. But first, I'll allow you to make the decision." Tolaris said. "You can give me that code…or I can take it. And I advise you decide quickly. I find taking it to be a very attractive option."

T'Pol made her decision easily enough. Surrender was never logical.

So she relaxed. And waited.

Tolaris chuckled. "Good girl."

His free hand came for her face but she didn't jerk away, as all her animal instincts howled for her to do.

She waited. And stared into his eyes.

And when his katra brushed against hers…she leapt and seized it.


To her shame, Hoshi thought at first that she was looking at some kind of alien sex thing. If she had to guess how Vulcans did the nasty, that's about what she would have figured.

But it only took a moment more to realize these two weren't having any kind of fun. It was some kind of Vulcan thing alright, but the kind that looked like it was going to leave one of them lobotomized or something.

And the one on top was the one that shot Murphy…

Without thinking she stepped forward and kicked out. A perfect side kick the likes of which she hadn't pulled off since she was a kid. The sole of her boot slammed against his head, sending Tolaris flying off T'Pol and against the nearby wall.

Only then did she realize that she'd picked a fight with a man easily ten times as strong as she was. But the moment his hand lost connection with T'Pol's face, Tolaris began to scream.

That was enough for Hoshi. She wasn't the sort to get into fights to begin with, if she could help it, and she'd just kicked someone right in the head on pure impulse. An alien someone, who could probably and quite literally tear her limb from limb. That he was suddenly screaming hysterically didn't help at all. Quite the opposite.

So she stumbled backward out of the room in a panic, tripped over the threshold and landed butt first in the corridor outside. From there she could still see him, though. And she couldn't tear her eyes away.

Tolaris lay on the floor next to T'Pol, grasping his head with both hands. His eyes were bulging out and the screams just kept coming. Even as T'Pol rolled weakly away to try to regain her feet, Hoshi could only stare.


Malcolm took the steps up to the corridor all at once, his phase pistol at the ready. He only spared a glance at the sight of their new recruit sitting there staring horrified into the room. The screams coming from inside had already made it clear that the day he'd been waiting for had come at last.

Taking cover against the doorway, he thrust his phase pistol through, ready to kill Tolaris the moment he drew a bead on him.

He rather expected to find T'Pol torturing the man, the way he was carrying on. But his instincts insisted she was in trouble and he'd learned to trust them when they spoke up.

What he certainly hadn't at all expected was to find T'Pol with her arms wrapped around the man's head from behind, gripping his chin in one hand and scalp in the other. And though the man had gone limp, he was still screaming bloody murder.

Confusing him more was the fact that she wasn't applying any sort of pressure that he could see. She wasn't doing anything at all that should have cause him to scream like that.

What she very obviously was doing was preparing the break the man's neck.

"Captain…" He said, cautiously. Something had obviously gone very wrong with the little talk she'd planned to have with Tolaris. But, still…she was about to kill the man.

"Shut the door." T'Pol ordered.

Malcolm had time to reflect this was likely one of the most bizarre scenes he'd ever been exposed to. And he'd seen quite a lot of strange things over the years. But T'Pol was about to break a man's neck, who was screaming like a lunatic while doing nothing at all to stop her…and her nose was bleeding so badly that it ran down her face and straight on along the man's shoulder…dark green, of course, which made the whole scene even more bizarre somehow…

Malcolm was a soldier. So he didn't allow himself to get swept away here. He knew what to do when given an order in a tense situation. Even, and perhaps especially, when the reason for that order wasn't readily apparent.

You don't question it. You just do it.

Malcolm swapped the phase pistol to his other hand, reached out and shut the door. Only then did he realize…it was Hoshi…that's why T'Pol wanted him to shut the door. She was in shock already and what was about to happen wasn't going to help her much.