Disclaimer: See Chapter One

Rating: PG - No smut and only mild violence - but that will change before the story winds down.

Tucker hadn't said more than five words in the past hour. He wasn't sure if he was dreaming, the victim of some elaborate deception or if his sister really had usurped Sato as Empress.

Lizzie certainly looked. . .not insane. They were seated in chairs by a window that overlooked the bay. A servant had brought Trip a drink - bourbon - but Lizzie was drinking herbal tea.

He had already downed two glasses, and he craved more.

Trip listened to the story of her imprisonment, and how she had gradually been noticed by the cabal that had placed her on the throne.

"As I said, I'm not a figurehead," she explained, "They didn't want a puppet. They wanted someone who could do the job, with their help of course. But I don't have much time to prove myself. Anyone would have looked good in the face of Sato's. . .eccentricity. When the memories start to fade and reality sets in, that's when things will get dangerous."

Lizzie smiled.

"By the way, I sent some Imperial Guards to take Mom and Dad into custody - for their own protection. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them, but I didn't want them peddling favors that I have no intention of granting. . .or worse. I suppose I don't want them kidnapped either."

Tucker nodded very slowly. The Empress thing. . .he could probably deal with that. As long as Lizzie didn't get overthrown, it could benefit him. But her other bit of news. . .the bit about Jonathan Archer. That was. . .more problematic.

"And of course I'm going to have to find something useful for Jon to do. He's not going to be content carrying around my robes of state. But I have to find something that makes him feel important that he can't screw up. It's quite a puzzler."

Tucker inhaled. Jonathan Archer. The man whose arrogance and incompetence had nearly gotten him killed more than once. The man who had tried to make T'Pol his personal concubine . . .despite hating Vulcans. The man who had been dumb enough to trust Sato.

Tucker used all the Vulcan tricks that he'd picked up from T'Pol to keep his disgust off of his face. Instead, he spoke carefully.

"So. . .you're not going to make him Emperor?"

Lizzie laughed.

"Hell no. If I had even suggested that, I think the cabal would have smothered him in his sleep. No, they're fine with me being married. They even think moving toward hereditary succession is a good idea, given the instability of the past few regimes. But they made me promise that Jon can never be regent let alone Emperor. In fact, if anything happens to me before little Charles's eighteenth birthday - they're going to kill Jon. Still haven't broken that news to him yet - I have to wait for the right moment."

Tucker was silent. Lizzie looked up at him.

"You don't mind that I'm naming the boy after you, do you? I mean. . .Charles is regal sounding, isn't it? And that doesn't mean you can't name your first son, Charles."

Tucker shook his head.

"Speaking of which, I hear you got married yourself."

Tucker nodded, still speechless with shock and unsure of how much Lizzie knew. Or how she would react. Aside from one miserable family vacation to Mars, Lizzie had never left Earth. He knew her interaction with aliens had been limited at best.

"What's she like?" asked Lizzie, "I, mean, Jon told me a little about her. But obviously you know her better."

Tucker bit his lip. What the hell did Archer know about T'Pol, except her ability to apply a nerve pinch. He was about to answer, when the back door of the chamber opened up. In strode Jonathan Archer, dressed in a Starfleet uniform which sported an admiral's rank. He smiled at Tucker.

"Good to see you, Tucker," he said, "I'm sure Lizzie has filled you in. . ."

He didn't finish. Tucker's fist had made contact with his face before he could continue, and he doubled over in pain. Tucker then leaned down and struck a blow in his stomach.

The blow hurt his hand, and Tucker shook it in pain before Archer stood up and attempted to retaliate. Lizzie had gotten between them. She looked pissed, but before she could speak, he did.

"Don't gimme that look Lizzie. He deserved it. You have no idea how much he deserved it. . ."

"What did I ever do to you?" ask Archer, hurt in his voice.

Tucker inhaled.

"It's what you did to my baby sister. . .oh, and to my wife. I know what you tried to do to her on The Defiant."

Archer rubbed his jaw as Lizzie examined it.

"That was before you two were married. And she was able to handle herself. And nothing happened thanks to her Vulcan pincher move," spat Archer, speaking more as though he were explaining to Lizzie than anything else.

Lizzie's mouth gaped open a little and her brow furrowed.

"I have to meet this woman," she mumbled.

"Last time I checked, the punishment for striking a member of the Imperial Family was death," said Archer.

Tucker glared at Archer, thinking only that hitting him had been worth getting executed over, but Lizzie shook her head.

"That's only the Emperor or Empress. . .and actually . . . the sibling of the Emperor outranks the consort. . .of course, that law assumed that the Emperor would be male and the consort female but rules are rules. . . but Trip, don't do that again."

Tucker stared at his little sister, realizing that while he didn't have to listen to Archer - something that he would be eternally grateful for - he did have to listen to her. She was the Empress.

Lizzie leaned in and placed a hand on Archer's shoulder.

"It looks like you might have a bruise. . .but you'll be okay. . . I should've warned you. It's kind of a Tucker family tradition for my brothers to rough up my boyfriends. . .and you're the only one who has managed to knock me up," she paused and turned to her brother, "but that's enough of that. I'm hardly secure on this throne, and I'm going to need all the help I can get to stay on it. Besides, if I'm knocked off this perch - you two are as good as dead. So, we're all in this together."

Tucker continued to give Archer his best death stare and wondered if T'Pol knew some Vulcan mojo that could make Archer pay for. . .being Archer.

"The family — and our new glorious endeavor — will only grow stronger," said Lizzie, "if we can manage to put differences behind us."

Archer was staring back at him, more confused than angry. But then again, he was always under the mistaken impression they were friends. They had never been friends. Tucker just thought he owed him. . .he never liked him.

At that point, some kind of attendant came into the room with an animal carrier in each hand. Lizzie turned her attention away from her brother and husband and toward the carriers.

"Mr. Boo! Elvis!" she cried into the carriers, tears in her eyes, "I never thought I'd see you two again."

Archer looked puzzled, and Tucker caught his eye.

"Her cats," he mumbled.

"And Mrs. Sommerville, the woman who had been caring for them?" asked Lizzie of the attendant.

"Given a lifetime pension, just as you decreed, Empress," he replied.

After nodding and dismissing the attendant, Lizzie took the two plump felines out of their carriers and placed them at her feet. The two animals meowed and brushed against her legs. She bent over and scratched their ears.

"You two are going to have the run of this palace," said Lizzie, "There's plenty of sunny spots."

Archer smiled at her. Not one of his nasty smirks. A real, honest-to-goodness smile and Tucker felt his stomach turn.

Holy shit. He loves her. . . This is gonna get weird, he thought.

T'Pol paced in her and Tucker's quarters, looking down at her Vulcan robes. She no longer wore the clothes of a slave, but she wasn't sure why. A steward had arrived earlier in the day and told her to remove her black garments. When T'Pol protested she had no other clothes to wear, she was given access to the ship's advanced replication system and told to produce "whatever she liked."

She had spent a few diverting hours creating new clothes for herself, but she remained concerned. She assumed Tucker had managed to convince the Empress to give her her freedom, but she could not imagine what he had promised in exchange for it. She had not heard from her husband all day, and she felt it necessary to meditate to suppress her nervousness.

She knew something had happened, but she trusted no one among the crew enough to ask - even Hess. She hadn't seen Mayweather in a significant amount of time, either.

Finally, the door of her quarters opened and rather than a steward, she was relieved to see Charles. He had not contacted her either through the communication system or their bond, and she had become somewhat concerned. He wore his red Starfleet shirt still, and he smiled at her. He also wore some sort of Imperial insignia around her arm.

She stood up and allowed him to embrace her, and she returned the embrace, placing her head on his shoulder. His familiar coolness was very comforting to her, and she relaxed against his body.

"I'm pleased you have returned unscathed," she said.

"I'm more than unscathed. How much do you know about what has been going on lately?"

She told him about her change of wardrobe and lack of information. After that, they sat down on the edge of their bed, and he followed with a rather extraordinary story about a coup - and his sister's ascension to Empress. Sato, Mayweather and their supporters were dead.

"It seems arresting your sister was a mistake on Sato's part," said T'Pol, digesting the strange tale.

"I'll say," he said. "I can't say I'm thrilled about it. I feel less safe than I did when Sato was in charge, but I'm sort of proud. I always knew Lizzie had potential."

T'Pol brushed her hand across Tucker's cheek, and he took her hand and kissed it. Tucker seemed as though he was still in shock.

"But Jonathan Archer," she replied, "That's unfortunate."

Tucker rolled his eyes.

"I love my sister, but she's never had much taste in men. I once asked her why she never found a guy as smart as her — and she just mumbled something about not being able to find one smarter than her."

T'Pol raised her eyebrow, and thought it was a shame that Tucker's sister had lowered herself so much. T'Pol could have found a Vulcan mate for her, if she was as intelligent as Tucker said she was.

"It gets worse," he said glumly.

T'Pol looked at him.

"She's making Archer an Admiral and putting him in charge of the Imperial Fleet. That means he'll get to be in charge of The Defiant when she's not making him . . .do whatever she makes him do when he's attending to her."

T'Pol thought about this, and she noticed her mate looked a bit ill. His expression was sour, to be sure.

"That seems an ill-conceived decision," replied T'Pol.

Tucker shook his head.

"It's actually pretty clever. She's not making him High Admiral, she's going to find a real strategist for that. She's just making Archer the figurehead of the fleet — a fleet I'm going to help her upgrade. He'll get to play with The Defiant and make speeches, two things he likes to do. The real work will be in the hands of a professional."

T'Pol shook her head. Archer. This was disagreeable.

"As for who is gonna be day to day Captain — I put in a good word for you."

T'Pol nodded. Life had suddenly changed. Although the situation was preferable to being enslaved to Sato, she found herself missing the days on The Selok when they had been distant from the intrigues and egos of Imperial power.

Far away, on an unfamiliar ship, Sato opened her eyes. She was in a dark, austere little cell of unfamiliar design. She looked down at herself, and she was no longer wearing the Imperial garb she had on when she stepped on to the transporter. She wore strange, black garments and noticed that she had bruises on her arms. From the aches in the rest of her body, she suspected that she had bruises elsewhere.

Her heart started to beat, and she wondered if she was dead and in hell. She realized that she wasn't when she looked up through the bars of her cell to see the smiling face of Malcolm Reed. A chill went down her spine, and she fainted.