— Chapter 20 —
The next two days were a trial for T'Pol, as her need to mate warred with her desire to save herself for Commander Tucker alone, hoping that he'd change his mind… yet the man was disagreeably firm in maintaining the course he'd laid out for their interactions. He was professional, polite, and surprisingly even less argumentative than normal, and yet to her chagrin T'Pol realized that she missed those good natured arguments, and more so missed spending time with the man himself as Commander Tucker had been burying himself in work and thus avoiding her and Archer in the process, making it practically impossible for T'pol to speak with him privately.
When she'd actually managed to trap the man in his office, on her third attempt to do so, he'd said, "Look, T'Pol, give me a few weeks, a month, let me get over this thing, and we'll work something out so that things aren't awkward between us. All right?"
"Yes," she'd said, understanding his sentiments, and determined to honor his needs…
But two nights later she'd violated her own resolution and tried to access the commander's cabin after hours in order to plead her case, only to find that he'd tampered with the security device on his door and barred her access to his quarters, and that stung T'Pol for completely illogical reasons. Worst of all at this particular time, the man denied her his touch, and T'Pol suffered cruelly due to that purposeful neglect. Something would have to give. Soon.
Malcolm walked into Engineering, heading directly for Trip's office. He needed some help from this department, and though he could have simply logged a request for help, or reached out directly to Engineering through the ships comm system, he'd come here on something of a personal mission, as he'd been unable to stop thinking about this situation with Trip and T'Pol in which he'd been unwittingly embroiled.
The lieutenant held T'Pol in high professional esteem and he'd always been strongly attracted to the Vulcan, but Trip was his best friend and to the introverted and aloof Brit that meant something more than such things generally meant to most people… hell, Trip had been willing to commit suicide on Shuttlepod One in order to buy a subordinate officer and a friend a few more hours of oxygen and life, and thus provide a small increase in Malcolm's chances for survival.
And how have I repaid that type of loyalty and self-sacrifice? thought Malcolm.
The answer to that question was like a knife, thrust deep into the stomach, for Malcolm. He finally reached the door to Trip's office, and when Malcolm glanced inside, he saw Trip speaking with Dillard.
"Hey," said Trip, for he'd caught sight of the lieutenant immediately. "What can I do for you?"
"Commander," said Malcolm. "If you have a few minutes I have a request I'd like to run by you."
"Sure. Hold on," said Trip, then gave Dillard a few parting instructions while Malcolm waited.
"All right, Chief. We'll get right on it," said Dillard when Trip had finished speaking, and then Dillard made his way from the room.
"What's up, Malcolm?" said Trip, indicating that Malcolm should take a seat.
Malcolm handed Trip a PADD unit, a Personal Access Data Device, and they spent the next twenty minutes discussing the changes Malcolm had in mind for the Weapons Bay, from which the photon torpedoes were launched.
"So what do you think, Commander?" said Malcolm.
"I have no problems with the changes from a professional viewpoint, Malcolm," said Trip. "Nothing you're asking for interferes with mechanical efficiency. It's your department that handles weapons, so if you want this done… let's see, we can start on it two days from now, then we're looking at a four day turnabout to complete the job."
"I appreciate your attention to this project, Commander," said Malcolm.
"No problem," said Trip. "Now I've got an injector assembly to pull apart."
"Right," said Malcolm, standing, then made to head for the door, though he never made it out.
"Malcolm?" said Trip, puzzled that the man had stopped walking before leaving his office.
Malcolm closed the office door and turned around to face Trip.
"Trip," said Malcolm, "look, what happened with T'Pol, I swear I didn't know what you felt for her and I—"
"Malcolm," said Trip, "look, I'm not gonna lie, I'm a little butt-hurt over this whole thing, but there's really nothing to be done about it. Forget about it. I'm trying to do that now, and in time I will."
"I don't want to ruin our friendship over this, Trip," said Malcolm, "and I don't want to… you know, 'service' T'Pol any longer, and make things worse."
"Listen," said Trip, "I really don't want to talk about this, Malcolm, but you, Jon and T'Pol are in this pickle to the end, or this thing will blow up in your faces and ruin you all. What's done is done, but I don't want to talk about it any longer. Tell me you understand that, Malcolm."
"I do," said Malcolm, and opened the door. "All right, thanks again for humoring my request, and for the last time, I am sorry my part in this, Trip."
Trip nodded, and with that Malcolm left Trip to his thoughts.
Seated in the captain's chair, Jon was lost in thought as well, silently considering the fallout of that private conference with Trip and Malcolm, just a few days past.
He and Reed had made their peace easily enough once the shape of things was clear, as neither of them truly loved T'Pol as such, and whatever desires Jon had harbored for the Vulcan, desires for something more emotionally intimate, had evaporated at the distress this entire episode had caused Trip, a distress suppressed and supposedly dismissed, yet too strong to pass without notice by someone who'd known Trip for more than a decade.
"Captain," said Ensign Sato, bringing Jon out of his reverie. "I have a comm message for you from StarFleet, through Earth's Embassy on Vulcan."
"Send it to my Ready Room," said Archer.
Moments later the captain took his seat at the desk and activated the connection, to see Admiral Ryan's face displayed in the monitor.
"Admiral," said Archer. "Good to see you."
"Likewise, Captain," said Ryan. "How are the war games going?"
"Well enough, Admiral. We've learned a lot," said Archer, grudgingly.
Ryan laughed for he knew of Jon's general ambivalence towards the Vulcans, and said, "Well, two more days of fun and games, and then I have some real work for you."
"Oh?"
"At the conclusion of the games, dismiss the Delus ships for Earth, and head for Vulcan," said Ryan. "Come see me."
"Aye, sir," said Jon. "May I ask why?"
"We're going to try establishing formal diplomatic ties with the Andorians," said Ryan, "and hope to bring them into this thing with the Romulans on our side, or at least try to ensure their neutrality."
"I see," said Archer.
"You're going to ferry Earth's Ambassador to Vulcan, as well as a Vulcan ambassador, to Andoria."
"Soval?"
"No, he's still out of action," said Ryan. "The worst of the damage he sustained is healing, but he needs more time to heal completely, and then he needs some rehabilitation therapy."
Jon nodded, and said, "We were scheduled to be fitted with Vulcan shield emitters at the end of the wargames, Admiral. They'll be a necessity soon."
"I know," said Ryan. "But HQ decided that cobbling together some sort of alliance to resist the Romulans is more important than shielding one ship."
"I can understand that," said Archer.
"Anyway," said Ryan, "given the bad blood between the Andorians and the Vulcans, a Vulcan ship entering Andorian space will likely be destroyed on sight. So it falls on us to make the attempt. Report to Earth's Embassy when you reach Vulcan."
"Yes, Admiral," said Jon, and with that Ryan nodded to Archer and severed the connection.
"What news?" said Sek, taking a seat next to Harris on a park bench overlooking San Francisco Bay.
There were far too many Vulcans on Earth to protect them all from the Romulans, though strategically important Vulcans like Sek generally had V'Shar bodyguards, and what's more, Harris had a half dozen Section 31 operatives scattered about as well in order to assure Sek's safety, although the man's seemingly innocuous job would make him a low-priority target… unless the Romulans knew that Sek's cover was a ruse, which was always possible. Anything was possible where the Romulans were concerned.
"Nothing good," said Harris. "We've buried another dozen or so Romulans earlier today, or rather we boxed them in. In return they took out six city blocks of London's Square Mile. It's thrown the financial markets in a tizzy, and it will take months to figure out the extent of the damage."
"I saw the news feed this morning," said Sek. "Tactical nuke?"
"Matter/anti-matter bomb," said Harris. "The city's SWAT teams were ordered to leave it for the SAS to deal with when those soldiers arrived on the scene, but a hot dog SWAT captain wanted to show the world his men could handle the matter, and they fumbled the task in the process."
"I hope he will not command another mission," said Sek.
"He's already lost his job, may face criminal charges, and by now he's probably hiding out in fear for his life," said Harris. "The press leaked his name to a mob crying for his blood, and the Romulans may wish to pay him a visit as well. Forget about him. He's done, one way or another."
"So why did you ask to see me?" said Sek.
"General Romulan ship locations in your sector for the next week or so," said Harris, handing Sek a PADD unit. "I didn't want to trust this info to the comm lines running into your embassy, no matter how well monitored though those comm lines must be. Carry this data to one of your battlecruisers in Earth's orbit and transmit this data directly to Vulcan with a short burst transmission and a triple encryption scheme, and I think you'll be ok."
Sek took the PADD unit from Harris and began paging through the data. If it was accurate, it was incredibly detailed, and for the thousandth time, he wondered how Section 31 came by it's intelligence, for it was every bit as good as the V'Shar's most of the time, and often, it was even better. Much better.
"There's a detection protocol for those cloaked ships as well," said Harris, "and though it's not a hundred percent, it's a better strike rate than you're getting now, and the changes and modifications to your sensor hardware is quite minimal. We've already implemented it on our ships, though our sensor hardware is lacking compared to yours. I'd appreciate any help your people can provide on that front. You guys have the best sensors."
"Certainly," said Sek, still paging through the data. "I'll get on it as soon as I transmit this data, and right off hand, I believe we can supply you with three or four hundred sensor units a month."
"That will do quite nicely," said Harris. "As soon as possible please."
Sek pocketed the PADD unit, and then looked at Harris, and said, "How are you getting this information?"
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," said Harris.
Harris knew he was right on that score, as the Vulcan Science Directorate had long determined that time travel was impossible, and in any case, the entire process was pretty hit and miss at this time, like a fishing net with gaping holes in it. It would catch a lot of fish, but it would miss just as many, or more… and all that stemming from hardware found aboard the burned out hull of a derelict alien ship, hauled to Earth and intended to be scrapped for metals, until a shrewd StarFleet Ensign had spotted the ship, scanned it deeply in passing, noted its thoroughly alien design, and passed word of it to some higher officers: that Ensign made Lieutenant two weeks later, as StarFleet needed thinking officers of that sort.
"Try me," said Sek.
"Sorry," said Harris.
"We've pressed both EarthGov and StarFleet at the highest levels for your sources of information, and they don't seem to know a damned thing," said Sek, watching Harris closely.
"I know. Keep pressing and we just might stop sharing info with your people," said Harris.
"Got it," said Sek. "Anything else?"
"No," said Harris, and with that Sek bid his farewell.